LAW OF THE JUNGLE

 Anyone who has viewed nature shows on their tv, phones, or tablets, know that there are predators and prey in any jungle.  Most of us know the advantages of one and the disadvantages of the other.  Given a choice, I would prefer not to become prey.  Using the jungle as a learning tool, it is evident that the main differential between prey and predator is strength of the predator and the perceived weakness of the prey.  In the jungle it is not always one against one.  Smaller predators band together to attack, and they attack the weakest member of the prey group.  That weakness can be due to a plethora of causes and is easily perceived by the predatory individual or pack.  The result is the weak don’t eat, they are eaten.  For the most part, the jungle inhabitants are well aware of their placement on the food chain as well as who or what is intent on using them for fodder.

The law is certain. If you appear weakened you will be prey. If you appear weakened you will be attacked.

If you are weak you will become food.

Like it or not, we humans are part of the animal kingdom and our specific countries exist in a worldwide jungle.  Strength matters.  Weakness invites attack.  The difference between predator and prey depends on perception.

The perception:  The United States of America has been perceived as one of the World’s strongest countries.  If not feared it has at least been respected as such.  We have been attacked on our own soil and we terminated those responsible.  Our strength has been made evident as fact to the rest of the World’s inhabitants. 

Our society has conflicted purpose in our quest to stay non-prey and still be above the rest of the human race in terms of the kindness factor.  We are seeing the result of waging a war without the intent of winning.  We have been in the Afghan conflict for twenty years simply because our rules of engagement removed our teeth.  We gave the predators the perception of a Lion with no teeth but still strong enough to fear.  This is true until we allowed the appearance of our strength to deteriorate.  Our point of actual weakness, that of internal sickness, has given packs of predators the invitation to test our strength and our resolve.  We have allowed: our educational system to infect our children; our politicians to play for their party rather than for our country; The unraveling of unity into tribal groups; the weakening of law and order; the loss of our news outlets as points of truth in favor of being a indoctrination device; and the failure of our method of choosing leaders.  The appearance of the ailing, sick Lion with no teeth invited the larger predators to start circling preparing for an eventual meal of Lion.

Is the final scent of weakness the fact that the smaller pack of predators were able to nip and attack the Lion?

Or is it the loss of principle in the abdication of responsibility toward our friends and allies?

PRAY THAT OUR CURRENT APPEARANCE OF WEAKNESS IS NOT PROPHETIC OF OUR BECOMING INTERNATIONAL PREY

CREATE DEPENDENCY... CREATE RESPONSIBILITY

 One fact that we are experiencing today is the creation of dependency is not really a good thing.  Many instances of that condition lack the understated necessity of benign responsibility.  We can see the affect of dependency and    the results of stepping away from responsibility.  Dependency has always carried with it the stigma of weakness and the creation of it has given power of control to the giver.  We can look to history for so many examples.  One example closest to our home of the United States is that of Cuba.  Socialism in its promises to provide for its society, its people, has created a nation of need. Needs unmet, by those who promised that nation a better life.

At today’s point in history The U.S. society watches the abdication of responsibility in a nation that dependency has been born.

As we watch the re-emergence of Taliban control in the country of Afghanistan, many of us blame the lack of resolve within the Afghan military forces.  Many in our country take the point of view that what happens to that society is their own problem if they refuse to stand for their own country.  Our  U.S. forces have been in that country for twenty years, we have spent billions of taxpayer dollars, we have lost more than two thousand American lives and so many more body parts in that period of time.  One of the facts that is oft unmentioned is the cost to the Afghanistan’s population.  They have contributed some sixty thousand plus souls fighting for their country and their new government, some estimated thirty to sixty thousand people remaining who have translated for our troops and fought alongside our troops in that conflict.  Our government took the political position of no further responsibility.  We provided their forces with the weaponry needed by their three hundred thousand personnel, which we trained, to fight for their country.  Those forces disbanded almost immediately. 

The dependency that we created in that military force through support of Intel, air support and advice carried with it a responsibility.  Our government did not see that responsibility.  Nor did it see or at least accept the responsibility to our own nation.

The Cost of INCOMPENTENCE

It’s hard to imagine the degree of fault we, the voting population, share in the loss of lives that is sure to follow our escape from Afghanistan.  We are the society that allowed our minds to be indoctrinated.  We refused to look at factual result in favor of thinking we were better than those other Neanderthals.  At this point in time we have to face the fact that we hired a “Commander in Chief” who reeks of ineptness.  Our mistaken pride in who we elected has proven itself to be a giant error.

It seems bad enough that we are in the middle of so many battles internally we now have exacerbated problems internationally as well.  We have an administration making decisions for the rest of us that will affect our country’s safety and our standing among even our staunchest allies.  If our country will not stand for those who have fought along- side our forces, in a twenty year conflict, whoever is to believe that we will stand for them.

The cost of this incompetence will be born in The United States in the form of shame.  Not just shame in the appearance of defeat but in the justified blame for the harm and bloodshed of those Afghanis we left behind.   The administration was well aware of the some thirty to eighty thousand Afghans who worked with our allies and our own forces during the last twenty years.  Without any provisions for those who would be targeted by the Taliban, it was decided to escape the country in the middle of the night.  There is so much wrong with that picture.  That shameful image is spread across the face of our nation.  How proud of that can we be.

https://arbeeresponds2.blogspot.com/2021/08/create-dependency-create-responsibility.html

THAT HOLE IN OUR FOOT

 There is an old country boy saying that offers some sage advice… 

                                      DON’T SHOOT YOUR SELF IN THE FOOT.

I would think that would be common sense dictating the obvious.  I’m pretty sure that saying came about during the days of the “Wild Wild,West”.  In those days, decades in the past, law, order and disorder were maintained by those with the ability to draw their sidearm and to shoot straight in order to eliminate threat.  Oft times, if inexperienced in the practice of drawing your pistol from its holstered resting place, holes in ones boot was a painful result.  That result could be attained regardless of intention whether it is for good or for bad.  Our country’s older generation has strong memories of those tumultuous years of the cowboy, the sheriff-marshals and the outlaw.  The radio, movies and then television gave us a belief in law and order and the never ending success of good over evil.  The good guys always had white hats, two guns, and the girl while the outlaw lay bleeding out his crime laden life.  If I were to teach the new batch of our societal inhabitants anything it would be:

• That good is better than evil
• Tempered with a knowledge of which is which
• The Ten Commandments, regardless of religious beliefs, are a good basis
•  
• Intention is important in life
• Refer to the above for direction
•  Common sense              and fact should dictate action
• Don’t rely on someone else’s emotion or intentions.
• The words can and are generally mightier than the sword
• Words from our beliefs, our beliefs form who we are
• Know where and why at whom and/or what you are pointing your weapon
• Most importantly “DON’T SHOOT YOUR SELF IN THE FOOT!

Our nation, our society has been shot in the foot by our own good intentions.  Our unity in beliefs has been under attack and the “E PLURIBUS UNUM” has been shattered by those who would divide us into splinters of separateness for their own self-interest of personal and national power.  They have used the errors of our childhood and adolescence as a nation to induce guilt as a weapon against us.  Unfortunately our own desire, to be a kinder, gentler more loving people has opened the door to the Trojan horse that can destroy our society…  If we let it.

GOD BLESS AMERICA AND THE MEN AND WOMEN WHO DEFEND IT