Last week I sat through four hours of missile defense presentations at The Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC. Those on the panel were the leading experts on this grave matter. Grave because we will soon be digging ours.
Not only was I able to sit and listen, but I was also asked to be a part of it. Now what could a 50+ year-old woman, wife, mother, grandmother, business owner and a tea party organizer know about missile defense? Not much, but probably more than the average bear.
As a member of the Tea Party Movement, we have researched for nearly two years now, and the research will boggle your brain. It will also tick you off!
The research we uncovered during the bailouts was focused on our financial standing. Realizing that our financial standing was unsafe led us to other areas of concern. We quickly realized that the issues were deeper than that. The real issue was leadership or the lack thereof.
Let me give it to you straight, Ladies and Gentlemen: Our leaders – aka our government — do not have the ability to protect us should our enemies send a missile our way, and they really don’t see the problem.
We are hanging by a thread with our defense systems, and one big job of our government is to “provide for the common defense.” Not pay for cell phones, upside down mortgages, or food for those unwilling to work for these things themselves. Not pay for abortions through our tax dollars to Planned Parenthood. Not pay for bait fish to have their own river while farmers can’t water their fields to grow our food. Not pay foreign enemies for their oil when we can’t drill for our own here.
There are so many “Not” things that our government pays for through OUR dollars, yet our defense system is ignored and allowed to rust while our enemies build bigger, better and longer range missiles than the United States of America.
I cannot possibly tell you everything about this hideous lack of leadership but you can listen to the panel of experts yourself here. It is a long program, so put it on in the background while you work.
As I was writing about this panel, the local newspaper was next to my computer. A small – very small box – caught my eye. The small headline: State Department uses Twitter to reach Iran. I stopped writing and read the tiny article and my heart stopped beating for a second. Our leaders are twittering Iran and encouraging the citizens to riot in the streets as the Egyptians did last week. While to some that may sound good and very democratic – I saw it as scary. Why? Because during the panel last week, we heard that Iran has long range missiles that we should be concerned about. So here we go. Our leaders are twittering the citizens of Iran and encouraging them to riot against their government, and their government hates us and has big, fat missiles that can kill us. And, our missiles are not as big as theirs!
So we have a government that believes twittering is better than building missiles. We have a government that believes it is good to encourage riots in Iran but makes fun of and discourages Tea Party members from marching on DC with their concerns.
We have a government who let the people of Iran die in the streets last year and said nothing about it but now feels it is appropriate to encourage them to go back in the streets today. Why now?
Something is going on, and no one is listening to the panel of experts.
No one listening … reminds me of the movie, The Blob. The Blob is an American science-fiction film made in 1958 that depicts a giant amoeba-like alien that terrorizes a small town. Steve McQueen and his girlfriend try to warn adults about this invasion, and no one will listen to them. The Blob keeps growing by killing people one at a time. It eats up the flesh of those it kills and it grows and grows and grows…until finally the adults have to face reality. The Blob really does exist because they can see it now. When they couldn’t see it – it didn’t exist, yet people died anyway.
In my part of the panel presentation (you can find it at 1:34:53 on the counter of The Heritage program above), I let the adults in charge know that they will be responsible for anyone who dies because they failed to protect us — because they just didn’t “see it.”
There is a Blob out there, and it wants to destroy us. Florida is especially vulnerable – as I was told by a few on this panel in a side bar conversation.
What can you do about this? You can do what Steve McQueen and his friends did. Keep saying it until you are heard. Stand up regarding the matter of national defense in our country. Many people do not think it is important or the subject matters not play well with fiscal discussions. Some will say it is not up to the Tea Party Movement to talk about such matters.
Call them fools and assure them – they will become a part of the Blob if they fail to see the danger in not addressing our defense concerns.
It is one thing to bankrupt our country, and it’s another thing to allow its destruction by enemy fire.
Billie Tucker is co-founder of a tea party group in North Florida. The views expressed by guest bloggers on the Foundry do not necessarily reflect the views of The Heritage Foundation.
