Sadly Devoted

By Anthony Levensalor

Monday, June 04, 2007 at 02:48 PM

Arkansas GOP party chair Dennis Milligan says we need more attacks on US soil to "wake us up" to the good job Bush has done. Isn't this a little dichotomous?

Newly elected Arkansas GOP party chair Dennis Milligan, a relative unknown in Arkansas state politics, was quoted in his first interview as party chair thusly:

(quote courtesy of Raw Story News)

At the end of the day, I believe fully the president is doing the right thing, and I think all we need is some attacks on American soil like we had on [Sept. 11, 2001]," Milligan said to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, "and the naysayers will come around very quickly to appreciate not only the commitment for President Bush, but the sacrifice that has been made by men and women to protect this country."

On the very face of it, these comments are outrageous and terribly, terribly ignorant. Rather than focus on the comments themselves and parse the meaning behind them, I'm going to focus on a single aspect here. Devotion.

This particular GOP party chair exemplifies a political machination we've seen all too frequently in the last 35 years in this country. Politicians, instead of serving, are simply basking in their power.

Power is all they know, and all they care about. This devotion only to power creates tyrants, liars, thieves, and millionaires. The accumulation of wealth and power are an addictive drug that can corrupt the best of men and women and compromise the most rock-solid principles.

We've seen politicians infer that we will be attacked if they are not elected, or that there will be endless war if we allow their opponents to rule. Milligan takes this type of below the belt politics a step further with not just an inference of impending doom, but a call for it.

By saying that we need to be attacked again so that the GOP can retain power, Milligan has cut directly to the quick on an issue we've all seen, and all known about. When power wanes, one will do anything to keep it.

This is what our government has become, petty children squabbling on the schoolyard about who gets to throw the egg at the teacher. The teacher may refuse to support either child, but she's still going to get egg on her face.

And so when Milligan says "it is time for a return to our values and our common sense", just whose values and common sense is he talking about?

Regardless of whether you support Iraq, or conversely have a fully functional brain, the notion that we should be attacked again to lend justification to the illegal, immoral, and downright juvenile behavior of both parties in our government is ludicrous, irresponsible, and lazy.

Kill more people so you can justify killing more people, Dennis. Way to go.

~A!