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This will be a
somber and troubling Fourth of July for many Americans. As the Zogby poll demonstrates, the
polarization in America has not dissipated since the political campaign of 2004
officially ended. Indeed, there is more restlessness and anguish now as those
who gave confidence to the status quo find themselves in the credibility gulch
between disappointment and disassociation. We don’t want
to “send the wrong signals”, but we have to accept that our passive silence is not
helping the troops, our nation or the fate of the Iraqis. Our wanting to make a success of
something begun in lies and deceit doesn’t justify more unnecessary death and
destruction. The war hasn’t made our nation safer, and it isn’t winning the war
on terror, quite the opposite. It
doesn’t disrespect those who have already died by saying “enough”. Indeed, we can save lives by stop
believing the lies. We must dispel
the notion that achieving success in an unnecessary war somehow justifies its deceitful
beginnings. We must set out clear
benchmarks to end a travesty. This well-known
wordsmith has written a nearly pitch-perfect song of patriotic dissent. We were a collection of rebels before
we were a nation of patriots, it was the economic tyranny that planted the
seeds of our political revolution.
We don’t have to have a revolution to stop this war, we just have to
break the tyranny of our own acquiescence. Our heritage is being abused and its up to us to reclaim it. KwC Ellen Goodman / Syndicated columnist BOSTON
- I am driving down the coast, E-Z Passing across borders from Maine to
Massachusetts, when the radio begins the day's news with a familiar bulletin:
"There has been another day of violence in Iraq today." A
description of suicide bombers and victims follows. Slowly, I turn to another
highway distraction, counting the cars that pass me wearing ribbon magnets and
decals that display the same slogan: "Support Our Troops." >From one
exit to the next, I count a red Ford Explorer, a bronze Jeep, a white Dodge, a
blue pickup truck and a silver Toyota. I
cannot interview the drivers at 70 miles an hour, so I do not know the
complexity of their politics. But I automatically read "Support Our
Troops" as a proxy statement for "Support Our Commander in
Chief." The yellow ribbons tied for soldiers fighting in Iraq seem to have
morphed into a collective blue ribbon for the president handling this war. If
there is anything this White House is adept at, it is co-opting symbols. If
there's anything that makes this driver wince, it is having such powerful
symbols wrenched away. Those who do not support the president are easily
dismissed as people who disparage the troops. On Tuesday night, the president stood before a sea of
soldiers and used prime time to defend a war that is not going well. Again and
again, in a tactic for which the word "shameless" was invented, he
linked Sept. 11, 2001, with Iraq. He tied the terrorists of 9/11 to the suicide
bombers of Baghdad without ever acknowledging what had made Iraq the fetid
center of the global war on terror. I
wondered how many more times he could go to
the well of Sept. 11 before it went dry. Last week,
California Congressman Randy Cunningham used the victims to support the
amendment against flag-burning. Justice Antonin Scalia even invoked 9/11 in his
dissent from a Ten Commandments decision. But
there was another linkage in the Fort Bragg setting: the president and
thousands of soldiers in green uniforms, one and indivisible. At one point,
Bush said, "The best way to honor the lives that have been given in this
struggle is to complete the mission." In a
single sentence, he defined his mission as the mission and his
opponents as those who would trample the graves of soldiers. This
is not the first time a "war president" has conflated war and
patriotism, or quietly tainted dissenters with disloyalty. It happens
routinely, especially in unpopular wars. The
opponents of this president have struggled to separate criticism of the White
House from criticism of the troops. They have talked about everything from
missing weapons of mass destruction to ineffective armor. Even though 58
percent disapprove of the handling of Iraq, those
symbolic ribbons of patriotism have produced a silenced majority. I
share that reticence even as one of millions drawn to the heartbreaking stories
of this war. I can't forget the father of a 22-year-old Louisiana corporal who
described his late son as an honest and godly man. "As far as I
know," said the father, " he didn't have any enemies." In war,
the corporal had enemies. Nor
can I forget the New Hampshire wife who told a reporter querulously, "I
have to respect the president. To not respect him would be to not respect, in
some sense, the reasons why our husbands are over there." Who among her
neighbors wants to shake her faith? Today, few Americans see either a clear way forward or a clean
way out of Iraq. When a war begun on false premises slogs on without an exit
strategy, when a war against terrorists becomes a terrorist training ground,
when the body count rises - 1,700
American troops and counting - it's
time to give up the notion that dissenters are the dangerous ones. The
president invoked July 4 as well as Sept. 11. He called it a day to celebrate
freedom and offer thanks to the troops by flying a flag, writing a letter,
helping a military family. I will
fly my flag this Fourth of July, as always, on a small island in Maine. I will
fly it for the men and women in harm's way. But I'll fly it as well for the
father who protests the military recruiters at his child's high school and the
19-year-old widow who tells "Good Morning America," "I just feel
enough is enough." The
silenced majority of Americans who believe we were misled into war have no
reason to be tongue-tied by a yellow ribbon. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2002353794_goodman01.html Zogby Poll: No Bounce: Bush Job Approval Unchanged by War Speech http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=1007 Also See Krugman: America Held Hostage http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/01/opinion/01krugman.html? Mail scanned
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