While we are not fond of either, their visitation is a certainty. We do everything we can to hold them at bay, but their manifestation is as predictable as the moon, sun, stars, rotation of the earth and birth.
The worst thing we can do in preparation is not to prepare for both. Hoping, yearning, stomping your feet and renaming or redefining the protagonists engaged in either as a vain attempt to hold them off simply rushes their arrival and diminishes our ability to not succumb to them faster.
Tucker Carlson’s equation regarding War is infantile and unrealistic. He has decided to redefine the core beliefs of a known enemy (without consulting with them), turned on an ally and decided that any effort, even kinetic, to preserve the US is not only fraught with error but entirely immoral. As it pertains to this current war, he surely seems to argue that Iran is the victim of the USA’s unwarranted aggression.
This comes on the heels of his curious new epiphany that the Moslem states in the Middle East are docile friends with no underlying hostile intentions toward us. Coincidentally, he seems to have also decided that Israel’s existence is illegitimate and hostile, that any relationship with them is unilaterally opportunistic in their desire to conquer and expand by swallowing up territory, even though no one would be able to provide a single example of Israel under the Israelites or the modern return of those in dispersion seeking to or expanding beyond the land promised them in Gen 15:18-21.
So, he has decided that Islam = good/benign + Israel = bad/hostile ∴ USA/Israel Alliance = bad. Aside from his lack of understanding of the players on the field of battle I expect based on his established presupposition that religion(s) are all equal and benign, he further seems to think that all war is bad, equal, and that Israel in some as yet explained way has managed to neuter the USA and is using us without our knowing it.
He apparently has never considered the possibility that our two foci could be diverse and yet mutually supportive, i.e., Israel is taking care of Israel and the USA is taking care of the USA.
Tucker was in fifth grade when the Iranians ousted the secular government in favor of the ideologically poisonous theocrats led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1979 during which they also sacked the American Embassy, taking civilian and Marine hostages after the Peanut Farmer posing as an American President ordered the Marine Security Guard to stand down. They were held for 444 days before an actual President threatened their destruction unless they released them. He was just entering ninth grade when the Marine Barracks in Beirut was hit, killing 241 U.S. and 58 French military personnel and six civilians. Two hundred twenty of those were fellow Marines.
Since then, through proxies or direct assault the Mullahs have killed an additional 2,000 Americans and thousands of Israelis while leaving an equal number with catastrophic wounds.
But Tucker apparently believes that after 47 years of continual harassment, bombings, kidnappings, death, mutilation, interference with free passage of shipping, non-stop threats, and ideologically fueled belief in the allah-ordered annihilation of both Israel and the Great Satan (USA), that “diplomacy” and, apparently further tribute payments, vis a vis Obama/Biden, is the only acceptable interaction. Short of that, we ultimately have earned whatever punishment the Mullahs can conjure for us, to which I say, “NUTS!” (Gen. McAuliffe 1944)
Further debate with someone like him is a waste of time; however, an actual thought-out public response with real data might cut into his passive-aggressive, historically false, retching rhetorical bait designed to do what all conspiracy theorists use it for, including floating questions, absurd possible counter-narratives, denigrating everyone supplying answers, overwriting long-established history and ignoring or rewriting religious teachings which ironically would put the ideological sword to the nape of his kuffar neck for insulting the holy quran, allah and his prophet mo, were he to do that in Azadi Square.
To his suggestion that Israel should never have existed and that its goal is to expand territorially, I will include a timeline of conquest for the Holy Land itself. Like every other square inch of land surface on the earth, “ownership” has been fleeting. Only those with the means and the will have ever held onto their nations, and that has been only until someone stronger and more determined comes along.
Like it or not, the current State of Israel has existed for the past 78 years and will continue as long as its people continue to desire it so:
BC
bc. 7000: Jericho is a walled settlement
bc. 5000-4000: Land of Canaan is occupied by Canaanites, then Amorites and Jebusites.
bc. 1200: Israelites under Joshua enter Promised Land.
bc. 930: Israel splits into northern kingdom of Israel and southern kingdom of Judah (including Jerusalem).
bc. 720: Northern kingdom conquered by Assyria and its 10 tribes sent into exile.
bc. 700: Southern kingdom’s King Hezekiah cuts tunnel from Gihon Spring to Pool of Siloam.
bc. 701: Assyrians conquer much of southern kingdom; Jerusalem is besieged but survives.
bc. 597: Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon captures southern kingdom and Jerusalem.
bc. 587: Following rebellion, Nebuchadnezzar destroys Jerusalem and First Temple, deporting most of population to Babylon (in present-day Iraq).
Persian Rule
bc. 539: Cyrus the Great of Persia conquers Babylon and allows Jews to return from captivity.
Hellenistic Rule
Bc. 332: Alexander the Great conquers Persian Empire, including all of Palestine.
bc. 323: Alexander dies and his kingdom is divided into four parts; Palestine falls under Ptolemaic Dynasty of Egypt, then under Seleucid Empire of Syria.
bc. 175: King Antiochus IV of Syria bans traditional Jewish practices and desecrates Temple.
bc. 167: Judas Maccabeus leads successful revolt against Seleucid Empire, rededicates Temple and restores religious freedom.
bc. 37: Rome proclaims Herod as King of Israel, now a Roman client state, ending the Hasmonean Dynasty.
Roman rule
bc. 20: Herod expands Temple Mount and rebuilds Temple.
bc. 3: Jesus Christ is born in Bethlehem.
AD
26: Pontius Pilate becomes procurator of Roman province of Judea.
30: Jesus is condemned to death and crucified.
70: Romans destroy Jerusalem and Second Temple.
73: Masada falls to Romans.
130: Emperor Hadrian rebuilds Jerusalem, renaming it Aelia Capitolina, and puts pagan temple over site of the Crucifixion and Resurrection.
Byzantine rule
330: Constantine moves his capital from Nicomedia to Byzantium (renamed Constantinople, now Istanbul).
570: Birth of Muhammad.
614: Persians capture Jerusalem
622: Muhammad escapes assassination in Mecca and flees to Medina, his flight marking first year of Islamic calendar.
629: Emperor Heraclius I re-establishes Byzantine rule in Jerusalem and recovers True Cross stolen by Persians.
Islamic rule
638: Islamic forces conquer Jerusalem, beginning rule by succession of Arab dynasties.
1071: Seljuk Turks capture Jerusalem, persecuting Christians, desecrating churches and barring pilgrims.
Crusader rule
1099: First Crusade captures Jerusalem and establishes Latin kingdom; Dome of the Rock becomes church called Templum Domini (Temple of the Lord).
1187: Sultan Saladin defeats Crusaders at Horns of Hattin above Sea of Galilee, then takes Jerusalem.
Islamic rule, again
1219: St Francis of Assisi visits Egypt and meets Sultan Melek al-Kamil.
1229: During Sixth Crusade, Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II negotiates return of Jerusalem and other Christian sites to Crusader kingdom.
1244: Jerusalem is sacked by Khwarezmian Tartars; control quickly passes to Egyptian Ayyubids and then Mamluks, who rule until 1517.
1291: Crusaders’ last foothold, Acre, falls to Mamluks.
Ottoman rule
1517: Ottoman Turks take control of Palestine from Mamluks.
1839: British Jew Sir Moses Montefiore proposes idea of a modern Jewish state.
1860: First Jewish immigrant neighborhood outside Old City of Jerusalem is established, funded by Sir Moses Montefiore.
1878: “Status Quo” defining possession of holy places is incorporated into international law by Treaty of Berlin.
1917: British government’s Balfour Declaration backs establishing Jewish homeland in Palestine, without prejudice to “civil and religious rights” of non-Jewish population.
British mandate
1917: British forces under General E. H. Allenby capture Palestine from Ottoman Turks.
1922: League of Nations approves British mandate of Palestine.
1946: Jordan gains independence from Britain.
1947: United Nations Partition Plan calls for a Jewish state and an Arab state in Palestine, with Greater Jerusalem (including Bethlehem) under international control; most Jewish groups accept plan but Arabs reject it.
1948: Amid civil unrest and violence, Britain withdraws from mandate.
Israel and Palestinian Territories
1948: After Jewish provisional government declares Israel an independent state, Arab forces invade.
1949: Israel prevails in Arab-Israeli War, though Egypt holds Gaza, and Jordan the West Bank and East Jerusalem; more than 700,000 Palestinians become refugees.
1967: In Six-Day War against Egypt, Jordan and Syria, Israel occupies Sinai, Gaza, Golan Heights, West Bank and East Jerusalem.
1973: In Yom Kippur War against Egypt and Syria, Israel makes further territorial gains.
1979: Israel and Egypt sign peace treaty; Israel agrees to return Sinai to Egypt.
Conjuring a definition of legitimacy just to assuage some underlying hatred or even self-loathing is not only a sign of a certifiable mental malady, but also entirely destructive to everyone around you. Tucker’s claims of illegitimacy for the current attack on Iran and his redefining of good/evil is, I suspect, born of frustration, boredom, seeking to create and/or to feed a following. However, what it is actually doing is further alienating an already fractured “Conservative” bloc which will only benefit the monolithic Left and give aid and comfort to a 1,400-year-old enemy of civilization that has already aimed its guns at us. This is not about following blindly; questioning is for personal illumination, not a tool to surreptitiously sway those who never research.
Tucker, it’s time to make a choice between notoriety and your country. We Marines have made clear where we stand, and hundreds have been killed and mutilated at the hands of the demonically possessed theocrats in Iran, crimes for which they have never been held to account until now! The Dems, whether out of greed and avarice, to gain or maintain power, sheer ignorance or worse, in complicit sedition have been undermining US hegemony, sovereignty, security and well-being since 1945. And Tucker, the evidence indicates that you have thrown in with them.
Say it ain’t so…
Semper Fidelis:
John Bernard
