Columnist – John Sammon
America is a country of illusions, or like a desert mirage, what you think you see is what you don’t necessarily get. This extends from the watered-down Obama health care package that in reality is so weak it isn’t a national health package at all, and will likely be repealed by Republicans anyway, to the idea that the country is fighting a war on drugs when epidemic drug use in this country fuels demand, to the recent government-promoted notion that the country is in an economic recovery.
America is a country of smoke and mirrors, one of the reasons we were so successful at founding Hollywood and Disneyland. Both are mythological kingdoms.
America is a country of ideas, often the false kind, that for reasons of our own we’d like to believe, or we need to believe. In other words, the truth is whatever we say it is. This really took off under Bush and unfortunately, despite the initial promises and good feelings, still holds true under Obama. Here are 10 examples:
The withdrawals in Iraq and Afghanistan are withdrawals.
The president announces the withdrawal of 10,000 troops out of 100,000. Some actually come home, but thousands more stay. Five years goes by and you forget all about the promises. Five years later, there are still 50,000 troops in those countries. By now you can’t remember how it all started anyway. The government created for you a successful illusion. It’s the withdrawal that isn’t.
The government honors and takes care of veterans.
Every July 4 veterans gather with flags to honor the fallen. Every year television channels like the oil-company-corporate-backed History Channel run movies showing the glories of war and bumper stickers on cars proclaim how we owe our freedoms to these sacrifices. And every year veteran’s health care for disabled veterans is abysmal. An airline charges returning veterans huge fees to ship their luggage. The government fails to provide flak vests for soldiers going into combat. The G.I. Bill no longer is gifted to veterans for their loyalty, but is instead taken out of their paychecks while they are on duty. Representatives on Capitol Hill and especially the Republican Party, who have never served in the military (neither have their children), always threaten to cut benefits. Civil War battlefields are lost to the development of Walmart stores and school children don’t know what World War II was. The sacrifices except among a few old men are forgotten.
America is the patriotic country that really isn’t.
America is a democracy, or a republic, or whatever.
Americans traditionally love to believe this is a free country, even though the founders with the exception of John Adams owned other human beings as slaves.
Take down a pad of paper and with a pencil jot down the things that you as a citizen have any say over with your single vote in the off-year and general elections. You can vote for a local school bond. You can vote for a mayor, a senator, even the president. You can vote for many things. But there are many you can’t vote for, whether or not to go to war, or extend forever war, the space program and its billions spent, the amount of federal tax you pay. The basic premise of the country was that an elite cadre of representatives (Congress) needs to make decisions for you, because you’re not smart enough to, and chaos would result. In fairness, there is some truth to this. But look up the definition of democracy in the dictionary, “government by the people and through elected representatives.” Go ahead and try to vote to repeal the Patriot Act.
America is the democracy that isn’t.
America is not a racist country because Oprah Winfrey has a television show.
Using television to pacify African Americans has a long history after networks got the message in 1962. The theory is, like giving beads and trinkets to natives in the old days, picking representatives of the race for glorification on the TV tube convinces members of the race that progress has been made. Though it is better than seeing African Americans only portrayed on TV as butlers and maids, jails are still full of black men, inner city schools still lag behind, and most whites if they were honest would admit they don’t want to live in a black neighborhood. Most whites still associate black people with crime, poverty, ignorance and violence.
America is the racist country that isn’t, but still is.
Our elected officials represent us.
During his recent announcement of the troop withdrawal that isn’t, Obama used the usual vague terminology presidents use to describe what has been accomplished in Afghanistan, and what our exact goals are, by not doing those things. It’s kind of like a shell game, which shell is the pea under. In other words, he stated the accomplishments and goals in such a vague off-hand way as to not state them. Nothing concrete. Iffy words like “be patient,” “light at the end of the tunnel,” their “influence has been weakened,” are used to convince you. Convincing you is what’s important. Recently, the American public found out in a surprising revelation that negotiations are in progress with the Taliban in Afghanistan, the announcement not disseminated through our own government, but because of a public statement made by the corrupt puppet ruler we set up in Kabul.
Apparently, all we’ve accomplished after 10 years, millions of Iraqi and Afghan lives lost, billions of dollars bankrupting the economically tottering U.S., and over 6,000 American dead, is to kill bin Laden, whom we set up in a leadership role way beyond his actual influence in the first place.
You’ll never learn the truth unless a fluke like Wikileaks happens or until documents are declassified sixty years from now.
The case of Wikileaks and the government’s apoplectic response proves that the government believes the less you know the better, for your own good. In other words, ignorance is bliss.
Here are five more:
China is our friend.
Corporate America is concerned about the extinction of the American middle class.
Mexican immigration is a threat to the U.S.
This is curious in light of the fact that the entire Western part of the country was once owned by Mexico and was taken from them by war, and that Mexican immigration has been a factor in the country for over 100 years, and that the American economy absolutely depends on Mexicans to do the work Americans won’t, flipping burgers, making beds, mowing grass, landscaping yards.
Rich white businessmen and government bureaucrats, those who complain the loudest, use low-paid Mexican laborers the most.
I guess that ties into the next one.
Americans aren’t hypocrites.
And lastly.
Americans are better than other people.
Whether it’s Teabaggers chanting “USA” “USA” like rooting at a football game, or intoning “God bless America,” asking God to bless only about five percent of the world’s population and ignoring the rest, there is plenty of evidence that we think we’re better. Because of money and power, we look down on other lesser peoples, people with less money and power. Money and power are what matters, not integrity and morality. My favorite is still the old Vietnam-War-era saying, “America, love it or leave it.” In other words, if you see wrong, ignore it.
That is truly a mark of superiority.
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