"I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man, sir ... the Jungian thing, sir."
Private Joker, Full Metal Jacket
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Shark and Shepherd on Dead Tree
I have a column in tomorrow morning's Journal-Sentinel on the 5th anniversary of 9-11.
3 comments:
Anonymous
said...
We learned (or at least we should have learned) that we did not create our enemies and, therefore, it is not within our power to make them go away.
A double error. We did help to create the enemy, though of course that wasn't our intention. We failed to see the unintended consequences of choices we made. You, Bush and Cheney still fail to see them. That's why things are going badly in Iraq and Afghanistan. Willful blindness.
But you are half right that getting rid of the enemy is not entirely within our power. The jihad takes on a life of its own. Still, countries have won their wars on terrorism in the recent past. The key is to fight smart and correct the mistakes you've made. But our leadership at the top is utterly incapable of doing that.
Exhibit A is the interpretation of the opponent as a species of fascism. Generals often want to fight the last war, but you conservatives want to go back about six wars and stick a swastika on Osama. The epitaph for your brand of conservatism will read: Fiasco.
Let's see. We have a group that claims superiority over all other groups (albeit on religious and not ethnic grounds). They seek to impose their way of life on others by force and propose to treat those who will not submit as, at best, second class citizens. In all this, they are inspired by a sense of group pride and perceived injury. Within their society, they brook no dissent from prescribed norms and will, in fact, kill (generally brutally) those who dissent. Sounds fascist to me.
Thanks for that essay, Rick. While I disagree with parts--your use of the word fascist, for example--you nicely sum up some things I've been feeling. I'm in the middle of a long anti-McIlheran screed to post later tonight, but I save some positive pixels for you at the end.
3 comments:
We learned (or at least we should have learned) that we did not create our enemies and, therefore, it is not within our power to make them go away.
A double error. We did help to create the enemy, though of course that wasn't our intention. We failed to see the unintended consequences of choices we made. You, Bush and Cheney still fail to see them. That's why things are going badly in Iraq and Afghanistan. Willful blindness.
But you are half right that getting rid of the enemy is not entirely within our power. The jihad takes on a life of its own. Still, countries have won their wars on terrorism in the recent past. The key is to fight smart and correct the mistakes you've made. But our leadership at the top is utterly incapable of doing that.
Exhibit A is the interpretation of the opponent as a species of fascism. Generals often want to fight the last war, but you conservatives want to go back about six wars and stick a swastika on Osama. The epitaph for your brand of conservatism will read: Fiasco.
Let's see. We have a group that claims superiority over all other groups (albeit on religious and not ethnic grounds). They seek to impose their way of life on others by force and propose to treat those who will not submit as, at best, second class citizens. In all this, they are inspired by a sense of group pride and perceived injury. Within their society, they brook no dissent from prescribed norms and will, in fact, kill (generally brutally) those who dissent. Sounds fascist to me.
Thanks for that essay, Rick. While I disagree with parts--your use of the word fascist, for example--you nicely sum up some things I've been feeling. I'm in the middle of a long anti-McIlheran screed to post later tonight, but I save some positive pixels for you at the end.
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