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With loss of civil liberties and justice for all...
I reject this creed of 21st century America.
It is no coincidence to me that the last time the population was anxious on the economic front was when George Bush #41 was in the White House, and his doom was sealed by a supermarket scanner and the want of the price of milk. Enter the governor of Arkansas and an eccentric Texas billionaire, and the first Bush regime was history.
The New Anxiety, ignited with destruction and heartbreak just over two years ago, has been exacerbated by yet another failed Bush economy, where the haves get more and the have-nots are supposed to wait - apparently with the patience of Godot - for the crumbs. Their numbers grow each day.
But unlike the last time a Bush occupied the Oval Office, there is much less of an outcry for his removal, or it is muted at best.
Why?
Fear.
Franklin Roosevelt, if he was right about anything, warned us that fear was the only thing to fear itself. Unfortunately, many Americans, bruised and shaken by September 11, have not shaken off the fear of that awful day, and have let the Bush regime run amok with its agenda, all in the name of a "war on terrorism". The consequences have led to the majority's complicity with an invasion of Iraq under false pretenses, more losses of jobs, rising gas prices at the pump while barrel prices fall, a hypernationalist atmosphere, and other byproducts of authoritarian - or let's just say fascist - rule.
William T. Sherman was right: War IS hell. But it is also profit. For the war contractors and arms merchants it is, anyway. For the rest of us, not sitting on the board of Lockheed, or lucky enough to be in the Saudi royal family, it is expensive, and sure to cause further havoc with the flailing economy.
War is also useful for nations run on fear. It keeps people on the constant alert for the "other". Neighbors with brown skin, or hard-to-place accents. Disdain and mockery of other creeds and religious beliefs. Susupicion and paranoia have replaced MYOB as the prevailing ethos. For a nation that supposedly values "individualism" above all else, there is an enormous propensity for mobthink, and "getting in line". Wave your flag and prove you are a "real American".
The media is the mouthpiece, rather than the natural adversary, of government. Pundits, the most superficial of commentators and masters of soundbites, have promoted themselves as thinkers and philosophers. Books promote dissent as treason rather than patriotism. Lies go unchecked and unquestioned. It is little wonder the Bush regime has, so far, been getting away with it.
The compliance of the American people DOES have a limit. Wallets will keep thinning, the death count overseas will keep increasing, and questions will be raised. The media, who serves profit even more than it serves the government, CAN be helpful if there is a way to show that dissent and truth are marketable, as well as... patriotic. Can it be done?
Yes.
Will it be done?
We have little choice, unless Americans, as Winston did in "1984", come to love their enslavement.
Peace is not merely the absence of war. It is also the absence of conditions which make war palatable or marketable. Fear, hate, anxiety, rage, deprivation, and nationalist chauvinism bubble in the cauldron of war.
Meanwhile, the cauldron is bubbling in Iraq, and future terrorist acts against innocent people worldwide, including here yet again, are assured. Then, more justification for more illegal wars. The cycle continues. We are led to believe "there is no other way".
Stop believing THAT lie, and you have a path to peace.
Get Bush out of the White House, and you have a path to peace.
Stop allowing corporate interests to dictate international policy, and you have a path to peace.
Start by treating your fellow-travelers in removing Bush with respect and kindness, and you have a path to peace.
Not THE path, but A path. There are as many paths to peace as there are hearts and minds in the Democratic Underground.
Peace, not war, is inevitable. Start believing that, and watch what happens. Watch the cycle break. Watch fear wash away. True freedom can be reclaimed, and economic justice restored.
Let us become one nation, under peace.
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