Okay, let me get this straight. On another continent, thousands of miles away, there is a country in the midst of an ongoing civil war. And we need to do something about it. Really? Why?

I love history. I am fascinated with the rise and fall of civilization throughout the ages, and also the way our knowledge of the events that have transpired seems to be ever-changing. This amateur hobby greatly affects my interpretation of current happenings. Rome often went to war…. but I can’t recall the instance where it went to war for nothing. It was for gain. Gain of precious metals, land for expansion, influence, captives, or even to increase your resume – sometimes all of these at the same time.

But why does our Republic go to war now? In fact, regardless of the sheepish bleating of the Michael Moores of the world, we haven’t gone to war for any good reason in over 60 years. And if you think our recent escapades in the middle east were for “Big Oil”, check the price of gas. I’m at the point where we should at least have cheap, plentiful fuel in exchange for the lives and limbs of American servicemen and women. At least history would record the reason for our decade-plus conflict as a practical one.

So here we are. Once again an American president is sitting next to a Soviet, oops… I mean Russian, leader, contemplating going to yet another proxy war with the land of the Tzars. If I remember correctly, we haven’t won one of those. I wish Rambo did exist, and with a tank-top and an M-60 machine gun he could single-handedly vanquish our foes without recieving more than a flesh wound, but he doesn’t. Vietnam sucked, and Korea was at best a stand-off. Maybe if we enslaved, oops…there I go again, I mean, conscripted millions to throw themselves against the Communist Hordes we would have had a better outcome.

When I look around me, I don’t see a populace ready to suit up and watch their buddies get turned into strawberry jam by an exploding IED. Not for some vague concept of policing the world or spreading “democracy” to people who wouldn’t recognize it, and if they did would reject it. The only people I do see ready to throw more Americans into the grinder are in D.C.. I’ve been watching McCain trundle in front of the cameras to tell me how important it is to not mind our own business. He’s fighting harder to get us into a third middle eastern conflict than he did to win the White House.

Oh, and I left out an important fact….. we’re freaking broke. America needs to be ordering off the Dollar Menu, not adding billions more to its bar tab. Here’s an idea…. let’s rebuild our own infrastructure before we blow up and rebuild someone else’s. Besides, we evidently are already going to send the “rebels” ( probably Al Qaeda-types ) some really sweet guns to use on us….oops, this is becoming a habit…. I mean on the bad guys. I seem to remember that every time we arm “freedom fighters”, they end up using those weapons to fight our freedom. Besides, maybe Egypt can send in all those brand new state-of-the-art fighter jets we sent them.

Truth is America cannot afford, in money, reputation, or willpower, to engage in another nation’s civil war. And judging by the look on Putin’s face while sitting next to our Fearless Leader, he knows it.