Random: "Too Much to Blog About" Things

Would you buy a terrorism plot that involved this man?

The idea that some rogue Quds plot to kill a Saudi Arabian ambassador to the US on American soil that involves some hapless used car salesman who doesn't even seem to fit the profile of a terrorist isn't necessarily far-fetched or a wag-the-dog bit of fakery.  The attention being paid seems a bit stage-y to me, but what do I know?

That Iran has issues with Saudi Arabia is an actual thing--why wouldn't it lead to an abstruse plot to kill an ambassador here?  It not only embarasses the US but might effect our relationship with Saudi Arabia, and um, did you know that the CIA once worked on shoes rigged with some kind of Nair in an attempt to kill Fidel Castro's beard?  Honest to fuck, it's hard to know what manner of cloak and dagger stuff is too weird to believe. For which reason I am loathe to call bullshit. 

President Obama is sending 100 US troops to do something about the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda.  Professional peckerhead Rush Limbaugh says this is because the LRA is Christian. It probably has a little more to do with them being murderous thugs, kidnappers, rapists, and all-around backwards fucks. But whatever.  Maybe Rush thinks child soldiers are awesome and are especially so when they are directed to kill or otherwise outrage civilian populations. It's his right to think what he likes. But implying that Obama is sending military assistance to Uganda to specifically target Christians (does Limbaugh want to call rapists "True Christians"?) is exceptionally shitheelish of him. 

The Uganda issue aside--he's also been applying his "Talent on loan from God" to insist that former MA Governor Mitt Romney is not a conservative. Although, in 2008, Limbaugh did get around to semi-endorsing Romney, saying he was a representative of the "stool of conservatism".   So what happened?

Let's lay it on the line--how is Obama getting re-elected not the best thing ever for Rush? He's got a Black, Democratic President who has been branded a Muslim socialist--of course he hates the only person in the GOP field who plausibly does well against his ideal nemesis in any polls. Rush Limbaugh thrives on the politics of resentment--and he can't be all that resentful if he has no one in power to be resentful of.  It's the only way he can remain relevant--otherwise, he's just another radio kvetch-artist with a dying demographic trying to fill airtime.  Taking him seriously is probably weirder than taking Manssour Arbabsiar seriously.

In other news, Underwear Bomber Omar Farouk Abumuttallab pled guilty this week of committing the terrorist act of blowing up his own junk on an airplane.  And what was he going to do, really?  Claim he was holding the exploding drawers for a friend?  It was all pretty much over for the fellow after he sort of confessed to everything in custody, and had a tape in anticipation of his martyrdom prepared.

For those keeping score, this is also one of the biggish-deal operations with which Anwar Al-Awlaki was tangentially associated.  Sadly, because of the guilty plea, we'll get no more details about the Al-Awlaki connection, and we'll get still less out of the man himself. But this does represent a bit of a triumph for the court system working at getting terrorists behind bars.

I have no idea what to even say about the death of the son of Omar Abdul Rahman, the "Blind Sheikh" behind the 1993 World Trade Center Attack.   The frightening thing about the Obama Administration is that, although they do not use the phrase "War on Terror", they certainly proceed as if they believed in a war on terrorists, and go about that business very particularly. The definitions of both "war" and "terrorist" are hopefully not infinitely flexible, but it is a particularly worrying thing. Not that I suspect that this particular scion of Islamicism was  in actuality a good guy or even a neutral guy--just that I rather hope the administration is working on exactly what line they will draw when they get around to drawing a line somewhere.

It's been a busy week, hasn't it?