Letters to the Editor
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You are so very, very wrong
When you claim:
"But it could also heighten the exhausted passivity, the resignation, and the sheer apathy that have marked America's response to the war."
I don't know what America you are living in, but I am surrounded by people who are sick to death of this war. Who are frustrated and sad, outraged and depressed. Fearful and hopeless. And who feel every day that they are powerless to make this nightmare end...and who are waiting with less hope than ever that their voices in Washington will end it for them.
NO! We are not resigned. We are not apathetic. We are not passive.
We are held hostage by this insane administration, and the rest of the government which is supposed to be of the people, by the people and for the people. But which has forgotten who the people are. And is failing miserably to represent and protect them.
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Iraq war is not
Why are people calling this a *war*? What army belonging to which country is US fighting against? The war finished when Bagdad fell and Saddam lost. Since then it has been a military occupation of a ex-sovereign country by a more powerful invading country. Guess what that leads to? Armed resistance by freedom fighters. So US is slaughtering those resistance fighters alongwith Iraqi masses and calling it the war on terror.
The fact that Bush got overwhelming support for all his mis-adventures from US Congress and Senate has exposed some truths about the *majority* of the US politicans:
. they have not learned their lessons from Vietnum
. they are arrogant bully with fear and loathing for Arabs/muslims while lusting after the middle-east oil
. they have little regard for non-American lives particularly non-Western lives
. they have forgotten the value of individual liberty (thus allowing the draconian laws to pass)
. they have low ability to critical thinking (thus allowing themselves to be fooled by Bush's propaganda)
. they are gullible and greedy (thus allowed themselves to be manipulated by neo-con agenda and military-industrial complex who push for this war).
The disastrous failure of the war is not going to fix the above character flaws of US politians, unless they start to really examin their past and present foreign policies. I hope US general public force them to do so.
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The historians will have a lot to write about
Barbara Bodine in the new movie "No End In Sight" makes the memorable comment "There were two or three ways to get Iraq right, and five hundred ways to get it wrong. What I didn't know was that we'd go through all five hundred."
When, as John DiIulio pointed out, in the Bush White House there is no policy but only politics, it follows that there is no strategy but only tactics. The Mayberry Machiavellis are a bunch of chess players that can only see one move ahead, if that. Immediate political reactions and coverage in the latest news cycle seems to be the horizon of their thinking. They were masters of distraction, playing with national security like the Enron accountants sauteing the latest quarterly balance sheets.
And the Iraq catastrophe is so intimately tied to the Bush inner circle's disdain for facts, contempt for intellectuals, and blindered lack of curiosity. Does it all tie together I wonder - loathing for analytical reasoned thought, and a short span of attention? Painting oneself into a corner does require unique skills.
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The Blame Game
The Iraq logjam will not be broken until the GOP is broken, and when it is broken the GOP will have wander in the wildnerness for at least ten, perhaps twenty, years. The only way to achieve that is for Democrats to stop playing at politics and and start aiming at the GOP's heart by telling Americans that the Iraq war is no longer being fought by the GOP in Iraq at all, it is being fought here, in the USA. That is because the only "strategy" for the GOP now is to keep on insisting the story from Iraq is Progress! , while their real strategy is to blame the Democrats. The Republican party can't lose in Iraq because without the national security issue the GOP is dead, kaput, banished. The utter cynicism the this strategy has to be emphasized at every opportunity. As an insightful post at the Daily brew puts it:
If the Democratic leadership could look further than five minutes ahead, they wouldn’t argue that the war is already lost (even though it is). They wouldn’t argue that that the military isn’t making any real progress in Iraq (even though they aren’t). Nor would they argue that Bush and the Republicans are only prolonging the war so they can pass it on to Bush’s successor (even though they are).
Instead, Democrats should repeat into the camera at every single opportunity that the Bush administration’s sole strategic objective in continuing the war in Iraq is to avoid being blamed for losing it. By putting it this way, even the American public will understand what is going on. And when the time comes to pay the political price for this awful mess, the Republicans won’t be able to pass the bill on to someone else.
see the Sept 14th post at: http://brew.notifylist.com/thedailybrew-archive/
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People *are* rising up
but the media isn't giving us much air time. There was a mass mobilization in DC this weekend with tens of thousands of people taking to the streets; of course, the march received very little coverage. And has anyone heard of CODEPINK's action in Congress today? Here is an excerpt from our press release (I'm on the national staff):
"CODEPINK Women for Peace led a coalition of anti-war groups on a tour through the halls of Congress on Monday afternoon targeting members who are staunch supporters of the Iraq war, encourage military strike against Iran, violate civil liberties, and those who receive oil and defense monies. The delegation estimated to be 50 turned out to be 150 with members from over 25 states and dozens of national and local peace organizations. The 150 broke up into 5 groups according to region and visited 15 Members of Congress and presented them with a Certificate of Induction to the People's Hall of Shame."
Fun and powerful actions like this are being ignored by the press. So are the people in every single state who are calling Congress, visiting their reps' local offices, are writing letters to try to end this war. I agree with Gary's eloquent essay that we need to rise up in even greater numbers, with even louder voices, but I wish more media attention was given to those who are already working passionately for peace.