Still Crazy
Daniel Patrick Welch
http://danielpwelch.com/0307sc.htm
After all these years, it still amazes how Americans can remain so
disconnected from the world events in which we play so central a role. I
use the term "world events" loosely, since the US today seems to have lost
even its historically tenuous connections with the reality of the rest of the
world. We continue to call our baseball championships the World Series,
oblivious to how quaint and naive, at best--or arrogant and self-absorbed,
at worst--it has always seemed to the rest of the world. This has been the
hallmark of Americans' role in the world--a curious blend of ubiquitous
involvement paired with near-total ignorance.
But the lovable galumpfing innocent act has worn thin around the
world--innocents don't usually oust your elected leaders and install their
own puppets--and its charm, if it ever had any, is no longer. Yet the
national
stupidity persists, facilitated by its enablers in the headline-addicted
US press establishment, to the detriment of the American reputation around
the world. Consider these gems from recent press accounts of the massacre in
the Mansur district of Baghdad: "Oh So Close," chirped half a dozen tabloids.
So close to what, exactly? Genocide? A War Crimes Tribunal?
No. The reference to a botched raid on a house where Saddam "may have been
hiding" was to how close our liberators came to catching The Beast. The
press has so completely given itself over to Pentagon propaganda that they
can't even see red flags where they should, sort of like a Bizzarro Running
of the Bulls.
Before the monotony set in, my ears perked up at the tedious repetition of
the obviously planted party line: how US forces had come within twenty-four
hours of catching Hussein's security detail, "...and possibly even the
deposed dictator himself."
Imagine my excitement! Almost! Very close! How dumb do you have to be to
infer correctly that, in the pathologically dishonest code of the worst
administration in history, as phrase as weak as "possibly even" should
translate as "definitely not." Almost, we have learned, only counts in
horseshoes and WMDs.
Aside from Paul Simon lyrics, the other reference unzipping itself from the
archive of my subconscious was the memory of Winston Smith, Orwell's
everyman from 1984, sitting and playing chess while listening to broadcasts
of how Big Brother would cleverly defeat the enemy. The parallel is chilling,
and makes me wonder what kind of personal hell we are each supposed to
go through before we all finally love Big Brother.
"How stupid do they think we are?," the question fairly screams in our minds.
Apparently exactly as stupid as we have proven to be after all these years.
Orwell's Goldstein expounded that he who controls the present controls the
past, and he who controls the past controls the future. Of course, 1984 was
at least partly fiction, a figment of Orwell's fertile communist imagination.
We never got to see the other side of the story Winston weaves into a
stunning triumph for Big Brother.
In this reality, at least for now, we are indeed privy to the rest of the
story. We have access to front line reports of the massacre that unfolded
under the name of this botched raid. The Independent's Robert Fisk takes
a different line than the oft-repeated Fish Story: Troops Turn Botched Raid
into Massacre
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/story.jsp?story=428199
"At least one civilian car caught fire, cremating its occupants," reports
Fisk. One civilian was brought to Yarmouk hospital "with his brain outside
of his head." Well, Emily Latilla would have remarked before issuing her
trademark "Never mind," "That's very different!"
However, the Fish Story about "the one that got away" is more compelling in
our national, self-delusional narrative than the truth, and far easier to
digest. But nobody needs a doctor to tell them that whether something
tastes good is not the best proof that it is safe to eat. Likewise, Americans
should be careful to trace how this poisonous story was deceptively
sweetened into a near triumph--especially when, under the icing, it reveals
an unmitigated disaster.
The veneer, our seemingly unending capacity to stay Still Stupid After All
These Years, allows our governments literally to get away with murder. It
allows us to ignore the roots of hatred and distrust in the region, from
the CIA
ouster of the elected but unacceptably socialist government of Mohamad
Mossadegh in 1953. Equally forgotten is the US installation of the Shah's
brutal regime and tireless efforts to prop up repressive governments
throughout the Gulf, including Hussein himself. He who controls the past....
But of course, Goldstein collides with Santayana at some inevitable point.
We appear to be indeed condemned to repeat the closed loop of Occupation
101. The language of imperial conquest is always the same: liberation,
civilization, democratization...all hopelessly self-aggrandizing concepts to
the families of the victim "with his brain outside of his head." The
stupidity
gene has been equally inherited by both major parties over the years, despite
the current mutation into the truly monstrous. Nonetheless, one of the most
rational calls comes from Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich,
who suggests withdrawing US troops, turning over reconstruction (and
contracting) over to the UN, and making the Administration pay for the
reconstruction its bombing made necessary. Cheney's personal fortune should
cover a chunk of it. Sound advice that won't be followed--Simon's lyrics give
way to Pete Seeger's, in the plaintive, almost mournful chorus to "Where Have
All the Flowers Gone?," a song he wrote in the wake of his indictment by the
Unamerican Activities Commission in 1955: "When will we ever learn/Oh when
will we ever learn?"
) 2003 Daniel Patrick Welch. Reprint permission granted.
Welch lives and writes in Salem, Massachusetts, USA, with his wife, Julia
Nambalirwa-Lugudde. Together they run The Greenhouse School
www.volunteersolutions.org/volunteer/agency/one_157700.htmlT
He has appeared on radio
http://www.informationclearninghouse.info/article3770.htm
[interview available here]
Past articles, translations are available at www.danielpwelch.com
We would appreciate your linking to us.
---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.515 / Virus Database: 313 - Release Date: 09/1/2003