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By
Bruce Bressack
11/06/2003
Boomers
My first article, "The Un-Great Divide, or how Peace nearly destroyed America", was written during the debates on whether we should wage War on Iraq.
This article was 'inspired' by a radio-talk-show-host calling people who were against the War 'peaceniks'...and, that if they didn't love America, they could leave it.
[An interesting side note about this article - I was contacted by a person who was promoting Anti-War protests on behalf of Yoko Ono's organization. They lost interest, however, when I said that I favored going into Iraq].
At that time, I believed that Saddam was linked to 9/11, had terrorist ties, and was hiding weapons of mass destruction. All of which "may" be true...but are still unproven at this point.
Here's some of what I said in my February 11th column -
I don’t care what the terrorists’ motivation is, and that’s the real shame. Whatever their just cause is, or was, is lost on this ex-Peacenik.
Are you listening? We don’t care. Just stop it! You cannot win. We are the inventors of "Weapons of Mass Destruction", and our stockpiles would make you weep with envy.
And, if you keep stoking the fires you will be fired upon, unless, of course, you’re willing to “Give Peace A Chance”.
I doubt it. You’d rather be a dead martyr, right? Trust me, my government will accommodate you.
On March 10th, I wrote a column called "Because God is on our side". If you recall, this timeframe was prior to our entry into Iraq.
This article was 'inspired' (again) by a radio-talk-show-host who said that we will win this War because "God is on our side". It just seems odd to me when people link God with War. And, I shared this 'perspective' in my March 10th column -
While there is no doubt that we can, will and must win this war, I pray that [for once] we can “just keep God out of it”.
I don’t think he approves of war. Not that he gets a vote. After all, he doesn’t have a seat on the United Nations Security Council.
It’s not that God’s a prude, or a party-pooper or anything. I just don't think he’s into this sort of thing. In fact, what I've heard is that he's kind, loving, tolerant, caring, benevolent and...‘non-warlike’.
Not to worry though. His fine qualities and attributes won't stand in our way. Nothing [not even he] can stop us once we’ve stepped onto the path of “peaceful-destruction”.
So, ultimately, we did go to War. And we even lost a few long-time 'friends' (like France, Germany, and Russia) along the way. I was particularly 'surprised' that our government was 'dirty-talking' the Russians (again!).
[Boomers will remember that, when we were growing up, Russia was our mortal enemy. But then one day, quite unexpectedly, they were our 'friends'].
This situation 'inspired' my April 24th column called "The Enemy of the Week Award goes to [fill in the blank]". Here's some of what I said at the time (starting with a recollection about those infamous air raid drills in the 50's and 60's) -
School districts held air raid drills. When the alarm went off, we all huddled in the hallway, then kneeled down...facing the walls…our tiny arms covering our fertile little minds.
We felt "safe" in those corridors, not knowing at the time that we had absolutely no chance of survival if the nukes were dropped.
Then one day, quite unexpectedly, Russia became our friend. No more Khrushchev shoe-bangin’ on tables...no more “we will bury you”. Suddenly, and amazingly, the Russians were “just like us”. The musician Sting always preached that philosophy - he even said "we share the same biology...regardless of ideology".
Last year, our president said that he looked the Russian Leader Putin in the eye and was able to get a sense of his soul. They became the "best-of-buddies"...arm-in-arm...no more good cop/bad cop...just good ol' buddies.
Now, we’re hearing that Russia "can’t be trusted". [And that goes double for France].
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