Muammar Row the Boat Ashore

The world media is, all of a sudden,  focussed on the middle eastern refugee problem.  Given that the middle east hasn't seen a peaceful day since the 40's and that 'refugee camps' are now geographic fixtures, how could it come to pass that the world gets blindsided by 'them' shifting their focus to a walk to Europe?  The last time there was such a migration, occurred in the 12th century and went in the opposite direction - the People's Crusade.

We 'knew' there were a lot of refugees - after all hasn't Assad been killing so many of his own people that the West has been 'honour-bound' to get the UN to introduce sanctions and  a little humanitarian bombing? Obama almost got his wish, but Putin 'interfered' to make a deal that (maybe) stopped an 'act of Congress' from adding to the rubble that is modern Syria. The Syrians have been moving out of the line of fire since Ambassador Geoff Pyatt declared the street riot  a legitimate attempt to remove a tyrannical government. That being said, the Gulf States immediately introduced a 'carte blanche' for weapons while the US called for, and trained, 'rebel forces'. Even the perennial bushwhacker John 'the Admiral' McCain  flew over to glad-hand 'the heroes'.  Little was anybody to know these were wolves in camo duds, more affiliated with the kind of  Islamic state that hates our freedoms than the kind of guys who would 'roll over' for a golf cart and a pair of new balance sneakers for each of 'the staff'.

John was shaking hands with the devil himself - Al Baghdadi the Killer.

In less than a year Obama's militias turned into ISIS, and then ISIL. Not only did the clear Assad's forces out of eastern Syria , they launched an invasion of America's second best friend , (well,   third), in Asia and drove the Iraqi government out of the northern half of the country. Then they allied themselves with the Iraqi Sunni 'insurgency ' and drove the Shiite government out of even more territory.  Lately ISIS/IL is only 34 miles from Baghdad. And the 'driving-back' seems stalled, while Europe girds its 'lions' for the fray.

 Needless to say  between the beheadments, and the bombing campaign, anybody with an iota respectable self-preservation made tracks for the nearest neutral ground. In northern Syria that was Lebanon on the west, Turkey to the north or 'Kurdistan' to the east. Anywhere else was into the fire.
And so things remained until Turkey declared itself into the War on Terror. All of a sudden southern Turkey - where the camps were - started to look like places a refugee could get confused with a Kurd. That's right, the Turks declared a 'war on terror' and  promptly attacked the Kurds. The Kurds returned the favour - inside Turkey - and the 'shivaree' was on.  For refugees,  all of a sudden Europe, at a distance, started to have some 'Clampett appeal'.

And so the latter-day 'descent of the Helvetii into Gaul' commenced.  But these weren't Swiss they were mostly Moslem refugees and they descended via Greece and  the Balkans onto south-central Europe. And there were thousands upon thousands of them - taking open boats to the Greek Islands, 'hopping'  the mainland, walking through Greece and the parts of former Yugoslavia to the border of Hungary. There the EuroHans Briker stuck his finger in a Dyke and  tried to stem the tide. But some broke through heading for Germany and even the Scandinavian countries. The Hungarians tried 'defending ' Europe against a tide of 'seekers' -  who  had actually started six months ago and had the Hungarians fencing-off their border. But this time they overwhelmed the border -a number of times. They 'hijacked' (metaphorically) the railway system in order to get to Germany. To-day we have the Austrians volunteering to man the ramparts with their old 'ally'. Holding Europe as they used to do a half a millennium ago.

Now the Euros are just like any other redneck who doesn't want to be forced into Sharia courts or to have to wear baggy pants, smoke the dope of pray eighty-five times a day - even if they do legitimize teen-aged sex slaves. They wanted to keep everybody out. But a kid drowned and a foolish photographer had his reputation made, taking a picture that mobilized the kind of sympathy rednecks save for their pets.  All of a sudden there is a groundswell to stop this or take refugees in. Today another half-dozen babies drowned, and while the patriots claim they shouldn't have taken their kids into danger, they still think that bombing them only hurts 'the bad guys'. And if these people are hurting,  it IS because they are 'bad guys' - in disguise! Those unpowered life rafts are the 'invasion rowboats' we've been told would bring Al Qaeda, or the Taliban, or, now, ISIS, ISIL and all the unholy killers of pandemonium.