The strategy of being tough and mean apparently is spreading thin with voters. The tough kid on the global block may terrorize the neighborhood and yet win fawning followers, but after a while the fear wears off and the fops withdraw to the caucus room of reason. The fear of the voters has incrementally transformed into the echo of nothing to fear but fear itself. After all, terrorism has been around for centuries, yet we make it sound as though it were exclusively and continuously directed at us. That al Qaeda with incredible luck was able to pull off dramatically — beyond even Osama’s expectations — a horrible day in the United States was owing more to our own stupidity than an ingenious, sinister strategy on the part of the terrorists.
Even though it is essential that we be ever on the alert, we nevertheless do get on with our daily lives as though the nightmare never happened. Yes, we brace ourselves during the multicolored alerts, but not as much as during an approaching hurricane or forest fire. Fear always resides in the back of the collective mind and does not surface unless there is a clear and present danger. However, when an administration, during an election year, continually reminds citizens that without its toughness in searching out enemies that are larger than life and determined to annihilate us, main street USA would resemble the streets of Jerusalem if we did not take action against these terrorists who wake up each morning plotting to take down the Sears Tower or the Golden Bridge. Yet at the same time the administration would have us believe that the insurgents in Iraq would be attacking our homeland, rather than protecting their local provinces from the occupation. In one respect it is true, for our provocation in Iraq has made more enemies who will unquestionably and eventually be plotting havoc upon our soil.
Terrorism is not as simplistic as we are led to believe — true, driven by killers and thugs — but it is not lacking political motive. It is in the main, a reaction to local and global conditions that threaten its separatism and religious beliefs. Northern Ireland, Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Palestine are telling cases. The Gulf War stirred the hornets’ nest in the mind of bin Laden to take action against the US, the world’s symbol of secular power and modernity, not because of any love for Saddam but that Saudi Arabia opened its ostensibly sacred land as a launching pad. To address these motives solely on brute retaliation will mean another Hundred Years War, unless we indefatigably work our way toward an alternative mode.
Finally, citizens say, “Hold on here, enough already.” If the fight against terrorism is that serious, why are we so dismissive with respect to the protection of our homeland? Is it not ludicrous to harass flight passengers and not check the flight’s cargo? Since our trade imbalance is so severe that we have to import millions of tons into the country shouldn’t we commandeer every ship at sea for a thorough search before they reach our vulnerable ports? And never mind our inability to protect the Iraqi borders, what about ours? Perhaps a change in course is a feasible alternative to staying the course.
The voters, then, are beginning to question these meandering tactics of the administration — brute strength and no brains.
Copyright © 2004 Richard R. Kennedy All rights reserved. Revised: October 8, 2004.
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