This story from The Telegraph is so bizarre, it could be a sitcom skit. Telegraph: Winnie the Pooh, Luke Skywalker and British football hooligans could shape the foreign policy of Barack Obama if he becomes US President, according to a key adviser.
Richard Danzig, who served as Navy Secretary under President Clinton and is tipped to become National Security Adviser in an Obama White House, told a major foreign policy conference in Washington that the future of US strategy in the war on terrorism should follow a lesson from the pages of Winnie the Pooh, which can be shortened to: if it is causing you too much pain, try something else.
Mr Danzig told the Centre for New American Security: “Winnie the Pooh seems to me to be a fundamental text on national security.”
He spelt out how American troops, spies and anti-terrorist officials could learn key lessons by understanding the desire of terrorists to emulate superheroes like Luke Skywalker, and the lust for violence of violent football fans.
Mr Obama’s candidacy was given an early boost by his opposition to the Iraq war and he has repeatedly said the US needs to rethink its approach to the Middle East.
Mr Danzig spelt out the need to change by reading a paragraph from chapter one of the children’s classic, which says: “Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump on the back of his head behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming down stairs. But sometimes he thinks there really is another way if only he could stop bumping a minute and think about it.”
Danzig has it backwards. Under Bush, we inflict pain on the bad guys. Before long they realize they don't like bump, bump, bumping their heads, and so they eventually stop terrorizing and beheading. Or maybe, they get vaporized by a Hellfire missile. The Bush approach is working, as al-Qaeda is being routed and the people of Iraq are getting their country back.
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Danzig needs to stick to children's books and let serious people fight the terrorists.
