An All Day Sucker

For those that do not know what an all day sucker is, it is a lollipop that is so big that it takes all day to eat it. So long, in fact, that you can almost feel your teeth rot. They were around when I was a kid. I don't know if they still are. 

But, I fear that the United States has become a sucker, all day, every day, in the eyes of the leaders of other countries. That is except for Israel, our greatest ally in the Middle East, that we now treat like a rented mule.

In Iran, the Ayatollahs pretend to negotiate and claim that they just want nuclear power. They smile and stall. We ease off on sanctions. They stall some more. Meanwhile their centrifuge farms get bigger and better. More uranium gets refined. And they bury their "secret" laboratories deeper under the mountains to prevent an attack. They will have a nuclear weapon.

Saudi Arabia pretends like they love us. They sell us some oil. Their decadent royalty gets fatter and more decadent while we protect them. Even though they fund terrorist organizations and anti-western madrassas around the world, we are in fact their army, navy, and air force. But they're our good friends, right.

France, our bon amie in Europe, has a deal with Russia to sell them advanced warships. The same Russia that publicly spits in our face. At least the Russians are up front about it. 

Our close friend and neighbor, Mexico, where law is controlled by who has the most money and the most guns, keeps a sick American marine in prison for making a wrong turn. They claim that they must abide by the rule of law. That would be a first in Mexico, but we still are unable to get him released. Meanwhile, we have a revolving door for Mexican criminals.

The Chinese take our money all day every day and we act like they are doing us a favor. Meanwhile their military is hacking our computers and stealing what ever technology they can get their hands on.

Diplomats from every nation come to New York City to the United Nations where they have so little respect that they rack up millions of dollars in traffic tickets and never pay a penny. Polite people don't treat their hosts that way. Our government should deduct that money from what we give the UN and turn it over to New York.

It goes on. Most of the leaders of South American countries are playing footsie with Russia, China, and/or the drug cartels. 

If you don't get any respect, you get treated like an all day sucker.