London in the ’70s was a pretty catastrophic dump, I can tell you. We had every kind of industrial trouble; we had severe energy problems; we were under constant terrorist attack from Irish terrorist groups who started a bombing campaign in English cities; politics were fantastically polarized between left and right.
The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor led to many very good things. If you follow the trail, it led to kicking Europeans out of Asia – that saved tens of millions of lives in India alone.
Japan is the only country in the world to have suffered the ravages of atomic bombing. That experience left an indelible mark on the hearts of our people, making them passionately determined to renounce all wars.
Millions of ordinary Americans may suffer from a toxic combination of ignorance and amnesia, but the victims of U.S. coups, invasions, and bombing campaigns across the globe tend not to. Ask the Iraqis or the Iranians, ask the Cubans or the Chileans. And, yes, ask the North Koreans.
The war on terror is the most insane and immoral war of all time. The Americans are doing what they did in Vietnam, bombing villages. But how can a civilised nation do this? How can you can eliminate suspects, their wives, their children, their families, their neighbours? How can you justify this?
Bombing the Murrah Federal Building was morally and strategically equivalent to the U.S. hitting a government building in Serbia, Iraq, or other nations.
As a comedian, it really gelled when I started doing standup. Because standup is so much about bravery, especially in the early days. There is no doubt that it is going to go terribly for you over and over and over again. But you cannot get funny without bombing.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev, one of the two brothers who carried out the marathon bombing, was a non-practicing Muslim who only became an Islamist militant once his dreams of becoming an Olympic boxer faded. At the time of the attack, he was unemployed.
I didn’t vote for Bush, and I’m not happy particularly that he’s president. But I will say I’m impressed that he didn’t start bombing Afghanistan the day after Sept. 11. The more time that passes without him bombing Afghanistan, the more I respect him.
And, unlike the earlier bombing on the World Trade Center, a major landmark and symbol of the strength of the financial world was, not just damaged but, totally destroyed.
I think, as a nation, we didn’t learn our lessons from the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993. We should have been more careful in a whole host of areas.
Suppose I criticise Iran. What impact does that have? The only impact it has is in fortifying those who want to carry out policies I don’t agree with, like bombing.
Everything about starting out in comedy is pride-swallowing, from handing out fliers to bombing in front of audiences.
Why does the Air Force need expensive new bombers? Have the people we’ve been bombing over the years been complaining?
Markets rebounded quickly from morning jitters after the London Thursday terrorist bombing.
I don’t want to be callous about it, but we all seemed to get over the Oklahoma bombing pretty quickly, and we’re never going to get over 9/11.
Once you start bombing in Syria, when you start looking for targets, there will be a lot.
My own people, the South Vietnamese, had been bombing trade routes used by the Viet Cong rebels. I had not been targeted, of course. I had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I bombed so much as a standup that messing up doesn’t matter to me anymore. I kind of enjoy bombing sometimes – I try and make everybody hate me more. Like, once I know it’s not going well, I can just have fun.
In 2002 and 2003, the Bush administration decided against bombing Zarqawi’s camp in northern Iraq because it might derail plans to depose Saddam Hussein. By focusing on Zarqawi in his speech at the United Nations, Secretary of State Colin Powell inadvertently spread his fame throughout the Arab world.
Pages: 1 2
