Weakness, All Dressed Up in the Elegant Clothes of Power
“A policeman in plain clothes is a man; in his uniform he is ten. Clothes and title are the most potent thing, the most formidable influence, in the earth. They move the human race to willing and spontaneous respect for the judge, the general, the admiral, the bishop, the ambassador, the frivolous earl, the idiot duke, the sultan, the king, the emperor. No great title is efficient without clothes to support it.”
- Mark Twain, "The Czar's Soliloquy"
Certainly, the longest war we ever fought, George Bush’s elusive, foolish and frustrating war in Afghanistan, is the proof of that. Brit Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s “peace in our time” deference to Hitler rings true 86 years later.
But there are more cutting-edge and current examples. History is not, and has never been, kind to weakness
You know what I mean, gang culture is weak. Imagine how much swagger one of those dudes would have walking down a street all by his lonesome without backup. Not gonna happen. Back in the day, you didn’t see Al Capone walking around downtown Chicago looking for pizza—dude was a fan of home delivery—and even then, someone else answered the door.
Doesn’t have to be an individual to get away with bullying, governments do that as well
In fact, they’re particularly good at it.
My home country bullied its way around the world ever since the end of WWII, and it hasn’t worked out all that well. Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, countries that most Americans couldn’t find on a map, all sent the most powerful military the world has ever seen home with its tail between its legs. But we keep asking Congress for more money, as if that was the problem. And they keep providing it, as though that was a solution.
Twain had a thought on that as well: “All Congresses and Parliaments have a kindly feeling for idiots, and a compassion for them, on account of personal experience and heredity.”
Which carries the humor of truth, if only it didn’t kill so many innocent women and children
So, humanity in its desperation to bridle the worst instincts of governments, invented the International Criminal Court (ICC). It does a reasonably good job of jailing a Serb here and a Congolese there, but the big guys just stay at home and don’t travel internationally.
Although backed by all members of the European Union, Australia, Canada, Britain, Brazil, Japan and dozens of African and Latin American Global powers, the United States, Russia, China and India decided to take a pass. Perhaps not thinking far enough ahead, Israel signed. More about that later.
For 20 Years, Team Bush escaped prosecution for their war crimes in Iraq
Yet, within one year after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the International Criminal Court charged him with war crimes. It seems Pax Americana has its privileges. We needn’t revisit the crimes of Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush, they’ve been done to death.
And now, Lindsey Graham slithers onto the criminal stage
(Salon) "We will crush you": Graham threatens allies with sanctions over Netanyahu arrest warrant. The GOP senator wants consequences for countries that help enforce arrest warrants against the Gaza war architects. Not a man willing to crush anyone at his age, Biden simply pissed his pants, dismissing the warrants against genocide as “outrageous”
Lindsey, who some say would sell what’s left of his soul to become president, wants a forceful response to American allies who might comply with an international court order to arrest Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his minister of defense between 2022 and 2024. Israel is signatory to the ICC founding document, which makes him available for indictment—and all 124 signatory governments are bound by law to arrest him on sight.
Russia and the United States were not so careless. I’m no fan of Putin but, compared to Netanyahu’s crimes, his indictment is a joke
(Back to Salon) “If you are going to help the ICC, as a nation, enforce the arrest warrant against Bibi and Gallant, the former Defense Minister, I will put sanctions on you as a nation,” Graham warned. “You’re gonna have to pick the rogue ICC versus America. We should crush your economy because we’re next,” Graham said. “Why can’t they go after Trump or any other American president under this theory?
Why indeed, Lindsey.
Now you’ve let the actual cat out of the actual bag. It very much depends upon who is exercising their inalienable right to genocide. Israel’s well-worn motto, ‘Never Again,’ is now understood throughout the world as ‘almost never’ and ‘perhaps again, under certain circumstances.’
In any event, it’s a weakness, no matter who wears the clothes.