News Hounds

Cavuto Suggests We Should Attack North Korea In The Interests Of Good Business

Reported by Ellen - April 12, 2009 -

Guest blogged by Dan

Neil Cavuto, Fox Business' Managing Editor, Anchor, and Lord High Everything Else, can stretch the term "Business" to cover just about any issue. In a recent post, he considered the "economics" of military policy toward North Korea.

In his April 6 post on FOXBusiness.com, called This Is the Stuff of Wars, Cavuto writes,

"Who knew the greatest threat to our financial future was a military one?...

"It's the nut with the missile, stupid.

And North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is the bomb.

Because folks fear pretty soon he'll have one, and be launching one."

Though Cavuto suggested North Korea's recent missile was a threat, it was in fact only carrying a satellite, something Cavuto failed to mention.

Cavuto didn’t quite get the international reaction right, either. He said, "Which has Japan worried. Because it's nearby,.. And China worried, because Japan’s worried."

But according to the Washington Post, "New sanctions (against N. Korea) seemed unlikely in the face of probable resistance from China, North Korea's closest ally." (my emphasis)

So what does Cavuto propose?

"So the nut with weapons that can kill us, beats financial dolts with rescues that can't save us.

After all, how can you turn a global economy around if we're not dead first?"

We'll leave aside the obvious unwarranted assumptions about "rescues that can't save us", and the over-reliance on spell-check instead of a human Editor (thanks Ellen) "...turn a global economy around if we're not dead first." So if we are dead first?

Cavuto continues:

"Because nothing is so certain as a nut so intent on disobeying, even lying.

It's the stuff of wars.

And now the stuff of wars we hope to prevent.

But that might mean revisiting the very military budget we thought could be pared.

And one few are considering paring now."

Again, the payload was what the North Koreans reported it was, a satellite, so there was no lie, (at least by N. Korea this time). But what is Cavuto’s point? Is he disagreeing with the Pentagon’s proposal to shift military spending away from conventional warfare and toward technology geared for guerrilla insurgencies? Or is it just that Neil Cavuto never met a weapons system he didn't like?

Or is Cavuto suggesting that the US attack North Korea?

Cavuto continues,

"Only this nut in North Korea has a certain staying power, despite Republican and Democratic administrations trying to contain him.

They hadn't. They haven't. They won't. ...So now we have a choice.

Ignore the nut and pray we can get our economies on track.

Or challenge the nut, recognizing as long as he does what he does, nothing's on track."

Apparently, for Cavuto, another war may be just a matter of smart money.