3 FEBRUARY—Two videos have stayed in my mind since I saw them. In each, people are shown disrupting town hall events to protest the war in Ukraine. In both cases the protesters are democrats calling out the corruption, hypocrisy, and warmongering of their elected representative. The videos are short and worth watching if for no other reason than as a reminder of what it looks like when ordinary people confront power—a rare sight these days. And so they function as civics lessons.
It’s always a fraught situations when someone starts yelling uncomfortable truths in public. It’s so obnoxious and embarrassing. Didn’t their mothers raise them properly? Why don’t they mind their manners and shut up? That seemed to be what the other people at the events were thinking. Most of them sat in what appeared to be silent embarrassment. But other braver souls stood up to the protesters telling them to be quiet or to leave the event I presume, and, in some cases, actually yelling at them.
Wow. What does someone have to be thinking to want to shut down an anti-war protester?
There is nothing more evil than war and there is nothing right now that is more important than stopping the war in Ukraine. And yet, judging by these videos, many of our fellow citizens—at least those among us who are democrats—are perfectly fine with Joe Biden and his colleagues in Congress marching us to the edge of Armageddon. Perhaps they think being polite is more important than stopping war. We’ve certainly come a long way from the Vietnam War protests when citizens risked and in some cases lost their lives to stand up against an immoral war.
The purpose of protest is to disrupt the status quo and make people uncomfortable in order to wake them up. Which means protesters are necessarily rude and obnoxious. But what’s actually ruder and far more obnoxious is Congress sending over $100 billion in weapons to Ukraine ensuring that more Ukrainian soldiers will die while Joe Biden escalates the war promising ever more dangerous and sophisticated weapons systems.
In his latest article, Ukraine: The War That Went Wrong, pulitzer prize winning journalist Chris Hedges details the long list of redlines Joe Biden has crossed as he continues to fund and escalate the war in Ukraine:
U.S. military support for Ukraine began with the basics — ammunition and assault weapons. The Biden administration, however, soon crossed several self-imposed red lines to provide a tidal wave of lethal war machinery: Stinger anti-aircraft systems; Javelin anti-armor systems; M777 towed Howitzers; 122mm GRAD rockets; M142 multiple rocket launchers, or HIMARS; Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided (TOW) missiles; Patriot air defense batteries; National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS); M113 Armored Personnel Carriers; and now 31 M1 Abrams, as part of a new $400 million package. These tanks will be supplemented by 14 German Leopard 2A6 tanks, 14 British Challenger 2 tanks, as well as tanks from other NATO members, including Poland. Next on the list are armor-piercing depleted uranium (DU) ammunition and F-15 and F-16 fighter jets.
Are all these weapons changing the outcome of the war? Again, Chris Hedges:
NATO military commanders understand that the infusion of these weapons systems into the war will not alter what is, at best, a stalemate, defined largely by artillery duels over hundreds of miles of front lines. The purchase of these weapons systems — one M1 Abrams tank costs $10 million when training and sustainment are included — increases the profits of the arms manufacturers. The use of these weapons in Ukraine allows them to be tested in battlefield conditions, making the war a laboratory for weapons manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin. All this is useful to NATO and to the arms industry. But it is not very useful to Ukraine.
And, lastly, another quote from the same article that illustrates the trap the U.S. now finds itself in:
In desperation, the empire pumps ever greater sums into its war machine. The most recent $1.7 trillion spending bill included $847 billion for the military; the total is boosted to $858 billion when factoring in accounts that don’t fall under the Armed Services committees’ jurisdiction, such as the Department of Energy, which oversees nuclear weapons maintenance and the infrastructure that develops them. In 2021, when the U.S. had a military budget of $801 billion, it constituted nearly 40 percent of all global military expenditures, more than the next nine countries, including Russia and China, spent on their militaries combined.
. . . A state of permanent war [which the U.S. has been in since it launched the war against Iraq] creates complex bureaucracies, sustained by compliant politicians, journalists, scientists, technocrats and academics, who obsequiously serve the war machine. This militarism needs mortal enemies — the latest are Russia and China — even when those demonized have no intention or capability, as was the case with Iraq, of harming the U.S. We are hostage to these incestuous institutional structures.
Meanwhile, ordinary Americans cannot afford rent or to pay for food and still do not have decent medical care or insurance and college graduates continue to drown in student loan debt. What’s really rude and offensive is spending U.S. taxpayer dollars on a war that has nothing to do with our own national security and that is in fact pushing us to the brink of nuclear war. And it’s truly bizarre that so many Americans seem to think all of this is somehow okay.
Most Americans, wholly unaware that the United Stated provoked the war in Ukraine and propagandized to believe Vladimir Putin is the embodiment of evil, acquiesce to whatever it is they are told to think and believe. If you want to actually know what is happening in the world there are plenty of excellent independent journalists and sources of information readily available to anyone with internet access. Don’t rely on the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN or MSNB. There you will only learn whatever it is those in power want you to think, whatever narratives serve the interests of empire, which is to say nothing that will challenge or threaten the existing power structure.
If ever there was a time to take your civic responsibilities seriously, to wake up, stand up, and speak out now is the moment.
Here is a partial list of reliable alternative media sources and independent journalists: Consortium News; ScheerPost; The Grayzone; Mint Press; The Scrum; Responsible Statecraft: Caitlin Johnstone; Alexander Mercouris; Glenn Greenwald; Aaron Mate; Matt Taibbi.
She told it. Cara told it!
Very good narrative about the current state of affairs, Cara! Thank you!
And I like Jeff's comment, especially the quote from Eleanor (the activist) Roosevelt.
In the early days of the 20th century, the great feminist, anarchist, free-thinker, and peace advocate, Emma Goldman, was considered "the most dangerous woman in America" as she drew large audience around the US to hear her lecture, and was finally deported in the early 1920's as she spoke "Truth to Power" which upset the status quo of the oligarchs running the country.
Too bad our fellow citizens are too lazy to Think for themselves when it comes to politics and issues which will effect their lives, but seem to prefer the sound-bite propaganda, 24/7 of big corporate media, as if every word were true.. Not only is it sad, but dangerous in the long run.
Tell it! Tell it!
The other part of this pie is that you'll notice how long they were able to hector their representatives before being ushered out of the meeting without getting an answer. Elinor Roosevelt said that well behaved women rarely (or never) make history. I understand why she said women but the truth is that well behaved people rarely make history.
Unfortunately, politicians are usually idiots and assholes (a deadly combination). Here in remote N. Idaho a few years back, the county commissioners (def: county commissioner, a townie who won't live in the country but wants to tell those that do, what to do and doesn't understand why those of us that do live out in the country think they're full of shit.) decided to implement this brilliant idea from a mentally challenged solid waste supervisor to reduce the number of dumpster sites for the county to 5. They were going to pitch this in a public meeting which was totally unannounced hoping that no one would show up and they could slam dunk it. Ha!!! The fools hadn't counted on the Tribe which wasn't going to have any of this and the network of people who live here who weren't having it either. After a rather raucous meeting they left. They didn't move the dumpster site. Tim Curry who was the lead commissioner lost his bid for re-election and subsequently said, Well the voters didn't understand solid waste. No, Tim you didn't understand what the voters wanted.