Let Barack Play With His Navy…

Let Barack Play With His Navy!
By Joseph E Rathjen
September 03, 2013

It’s great to have a job as a congressman or a congresswoman in the United States of America. It’s even better to be one when you are on vacation. When you are a member of Congress and you are on vacation you don’t need to worry about being called back into work for an emergency or whether some women and children in a third-world country have been exterminated by chemical gas attacks. After all, why ruin a good golf game…right? Besides, what’s the urgency, what difference does it make if a few hundred or even a thousand more people die in the next week or two? There are just some things that are more important in life…right?

Currently, in Israel, gas masks are being passed out. In the Mediterranean Sea, four of our Tomahawk cruise-missile destroyers are standing by and the USS Nimitz and her accompanying battle group are heading for the Red Sea for “prudent positioning.” At the same time the Syrian military is moving their weapons caches, ammo depots and every barrel of chemical weapons that our military has already targeted. Russia is sending two warships that can give the Syrians advance notice of any of our missile launchings and are watching every strategic move we make. China is warning the United States not to bomb Syria and the rest of the world is holding its breath. The crisis is so serious that even the British Parliament was summoned back from their vacation to cast an immediate vote five days ago.

But the United States Congress remains on vacation and will be until September 9th.

In a situation like this, one needs to wonder just why we have a Congress at all. If they cannot be relied upon to drop everything at a moments notice, and especially when a crisis arises, what good are they? Also, what good is it having a president who can’t seem to come to a decision on his own? While he waits for Congress to come back from vacation and give him permission to play with his Navy, the rest of the world scratches their heads in bewilderment and wonders exactly who is in charge over here.

This scenario reminds me of when I was a little kid living in an apartment building back in the 1960’s in Queens, New York. For Christmas one year Santa Claus brought me a rocket launcher game. There was about 12 rockets of varying sizes that lined up sequentially on a launch platform. The rockets were awesome looking and painted red, white and blue. To launch them, you would fill up this little water tank then pump it up which pressurized the water supply lines going to each rocket. To launch a rocket, you simply pressed a red button next to the rocket you wanted to launch. The water pressure would rush up into the rocket and propel it off the launch pad and into the air.

It was cool. I would have all my targets positioned perfectly across the living room, which would usually be one or two of our sleeping cats. All I would have to do is ask my dad if it was okay to launch them. After all, they were high-tech and could do some serious damage if one of them went astray.

There I was one day, all set up to launch. Both of the cats were snoozing in the midday sun, unaware what was to befall them…and on top of them. I pumped up all the rockets, looked across the room for a last check then looked over at my dad who was sitting in his recliner reading a newspaper. I waited with bated breath.

“Not now!” he yelled to me with disapproval.

I took my finger off the launch button. What a bummer. It could have been glorious. I could have unleashed a barrage of lethal missiles upon my targets with deadly, pinpoint accuracy. But I wasn’t allowed to. I didn’t have permission. At least not yet, anyway.

I know how President Obama feels right now. It sucks when you want to play with your Navy but no one will let you!

© Joseph E Rathjen – All Rights Reserved – 2013

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