While my adolescence may not have been quite as adventerous as Tim’s, I had my share of boneheaded moments. I also have quite a few memories where I kept my friends out of serious trouble, and my friends did their best to keep me out of serious trouble.
When I was 19, I was in a car driven by my buddy Ray. Ray was and still is a hot head. We got rear ended by a little sub-compact driven by a seventeen year old and three idiot passengers. Ray and the driver started yelling at each other and initiating standard male primate threat and dominance display behaviors. I was ready to brawl, and we could have take them. Thanksfully a cop came by, and started to collect information. However one of the idiot passengers now that he had the safety of a cop near by decided to start escalating the verbal taunting and got under Ray’s skin. I knew Ray well, and I knew when he was about ready to start a fight as his frustration coping mechanisms sucked. He was about ready to start swinging with a cop 6 feet away — this would be an extremely easy way to get an assault charge that Ray really did not need at the time. The cop was mostly oblivious to the dynamic so I decided that talking Ray down would not work, so I grape vined Ray’s leg, and put a partial choke on him. That involuntarily calmed Ray down. The cop saw that, was surprised and came over to me quickly and asked what the hell was I doing. I responding that I thought my friend was about to start a dumb fight, so I was trying to keep my friend out of trouble. The cop accepted that answer and backed the idiot kids up another fifty feet.
Six months later, during an epic road trip, I introduced my girlfriend to my boys. She was hot, she was smart, and as my friends quickly deduced, she was not good for me. They drank her family’s beer, ate their food, and enjoyed their company for the two days we were visiting. They held their tongues until we piled into the 1984 Toyota van and got to the second stop light from her house and they let me know that they understood why I was with her, but it would be in my long term interest to get the hell out. I ignored them for another two years but at the end I saw what they were seeing.
Good friends are supposed to protect you from yourself when you are making dumb decisions.
That applies to the guys I grow up with and to international allies as Daniel Larison points out:
you realize that Cohen is judging the state of the “trans-Atlantic alliance” solely on whether or not it can be used to wage war on a country that poses no real threat to Europe nor America. Britain didn’t “abandon” the U.S. at “crunch time.” It’s not as if the U.S. came under attack and then Britain ignored its treaty obligations. Britain opted out of a punitive American war of choice. One might as well pretend that Eisenhower “abandoned” Britain and France when he opposed their attack on Egypt. This sort of thing makes sense only to someone who thinks that alliances require a government to endorse the least defensible mistakes of their allies.
Good friends are good friends because they’ll tell you that you’re being stupid. That applies to 19 year olds full of piss and vinegar and that applies to major powers as well.
Poopyman
‘Murkins don’t like bein’ put in no headhold by no damn Brits.
Villago Delenda Est
Pundits are dumbasses. Film at 11.
schrodinger's cat
@Poopyman: But, but, Britain is our mummy…
El Cid
Nothing disturbs the home-bound advocates of war as much as not getting others to fight the war they wanted.
They already know they’re not the actual warriors, but if they cheer on a war with enough exuberance, they get to share in the warrior aura produced by the conflict (which of course, they imagine going swimmingly & popularly).
When their warleading fails, they must recognize simultaneously that they are neither directly nor indirectly members of the warrior class.
This is a great shame for them, as the warrior light with which they seek to highlight themselves is only reflected.
Violet
Real Murka tells other countries what to do.
cvstoner
A “war of choice” is basically premeditated mass murder conducted to the waving of flags and beating of drums. There is no other reason or outcome.
Mike E
Heh. Indeed.
Villago Delenda Est
@cvstoner:
A “war of choice” is the sort of thing that leads to Godwin.
Knight of Nothing
Well put. One of my favorite JRRT quotes: “It may be the part of a friend to rebuke a friend’s folly.”
Also, too: belated welcome! I’ve enjoyed your posts.
Chris
As a citizen of two NATO countries (France/United States), I agree completely. It blew my mind how apeshit the country went ten years ago simply because the French refused to back the Iraq War, pointed out that it was a dumb idea, and were subsequently vindicated by every development in the war. No one expected America to die on France’s hill during the Algerian War, FFS.
(Of course, when you talked to them about it, they’d say “loyal opposition is one thing, but France really isn’t acting like an ally.” And when you asked “how’s that?” it quickly came out that what they were really butthurt about wasn’t French policy, but the fact that some French intellectuals and protesters had called us cowboys and made fun of our Exceptional nation. As always, their driving concern is the sense that someone, somewhere, is laughing at them).
Comrade Dread
Yeah, but there’s the catch, they don’t really see our allies as friends, they see them as subordinates or clients. They’re supposed to back up the boss. When they don’t, they’re undercutting him or betraying him.
Violet
@Chris:
And that’s why one of the very best things to do wrt conservatives is to point and laugh. They cannot handle it. Delicious to watch the meltdown.
...now I try to be amused
If only Germany had told Austria-Hungary in 1914 that they were being a dumbass.
Roger Moore
Yep, and France and Germany were better friends than the UK when they told us we were making a mistake by invading Iraq. They proved they were really good friends by forgiving us for all the vile things Bush and his cronies said about them at the time.
Villago Delenda Est
@…now I try to be amused:
If only France and Britain had told Russia they were being a dumbass, too.
The problem was, the dumbass disease was fucking everywhere in 1914.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Now that starting a war of choice has become acceptable what will pay-per-view charge when starting a war for entertainment becomes acceptable?
Don’t think of it as senseless carnage for the titillation of jaded masses, think of it as the ultimate reality show.
cleek
yeah, but this just a reflection of the fact that the UK wants chemical weapons use to be come commonplace.
right?
jibeaux
I haven’t kept up, does Poland still have our back?
WereBear
Because, except in their Bubbles of Consensus, it happens so often.
Mike Furlan
What you said in the title.
Friends don’t let friends quote proud members of a Hate Group.
Larison is member of the League of the South.
http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-files/groups/league-of-the-south
Citizen_X
I refer to this sort of idiocy as Skinhead Solidarity: “I will pick a fight and you will back me up.”
RaflW
I don’t know that the Brits opted out of Syrian bomb-bomb adventures out of friendship to us. But it did seem like the better choice.
Citizen_X
@Mike Furlan: So did Larison say the same thing during the days of Freedom Fries and “cheese-eating surrender monkeys?” Please don’t shock me by saying no.
And I suppose starting a war to break up the country to defend slavery is the ultimate “war of choice.”
burnspbesq
@Mike Furlan:
Responsible, sensible adults are capable of understanding that people sometimes have flaws that are worth overlooking.
Morons don’t get that.
You just showed which tribe you belong to.
daverave
OK, Richard, this is a good point but what does it have to do with health insurance?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
When I saw a Cohen was saying something stupid and bemoaning the war that got away (so far), I assumed it was Dickie “Therapeutic Violence” Cohen of the Village Daily Monger. I had a better opinion of Roger of the NYT.
Roger Moore
@Villago Delenda Est:
Or if Russia had told Serbia they were being dumbasses. There was more than enough stupid to go around.
smintheus
Just as France tried to do us a favor in 2002/3 by opposing our plan to invade Iraq. Chirac has said he tried hard to persuade Bush that it would turn out like France’s experiences in Algeria, to no avail.
smintheus
@smintheus: I see Roger Moore and Chris already said exactly that.
Villago Delenda Est
@burnspbesq:
Larison is like a stopped clock.
Villago Delenda Est
@Roger Moore:
Like I implied, the dumbass disease was epidemic in Europe at the time. It even spread during the war itself, to Italy, which initially had the good sense to stay the fuck out.
Villago Delenda Est
@Citizen_X:
Well, yes, it was. The South, IMHO, didn’t pay high enough a price for its folly, either, as there are asshats like Larison who think that they can still have a Confederacy.
Yatsuno
@daverave: Break out of your paradigms man!!!
Villago Delenda Est
@Comrade Dread:
This is the deserting coward definition of “loyalty”. He didn’t believe it was a two way street, either.
Which is why he was an abysmal failure as a leader.
Mike E
@Villago Delenda Est: Yep, and the dumbass disease even spread to Nobel Prize winners, too. Also.
Bobby Thomson
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I, too, assumed it was Even the Liberal Adulterer Richard Cohen.
Morbo
Meanwhile Dennis Kucinich will interview Bashar Assad for Fox News. That sounds fun.
Ted & Hellen
The macho preening in this post is very hot.
patrick II
We probably would have bombed Syria weeks ago if Cameron had not decided to go to the British Parliament and the Parliament had voted no. France was lined up to go and so was Cameron. We owe Cameron a thanks for putting it to a vote (I don’t know British law at all — so maybe it was required?) and the Parliament for voting no. It gave Obama pause enough that he pursued avenues other than the one he was evidently on at the urging of most of the Washington’s hawks.
Thank you, England.
Ben Cisco
@Villago Delenda Est: Agreed.
J.D. Rhoades
@Villago Delenda Est:
It had been building for a long time, with a lot of near misses and almost-wars until finally everyone’s luck ran out.
J.D. Rhoades
@Mike Furlan:
You can be right on some things and terribly terribly wrong on others.
Mike Furlan
@J.D. Rhoades:
Larison has admitted to being a member of The League of the South.
The League of the South is a Hate Group according to SPLC.
Where am I terrible wrong?
J.D. Rhoades
@Mike Furlan:
Larison can be right on some things and wrong on others.
The “you” was a generalization. As in “you never can tell.”
English your second language, maybe?
OzarkHillbilly
Now, if only somebody would be a “friend” to Israel…
Mike Furlan
@J.D. Rhoades:
Can you comprehend ad hominem?
Anyway.
Let’s go back to the begining.
“Friends during times of stupidity”
I find you and Richard “standing with your arm around a Klansman” let’s say. And I ask why would you want to do that?
And you say, He just worked all day cleaning up a section of highway, what is wrong with that (you poopy head). See the sign says “This Section of Highway maintained by the local KKK”.
Well, I say, your new friend is more known for being a Klansman than for having spent one day cleaning up a highway. People might start to think that you are just looking for an excuse to promote White Power.
Have it any way you want. I just think that you can promote “clean highways” without having to hug the Klan.