Skippy of the Day: Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX)

After Dubya specified his position regarding Iran, promising there's no plan to attack but he's keeping all his cards on the table (Thanks for clearing that up, George), we're now getting some expert (cough) foreign policy advice from a Representative in Dubya's old stomping grounds:

"Syria is the problem. Syria is where those weapons of mass destruction are, in my view. You know, I can fly an F-15, put two nukes on 'em and I'll make one pass. We won't have to worry about Syria anymore."

Alright, let's not even get into the whole "I know where the WMD's are" malarkey this guy is peddling. Since the entire federal government couldn't find WMD's with mounds of intelligence, hi-tech equipment and several years of searching, forgive me if I consider Johnson's claim as spurious. The way he phrases it in the quote, it sounds like his claim is far less based on actual, you know, evidence and more on the paranoid instinct that drives other people to believe all black men who wear hip hop clothing are packing heat.

Let's turn our attention, instead, to Johnson's final solution to the problem. That phrasing is intentional, and is not one I use lightly. Since the whole Threaten/Invade/Occupy plan in Iraq has turned out far less than perfect, Johnson is advocating wholesale destruction of an entire country and it's populace the next time we suspect WMD's. The advantages of this being that we can say afterwards that all the evidence of WMD's were destroyed in the attacks and we can just trust the Government that they were indeed there. The disadvantages to this being...what, do I have to type you a list?!?!

This kind of apocalyptic rhetoric is nothing new to the right wing, but it's not normally so blatant and from the mouths of elected representatives. Furthermore, Johnson reveals before he says this that he gave this advice to Bush himself on a visit to the White House. There's a large part of me that refuses to believe that Dubya and his cohorts would ever go into the direction that Johnson advocates, but it still gives me pause.

If Iraq's stab at democracy goes awry due to the efforts of insurgents, and even die hard Bush fans have to acknowledge this possibility, then Bush will need to rethink his entire Middle East strategy that he's been preaching to the public for years. There is a small part of me that considers entirely feasible the sight of Dubya coming onto the airwaves, making a "Desperate times call for desperate measures" speech, and then revealing his unfathomable actions.

Nonsense, you say? Then let's hear it from the boy, shall we? Let's hear some Republicans renounce this Slim Whitman-wannabe. If Trent Lott deserves a slap on the wrist for his little verbal nostalgia trip to the days of segregation, then this little genocidal call to action certainly warrants the attention of the GOP.

There's a quote I remember from "Needful Things", which is spoken by Max Von Sydow as the Devil. He's certainly not the first one to say it, but it was the first time I had ever heard it and so it sticks: "Kill them all and let God sort them out". If Bush decides on such a philosophy change, then it will add a whole new catastrophic level to the administration's tendency to pass the buck.