More Ruskis!

Charles Krauthammer  I think, nails it:

"The entire northern part of the Middle East is now under an Iranian-Russian condominium, because this administration, in its naiveté, has allowed Russia and Iran to progress with no resistance and with nothing on our side," Krauthammer said.

Let's step back. Americans never really thought about the Middle East until the 1970's; the oil shocks, the Iranian Revolution, etc, etc.  Since then American hostages have been taken, a commando operation thwarted, we've escorted tankers in the Gulf, bombed Libya, sent and lost marines in Lebanon, saw Americans taken hostages in Lebanon, fought a war over Kuwait, kept Iraq under blockade in the aftermath, botched the Kurdish and Shia revolts against Saddam, later overthrew Saddam, spent five years fighting a war in Iraq...

So its been a difficult drain.

Now the question is why do we even care. I mean, no one gives a crap that people are slaughtering one another in South Sudan, or Congo. Well, they don't have oil, do they?

I like to think with the fracking revolution the U.S. can forget about this god awful place.

In his own travels in the Middle East, the great PJ O'Rourke pointed out that one drives past Roman forts, Byzantine stockades, Crusader castles, Ottoman enclaves, and British posts...no one ever really succeeds there.

I dunno, maybe I'm the one being naive now. Its an American thing. When you have an entire continent pretty much to yourself and two oceans separating you from everyone else, you start to think screw 'em all.

Why not?

No one in American cared about the rest of the world until the war  with Spain in 1898. After WWI we packed up and went home, and pretty much did the same thing after the Cold War. Americans like to get involved up to our necks and then go home.

The Middle East? Let the Russians have it. At least we know they won't pull any punches against these Islamic whack jobs. Enjoy Mr. Putin, enjoy...