BETWEEN THE LINES

I can't help but get really, really sad when I read stories like this. Not because of the latest embarassing rhetorical performance by our jack-assed idiot of a president ("First of all, I don't think I called for a deadline. I thought I said, time — I did? What exactly did I say? I said, 'deadline'? Okay, yes, then I meant what I said."). Those are, of course, sad too.

But really think about that CNN story for a moment. Is this what we're reduced to? Really? Can you even imagine this story running in 1960?
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The President of the United States is off on a tour to strengthen alliances with 4th-rate ex-Warsaw Pact powers. That's bad enough. Headlines like "Bush hails Bulgaria as valued ally" are enough to make you sit up and wonder "What the fuck happened to this country?" Is this really it? Is this what the United States is reduced to in 2007: kissing ass in Estonia, Poland, Bulgaria, and so on?

As if that's not bad enough, the President then makes a policy-oriented statement about international affairs by asserting our support for Kosovo's independence.

Fine. Whatever. And the response? Serbia tells us to go fuck ourselves. Serbia. A country without a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of. A country that didn't exist independently 12 months ago. The kind of country that used to do everything it could to curry favor with us.
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Yes, that is how little is thought of the U.S. in today's world – so little that Serbia can blow us off. It used to be that only the Soviet Union could get away with taking those sorts of potshots at us.

Now every crackpot named Chavez and post-Soviet shithole can just fire away. That's what happens when you have zero credibility.

And this all happened in one generation. People who lived during the days in which everyone kissed our ass are alive to see us reduced to kissing ass (i.e. Bulgaria) or being told to shove it by afterthought states.