You Mean Diplomats Are Supposed to Be Diplomatic?
Jan 29th, 2006 at 6:10 pm by Susie
Who’d a thunk it?
On January 18, 2005, Under Secretary of State Robert Joseph was flying on United Airlines from Washington Dulles Airport to Oakland, California — and was flying FIRST CLASS. (Most U.S. Ambassadors fly in economy class — so they should take note of Under Secretary Joseph’s privileged status.)
Bob Joseph was on his way to meetings at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories.
He was having a loud conversation with someone he was sitting next to.
(Of course, “loud” is a relative term — but let’s satisfy that with “loud enough to be heard by others in first class.”)
The key point of conversation is that Joseph reportedly stated “I miss the Soviet Union, because they knew what the rules were, and now we are stuck with these ’surrender monkeys’ in France and Germany.”
His remark reveals his neocon creed — his passport to approval in Condi’s State Department.
When the Red Menace and Yellow Peril faded away, and became only empty suits compared to the existential threats they had been, these people did not adjust; they stuffed the empty suit with whatever was available. And they put hair on it, and adjust the lighting to make it look as scary as possible.
Fighting an endless fight against the Other is their first and true love; it is what gives their lives meaning.
If it wasn’t Muslims trying to conquer the whole world, it would be the damn Hindus, or the Europeans with all their funny words, or the Japanese again, or the dreaded Eskimos.
I just watched a rerun of “Back to the Future”. Anybody remember when it was “The Libyans!” who were the scare of the day? And a plutonium-weapon for terrorists was already a plausible storyline for a movie from the mid-80’s. But of course, everything changed since 9/11.