http://www.heraldstandard.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=17336307&BRD=2280&PAG=461&dept_id=480247&rfi=6
It’s all so clear now; the people of Iraq only have to hold on until Frodo W. Bush, Samwise Cheney and Gollumsfeld make it to the Election of Doom. Oops, Gollumsfeld fell into the lava (or was he pushed?); now all we need are some magic Eagles to pluck George W. Baggins and Dick Gamgee out of the mess they have gotten us into, and we can all live happily ever after.
So, what is the Ring of Power? And where is it going to be destroyed?
Democrats? In the voting booth?
Let’s not think about how Bush is really Aragorn. Let’s REALLY not think about how Catherine Harris is Arwen. Not enough brain bleach in the western hemisphere.
Did Santorum not understand that the whole point of the last bit of the damn book was about* distracting * Sauron? Keeping his gaze on a hopeless battle whilst the real dangers were in his backyard?
It’s not just a stupid analogy, it makes exactly the opposite point than what he’s trying to make!
Could Senator Santor-uman be lying to us? Has his gaze been transfixed by the evil of one of Mark Foley’s Crystal Balls? As for ‘the Ring of Power’, I have no doubt that Condi Rice kisses it lovingly on each morning on her knees at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue…
That was the point. I think what he was talking about was the “fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them here” strategy. He got the analogy right, and I think this OP is stupid, stupid, stupid. Santorum is not basing his strategy on LotR, he’s simply using that as an analogy. n.b.: I don’t agree with his strategy, but the analogy isn’t a bad one. We’re not exactly trying to destroy the Ring of Power here in the US, but we are trying to protect the US from terrorists.
Gee, and I always thought this was just a joke!
Santorum is such a buffoon.
Dude, the analogy sucks elephant dong. We are not facing any kind of superhuman evil mastermind that has the power to plunge the entire world into slavery, misery and evil if we don’t manage to destroy a small technological device on which his power is based. We have no hope of being able to perform any such crucial mission completely unnoticed by our enemy, no matter how much “distraction” we try to throw at them. Nor are we actually undertaking any such crucial mission that can possibly produce any such decisive victory (“the hobbits are going up Mount Doom”, my ass). Santorum’s parable is sheer desperate invocation of the power of myth and fairy tale to pretend that we’re actually doing something constructive in the Iraq war.
Furthermore, the very concept of using the Iraqi people as a “human shield” for the American people, hanging them out as “terrorist bait” in a battered and destabilized country that will appeal to terrorists as a softer target, is unspeakably vile, if not in fact an actual crime against humanity. Trying to compare such a strategy to the noble actions of the army of Gondor, who undertook to sacrifice THEMSELVES in combat before the Gates of Mordor in order to buy time for the hobbits’ secret mission, is so far beyond disgusting as to be indescribable even in the language of the Pit.
Which I find stupid, stupid stupid, and from what you have said, so do you. What I am pitting is his attempt to legitimize his stupid strategy by comparing it to a fantasy story in which the villain apparently has ADD and can only concentrate on on threat at a time, and the protagonists only succeed by dint of magic. Too bad real life and the foes we face are not that simple, and those who pretend otherwise are risking American lives here at home with a false sense of security, while squandering blood and treasure in faraway lands for nothing. It is a terrible analogy which does nothing to support his theory that we are safe from attack so long as we are making war somewhere else.
Does this mean that when the Ring of Power is destroyed, the United States will blow up? And he wants this to happen? What kind of America-hating monster is he?
Then I’m not clear then on what his analogy is. He’s saying that we need to keep the Eye focused on Iraq - to keep the analogy correct, and assuming he’s making himself the good side, that means that Iraq is the distraction, away from the real battle that’s being fought in the U.S., meaning that the U.S. is the home of evil and Bush as leader is Sauron?
I assumed what he was trying to say is the opposite, that Iraq is the land of evil with the various insurgency groups and so forth taking on the Sauron role, but that doesn’t make sense in the analogy either since he’d then want the Eye focused on the U.S. (the distraction). Either way, it doesn’t seem to work (and either way, I seem to be making a lot of very geeky arguments in the Pit recently).
The problem with the analogy is that is works a lot better with us as Mordor. We’re the overwhelming, unstoppable military force distracted by a minor, ultimatly trivial (to us) battle, while the terrorists are made up of small groups of people drawn from many different nations, attempting to avoid our attention and strike at us deep inside of our seat of power.
Note, please, that I’m not drawing a moral equivalence between the US and Sauron, or between Al Qaeda and the Fellowship.
A better analogy might compare what is happening within the US to the effects of the war and Saruman’s perversion on the Shire.
“The terrorists” are Mordor and they have their eye on Iraq instead of on the US. OK, it’s not the greatest analogy in the world but it does work on a certain level-- you have to understand what Santorum’s assumptions are. He assumes that the “fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them here” strategy is a good one. I don’t, but that doesn’t matter in term of seeing whether or not the analogy works for him.
I guess the question is who is Karl Rove? I’m sure Santorum would say “Gandalf”, but “Wormtongue” would probably be more accurate.
Ahhh. Gotcha. You’re right, that does make some sense (and of course you’re also right in that it’s a really bad strategy).
I suppose to keep the analogy going, Bush and Cheney are Frodo and Sam.
Wouldn’t that be oliphant dung?
Just because you don’t like the strategy doesn’t mean that the analogy is bad. But any analogy can be picked apart and shown to have weaknesses-- that’s why it’s an analogy and not the actual thing being described.
And I thought guys at The Onion were losing their touch. This is brilliant satire!
What?
Stranger
Yeah, that analogy works much better. Terrorist acts and destroying the ring would both be examples of asymmetrical warfare. Of course, where it fails is that there hasn’t actually been a terrorist attack in the US, but it could certainly be used to show a mistake the US ought to avoid.
So, the terrorists lured us into Iraq so that they could strike at the heart and soul of the US? Uh-uh. The key part of the analogy is the Eye of Mordor part, and that it has been deliberately distracted. That’s what Santorum is getting at. Sure, the analogy breaks down if you try and aplly all the details of the LotR plot to the Iraq war and the WoT, but that’s not the point.
Duly noted.
Sounds to me like Santorum failed an intelligence save. He shoulda rolled his lucky 20-sider.