After the events of September 11th, the response for America seemed clear. Americans should defend their country. Then came a speech by Ossama Bin Laden. Americans, he said, deserved the attack, for the Iraqis they had killed, the Palestinians who had died and were still dying. Suddenly the response was entirely wrong.
Would I defend my country against attack? Of course I would. Would I defend my country’s actions in the Mideast? How could I?
Who could deny that America had killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis? Who could deny that every Palestinian, Lebanese, Syrian or Jordanian killed by Israel was paid for by America?
America was a promise made by its founding fathers for all humanity. The land within its borders existed long before the proposal for its government was made. “We hold these truths to be self é evident”, they wrote, “that all men (people) are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights. That among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” They didn’t say “We want to establish a government where in everyone will have equal rights.” America’s Declaration of Independence stated a belief regarding all of humanity. They stated it was plainly obvious that human beings are entitled to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness because they are Human Beings, and these rights were meant for them to have by the One who created them, not gifts from the founding fathers.
So America began to wave the flag, the red, white and blue. Will I defend my flag and “that for which it stands”? (from the American Pledge of Allegiance) Will I defend the rights of all mankind to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness?
Should I defend the right of America to assist in the killing, in which its ally Israel is engaged? Will I defend the killing of Iraqis? Will I kill Afghanis? Should Ossama Bin Laden be killed for attempting to defend the rights America’s own Declaration of Independence says God gave all of humanity?
Kuwait was invaded. We had to defend the Kuwaitis from the aggression of evil, to protect Kuwait from tyranny and the loss of the freedom of the people of Kuwait é we had to kill over 300,000 Iraqis to do this. (Never mind protecting their rights or was it from their evil leader? In any case, it was for their own good.) And we did it without putting any American in harm’s way! Unless the people who died in the World Trade Center had been put in harm’s way, of someone from the Mideast who thought to defend the right to life of people in the Mideast.
But it’s the way in which it was done, by surprise, and by stealth! By Terrorists! They used Airliners as bombs! And they are planning more all around the world.
Nevertheless America is set on its course as the mightiest power in the world. If someone attacks America or plans to attack America, they will be discovered and killed. No impression of American vulnerability can be allowed. But on September 11th America’s invulnerability, its indomitable force by which it prevails all around the world was insufficient. Trillions of dollars have been spent (while America doesn’t lack for poor or ill among its population) to ensure that nowhere in the world by force, or surprise or stealth will anyone prevail in opposition to America. America will be protected and curiously somewhere America’s promise has changed from opportunity offered by freedom to ‘pursue happiness’ to the opportunity to ‘pursue happiness in the form of unlimited wealth’. ‘America’ represents the opportunity to acquire wealth both to Americans and people around the world. If there is anyone who impinges on that perception they will be corrected until they see the truth of it. No one understands and defends that perception better than American leaders. In their role in the world, they are inviolable!
Now there is also the ‘Office of Homeland Security’ to keep American government informed. It will be aware, not only of disagreeable elements around the world, but also within its borders. Big Brother is Home.
Should we mistakenly comfort ourselves with the notion that at least no one will control our minds, we will be free to have our own thoughts, there is the press. ‘All the Wjorld supports us they proclaimed as they declared ‘America’s new War’. While letters to the Editor in Der Berlinermorgenpost expressed the hope that ‘America would take the opportunity to review the Mideastern policy from the ground up.’ Further suggestions have been made that Israel be charged duty on imports to Germany that originated from outside its pre-1967 borders. Is someone trying to infer that Israel should withdraw itself back inside its pre-1967 borders? Is there someone in Germany who doesn’t support America’s New War? Msr. Chirac visited the White House from France and Herr Schroeder came from Germany. We saw them waving over the top of their limousines as they departed. No one disclosed exactly what it was they said. German news articles referred to another one of Mr. Bin Laden’s ausgezeichneten Kasseten (excellent tapes).
Most confusing was the tape quoted by Mr. Blair of England, in which Mr. Bin Laden claims the right to take lives in defense of the lives taken of the sons of the Mideastern people. Mr. Blair refers to this ‘unpublished tape’ as evidence that Mr. Bin Laden is a murderer, but is Mr. Blair admitting to taking the lives of the sons of whom Mr. Bin Laden spoke. How could he refer to the statement’s latter half without accepting the first half? (Even stranger is CNN’s claim to Al-Jazeera that they never knew of the existence of this tape while they broadcast Mr. Blair’s statement.) All the world can see the discrepancies!
Having battered Afghanistan with our military might, the Press puts the question to the American people. “Where shall we attack ‘Terror’ next?” Where shall we drop bombs on suspected ill-wishers who might resort to strategies of secrecy and surprise to attack us, next? And so the Press Americanizes the people. Being American is about access to force.
The FBI and the CIA search about for explanations of what went wrong on September 11th. How it was that they failed to know what someone insubordinate to American ideology was thinking. America must be able to defend itself against any who challenge our ‘unalienable rights’, before they are able to do the deed. It must spy, restrict and suppress all around the world, the unalienable rights of all people given by their Creator notwithstanding! America is destroying America because it will win all of its wars.
