Hello,
what a discouraging event. i feel confident that i did what i could
to retire
our arrogant, cowboy of a President. I'm surprised that none of the
talking heads
are talking about the effect that the Osama video possibly had on the
election. i
think it scared some people into the Bush camp. Because 42% of the
country
claims to be evangelical or born again and they seemed to vote as a clump
for Bush there was not much slack for the Kerry camp. That video which
was
released during the last week of the campaign may have been the clincher.
How upsetting!!!
It appears that the majority of the American people believe the garbage
that the war in Iraq is a legitimate part of an effort against
terrorists.
I want to grab them by their collars Jack Nicholson like and scream
at them 'You can't handle the truth." While Kerry was in no way an
antiwar candidate, because he consistently stated he would not pull
out of Iraq and intended to pursue the war on terror, none
the less Bush very clearly ran on a open campaign of bringing capitalist
democracy to the middle east though the barrel of a gun.
Exit polling data indicates that those voters concerned about the war in
Iraq
voted for Kerry in their majority, while those voters concerned about the
threat of terrorism (i believe that Osama's last minute video
dramatically
increased the numbers here) voted for Bush. It seems fair to say the
majority of American voters accept Bush's and the Republican argument
that the war in Iraq is a logical and necessary extension of the supposed
war on terror. The issue of WMDs was not the real issue and a majority
of Bush's backers accept that without any difficulty, apparently. Folks
like
Michael Moore, the Greens and to some degree Ralph Nader who touted
that the majority of Americans are opposed to the expansion of the
supposed
war on terror into Iraq and that people were duped by Bush and the
Republicans following 9/11, I believe are proven now to be wrong.
Where does this leave the antiwar movement? I hope with a realization
that
at this time we are a minority current that finds itself in a country
that will
pursue the war in Iraq, if not expand it to other middle eastern nations.
Ultimately, I am more convinced than ever that even demonstrations
of hundreds of thousands against the horrific war in Iraq will not be
effective in moving public opinion in the US until massive numbers of
US forces are killed and astounding numbers of Iraqis and other Arab
people are slaughtered with still no end to the war in sight. The picture
before us is simply put quite grim.
I am more convinced than ever that even demonstrations of hundreds of
thousands against the horrific war in Iraq will not be effective in
moving public
opinion in the U.S. until massive numbers of U.S. forces are killed
That only U.S. casualties will move most Americans to an antiwar position
is
clear enough. However, antiwar demonstrations are a necessary component
in
the equation of ridding Iraq of U.S. domination. They give the
legitimacy of
numbers to the position that heavier U.S. casualties will bring people
toward:
the U.S. needs to get out, now!
Hopefully, now that the election nonsense is past, our efforts can get
back
to building the movement against the war. We need to work at moving the
Democratic Party back to it's compassionate, workers roots. We need to
help build and support the third party efforts because they are speaking
the truth and their calls for proportional elections (like what Colorado
considered doing with their electoral college votes. If 48% voted for one
candidate then they get 4 of the 9 votes and the guy who got 53% gets
the other 5 and instant runoff balloting where you vote for your first
choice
and second choice so if you vote for the Greens, but they do not win then
your vote goes to your second choice. That will make us a more thoughtful
electorate and will help empower third and forth party candidates.
Putting
a lot of time and other resources into a drive to elect a pro-war
candidate
served to distract us from that task. At least now we don't have to go
through the period of illusion that somehow Kerry would be a better,
kinder warlord than George W.
keep the faith, Ross
"Our lives begin to end the day we become
silent about things that matter." Martin Luther King, Jr.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
The Truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.
~ Flannery O'Connor
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