I don’t mean to be disloyal to my president, but I have to shout three cheers for Saddam Hussein, the best thing to happen to the United States since the invention of the Ayatollah Khomeini.
He is the most despicable carbon-based life form. He represents no actual threat to the nation, yet rescues us from the one great American malady: boredom.
Like so many people, Hussein has been misportrayed by a biased media. I am certain he did not intend to shake that baby or hit his head — sorry, wrong hot media story.
The world is filled with people and nations who think the U.S. is good only for purchasing products of Chinese forced labor. Iraq has highlighted yet another unappreciated area of American expertise.
Our national knickers are in a global twist because Hussein won’t let UN inspection teams operate inside his country if those teams include inspectors from our country.
Our position, and that of all the allies we can afford, is that the teams must include Americans or, to quote King Lear, we “will do such things, what they are we know not yet but they shall be the terrors of the earth!”
A position that moves me to ask: Is there no limit to American indispensability? As blower-uppers of airfields, killers of tanks and pacifiers of Europeans we are unstoppable. Like the Marines, we say we are the people to call when it absolutely, positively has to be destroyed overnight. But who knew we were the only qualified factory inspectors on Earth? I am bursting with pride. With enemies like Hussein, who needs friends?
Hussein gives Washington pols the chance to talk tough as they wanna be. Microphone cables all over D.C. are clogging with the testosterone being gushed into them by senators, representatives and NPR correspondents. You can almost hear Carol Moseley-Braun shouting, “Go ahead, shoot at a U2, make my day.”
Hussein also affords us an opportunity to rethink or maybe think through our Persian Gulf policies. Some people believe our policies are working so long as no Arab country is led by Louis Farrakhan. But because of the time, trouble and expense of Hussein, many ask why we are involved in that part of the world at all.
Former Secretary of State James Baker said we were involved in the Persian Gulf because of jobs, jobs, jobs. But even in the midst of the war that was recognized as transparent political hogwash (some became suspicious because as Baker made the statement his nose began to grow).
Equally wrong, however, is the notion that we are interested in gulf countries only because of their oil. America’s goal in the gulf is wholly humanitarian. We are not spilling blood for oil. We are fighting to make the world safe for feudal monarchies. Someone has to defend the princes of Saudi Arabia, the sheiks of Oman and the United Arab Emirates, not to mention the region’s assorted sultans. They cannot defend themselves because they are all skiing in Vail. Their protection is perhaps America’s first best destiny; we are blessed to have the chance to pursue it.
So, on behalf of the patriots, princes, pols and pundits, I raise my vitriol-filled glass to salute the president of Iraq, Saddam Hussein — the Dennis Rodman of global politics. Thanks to him, we’re working.
