Dear Editor,
“The world now demands a maturity of America that we may not be able to achieve. It demands that we admit we have been wrong from the beginning of our adventure in war, that we have been detrimental to the life of the target nations’ people.” – Martin King
I read a lot of history. Wars don’t turn out like you’d think or believe. You tell “consumers” about how God meant for your country to rule and civilize the world, but because it’s so wonderful, everybody hates your country, so we need a bigger army because there’s a terrorist under everybody’s bed. It’s worked every time.
“Our government” relies on the historical ignorance of Americans allowing neocons to fashion “news” “consumers” accept. Obama recently said that America’s destruction of Iraq, a country in total ruin, isn’t as bad as Russia’s acceptance of Crimean self-determination. Secretary of State Kerry actually ordered Putin to prevent the referendum and stop Crimea from exercising self-determination.
Our propaganda system allows America’s Leadership to commit endless crimes without suggestion of misbehavior; war criminals like Henry Kissinger appear regularly on TV commenting on the crimes of others. Welcome to the Truman Show. Everything is scripted. Eleven years have passed since America started the Iraq War with prestitutes encouraging the gullible public, and its promoters are still called “National Security Experts.”
The recent wars are now recognized as a disastrous mistake, and lost, but the corporate media always welcome the next one. A war that should have destroyed the careers of every politician associated with it cost them nothing. Those few who publicly opposed the wars lost careers, elections, and acceptability in “Serious Circles”. The idea of opposing America’s wars has been dressed in tie-dye, and burnt in effigy. Opposition to anything the warmonger class fancies at any particular moment is destroyed in similar fashion. Speak of it and you won’t be invited to dinner parties; a most horrid sentence.
Nothing was gained from the wars and much was lost like Truth. “Embedded” reporters replaced it with comfortable lies. Those who see through the lies are marginalized in discussions of the ways each new American war takes us places we can’t return from. Vietnam taught the pentagon the dangers of an actual free press.
“The Hunger Games” movies show how manipulation and illusion can control people. “Our government” and Wall Street use the same tools to control “consumers”. “Consumers” believe “If it was true, we’d have heard about it” regarding stories the “news” refused to cover. It wasn’t on TV so those who mention them are considered crazy. I regularly encounter people, who completely distrust government and “news organizations” yet only believe “stories” they hear from them.
Irrational attachment to Israel lured the Empire into disastrous attacks on Muslim states. In 2008, one economist estimated that the war on Iraq cost America more than $3 trillion. He has since repeatedly revised that estimate upward. Include Afghanistan and other countries of the anti-Muslim, pro-Zionist crusade, and we’ve spent double-digit trillions, not to mention the dead.
The Soviet Union’s collapse/Cold War ending didn’t save money; bring disarmament or reduce militarism with subsequent imperialist wars by the Empire continuing its greedy agenda and the ongoing effort by the elites to enlarge their stranglehold over the world.
The attitude is; “We won the Cold War. We’re the world’s empire. We now rule and everyone must defer to us. We police the world” so, they treat everyone like garbage, as empires always do. America has provided many examples since its birth.
“Our leaders” play innocent, blaming the anger of the world’s people for the Empire on America’s “freedom, values” and financial success. The Empire’s arrogant officials blind many Americans to the truth; the reason people hate America is because they don’t like being treated like garbage by arrogant, hypocritical, self-righteous, dishonest, imperialist political and bureaucratic hacks.
America ignores international law acting as they please against sovereign states, saying; ‘If you’re not with us, you’re against us. Empires act the same before collapsing. The marketing is: America, the world’s superpower, needs to intervene anywhere to preserve freedom, democracy and protect American enterprise. This is old-fashioned “white man’s burden” colonialism updated.
Colonialism’s justification, civilizing the unwashed, covers the actual motivations: greed and power. International bankers, led by the IMF, World Bank and American megabanks, encourage countries into debt beyond their ability to pay. Once the target is drowning, austerity is imposed and its resources are used to pay the bankers. This technique has been used around the developing world. If the nation’s leaders object to sending their people’s wealth to Wall Street, the CIA removes them, “restoring order”, with a willing pawn of the Empire.
Our accepted lies; “The Defense Department makes us safer”, “the marketplace benefits us all”, “the corporate media is independent of the government”, “the government is independent of the corporations.”
“Our government”, in economic decline, its foreign policy like mafia protection, continues as the most persistent aggressor because it’s paid no price for its crimes. America’s arrogance is enabled by its allies who could have used current “logic” to toss America out of the G8 after their invasion of Iraq, occupations of Haiti, destruction of Libya, or the Empires destruction of Syria.
Conflict with Russia continues America’s military/political role in Europe as the lead NATO power. Recently Lithuania and Latvia doubled their military spending because of America’s instigated Ukrainian/Russian tensions, which will certainly involve expensive American weapons sales.
American propaganda says we’re the shining light, protecting human rights, opposing torture, defending liberty, champion of the oppressed, lover of peace, and benefactor of the world. This image survives even as “our government” keeps contrary representative governments from succeeding and bombs many countries into rubble.
You don’t have to be smart to oppose the empire, but you must be an ignorant jackass, or a politician, to support it.
Craig Dudley