This letter to the editor went to print in the Planet sometime during spring of '07, but even more applicable today. The Republicans are just trying to keep a sinking ship afloat just long enough to dump it on Democrat hands, while cackling all the way to the bank.
Your time and consideration is greatly appreciated!
"The consciousness of being at war, and therefore in danger, makes the handing-over of all power to a small caste seem the natural, unavoidable condition of survival."
1984 George Orwell
Representative Cubin,
You're "fight to win" guest columnist piece in the Feb. 21-27, '07 PlanetJH weekly eerily reminded me of sideline pep talks from childhood soccer games perverted with Orwellian "Newspeak" straight out of 1984. This concerned me enough to respond to your words.
The current Dalai Lama, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate has stated that "war is outdated". The experiences since the US invaded Iraq are proving this statement to be true. This realization, however, is unfortunately not the result of enlightened consciousness, but the exact opposite.
War has become outdated not because of superior hi-tech weaponry, but due to the fact that the insurgents have resorted to fanatically primal levels to further their cause.
Specifically, war has become outdated, because you can never win when you there is an endless supply of fundamental martyrs willing to transform themselves into human guided cruise missiles.
You write fervently about how important it is to win this war, but it appears to myself and millions of other concerned global citizens that it is all ready lost. Of coure, we now know that the WMDs turned out to be "Weapons of Mass Delusion" and the preemptive strike was never justified in the first place. Please, shake a little salt on those "freedom fries".
A troop surge is merely a desperate attempt to prolong the inevitable and dump that responsibility on Democratic hands after '08 elections. It is important to remind you that the "disgrace forever" you mention rest solely on the Bush regime, not the entire United States.
You also state that "we did not choose to start this war", but the facts, figures, and especially the physics behind 9/11 reveal an entirely different story. It points to an "inside job". A "Pearl Harbor" type incident choreographed to initiate the Iraqi conflict. War is big business after all and if business is slow, then why not start a war?
I suspect that the Iraq fiasco will end like an old "Scooby Doo" rerun. When the mask of Bin Laden is finally removed, we'll see Dick Cheney's grimacing face. "Rats, those meddling kids."
Joshua Doolittle
Jackson, WY