Making Peace, Not War, Stupid!
As I was sitting down to start composing what follows, Bud Trillin's piece popped up on my screen. FOCUS - Calvin Trillin | A Fallen Soldier's Family
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/032005Z.shtml
Bud was a year behind me at Yale and took on the chairmanship of the Yalie Daily the year after I had done my stint in 1956, so we are both dated as children of WW2, draft eligible during the Korean War, experienced with the Viet Nam fiasco, and presumably sentient in the face of the horrendous smoke screens that blur any serious news about war and peace today available to the great bulk of Americans on their TV screens.
Were one to rank importance of national affairs per these media and their print counterparts, one would be led to believe that America is in the throes of a murderous epidemic of wife murders, devastated by child molesters and those who would emulate the Nazis by exterminating all disabled persons. At least such is to what our attention is constantly being directed as we seek serious news about matters of war and peace and the real threats that face us and our children -- terrorism, drugs, environmental degradation, hunger, cruelly rationed medical care, homelessness, unemployment -- all undoubtedly setting the stage for crime and punishment and more killing down the line -- both at home and abroad.
With a slight shift in the breezes this morning and then all too briefly I caught a glimpse of our military Chief of Staff, General Richard Meyers, on Meet the Press, trying to explain to Tim Russert, among other things, why those Iraqi soldiers and police that we are trying to train to replace our troops keep mysteriously disappearing? I felt sorry for General Meyers as he bumbled along. He is trained to fight wars, not to make peace in a nation traditionally torn by its warring factions -- Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, and other fragments, religious and secular. And how can he explain our other Middle Eastern 'conquest' -- Afghanistan -- which we have reconverted back into the heroin producing capitol of the world? 'Gosh, wow, they have had elections over there and the morale of our troops is excellent! Twenty nine of them told me they were planning to re-enlist when I visited them the other day!'
Help! Can no one see that those Iraqis that we are training are going to be shooting at each other -- and some would claim are already some of the ones that are shooting at our troops? Ish! If our men cannot even speak the language, let alone understand the culture, how can they possibly guess who is what or what will be the outcome of our training efforts? All that one can say of both Iraq and Afghanistan is that they are economic basket cases and war zones -- with things likely to get much worse?
Well, back to the distraction of Terri Schiavo. It is manifestly more comforting to our pols to be saving the life of one extremely disabled person than to take responsibility for the killing and maiming of many thousands of innocents -- both ours and theirs -- over there!
Thanks, Bud, for your contribution. It is reassuring to know that there are still a few caring voices speaking, even if they are mainly being drowned out by those who get their jollies out of killing!
Yes, I weep, too, for so many needlessly being killed. I also have a new grandchild, Conor, born this past November 18, and I fear for his future. But I thank the gods that his mother, who saw our military as a peace-keeping organization, resigned to do her medical training privately just before 9/11. She is now sustaining lives in intensive care and cannot be recalled into this madness where I fear too many of her military buddies may now be. What a waste! What a waste! What a waste! Ed Kent
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort
to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CollegeConversation
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PeaceEfforts
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EndingPoverty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/440neighborhood
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StudentConcerns
http://BlogByEdKent.blogspot.com/
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/032005Z.shtml
Bud was a year behind me at Yale and took on the chairmanship of the Yalie Daily the year after I had done my stint in 1956, so we are both dated as children of WW2, draft eligible during the Korean War, experienced with the Viet Nam fiasco, and presumably sentient in the face of the horrendous smoke screens that blur any serious news about war and peace today available to the great bulk of Americans on their TV screens.
Were one to rank importance of national affairs per these media and their print counterparts, one would be led to believe that America is in the throes of a murderous epidemic of wife murders, devastated by child molesters and those who would emulate the Nazis by exterminating all disabled persons. At least such is to what our attention is constantly being directed as we seek serious news about matters of war and peace and the real threats that face us and our children -- terrorism, drugs, environmental degradation, hunger, cruelly rationed medical care, homelessness, unemployment -- all undoubtedly setting the stage for crime and punishment and more killing down the line -- both at home and abroad.
With a slight shift in the breezes this morning and then all too briefly I caught a glimpse of our military Chief of Staff, General Richard Meyers, on Meet the Press, trying to explain to Tim Russert, among other things, why those Iraqi soldiers and police that we are trying to train to replace our troops keep mysteriously disappearing? I felt sorry for General Meyers as he bumbled along. He is trained to fight wars, not to make peace in a nation traditionally torn by its warring factions -- Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, and other fragments, religious and secular. And how can he explain our other Middle Eastern 'conquest' -- Afghanistan -- which we have reconverted back into the heroin producing capitol of the world? 'Gosh, wow, they have had elections over there and the morale of our troops is excellent! Twenty nine of them told me they were planning to re-enlist when I visited them the other day!'
Help! Can no one see that those Iraqis that we are training are going to be shooting at each other -- and some would claim are already some of the ones that are shooting at our troops? Ish! If our men cannot even speak the language, let alone understand the culture, how can they possibly guess who is what or what will be the outcome of our training efforts? All that one can say of both Iraq and Afghanistan is that they are economic basket cases and war zones -- with things likely to get much worse?
Well, back to the distraction of Terri Schiavo. It is manifestly more comforting to our pols to be saving the life of one extremely disabled person than to take responsibility for the killing and maiming of many thousands of innocents -- both ours and theirs -- over there!
Thanks, Bud, for your contribution. It is reassuring to know that there are still a few caring voices speaking, even if they are mainly being drowned out by those who get their jollies out of killing!
Yes, I weep, too, for so many needlessly being killed. I also have a new grandchild, Conor, born this past November 18, and I fear for his future. But I thank the gods that his mother, who saw our military as a peace-keeping organization, resigned to do her medical training privately just before 9/11. She is now sustaining lives in intensive care and cannot be recalled into this madness where I fear too many of her military buddies may now be. What a waste! What a waste! What a waste! Ed Kent
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort
to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CollegeConversation
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PeaceEfforts
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EndingPoverty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/440neighborhood
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StudentConcerns
http://BlogByEdKent.blogspot.com/
posted by Ed Kent at 12:18 PM
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