Killers or Healers?
Killers or Healers?
Congratulations, Americans. That was certainly worth voting for! Voters thoroughly routing the entrenched Neo-Con administration will help restore our world image, so badly damaged since re-electing t
Congratulations, Americans. That was certainly worth voting for! Voters thoroughly routing the entrenched Neo-Con administration will help restore our world image, so badly damaged since re-electing them in 2004 and passively accepting their fraudulent election.
Assuming that Neo-Cons continued their effort to jimmy every voter roll and rig every voting machine they could, one has to wonder to what extent the vote may have gone in an honest election. Well, it went well enough! We shall certainly see a bit of reform on behalf of Republicans while they reassess their priorities and seek to prevent even larger losses in coming elections.
It's now a good idea for Democrats to reassess their priorities, too. Folks with a democratic bent might consider writing their new majority representatives to remind them what a Democratic agenda ought to look like.
We have amply demonstrated our arrogant willingness and ability to "kill or capture" anything or anyone of our choosing. We have rewritten the rules for what to do with the captured. But has it really worked? Maybe war is simply obsolete. Perhaps we should practice peace and healing instead.
When I was growing up, I was always encouraged to stand up against bullies, to stand up for my rights and to stand against injustice. Well, I have to ask myself, "What did Iraq ever do to us?" Try as I might, I keep drawing a blank. They didn't fly planes into the twin towers. They didn't coddle violent fundamentalists. If Democrats are serious about a new direction in Iraq, I have a sneaking suspicion that an apology might be a great place to start. After that, prosecuting a few war crimes might even make it look sincere.
Let's compare notes. The government of Iraq recently investigated allegations of improprieties in several prisons and detention centers. They found that detainees had been tortured and subsequently indicted hundreds of people, from rank-and-file workers right on up to the top administrators.
Remember Abu Ghraib, where leaked photos showed U.S. personnel enjoying the torture and humiliation of Iraqi detainees? A handful of lower-echelon scapegoats were prosecuted while decision makers skated. That's not right. Let's borrow a page from our Iraqi partners and show the people that we will stand up to injustice with equal justice.
To my thinking, painful as it may be for our nation, George Bush needs to be the first to explain, under oath, the formulation of his inexorable run-up to the war, the fudged "intelligence" behind it and the astonishing consistency of the results with policy documents prepared years earlier by all his most important advisors under the aegis of The Project for a New American Century.
Then he and his boys should explain where all the money went.
After this bit of apology and truth-telling, we can get on with a responsive Democratic agenda. After all, we need the same things they do. Let's get back to basics. We're all human, after all. So contact your newly elected and newly empowered representatives. Admonish and encourage them to adopt an agenda that is democratic at home as well as abroad.
Instead of building armaments for killing, lets get back to things that help, not hurt people. Let's renew our focus on a clean environment and energy self-sufficiency. Let's quit trying and actually accomplish access to health care, education and employment. Getting busy on these issues could make the world a better place.
As we are hopefully learning in Iraq, bombs and guns can only make things worse.
Assuming that Neo-Cons continued their effort to jimmy every voter roll and rig every voting machine they could, one has to wonder to what extent the vote may have gone in an honest election. Well, it went well enough! We shall certainly see a bit of reform on behalf of Republicans while they reassess their priorities and seek to prevent even larger losses in coming elections.
It's now a good idea for Democrats to reassess their priorities, too. Folks with a democratic bent might consider writing their new majority representatives to remind them what a Democratic agenda ought to look like.
We have amply demonstrated our arrogant willingness and ability to "kill or capture" anything or anyone of our choosing. We have rewritten the rules for what to do with the captured. But has it really worked? Maybe war is simply obsolete. Perhaps we should practice peace and healing instead.
When I was growing up, I was always encouraged to stand up against bullies, to stand up for my rights and to stand against injustice. Well, I have to ask myself, "What did Iraq ever do to us?" Try as I might, I keep drawing a blank. They didn't fly planes into the twin towers. They didn't coddle violent fundamentalists. If Democrats are serious about a new direction in Iraq, I have a sneaking suspicion that an apology might be a great place to start. After that, prosecuting a few war crimes might even make it look sincere.
Let's compare notes. The government of Iraq recently investigated allegations of improprieties in several prisons and detention centers. They found that detainees had been tortured and subsequently indicted hundreds of people, from rank-and-file workers right on up to the top administrators.
Remember Abu Ghraib, where leaked photos showed U.S. personnel enjoying the torture and humiliation of Iraqi detainees? A handful of lower-echelon scapegoats were prosecuted while decision makers skated. That's not right. Let's borrow a page from our Iraqi partners and show the people that we will stand up to injustice with equal justice.
To my thinking, painful as it may be for our nation, George Bush needs to be the first to explain, under oath, the formulation of his inexorable run-up to the war, the fudged "intelligence" behind it and the astonishing consistency of the results with policy documents prepared years earlier by all his most important advisors under the aegis of The Project for a New American Century.
Then he and his boys should explain where all the money went.
After this bit of apology and truth-telling, we can get on with a responsive Democratic agenda. After all, we need the same things they do. Let's get back to basics. We're all human, after all. So contact your newly elected and newly empowered representatives. Admonish and encourage them to adopt an agenda that is democratic at home as well as abroad.
Instead of building armaments for killing, lets get back to things that help, not hurt people. Let's renew our focus on a clean environment and energy self-sufficiency. Let's quit trying and actually accomplish access to health care, education and employment. Getting busy on these issues could make the world a better place.
As we are hopefully learning in Iraq, bombs and guns can only make things worse.
