Military
patriotism … How when Canada sends its boys – the best of our people – to
slaughter we honor them with thousands of stone memorials across the country,
that draw its citizens like “2001: A Spacy Odyssey” monoliths for quiet, solemn
remembrance of not just the loss of life but the loss of potential for what the
country could’ve been had these men (and women) come home instead of being
buried in foreign soil. And because we lost so many people (World War I and II)
as a percentage of our total population, not a family, it seemed, in my growing
up years in small town Ontario was not touched by some devastating human
loss. So, Canadians view new wars, those that are regional and strictly
political, with suspicion. Patriotism takes on a compassionate aspect rather
than a primarily militaristic one.
How a draft for a
regional war (Vietnam) makes it possible to divide a nation into haves and
have-nots. We find, here in the United States, that we can forgive those who
escape the draft (current president, for example) through dubious means. Why? Because
there is no overarching imperative in a land that capitulates on its potential by
settling on being a society of haves and have nots. Not to mention that the draft
is used to outfit a have-not army that is fighting a political war for imperial
reasons, to create allies, supplicants for business, those who we will be able
to treat as client states; with us, the American exceptionalists, in charge.
(Oh, and I think
about how cold it is for March …)
Next: Running for Your Life: March Mood
