Happy Furry Puppy Story Time with Norbizness

With Their Hybrid Cars and Their Non-Fat Lattes...

I! THINK! WE! SHOULD! INVAAAADE! SYYYYYYRIA!

One of the more bizarre quotes on this weekend of anti-war protests comes from across the pond, as illiterate, hanky-on-the-head-wearin' Prime Minister-Dirt Farmer and Spiro Agnew impersonator Tony Blair attempts to purge his party of a majority of its members:

Tony Blair will signal this week that Labour should abandon "urban intellectuals" who deserted it over the Iraq war.

Forgive me if I'm terminally naive about British politics (I was last in country during the prime ministry of John Major), but I don't think that Labour's majority in the last set of elections was reduced because of the influence of geezers on recumbent bikes reading Howard Zinn essays off of the labels of imported mineral water bottles. If I'm not mistaken, a majority of the public in the UK has been against their participation in the Iraq War for quite a while (and I'm sure that the pictures of Jailbreak '05 with a soldier on fire jumping out of a tank didn't exactly help matters):

Meanwhile a YouGov poll for Five News last night showed that 57 per cent of those asked said yes to the question "should British troops pull out of Iraq?" while 27 per cent said no.

Meanwhile, as the stateside press squabbles over how many tens of thousands of people showed up at anti-war protests, I would suggest that future get-togethers have a different set of signs. I think that some of the placards are very 2002-2003, and don't reflect the current mood/direction of the country that that roving reporters need to cover.

-- "No Blood For Oil" is kind of played out. In any event, it's too late for that; plus, as we've learned, we haven't exactly managed to exchange the blood of tens of thousands for any appreciable increase in oil production. How about, "65% of Americans think that we're spending too much on the sinkhole in Iraq, as opposed to 27% who think that we're spending the right amount"? Or "64% of Americans think that the Iraq money is spent unwisely, as opposed to 35% who think it's being spent well"?

-- Bush Knew? That's way too vague, and I think that recent developments suggest that most people in the Administration actually possess very little knowledge on how to extricate ourselves from the current situation. How about "67% of Americans disapprove of the way the Administration is handling Iraq, as opposed to 32% approval"?

-- Freedom For Palestine? I.. er.. suppose. Well, not everybody can stay on topic in a gathering that large, I guess. I would prefer "59% of Americans think that we made a mistake in invading Iraq, as opposed to 39% who believe we didnt."

-- Now our protesting South Korean friend has the right idea here, as 63% of Americans are uneasy that the President can make the right decisions in Iraq, as opposed to 35% who are clinically brain-dead and therefore confident in his abilities.

-- And, the revised 2005 message (forward-looking) of "Send Our Troops Home Now" seems more in line with current reality, as 63% of Americans want to withdraw some (33) or all (30) of our troops, as opposed to 34% who either want the status quo (26) or to send more troops (8).

Gotta go back for a second to the urban intellectual comment:

The son of a barrister and lecturer, Tony Blair was born in Edinburgh, but spent most of his childhood in Durham. At the age of 14 he returned to Edinburgh to finish his education at Fettes College. He studied law at Oxford, and went on to become a barrister himself.

Is this the political equivalent of Robby "Vanilla Ice" Van Winkle claiming that he was from the gang-riddled streets of Miami, as opposed to attending Turner High School in suburban Dallas? I actually knew somebody in college who went to school with Mr. Ice. If you're that guy, drop me a line in the comments.

UPDATE: Oh, I didn't realize that he was impotently letting off steam. UPDATE 2: Or maybe not. Those wacky Labourinians!

Posted by Norbizness at September 25, 2005 10:00 AM