Taking Care of Peewee
October 15, 2002

by Joe Sobran

     Who can forget Bert Lahr as the Cowardly Lion in THE 
WIZARD OF OZ? Frustrated in his attack on the other 
characters, he threatens Dorothy's little dog, Toto: 
"I'll take care of you anyway, Peewee!"

     President Bush reminds one of the Cowardly Lion. 
Unable to make headway against the al-Qaeda terrorists, 
he figures he can at least take care of a Peewee, Saddam 
Hussein -- that supposed "threat" whose military forces 
are at a fraction of their strength in 1991, when they 
were badly mauled.

     The perverse genius of al-Qaeda is that it doesn't 
depend on any single state for support. Even if it has 
some ties to states, including Iraq, that doesn't mean 
that destroying those states will seriously hamper its 
operations.

     Millions of people in and around Washington, D.C., 
have just learned how much panic and disruption a single 
murderous sniper can create, baffling the combined forces 
of the District, Virginia, and Maryland.

     If one lone terrorist, without support from Iraq, 
can wreak such havoc locally, imagine the difficulty of 
defeating terrorism globally.

     Even if the task is impossible, we can count on our 
rulers to pretend they're winning the War on Terrorism. 
Writing in the London magazine THE SPECTATOR, Matthew 
Parris offers some shrewd tips on how to tell when the 
government and the media are bluffing us.

     First, look for imputations of guilt by association. 
"Watch for the use of terms like 'linked,' 'possible 
links to,' to beef up a thin story. Slyly employed, such 
words suggest a hard link where only a soft association 
exists."

     Second, beware of reports of "front" associations, 
again suggesting concrete links where there are none.

     Third, look for "the slither from sympathy to 
'sympathizer.'" Parris notes: "I once wrote that we 
should try to understand the grievances motivating 
terrorists, so I may find myself called 'an al-Qaeda 
sympathizer.'" Or "supporter," or "apologist."

     Fourth, watch out for news reports trumpeting the 
capture of "key" figures -- or "ringleaders," "henchmen," 
"organizers," who usually turn out to be nobodies.

     Fifth, notice "big-sounding stories which 
mysteriously vanish." Again, we are often told that the 
government has made a "breakthrough" in the War on 
Terrorism, but the other shoe never seems to fall. The 
initial impression is that the government is succeeding, 
yet nothing comes of it.

     Sixth, be alert for "'security' as a justification 
for the apparent death of a story." Has anything really 
been learned from all those "crack troops" being held in 
cages in Cuba? We'll never know. But the Pentagon can 
always claim the information gleaned from captives, 
however meager, is too "sensitive" to publish.

     Maybe neither we nor the government has any real 
idea of how well the War on Terrorism is going, but the 
persistent official use of slippery, evasive, even 
meaningless language isn't encouraging. We aren't being 
informed with the respect due to mature people who 
deserve the unvarnished truth. Instead, we're being 
treated like the dupes of advertising hype -- like kids 
being sold on the latest sugared and dyed breakfast 
cereal.

     Bush keeps insisting that the stakes in his 
prospective Iraq war are very high, but neither he nor 
anyone else acts as if this were true. If Saddam Hussein 
really poses an "imminent threat" to the United States, 
why isn't the president urging us to take precautions to 
protect ourselves?

     During the Cold War, when Americans truly feared a 
nuclear attack from the Soviet Union, schoolchildren were 
taught to take civil-defense measures, radio stations 
broadcast practice alerts several times daily, and people 
built bomb shelters in their yards. No such preparations 
are being made now against Iraq.

     Of course we don't have to go back to the Fifties 
for pertinent precedents. Immediately after the events of 
9/11, we became obsessed with security and took countless 
steps, at a cost of billions, to frustrate or avert more 
terrorist attacks. We still do.

     So why aren't we also bracing ourselves for an Iraqi 
attack? Why isn't the government requiring or even 
advising us to do so? The answer is all too obvious: 
because nobody believes an Iraqi attack is coming -- 
least of all Bush.

     That tells you how seriously the president himself 
takes the "threat" which, he insists, justifies his 
"preemptive" war.

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