Observational Contemplations of a Sexagenarian Trailpoke.
I realize 66 is not old-old, but it is old. Given good health, financial stability, and the wisdom to act, you can assemble a life tailored to your own peculiar quirks and strengths. I have never been any risk taking adventurist chasing after adrenaline rushes. Once a competitive beast, decent at creative plans to get from point A to B, I prefer now, for the most part, to go from point A to point A the same route every day. Any detours are pestiferously vexatious. If we are ever creatures of habit, aging kind of ensures we become one. Most days I try to get a 3 mile walk in, either at the Arboretum, the Cantigny estate, or the forest preserve. I'll take Mother Nature over all the razzle-dazzle gadgets others thrive on any day. I'll take pensive communicating surrounded by nature over the verbal clatter of human gatherings---with precious few exceptions. I still enjoy select individual one on one conversations involving meaningful in depth discussions of varied matters with all sorts of people. August though, is a bit tough on my lifestyle, being outside can be quite oppressive in the heat, so am looking forward to September. Walking, reading, writing these musings, cooking, music, football, and an occasional trip to some nature setting defines a good life to me at this age. I avoid any pushing and shoving like the plague. The time for that stuff is over. Recently I have added 3 movies each week via Netflix, a neat deal where you select what you want from the comforts of home and zap, just like that the movies come to you. Usually 1 out of the three is a loser. Also, I am now taking two courses in college---well, sort of. The two courses are: Great Ideas of Philosophy (60 lectures) and the Philosophy of Liberation (8 lectures). All the lectures are on CDs so each morning I can lie in bed and listen to a lecture. No need to take notes because after each lecture I go to the course guidebook and for each lecture there are well organized notes on each lecture, so I just review them. The Professors are well known from major universities. Pretty soon I will have learned enough to die a little smarter. I already have some well entrenched philosophical ideas----like in the long run we are all dead. Having lived a reasonably good life I hope I can manage a good death.
The remaining time of the day I hope to form a miniature foundation called FANAFI (Find A Need And Fill IT) and provide some limited financial aid and encouragement to young post high school grads who face life with little if any support base. Whither this will go, how far, and most of the specifics, are yet to be worked out. Nothing in my life, by design at this point, is roaring along at high speed, including my 3 mile walks. My goal is to keep life simple, not get caught up in seeking contentment via piling 'stuff' higher and higher or expecting others to amuse/entertain me. I also am acutely aware of just how much misery and hardship there is in this world, embarrassed by the priorities of my own country, by my own blessings not all-together earned, and resigned to watching this monster American empire Humpty Dumpty, which Bush did not create, but put on the fast track to military attainment, fall off the pedestal; all the Kings horses and all the Kings men will not be able to put the pieces back together again. Such is the nature of this created evolutionary process---things change---time stays---WE GO. Maybe on my tombstone I will have carved, 'Pardon My Dust'.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Monday, August 27, 2007
KNOWLEDGE
KNOWLEDGE
We use numerous words to indicate we know something: Knowledge, reason, religion, science, intelligence, experience, cognizance, perception, apperception, awareness, understanding, comprehension, education, learned, enlightenment, erudition, etc. Clearly, the apperception of a dumb-downed American populace aside, we all want to acquire knowledge. At the same time we all recognize the human mind has limitations, any total reality being beyond reach.
Science and religion have always been sort of uneasy bedfellows. Some things we can prove, other things we just have to believe. I can accept this up to a point. It is ok to believe a certain team will win the championship, that a certain marriage is likely not to last, that a certain politician will win an election etc. I believe a lot of things and accept the limitations of a belief. But I balk at formulating religious principles based on inheritance, or the written dictates of some human centuries ago, or on fabricated rituals, or worship in fancy cathedrals, or involving any salaried hierarchy of weirdly dressed titled designees of supposedly superior religious status. This degrades religion into some sort of inheritable voodooism.
Like most other areas of conceptual understanding religion should be a dynamic, ever growing and changing perception of principles which shed enlightenment on the meaning of life and relationships between the planet and all the living species on the planet, including of course the proper interrelationships between humans. The guiding tool for forming religious beliefs should always be reason. Most every human, at least at a basic level, understands right or wrong. If they don't they are some sort of psychopath, which of course is a mental disorder. The problem, almost always, is finding the conviction to sacrifice personal inclinations for the betterment of society for all members of society.
Today there stands out in my mind two overriding concerns regarding religion. First is the concept of community. Earlier in history a community was a small village. This then expanded to some kind of larger state or nation. Then nations began to form alliances and community became a larger and larger concept. Today, with modern means of rapid communication and travel, we live in a global community. In a practical way religion can then no longer be centered primarily around a small community as much earlier in history. This makes the application of religion more difficult. Unfortunately, at least in regards to our own country, a sense of community has gone by the wayside (for many reasons) and has been replaced by 'family values', which means for most that community has been reduced to simply a first generation family unit----a sort of focus on the needs and feelings of one's immediate family. Meaningful interaction outside of this small unit is becoming less and less. Neighborhoods and towns have little relevance to human interaction anymore let alone any feeling of responsibility for any global community. Thus, we find ourselves living in a global community but isolated into self centered family units. Second, there seems to be a growing tendency, I suspect from the loss of any sense of community, for people to use narrow inherited religious precepts to attack others---either physically or with oppressive laws. This just adds the ultimate fuel to violence as the solution for conflicts of most any sort.
To me, any kind of legitimate use of religious beliefs cannot lead to violence as a solution to anything. History and reason clearly have demonstrated that violence begets violence; that successful violence just begets revenge and revenge begets more revenge and just like that you end up with situations like in Ireland, Afghanistan, Iraq, and an increasingly growing number of other spots across the globe. Overpopulation and poverty may be the incendiary causes, but religion often provides the emotional level for the rage. It seems whenever there is war, there are always religious priests of some sort blessing combatants on both sides of the conflict, each side totally convinced God is on their side. If it weren't for the human massacre these war scenes would be comical, especially the tough talk by non combatant leaders. When a leader has a past of avoiding battlefield adventures himself, the tough talk is downright cowardly. I always think of Teddy Roosevelt who thought early in his life that wars were the greatest adventures, a true test of manhood. With Teddy, if there were no war he would start one. But to his credit he always wanted to be, and often was, on the front line. After losing three sons to war he later decided war wasn't such a great thing after all. I suppose better late than never. Then there are those people who find the adrenaline rush of battle as rewarding as those daredevils who engage in all sorts of dangerous hobbies. If allegiance to war as a solution to conflict is a measure of patriotism, then these warmonger addicted citizens are the best patriots of all. They are more than willing to risk their lives---their country, right or wrong.
Accepting reason as the basis for formulating religious convictions does not lead to any uniform end point. After all reasons are not the same thing as facts. I would like to think otherwise, since I am not that good at math, but it seems almost all reality in our created world follows mathematical laws of some sort. Some of these mathematical equations are formulated centuries before their reality in nature is finally demonstrated. Amazing. I wonder if all the mysteries of nature will eventually be proven to be described by some sort of mathematical formula. All these constantly moving molecules which create the orderliness of our universe are all moving according to the dictates of mathematical equations.
The question then begs: what can we know about religion from reason?
Here things get a bit personal. Humans don't all reason alike. Lot of stupidites abound except you and I----and sometimes I wonder about you. But for me it starts with the existence of a Creator. Ok, I can't see the Creator, I can't know the Creator, I can't talk to the Creator, but I am surrounded by the results. If someone sends me a gift it is irrational to believe there is no sender. I know, some people claim they talk with God all the time, know him well. To me this is delusional since they can't present the smallest evidence of any such relationship. This is not to say such a delusional unreasonable (in the absence of evidence) stance does not make them feel better. Maybe in some sense it does make them feel better (mostly a holier than thou feeling) but these devout fundamentalist inherited beliefs also seem to make any holder angry and intolerant. For the most part, these are not fun people to be around. They always seem to seek opportunities to go after 'heathens', of course in the name of God, and they have a long list of people they want nothing with which to do. This kind of mental state is just further proof of how delusional their purported personal relationship with God. To the best of my knowledge there is no documented evidence that these people who claim such a close relationship with God ever suffer less from disease, accidents, victims of crime,divorce, social or career success than the general population. Thus, there is no reason to think their purported relationship with the Creator has given them any advantages or protections in their earthly life. I guess they might reply that, "well I am going to heaven, you are not". My guess is that it would be useless to press for any evidence from them for such a statement, other than to get their reply, "It is true because I say or feel so".
At any rate I assert here it is reasonable to believe a Creator exists for the logic expressed above. If I have the ability to create or make something and I don't like what I make, I destroy it---discard it. What I like I keep. It seems reasonable to assume God likes His created evolutionary system of life. I include the word evolutionary because there is plenty of reasonable scientific evidence
for evolution. Believing both in God and evolution as well has a reasonable basis. The limitation to using reason as the basis for religious beliefs is obvious: there is far more to reality than what is accessible to our senses. Still, the alternative is to guess, to simply feel, to inherit beliefs, or----even worse---generate beliefs which promote your own welfare or justify your own advantages in life at the expense of others existing without such benefits. Of course, it is not so unreasonable to insist "only I count, that others do not, that the goal is to simply make sure my own existence, as ephemeral as it is, is as pleasant and rewarding as it can be". But can a person really be happy in life with such a selfish focus? I tend to keep a respectable distance from those motivated in life by materialism, wealth, power, control over others, etc.---all the goals which promote the welfare of self at the expense of others. I have always kept a certain distance because my own observation has been that these sort of people are not happy campers and I have been around, in varying capacities, a small army of them. Every time I allowed myself (it isn't always avoidable) to get caught up in their world, life became unpleasant---filled with pressures, competition, endless manipulation and pre-empting, revenge, outsmarting, etc---all of which make life unpleasant. Thus, to me, there are reasons why one can elect not to promote the welfare of self at the expense of others, and it is a selfish reason---it does not lead to a state of happiness. If this is true then why do so many go down that road? Well, it is really an addiction just like other addictions. Addictions rarely lead to any state of lasting happiness. All addictions lead to highs, then it takes a greater level of addiction to get a good high and each high is followed by unpleasant lows; the greater the highs the greater the lows---and boom just like that your life is wrapped in a roller coaster of increased misery. Be careful for what you wish.
Part 2 to follow at some point.
We use numerous words to indicate we know something: Knowledge, reason, religion, science, intelligence, experience, cognizance, perception, apperception, awareness, understanding, comprehension, education, learned, enlightenment, erudition, etc. Clearly, the apperception of a dumb-downed American populace aside, we all want to acquire knowledge. At the same time we all recognize the human mind has limitations, any total reality being beyond reach.
Science and religion have always been sort of uneasy bedfellows. Some things we can prove, other things we just have to believe. I can accept this up to a point. It is ok to believe a certain team will win the championship, that a certain marriage is likely not to last, that a certain politician will win an election etc. I believe a lot of things and accept the limitations of a belief. But I balk at formulating religious principles based on inheritance, or the written dictates of some human centuries ago, or on fabricated rituals, or worship in fancy cathedrals, or involving any salaried hierarchy of weirdly dressed titled designees of supposedly superior religious status. This degrades religion into some sort of inheritable voodooism.
Like most other areas of conceptual understanding religion should be a dynamic, ever growing and changing perception of principles which shed enlightenment on the meaning of life and relationships between the planet and all the living species on the planet, including of course the proper interrelationships between humans. The guiding tool for forming religious beliefs should always be reason. Most every human, at least at a basic level, understands right or wrong. If they don't they are some sort of psychopath, which of course is a mental disorder. The problem, almost always, is finding the conviction to sacrifice personal inclinations for the betterment of society for all members of society.
Today there stands out in my mind two overriding concerns regarding religion. First is the concept of community. Earlier in history a community was a small village. This then expanded to some kind of larger state or nation. Then nations began to form alliances and community became a larger and larger concept. Today, with modern means of rapid communication and travel, we live in a global community. In a practical way religion can then no longer be centered primarily around a small community as much earlier in history. This makes the application of religion more difficult. Unfortunately, at least in regards to our own country, a sense of community has gone by the wayside (for many reasons) and has been replaced by 'family values', which means for most that community has been reduced to simply a first generation family unit----a sort of focus on the needs and feelings of one's immediate family. Meaningful interaction outside of this small unit is becoming less and less. Neighborhoods and towns have little relevance to human interaction anymore let alone any feeling of responsibility for any global community. Thus, we find ourselves living in a global community but isolated into self centered family units. Second, there seems to be a growing tendency, I suspect from the loss of any sense of community, for people to use narrow inherited religious precepts to attack others---either physically or with oppressive laws. This just adds the ultimate fuel to violence as the solution for conflicts of most any sort.
To me, any kind of legitimate use of religious beliefs cannot lead to violence as a solution to anything. History and reason clearly have demonstrated that violence begets violence; that successful violence just begets revenge and revenge begets more revenge and just like that you end up with situations like in Ireland, Afghanistan, Iraq, and an increasingly growing number of other spots across the globe. Overpopulation and poverty may be the incendiary causes, but religion often provides the emotional level for the rage. It seems whenever there is war, there are always religious priests of some sort blessing combatants on both sides of the conflict, each side totally convinced God is on their side. If it weren't for the human massacre these war scenes would be comical, especially the tough talk by non combatant leaders. When a leader has a past of avoiding battlefield adventures himself, the tough talk is downright cowardly. I always think of Teddy Roosevelt who thought early in his life that wars were the greatest adventures, a true test of manhood. With Teddy, if there were no war he would start one. But to his credit he always wanted to be, and often was, on the front line. After losing three sons to war he later decided war wasn't such a great thing after all. I suppose better late than never. Then there are those people who find the adrenaline rush of battle as rewarding as those daredevils who engage in all sorts of dangerous hobbies. If allegiance to war as a solution to conflict is a measure of patriotism, then these warmonger addicted citizens are the best patriots of all. They are more than willing to risk their lives---their country, right or wrong.
Accepting reason as the basis for formulating religious convictions does not lead to any uniform end point. After all reasons are not the same thing as facts. I would like to think otherwise, since I am not that good at math, but it seems almost all reality in our created world follows mathematical laws of some sort. Some of these mathematical equations are formulated centuries before their reality in nature is finally demonstrated. Amazing. I wonder if all the mysteries of nature will eventually be proven to be described by some sort of mathematical formula. All these constantly moving molecules which create the orderliness of our universe are all moving according to the dictates of mathematical equations.
The question then begs: what can we know about religion from reason?
Here things get a bit personal. Humans don't all reason alike. Lot of stupidites abound except you and I----and sometimes I wonder about you. But for me it starts with the existence of a Creator. Ok, I can't see the Creator, I can't know the Creator, I can't talk to the Creator, but I am surrounded by the results. If someone sends me a gift it is irrational to believe there is no sender. I know, some people claim they talk with God all the time, know him well. To me this is delusional since they can't present the smallest evidence of any such relationship. This is not to say such a delusional unreasonable (in the absence of evidence) stance does not make them feel better. Maybe in some sense it does make them feel better (mostly a holier than thou feeling) but these devout fundamentalist inherited beliefs also seem to make any holder angry and intolerant. For the most part, these are not fun people to be around. They always seem to seek opportunities to go after 'heathens', of course in the name of God, and they have a long list of people they want nothing with which to do. This kind of mental state is just further proof of how delusional their purported personal relationship with God. To the best of my knowledge there is no documented evidence that these people who claim such a close relationship with God ever suffer less from disease, accidents, victims of crime,divorce, social or career success than the general population. Thus, there is no reason to think their purported relationship with the Creator has given them any advantages or protections in their earthly life. I guess they might reply that, "well I am going to heaven, you are not". My guess is that it would be useless to press for any evidence from them for such a statement, other than to get their reply, "It is true because I say or feel so".
At any rate I assert here it is reasonable to believe a Creator exists for the logic expressed above. If I have the ability to create or make something and I don't like what I make, I destroy it---discard it. What I like I keep. It seems reasonable to assume God likes His created evolutionary system of life. I include the word evolutionary because there is plenty of reasonable scientific evidence
for evolution. Believing both in God and evolution as well has a reasonable basis. The limitation to using reason as the basis for religious beliefs is obvious: there is far more to reality than what is accessible to our senses. Still, the alternative is to guess, to simply feel, to inherit beliefs, or----even worse---generate beliefs which promote your own welfare or justify your own advantages in life at the expense of others existing without such benefits. Of course, it is not so unreasonable to insist "only I count, that others do not, that the goal is to simply make sure my own existence, as ephemeral as it is, is as pleasant and rewarding as it can be". But can a person really be happy in life with such a selfish focus? I tend to keep a respectable distance from those motivated in life by materialism, wealth, power, control over others, etc.---all the goals which promote the welfare of self at the expense of others. I have always kept a certain distance because my own observation has been that these sort of people are not happy campers and I have been around, in varying capacities, a small army of them. Every time I allowed myself (it isn't always avoidable) to get caught up in their world, life became unpleasant---filled with pressures, competition, endless manipulation and pre-empting, revenge, outsmarting, etc---all of which make life unpleasant. Thus, to me, there are reasons why one can elect not to promote the welfare of self at the expense of others, and it is a selfish reason---it does not lead to a state of happiness. If this is true then why do so many go down that road? Well, it is really an addiction just like other addictions. Addictions rarely lead to any state of lasting happiness. All addictions lead to highs, then it takes a greater level of addiction to get a good high and each high is followed by unpleasant lows; the greater the highs the greater the lows---and boom just like that your life is wrapped in a roller coaster of increased misery. Be careful for what you wish.
Part 2 to follow at some point.
Monday, August 13, 2007
WHY LINCOLN IS..........
WHY LINCOLN IS VOTED BEST PRESIDENT BY HISTORIANS, HAS MORE BOOKS WRITTEN ABOUT HIM THAN ANY OTHER PERSON IN HISTORY, HAS MORE VISITORS TO HIS MONUMENT THAN ANY OTHER NATIONAL MONUMENT, REMAINS THE MOST REVERED AMERICAN ACROSS THE WORLD, AND WHOSE DEATH DREW THE GREATEST PERCENTAGE OF CITIZENS TO EVER ATTEND A FUNERAL OR VIEW A CASKET.
With so much written about Lincoln it is difficult now to view the forest for the sake of the trees. Metaphorically speaking Lincoln was the biggest forest of human largeness in history. Documentation of each reason for this listed below requires attention to the details found in the research behind the thousands of books written about him. The below are the conclusions not the justifications. Others would no doubt add more to the list.
1. His humble beginnings and early life in bona-fide log cabins
2. His rise to an unusually superb use of the English Language with only 3 or 4 months of formal schooling in his life
3. His understanding of human nature and it's universality.
4. His ability to bring out the best in those with whom he came in contact
5. His wry sense of humor
6. A physical appearance which belied his genius and opened the door for his enemies to refer to him as the original ape.
7. A kindness to children, to animals, to every sort of ethnic human which remained steadfast despite the many cruelties thrust at him from every direction.
8. A personal strength which has best been described as a cable of steel which, while bending this way and that way to keep the ship from tipping over, gets to it's intended destination.
9. An eternal patience throughout the most trying of circumstances, including a Civil War, the early loss of his mother, the loss of 3 out of 4 of his children, and a wife whose mental state deteriorated under the same tragedies.
10. A personal space which was impenetrable by his closest of associates
11. A defense of the rights and dignity of humans irrespective of their ethnicity, their religion, their social or economic status, their culture, their divergent personalities---even when he knew this defense of those with whom he had so little in common would lead to his likely death. In a strange way Lincoln was a protector of all groups and a member of none. Even his skin color was some sort of strange swarthy nondescript shade of something or other.
12. The simplicity of his daily life. No pomp and circumstance, no tailored clothing, no best of anything, no pretenses about anything, no particular interests in the trappings of wealth or personal dress.
13. A personal honesty which disarmed many a virulent opponent.
14. An insistent availability to those from all walks of life through his open door policy held two afternoons a week.
15. Uncanny manipulative skills which enabled him to get divergent populations to pull generally in the same direction, if even for different reasons.
16. A persistence which emanated from an unreal ability to focus on matters at hand in precise logical ways regardless of his surroundings or the events unraveling in the varied theaters of his life.
17. A sensitivity to the plight of the unfortunate which radiated from his actions all his life.
18. A self depreciating humbleness which made others from all walks of life comfortable in his presence.
19. A thought process which started with an openness about any subject matter, encompassed input from divergent sources, and proceeded with impressionable logic to a conclusion.
20. A personality so complex and mysterious that others in his presence were often mesmerized by the essence of their experience. One person even refused to see Lincoln anymore because he hated the policies of Lincoln, always felt bested by any conversation with him, and angry that afterwards he could not resist a certain kindness toward Lincoln despite his wanting to feel otherwise.
21. The total absence of revenge for behaviors which he despised. He often reminded those in the north that if they were born in the south they would think and behave the same way. Lincoln concentrated on changes for the betterment of humanity, never revenge for past crimes against humanity.
22. His refusal to be drawn into any argument about inherent abilities or talents of any particular group of people. For Lincoln it was always about freedom and justice for all.
23. A religiosity which permeated his life despite never becoming a member of any church, attending church services, or professing allegiance to any of the rituals or varied peculiarities of the differing sects.
24. He wrote his own speeches and made very few of them.
25. He had no propaganda or spin machine, just 2 secretaries and 1 part time secretary. His written and personal communications with others as revealed by these others were the primary conduit of his thoughts to the public.
26. Lincoln rarely left Washington and then almost exclusively to visit his generals and the troops. He did not vacation and his work day was from 7 AM until 11PM. He did leave Washington to make a speech at Gettysburg. It was two paragraphs long and remains one of the most admired masterpieces of the English language and of our political history. It may have been written on a napkin.
It was so apt that the first words spoken by another person after Lincoln took his last breath were: "Now he belongs to the ages." I guess so.
With so much written about Lincoln it is difficult now to view the forest for the sake of the trees. Metaphorically speaking Lincoln was the biggest forest of human largeness in history. Documentation of each reason for this listed below requires attention to the details found in the research behind the thousands of books written about him. The below are the conclusions not the justifications. Others would no doubt add more to the list.
1. His humble beginnings and early life in bona-fide log cabins
2. His rise to an unusually superb use of the English Language with only 3 or 4 months of formal schooling in his life
3. His understanding of human nature and it's universality.
4. His ability to bring out the best in those with whom he came in contact
5. His wry sense of humor
6. A physical appearance which belied his genius and opened the door for his enemies to refer to him as the original ape.
7. A kindness to children, to animals, to every sort of ethnic human which remained steadfast despite the many cruelties thrust at him from every direction.
8. A personal strength which has best been described as a cable of steel which, while bending this way and that way to keep the ship from tipping over, gets to it's intended destination.
9. An eternal patience throughout the most trying of circumstances, including a Civil War, the early loss of his mother, the loss of 3 out of 4 of his children, and a wife whose mental state deteriorated under the same tragedies.
10. A personal space which was impenetrable by his closest of associates
11. A defense of the rights and dignity of humans irrespective of their ethnicity, their religion, their social or economic status, their culture, their divergent personalities---even when he knew this defense of those with whom he had so little in common would lead to his likely death. In a strange way Lincoln was a protector of all groups and a member of none. Even his skin color was some sort of strange swarthy nondescript shade of something or other.
12. The simplicity of his daily life. No pomp and circumstance, no tailored clothing, no best of anything, no pretenses about anything, no particular interests in the trappings of wealth or personal dress.
13. A personal honesty which disarmed many a virulent opponent.
14. An insistent availability to those from all walks of life through his open door policy held two afternoons a week.
15. Uncanny manipulative skills which enabled him to get divergent populations to pull generally in the same direction, if even for different reasons.
16. A persistence which emanated from an unreal ability to focus on matters at hand in precise logical ways regardless of his surroundings or the events unraveling in the varied theaters of his life.
17. A sensitivity to the plight of the unfortunate which radiated from his actions all his life.
18. A self depreciating humbleness which made others from all walks of life comfortable in his presence.
19. A thought process which started with an openness about any subject matter, encompassed input from divergent sources, and proceeded with impressionable logic to a conclusion.
20. A personality so complex and mysterious that others in his presence were often mesmerized by the essence of their experience. One person even refused to see Lincoln anymore because he hated the policies of Lincoln, always felt bested by any conversation with him, and angry that afterwards he could not resist a certain kindness toward Lincoln despite his wanting to feel otherwise.
21. The total absence of revenge for behaviors which he despised. He often reminded those in the north that if they were born in the south they would think and behave the same way. Lincoln concentrated on changes for the betterment of humanity, never revenge for past crimes against humanity.
22. His refusal to be drawn into any argument about inherent abilities or talents of any particular group of people. For Lincoln it was always about freedom and justice for all.
23. A religiosity which permeated his life despite never becoming a member of any church, attending church services, or professing allegiance to any of the rituals or varied peculiarities of the differing sects.
24. He wrote his own speeches and made very few of them.
25. He had no propaganda or spin machine, just 2 secretaries and 1 part time secretary. His written and personal communications with others as revealed by these others were the primary conduit of his thoughts to the public.
26. Lincoln rarely left Washington and then almost exclusively to visit his generals and the troops. He did not vacation and his work day was from 7 AM until 11PM. He did leave Washington to make a speech at Gettysburg. It was two paragraphs long and remains one of the most admired masterpieces of the English language and of our political history. It may have been written on a napkin.
It was so apt that the first words spoken by another person after Lincoln took his last breath were: "Now he belongs to the ages." I guess so.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
PRESIDENT BUSH VS JUNIOR LIEUTENANT BEAH
President Bush vs Junior Lieutenant Beah
I have listened to foreign policy statements from a lot of our importantly titled patriotic political leaders. It all seems, mostly, to be more of the same, the only difference often being where bloodshed will occur and by what means. 9/11 and George Bush certainly changed the nature of conflict, the reasons for war, and the prospects of any peace across our globe. The best insight on all this, for me, came from Junior Lieutenant Beah in 1996, speaking before the United Nations.
Lieutenant Beah is a tad different from George Bush. Bush was raised waddling in wealth. There was never much of any need for Bush to chase after, or achieve much of, anything---everything was handed to or arranged for boy George to amass the kind of money and titles appropriate for his status in life, that status as a son of a former Vice-President and President. Even school came easy for George---with a C average and mediocre entrance exam scores George was admitted to Yale, but of course not under any affirmative action program, so in his circles it was legitimate. George seemed a nice enough harmless enought spoiled brat, enjoyed baseball and partying. When the Vietnam War came along George was little interested in real combat or bringing democracy to Vietnam, and it was quietly arranged for him to be assigned to some sort of special National Guard Unit. Back then the National Guard was a way to avoid Vietnam. He was moved to the front of the line to be trained to be some sort of pilot. Near the end of his tenure in the National Guard no one seems to remember him ever even being present in any capacity. What was known is that he refused to keep his pilot license up to date. Maybe he knew such an act would subject him to some future assignment in some war somewhere or maybe George just lost interest in being a pilot, the reason for being a pilot gone with his escape from going to Vietnam. Like myself (a 'valuable' graduate student) George escaped. My culpability is probably worse than George since early on I was gung ho for that war. After the war George's dad directly or indirectly bought George a baseball team. George has since said he enjoyed owning a baseball team as much as anything in life. Somewhere along the line George learned to achieve things in life by his gut feelings. Every gut feeling was always rewarded, from baseball team owner to Governor of Texas to President of the United States. 9/11 changed George and for the first time George showed some real interest in something serious. Unfortunately, for the rest of the country, George genuinely liked being Commander in Chief. In George's case 'war has no fury like a noncombatant'. On any other matter George sort of gets glassy eyed and bored, but Commander in Chief gets his adrenaline going along with his usual gut feelings. The rest is now history: a total global mess with violence as the solution and a rapidly growing number of terrorist groups busily engaged in random killings to teach those they hold responsible for their unhappiness a lesson. The tragedy of George is that he doesn't know what he doesn't know and the less he knows the more sure he is that he knows a lot. Poor George (and the rest of us), the more he spends and the more he kills---the more terrorists, the better they are trained, the less centralized any control over them, and the most powerful military operation in the world becomes more and more reduced to circling wagons in heavily armed 'green' zones here and there.
The latest answer to all of this from President Bush is to surge things up, declare a situation he has created to be a fight to the death, a war between Good and Evil, freedom fighters vs. terrorists, right wing Christians vs radical Muslims, and the right of our country to place military bases all over the globe, mostly to ensure countries have as leaders those who understand the importance of doing our bidding on all sorts of matters. We will be the deciders and George will be our decider. Then everything will be ok; peace and prosperity will come to all. George's gut feelings tell us this. Prior to this who could have guessed he had any guts. The President says, over and over, with each news conference, that progress is being made. Sure. Any more progress and we are ruined.
Personally, I think Junior Lieutenant Beah has a clearer insight on foreign policy. I first saw Mr. Beah in an interview on Chicago Tonight, a public television news program. He piqued my interest and so I read a book he wrote titled, Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. His whole name is Ishmael Beah and he became a Lieutenant in a government army at age 12: that's right age 12, a Junior Lieutenant in charge of his own unit, all members around his own age. Before his army stint, Ishmael was visiting another village the day rebels attacked and murdered or sent fleeing all those in his home town. It wasn't Sudan, Somalia, Darfar, Iraq, Afghanistan, or any of the other many such crazy cruel conflicts spread across the globe---his hell was found in Sierra Leone. His story is similar to other kids in so many places across the earth---no family, left alone with no home, no food, fleeing with other kids as best they can, seeing death from disease, starvation, machetes, from being set on fire, shot, drowned---until the innocence of youth is lost along with respect for human life. To get access to food and some kind of family, these kids join armies, are supplied weapons and drugs to help them get over their horrors and fears of all that goes on around them. Supplied with modern weapons, usually American made, the pattern is similar world wide. Lieutenant Beah's unit would sneak up on an unsuspecting village then gun down all the inhabitants, burn many alive in their own homes, and sometimes make some women and children haul the loot back to their camp before killing them. Nothing was too cruel---slow torture, burying people alive, rape, every despicable act imaginable. Kids being kids I guess.
At some point the army he was part of agreed to stop using boy soldiers and U.N. representatives showed up at his camp one day and all the kids were forcibly saved (removed) to a rehabilitation facility. The kids were angry, they felt they were now alone again, helpless, with no power, and a lost meaning to their lives. They fought viciously with each other practically every day and attacked their counselors and teachers at every opportunity. They tore up any books given to teach them, and went through terrifying withdrawal symptoms from their former drug use and war atrocities. With the drug withdrawal came nightmares and they trusted no one, most of all the staff of the facility. Many were permanently lost to a mindset of irrationality. Ishmael credits his rehabilitation with the patience of a particular nurse and a UN counselor. It took 2 years for him recover his lost human feelings for others. Whenever Ishmael would get violent towards others or himself these two guardian angels would tell him "it's not your fault", but he hated to hear that so much he would then attack them. Slowly his lost boyhood innocence began to emerge and the former Lieutenant began to trust others, smile, and enjoy some things in life. They managed to find a relative, an uncle who took him in to his home. The other kids in his new home were not told of his past because people feared former boy soldiers---as well they should have.
He progressed so much that they sent him to New York to address the UN. He was 16 years old then. Here is his little speech: "I am from Sierra Leone, and the problem that is affecting us children is the war that forces us to run away from our homes, lose our families, and aimlessly roam the forests. As a result, we get involved in the conflict as soldiers, carriers of loads, and many other difficult tasks. All this is because of starvation, the loss of our families, and the need to feel safe and be part of something when all else has broken down. I joined the army really because of the loss of my family and starvation. I wanted to revenge the deaths of my family. I also had to get some food to survive, and the only way to do that was to be part of the army. It was not easy being a soldier, but we just had to do it. I have been rehabilitated now, so don't be afraid of me. I am not a soldier anymore; I am a child. We are all brothers and sisters. What I have learned from my experiences is that revenge is not good. I joined the army to avenge the deaths of my family and to survive, but I've come to learn that if I am going to take revenge, in that process I will kill another person whose family will want revenge; then revenge and revenge and revenge will never come to an end."
George Bush has led America down the path of endless revenge. George Bush is not rehabilitated. We all need to fear him. Most now do, even Americans. Anyone anywhere who fights to get the U.S. military out of their country is labeled a member of El Qaida. The number of dissident groups fighting across the globe with any kind of real link to El Qaida leaders is probably absurdly small. The link with El Qaida hangs essentially on one common thread---fighting to get U.S. forces out of their country. Many of these new militias are far worse than El Qaida in that they are devoid of any political or religious principles. They are mostly gangs of thugs thriving on violence and fear, simply stripping communities of property and valuables. To the extent we continue to try to out terrorize the terrorists, to keep fighting on their terms---we cannot win and everyone loses. Junior Lieutenant Beah has seen it all close up. Revenge is a scourge hard to shake.
P.S. Ishmael returned to Sierra Leone but a coup occurred and once again Ishmael was sent running out into the forests alone, without family or friends. This time he was determined not to join any army but wended his way, alone, to the border of Guinea. He managed to get across the border, and contacted some older woman he met while in New York. She got him to New York, adopted him, he graduated from high school and recently from Oberlin College. He lives in New York. He is now 26 years old. I wish he were our Secretary of State. He understands the nature and consequences of what is going on across the globe. His priorities are now straight. We need to follow suit. He could probably justifiably claim that Jesus, Buddha, and most all the assorted religious leaders of the past and present would take his side. Those who think otherwise must have little real understanding of religious principles. Sorry George. I doubt God is very happy with you. Lincoln, who understood human nature as well as anyone, served as President during a most contentious Civil War, and unlike Bush, faced the situation thusly: "I shall do nothing through malice; what I deal with is too vast for malice." It makes sense to be concerned more with whether we are on God's side than arrogantly assume God is on our side. Maybe he is on neither side right now, the behavior on both sides is seeped with malice. Not good.
I have listened to foreign policy statements from a lot of our importantly titled patriotic political leaders. It all seems, mostly, to be more of the same, the only difference often being where bloodshed will occur and by what means. 9/11 and George Bush certainly changed the nature of conflict, the reasons for war, and the prospects of any peace across our globe. The best insight on all this, for me, came from Junior Lieutenant Beah in 1996, speaking before the United Nations.
Lieutenant Beah is a tad different from George Bush. Bush was raised waddling in wealth. There was never much of any need for Bush to chase after, or achieve much of, anything---everything was handed to or arranged for boy George to amass the kind of money and titles appropriate for his status in life, that status as a son of a former Vice-President and President. Even school came easy for George---with a C average and mediocre entrance exam scores George was admitted to Yale, but of course not under any affirmative action program, so in his circles it was legitimate. George seemed a nice enough harmless enought spoiled brat, enjoyed baseball and partying. When the Vietnam War came along George was little interested in real combat or bringing democracy to Vietnam, and it was quietly arranged for him to be assigned to some sort of special National Guard Unit. Back then the National Guard was a way to avoid Vietnam. He was moved to the front of the line to be trained to be some sort of pilot. Near the end of his tenure in the National Guard no one seems to remember him ever even being present in any capacity. What was known is that he refused to keep his pilot license up to date. Maybe he knew such an act would subject him to some future assignment in some war somewhere or maybe George just lost interest in being a pilot, the reason for being a pilot gone with his escape from going to Vietnam. Like myself (a 'valuable' graduate student) George escaped. My culpability is probably worse than George since early on I was gung ho for that war. After the war George's dad directly or indirectly bought George a baseball team. George has since said he enjoyed owning a baseball team as much as anything in life. Somewhere along the line George learned to achieve things in life by his gut feelings. Every gut feeling was always rewarded, from baseball team owner to Governor of Texas to President of the United States. 9/11 changed George and for the first time George showed some real interest in something serious. Unfortunately, for the rest of the country, George genuinely liked being Commander in Chief. In George's case 'war has no fury like a noncombatant'. On any other matter George sort of gets glassy eyed and bored, but Commander in Chief gets his adrenaline going along with his usual gut feelings. The rest is now history: a total global mess with violence as the solution and a rapidly growing number of terrorist groups busily engaged in random killings to teach those they hold responsible for their unhappiness a lesson. The tragedy of George is that he doesn't know what he doesn't know and the less he knows the more sure he is that he knows a lot. Poor George (and the rest of us), the more he spends and the more he kills---the more terrorists, the better they are trained, the less centralized any control over them, and the most powerful military operation in the world becomes more and more reduced to circling wagons in heavily armed 'green' zones here and there.
The latest answer to all of this from President Bush is to surge things up, declare a situation he has created to be a fight to the death, a war between Good and Evil, freedom fighters vs. terrorists, right wing Christians vs radical Muslims, and the right of our country to place military bases all over the globe, mostly to ensure countries have as leaders those who understand the importance of doing our bidding on all sorts of matters. We will be the deciders and George will be our decider. Then everything will be ok; peace and prosperity will come to all. George's gut feelings tell us this. Prior to this who could have guessed he had any guts. The President says, over and over, with each news conference, that progress is being made. Sure. Any more progress and we are ruined.
Personally, I think Junior Lieutenant Beah has a clearer insight on foreign policy. I first saw Mr. Beah in an interview on Chicago Tonight, a public television news program. He piqued my interest and so I read a book he wrote titled, Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. His whole name is Ishmael Beah and he became a Lieutenant in a government army at age 12: that's right age 12, a Junior Lieutenant in charge of his own unit, all members around his own age. Before his army stint, Ishmael was visiting another village the day rebels attacked and murdered or sent fleeing all those in his home town. It wasn't Sudan, Somalia, Darfar, Iraq, Afghanistan, or any of the other many such crazy cruel conflicts spread across the globe---his hell was found in Sierra Leone. His story is similar to other kids in so many places across the earth---no family, left alone with no home, no food, fleeing with other kids as best they can, seeing death from disease, starvation, machetes, from being set on fire, shot, drowned---until the innocence of youth is lost along with respect for human life. To get access to food and some kind of family, these kids join armies, are supplied weapons and drugs to help them get over their horrors and fears of all that goes on around them. Supplied with modern weapons, usually American made, the pattern is similar world wide. Lieutenant Beah's unit would sneak up on an unsuspecting village then gun down all the inhabitants, burn many alive in their own homes, and sometimes make some women and children haul the loot back to their camp before killing them. Nothing was too cruel---slow torture, burying people alive, rape, every despicable act imaginable. Kids being kids I guess.
At some point the army he was part of agreed to stop using boy soldiers and U.N. representatives showed up at his camp one day and all the kids were forcibly saved (removed) to a rehabilitation facility. The kids were angry, they felt they were now alone again, helpless, with no power, and a lost meaning to their lives. They fought viciously with each other practically every day and attacked their counselors and teachers at every opportunity. They tore up any books given to teach them, and went through terrifying withdrawal symptoms from their former drug use and war atrocities. With the drug withdrawal came nightmares and they trusted no one, most of all the staff of the facility. Many were permanently lost to a mindset of irrationality. Ishmael credits his rehabilitation with the patience of a particular nurse and a UN counselor. It took 2 years for him recover his lost human feelings for others. Whenever Ishmael would get violent towards others or himself these two guardian angels would tell him "it's not your fault", but he hated to hear that so much he would then attack them. Slowly his lost boyhood innocence began to emerge and the former Lieutenant began to trust others, smile, and enjoy some things in life. They managed to find a relative, an uncle who took him in to his home. The other kids in his new home were not told of his past because people feared former boy soldiers---as well they should have.
He progressed so much that they sent him to New York to address the UN. He was 16 years old then. Here is his little speech: "I am from Sierra Leone, and the problem that is affecting us children is the war that forces us to run away from our homes, lose our families, and aimlessly roam the forests. As a result, we get involved in the conflict as soldiers, carriers of loads, and many other difficult tasks. All this is because of starvation, the loss of our families, and the need to feel safe and be part of something when all else has broken down. I joined the army really because of the loss of my family and starvation. I wanted to revenge the deaths of my family. I also had to get some food to survive, and the only way to do that was to be part of the army. It was not easy being a soldier, but we just had to do it. I have been rehabilitated now, so don't be afraid of me. I am not a soldier anymore; I am a child. We are all brothers and sisters. What I have learned from my experiences is that revenge is not good. I joined the army to avenge the deaths of my family and to survive, but I've come to learn that if I am going to take revenge, in that process I will kill another person whose family will want revenge; then revenge and revenge and revenge will never come to an end."
George Bush has led America down the path of endless revenge. George Bush is not rehabilitated. We all need to fear him. Most now do, even Americans. Anyone anywhere who fights to get the U.S. military out of their country is labeled a member of El Qaida. The number of dissident groups fighting across the globe with any kind of real link to El Qaida leaders is probably absurdly small. The link with El Qaida hangs essentially on one common thread---fighting to get U.S. forces out of their country. Many of these new militias are far worse than El Qaida in that they are devoid of any political or religious principles. They are mostly gangs of thugs thriving on violence and fear, simply stripping communities of property and valuables. To the extent we continue to try to out terrorize the terrorists, to keep fighting on their terms---we cannot win and everyone loses. Junior Lieutenant Beah has seen it all close up. Revenge is a scourge hard to shake.
P.S. Ishmael returned to Sierra Leone but a coup occurred and once again Ishmael was sent running out into the forests alone, without family or friends. This time he was determined not to join any army but wended his way, alone, to the border of Guinea. He managed to get across the border, and contacted some older woman he met while in New York. She got him to New York, adopted him, he graduated from high school and recently from Oberlin College. He lives in New York. He is now 26 years old. I wish he were our Secretary of State. He understands the nature and consequences of what is going on across the globe. His priorities are now straight. We need to follow suit. He could probably justifiably claim that Jesus, Buddha, and most all the assorted religious leaders of the past and present would take his side. Those who think otherwise must have little real understanding of religious principles. Sorry George. I doubt God is very happy with you. Lincoln, who understood human nature as well as anyone, served as President during a most contentious Civil War, and unlike Bush, faced the situation thusly: "I shall do nothing through malice; what I deal with is too vast for malice." It makes sense to be concerned more with whether we are on God's side than arrogantly assume God is on our side. Maybe he is on neither side right now, the behavior on both sides is seeped with malice. Not good.
Sunday, August 5, 2007
SO NEAR YOU CAN ALMOST TOUCH IT
So Near You Can Almost Touch It:
The Manager of my condo building is always telling others I am her happiest owner. I suppose on a purely personal level I might even be---there are not a lot of major problems with which I must deal on a daily basis. These days I thrive on peace, quiet, eating, walking, reading, and writing. I am well aware it will not last forever, maybe the vultures are already gathering to hover over me, at least during my daily jaunts through the forest preserve, the McCormick estate, Morton Arboretum, or Chicago's lakefront.
But there is a pensive side of me which feels sad, and the more I observe our troubled times the sadder I kind of feel, and the more I fear my prediction of 13 years ago which pegs chaotic disintegration in our country within 2 years after Bush leaves office. No one could read many of my musings without sensing a certain amount of suspicion things are too often overstated, or simply too unsettling. So I root against myself, hoping that it all amounts to the babbling nonsense of an idiot past his prime. Still, a chaotic collapse seems so near one can almost touch it.
No singular sign stands out except human overpopulation of the globe; the rest are notable because there are so many signs, in so many ways, in so many places. This musing was prompted by the murder of that gorilla family in the Congo. Senseless slaughter---not for the meat or body parts just killing for the hell of it---or maybe because humans want the land to build on or forest for lumber, whatever. The gorillas are simply in their way. Women killing and cutting out babies from pregnant mothers so they can have a baby; mindless drive-by shootings, teenagers killing teenagers (around 60 per year in Chicago alone), people cheering at dog fights, young children growing up behind barred windows and doors, 41 million people without health insurance, the existence of millions upon millions of refugees across the globe, the millions upon millions of homeless; the millions and millions of people who die from preventable disease; the wanton mindless destruction of natural resources across the globe; a species extinction rate not seen for millions of years; an accumulation of immense wealth in the hands of a few---the kind of accumulation never seen in our country's history; atmospheric pollution affecting climate which is not corrected because of the cost; a military and War on Drugs budget which totally overshadows anything else on which this country spends money, and for which cost is never a matter; a growing disparity between the poor and the affluent which is growing more disparate in this country compared to any other industrialized country; the rapidly declining purchasing power of our minimum wage; the increase in work hours, decrease in pay, loss of pensions, and loss of health care rampant and growing in our work force; an absurd obsession with technological gadgets which guts any sense of community or inter-family socialization (call it family values if you must, I call it family isolation); the incarceration of citizens to the tune now of over 2 million, the highest incarceration rate in the world (this is my country?); the near total control of our Congress, the Presidency, the Judicial system and the media by corporate buy ups; an educational system that is underfunded, mismanaged, and widely disparate in terms of money spent per child; non secure borders; employers free to hire illegal aliens; professional sport teams controlled, with no oversight, by wealthy owners and player unions; a Presidency riddled with greedy self serving slime balls, answering to no one and provided a pardon if caught and convicted; an American empire that is so overreached, so disrespectful of others, and so arrogant as to have spawned an increasingly out of control massive terrorist movement across the globe; the establishment of pre-emptive wars (Hitler kind of invented this kind of mentality); the use of military force without ever first attempting dialogue, use of international courts, or negotiation; the establishment of military bases by a country of one religion all over the lands of countries of a different religion (brilliant!); a growing pervasive indifference to the plight of others and to justice for all; etc. This list could go on and on but I don't wish to spend more than fifteen minutes compiling one.
But it is really scary. In the past our history was such that major problems were small in number, everyone could therefore focus on them. and subsequent progress was the result. Now we are inundated from all sides, we can no longer see the forest for the sake of the trees, individuals feel powerless, there is no frontier to escape to (where the hell can anyone run for escape today?), and the evolutionary event of human overpopulation seems totally beyond the grasp of human responsibility. Those who prate on about how humans, or at least their particular clump of humanity, are under some kind of protection by the Creator, are fools clinging to illusions---but no more so than I, who spends so much time sensing the tragedy already upon so many, and encroaching ever so rapidly on the rest of us. I need to shape up, put on my blinders, party myself into some sort of induced hedonistic stupor until the end-point cliff arrives, or natural death first---either way death levels all, and I will take my last voyage---a giant leap in the dark. The curtain will be drawn and the farce played out. Well, it was a fun, interesting run. I just don't like the finish.
Of course there is no finish. The Created evolutionary process has been in existence for billions of years---this 'little gleam of Time between two eternities' of which constitutes our own existence, is but a footnote in the continuum of life---these mysterious little molecules of DNA, of which our own unique lives were generated---these molecules continue on, get shuffled again and again, giving rise to new forms of life, thus presenting us with the clearest understanding our current human mind can grasp, namely----time doesn't pass; time stays, we go.
'Say good-night Gracie'.
The Manager of my condo building is always telling others I am her happiest owner. I suppose on a purely personal level I might even be---there are not a lot of major problems with which I must deal on a daily basis. These days I thrive on peace, quiet, eating, walking, reading, and writing. I am well aware it will not last forever, maybe the vultures are already gathering to hover over me, at least during my daily jaunts through the forest preserve, the McCormick estate, Morton Arboretum, or Chicago's lakefront.
But there is a pensive side of me which feels sad, and the more I observe our troubled times the sadder I kind of feel, and the more I fear my prediction of 13 years ago which pegs chaotic disintegration in our country within 2 years after Bush leaves office. No one could read many of my musings without sensing a certain amount of suspicion things are too often overstated, or simply too unsettling. So I root against myself, hoping that it all amounts to the babbling nonsense of an idiot past his prime. Still, a chaotic collapse seems so near one can almost touch it.
No singular sign stands out except human overpopulation of the globe; the rest are notable because there are so many signs, in so many ways, in so many places. This musing was prompted by the murder of that gorilla family in the Congo. Senseless slaughter---not for the meat or body parts just killing for the hell of it---or maybe because humans want the land to build on or forest for lumber, whatever. The gorillas are simply in their way. Women killing and cutting out babies from pregnant mothers so they can have a baby; mindless drive-by shootings, teenagers killing teenagers (around 60 per year in Chicago alone), people cheering at dog fights, young children growing up behind barred windows and doors, 41 million people without health insurance, the existence of millions upon millions of refugees across the globe, the millions upon millions of homeless; the millions and millions of people who die from preventable disease; the wanton mindless destruction of natural resources across the globe; a species extinction rate not seen for millions of years; an accumulation of immense wealth in the hands of a few---the kind of accumulation never seen in our country's history; atmospheric pollution affecting climate which is not corrected because of the cost; a military and War on Drugs budget which totally overshadows anything else on which this country spends money, and for which cost is never a matter; a growing disparity between the poor and the affluent which is growing more disparate in this country compared to any other industrialized country; the rapidly declining purchasing power of our minimum wage; the increase in work hours, decrease in pay, loss of pensions, and loss of health care rampant and growing in our work force; an absurd obsession with technological gadgets which guts any sense of community or inter-family socialization (call it family values if you must, I call it family isolation); the incarceration of citizens to the tune now of over 2 million, the highest incarceration rate in the world (this is my country?); the near total control of our Congress, the Presidency, the Judicial system and the media by corporate buy ups; an educational system that is underfunded, mismanaged, and widely disparate in terms of money spent per child; non secure borders; employers free to hire illegal aliens; professional sport teams controlled, with no oversight, by wealthy owners and player unions; a Presidency riddled with greedy self serving slime balls, answering to no one and provided a pardon if caught and convicted; an American empire that is so overreached, so disrespectful of others, and so arrogant as to have spawned an increasingly out of control massive terrorist movement across the globe; the establishment of pre-emptive wars (Hitler kind of invented this kind of mentality); the use of military force without ever first attempting dialogue, use of international courts, or negotiation; the establishment of military bases by a country of one religion all over the lands of countries of a different religion (brilliant!); a growing pervasive indifference to the plight of others and to justice for all; etc. This list could go on and on but I don't wish to spend more than fifteen minutes compiling one.
But it is really scary. In the past our history was such that major problems were small in number, everyone could therefore focus on them. and subsequent progress was the result. Now we are inundated from all sides, we can no longer see the forest for the sake of the trees, individuals feel powerless, there is no frontier to escape to (where the hell can anyone run for escape today?), and the evolutionary event of human overpopulation seems totally beyond the grasp of human responsibility. Those who prate on about how humans, or at least their particular clump of humanity, are under some kind of protection by the Creator, are fools clinging to illusions---but no more so than I, who spends so much time sensing the tragedy already upon so many, and encroaching ever so rapidly on the rest of us. I need to shape up, put on my blinders, party myself into some sort of induced hedonistic stupor until the end-point cliff arrives, or natural death first---either way death levels all, and I will take my last voyage---a giant leap in the dark. The curtain will be drawn and the farce played out. Well, it was a fun, interesting run. I just don't like the finish.
Of course there is no finish. The Created evolutionary process has been in existence for billions of years---this 'little gleam of Time between two eternities' of which constitutes our own existence, is but a footnote in the continuum of life---these mysterious little molecules of DNA, of which our own unique lives were generated---these molecules continue on, get shuffled again and again, giving rise to new forms of life, thus presenting us with the clearest understanding our current human mind can grasp, namely----time doesn't pass; time stays, we go.
'Say good-night Gracie'.
Thursday, August 2, 2007
THE SANCTITY OF LIFE
The Sanctity of Life:
Here's a concept to which almost everyone will say Amen. But what any of us really mean by it is elusive. It seems mostly a feeling that surges forth selectively, more frequently and more strongly in some than others. It wasn't that long ago when the whole country was caught up in the comatose life of a young gal, I think her name was Nancy, who had been comatose for years and the husband wanted to pull the plug and her parents didn't and before long even Congress and the President were all in a dither about the whole thing. I guess everyone agrees life is precious in some sort of vague way. For most there clearly are exceptions, like serial killers for one example. I looked at my cat Keisha sleeping so peacefully on the bed this morning and since she is 14 years old I realized something precious was soon to be lost. But the precious in this case would be limited to me. So much in life is always so relative.
Are some lives more precious than others? When Kennedy was shot it certainly seemed so. When Lincoln was shot the whole country went into prolonged dazed grief. Those who had unmercifully censured him months and years prior to his being shot wailed as loud as any others. If Bin Laden were to be captured and killed, Americans would rejoice, but a much larger mass of humanity would be outraged. A martyr would be born. Maybe that is why he alone, of all the El Qaida leaders, mysteriously escapes capture. Booth, for example, did the worst possible thing for his cause in killing Lincoln.
Part of the problem is that life is a continuum. Since the Created beginning it has never ended. We all, for example, arose from already living cells. At the genetic level we have always existed since the beginning of life, alive but in different forms until some hap-pence shuffling gave us our current form. Even then, aside from our functioning mental state we just ain't we. Over time our mental state changes so any "I" refers to a particular point in time. With so many varied mental states and subsequent interpretations of external events, what the hell can be determined as the truth? Then too, isn't life only precious to the conscious living? In that sense when we say life is precious it is kind of a selfish statement. I guess when others die it is more a misfortune----when we die it is more a tragedy.
Perhaps the concept of 'life is precious' needs qualification. Clearly for some people, for reasons of mental illness or life circumstance, life is not precious and they commit suicide. Who determines whether life is precious? Or more precisely how precious?
When we use the term 'life is precious' are we incorporating the quality of life into this term? When a parent lovingly states the life of their child is precious, they don't seem to mean just alive functioning cells. They seem to imply preciousness incorporates for their child good health, a good education, a good home, ample opportunities for a successful life, etc. I am sure they do. If all of this is part of the concept of 'life is precious' for their own child, it must, by any line of logic, mean the same implications apply to all children. Either that or life is only precious, in the full sense of the term, to select children. Here is where I part company with the 'family values' religious right.
All children, because life is precious, deserve to have equal amounts of money spent on their education, their health, and ample opportunities for a successful life, including an adequate adult support base whether that support base be all biological or not. When family values applies to all families I see the ethics; when, in reality, it applies to just certain families, then I interpret this as unethical, selfish, and uncharitable. Life, isolated simply into some living cells, is not inherently precious. A child's life in the worst squalor of a ghetto is not precious by definition. If the child's life were precious, no valid civilized moral society would allow the child to live under such circumstances. Keisha, my cat, is precious to me. The scrawny alley cat who scurries across my visual sight is not precious to me. So at least with cat lives, there is no blanket 'life is precious'. One cannot logically claim something is precious and treat it otherwise.
Those who are against universal health care policies for everyone consider the cost and sacrifice attending such a venture. They cannot possibly be serious about any sanctity of life. It becomes a term which then applies only to their own lives. Is it remotely reasonable to distill the term sanctity of life to mean only some functioning living cells? I mean that's it? The word life is reduced to that and then hailed as some sort of sacred duty to keep those cells going by any means for as long as possible? By this weird priority we can leave a child adrift with poor nutrition, no health insurance, no decent schools or teachers, no safe atmosphere in which to play, etc. and then if he gets shot with some sort of Uzi by being in the wrong place at the wrong time---leaving him hopelessly comatose----then all hell breaks loose if someone says, "Pull the plug". It just seems the time to show concern for others is when they find themselves on an unlevel playing field. That is the time to show concern for the sanctity of life.
Part of life is dying. We put animals to sleep painlessly because we treasure their lives so much that we want them to have a painless merciful dying process. I will never forget the scene in a hospital where the guy next to me in the room was paralyzed completely from a stroke. All he could do is move his eyes. He was a minister. People came in, read scripture to him, told him God was not through with him yet, all sorts of friends and hospital personnel asked him questions in which he was to move his eyes to the right for yes and to the left for no. Never once did they ask him if he wanted to die, if this was more than he could handle. I spent a lot of time buzzing for the nurses because he was constantly and violently gagging on his own saliva. I went over to his bed once (with difficulty) to assure him I had called for help and the look in his eyes was one of pure terror. And I was helpless. I hate being helpless so I demanded to be moved to another room to prevent me from being a witness to this cruelty. I will never understand the mentality involved in the government controlled dying process. Even when permission is given to remove tubes the patient is left to either suffocate to death or starve to death. Of course we sedate them. Is there something sinful about death with dignity, a peaceful death, or a dying process according to the wishes of the person dying? To me the sanctity of life demands all this. It is the person who counts not some useless machine driven functioning cells. For over a decade others were not allowed to visit Reagan because, put bluntly, Reagan was gone. Millions were probably spent to keep Reagan alive another ten or fifteen years. Excuse me, I misspeak, Reagan was gone, the millions were spent to keep a body alive.
Every death is unique. Everyone deserves the right, when possible, to control their own dying process. Everyone is entitled to death with dignity, to decide when enough is enough, either at the time or through advance directives. To do otherwise is to buy into the mentality that says, "God is not through with you yet". What kind of God must these people worship? I can't imagine what this minister had done so evil in his life that "God was not through with him yet". If this is how God treats his subjects I am really glad I will use common sense when Keisha is dying. She is going to die the old fashioned Hemlock way----good life, good death. Why, when humans behave badly in a collective fashion do we always blame it on God? Every one of the bastards leading all the killing factions across the globe, including George Bush, believes God is on their side----even Hussein believed that. I opposed the war from day one and I agree with Obama when he said he was willing to meet with almost anyone to settle disputes peacefully. In fact no one should ever go to war without meeting the opposition to try to settle things peacefully first. There needs to be a lot less claiming God is on our side and a lot more concern about whether we are on God's side. It seems God never endorsed killing to solve disputes because unlike us, God seems to appreciate the sanctity of life. Then again, I guess the Creator of life would.
Here's a concept to which almost everyone will say Amen. But what any of us really mean by it is elusive. It seems mostly a feeling that surges forth selectively, more frequently and more strongly in some than others. It wasn't that long ago when the whole country was caught up in the comatose life of a young gal, I think her name was Nancy, who had been comatose for years and the husband wanted to pull the plug and her parents didn't and before long even Congress and the President were all in a dither about the whole thing. I guess everyone agrees life is precious in some sort of vague way. For most there clearly are exceptions, like serial killers for one example. I looked at my cat Keisha sleeping so peacefully on the bed this morning and since she is 14 years old I realized something precious was soon to be lost. But the precious in this case would be limited to me. So much in life is always so relative.
Are some lives more precious than others? When Kennedy was shot it certainly seemed so. When Lincoln was shot the whole country went into prolonged dazed grief. Those who had unmercifully censured him months and years prior to his being shot wailed as loud as any others. If Bin Laden were to be captured and killed, Americans would rejoice, but a much larger mass of humanity would be outraged. A martyr would be born. Maybe that is why he alone, of all the El Qaida leaders, mysteriously escapes capture. Booth, for example, did the worst possible thing for his cause in killing Lincoln.
Part of the problem is that life is a continuum. Since the Created beginning it has never ended. We all, for example, arose from already living cells. At the genetic level we have always existed since the beginning of life, alive but in different forms until some hap-pence shuffling gave us our current form. Even then, aside from our functioning mental state we just ain't we. Over time our mental state changes so any "I" refers to a particular point in time. With so many varied mental states and subsequent interpretations of external events, what the hell can be determined as the truth? Then too, isn't life only precious to the conscious living? In that sense when we say life is precious it is kind of a selfish statement. I guess when others die it is more a misfortune----when we die it is more a tragedy.
Perhaps the concept of 'life is precious' needs qualification. Clearly for some people, for reasons of mental illness or life circumstance, life is not precious and they commit suicide. Who determines whether life is precious? Or more precisely how precious?
When we use the term 'life is precious' are we incorporating the quality of life into this term? When a parent lovingly states the life of their child is precious, they don't seem to mean just alive functioning cells. They seem to imply preciousness incorporates for their child good health, a good education, a good home, ample opportunities for a successful life, etc. I am sure they do. If all of this is part of the concept of 'life is precious' for their own child, it must, by any line of logic, mean the same implications apply to all children. Either that or life is only precious, in the full sense of the term, to select children. Here is where I part company with the 'family values' religious right.
All children, because life is precious, deserve to have equal amounts of money spent on their education, their health, and ample opportunities for a successful life, including an adequate adult support base whether that support base be all biological or not. When family values applies to all families I see the ethics; when, in reality, it applies to just certain families, then I interpret this as unethical, selfish, and uncharitable. Life, isolated simply into some living cells, is not inherently precious. A child's life in the worst squalor of a ghetto is not precious by definition. If the child's life were precious, no valid civilized moral society would allow the child to live under such circumstances. Keisha, my cat, is precious to me. The scrawny alley cat who scurries across my visual sight is not precious to me. So at least with cat lives, there is no blanket 'life is precious'. One cannot logically claim something is precious and treat it otherwise.
Those who are against universal health care policies for everyone consider the cost and sacrifice attending such a venture. They cannot possibly be serious about any sanctity of life. It becomes a term which then applies only to their own lives. Is it remotely reasonable to distill the term sanctity of life to mean only some functioning living cells? I mean that's it? The word life is reduced to that and then hailed as some sort of sacred duty to keep those cells going by any means for as long as possible? By this weird priority we can leave a child adrift with poor nutrition, no health insurance, no decent schools or teachers, no safe atmosphere in which to play, etc. and then if he gets shot with some sort of Uzi by being in the wrong place at the wrong time---leaving him hopelessly comatose----then all hell breaks loose if someone says, "Pull the plug". It just seems the time to show concern for others is when they find themselves on an unlevel playing field. That is the time to show concern for the sanctity of life.
Part of life is dying. We put animals to sleep painlessly because we treasure their lives so much that we want them to have a painless merciful dying process. I will never forget the scene in a hospital where the guy next to me in the room was paralyzed completely from a stroke. All he could do is move his eyes. He was a minister. People came in, read scripture to him, told him God was not through with him yet, all sorts of friends and hospital personnel asked him questions in which he was to move his eyes to the right for yes and to the left for no. Never once did they ask him if he wanted to die, if this was more than he could handle. I spent a lot of time buzzing for the nurses because he was constantly and violently gagging on his own saliva. I went over to his bed once (with difficulty) to assure him I had called for help and the look in his eyes was one of pure terror. And I was helpless. I hate being helpless so I demanded to be moved to another room to prevent me from being a witness to this cruelty. I will never understand the mentality involved in the government controlled dying process. Even when permission is given to remove tubes the patient is left to either suffocate to death or starve to death. Of course we sedate them. Is there something sinful about death with dignity, a peaceful death, or a dying process according to the wishes of the person dying? To me the sanctity of life demands all this. It is the person who counts not some useless machine driven functioning cells. For over a decade others were not allowed to visit Reagan because, put bluntly, Reagan was gone. Millions were probably spent to keep Reagan alive another ten or fifteen years. Excuse me, I misspeak, Reagan was gone, the millions were spent to keep a body alive.
Every death is unique. Everyone deserves the right, when possible, to control their own dying process. Everyone is entitled to death with dignity, to decide when enough is enough, either at the time or through advance directives. To do otherwise is to buy into the mentality that says, "God is not through with you yet". What kind of God must these people worship? I can't imagine what this minister had done so evil in his life that "God was not through with him yet". If this is how God treats his subjects I am really glad I will use common sense when Keisha is dying. She is going to die the old fashioned Hemlock way----good life, good death. Why, when humans behave badly in a collective fashion do we always blame it on God? Every one of the bastards leading all the killing factions across the globe, including George Bush, believes God is on their side----even Hussein believed that. I opposed the war from day one and I agree with Obama when he said he was willing to meet with almost anyone to settle disputes peacefully. In fact no one should ever go to war without meeting the opposition to try to settle things peacefully first. There needs to be a lot less claiming God is on our side and a lot more concern about whether we are on God's side. It seems God never endorsed killing to solve disputes because unlike us, God seems to appreciate the sanctity of life. Then again, I guess the Creator of life would.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
WHY U.S. MUST GET OUT OF IRAQ NOW
Why the U.S. Must Get Out of Iraq NOW:
The latest justifications for continuing the occupation of Iraq are merely more of the same disingenuous tripe the American public have been fed since beginning the invasion of Iraq. As always, the U.S. is portrayed as the Good Guys using freedom fighters, under God, fighting Bad Guys to bring freedom and peace to a troubled region. It has never bothered President Bush that the reasons for attacking a supposedly sovereign country were false, that his actions have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilian men, women, and children, that his actions have resulted in a vast growth in the number of terrorists in Iraq and across the world (probably few with any direct or meaningful connections with El Qaida, but sympathetic to El Qaida), that his actions have created an Iraqi refugee population which is now the third largest in the world and totals 20% of the Iraqi population, that the U.S. is now seen increasingly across the globe by good decent people as an arrogant, self serving, militaristic monster with little or no concern for the environmental or human problems others in the world wish to address and make a priority.
The newest rational for 'staying the course' is that we owe it to the Iraqi people to bring stability and democracy to their country. That failure to do so leaves Iraq ripe for training and dispersal of terrorists. This reasoning needs closer examination.
First of all, it is never our responsibility to tell any sovereign country what kind of government they should have, let alone run their country. Secondly, if one invades a sovereign country for illegitimate reasons there are no logical reasons why one can then claim any legitimate reason for winning. Polls in Iraq show that most Iraqis want us to get out, but frankly that is kind of irrelevant. One might take a poll in this country and find that the vast majority want Bush out of office. That hardly gives the green light for another country to invade us, depose Bush, set up military bases across our land, and then decide for us the best kind of governance which would be best for us. As icing on the cake let's make this 'savior' invader a Muslim country sending over 'freedom from Bush fighters', under Allah, to bring freedom and security to the American people. I suspect I can speak for the American people: Bush is our problem and we are the ones who have to get rid of him and decide our own political fate.
It gets tiring listening on television to American after American debating what needs to be done in Iraq. Imagine if we had to listen to Iraqi after Iraqi debating what needs to be done in America. It is their country, even in the current demolished state. We demolished it, we caused this problem; they pretty much all understand that now (any illusions have long since evaporated), we are in fact an occupying force whose presence guarantees the conflict will not end; we are in no position to remotely, at this point, be part of the solution. When you can't be part of the solution you get out. GET OUT. Will our leaving result in a friendly supportive Iraq to American self interests? Of course not. But neither will our staying. Guess what? We have lost. That's right---we have lost. We better get used to it. To allow any more American young men and women to die in a lost cause is disgusting and unpatriotic. To participate any longer in the slaughter of the Iraqi people is a pathetic a misuse of power. Any illusion of Bush that God has ever been with us in this Hitlertorian adventure should surely not be accepted by the American public.
Whether we stay or not, Iraq and many other places across the globe are going to become breeding grounds for terrorists. This global terrorist movement has little to do with El Qaida per se and everything to do with poverty, joblessness, homelessness, societal chaos, lack of personal security, and the growing economic disparity between the haves and the have nots. El Qaida was formed to fight the presence of American military bases in Arabia. This spirit then spread to other areas where portions of populations in various countries also wanted American military bases propping up their governments out of their country. For a country like America, so instilled with the spirit of Americans controlling our own destiny, it is just disgusting to see us use our military might in an attempt to control the internal politics of others across the globe.
We are now at the crossroads. We have over extended ourselves and expend most of our tax money now on empire building. The rest of the world clearly wants us to stop and we should. If we get out of Iraq the contest will be over. We will have lost. We deserve to lose. What we did was wrong. Now the Iraqis will have to deal with themselves. If they need help mediating a peaceful settlement others will have to be the mediators because we have too much blood on our hands, there are way too many relatives and friends of those we have killed. It is good that we lose this. We need to learn that the best way to win the hearts and souls of others across the globe is not to heave bombs or prop up governments across the globe with military bases. We really have no choice. All our smart bombs and military superiority are now pretty limited in their usefulness for the kind of global problems humanity faces. Barack is right. We aren't accomplishing much any more by refusing to talk to those who oppose us, and solutions to world problems are no longer amendable to military solutions.
All the above seem sufficient reasons to pull out now, but there is one more pressing reason. This venture is teaching those sent to fight this unwarranted war to become callous and indifferent to human life. In a May 4th report issued by the Pentagon a survey found that only 47% of soldiers and 38% of marines agreed that Iraqi civilians should be treated with respect and dignity. Only 55% if soldiers and 40% of marines said they would report a unit member who had killed or injured an innocent non combatant. According to interviews with some recently returned soldiers the cruelty to Iraqi citizens by American soldiers is a widespread and pervasive practice. Why are our soldiers doing this? The answer is not particularly surprising. As one soldier explained, "the soldiers honestly thought we were trying to help the people and they were mad because it was almost like a betrayal. Like here we are trying to help you, here I am, you know thousands of miles away from home and my family, and I have to be here every day and work on these missions. Well, we're trying to help you and you just turn around and try to kill us."
From a distance this reality is sort of sickening. My country has never been, with the exception of Vietnam, in any war in which American soldiers preyed upon civilian populations. The examples these soldiers cited are at the level of the worst ghetto gang like behavior anywhere. They showed one photo of an American soldier acting as if he is about to eat the spilled brains of a dead Iraqi man with his brown plastic Army-issue spoon. The scene, Sargeant Mejia said, was witnessed by the dead man's brothers and cousins. Another soldier, Philip Crystal, reported they were approaching this one house in a farming area, "They had a family dog. And it was barking ferociously 'cause it's doing its job. And my squad leader just out of nowheres, just shoots it. The bullet went in the jaw and exited out. And so the dog's yelping. It's crying out without a jaw. And I am looking at the family, and they're just, you know, dead scared. The family is sitting there, with three little children and a mom and dad, horrified. And---I actually get tears from saying this right now, but--and I had tears then, too---and I'm looking at the kids and they are so scared. No reports are ever filed about this kind of stuff, no one is ever punished. It happens all the time."
These soldiers explained that most raids are done on the basis of poor intelligence, and thus, the raids rarely have any real catches. A lot of times Iraqis report people to be terrorists to settle family disputes, tribal rivalries, personal vendettas. One soldier described how suspects are rounded up. "We throw them in the back of a Bradley shackled and hooded. These guys were really throwing up. They were so sick and nervous. And sometimes they were peeing on themselves. Can you imagine if people could just come into your house and take you in front of your family screaming? And if you are actually innocent but had no way to prove that? It would be a scary, scary thing." Another soldier said it was very common for American soldiers to call Iraqis civilians derogatory terms like camel jockeys or Jihad Johnny and sand nigger.
One soldier who worked the headquarters office at Abu Ghraib prison, claimed this: "That was when I totally walked away from the Army. I read these rap sheets on all the prisoners in Abu Ghraib and what they were there for. I expected them to be terrorists, murderers, insurgents. I look down this roster and see petty theft, public drunkeness, forged coalition documents. These people are here for petty civilian crimes." One soldier reported the kind of incident which "has long ceased to arouse much interest or even comment in the military". The incident he related was one in which an unarmed man drove with his young son too close to a check point. At that point the father was decapitated in front of his small, terrified boy. He went on: "As an American, you just put your hand up with your palm towards somebody and your fingers pointing to the sky. That means stop to most Americans, and that's a military hand signal that soldiers are taught that means stop. That's a sign you make at checkpoint. To an Iraqi person, that means Hello, come here. So you can see the problem that develops real quick. So you get on a checkpoint, and the soldiers think they're saying stop, stop, and the Iraqis think they are saying come here, come here. And the soldiers start hollering, so they try to come there faster. So soldiers holler more, and pretty soon you're shooting pregnant women."
Enough. Enough. It is not a pretty picture, this war. So who really are the cruel animalistic people in this conflict? Who are the good or the bad guys? How do you tell? Who should we hate? There are so many candidates. As usual I always look to Lincoln for insight on human nature. Lincoln always took a moral stand against slavery, yet had this to say about southerners: "They are just what we would be in their situation." It seems this applies here. Many of us, put in the situation of our American soldiers, would behave thusly; most Iraqis and Americans, if their lives had been switched around, would behave similarly. Clearly then, the focal point needs to be the situation, not the players. The blame lies on those who create situations in which normal people end up behaving badly. The saddest aspect of this Bush Administration created situation, is the permanent damage to the psyche of so many American soldiers. It is hard to undo learned insensitivity to others; it is hard to undo the use of violence to solve conflict; it is hard to have tolerance after being taught to be intolerant. Many of these American soldiers are going to come home changed in their attitudes about others, changed in how they react to conflict, changed in how they react to diversity, changed in their ability to control their emotions; changed in their ability to be sympathetic to others.
It is time to bring the troops home---for their sake and the sake of the Iraqi people. Our ability to be part of the solution has long been lost. We are part of the problem. If we left there will be all sorts of problems remaining, but at least we will not be part of them. It is like a guy who goes to a wedding, causes turmoil in the form of a brawl to break out, and then when the cops tell him to leave, he says "I can't leave. Having caused the problem I have a responsibility to solve it and as soon as they do as I say, things will be all better." Can anyone imagine the cops saying, "He is right. He caused the problem. It is his responsibility to fix it. He can stay."
The latest justifications for continuing the occupation of Iraq are merely more of the same disingenuous tripe the American public have been fed since beginning the invasion of Iraq. As always, the U.S. is portrayed as the Good Guys using freedom fighters, under God, fighting Bad Guys to bring freedom and peace to a troubled region. It has never bothered President Bush that the reasons for attacking a supposedly sovereign country were false, that his actions have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilian men, women, and children, that his actions have resulted in a vast growth in the number of terrorists in Iraq and across the world (probably few with any direct or meaningful connections with El Qaida, but sympathetic to El Qaida), that his actions have created an Iraqi refugee population which is now the third largest in the world and totals 20% of the Iraqi population, that the U.S. is now seen increasingly across the globe by good decent people as an arrogant, self serving, militaristic monster with little or no concern for the environmental or human problems others in the world wish to address and make a priority.
The newest rational for 'staying the course' is that we owe it to the Iraqi people to bring stability and democracy to their country. That failure to do so leaves Iraq ripe for training and dispersal of terrorists. This reasoning needs closer examination.
First of all, it is never our responsibility to tell any sovereign country what kind of government they should have, let alone run their country. Secondly, if one invades a sovereign country for illegitimate reasons there are no logical reasons why one can then claim any legitimate reason for winning. Polls in Iraq show that most Iraqis want us to get out, but frankly that is kind of irrelevant. One might take a poll in this country and find that the vast majority want Bush out of office. That hardly gives the green light for another country to invade us, depose Bush, set up military bases across our land, and then decide for us the best kind of governance which would be best for us. As icing on the cake let's make this 'savior' invader a Muslim country sending over 'freedom from Bush fighters', under Allah, to bring freedom and security to the American people. I suspect I can speak for the American people: Bush is our problem and we are the ones who have to get rid of him and decide our own political fate.
It gets tiring listening on television to American after American debating what needs to be done in Iraq. Imagine if we had to listen to Iraqi after Iraqi debating what needs to be done in America. It is their country, even in the current demolished state. We demolished it, we caused this problem; they pretty much all understand that now (any illusions have long since evaporated), we are in fact an occupying force whose presence guarantees the conflict will not end; we are in no position to remotely, at this point, be part of the solution. When you can't be part of the solution you get out. GET OUT. Will our leaving result in a friendly supportive Iraq to American self interests? Of course not. But neither will our staying. Guess what? We have lost. That's right---we have lost. We better get used to it. To allow any more American young men and women to die in a lost cause is disgusting and unpatriotic. To participate any longer in the slaughter of the Iraqi people is a pathetic a misuse of power. Any illusion of Bush that God has ever been with us in this Hitlertorian adventure should surely not be accepted by the American public.
Whether we stay or not, Iraq and many other places across the globe are going to become breeding grounds for terrorists. This global terrorist movement has little to do with El Qaida per se and everything to do with poverty, joblessness, homelessness, societal chaos, lack of personal security, and the growing economic disparity between the haves and the have nots. El Qaida was formed to fight the presence of American military bases in Arabia. This spirit then spread to other areas where portions of populations in various countries also wanted American military bases propping up their governments out of their country. For a country like America, so instilled with the spirit of Americans controlling our own destiny, it is just disgusting to see us use our military might in an attempt to control the internal politics of others across the globe.
We are now at the crossroads. We have over extended ourselves and expend most of our tax money now on empire building. The rest of the world clearly wants us to stop and we should. If we get out of Iraq the contest will be over. We will have lost. We deserve to lose. What we did was wrong. Now the Iraqis will have to deal with themselves. If they need help mediating a peaceful settlement others will have to be the mediators because we have too much blood on our hands, there are way too many relatives and friends of those we have killed. It is good that we lose this. We need to learn that the best way to win the hearts and souls of others across the globe is not to heave bombs or prop up governments across the globe with military bases. We really have no choice. All our smart bombs and military superiority are now pretty limited in their usefulness for the kind of global problems humanity faces. Barack is right. We aren't accomplishing much any more by refusing to talk to those who oppose us, and solutions to world problems are no longer amendable to military solutions.
All the above seem sufficient reasons to pull out now, but there is one more pressing reason. This venture is teaching those sent to fight this unwarranted war to become callous and indifferent to human life. In a May 4th report issued by the Pentagon a survey found that only 47% of soldiers and 38% of marines agreed that Iraqi civilians should be treated with respect and dignity. Only 55% if soldiers and 40% of marines said they would report a unit member who had killed or injured an innocent non combatant. According to interviews with some recently returned soldiers the cruelty to Iraqi citizens by American soldiers is a widespread and pervasive practice. Why are our soldiers doing this? The answer is not particularly surprising. As one soldier explained, "the soldiers honestly thought we were trying to help the people and they were mad because it was almost like a betrayal. Like here we are trying to help you, here I am, you know thousands of miles away from home and my family, and I have to be here every day and work on these missions. Well, we're trying to help you and you just turn around and try to kill us."
From a distance this reality is sort of sickening. My country has never been, with the exception of Vietnam, in any war in which American soldiers preyed upon civilian populations. The examples these soldiers cited are at the level of the worst ghetto gang like behavior anywhere. They showed one photo of an American soldier acting as if he is about to eat the spilled brains of a dead Iraqi man with his brown plastic Army-issue spoon. The scene, Sargeant Mejia said, was witnessed by the dead man's brothers and cousins. Another soldier, Philip Crystal, reported they were approaching this one house in a farming area, "They had a family dog. And it was barking ferociously 'cause it's doing its job. And my squad leader just out of nowheres, just shoots it. The bullet went in the jaw and exited out. And so the dog's yelping. It's crying out without a jaw. And I am looking at the family, and they're just, you know, dead scared. The family is sitting there, with three little children and a mom and dad, horrified. And---I actually get tears from saying this right now, but--and I had tears then, too---and I'm looking at the kids and they are so scared. No reports are ever filed about this kind of stuff, no one is ever punished. It happens all the time."
These soldiers explained that most raids are done on the basis of poor intelligence, and thus, the raids rarely have any real catches. A lot of times Iraqis report people to be terrorists to settle family disputes, tribal rivalries, personal vendettas. One soldier described how suspects are rounded up. "We throw them in the back of a Bradley shackled and hooded. These guys were really throwing up. They were so sick and nervous. And sometimes they were peeing on themselves. Can you imagine if people could just come into your house and take you in front of your family screaming? And if you are actually innocent but had no way to prove that? It would be a scary, scary thing." Another soldier said it was very common for American soldiers to call Iraqis civilians derogatory terms like camel jockeys or Jihad Johnny and sand nigger.
One soldier who worked the headquarters office at Abu Ghraib prison, claimed this: "That was when I totally walked away from the Army. I read these rap sheets on all the prisoners in Abu Ghraib and what they were there for. I expected them to be terrorists, murderers, insurgents. I look down this roster and see petty theft, public drunkeness, forged coalition documents. These people are here for petty civilian crimes." One soldier reported the kind of incident which "has long ceased to arouse much interest or even comment in the military". The incident he related was one in which an unarmed man drove with his young son too close to a check point. At that point the father was decapitated in front of his small, terrified boy. He went on: "As an American, you just put your hand up with your palm towards somebody and your fingers pointing to the sky. That means stop to most Americans, and that's a military hand signal that soldiers are taught that means stop. That's a sign you make at checkpoint. To an Iraqi person, that means Hello, come here. So you can see the problem that develops real quick. So you get on a checkpoint, and the soldiers think they're saying stop, stop, and the Iraqis think they are saying come here, come here. And the soldiers start hollering, so they try to come there faster. So soldiers holler more, and pretty soon you're shooting pregnant women."
Enough. Enough. It is not a pretty picture, this war. So who really are the cruel animalistic people in this conflict? Who are the good or the bad guys? How do you tell? Who should we hate? There are so many candidates. As usual I always look to Lincoln for insight on human nature. Lincoln always took a moral stand against slavery, yet had this to say about southerners: "They are just what we would be in their situation." It seems this applies here. Many of us, put in the situation of our American soldiers, would behave thusly; most Iraqis and Americans, if their lives had been switched around, would behave similarly. Clearly then, the focal point needs to be the situation, not the players. The blame lies on those who create situations in which normal people end up behaving badly. The saddest aspect of this Bush Administration created situation, is the permanent damage to the psyche of so many American soldiers. It is hard to undo learned insensitivity to others; it is hard to undo the use of violence to solve conflict; it is hard to have tolerance after being taught to be intolerant. Many of these American soldiers are going to come home changed in their attitudes about others, changed in how they react to conflict, changed in how they react to diversity, changed in their ability to control their emotions; changed in their ability to be sympathetic to others.
It is time to bring the troops home---for their sake and the sake of the Iraqi people. Our ability to be part of the solution has long been lost. We are part of the problem. If we left there will be all sorts of problems remaining, but at least we will not be part of them. It is like a guy who goes to a wedding, causes turmoil in the form of a brawl to break out, and then when the cops tell him to leave, he says "I can't leave. Having caused the problem I have a responsibility to solve it and as soon as they do as I say, things will be all better." Can anyone imagine the cops saying, "He is right. He caused the problem. It is his responsibility to fix it. He can stay."
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