Posted on 06/02/2002 10:17:16 PM PDT by kattracks
Now wait jest a dadbern minute. Exactly what's so all-blame wrong with being a cowboy anyway is what I'm-a wontin' t'know?
I can picture "Gunsmoke's" squinty-eyed, skeptical Festus, slapping his hat against his thigh, waiting for Marshal Matt Dillon to explain how come everybody suddenly hates cowboys these days. Marshal Dillon wipes the sweat from his brow, shakes his head slowly and says: "Festus, the world isn't easy to explain. I guess we just have to keep fighting for law and order and hope the good guys win."
Not since the Clanton Gang rode into Tombstone have cowboys been so maligned. When President George Bush said he'd take Osama bin Laden "dead or alive," critics pejoratively said, "Why, he's acting like a cowboy." When he declared Iran, Iraq and North Korea the "axis of evil," they said Bush was practicing "cowboy diplomacy."
Now, as Bush asks other countries to end nuclear and arms cooperation with Tehran, notoriously sensitive Iran is complaining that the U.S. president is "acting like a sheriff in the Wild West."
And their point would be? Were they hoping for something more au courant, say, a totalitarian fascist dictator wearing a checkered gutra and riding a camel?
"Bush thinks he is still living in the age of the cowboys, and that the world is like Texas with him as its sheriff," said Iran's Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani. "He must know the time of cowboys is over." Not in Texas, it's not. And not in most of the United States. Remember the red states, the states that voted for Bush in the last election? That vast flyover stretch between D.C. and L.A.? Cowboys and cowgirls. And besides, as Festus might have asked, what exactly is wrong with cowboys?
I don't know what TV shows Shamkhani grew up on, but in this neck of the woods, most taxpaying Americans grew up watching cowboy shows. Before there was Ally McBeal and girls seeking sex in the city, there were guys on horses doing good deeds: the Lone Ranger, Gene Autry, Roy Rogers. The Cartwrights. God I loved those guys. Adam, Hoss, (sniffle) Little Joe, Ben. Hankie anyone?
We kind of like our cowboys over here and, not incidentally, our cheeseburgers. It's hard to have one without the other. Moreover, cowboys are the good guys, remember?
Sure, cowboys and Indians had their disagreements (not to be confused with unconscionable government policies toward indigenous Americans). And it's true that a few cowboys became outlaws and gunslingers. But the real cowboy, the genuine driver of cattle across lonely, death-around-every-corner prairies and torrential rivers was the American heroic prototype -strong, brave, trustworthy, loyal, wise, resourceful, self-reliant and dutiful. Sort of like a Boy Scout, except not as clean.
The cowboy spirit, which is alive and well in America and anathema to the axis countries and others who hate us, is characterized by freedom; that cliché that was born of good reason, rugged individualism. The cowboy cherishes freedom above all else, as do most Americans.
No wonder they hate us. And no wonder "cowboy" has become an epithet from the freedom-hating masses. If you want to insult an American, they must figure, call him a cowboy, yeah, that'll show him.
One might disagree with Bush's policy toward Iran, though I can't imagine why. Cowboys hate state-sponsored terrorism. One might find legitimate reasons to fault Bush for asking Russia to stop helping Iran develop nuclear power plants, though I can't think of one.
But averring that Bush is a cowboy is like saying he's an honorable man whose word is his bond. Whoa, that hurts.
The intended suggestion is that Bush is not a modern man, that he hasn't evolved, that he doesn't grasp the nuances of diplomacy in a global environment. What it really means, of course, is that Bush is following through on his promise: The United States cannot and will not tolerate hostile countries' developing weapons of mass destruction. Sorry, pals, but that's the way it is. Bad guys don't get to play with the big guns.
Thanks to terrorists, the world has become a global Dodge City. Lucky for us that a Wild West sheriff is in charge.
Contact Kathleen Parker | Read her biography
©2002 Tribune Media Services
Yeah. We've had eight years too many of snake oil salesmen and their cathouse whores running the country.
As we used to say in days gone by....hope to sh**t in your messkit! I shudder to think where our country would be if Gore (or Clinton for that matter) were in office. We got lucky!!!
When my old computer faded away, I lost some great files. One was a polical cartoon showing a Dead Talibaner in a street of a small Western town. In the windows of a bar by the street were some very worried looking Islamic people looking at the dead Talibaner and a cowboy hero standing tall with a smoking six shooter. The hero was a cartoon GW, who was blowing the smoke from his six shooter and saying NEXT!
The message was loud and clear. He set up that loud and clear message with his West Point Speech re preemptive strikes.
But "like smoky old poolrooms
And clear mountain mornings.
Little warm puppies, and children,
And girls of the night.
Them that don't know him won't like him
And them as do sometimes won't know how to take him.
He ain't wrong, he's just different,
But his pride won't let him
Do things to make you think he's right."
(Waylon Jennings, Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys...)
the infowarrior
Some of my best friends are cowboys.
HANS:
I'm afraid not. But you have me at a loss -- you know my name, but who are you? Just another American who saw too many movies as a child. Another orphan of a bankrupt culture who thinks he's John Wayne...Rambo...Marshall Dillon.
MCCLANE:
Actually, I was always partial to Roy Rogers. I really dug those sequined shirts.
HANS:
Do you really think you have a chance against us, Mr. Cowboy?
(Long Pause)
MCCLANE:
Yipee-ki-yea...m****r-f****r.
All of my heroes are cowboys ... and cavalrymen.
Great stories come with a bonus...I always wondered how to spell "yippi-yi-o-ki-yay." Thanks kattracks!
Heh, heh, heh. Apparently so.
You know where the Iranians, the Euroweenies and the Soviets got the idea that "cowboy" was an insult? They got it from our Liberal media wussies. Why can't Americans be allowed to carry firearms? We can't go back to the Wild West days, we've progressed beyond cowboys and indians.
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