Posted by
AudiR10TDI on Sunday, December 31, 2006 10:24:28 AM
December 31, 2006 -- On this New Years Eve day we are faced with the deaths of three different men, which is driving the Ponytail Hippies crazy because they don't know which way to run first. In fact, I am awaiting the first conspiracy geek who will opine that the Government euthanized both President Ford and James Brown to keep the Ponytail Media from focusing on the hanging of Saddam Hussien.
I have no interest in James Brown; he was an entertainer and I didn't care for his brand of entertainment. But I'm finding it interesting to contrast the deaths of President Gerald R. Ford and Dictator/Tyrant Saddam Hussien.
Gerald Ford was a modest and gentlemanly man who proclaimed himself "A Ford, not a Lincoln" as he found himself thrust into a job he of course knew intellectually he might be called upon to perform but likely never believed it would happen. Although Hollyweird and the Ponytail Media mocked him as a clumsy, ignorant oaf (not unlike their attitude toward our current President, come to think of it), Chevy Chase has admitted after President Ford's death that his behaviour was a relic of a time when he was 'young, ignorant and liberal' and that in later years he'd become friendly with the President and found him quite a different man. Except for the reserntful residue who prefer to pound the drum and whine that Ford's pardon of Nixon was the only thing that mattered about him (that evil stupid move according to them), those who speak of Gerald R. Ford speak of him as a modest and gentlemanly man who knew his job -- restore honour and dignity to the office of the Presidency, which he did at least until that oaf from Georgia dragged it down for what proved mercifully to be an intermission) -- and who did it to the best of his God-given talents and abilities.
Then there's the dictator/tyrant Saddam Hussien, who went to his death screaming threats and secure in his delusion that he had not in fact destroyed and ruined the country given to him to admiister, but that Iraq was a glorious beacon to the world ... that all those millions he had murdered, known and unknown to us, were just collateral damage not worthy of a thought, and that regardless of his ignominious end, he was a hero. Although the Ponytail Media spent the day after his death rushing madly around the world looking for people breathing threats against America and pronouncing hopefully "It won't change a thing", the only anti-American threat-breathers they could locate seemed to be academics from liberal universities...fellow travellers, as it were. Those people Sadddam claimed he had restored to glory seemed to be dancing and singing and celebrating the end of an ugly and shameful period in their history and to be looking forward to a day when they too will have a President Ford to mourn in dignity and peace.
And those of us with a classical education remember that "No man is an island" and that each man's death diminishes us in some way. In the case of Saddam, I believe his death is the lancing of a boil -- it will not cure the disease, but it will make the body more comfortable and cleaner so the ongoing treatment can do its work. Or as Thomas Jefferson said, "We don't kill a mad dog as an example to society; we kill a mad dog because he threatens society."
On this New Years Eve we bid farewell to a Mad Dog and a Gentleman. Both were part of our civilization and our history. For Gerald Ford I pray a quiet remembrance in the history of the country he did his best to hold together; for Saddam Hussien I pray the fate of Ozymandias, whose broken statue commanded "Look on my works ye mighty and despair!" in the middle of a desert of blowing sand that evidenced a legacy of nothing.
And to those who believe it doesn't mean a thing, I pray that on New Years Eve 2007 they'll understand that after all it did.