It's a Mad, Mad World

Once again adherents of the Religion of Peace have worked themselves into a murderous rage, this time against the Danish. A newspaper in Denmark had the temerity to publish some rather mundane, but unflattering, cartoons of the prophet Mohammed. American newspapers which routinely denounce the Israeli refusal to submit quietly to genocide as 'aggression' and will defend to the death the right of the American government to support taxpayer-funded crucifixes submerged in urine are chiding the Danish for religious insensitivity.

Meanwhile, Democrats who demanded in thunderous tones why we didn't know in advance of every move the terrorists made before 9/11 are busy denouncing President Bush for having the temerity to do what they denounced him for not doing before 9/11.

North Korea is a strange little country. Kim Jong-Il seems content as long as the world recognizes him as the undisputed World Nutjob Champ. But as soon as we put him out of our mind and worry about some other nutjob, he crashes back into the ring to demonstrate that no one is nuttier than he. Now that Iran is challenging his title we should be very worried. One of these lunatics is going to fire off a nuke sooner or later. Then the same people who scream when we do anything about terrorism will be screaming about why we didn't do more.

An historical oddity is that in the years before great, catastrophic conflicts advanced societies always obsess over banal trivialities. We dither as the storm gathers force. Modern historians are often baffled at why the west could not summon the will to stop Hitler when the cost would have been light, given how obvious he made his intentions. A half century hence, historians will wonder the same about us.