The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

A lot of my cohorts are boiling mad about the folks who refuse to vaccinate, blaming them for the latest surge in Covid cases, hospitals filling up and kids dying of the virus. They blame them for the mask mandates that are being imposed and the shutdowns that are sure to come. When they see footage of anti-vaxxers and Proud Boys attacking journalists, they see red. When they hear the governor of South Dakota welcoming the 700,000 bikers at their yearly Sturgis rally, they go practically bonkers. If you get can calm them down for a few moments, they’ll grow apoplectic about Texas and Florida where mandates are handed down outlawing mandates, what my pals see as government intervention to prevent government intervention.

I can’t say I blame them for their outrage. I’d like to move beyond the plague, maybe turn my attention to the Afghanistan civil war, another wasted effort by the United States, trillions of dollars, lives lost, a hopeless quixotic attempt to bring democracy to a country barely out of the Stone Age and apparently happy to stay there. We never really learn, do we? Korea, Viet Nam, Iraq, Afghanistan, not quite ready for prime time, but we figure, this City on the Hill, we can bring the news to these folks even if we have to ram it down their throat. Somebody forgot to tell the powers that be these people have a civil war on their hands and nothing we do is going to change that. I mean, Duh.

They just have to fight it out, terrible as it is to watch, but nothing we do will prevent it. Course, we could always just sit back and sell them weapons, get it over with soon as possible. Twenty years in Afghanistan. Now we’ll blame the Democrats for leaving too soon. Or we’ll blame the Republicans for declaring we would be leaving (too soon). Some folks want to stay there another 20 years, some folks want to shut the door, pull the shades and pretend it never happened.

My war was Viet Nam, something about a Domino Effect, communism sweeping through Indonesia. The French gave up and their civil war kicked right back into gear. The Russians left Afghanistan and … well, here we go again. The Taliban are back, fun loving warlords that they are. Maybe Putin is itching for a sequel, but I sort of doubt it. And don’t look for Kabul Part 6 from our own Department of Defense. We took awhile, but I suspect we learned our lesson.

Meanwhile, back at the farm, my cohorts are mad as hell and they say they aren’t going to take it anymore. MAGA folks and Proud Boys are bashing in the Capitol doors, taking it to the street. I guess we got our own civil war to worry about here. Hopefully some Do-Good country won’t decide to intervene.

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