White Collar War
Why do I get uncomfortable when President Bush asks each American child to send a dollar to feed Afghani children.  Sociologically, his request reminds us to that the Afghani people are our same species.  Psychologically, it focuses our minds away from anxiety over current and impending terrorist retaliation for our bombing campaign.  Economically, it may save our parents a few tax dollars.
Have I fallen into so cynical a crevasse that I can no longer entertain the thought that our commander-in-chief is capable of a humanitarian gesture?  But alas, a gesture is the only way I can view it.  How much of the food we drop from the sky will reach the starving Afghanis who made the impossible choice to leave their homes and alight to the border with little more than the clothes on their backs?  According to disaster relief expert Steve,Hansch, our food drop will satisfy only one one-hundred-thousandth of the potential need.
If the world is a dysfunctional family, the U.S. is dad.  Like a molesting father who plies his child with candy, a wink and a coercive smile-- “We’ll just keep this our special little secret, alright?” --we first bomb and then feed our Afghani victims.  “Please love me—or else.  I just can’t help myself.”  Like a violated child, the Afghani people are in shock.  Someone is reaching out to wipe away their tears, offering a hug and a snack.  How compassionate—except that it’s the same thug who just raped them!  What was it that Lincoln said about fooling the people?
Does anyone else see the irony in how we deliver subsistence aid?  Bombing with vegetables makes for a sad attempt to mask another parallel with “The Evil Ones” as President Bush likes to call our attackers.  5000 Americans died in New York and the Pentagon.  Many times that many will die of starvation fleeing our bombs.
But this is a white collar war.  The people who make decisions which they know will result in the deaths of tens of thousands of innocents do so from their posh, well appointed offices, not from the dark depths of underground bunkers.  Our white collared warriors are sitting in leather bound lazy boys, not squatting in the dirt.  They don’t pull the trigger; they leave that up to naïvely patriotic young soldiers—our sons and daughters.  They spin propaganda, labeling Bin Laden as terrorist, coward, evil one, proclaiming that his aim was to kill innocents.  But do the facts support their assumptions?
If bin Laden had wanted to maximize his killing, he could have waited for Sunday and aimed those four jets at American football stadiums.  Assuming three out of four found their targets, some two hundred thousand people might have lost their lives. We can say that bin Laden’s goal was to send a message, striking at the heart of American business and military leadership.   Are we not now sending a message to terrorists around the globe, i.e., “attack us at your own risk”.  We did not accept bin Laden’s message and those we call terrorists won’t accept ours.
The real difference between us and them is that most of our killing is covert, indirect.  Our policies in these countries lead to conditions of malnutrition, starvation, disease and despotic power struggles resulting in death on so a massive scale that it shrinks to statistical insignificance the 5000 Americans who died in this direct, overt attack.  Which is more cowardly?    Although it comprises only 4% of the world’s population, the United States controls and consumes over 40% of the world’s assets .  Why?  Is it because we’re smarter, more efficient, more worthy than citizens of any other country on the globe?   Or is the reality that we’ve taken more than our share?  And how does that happen?  Does the rest of the world simply hand us their wealth on an endless line of silver platters?  No.  We use our wealth and power, both overtly and covertly to assist American companies in coercing and manipulating the world to hand over the goods .
So drop your dollar into the collection basket.  Help feed the poor, starving Afghani children—or at least two percent of them.  Then pat yourself on the back,  say “Proud to be an American” and stand in bewildered shock when twenty years from now, those few who survived our largesse, demonstrate their gratitude with another “terrorist” attack.

Ron Bell
October 18, 2001
 

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