What is this sudden inclination to bomb Syria all about? Despite marginal opposition, the bombing of ISIL targets in Iraq faced no real naysayers (except those that would never agree with any military action by Australia under any circumstances). Sharpening a bayonet is anathema to those people. They are the same people who would be speaking German or Japanese by now if it wasn’t for the efforts of millions of Australians who were willing to put on a uniform and learn to shoot. Enough about them. Darwinism will sort them out in a couple of hundred years anyway.

Back to the real world. When ISIL reared its quite ugly and teatowel-draped head, the marginally representative government of Iraq welcomed our involvement (after John Howard had convinced everyone that our invasion of that country was ok because they had weapons of mass destruction…) Remember WMDs? No? That’d be because Johnnie and his mates George Dubya Bush and Tonywhatshisname couldn’t find any to justify the invasion… Bugger.

So, at worst, in Iraq we are cleaning up the mess Johnnie Howard got us into while we really weren’t paying attention… But this time, there is no excuse for being distracted. Oi! Stop watching AFL, ARL and wogball on the weekend! We have real questions of life and death to deal with here!

Problem is, yet again, it isn’t actually our lives and deaths that are involved. That’s becoming a pattern. Unless, of course, by pure arse, a RAAF pilot gets shot down with a machine gun by some Syrian faction we can’t pronounce, in a place we couldn’t get within 1000 km of on one of those spinning globes. So, apparently it’s ok to drop taxpayer-funded high explosive on targets in Syria without really understanding what it’s about, or who is who…

Over here! Syria! It is in the Middle East! (audience glazes over). Asked to point at the Middle East on a map, Friday afternoon happy hour guy places his index finger on Belize. (Sorry, Belize, that was a close call…, you are lucky I was here, and I know you are actually in South America)

No excuses this time, Australia. If you let Captain Tony Rabbit and his merry flag-bedecked squadron send our RAAF to bomb Syria, we might as well become the 51st state of the United States. Get a grip and send an email to your MP. The widget to work out who your MP is, is here. A list of their email addresses is here. Don’t say you didn’t get the warning…