It's Finally Over and We Lost

I watched it.

I shouldn’t have.

When it was mercifully over I felt sick to my stomach.

I understand that most of what I was taught to believe about the United States is myth. When the fables of American exceptionalism are stripped away, what remains reveals that this is a nation built on racism and genocide, imperial conquest, double-dealing and hypocrisy. This is harsh but inescapable. Recognizing the truth about one’s country doesn’t imply or prove hatred of one’s country.

Not a single direct question in any of the “debates” about climate change, the most urgent issue facing the world. This is inexcusably irresponsible.

Deemed more important is a false question about the national debt and entitlement programs. First of all, Americans pay into Social Security and Medicare paycheck by paycheck, with the promise that when the time arrives, as it will for all of us, these programs will be there to insure that no person that has worked his or her entire life is forced to live in poverty. Conservatives have railed against Social Security and Medicare for decades, and now they are routinely joined by corporate Democrats like Hillary Clinton, all shouting in unison for austerity measures.

It’s total bullshit, of course. If this country stopped pouring trillions of dollars into the Pentagon, we would have more than enough to fund Medicare for all and to insure that Social Security lives up to its implicit promise. Year after year polls show that the majority of Americans want to expand these programs, and year after year the political class ignores the will of the majority.

Was I surprised that Donald Trump is completely ignorant about abortion?

No more than to hear Hillary Clinton blame Russia for trying to tip the election in favor of Trump. Hillary declared that Russia -- the highest levels of the Kremlin, mind you, harkening back to the Cold War -- is behind the cyber attacks that led to the latest WikiLeaks disclosures. Clinton stated that all 17 of America’s intelligence agencies have confirmed that Russia is behind the leaks. My first question is: do we really need 17 intelligence agencies? And these are, I suppose, the same crack agencies that spent more than a decade searching the globe for Osama bin Laden, the world’s most wanted man? Couldn’t find him anywhere...

And speaking of that great bogeyman bin Laden, Clinton twice said that bin Laden had been brought to justice. Strange, I don’t remember bin Laden being charged and tried in an American court or any court for that matter. Didn’t America’s brave operatives assassinate bin Laden and dump his body into the sea? In an age when the American president decides who shall live and who shall die by remote controlled drone, I suppose you can say that bin Laden was brought to justice.  

If Russia is behind the cyber attacks and attempting to subvert our election all I can ask my country is: how does it feel to have the tables turned, to be on the receiving end for a change?

Some of the exchanges were merely amusing, ample proof, as if any were needed, of the utter debasement of our democratic process, like when Trump insisted that nobody respects women more than he does. Or when Clinton defended the money laundering operation that is the Clinton Foundation.

It was a sad night for America. I shouldn’t have watched, but I did.

Our Booyah Moment

We got bin Laden.

High five in the streets. Fist pumps in the bar. Crank up the ticker tape parade. Dispatch six F-14’s to do a flyover above New York City.

We got the big bogeyman.

Finally.

Killed him dead they say. Tested his DNA to prove it.

It only took ten years and thousands of deaths and casualties for the US to kill the world’s most wanted man.

This is a triumph for our crack intelligence community and intrepid troops.

Even if it took ten brutal years.

Now what? Does Al Qaeda fold its tent and slink off into the dusk?

Doubtful. It’s likely there will be reprisals, somewhere, for the killing of bin Laden, just as there will be Pakistanis and Afghans and Iraqi’s willing to die as long as their friends and relatives are being killed by US drone strikes or occupation forces. When it comes to death, people have long memories. Bin Laden may be gone, but Al Qaeda will be with us for a time yet.

Killing begets more killing, but we are blasé about it now, as blasé as bin Laden acted after 9/11. Bin Laden indirectly plotted to kill in spectacular fashion; we kill systematically with our powerful weapons, our eyes that see in the dark and through thick walls.

This really is an amazing development on one level. No, I’m not talking about the breathless reporting from Diane Sawyer and Brian Williams, or the sound bites from Uncle Dick Cheney and Hillary Clinton; I’m talking about the fact that the US cedes to itself the authority to assassinate a man on foreign soil. If any nation in the world except Israel – which plays by a different set of rules -- granted itself the same authority, the US would be screaming about the rule of law and sovereign rights.

Hypocrisy is unpleasant. Do as I say, not as I do.

But it goes without saying that the US only kills with the purest motivation and in the name of the highest ideals. Right? Our cause is always righteous, though I wonder what the back-channel traffic on this operation looks like, the secret cables between spies and soldiers, diplomats and politicians. And I wonder what the US had to promise Pakistan in order for the latter to cough up bin Laden? Why now? Why not five, six or ten years ago?

But hey, why be skeptical of the US government and its motives? After all, this is the finest government money can buy and it can be depended on to do the will of its benefactors. This is a “feel good” story, frontier justice meted out to the mastermind of 9/11.

The only surprising thing thus far is that Donald Trump hasn’t claimed responsibility for killing bin Laden.