AlterNet: War on Iraq: Why Can't We Talk about Peace in Public?
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Saved by 2 people (0 private), first by anonymouse user on 2007-03-02
- Vajrasattva1 on 2007-03-03 - Tags geopolitics , iraq , us_military , us_politics , war_on_terra
- Diana9 on 2007-03-02 - Tags no_tag
Public Sticky notes
just braggadocio on the subject of killing.
Highlighted by diana9
But the letter from this Marine pilot is something different. What worries me about it is this unabashed glee in killing people from high altitudes might not be a psychiatric aberration, but an inevitable consequence of the entire structure of our economy, which is based heavily on government spending in the area of high-technology defense manufacturing.
Highlighted by diana9
how a society whose economy is based on hi-tech defense spending will first tend to gravitate inexorably toward hi-tech defense solutions to policy problems, and then over time will raise whole generations instilled with an implicit belief in and enthusiasm for such lunacies as the "surgical strike."
Highlighted by diana9
We all know that the American Way of War is to use our technology to pour firepower on the enemy from a safe distance. Implicit in this is the central myth of precision bombardment that dates back to at least to the Norden Bombsight in World War II ... Of course this is all hogwash, as the conduct of the Iraq War has proven once again. Real war is always uncertain and messy and bloody and wasteful and accompanied by profound psychological and moral effects. But these preposterous theories are central to the American Way of War, because they justify the maintenance of a high cost hi-tech military which is so essential to the welfare of the parasitic political economy of the military-industrial-congressional complex that is now seamlessly embedded in our political culture.
Highlighted by diana9
Among other things, I'm seeing a lot of TV commentators pound home the theme that the Democratic party needs to shed its reputation for "pacifism."
Highlighted by diana9
After four years of Iraq, we still can't talk about peace in public! This evil bullshit has been buried in the commercial media's descriptive campaign language seemingly forever by now, but it may be time -- in the wake of this Iraq disaster -- to start thinking about where it comes from and what effect it may have on the national psyche.
Highlighted by diana9
Excepting the occasional Kucinich, no one in either party is interested in trying to change who we are, no matter how sick we become.
Highlighted by diana9
Public Comment