Why aren't we?

Sunday, 3:04 pm

By Kate

Sep

03

2006

James Wolcott posted a particularly fine essay yesterday, Five Minutes to Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, in which he examines the ramp-up of war rhetoric this month. In his analysis it’s a last ditch effort to marshal the forces of fear to keep the bombs falling in accordance with neo-con whims. People are losing interest, growing tired of the constant war bluster, growing weary of daily accounts of troop deaths and civilian deaths. People are tired of a war on terror that apparently has no other objective than a foggy goal of talking big and staying the course. What course? There is no definable course nor is there any evidence that our leaders know how to stay whichever one they’re imagining exists. The civil warriors and neo-con supporters are losing their battle of escalation. Bankrupt of other ideas, just pull out the stops and let loose the rhetoric of war and fear to the nth degree. It’s all they’ve got.

In the days approaching the 5th anniversary of 9/11, the rhetoric should be be nearly apocalyptic. As if it hasn’t been already. But here’s the thing…

Terrorists can destroy infrastructure a piece at a time and, yes, kill people, but they can’t destroy the United States. I’ve never felt a particular danger of terrorists conquering us. The United States is as much an ideal as a physical place. Democracy is a way of life, an ideal, an idea. It is so deeply ingrained in our society that it’ll never be eradicated. The only dangers to it, that I can see, are the blockheads in our own government who have succumbed to fear, promote it, and also use it to achieve their political goals. By hacking away at the Constitution, they seem to believe they can protect and preserve us—and themselves. Mostly themselves, in my opinion. Isn’t that the greatest irony? If we’re to be temporarily undone, it won’t be by any terrorist’s hands. We’ve lost our nerve, given in to fear, and stopped thinking critically. That’s a signal of weakness. This country should be better than that. Why aren’t we?