"YANKEE  GO  HOME!"

An Idea Whose Time Has Come

by Richard Cummings

Who can forget the good old days when an angry mob pelted Richard Nixon with rotten eggs in Caracas? Or when Edgar Bergen quipped that he'd been stoned more times than an American embassy? When the rallying cry of the rest of the world was "Yankee Go Home"?

Now that the future of America (and the world) is in the hands of a band of religious crackpots who use the word "evil" with alarming regularity to justify their own political, military, and diplomatic illiteracy, there is only one justifiable universal response: "Yankee Go Home!"

The slogan of a by-gone era of American grandiosity, it has a certain ring of validity today, as George W. Bush, supremely confident that he has been chosen by God to rid the world of evil, jogs forth to save us from Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Lebanon, North Korea, and a host of other countries. Bolstered by a nut case from the Rand Corporation who is an associate of that perennial paranoid, Lyndon Larouche, telling us, at the behest of warmonger Richard Perle, that Saudi Arabia is a "kernel of evil" and our mortal enemy, Bush has no doubt about his mission – to save us all by blowing us all up.

But there is an out. Suppose everyone simply told America, "Thanks, but no thanks." It’s starting to happen. Even Israel is beginning to sit up and take notice, uneasy with the unholy alliance Ariel Sharon has entered into with the lunatic fringe who believe the Jews will all become Protestants once the heathens have been routed by military might.

The leader of this odd coalition of the Anti-Defamation League and the wacky, self-appointed God squad is none other than Ralph Reed, GOP and Enron whiz bang consultant, Christian Coalition leader, and chairman of the Republican Party of Georgia. Does that take your breath away or what?

Into this insanity has entered the mayor of Haifa, Amram Mitzna, a retired major general who is seeking the leadership of Israel's Labor Party. He openly says America is wrong to tell the Palestinians who their leaders should be and insists that peace talks begin immediately, with Israel pulling out of all the occupied territories. Could he go a step further and say Israel should ask the United States to phase out its aid, so Israel can become a legitimate Middle Eastern country and not an extension of DC? It could happen.

As we fold up our tents and march off into the sunset, one can hear the sigh of relief emanating from Cairo to Karachi, from Bogotá to Bombay. And George W. Bush can leave Washington to take up permanent residence in Crawford, Texas, where he can jog to his heart's content, knowing that he did his best to wreck the world.

August 17, 2002

Richard Cummings is a playwright, novelist, and international lawyer. He went home ages ago, but is still a member of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers.

Copyright © 2002 by LewRockwell.com