After 9/11, I think it would have been helpful if the WH had started a web site about what we as citizens can do to help in the war on terror. Included in that web site should be a list of reading materials so that people know what we're up against.
Western culture can't even seem to articulate why we are fighting against Islamist extremists, let alone why we should win. Sad.
“... I would then have him trace the process of our moral decline, to watch, first, the sinking of the foundations of morality as the old teaching was allowed to lapse, then the rapidly increasing disintegration, then the final collapse of the whole edifice, and the dark dawning of our modern day when we can neither endure our vices nor face the remedies needed to cure them.....of late years wealth has made us greedy, and self-indulgence has brought us, through every form of sensual excess, to be, if I may so put it, in love with death both individual and collective...” TITUS LIVIUS 59 B.C. TO 17 A.D.
Don't kid yourself into thinking that this is a modern phenomenon. Even in the Civil War there were draft riots and pro-slavery, anti-war Copperheads.
In WWII, anti-war activities were strongly suppressed, such as the Phoenix, AZ, anti-draft riot by blacks who felt they were being drafted in disproportionate numbers. The government response was to call out the national guard and machine gun the asphalt in front of the protesters, showering them with chunks of pavement. Then the news of the event was buried by the local newspaper. No record of casualties. It only came out in the 1960s, when a reporter who had been there was allowed to describe it in detail.
When communists or other unreliables were drafted, they were often shipped to the Aleutian Islands to keep them from agitating, disrupting, or otherwise interfering with the war effort. It was also the dumping ground for individuals who discussed classified information when drunk and other such sins.
The non-draftable communists were also pestiferous. Initially they railed against Nazis, until Hitler signed his pact with Stalin. Then the American communists did a 180 degree turn and fully embraced Nazism as a good thing.
Then when Hitler invaded Russia, the American communists went back to ranting against Hitler. You can see where their loyalties were then, just as you can see where their loyalties are today.
Many such villains spent four years in a federal penitentiary for refusing to be drafted. It was the standard punishment, and well deserved.
Ping list for the discussion of the politics and social (and sometimes nostalgic) aspects that directly effects Generation Reagan / Generation-X (Those born from 1965-1981) including all the spending previous generations are doing that Gen-X and Y will end up paying for.
Freep mail me to be added or dropped. See my home page for details and previous articles.
I can't help but think that since this nation has started taking God out of EVERYTHING, it all turned to poo. In God We Trust is no longer and now we're screwed.
Never should have gotten talked into stopping the Red Scare of the 1920s, never should have let someone as ineffective as McCarthy drive it during the 1950s. Never should have allowed youth rebellion during the 60s to go much farther than the first round of cracked heads and mass arrests (including treason trials). Never should have stopped COINTELPRO.