After watching this morning’s Grammy Awards recaps on the news, I’ve come down to the conclusion that the people that have been protesting military action in Iraq are the most ignorant lot of our nation. It’s not that they’re stupid – it’s more like they’ve been sold a bill of goods and they’re content to never investigate the truth beyond “what they were told” nor do they have the facts to back up what they’re protesting much less why – I’ve seem similar things from people for the war, but it doesn’t usually seem as visible as the protesters seem to be. It’s their right to protest, obviously, but I find it some what humorous that their biggest argument is that they don’t like Bush’s “blind and emotional” efforts to disarm Iraq, when they are trying to fight war with a “blind and emotional” protest. The biggest proof of this came in the “minor” comments from the musical artists last night, during the Grammy’s and is further backed up by an on the street interview that someone sent me online.

After watching the interviews this morning, a number of artists claim that they were told to “stay away from war comments” both Pro and Anti. I can agree to this – if these artists want to protest or support something political, they should find the proper forum for it and an award show simply isn’t the right one. I’m completely convinced that there would be a holy fury of legal action if one of the presenters of an award said “Hi, I’m so and so, and I really like the fresh clean feeling after a shower taken Irish Spring soap! And now the winner for best new record is…” Working an award show is not the place to trade on your name for a cause, no matter how noble it might be. Of course some of the more dense stars missed that point entirely – it’s like trying to insult stupid people that don’t realize how stupid they are. It’s a form a mental masturbation, to try to teach some people the definition of irony. Anyway, the best line I heard was “War’s not right – it should just go away.”

Well, lets look into that. It should just go away. Why are we gunning for war so acutely? Simply put: Iraq won’t disarm themselves of weapons of mass destruction, which the UN required after the Gulf War, when Iraq was invading and bombing neighboring countries. This is why weapon inspectors were being sent to Iraq in the first place. For eight years Iraq has not only not disarmed – most recently proven by the long range missiles that the UN uncovered – but they’ve also spent some time blocking inspectors from coming into the country. So how long should we wait? Isn’t eight years enough time? That’s something for the UN to decide – oh, wait, that’s right. The US is proposing that to the UN this very week – if the UN agrees, how is the US to blame for this whole debacle? The problem isn’t the US; the problem is Iraq not following the UN resolutions that they said they would, which has caused the US to go into motion in the first place. Protesters haven’t seemed to learn yet that you cannot point to the UN for the main argument for peace when they a) have failed for 8 years and b) by their own rules say that military action might indeed be justified!

The protesters also seem to think that if we just do nothing, the problem will go away, like Vietnam did in the 60’s. This is a different problem that we face now. For a better example of what happens when you do nothing by wait, take a look at the situation in North Korea, who is now saying that their nuclear weapons can tag the western coast of the US. That was a classic case of a “If we wait and treat them nicely, we don’t have to worry about them!” that the Clinton administration was famous (and often praised) for.

I also heard somewhere that a group of Americans were going to go over to Iraq and protest there, with the intension of forming a human shield. They believe that if Americans were to protest on an international level and stay in the “presumed war zone” that our government would be swayed to not strike targets in Iraq. Um, if there’s been one bedrock policy that the US has had, it’s been that they do not cave into terrorist threats. Allowing yourself to be held hostage, even though you’ve agreed to go over there on your own, you are trying to make the US bend to a hostage situation – it won’t work! You will become American-born casualties if you pursue this course of action. I don’t think they see it this way though, so I’m sure we will hear about these “human shields” before this whole mess is over. I find that the true irony of the whole protesting thing to be that the only reason why these people have the right to protest in the first place is because of war. We wouldn’t be allowed these freedoms if we didn’t successfully protect ourselves for the last two centuries, aside from the terrorist attacks in ’01. Let me put it a bit more bluntly: the reason why you candy asses can assemble in freedom – which is more than the people you’re preaching about that we’re trying to help for a second time – is because of the military and the war of 1776. Simply put: Duh.

And if only to support my own contempt for the protesters that have crawled out of the woodwork – be it star or layman – I have a link to a video short that a reporter has made. Don’t expect to see this on the networks; I don’t think they have the balls to show such a slanted piece, in either direction, of this debate. You’ll need QuickTime and probably a broadband connection, if you want to see it; Evan has instructions on his page, if you have trouble – go take a look at the clip and I think you’ll see what I’ve been talking about.