Stupidity, thy name is Benson

Whenever I don't have much time to blog, I can always read one of the columnists from the Deseret News or Salt Lake Tribune for an easy-as-shooting-ducks-in-the-rain-barrel target. They are so chronically clueless it's almost cruel to criticize them.

In this case, it's Lee Benson of the DesNews, who pens an unbelievably dumb column about how -- get this -- Iraq is worse than Viet Nam. And yes, that's not a typo. Benson actually believes this tripe. I should know, I read it a couple of times just to make sure it wasn't a cleverly-written satire.

Of course, he provides no proof of the imminent collapse of Iraq other than to point out that the various ethnic groups hate each other. And he maintains, with a straight face, that we are losing all the battles.

I'm speechless. This man is simply in way over his head. Benson is a former sportswriter, which might explain his stupidity. He's the journalistic equivalent of a dumb jock, someone who knows sports pretty well but has no grasp of history, statistics, or military tactics. Better send him back to covering BYU football: If you want to see consistent losing, they're far better examples than the US military.

Of course, Benson might just be repeating Big Media groupthink, where everyone he knows has said the same thing over and over for so long that he believes it's true. Whatever the case, I'll monitor his output to see if he even is aware of the constitutional referendum next week. You know, the one that all polls predict will produce a massive turnout and will likely pass. I'm betting he doesn't even know it's coming up.