OpEdNews
Original Content at
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_timothy__080104_things_most_people_w.htm--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
January 4, 2008
The American people need to understand one thing, and this by the way is the most important thing that they could possibly understand; there is no military solution to the problems that exist in the Middle East. We can posture and waste billions of dollars in our quest to secure a favorable outcome that will benefit this country from military confrontation, but in the end, if indeed there ever is an end, it will be a political solution and not a military one that will prevail. Iran will be convinced that it needs nuclear weapons in the face of American military threats. Pakistan will become increasingly anti-American with each passing day if we refuse to accept that they are an independent country with the right to self-determination and especially if we ignore their borders in Peshawar and bring Special Ops forces across their borders.
This is a classic American mistake. We have not learned anything from decades of military involvement in foreign countries. When is this country going to understand that we will never “win the hearts and minds” of those that oppose us through military force? This is such an elementary truth that it seems totally unbelievable that any American administration that pursues military action in order to seek a cessation of hostilities must either be insane or they have no wish to eliminate hostilities. I believe that in the case of the Middle East and Afghanistan and Pakistan, there is a greater agenda than eliminating al Qaeda or the Taliban. The United States has an agenda that they are keeping to themselves. This is something that all Americans should be wondering about as well as asking questions of our government. What is the true agenda of our policies in this area of the world?
Think of the damage that these wars have already caused not only to the nations involved but also to our own country. We are borrowing almost two billion dollars a day from the Chinese and the Japanese to fund these wars. Our reputation in the world has sunk to an all-time low, greater than the blowback of the Vietnam debacle. Instead of the world seeing us as a beacon of democracy and freedom, they see us as a nation hell-bent on conquest and see our nation as one that is fast approaching a police state. Great Britain has already become a police state, with cameras at every intersection and laws that restrict cameras in “sensitive” areas. Many Americans returning from England warn others that it isn’t a pleasant place to take a vacation.
We in this country have already built more than 90 internment camps throughout this country. This is common knowledge yet nobody has written anything substantial about what these camps will be used for. Is this a development that people would rather not speak about? Why have we signed a military pact wit India to share military knowledge and conduct joint military maneuvers along with the sharing of nuclear technology without a debate in Congress? Where are we going with these things? Why are we using mercenaries in our wars overseas that operate outside the rule of law?
The most fantastic part of this entire scenario is that the so-called Presidential Candidates do not address these things. They talk about issues like Social Security, immigration, education and other “safe” subjects without mentioning the very things that the mainstream media refuses to report about in detail. John Edwards “alludes” to the corporate take-over of our media and government without going into too much detail about how they finance and support candidates that call for higher defense budgets and a get-tough policy with those that don’t agree with us. Ron Paul talks about the civil liberties we have lost and how the government operates outside of the Constitution. So far the majority of Americans have hardly listened to them at all. Is it because Americans really don’t want to know what our government is doing because the answer might be too upsetting to them or is it because people have been dumbed down by the mainstream media to the point where they believe that Paul and Edwards are “making these things up”?
People reading this already know what I’m talking about. It is truly a shame that the only people that will read pieces such as this are people that already know “what time it is”. Just once I wish that I could write an Op-Ed on The New York Times or have an article in Time or Newsweek that people in the mainstream could read. Of course they wouldn’t print any articles of mine, I’ve already tried. It makes no matter that I probably have more readers than some of their staffers at the magazines, all of my readers are part of the “Crazy fringe left” as they call us. So I go on preaching to the choir and hope that in some small way I am doing my part to wake this country up before the train goes off the rails.
That’s the way I see it.
Authors Website:
http://liberalpro.blogspot.comAuthors Bio: Former Chairman of the Liberal Party of America, Tim is a retired Army Sergeant. He currently lives in South Carolina. A regular contributor to OpEdNews, he is the author of Kimchee Kronicles and is currently at work on a new novel.
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