Alan: America's persistent lunacy is to assume problems can always be solved by using the appropriate level of violence.
Ted Cruz' determination to "carpet bomb ISIS until the sand glows" epitomizes this madness.
A Trump Presidency And ISIS: Aggressive U.S. Intervention Is Exactly What They Want
ISIS is hoping the U.S. takes the bait by sending ground troops — and Trump in the White House certainly will
Excerpt: "A Trump supporter in Fountain Hills asks me, “If you’re a liberal, do you believe in the government controlling everything? Because that’s what Barry wants to do, and what he’s pretty much accomplished.” She then makes the (to me, irrational and irritating) claim that more people are on welfare under Obama than ever were under Bush. “Almost fifty million people,” her husband says. “Up thirty per cent.” I make a certain sound I make when I disagree with something but have no facts at my disposal. Back at the hotel, I Google it. Damn it, they’re right. Rightish. What I find over the next hour or so, from a collection of Web sites, left, right, and fact-based: Yes, true: there are approximately seven million more Americans in poverty now than when Obama was elected. On the other hand, the economy under Obama has gained about seven times as many jobs as it did under Bush; even given the financial meltdown, the unemployment rate has dropped to just below the historical average. But, yes: the poverty rate is up by 1.6 percentage points since 2008. Then again the number of Americans in poverty fell by nearly 1.2 million between 2012 and 2013. However, true: the proportion of people who depend on welfare for the majority of their income has increased (although it was also increasing under Bush). And under Obama unemployment has dropped, G.D.P. growth has been “robust,” and there have been close to seventy straight months of job growth. But, O.K.: there has indeed been a “skyrocketing” in the number of Americans needing some form of means-tested federal aid, although Obama’s initiatives kept some six million people out of poverty in 2009, including more than two million children. So the couple’s assertion was true but not complexly true. It was a nice hammer with which to pop the enemy; i.e., me. Its intent: discredit Obama and the liberal mind-set. What was my intent as I Googled? Get a hammer of my own, discredit Bush and the conservative mind-set. Meanwhile, there sat reality: huge, ambiguous, too complicated to be usefully assessed by our prevailing mutual ambition—to fight and win, via delivery of the partisan zinger. LeftLand and RightLand are housemates who are no longer on speaking terms. And then the house is set on fire. By Donald Trump. Good people from both subnations gape at one another through the smoke."
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