This morning as Makai, our Anatolian Shepherd, and I were walking past a field, I looked out across the expanse and saw a single deer about 300 yards away. It was at the far edge of the field and could have disappeared in the surrounding woods in less than a heartbeat. But it didn’t. It was content to munch on whatever was growing and to watch what Mak and I were doing. We were on a time schedule, the deer wasn’t. I think of myself as a free man but it is far from true; take Mak on a walk, be at the barn by 7:00 a.m. to do goat herder stuff, then off to the shower and then to the office by 8:30. Certainly not the same degree of freedom that the lone deer was experiencing.
I felt a lost kinship to that deer. Our American psyche has always been different from that of other countries. Not necessarily better, but certainly different. And, I think, that American character is wrapped up in our romanticized view of “The Cowboy Life.” The lone stranger, the reluctant hero, the one man who would do what was right just because it was right and then just mosey off into the sunset.
This national character is getting us into trouble in this modern world. We believe that we are doing the right thing when our Elected Betters lead us into policing the world and righting the wrongs that man does to his fellow man. How else can we explain our involvement in Bosnia and Somalia and continuing to stay in Iraq and Afghanistan? We used to think it was great that Chechnya wanted its freedom from Russia; but, later we found out that Chechen rebels were also Moslem and some of them extremists and therein lies another set of problems. We aid the Bosnian Moslems and the Albanian Moslems and darn if they don’t support our enemies in other actions we undertake.
The point in all of this is that we did not have to make their problems our problems. We are no longer the lone cowboy who can solve a town’s problems with a gun and a “pure” heart. Truth to tell, our form of government is not the best form for every group and some day, like today, we should face that fact. Once we accept that, we need to realize that we are not responsible for or capable of solving everyone’s internal problems. Hell, don’t we have enough of our own internal problems to keep us busy for a very long time?
As for our military, they are so capable that our Elected Betters are much too anxious to use them. Any U.S. Senator that consents to send our troops into harm’s way without understanding that “collateral damage” will occur, needs to be involuntarily retired. If a situation is bad enough for us to go to war then we need to kill as many bad guys as possible, as quickly as possible. We will break things, we will hurt, kill and maim innocents by mistake because they are in the vicinity of our enemies and, sad to say, we should expect and accept those facts before we commit our flesh, blood and treasury in a military pursuit. Our Commander in Chief is responsible for the use and/or misuse of our military but our Senators have to stop hiding behind “continuing resolutions” and vote aye or nay when it comes to putting our sons and daughters in the field. And, when they put them in harm’s way, they need to let them perform their duty and cease being meddling politicians looking for leverage and advantage when things go badly, and in war things always go badly at some point.
After we finish with the military operations, come home. If we don’t like the idea of posting our troops on own city streets (remember posse comitatis) what makes us think that we won’t wear out our welcome posting troops in foreign cities? If we must act like a gunslinger, then after we smash things and kill people, get our troops home. We can neither win nor have the continuing will to police a foreign country and its citizens. Like a town in the Wild West, after it is cleaned up by the cowboy the townspeople have to take its governance on themselves.
So, “Momma, don’t let your sons (and daughters) grow up to be cowboy politicians.” There is nothing wrong with being a cowboy—brave, honest, willing to put yourself in danger for someone else--but only cowards and lame politicos risk the life and limbs of others so that they can be pretend cowboys.
