COLUMBUS: Gasoline prices are coming down. Last week $1.70, today $1.42. Forget what Mr. Rumsfeld and Tommy Franks are telling you. The best gauge of how the war is going is gas prices. Gas prices and Wall Street.
Last week I overestimated Turkey, and I apologize for my optimism. At the time it looked like they would let us take a shortcut through their back yard. But no, they want our soldiers to take the scenic route, the two-week cruise through the Red Sea before they have to face Saddam’s Elite Republican Guard. That’ll give the Kurds two more weeks to get ready for the Turks. They’ll need it, they’ve only been preparing for 80 years.
In Washington, the Senate cut the President’s tax cut in half. They will only let us have $350 Billion of our money back. Mr. Bush says we need the entire $700 Billion tax cut for the country to recover. The Senate says, “No, we’re better off if we just let half the country recover.” The other half won’t get to recover till the next war. (I’ll let you guess which half you’re in.)
Really, what they said was they need $350 Billion to pay for the war. Mr. Rumsfeld figures he needs no more than $100 Billion. So don’t be surprised if the final budget bill includes $100 Billion for Rumsfeld and $250 Billion for our various Congressional Districts, mainly to build armor plated pork barrels.
We lost a dozen soldiers when they made a wrong turn and ended up in enemy territory. It is tragic and our thoughts and prayers are with them and their families. You’ve got to remember though that a wrong turn in some of our bigger cities can give you the same result.
I’ve been following the war live on CNN by videophone, especially the 7th Cavalry. It’s amazing, they have gone 250 miles into Iraq, and not lost a single horse.
I just heard we knocked Iraqi television off the air without blowing up the station. Now there’s some technology that can come in handy the next time one of those Survivor shows comes on.
Historic quotes from Will Rogers: (more on Europe, and Turkey)
“Europe, when I was over there lately, and when I was over there two or three years ago, used to ask me, they says, “Rogers, why is it you all are in so bad?” You know, nobody seems to like America, and so I had to admit that we was in kinda bad. We are sort of the polecat of nations.
We wasn’t hardly what you would call the world’s sweetheart, but after they kept this up for quite a while, I used to casually ask them, I says, “Well, now,” be it Englishman or Frenchman or Italian or whoever it was, I used to say to him, “Well, we are in bad, but will you just kinda, offhand, just casually name me a list of your bosom friends among other nations?”
All those nations over there have been hatin’ each other for years, and they can’t hate us as bad as they hate each other.
And they wouldn’t hate us so bad if they really knew, and they wouldn’t envy us, I mean, as bad if they knew really how we was gettin’ along. They think we are doing better than we are. They could be doing just as good as we are if they bought as much on credit as we do. They are an ignorant kind of people. They don’t know, they just go and pay for anything when they buy it. They don’t know you can have nice radios and automobiles and everything and never pay for it, you know. They are awfully funny that way.” Radio broadcast, April 6, 1930
“There is nothing that irks a Turk so much as peace.” WA #408, August 19, 1930