Boiling Frogs

Looking back on American History, many of us can easily remember the famous wars we have fought Gulf War, Viet Nam, WWI, WWII, Civil War, Revolutionary War. But taking a more academic look, one will find that in the history of America as a recognized nation, it is difficult to find a decade that is without conflict. Through the Gulf War, we Americans have focused on fighting a traditional type conflict; well-defined enemies, political motivations, clear territorial lines, a declaration of war and a declaration of peace. Since the Gulf War, we have become mired in a new sensibiltiy of armed conflict. You can't call it war anymore since the only similarity are the casualties produced. Our motives have become convoluted, our leaders displaying less interest in moving America into a time of domestic equilibrium while becoming more blatant in their self-serving actions. Our wars have little but a headline's worth of meaning at their declaration, and their conclusions are found only on government issued stationary. The war I am currently fighting is by no definition a war like any other, even Viet Nam was better defined. Statistically, this war was over 2 years ago, so says a piece of paper that allowed our government to generate some interesting numbers like a bar bat between friends on who could kick Saddam's ass more efficiently. This war, when it was officially considered a war, produced less casualties than the Gulf War, was over in relatively the same time, and was able to topple a government while getting some good PR photos of Saddam in a spider hole. I guess this administration wins.

Previously, a declaration of the end of hostilities would be followed by an exit and or reconstruction plan. The Marshall Plan is arguably the most famous and effective. After WWII, reconstruction began on Europe. America played a huge role in rebuilding infrastructure (roads, buildings, power plants, etc) and governments. Our current war has no such exit plan. Donald Rumsfeld was asked about how long we would stay involved in Iraq. His response was, "sooner or later they (the insurgency) will get tired of being killed." I have been witness to our "reconstruction efforts". The current push is to "commercialize". That sounds good in conversation but how is it being effected? After 2 years since the end of the war, we have civilian contractors commercializing one of the largest bases in Iraq with high-speed laser based wireless networking and internet using the latest Cisco hardware. The juxtapositioning bewilders me. The country is near a stone-age level quality of life, except for urban areas, with sky-high illiteracy rates, incomplete electrical power grid, barely driveable roads where roads are available, no drinkable sources of water in rural areas. This is the infrastructure chosen to be emplaced now. The surrounding infrastructure off-base is unable to support such a technology. Maybe in the larger cities like Tikrit and Baghdad, high speed internet would be a good third-phase feature, but now it shines as a monumental lack of priorities. American citizens need to demand to know where the war budget is being spent. Eighty-two billion dollars and no one is holding the reconstruction process accountable for reponsible progress. The Marshall Plan took 7 years.

Interesting to note that our motivation at the time of port-WWII reconstruction was to establish 'free' nations, but not one government was modelled after the government we've used for over 200 years. Germany, for example is a Socialist Democracy. Germany has not seen conflict since 1945. Socially, Germany is very stable also. As in most of Western Europe, there is a nationalism that is the common bond amongst its citizens; Germans are Germans, French are French, without fear of their pride. If a German doesn't like France, that German doesn't have to live or visit there, they can go back to their respective homeland. We Americans have partially disposed of such sentiments. We are afraid to say it, guilty for feeling it. There is no American birthrite because we have been so shamed into believing that we owe everyone something for our past actions. Because there seems to be an endless tap pouring out reparations for past national sins, we've been split into essentially two groups. The first group is those that feel entitled to something for free; like a warranty return on the American Dream. Something bad happened to their Grandaddy and their lives aren't ever the same unless the government supplies them a handout. Their efforts go into getting more and more 'civil rights' instead of working toward and honorable and productive life. The term 'civil rights' has lost its preiously lofty meaning and been commonly used in place of the term 'free government money'. This group is commonly recognized as the hyphenated-American; African-American, gay-American, muslim-American. Hyphenation means they can keep ahold of what gives them the guilt-foothold on American society, but still identify with the rest of the nation byleaving on the predicate.

The other group, formed by our national shame, is the folks that are paying, quietly, for our demise. Whether they have been scared into silence, realized the futility of politics, or have been so programmed by liberal propaganda that they truly will hand over the farm to anyone they feel sorry for, they all fit the bill of the grand enabler. Inaction is this groups characteristic. Like a huge dysfunctional family, this groups sits by and watches the alcoholic parent abuse the kids in silence. Maybe it is the general delusion generated and spoon fed to them by the corporate media (notice the use of the term) that placates them into the cow-eyed stupor they sustain while paying increasing tax dollars to fund the first group, while accepting increasing numbers of American casualties with no apparent national gain at the completion of the occupation in Iraq, while they sit and watch reality on TV as the time honored institutions that society has been based upon are eroded to eleviate the shame felt by the extreme minority.

This is the modern day invasion. A social takeover of systematic desentization in which our minds, bodies, society, and our children are at stake. Gay marriage, child abductions, body modification, self-effacing guilt from 9/11, the bastardization of current 'civil rights' movements, these are all symptoms of a national sickness, the decay of an American Standard, our fear to fight to keep it. There is no peace when preparing for, or recovering from, an invasion. Ours is a social invasion by an endless stream of minority groups refusing to adopt the American dream in lieu of the American handout.

How does the American occupation of Iraq have anything to do with the social decay in America? Simple, it is the largest symptom evidenced by our depravity. A new, insidious, and subtle form of imperialism that has been widely accepted through the inaction of the American public. We have accepted the idea of an open-ended, money-funnelling, war when we were first sold on the idea of a War on Drugs. Ridiculous premise. Now we have an unwinnable War on Terror. What standard will that war be measured on? How is one identified as an enemy? How does a nation erase the ill-will it feels, when terrorism is bred and held in the hearts of men? We alienate ourselves as Americans by minority rule and endless hyphenations. The ethical majority has been muted with fear or shame, and our dysfunction has spread throughout the world in the form of the oxymoronic "armed peacekeeping missions". We are unhappy with ourselves as a society and are looking to be distracted by a common enemy. Those enemies, like bin Laden, do exist. But if he is caught, without that emblem of evil, might we have to focus on policing ourselves?