Blind Loyalty Might Be a Lost Art

Blind loyalty.

We have, or maybe had, a rich history in this country of blind loyalty.

Whether it comes to family where siblings could fight like cats and dogs . . . until an outside stepped in. Then the siblings were united as never before and the outsider was in for a long day.

The same was true with our presidents. We could grumble and gripe all the live long day (to borrow an old phrase). But when it came to outsiders our attitude was “our president, right or wrong.”

Could somebody tell that to the Democrats, please?

Usual suspects like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Chuck Schumer and Hakeen Jeffries led the barrage after the airstrikes on Iran. AOC called for impeachment (again) while Schumer hypocritically said no president should be allowed to unilaterally march this nation into something as consequential as war . . . never you mind when Joe Biden OK’d airstrikes in Syria and Iraq in 2023. By the by, that wasn’t one strike, not two, not three . . . it happened four times: March 25, Oct. 26, Nov. 8 and Nov. 12. I don’t recall AOC, Schumer or Jeffries calling for Biden’s impeachment then, do you?

I keep saying this, but the world is upside down. We don’t have the space here to go into all the actions Iran has taken against us – as in capital U, capital S. Remember the taking of 66 Americans back in 1979? Remember the 1983 bombing that killed more than 200 U.S. Marines? Remember when the CIA station chief was kidnapped and killed in 1984? Remember the bomb that blew up a bus in Jerusalem in the mid ‘90s? Remember August of ’98 when U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed and more than 200 people were killed? Remember Oct. 7, 2023 when more than 1,000 people are killed and taken hostage in southern Israel?

Oh yeah, remember 9-11?

It’s not just that. The Iranians and their minions have stuck fast to the idea that America and Israel must cease to exist, be wiped off the map.

Let’s be clear though, President Trump, just like President Biden, didn’t go to war. They authorized strikes. A strike this time that hopefully ends any possibility of Iran having the ability to produce a nuclear weapon.

To be fair, it’s not just Democrats screaming. U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said: I am gravely alarmed by the use of force by the United States against Iran today. This is a dangerous escalation in a region already on the edge – and a direct threat to international peace and security. At this perilous hour, it is critical to avoid a spiral of chaos. There is no military solution. The only path forward is diplomacy. The only hope is peace.”

If it wasn’t so sad, it’d be funny. How much diplomacy, how much hoping for peace would be going on if next week Tel Aviv became a big radioactive hole in the Earth?

Regardless of how unlikeable Trump can be, the guy who wrote The Art of the Deal repeatedly offered Iran a seat at the table to figure this out. Diplomacy and negotiating only work when you have two willing parties.

I digress. The point, dear friends, was blind loyalty, wasn’t it? The Democrats could learn a thing or three about it . . . and so could the Republicans. This time the Grand Old Party is on the side of the president. They weren’t so much when a different sort of Joe sat in the Oval.

All that bickering used to be OK so long as we came together when it came to outsiders. We don’t do that now. It’s long past time for the two major political parties to figure out they are all losing. They are losing voters, they are losing our trust and more than anything they are losing this Republic. Here’s hoping they remember that a little blind loyalty isn’t a bad thing.

Two cents, which is about how much Timmons said his columns are worth, appears periodically on Wednesdays in The Paper. Timmons is the publisher of The Paper and can be contacted at ttimmons@thepaper24-7.com.