|
 |
|
Is There An Axis Behind The Axis? |
| It was an eyeball-rubbing moment. With the Big Vote looming in the U.N., the Larry King Show serves up former presidential candidates George McGovern and Gary Hart to light the way out of the wilderness. It was like watching Looney Tunes reruns on the Cartoon Channel, except that Bugs Bunny’s policy in dealing with the threat posed by Elmer Fudd would have made more sense. McGovern is best known for his 1972 landslide loss to Richard Nixon. When it was discovered that his running mate Thomas Eagleton had undergone psychological treatments, McGovern backed him "1,000 percent," then fired him 24 hours later. Hart, a former campaign manager for McGovern, is best known for his JFK imitation, his Monkey Business with model Donna Rice, and for injecting charisma into the otherwise spiceless Walter Mondale. When Hart claimed to have "new ideas," Fritz shot back "Where’s the Beef?" Watching the King show, I had to wonder: Where’s Michael Dukakis? I half expected to see him skittering across King’s desk, wearing a pith helmet and piloting a Tonka toy tank. Hart-McGovern and memories of Dukakis wouldn’t have been so bad, except that 24 hours earlier we were treated to the self-sanctimonious blather of former President Jimmy Carter. This foreign policy wizard presided over —- make that under — the Iran hostage crisis, and more recently brokered the 1994 "Framework" agreement that has left North Korea threatening to blow up New York. Irony is not a concept that has been allowed to penetrate Carter’s clouded brow. Then there is weapons inspector Hans Blix, who is perpetually seen trudging from news conference to news conference to report on what he hasn’t found in Iraq. Yo, Hans, if you want to find some weapons, why don’t you check out the Republican Guard’s ammo dump? When Hans Blix was a little boy, do you suppose he could have pinned the tail on the donkey? Could he do it now? Somewhere between Jimmy and Hans, it was posited that Saddam might blow up some oil fields if we attack. This bit of news was presented as a reason to hold off, so that we can reward Saddam for threatening to act like Hitler-Stalin. We wouldn’t want to do anything to make him mad, would we? Then there was the grim report that Al Qaeda might be persuaded to help Saddam should we take military action. Gee, do you suppose? Shouldn’t this be viewed as good news, a chance for a "two for one?" Couldn’t we arrange for all of Al Qaeda to be in Iraq once the conflict starts? Lacking other arguments, the anti-war crowd has seized on North Korea as a reason to stand down from Iraq. Yes, tell us, Sen. Dodd, what would you do about North Korea? Perhaps Hans Blix and his wily inspectors could be dispatched to the scene forthwith. Or maybe we could send Jimmy Carter to wave his diplomatic wand. Meanwhile, this Axis Of Evil update. (President Bush, you’ll recall, has been ridiculed for naming Iraq, Iran, and North Korea to the Axis.) According to the usually reliable Bill Gertz in the Washington Times, France has been supplying Iraq with weapons parts using dummy companies set up in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Iran, which gets help from Pootie-Poot in Russia, has a nuke program going, and North Korea’s chest thumping is located only a stone’s throw away from China’s reluctance to get involved. So the question: is there an axis behind the Axis of Evil? Rich Acello is a syndicated columnist; you can reach him at richace@cox.net
|
