truly magnificent ceremony at the National Cathedral...
...seeing the colors march out at the end was not unlike an exclamation point to, "We are at War !"
I don't understand our apparent dilemma with the U.S. airlines ~ we're at war, we're going to need all these aircraft to move thousands of troops and tons of supplies: Nationalize the Airlines; replace the burger-flippers presently employed at the security stations and position the National Guard to serve as transport gate-keepers. Would like to see Dubya get ahead of the curve on issues like this :-/
We need to gear up domestic Civil Defense measures and necessary adult education - hopefully these (H&HS, HUD, etc.) cabinet ministers will help The President shake the populace out of denial mode, get the public shelters ready and emergency drills in our schools, workplaces underway.
Imports are perhaps our greatest vulnerability, as clever terrorists attack flows rather than the state. Insofar as oil in this part of the world, we're going to need to take over Pemex in Mexico and perhaps Petro-Venezuela as well; price controls on oil will be necessary ~ perhaps rationing of this commodity...
...We can double the price of gasoline by tax levies (iow, make it equal to petrol in the EU) and by doing so implement de facto conservation, as well as supplement the inevitable War Bonds we will need to keep the Treasury solvent - in addition to the ~$40B printed up for the D.O.Defense last week, O'neil wire-transferred ~$50B from the Fed to the ECB in Bruxelles.
Like you, Berney ~ I am haunted by that soldier, standing guard in Beirut without bullets in his rifle (!) and as difficult as it is now to get the population out of "denial mode" - fully realize that "We are at War"...
...a message that The President was clearly trying to get through to the population this week-end ~ it's gonna take awhile for the rest of our government to shake off their slumbering complacency ~ put in place all the measures we will need to win a prolonged conflict against terrorists all over the world.
Fortunately we have many historical war-time precedents to follow but, too few of our WWII elders (and even Vietnam-era veterans) are available to gear us up and guide us through total war.
It seems like we have to learn the same old lessons every time we go to war {sigh}
-Steve |
