Why Cage a Paper Tiger?

I was too busy getting the house and yard ready for trick-or-treaters to get much news over the weekend. As a result, I have to admit that I began to wonder whether my electoral college interpretation of bin Laden's remarks was something of a Gracie Allen moment. It was not. I was, in fact, correct: the Arabic turns out to be exactly that. I won't claim knowledge of Arabic here, but I'll slap myself on the back for having good instincts.

More news comes today from the "meddling foreign powers" front. One of the Clinton campaign's most famous contributors, Red China, has tacitly seconded bin Laden's endorsement of Kerry Edwards. As usual in this election, a Kerry endorsement turns out to be a warning when examined in any detail at all.

If China maintains that, "The U.S. strategy of pre-emptive strikes would bring insecurity and ultimately the demise of the 'American empire,'" why do they attack this policy and implicitly endorse Kerry? Wouldn't our overextension ultimately improve their odds of re-taking Taiwan? Their own words provide the clue: "The current U.S. predicament in Iraq serves as another example that when a country's superiority psychology inflates beyond its real capability, a lot of trouble can be caused. But the troubles and disasters the United States has met do not stem from the threats by others, but from its own cocksureness and arrogance." Just as Old Europe despises George Bush as a "Cowboy," so does China despise the idea of America emerging from the constraints of the U.N. and "world opinion" to act in its own self-interest. A couple of years ago, the Chinese consulate in my home town took the trouble to send a letter to the editor of our paper about a Chinese dispute with Taiwan. I don't remember the nature of the dispute, but I distinctly remember China telling us that the matter was an "internal affair" of China. They want us to butt out when it comes to Taiwan. This is why they helped Clinton raise funds and are now preying on our fear that the war is overextending our military power. So making a fugitive of bin Laden by deposing the Taliban is "beyond the scope of self-defense," but letting bin Laden escape three times is not? China wants what will make America weaker, and that would be John Kerry. China also would want what would make China stronger, and that might be Clinton, who owes them, as Secretary General of the U.N. For this to occur, whether or not Annan resigns before the end of his term, he would need the approval of the President. Kerry owes Clinton something for getting out of his sick bed to campaign for him.

Wow! China collects from Clinton, who collects from Kerry. We have the shameless pull-peddling depicted as fiction in Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, but on a global scale. We also will have much less in the way of national sovereignty after a few years of that. Let's hope for our own sake that this doesn't happen. I was going to say, "and for Taiwan's sake," but Colin Powell's most recent remarks on that subject have me wondering whether Bush wants to use the island nation as a bargaining piece for "leverage" with North Korea. Remarks like this, and our abject failure to confront Iran by now make my backing of Bush increasingly difficult, to the point that I feel obligated to point out the best argument I've seen yet for supporting Kerry! Read that, and then this before heading to the polls. Regardless of the winner, we must all push for all-out war against Islamofascism (and its opportunistic allies like China) and for the unfettered assertion of our nation's right to self-defense.

--CAV