The Bartlett Doctrine: Disproportional Response

^.^

"Let the word ring forth from this time and this place, you kill an American, any American, we don’t come back with a proportional response, we come back with total disaster!"

"Did you know that two thousand years ago a Roman citizen could walk across the face of the known world free of the fear of molestation? He could walk across the earth unharmed, cloaked only in the words ‘Civis Romanis’ I am a Roman citizen. So great was the retribution of Rome, universally understood as certain, should any harm befall even one of its citizens. Where was Morris’ protection, or anyone else on that plane? Where is the retribution for the families and where is the warning to the rest of the world that Americans shall walk this earth unharmed, lest the clenched fist of the most mighty military force in the history of mankind comes crashing down on your house!?"

Quotes by President "Jed" Bartlett, "The West Wing"
"A Proportional Response" (Season 1, Episode 3)

---

Yes, I will admit, I have started watching "The West Wing", and I am beginning to like it...a little. Don't get me wrong...the show is still a liberal fantasy about a Democrat in the White House. That the show was first aired in 1999 tells me that the liberal Democrats knew they were losing the election in the next year, but here was something that they could console themselves with...a Hollywood left version of comfort food, so to speak.

And although it looks like the show's creators are about to recognize reality and a Republican is about to be put in the White House, the people playing the Republican contender are Alan Alda, and Jimmy Smits...both of whom are liberals. I guess the Democrats can only take so much Republicanism at one time. It doesn't help that the show has cast liberal bomb-thrower Janeane Garofalo as a media consultant.

So, am I likely to become a full-fledged fan? Probably not. However, as I have been putting down rental money to rent the DVDs from the show's first season, I find that I like bits and peices of the show.

For instance, no matter what his politics, Martin Sheen makes a good president. In some episodes, Sheen's character impacts the scene like thunder, like in the above quotes. In a later episode, President Bartlett is deeply troubled by a decision on whether to use his powers to intervene on the behalf of a death-row inmate after the Supreme Court refuses to stay the man's execution.

I'll admit, this is only a preliminary opinion, but so far, I find that I like the episode "A Proportional Response" the best. It shows President Bartlett thinking what I imagine any Persident must feel when American citizens are in harm's way. While the solution is typically liberal...the President decides to go with the measured response, I believe that the point is that ALL people have to respect the office and the powers of the President of the United States, including the President himself.

The thing is, I don't believe that no one, not the American people, nor the world, has ever seen what I will call, the Bartlett Doctrine, that is that every single American life is precious, and that if harm comes to ONE American, the perpetrator will be destroyed with extreme prejudice.

The last time America pursued anything like the Bartlett Doctrine was the Union during the US Civil War. General Sherman's march to the sea, from Tennessee to Savanah, Georgia was part of a massive policy designed to grievously injure the South and bring the war to a close.

I don't believe anything before or anything since really compares to Sherman's march, and I believe that it is because of this that Americans seem willing to accept kess than a total crushing victory in some of the problems we face today around the world.

Quite simply, the last two times we had a credible military victory before 2003 in Iraq were 1991, in the first Persian Gulf War, and 1945, when Germany and Japan fell. It's 2005, and I dare say that most people were not around for 1945, and quite a few people who are now reaching the age of adulthood were not forming coherent thoughts in 1991.

And no one alive today was around in the tail end of 1864.

But I do believe that Americans need the kind of protection that is outlined in the Bartlett Doctrine. I was listening to the BBC, and a reporter was talking to the Pakistani president, who said that most of the problems of Islam were caused by the United States, because we are the source of all of the extremism. Now, I don't believe I have met many muslims, and so I would like to know where I harmed Islam.

Talking to a college student later, he explained to me that it is our policies supporting globalism that aer seen in the muslim world as an attack upon their culture. So, I guess McDonalds is responsible for the muslim rage that led to the downing of the World Trade Center.

I replied that it is not the right of muslim extremists to use violence to push America out of their countries. If they don't want American businesses in their countries, they should pass laws keeping us out, then work to evict those companies that are there.

The idea here is that Americans should feel safe where-ever they are in the world, and they should know that if they are harmed, the government of this country will rain down fire and brimstone on the perpetrators.

Does this mean that the Bush administration should be doing things differently? Perhaps. How about an overwhelming presence of US troops in Iraq until there is no enemy left? How about making it clear that if you are an insurgent in Iraq, you had better not show your face in daylight if you want to stay alive. How about offering a year's salary for every confirmed insurgent that is brought in by the residents? How about plastering the airwaves and a non-stop message of what is going right in Iraq? How about a White House that doesn't pansy around on the leftist, defeat America slant that the press seems to like to throw to the American people...how about these morons get taken aside by a White House staffer ala Josh Lyman, who turns on them as soon as they are out of earshot and says "Look you STUPID morons..."

Quite frankly, while I support the Bush administration on our Iraq policy, I don't think we've gone nearly far enough. We should try to win the conflict in Iraq in one year, not ten, we should make it clear what our goals are going to be, and that once those goals are met, we are done, and that the best way for those that don't want us in Iraq to get their wish is if they and the rest of their Iraqi buddies cooperate with us.

We should make it clear that while we aer a benevolent superpower, we will not tolerate harm coming to our people, and if you harm us, our military will swarm in and turn your country into a parking lot. We should stress that we are all in favor of diversity, and we respect other people's opinions, but that tolerance stops when some whacko who doesn't like our Israel polciy picks up a gun.

And, by the way, someone needs to explain to the leader of Pakistan that we are not the source of all of the problems of his religion. Islam needs to look in the mirror and clean up its own mess before they start looking outward. I think that people in the United States would take Islam's grievances against our pro-Israel policies a bit more seriously if the dominating image that we see of them was not a bunch of Islamic Jihad terrorists marching around and telling anyone who will listen that they forced Israel out of the Gaza Strip.

I think that the Bartlett Doctrine could usher in a new Pax Americana.

John B.
Blog Guy