2.1.08

So they say the terrorist hate freedom and that is why they hate America. Entire presidential campaigns center on the notion that if we don't elect candidate X the terrorist will take away your freedom.

9/11 was tragic but the terrorist did nothing to damage my freedom directly. Indirectly they did, sorta I suppose, if you count Bush limiting my rights with the Patriot Act.

Come to think of it, the Army fights for my rights. At least that what all the bumper stickers say. But no Iraqi has ever tangibly harmed my freedom. Nope. The only people that have harmed my rights live in D.C. in upper-class neighborhoods with fences around them and rent-a-cops patrolling the hood.

Has any one but me noticed that in the Constitution of this nation freedom are set up to protect the individual, you and me, from the government. That government being the US government. There is no mention of protecting me from foreign nationals or even Joe Smoe living down the road. Nope, it's set up to protect me from people like Bush and Cheney and Rumsfield and all the other cronies sitting pretty up on the hill.

Yet, my brothers and sisters are protecting this freedom in Iraq. That doesn't make sense to me at all. Maybe someone can explain this to me. I mean, it seems to me, that the only way a foreign entity could harm my rights would be to pose an existential threat to the government. I'm sorry but an IED only poses an existenital threat to Humvees without armor and the soldiers driving them, but in no way my government. It seems if the military wanted to protect my rights they would have to stage a coup.

The biggest lie the government ever told was that they are the one's to trust and the one's to hate live over there (wherever there happens to be at the time). The founding father didn't like the man, that is why they wrote the Bill of Rights to keep the man at bay. So I say, loudly and proudly, fuck the man.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"provide for the common defense" would include protecting you (and everyone else) from foreign nationals or Joe Smoe. However, we do have to ask ourselves when defense came to include permanent military bases all around the world.

I'm sure we would have a fit if China or Saudi Arabia wanted to build a military base in West Virginia but it's fine for us to have bases located in Japan, Iraq, and Germany (to name a few).

Raymond Sebond said...

I totally agree. My point was more to make a point on the common belief that the military is "fighting for our freedom." They are certainly providing defense. (Although, it's reasonable to think that our military presence is making more people more mad; hence, in some making making the problem worse. I mean, if some country were to actually have troops here, I'd pull out my gun and start shooting. But I digress..) I just don't understand how fighting terrorist in Iraq, or even at home, protects my freedom. Al Qaeda cause fear certainly but in no way could be considered an existential threat to the United States. Not like Germany and Japan in WWII, or the USSR in the Cold War, etc.