apathy and know-nothingness

There's a commentary here by a man named Joe Galloway, military columnist & co-author, with Lt. Gen. Hal Moore, of "We Were Soldiers Once ... and Young." It's summed up in these excerpts, but I recommend you read the whole thing.

This week, the Iraq war claimed its 4,000th American killed in action, but that sad and tragic milestone came as the war seems to have slipped off the evening news, off the front pages and from the minds of the American people.

I suppose this benign neglect of so important and damaging an event is combat fatigue on the part of the public. No doubt the White House is happy to see Iraq shoved to a back burner...Shame on them, and shame on us, for such callous indifference to the service, sacrifice and suffering of the families of the dead, wounded and injured troops who've given so much for so little in return.

That's the sort of apathy and know-nothingness that elected and then re-elected Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. They're what happens when fewer than half the eligible voters in this great experiment in democracy and freedom even care enough to vote on Election Day.

The war that Americans don’t want to know about drags on because its authors don’t care what you think or even if you think. In fact, they'd prefer that you didn’t think or ask any pesky questions that they can’t answer without lying.

Now. Surely it will surprise few or none of you who have read this blog for a day or more that I agree with the casting of shame upon Bush, Cheney, etc. But I think there's something missing from this commentary which needs to be taken into account.

First of all, if the war has "slipped off the evening news, off the front pages," shame on the newspaper people. Shame on the managing editors of the commercial-driven evening news. Shame on both these groups for being only too happy to spread lies and dirt across our screens and papers.

Shame on them because they helped the Bush administration rush us in a panic to this needless war. Shame on them because even now, they're not doing the hard and serious job of looking at the deceptions of that administration or, god forbid, themselves.

Shame on those dullards, both known and unknown, because they aren't just trying to smooth over those deceptions...they're actually glib about it.

This is Wolf Blitzer, on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, in 2004.

(Emphasis mine, because I want to stress that for almost four years now, it's been known that this war is at least a mistake. And that's only if you want to be very, very gracious; myself I'd just say it was criminal.)

Here's Stewart & Blitzer:

STEWART: Let me ask you... you work in news... [laughter] and I don't... the Senate Intelligence Committee, they come out with this report that says "Oh, the Iraq War... yeah, that's kind of a funny story... it was a mistake... [laughter] We were wrong about all that..."

BLITZER: Mmm-hmm...

STEWART: Taking the country to war based on information that turns out to be completely wrong because it was told to you by a guy named "Curveball"... [laughter]... Shouldn't that be... I mean, just out of curiosity... The biggest scandal we've ever had in the country? Or no? Am I thinking...

BLITZER: Well, you know... you never made a mistake in your life?

STEWART: That's a good point.

BLITZER: The CIA's not perfect, and sometimes they... get it wrong.

STEWART: That's right...

BLITZER: They got it wrong.

STEWART: And if... but in that situation, shouldn't someone be... fired? [laughter, applause] ...or is it... I could be wrong...

BLITZER: Well, George Tenet did leave this weekend.

STEWART: After being told he was doing a "superb job!"

As I've said, Stewart is more gracious than I. I remember watching that exchange at the time; it has stayed with me, and I remember thinking: A mistake? A mistake? Yes, I'm sure Stewart has made mistakes (six words: You Wrote It, You Watch It). As have I. As has every one of you reading this.

Remarkably few of us, however, have been in a position to make "a mistake" that leads to the deaths of 4,000 of our fellow citizens. A "mistake" that, in a very real sense, may have hastened the destruction of this country itself.

(Notice too: "They" got it wrong. Not "we" got it wrong)

I could (barely) forgive such a mistake...if I thought it was an honest mistake, and that those who had done it were properly horrified by the consequences of their actions, and had been held accountable. But brazenly, they're not, and they haven't been. And what I cannot forget is the cowardly act of being flippant about that mistake.

I once said here that I think if George W. Bush had an ounce of true patriotism in his body, he would have submitted his own resignation after demanding Cheney's. Years ago. To that I'll now add that if Blitzer and people like him were true journalists they would put 45s in their mouths and pull the trigger.

And now I come back to the Joe Galloway piece which urges shame upon the American people for what he perceives as "Iraq fatigue, " "callous indifference to service and sacrifice" "apathy and know-nothingness" about our elected "leaders" and "The war that Americans don’t want to know about."

But it wasn't "Americans" who (for only one example) proposed to cut veterans' benefits in a time of war, it was the Bush administration.

It wasn't "apathy and know-nothingness" that elected Bush & Cheney the first time...they weren't elected the first time. As for the second time, "apathy and know-nothingness?" Or a damp squib of an opposing candidate who could be "swift-boated" instead of standing up?

(Yes, the "swift-boaters" themselves did it, with the help of the news corporations...but if Kerry had been an adult human being...) Of course Bush and Cheney were re-elected over him. A hamster would have been re-elected over him.

Finally, "the war that Americans don't want to know about?" Or the war that Americans weren't, aren’t, and probably won't be for years, told the truth about?

I have very little stomach for the "everybody is to blame" style of comment. There are some very specific people who are to blame. And if Americans as a whole ought to be ashamed of anything, it's that those people haven't been forced to resign in disgrace.

If we're "fatigued" about anything, it's not the war itself, but the utter refusal of virtually anyone in power in politics or journalism to listen to our reasons for not supporting the invasion of Iraq until it was too late. And now it's a few years past too late.

It's because even now, "journalists" are still listening to people whose mark of distinction in the months leading up to the Iraq war was how wrong they were. Instead of the people who were right.

(I still think that's a big part of why Obama is in the lead, and should be talked about more)

But when 82% of Americans say we should be out of Iraq before the end of the next president's first term (personally, I'd say before the end of his-or-her first 100 days)--don't tell me we don't care and we don't know.

We care. We know.

And we know who doesn't care.