Marching Against Endless War

On Boston Common this morning, about 10,000 people rallied and marched against the Iraq war and the possibility of a U.S. attack on Iran. A Gold Star step-mother spoke of the letters she received from her son in Iraq playfully complaining about the laziness of a fellow soldier. She reported that her step-son's death was followed 18 days later by the death of his "lazy" friend.

Several Iraq war veterans stood silently on stage as one of them spoke about the many costs of the war to themselves and the nation. Rappers, including Son of Nun, performed in a medium particularly well-suited to political invective. Several speakers reminded those assembled that rights were never so much granted from above as demanded from "below." Howard Zinn, the leftist historian, asserted that the mission of all governments is to maintain the position of the wealthy and powerful. Another speaker, an official from the Unitarian Universalist Association called for America to regain its position as a moral leader in the world. Not all were in agreement that America was ever a world leader morally. Zinn suggested that the last war the U.S. fought in genuine reaction to being attacked was in 1812. This seemed the great divide among the protesters: those who thought America had lost its way but could regain its moral footing and those who viewed America as a historical bully and provocateur.

Ever since that humid week in Philadelphia in 1776, America has wrapped itself in the lofty rhetoric of liberty and justice for all. The Founders were sincere in their love of liberty; they staked their lives on it. That sincerity created this nation and millions within the US and around the world continue to draw strength from those words. But when our leaders justify their ugly foreign policy with the use of that lofty rhetoric, we enter Orwell country -- at very much our own risk. It appears that President John Kennedy first introduced the nation to what later was called "double speak." The soldiers that JFK sent to Vietnam were to be called "advisers." The war was to be referred to as a "police action." (His many medical ailments were to be called "vigor.")

It took President Ronald Reagan of Hollywood, to attempt the greatest verbal flights of fancy while justifying his imperial adventures. The Contras of El Salvador were on par with our Founding Fathers, he once said in one take. The missiles he pushed on the world like a street corner dealer, were labeled "peace keepers." Reagan possessed the ability to thoroughly protect himself from reality. Perhaps it is fitting that the airport in Washington named for him is today an armed camp ringed with metal detectors allegedly protecting passengers as they board heavily delayed planes.

The true Reagan legacy may be that the sense of unreality he brought to the White House has now pervaded American life. Many feel it but cannot name it. War, global warming, looming federal budget problems of unprecedented scope are all left unmentioned on the 6 o'clock news as most of the coverage concerns a "star" captured on camera holding her baby upside down or forgetting to attach it correctly to a car seat. No matter, we are told the young aren't watching TV news anyway. And as for the rest of us --we are locked so tightly within our daily regimens of work, family and gym visits, gulping down gourmet coffee in a state of numbed perplexity, attempting to decipher the latest technological gadget we are told we need--that we have little time and less inclination to ask what happened to the size of our nation's dreams.

At the rally this morning, a sister of a U.S soldier serving his third deployment in Iraq said that the worst moment for her came recently when she went to the drug store to purchase ten containers of lip balm for her brother. When the clerk asked her what they were for, she said they were for her brother in the war.

"What war?" he asked.