Trembling in the Belly of the Beast

I am currently on assignment in Houston, Texas. Nothing makes me more paranoid of the good ol' US of A than actually being in the country. While these people go about their merry little lives their government participates in state sanctioned terrorism. Ok... wait a second where did that come from? Oh, and I thought I wasn't going to take myself so seriously. Well, I made a big mistake and indulged in the airport bookstore on my way to the execution capital of the world and bought Noam Chomsky's latest, "Hegemony or Survival". An odd book to pick up for "light" reading on the plane.

Most people that no me know that I am no big fan of the mighty political machine that is our neighbor to the south. But please believe me I am not anti-American. Indeed this book has made me realize that. In a way it has made me sympathize with the nation that so often tries to the "right" thing yet is steered so blindly of course by the ruling class that dominates their highest political offices and coerces its own population into numbness. What this book has made me realize that nothing much has changed since the days rulers that were "ordained by God" to govern in her peculiar absence.

Manifest destiny is alive and well in the US and its current practioners are wielding it as a brutal blunt instrument. I am amazed that the overwhelming evidence of the abuses of the current administration goes largely unchallenged. How else can we explain the re-election of an administration that has presided over such abuses as Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo and the arrogant defiance of the world's opposition to the illegal actions of the invansion of Iraq. And that is just in the last year. I wonder how the world can sit idly by wile the US moves forward on its plan of global domination and its farcical attempt to parade a group of powerless countries / regimes (Grenada, Nicaragua, Iraq) as the greatest threat to world peace.

But I have my answer when I reflect, I have not lifted a finger. As impassioned and incensed as I am I have come to enjoy all the trappings of a lifestyle that is normally associated with the pursuit of the "American Dream". Am I to throw that away and the comfort it gives to me and my family? Am I being overdramatic? I just don't know where to start and even if it would have an effect. There are far more intelligent people then I that have been trumpeting the case (Noam Chomsky comes to mind) and have had little effect in halting or even slowing the assault on human rights or civil liberties.

On the other hand should I comfort myself in the thought that all empires have crumbled despite their frantic grasping of at continuation. In the meantime I can comfort myself with Winston Churchill's words that "the Americans will always do the right thing... after they've exhausted all the alternatives". Let's pray that we can be that patient and that not too many have to die in the exhaustion of alternatives.