[Ed. Note - Welcome to our new guest poster, Tim James. Tim is a teacher, law student, and long-time admirer of the Doublespeak team's ability to throw the party that rocks the party. He fancies the following paraphrase of Sir Mix-A-Lot applies to him, “’Cause I’m long[-winded], and I’m strong[minded], and I’m down to get the freak[y] [geopolitics] on.” And if you are a single woman who enjoys Indian food and occasional dancing until dawn, he’s interested in meeting you.]

A beach bully pummels someone, the 90 lb. weakling, on the grounds that the 90 lb. weakling is going to bulk up and challenge his alpha male status; however, there’s no convincing evidence that the 90 lb. weakling is bulking up. What do you suppose the other 90 lb. weaklings whom the bully dislikes are going to do? Speaking as a 90 lb. weakling, I’d go and get my Charles Atlas workout kit; more to the point, I’d probably start packing heat. Wouldn’t you? If the bully’s irrational, I’d make sure that he couldn’t push me around.

The North Korean test of what the press is reporting as a nuclear device is yet another consequence of the folly of this administration’s foreign policy. To subscribe to the notion that the Republicans are ’stronger’ on national security is to wallow in a sort of geopolitical dementia, to immerse oneself in a fantasy land. Only if we define ’stronger’ as ‘pig-headed’ or ’stubborn’ could such claim be made without being laughed out of the room.

North Korea’s test of a nuclear device was wholly predictable as a response to our invasion of Iraq, as is the likely Iranian nuclear test to come. The Bush administration forced the U.S. to invade Iraq, knowing that this invasion would, in all probability, push Iran and North Korea closer to developing nuclear weapons to serve as a deterrent.

One hopes, almost, that the president and his advisers have violated their oath of office in this tragicomedy of foreign policy gaffes; I can only pray that they are not ‘faithfully executing their offices’ to the BEST of their abilities. But I fear that this might be as good as it gets. Scary thought.

The world has sailed into a terrifying and dangerous sea of nuclear brinksmanship, a sea that could have been avoided by the most elementary statesmanship; however, this administration has shown itself to be without statesmen, without intelligent leadership, and without the capacity to steer our ship of state to safe harbor.