and “America First” or “America Only”
Islamic terrorists killed more than 30 people in Brussels last week, including at least four Americans. The attacks were by the same gang that killed over a hundred in Paris last November.
The problem in Belgium and other European countries is they spend all their money on social programs and fine dining. There’s no money left to pay for a strong police force and military. That works as long as everyone in a country has the same belief system, the same culture, and a generous Big Brother from across the Atlantic. But when radical Islamists arrive by the thousands and set up their own isolated neighborhoods, with Sharia law and hatred for non-Muslims, that upsets the apple cart.
On Sunday Islamic terrorists (Taliban) killed more than 60 Christians and injured 300, mostly women and children, as they celebrated Easter at a park in Lahore, Pakistan. President Obama is home from his trip to Cuba and Argentina, but I heard no condemnation from him for this blatant attack on Christians.
After the Brussels attack, Republicans had criticized him for going to a baseball game in Havana with Raul Castro instead of flying home to work on a plan to destroy the ISIS Islamic terrorists. Now, if he had been on that trip alone, I’m sure he would have interrupted it and flown home for 24 hours, then on to Argentina. But since it was a Spring Break vacation for his wife, daughters and mother-in-law, why, he felt compelled to keep with the original schedule.
To his credit, President Obama did announce this weekend his own sure fire plan to defeat ISIL. In a calm voice he will say to them, “You are not strong; you are weak.” He plans to keep repeating it, over and over. After they hear “You are not strong; you are weak” maybe a thousand times, they will drop all weapons, and plead with the President to please stop the torture. Sure beats waterboarding.
Bernie Sanders swamped Hillary Clinton in all three states Saturday, Hawaii, Alaska and Washington. She seems to have the Democrat nomination wrapped up, but the strong showing by a self-proclaimed socialist means she may have to select a vice-president running mate with a similar record. Since there’s no Democrat as far left as Sanders, she might pick a man who could “appear” to be another Sanders. Julian Castro is HUD Secretary and former San Antonio mayor. He’s no socialist, but they might fool Sanders supporters long enough to get their vote. How’s this for a bumper sticker, “Clinton / Castro 2016.” Not a chance, not a chance.
Donald Trump announced a new idea called “America First.” Well, he may think it’s new, but ninety years ago Mayor Bill Thompson of Chicago started a Society called “America First.” Will Rogers responded with his own plan for one called “America Only.” He devoted an entire weekly column, kinda tongue-in-cheek, poking fun at the “America First” concept (excerpts below).
Historic quotes by Will Rogers:
“You have read about Mayor Bill Thompson’s Society, ‘America First.’ In America there was originally just one Society (well, it was really two combined): the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. If you was here you was all members of the same club. You didn’t know whether you was 100 percent or 2¾ percent or what ratio you was. All you knew was that you belonged to this club called America, and all you had to do was work for it, fight for it, and act like a gentleman. As long as you did that, you could worship what you want to, talk any language you want to, in fact it looked like a pretty liberal layout. But after 150 or more years, it was immediately seen that this plan was no good, that the old boys that laid out the Constitution didn’t know much… ‘America First’ is all right, but it allows somebody else to be second. Now some times second can be almost as good as something that’s first. So that’s what my ‘America Only’ Society avoids. It’s with the whole idea of there being no one else. I can take my ‘America Only’ idea and eliminate wars. The minute we extinguish all other nations there will be no more wars, unless it’s a civil war among ourselves. I am getting a lot of applications already, [from] real red blooded, go-gettum Americans that have seen this country trampled under foreign feet enough.” WA #255, Nov. 13, 1927