That humorous quip generally attributed to Yankee baseball legend Yogi Berra, keeps bouncing around in my head these days. Like a SuperBall dropped from the third floor in a school stairwell that careens into an open locker, exploding into an AK 47 like rat-a-tat-tat …I just can’t shake that phrase out of my head somehow.
As my upcoming birthday approaches that will officially denote my survival for six and a half decades in this Nation, I find myself reflecting back over the events of my life. I remember my father fought in the “War to end all wars”, my father in-law fighting to stop communist aggression in Korea and my childhood friends and classmates fighting to again stop communist expansion in the jungles of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.
In more modern times, I’ve seen the U.S. enter into Kuwait and Iraq to push Saddam Hussein back into Iraq during the Administration of President George H W Bush and then Afghanistan to avenge the deaths of Americans lost in the 9/11 (ironically, my birthday) attack on the Twin Towers in NY, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania during his son President George W Bush’s Administration.
While the all out invasion of Afghanistan seemed a bit over the top as a response to avenge the acts of a particular group of terrorists, no one seemed to question that action as we as a Nation were severely angered on the unprecedented attack on American soil. Were there better alternatives? Maybe, but there was no real debate and the vast majority of Americans were happy to see a swift and aggressive response.
But then I remember the call to take this war into Iraq. Our President described the “Axis of Evil” confronting America, his Vice President Dick Cheney assured us that Saddam had a nuclear weapons program and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice said that America couldn’t afford for the “smoking gun” evidence to come in the form of a “mushroom cloud”… There was absolutely no doubt that Iraq possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction and the capability to manufacture chemical, biological and nuclear weapons that posed an eminent threat to Israel, the world, and of course America. An entire portfolio of evidence was presented to the American public and the rest of the world detailing all sorts of evidence to support the dire need to stop Al-Qaeda, which supposedly Saddam Hussein had close relations to and supported closely.
The evidence was irrefutable… yellowcake nuclear material being purchased from Africa by Iraq, aluminum tubes that could only be for the purpose of uranium enrichment centrifuges, the evidence was overwhelming and then Secretary of State Colin Powell presented the U.S. case to the United Nations to create a coalition of countries to join the U.S. in a preemptive war into Iraq to defeat the evil Saddam Hussein before he could attack his neighbors and America with his stockpile of WMDs. America would liberate the Iraqis and usher in an era of democratic rule and peace in the Middle East that would spread the values of democracy to a region in dire need of western values. The leader of our closest Middle Eastern ally, Israel officially took a neutral position on the war on Iraq under the leadership of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, but then private citizen “security expert” Netanyahu, testified to a U.S. Congressional committee that there was NO question whatsoever that Saddam was seeking and developing nuclear weapons, no question whatsoever. He stated that “Saddam is hell-bent on achieving nuclear capabilities as soon as he can”.
While the United Nations never declared the legality of a war with Iraq, America proceeded to launch an attack with a coalition of allies, but without the support of many of our important allies, nor the UN.
Except of course, all of that was wrong. Much of it was outright lying. The ill advised 2003 invasion of Iraq would drag on for years, costing this Country and many other countries thousands of lives, and tens of thousands of injuries, not to mention the deaths of a million or more civilians and costs estimated to eventually reach nearly 6 trillion dollars. On top of this, the damage to the American reputation globally has been potentially irreversibly damaged. Our actions have led to increased terrorist activities in the Middle East, and what was previously Saddam Hussein’s army, has become the most aggressive terrorist group we have ever dealt with (ISIS/ISIL). Instead of bringing democracy to the Middle East, we brought about chaos and seemingly endless sectarian war/turmoil. It isn’t like Saddam Hussein was a good person, but no one can even remotely assert that our actions have improved any aspect of life, or a chance of peace in the Middle East.
All of which brings us to today. After spending over a year and a half to work out a multinational agreement to stop the Iranian nuclear weapons development program in its tracks, to virtually assure the world that there is virtually no chance that Iran could develop a nuclear weapon for at least a decade and probably much longer, the very same voices that told us how much we needed to invade Iraq to stop the growth of Islamic terrorism are telling us that this agreement is the worst imaginable thing to ever happen to America, Israel and the world. As presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee said, the agreement was akin to President Obama taking Israelis to the “door of the ovens”.
Every single Republican presidential hopeful, every Republican leader and of course now Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu have condemned this diplomatic effort of the Obama Administration and all the members of the permanent United Nations Security Council plus Germany. An agreement nearly universally supported by the rest of the world. Why? Because it isn’t a “good” agreement… we should have gotten a “better” agreement. The specifics of a “good” agreement are the complete capitulation of all Iranian hopes and actions. It is of course an agreement that would never be agreed upon by Iran, which seems to be their real intention. They don’t want an agreement, period.
What they want is another Middle East war. As Texas U.S. Representative Louie Gohmert just stated, he thinks we need to bomb every Iranian nuclear site immediately, destroy every Iranian centrifuge. Except of course, these actions would not delay the Iranian efforts, to nearly the extent of the current negotiated agreement. But for the most part, conservative Americans are buying into the same old neocon philosophy. American might, makes right. There is the fallacious belief that American military intervention is always the best approach; that diplomacy is for “weak”, “feckless” parties, negotiating from an inferior position of weakness…
It really is like déjà vu, all over again…
But, there is one voice that has consistently spoken like a true American statesman. A voice that bravely voted against the Iraq invasion in 2003, a voice that supports the current multinational Iranian agreement, a voice which has consistently spoken up for the average working American, a voice that has espoused true American family values, and values of liberty and freedom from oppression by government and the outsized influence of corporate greed and extremely wealthy plutocrats that want to lead this Nation into yet another Middle Eastern war.
That is the voice of current Senator and presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders. Senator Sanders has been consistently on the right side of foreign policy votes in Congress. He is one of the very few politicians who seem to understand the real reasons that middle class, working Americans see their stations in life diminishing every single year for the past 40 or so years. As a true independent, he has operated outside of the traditional two party system of finger pointing and blaming the other side, while in large part working together to perpetuate the corrupting influence of money in our political processes. He recognizes that money is not the same thing as free speech, that artificial entities (corporations) are not humans, entitled to the same benefits as natural human beings.
There is still hope for America and Americans. We have a potentially once in a lifetime chance to actually make a real change in our direction. A chance to make America once again a country that supports family values, equal opportunity for all, universal health care, affordable, high quality education. A nation that has the wisdom and foresight to invest in itself, rebuilding a crumbling infrastructure, modernizing our entire energy infrastructure to dramatically reduce our dependence upon fossil fuels for energy purposes, putting literally millions of Americans back to work at wage levels that will eliminate the growing and unsustainable reliance upon government subsidies for the unemployed and working poor, a country that is a true world leader and promoter of peace and equality.
It is time for Americans, both liberal and conservative to wake up to the reality that America is no longer the “land of the free”. We incarcerate more people than any nation on earth! It is time to admit that the “War on Drugs” is an abject failure and totally misguided. We are directing billions of dollars a year to the worst cartels on the planet, wasting billions of dollars a year on incarceration and ill advised enforcement of laws that should in reality be considered unconstitutional. It is time for America to restore integrity and impartiality in our media sources. There are an alarming number of Americans who believe complete fabrications. They believe an entertainment channel dedicated to promoting neoconservative ideals while promoting outrage and feelings of persecution in its viewers, is actually a “news” channel.
It’s not too late. In my six and a half decades of living in America, I have found that most Americans share more common ideals and values than we have differences. We’ve always had different opinions in America, and that is a good thing. However, we have been intentionally manipulated for decades to focus on the differences in a negative sense. Many have tried to inject religious beliefs and differences into our political process and public laws. Many have tried to revise history into an idealist fantasy that never really existed. There has been a rising fundamentalism that rejects science and history and tries instead to bend America into a theology based society and government, the very things that we reject in other countries who have already done so, but with a different fundamentalist theology.
But Americans universally love their Country. They love our heritage and the sacrifices that so many have made to move our Nation forward and forge it into a world power and leader. We have to reject efforts to make America some sort of imperialist force, intent on bending world views to the growing distorted views of those behind the scenes trying to divide Americans, while exploiting global resources and labor.
This is a unique time in our history, if we come together, we can change the course of America back to what many of us remember in our childhoods.
But it will take a virtual American revolution.
But, if we stay divided, like we are today… then it’s just déjà vu, all over again…