G. Michael Hopf’s entire quote goes like this: “Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.” The quote comes from one of Hopf’s novels titled, “Those Who Remain.” Both past and current events prove this quote to be accurate. Weak leaders avoid confrontation, especially confrontation that might be lethal. It is generally understood that bullies who are never punched in the nose, will continue to be bullies.
If ever there was a political equivalent to Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown as he runs up to kick it, it is in what we have witnessed in our dealings with Iran. This is, of course, a reference to the “Peanuts” comic strip. If you are not a reader of “Peanuts”, here is a quick tutorial. Lucy has a history of promising Charlie Brown she will hold the football so that he can run up and kick it. Each time she convinces him she will not remove the ball. She then proceeds to pull the ball away and laugh derisively as Charlie falls flat on his back. This is a perfect analogy of the U.S., Iran, situation that has been running almost as long as the “Peanuts” comic strip. Lucy represents Iran and Charlie Brown the U.S. It could even be considered comical if it weren’t for the fact that countless people have suffered, even died, because of our gullibility and/or stupidity.
History has repeatedly shown that evil people will not be appeased. Have we learned nothing from murderers like Stalin, Lenin, Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, Ayatollahs, Sadam, etc.? No matter what they are given, they demand more. They, or their proxies, murder innocent people and take others hostage. Their terror tactics shock and strike fear in the hearts of civilians and weak leaders in the West. The depth of their depravity is unimaginable to civilized people. Evil leaders sense their prey’s weakness like sharks smell fresh blood in the water. When they sense weak leaders they are emboldened to employ their terror tactics. Russia invaded Ukraine just one year after Joe Biden took office. Evidence of other evil people taking advantage of this weak U.S. President include China threatening Taiwan, China flying a spy balloon over the entire length of our country, and the brutal terrorist attacks by Hamas into Israel on 10/7. Thus far, the above actions have gone without any serious response from our President. He did put the fear of God into the Ayatollah when, after Hamas invaded Israel, he stood on the world stage and warned, “Don’t, don’t, don’t, enter the fray. You’d think that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would wet himself upon hearing this. Apparently not. Since those fiery words, over 20 American soldiers have been injured by Iran, or its proxies, in 18 attacks on U.S. installations. That infuriated Joe to the point that he felt compelled to warn Iran again. He told us that he issued a “stern” warning to the Ayatollah. He warned that if Iran injured any Americans we would retaliate. (In that we have already suffered many injuries, he must have meant if they injured any MORE Americans he would retaliate). He warned Iran to be prepared. A strong leader would have retaliated after the first attack, then questioned the lack of preparation displayed by the enemy.
History has taught us that the proper response to terrorism is to punish the terrorists, then cut off the source of their funding. President Trump put forth the perfect case study to eradicate terrorism. When U.S. intelligence identified a terrorist mastermind in plain sight, Trump had him killed. Iran immediately sent a litany of threats to the U.S. Trump explained to the Ayatollah that he had identified 52 high level targets in Iran. That represented one for each of the 52 American hostages Iran had held for 444 days, when Jimmy Carter was President. He promised he would hit each of those targets, fast and hard, if Iran attacked Americans, or U.S. assets. He also put sanctions on Iran that reduced their oil production to a trickle. In that oil is the life blood of Iran’s economy, their ability to train and fund terrorism was greatly diminished. Iranian power was reduced to near zero, as their economy withered on the vine. Like him or not, Trump had effectively silenced one of the key leaders of state sponsored terrorism.
Then Trump was replaced by Joe Biden. As Vice President, Biden saw his boss release something between $100 and $150 billion to the Iranian Ayatollah. That Iran had long been on a list of countries known for fomenting terror didn’t matter to Obama, a weak leader. All that this Charlie Brown needed was a promise from Lucy to not continue developing nuclear weapons. Oops! They lied. They got the money and continued developing nuclear weapons. We should not have been surprised when Biden decided against enforcing Trump’s successful Iran sanctions. That decision resulted in the replenishment of the tens of billions of dollars that Trump had removed from Iran’s treasury. It put Iran back into the lead role of training, funding, and supplying, barbaric terrorists. Just days before Hamas invaded Israel, Biden made an additional $6.7 billion dollars in “frozen” assets available to the terrorist regime. We should be comforted in knowing that before he did that our weak President was able to secure a promise from the Ayatollah that those funds would only be used for humanitarian purposes. Dear Lord, how completely inept can this man be? In fairness, since the horrific raid on Israel, those assets have been refrozen.
Our President has asked the Israelis to delay going into Gaza while we negotiate for the release of hostages. His administration has suggested a cease fire. There is one question we need to ask of those requesting a cease fire. Did we call for a cease fire after terrorists murdered U.S. civilians on 9/11? The 10/7 invasion is the equivalent of our 9/11 for Israel.
The eradication of terrorism is complicated and will take a long time to achieve. Trump laid out a perfectly workable template. If we are going to put an end to those who would put an end to us we must understand that evil people will not be appeased. We must believe them when they tell us they want to kill us. When they march in their streets chanting death to America, we’d better take them seriously. We must not hesitate to kill their leaders. See Osama Bin Laden. We must use our position as the leading economic power in the world to completely shut down the ability of terrorist nations and organizations to gather currency. Without leaders, or a source of income, evil doers will find it increasingly difficult to carry out terrorist activities. Terrorism will not go away on its own. It will exist until the civilized world decides to exterminate it. Nobody will be safe until we do.
Thank you for taking the time to read my words. Bob