1, 2, 3, 4, I Declare a Rummy War

At the video store, we have several veterans from a variety of foreign wars as regulars. Very often, they're extremely interested in war movies. (In fact, conversations about war films are generally how I discover their veteran status, except for a few that frequently wear caps or shirts explaining the specifics of their service). At first, this was unexpected. I would have hypothesized that veterans might not want to view re-enacted war as entertainment. It would remind them of the horrors they personally witnessed.

Instead, I think maybe it's cathartic in a way. There's a conflict, it all feels kind of oddly familiar and maybe even nostalgic, but then the movie ends and you get to turn it off. After spending years in country, that must be a kind of reassuring feeling. The movie's called The Longest Day, and it is long and involved, but even at 3 hours it's no match for the actual Normandy invasion.

We had such a customer in the store today, a guy I've seen in there maybe one or two other times but never really noticed specifically. He was wearing a T-shirt festooned with American flags and bald eagles, proclaiming that "Freedom Isn't Free," and was buying, of course, several war movies and asking about others. I found a few things for him, answered a few questions, and when all was said and done he introduced himself and his wife to me by name.

As I always do when customers make this friendly gesture, I reached out my hand to shake. Dear readers, let me assure you that I had no idea the man had a, for lack of a better term, gimpy right hand. Clearly damaged in some sort of battle-related horror, the guy's entire right hand and wrist dangle flaccidly from the end of his forearm, apparently useless. But like a lot of canny wounded vets of the Bob Dole School, this guy obviously was good at downplaying his disability in public. As I said, I'd seen him and helped him out before in the store and honestly never noticed his hand before that moment.

There were two ways to go in this situation: pull back my hand and extend the other one or awkwardly shake his left hand with my right hand. I went for the second option and kind of regretted it because it was so strange, so obvious that I hadn't noticed his other hand. Although, now that I think about it, it would have been odd to shake hands with my left hand as well.

Anyway, the guy was really good about it and didn't seem to take offense and in general had a really pleasant, upbeat attitude. But still, the entire incident made me think about our present war, from which thousands of young Americans will return home with unsightly injuries. That is, if they manage to return at all.

I don't have the patience this Memoral Day's evening to catalog once more all the reasons we should never have started this war and should make all due haste in exiting the battle zone we have regrettably created. Besides, I'm starting to notice my fellow citizens coming around to the idea that our leaders are corrupt, incompetant criminals with questionable motives and no sense of patriotism or respect for the Constitution.

Blogger Pacacutec makes a fine case against the entire theoretical "Global War on Terror," can be found here at Firedoglake if anyone's interested.

Two weeks ago, in a kind of rambling, long-winded post about pop culture, propaganda and the military, I discussed those who continue to support the Iraq War on ideological rather than rational grounds. I'm fascinated by the notion that supporters of BushCo. and the Iraq War exist in a malleable pseudo-reality that can be altered through language and perspective. The idea that American pessimism about the war is actually having a measurable effect on the success of the military's effort demonstrates something of a flight of fancy. Likewise the notion that we can somehow "stop terrorism" through some sort of demonstration of power or strength of will.

We're over here trying to discuss the future of the nation reasonably, soldiers are over there being shot at and the two circumstances only co-exist rhetorically. To believe that an idea in my head, a wish perhaps that Americans would stop killing Iraqis, translates into troops being unable to stop an insurgency requires something of an active imagination.

It's as if, based around a few actual events but not supported by any kind of facts or rational analysis, Americans have begun to devise their own reality. And we all know what happens when a schizophrenic is confronted with actual reality - they react out of fear and paranoia, often with violence. And I think this is what we're seeing in the culture right now.

You have a wide spectrum of delusion, from those who never bought into the ridiculous lies about Saddam Hussein wanting to rule the Earth with his massive arsenal of WMD's to those like my friend Steve, who on September 12th announced to met hat we should drop a nuclear bomb on every country in the Middle East. (He was hopefully kidding but you never know with that guy). I feel like it's going to be very hard to win back those at the far end of that spectrum, who seem to crave endless war and get offended when you try to delicately remind them that casualties mean actual dead people and not just numbers that can be fudged or dismissed or argued ad infinitum.

Everyone likes to wax philosophical on Memorial Day. You hear a lot of talk about sacrifice and patriotism and freedom. Our loose turd of a President had this to say:

Last week, the family of Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Fenty, Junior, gathered here at Arlington to pay their last respects to the husband, son, and father they loved. Colonel Fenty was killed with nine of his fellow soldiers in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan earlier this month. Hours before that crash, he had spoken to his wife Kristen about their newborn daughter he was waiting to meet. Some day she will learn about her dad from the men with whom she served -- he served. And one of them said this about her father: "We all wanted to be more like Joe Fenty. We were all in awe of him." I am in awe of the men and women who sacrifice for the freedom of the United States of America.

That's a real family that this war has destroyed. He's using them as a rhetorical device - you add in anecdotes to a presentation such as this one as a template, a useful example to others. We should all be like Colonel Fenty's newborn daughter, quietly remembering the dead, in awe of their sacrifice in a distant, hazy, far-off kind of way, but constitutionally unable to speak out of turn.

Bush wants to rule over a nation of newborns, I suspect, cute little critters he can discuss fondly but not have to actually engage in any way. Helpless beings who will bob their heads in agreement automatically when asked any question, from "should we invade Iran" to "do you hate Stephen Colbert as much as me"? As an added bonus, he'd finally be communicating with others on his level.