------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the Oct. 31, 2002 issue of Workers World newspaper -------------------------
EDITORIAL: SNIPERS AND MONEY The headlines and airwaves are filled with reports that the person or persons connected with the sniper killings has demanded millions of dollars, threatening to shoot children if the money isn't received. Of course this news strikes terror in the hearts of parents and other loved ones who have been looking over their shoulders in fear since the serial killings began. The "Beltway Sniper" is the topic of anxious discussion in airports, barber shops, restaurants and video stores. Who would treat precious human lives with such chilling disdain? Experts on criminology and psychology fill news programs posing the same question that's on many peoples' minds: What produces these serial killers? Video games? Aberrant individual mindsets? Violence on television and in the movies? How could such a thing happen in this society, touted as the most democratic and free in the world? But they leave out the most important questions. Shouldn't these pundits be exploring the role of militarization and the dog-eat-dog, get-rich-or-be-a-chump culture that dominates and imbues life under capitalism? If the killer, or killers, is demanding money in return for the lives of children, isn't that a microcosm of the demand being made by powerful U.S. capital to Iraq: "Hand over your oil or we will continue to starve your children to death"? That's how it must look to the parents of more than half a million Iraqi children who have died as a result of the U.S.- led embargo that is strangling Iraq economically. Bush boasts from the bully pulpit that no one will get in the way of U.S. interests--read the banks' and oil companies' drive for profits--without paying the price in the blood of their parents and children, neighbors and co- workers. Is there any way that this imperialist policy, bristling with weaponry, would not seep down into the society as a whole? Of course those who live in the D.C. region are concerned, first and foremost, about an end to the threat of the Beltway sniper. And people around the county and around the world support them. But when the question is raised, "What kind of person or persons would kill for money," we think many people around the world know the answer. And they are looking to the anti- war movement in the United States to disarm the most powerful killers of all. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but changing it is not allowed. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] Support the voice of resistance http://www.workers.org/orders/donate.php) ------------------ This message is sent to you by Workers World News Service. To subscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To switch to the DIGEST mode, E-mail to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Send administrative queries to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
