[Mb-civic] After the Election, ...

[Sibley Smith]

The following is reprinted for the MB-Civic list by my request with the permission of the author, John Ketwig, long-time member of the VVAW (Vietnam Veterans Against the War) and author of "...and a hard rain fell: A GI's True Story of the War in Vietnam."   --Sib Smith / Tioga Joe  (also, Hola Diego!)
After the election, my concerns remain.

It's five days after the 2004 Presidential election.   John Kerry, the one politician we've believed in and supported for so many years, will not move into the White House in January.   We will try to endure four more years of George W. Bush and his Neo-con Nazi henchmen.   What will the deficit be four years from now?   How many young Americans will be killed or maimed in Iraq, Afghanistan, or some other unnecessary war?   How many of our liberties will be curtailed?   Under the umbrella of "homeland security", will the feds demand to know which books I've read?   Will Dubya stack the Supreme Court, then outlaw abortion?     How big, and corrupt, will Halliburton become?   How much will we be paying for a gallon of regular gas in 2008?   Will America still be ostracized from the international community of nations?   I don't mean to be adversarial, but I refuse to call a government "conservative" when it overspends its budget by trillions.   I detest the hypocrisy of zealots who call themselves "Pro Life" when considering an American fetus, but are heartlessly cruel and contemptuous when the bombs are raining down upon Iraqi civilians.   I refuse to believe that the owner of a gigantic SUV with the requisite "United We Stand" decal on the back is more patriotic than the activist who marches for peace.   I simply cannot accept that an evangelistic, "born again" Christian is more religious than a Democrat.     

What happened?   How can this be?   Early Wednesday afternoon the TV commentators began to discuss "values", whatever that means.  No one has defined this "values" thing, although it seems to have something to do with evangelical Christians and the anti-abortion folks.   I'm confused.   After all, I cannot escape the fact that this is the Republican party we're talking about.   The party of Richard Nixon, who subverted our Constitution and delayed the end of the Vietnam war, while keeping an "enemies list" of those who disagreed.    Nixon broke all the rules, utterly contemptuous of the Constitution and the American people. especially the ones dying in Vietnam.   The GOP is the party of Ronald Reagan, the affable actor who nearly bankrupted our nation both financially and morally.   Ketchup was a vegetable in school lunches under Reagan, the homeless supposedly loved their subway grates, and an unprecedented number of Reagan's administration went to prison for felony offenses.    The "Teflon President" snoozed through cabinet meetings while Oliver North supplied clandestine arms to the Contras.   (And John Kerry investigated and found the returning planes were full of cocaine to be sold in our schools!)   Then there was George Bush the elder, and the first Gulf War.   'Way back then I carried a sign that said "No blood for oil!"   Now Son of George Bush has alienated the world, abrogated the United Nations, and sent over eleven hundred fine young Americans to their death.   The surplus Bill Clinton left in the national cookie jar has disappeared, and our deficits are at all-time record levels.   Sorry, I am not attracted to the "values" of a "pro-life" Commander-in-Chief who calls down a "Shock and Awe" blitzkrieg upon the city of Baghdad, killing untold innocent civilians.    I have seen carpet bombing, and the mutilated bodies, the horror and suffering of civilians caught in the crossfire of modern warfare.   Anyone who would unleash those horrors unnecessarily, even distorting facts to justify the act, exhibits "values" I cannot value at all.                                                   

I came back from Vietnam traumatized by the violence and horrors I had witnessed.   As I examined my heart and head, I discovered that I had feared the enemy, but I had come to hate the power-mad military brass, who were primarily concerned with advancing their military careers.   Atrocities happened, and I know that John Kerry was right in 1971, and he was the more decent, humanitarian candidate in 2004.   I cannot accept that those qualities are equivalent to weakness, just as I cannot accept the characterization of Michael Moore as "Hollywood", when all he did was show us the out takes from the corporate-crafted far-Right evening news broadcasts... snippets that illuminated the truth.   Perhaps, after all the "special effects" in the movies and the staged macho violence of the WWF, the American people can no longer separate fact from fiction.   If truth is anti-American, our nation and its way of life are doomed.

Once upon a time, my country was a constructive, benevolent force in the world.   Then, despite the dire warnings of a Republican President Eisenhower who foresaw the dangers posed by the military-industrial complex, we abandoned compassion and adopted policies of murdering all who disagree with us, or who stand in the path of increased corporate profits.   Where once Lady Liberty welcomed the world's downtrodden, we found reasons to shoot them, and praised our President's "character" when he distorted the facts and unleashed weapons from Hell upon peasants.   I cannot admire the "values" of the Bush administration's NeoCon cadre when their answer to the world's problems is to export destruction and death.   The Pentagon recently announced that the first fifty "Shock and Awe" missions ALL failed to hit their targets, and they officially estimate that more than 100,000 Iraqis have died... many of them innocent civilians.   I am angry at the cost of a gallon of gas, but I know that I opposed this war for oil from the very first. 

Business is good.    The Dow-Jones rose a few points after Dubya was re-elected.   Halliburton, Dick Cheney's former company (he still gets eighteen million dollars a year from them, a VERY golden parachute!)  is under investigation for corruption, a mere drop in the ocean.    As a nation, we have chosen not to compete with the life-oriented products from BMW and Seiko, Michelin, Toyota, Kia, Hyundai, Mazda, Mercedes-Benz, Nikon, Sony, Sanyo, and Yamaha.   Our only thriving industries are "defense" contractors with lush Pentagon licenses.   We are in the business of international death and destruction, and business is very, very good.    

I am most angry when I see the "Support Our Troops" stickers.  What exactly are they suggesting?   Shall I purchase a Kevlar flak jacket or a serviceable gas mask and send it to an under-equipped G.I. in Iraq?   Shall I take up a collection and buy meals for the wounded in our military hospitals, or armor plating for a Hum-Vee?   How can I tell our brave young soldiers in Iraq that, despite the nightmares and the damage to their consciences, they will probably come home and raise families and gain car payments and mortgages?    The epidemic of suicide among our troops inspires me to reach out to them, tho' some would call me soft or overly sensitive.   It isn't "patriotic" to suggest that war creates terrible aftereffects in the minds of the warriors, despite all the sad, irrefutable evidence.

How have so many religious people abandoned the concept of "do unto others"?    It is not fashionable to be moral today, although it is very fashionable to be a regular church attendee, and to parade your mysterious "values" as if they were somehow unique.    Despite the teachings of all the world's religions, today much of our society has little place for compassion.    Hypocrisy is epidemic, and it is destroying our culture.  The war on terror will not address the core of our problems on Main Street USA.    Separation of church and state is seen as a curious old-fashioned concept to be overthrown.    Values indeed! 

The Right would say that this message is pessimistic, that I hate America.   It is full of disgust and disappointment, but I retain my optimism.   I believe in the basic goodness of most people, and that we are all neighbors on this planet.   I'm glad I am an American, but this is far from utopia, and I cannot ignore my nation's problems.  One loves the ill child but curses the disease.   I see my country dying of cancer, and I must protest.   It is my right.   At least, it was once.    As John Lennon said, "When you talk about destruction, don't you know that you can count me out!"    And also, "You may think that I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.   I hope some day you'll join us, and the world can live as one."    I will continue to search for avenues that lead to that day.   

John Ketwig

11-8-04

_____________________________

John Ketwig of Washington, New Jersey, is the author of .and a hard rain fell: A GI's True Story of the War in Vietnam (check www.sourcebooks.com).  This is a personal account of what our youth endured in the Vietnam War, written by and from the point of view of an Army private first class.   Originally from upstate New York, John arrived in Vietnam in September of 1967 and spent the next year stationed at Pleiku in South Vietnam, where he was a wheel and track mechanic and body-fender repairman and welder, attached to the 4th Infantry Division.  Since leaving the Army, John has continued working in the automotive industry, primarily with service and parts. He has held management positions with Toyota, Rolls-Royce, and currently Hyundai, and has been a consultant to Ford Motor Company.

 

 

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