And to keep our honor clean

After all of that sounding off about Egypt, I should probably say something about Libya, right?  That is what you have been waiting for, after all, as you try to determine what to think about ol’ Muammar Gaddafi or Kaddafi or Khaddafi or Qaddaffi.  However you spell his name, I don’t know.  Plus, what’s to say about Muammar?  He’s obviously nuttier than a fruitcake and even Ace, who likes fruitcake, probably does not like GhKQaddaffi.  Of course Ace does not like the guy.  He’s batshit.

Only Silvio Berlusconi seems to like Muammar, and his reasoning is suspect.  My bet is that Silvio doesn’t want any more late night phone calls interrupting his bunga bunga parties.  Either that or he’s got ideas about colonizing the place again but doesn’t want to look too eager.  Figures perhaps that the whole place might just descend into such chaos that the UN will say, “Hey Italy, can you straighten this out for us?”  Because there is no one like the Italians to untangle a complex political and cultural situation.

Last time around (ie: when the Ottoman Empire was disintegrating) Libya because something of a “rouge state” and not in the quaint way Alaska gives us Sarah Palin.  I mean rouge like they were sending pirates out into the Mediterranean to hijack ships that did not pay tribute to Tripoli.  And by “tribute” I mean “money” not “Mazadas.”  When the situation got bad enough, one fledgling little state sent an expeditionary force to put a boot in the ass of the corsairs (which is a nice term for pirate.)

Hence we get “to the shores of Tripoli” in the Marine Corps Anthem.  That little show of strength did get the North African pirates to back off, and it showed that our recent spat with the Brits had not left us without the fighting spirit.  One wonders if, perhaps, the Barbary Coast will not get another visit from the Leathernecks, proving that they still have vigor despite years in Iraq and Afghanistan.  While I hope not, I have a hard time imagining that the Libyans are going to be learning to sing “O Sole Mio” any time soon either.