Greeson: Trump staring down Iran feels like baseball fight

President Donald Trump addresses the nation from the White House on the ballistic missile strike that Iran launched against Iraqi air bases housing U.S. troops, Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2020, in Washington, as Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, and Vice President Mike Pence, and look on. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
President Donald Trump addresses the nation from the White House on the ballistic missile strike that Iran launched against Iraqi air bases housing U.S. troops, Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2020, in Washington, as Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, and Vice President Mike Pence, and look on. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)

We'll start this morning with the most fundamental non-faith and non-family statement I can make.

Social media is not real life, friends.

There are more than 330 million people in the United States, and there are fewer than 49 million Twitter users in this country. That's one in roughly every 7 Americans.

While that may seem like a lot, 80 percent of U.S. tweets come from the most active 10 percent of Twitter users.

Hence, there are fewer than 5 million of the 330 million among us who are directing 80 percent of the Twitter conversation.

Think about that for a second. That's 1 of 66 people dictating the talking points of what too often influences what we talk about, what we rage about, even what some news organizations choose to cover. It makes the screams from social media even more of an echo chamber, right?

I started there this morning because my initial outrage over "Praise Iran" trending on Twitter needed to be calmed.

This is not about the angst some of you shared or the social disagreements we may have about things that are intended as jokes. This was thousands cheering against our country as we teeter on the verge of a possible international incident.

Hey, say what you want about our president, and I'm sure you will, but if you are siding with a country with the history of terrorism and mass murders that Iran has, well, that says more about you than the president.

I can hope for peace, and hopefully you will, too. Because the other option is no good.

Hopefully this will be the end of this schoolyard skirmish that could be so much worse.

And we should all hope that, because regardless of the letter on your ballot, if this escalates - be it for the right reasons or the wrong ones - there will be American lives lost.

So let's hope that this is a geo-political version of a baseball fight. That's right, baseball, the American pastime before the NFL, college football, basketball, cornhole, the Krystal eating competition, Vols coaching searches, the Westminster dog show and a slew of other activities that are more attractive to younger generations than baseball.

You remember baseball brawls, right? A pitcher takes offense because he hung a slider and some player hit it 400 feet and watched in joyous exuberance as it sailed over the fence.

Well, said pitcher then throws a fastball at the next hitter, and that hitter takes offense. Roughly 99 times out of 100, this leads to the batter pointing at the pitcher and yelling at the pitcher but not exactly charging the pitcher.

At least not until the other players on the field can get between pitcher and hitter, and then the shouting escalates but very little carnage occurs.

Again, hopefully, that's the station in which we have docked against Iran.

We killed a no-good terrorist who reportedly orchestrated the murder of hundreds of innocent folks.

Iran answered with a couple of easily detectable missiles into what I understand is the Iraqi version of the Parkway Towers.

President Trump hopefully is looking to move on to the next batter in the order.

Let's all hope that will be the end of this.

Because right now, while there may not be a clear winner on the global scene, if this escalates to a full-on, bench-clearing brawl, there will be only losers.

photo Jay Greeson

Contact Jay Greeson at jgreeson@timesfreepress.com.

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