It’s been a terrible week for me, the problems the US is facing has been swirling and twirling around my head all week….this diary is the result.
The horrific event of 9/11 was bad enough with the deaths and destruction of that awful day, but the five years since has brought us far worse in just about every area I can think of, all of it because this country decided to take an “offensive” approach. An offensive approach or an act of revenge that first of all led us to attack Afghanistan. Why did we attack Afghanistan, because we thought Bid Laden was hiding there and the Afghan’s would not turn him over to us, even though they said they did not know where he was and could not comply. So we invaded that country at great cost and resulting in the loss of many lives, soon a destabalized country which now is descending into an even worse state than when we invaded as I write this…
It was not long before that act of revenge was not quite enough for the bloodthirsty hawks in Bushco’s administration so what brilliant idea did they come up with next, oh while we are at it why not knock off Sadaam in Iraq, take over that country and really put revenge in full force there.
Now years later, the tally in the hundreds of billions, the decimation of our military almost complete, the lives lost almost approaching the loss of the World Trade Center, the lives lost of Iraqi’s most likely in the hundreds of thousands, devastation as far as the eye can see and more, much more to come, with no end in site.
These acts of revenge served in many ways to lead to the reelection of a man most unsuited for the job of leading a country in any case, but definitely unsuited for leading a country into war which we know full well after seeing the management he has provided.
This also led to the greatest deficit the world has ever known, with China our potentially biggest threat holding the notes.
These act of revenge has led us to torture in Iraq, to now considering laws to make that torture legal, to the complete scorn and derision of this country in all parts of the world, to abandon many of our rights and freedoms and to deny all those captured any rights at all. No matter if they were innocent or guilty.
Our country is now in shatters, our people go without health care or decent incomes, gas prices are many times higher than pre war, our elections a sham, our leaders bereft of leadership, our ports weak and vulnerable, our people divided worse than ever before, our whole country weak and vulnerable and on and on.
Now we are faced with probably the most important election in the history of this country, most likely our last chance to oust the lying, liars, an election we have no faith in whatsoever to be fair or accurate.
So here we are now, about to observe the day 9/11 once again, our Pres about to lay wreaths on all the sites on that day, and to give a speech to us in the midst of the showing of a movie giving a fictional account of it all and the contents of which are designed to blame it all on Clinton.
Are we safer now? That is the biggest joke of all time. Bin Laden in his wildest dreams could not have come up with a plan that would so devastate us as we have done to ourselves. This is what revenge has brought us and so I would ask, was it worth it.
I can only dream of what life, our country, our world would be like today if we, our nation had never sought this revenge, but I doubt that any other path would have brought us so low. Thanks Mr. President, thanks Mr. Cheney and Rumsfeld, thanks Congress, thanks to all the citizens who thought it a worthy endeavor and who kept this man and these people in office. Thanks a lot.
I’ll end this with a quotation “Revenge is mine, sayeth the Lord.” The bible thumpers should have paid attention to that.
I’ve said my piece, what say you?
Village Blue
I a sorry to lay another late night rant on you but it seems it could not be helped.
I do send love to all of you great and wonderful fighters who never give up trying to change and to end these awful things. Peace be unto you and to us all!
I am proud to know you and count myself among you.
You say what has been running through the minds and hearts of many for years. I have been so damn mad this week I could not even do a podcast about it but will be doing one later today.
It’s funny that I’ve been barely able to write anthing for months now, but this week I just went on overload and it had to come out. It’s hard to narrow these thoughts down to a diary sized ball.
I’ve been talking to shirl a lot about how over informed all of are, we know all the details of all of these issues and a week like this just stirs the whole pot up in our brains.
I was doing so well for months, not getting too involved, too upset, and maybe that’s good so now I am not all burnt out, but still a little toasty. But now I have been having these intense dreams, filled with people and pretty confusing situations that always have a neverending problem for me which I cannot solve.
My dream ended last night when as the last straw my glasses were suddenly all bent and skewed and as I tried to unravel what happened I discovered they weren’t mine at all and I had no idea where mine were in this sea or rather houseful of people I was with.
Frustration with a capital F.
It has been a terrible week — but you’ve produced some great diaries as a result of it, instead of curling up in a ball and pulling a blanket over your head. I’m grateful to you.
Hi Kahli, thanks for your comment. No chance of curling up in a ball and sometimes I wish I could. It all makes me just fighting mad but no one to fight with.
Before I went to bed last night I was thinking of doing a Welcome Wagon Diary this morning, but after my dream which I told a little about in comment to Refinish, I just couldn’t go back to sleep and I had all these thoughts wirling around in my head the minute I woke up so I just had to write this diary.
The words did not come out so easy tho, as they usually do when I write, too much to say about too many things and the narrowing down is hard.
I am really curious as to how others are dealing with this latest barrage and I hope you and other will express this in comments.
Also I watched the trailer for the 911 film last night and it just made me sick. Does anyone else think it’s another good tool for Bid Laden et al to use, “see how much they fear us now, we got them on the run.”
How am I dealing with all the crap?
Swearing, weeping, drinking, news boycotting, petition signing, letter writing, nature walking, meditating, gardening, personal relationship healing, in the moment being, gratitude feeling, head shaking, top of my lungs singing, blog reading, deep breathing, one foot in front of the other putting.
Wow that was great Kahli, that about sums it up for me too, except for the singing, maybe I should try that.
Just this morning I was sickened to hear Rep. strategist deny the senate report with the most faulty logic possible. Simply put, they are not buying that Sadaam was not connected to 9/11, by damn and he lied about not having weapons, yeah, he lied but funny we couldn’t find them.
Great writing, Diane. And, indeed, what did our revenge cost us? You have touched very eloquently upon what so many of us are feeling and experiencing today.
Thank you for this diary. You have found all the words I couldn’t.
Hugs and loves,
Shirl