The North Coast times-eagle., January 01, 2002, Page 6, Image 6

PAGE 6
VOICES SPEAKING OUT
BY LLOYD K. MARBET
“ Violence is the voice of the unheard."
-MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR
On September 11,1 awoke at 6:00 a m. to take my
son to school. While eating breakfast, I happened to turn on
the television to witness the second airliner crash into the World
Trade Center in New York City. Since that time my life, and I am
sure all of our lives as well, has been a quest to understand why
these terrorist acts occurred. I have reviewed hundreds of e-mail
messages, read newspaper accounts and have purchased and
am reading a number of books on Afghanistan and the Middle
East. I am far from through digesting all of this material. What
I would like to share is an amalgamation of voices which will
hopefully help provide a path by which we might be able to
navigate our way through these events.
Such as these words by Virginia Satir:
Life is not the way it is supposed to be It’s the way it is.
The way you cope with it is what makes the difference . .1 think
if I have one message, one thing before I die that most of the
world would know, it would be that the event does not determine
how to respond to the event. That is purely a personal matter.
The way in which we respond will direct and influence the event
more than the event itself.
I would like to start with two quotes which help to form a
theme throughout what I have to say:
Every gun that is made, every warship that is launched,
every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those
who are hungry and are not fed, those who are cold and not
clothed This world in arms is not spending money alone It is
spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists,
the hopes of its children... This is not a way of life at all in any
true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity
hanging from a cross of iron
-DWIGHT D EISENHOWER
(to the American Society of Newspaper Owners, 4/16/1953)
People used to buy things because they needed things
to survive, not because the things needed people to survive.
-MASON WILLIAMS
Those who control the wealth of this country, the alloca­
tion of its resources, the direction of our foreign policy, and the
corporatization of our media and democracy have one vision for
your life: They want you to be consumers. Notice the message
of patriotism in a time of terrorism: Go out and buy more!
They want you to substitute what is unique in your life
for the standardization of the mediocre, the sensationalism of
corporate media, self-gratification through corporate advertis­
ing, game shows — the pursuit of something for nothing. They
want you to believe that it is all right to have taxation by state­
run gambling — government financed by addiction They want
you to feel that there is nothing you can do to stop injustice, in
your own life or in others.They want you to embrace your apathy
or wrap yourself in the flag. They want you to exchange your
civil liberties for security: their security They do not want you to
exercise your sovereign power and wrest your destiny from their
control.
We are at war again, and humanity is still hanging from
a cross of iron. Violence is begetting violence and it is business
as usual in America. Before the acts of terrorism in New York
City and Washington, D C. we were spending $300 billion a year
on military defense and it did not give us security on September
11. Now we are spending even more The question has to be
asked: are we making ourselves safer? Are we addressing the
real problems of terrorism?
Listen to the words of former Attorney General Ramsey
Clark in an interview which took place in August, before these
terrorist acts even occurred. He was asked , “Do you think most
Americans would agree that U.S. foreign policy has been a
disaster?”
Sadly, I think most Americans don’t have an opinion
about our foreign policy Worse than that, when they do think
about it, it's in terms of the demonization of enemies and the
exaltation of our capacity for violence.
When the Gulf War started in 1991, you could almost
feel a reverence come over the country We had a 42-day run­
ning commercial for militarism Nearly everybody was glued to
CNN, and whenever they saw a Tomahawk cruise missile taking
off from a Navy vessel somewhere in the Persian Gulf, they
practically stood up and shouted, ‘Hooray for America!" But that
missile was going to hit a market in Basra or someplace, destroy
food stalls, and kill very poor people And we considered that a
good thing
It is very difficult to debate military spending in this
country today — which is unbelievable, because our military
spending is absolutely, certifiably insane Just to provide one
example: We still have 22 commissioned Trident nuclear
submarines, which are first-strike weapons Any one of those
submarines can launch 24 missiles simultaneously Each of
SHALLON
* WINERY-«
those missiles can contain as many as 17 independently
targeted, maneuverable nuclear warheads. And each of those
warheads can travel 7,000 nautical miles and supposedly hit
within 300 feet of its predetermined target. If we fire them in
opposite directions, we can span 14,000 nautical miles: halfway
around the world at the equator. This means we can take
408 centers of human population, hitting each with a nuclear
warhead ten times as powerful as the bomb that incinerated
Nagasaki.
(This is from) one submarine. And we have 22 of them.
It is an unthinkable machine. Why would you have it? What kind
of mind would conceive of such a machine? What justification
could there be for its existence? What would be the meaning
of daring to use it?
. Our foreign policy is based on the use of our military
might as an enforcer, exactly as Teddy Roosevelt implied when
he said that we should “speak softly and carry a big stick." What
does that mean? It means. “Do what I say, or I’ll smash your
head in. I won’t make a lot of noise about, I’ll just do it.
And so we are smashing heads in — in a “terrorism
magnified a hundred times over” doing the bidding of our
leaders and according to Hitler’s number two man, Herman
Goering:
It is the leaders of the country who determine the
policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along,
whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parlia­
ment. or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people
can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders That is easy
All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and
denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing
the country to danger It works the same in any country
Doesn’t it all sound familiar? Isolate our focus on the
acts of violence itself, to which our corporate media so willingly
complies, and drown out the voices of dissent and any of those
seeking international justice through law Forthose in power, it
simply becomes a formula for new public relations, repackaged
with the help of those whose vast experience in corporate adver­
tising know how to package the lie. Instead of justice, it is just
a matter of putting on another show of force and where it is not
convenient to closely examine the truth, then by Presidential
order we can now have secret military tribunals.
I can almost hear the little old lady on that television
commercial saying, “Where’s the beef?" but in this war examin­
ing the beef means confronting ourselves. Listen to the words of
Philip Agee who worked for the Central Intelligence Agency:
There was electoral intervention, propaganda via the
media, and also the penetration and manipulation of women’s
organizations, religious organizations, youth and student organi­
zations, the trade union movement — very important — but also
the military and security services and. of course, political parties.
All of these institutions were free game for infiltration and mani­
pulation by the CIA In short, the CIA influenced the civic life of
countries all around the world. It did this due to a lack of faith in
democracy in other countries. There was a desire for control.
The secret U.S. policy was to not leave things to “chance" —
that is to the will of the people in whatever country it might
be. They had to be tutored, they had to be “guided” in such a
way that they would be safe for U. S. control. Control was the
key word. None of this was done for altruistic or idealistic
reasons.
And if you carefully examine the news you find that
nothing has changed. On November 6, an article appeared
in The Oregonian on the outcome of the election in Nicaragua.
It was entitled, “BOLANOS BESTS ORTEGA":
Political analysts said the margin of victory, which defied
opinion polls showing the two candidates in a statistical tie,
resulted from both fear of the Sandinista' past and declarations
by U.S. officials who doubted the sincerity of Ortega's makeover.
“We must congratulate Washington because of their
intimidation tactics," said the Rev. Miguel D'Escoto, a former
Sandinista foreign minister. “They are now into electoral terror­
ism among a people here where the wounds are still open. We
did not lose 5,000 people like in New York, we lost 50,000 in war
that was invented, organized, armed and financed by the United
States."
You also hear it in the voice of Arun Gandhi, Director of
the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence:
We must acknowledge our role in helping create mon­
sters in the world and then find ways to contain these monsters
without hurting more innocent people and then redefine our role
in the world. I think we must move from seeking to be respected
for military strength to being respected for our moral strength.
We need to appreciate that we are in a position to play
a powerful role in helping the “other half’ of the world attain a
better standard of life not by throwing a few crumbs, but by
significantly involving ourselves in constructive economic
programs.
For too long our foreign policy has been based on “what
is good for the United States." It smacks of selfishness. Our
foreign policy should now be based on what is god for the world
and how we can do the right thing to help the world become
more peaceful
But this is “the road not taken" for the message we
are sending the world is exemplified in a letter that recently
appeared in the newspaper The Friday Times in Pakistan:
Sir
Recent headlines read “The U.S. has authorized the
CIA and other agencies to kill Osama bin Laden in any way
at their disposal." To kill a person without trial or a chance to
defend himself for any alleged crime is a criminal act of murder.
Have the nations of the world given the U.S. a license to kill
anybody? Is this a shuddering preview of the future of the world,
'pECOMMUNTrrgro^
WORLD WAR III
I think we will be seen, if there is anyone left to see us,
As a crazy people insane;
Who, in a quest for technological superiority
In service to a concentration of economic power,
Consumed the natural resources of the earth
To protect our interests at the expense of all others
And in doing so created such weapons of destruction.
Obliterating the natural resources of the earth
And what fragile biological life support systems remained,
(With prayers uplifted to respective gods!)
Leaving what could have been shared
To no one
-LLOYD MARBET (10/4/2001)
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