This IS how It Begins, Kameraden
It is how it always began, always will begin:
ALL those fine immortal Wise Principles at the very core of a nation's / group's reason for existing .. so wonderful to contemplate and extol.. in times of low-stress, of comfort, of sanctimony about how much Better we are than those Other guys.
Christians do (have done, will do) it - Salem, Inquisition (torture neatly dealt with there too: it's for Your Own Good, so you can meet God 'Clean')
Americans do (have done, will do) it - Lock up the Japs=American citizens of Japanese descent including Issei, Nissei. Recently, local reports covered how many Italians were similarly dealt with; far less publicised then and after. McCarthy: social death by innuendo, slander - by protected Legislators - immune from suit.
Then comes trouble.. fear is generated. First casualty after it is deemed war is: truth. Next follows the race to trade the aforementioned Principles for the chimera of Security, as a balm for The Fear.
And ever are the rationalizations, the weaseling, the spin, pure and simple cowardly expediency. It is a historically repetitive process, each time being relearned -amidst it- by all those remaining ignorant of their own history.
As now. All we need do next to out bin-Laden bin-Laden is, exactly where this simpering mindset leads inexorably.
October 2001: Constitution R.I.P.
Its premature death occurred with a whimper, not the expected bang. Fear was the midwife and ignorance the Administrator.
Suggested music for solitary services: Schubert Piano Sonata in A.
Mourners include: Enemies of the State of all stripes, in and out of incarceration currently.
The service will not be televised.
The war will be cancelled when there is nothing left worth defending.
Meanwhile: loyalty oaths are being printed, for all Good Americans to sign (We are sure that the Bad Ones wouldn't sign such a thing. No.. wouldn't)
(This message will self destruct as soon as the AG gets to it) Intellekchuls - turn selves in now and avoid unpleasantness later, you Comsymps.
Ashton
Hey Addison!
ALL bets start coming off about Glocks n'stuff - just after the 'war' becomes declared on *Us* by the omnipresent local forces, ever addicted to as much authority and control as the traffic will bear. Now that, 100:1, the Dubya/Ashworth/Oil Biznessmen axis has been given carte blanche -
At That point: we have already lost all the arguments and the chances.. for striving towards a culture in which being armed is unnecessary (for the mindset such a 'need' inevitably produces in All members). Now that we are rapidly passing the point where maintaining such an attitude of mutual respect among members - remains possible (?)
Perhaps we *shall* end up on the same side of the barricades! as I augment my M-1, BAR, .45 lore with the er more modern clip-fed semiautomatic devices. Not that personal armament has anything to do with reconstruction of a lost culture; just seems better to go down with other than a whimper. A homo-sap kinda thing?
Mea Culpa. You knew Us better than I imagined 'Us' as we might become - and the present dialogue (on NPR yet) re "shall we start 'official' torture soon?" confirms your more realistic view of our fellow-traveller Muricans. I concede.
{sheesh}
