Tuesday the Huffington Post ran a story in which Defense Secretary Leon Panetta was warning against the “very real” threat of another terrorist attack. Great. What did he expect me to do, move into his bunker with him?
Once again a government official was warning me to “be afraid, be very afraid” of the invisible terrorist who might materialize from somewhere — anywhere! — to find me among millions of Americans and blow me to smithereens. Well, dammit, I’m getting sick and tired of it! I’m tired of my country looking and feeling like an armed camp, with barricades and guards at every public venue. I’m tired of being treated like I might be a terrorist. This is my country; I’m not the enemy! Stop listening in on my phone calls and tracking my Internet activity. Stop nosing through my luggage at the airport and patting me down like I’ve got a bomb tucked where the sun don’t shine. You see this gray hair? You see this birth certificate? I’m old enough to be your mother and I’m every bit the loyal, patriotic American you and your gestapo government buddies are.
My comment on HuffPo:
I refuse to wallow anymore in the horror and grief that was 9/11. I refuse to watch any of the 9/11 programming that the networks want to foist on me. And I will not live in fear of some terrorist boogeyman. Terrorism does not even make the Top 100 list of things that might kill me. I am far more afraid of my own overreaching government that claims to be “protecting” me while it takes away some of my most basic constitutional rights and freedoms.
Stop the ongoing disproportionate overreaction to a one-time tragedy. Stop the navel-gazing and the rehashing and the what-ifs. Stop giving the terrorists the victory they couldn’t accomplish by themselves. Stop turning American against American, Christian against Muslim. Stop insisting we live in fear. Stop building Fortress America and get back to building America the Beautiful.
Take care that the new “PC Police” don’t come after you! 😀
But seriously, with all the talk of how we need to cut spending, roll back government expansion, and “get government out of our business,” not one of the TEA Party folks has stepped forward to decry the mind blowing amounts being spent to create and maintain the secret post-9/11 “spy on everybody” infrastructure talked about in the PBS “Frontline” documentary Top Secret America.
That link contains the entire 53:41 video, but I also found this Sneak Peek: Inside “Top Secret America” on Youtube. 😐
Thanks for the links. I watched the Sneak Peek. If Priest and Arkin haven’t mysteriously disappeared yet, then I’m probably safe for a while.
I had gone into the spending thing, but finally decided it was diluting my point. Yes, I’m furious that so much money (my tax money) is being spent to spy on me! And to keep fighting “wars against terror” in Afghanistan and Iraq, when the relatively few terrorists we know about are in Pakistan, Yemen, and elsewhere. I’m angry that this insatiable beast known at Homeland Security keeps growing like kudzu, all to fight an idea, not a nation or a people we can ever defeat.
Frankly I see terrorism as an international crime problem, something to be dealt with by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, alert citizens, and a few special ops military groups for pinpoint strikes when appropriate (all of which were in place before 9/11). That’s where the rubber has met the road so far and I think that’s the way we should continue to handle it.
By Golly!!
My thoughts EXACTLY!
A Tony-the-Tiger G R E A T ! ! !
Amen to this post, Pied, and Izaak and ImA too. And allow me to add this: Not only did America’s leaders, and I’m talking Bush/Cheney here, allow us to be terrorized into recklessly stampeded into two unnecessary wars, adding redundant massive layers of bureaucracy and engaging in needless and confusing “contracting”, but they did so at the expense of what they should have been doing – repairing our century-old electrical grid and making far-reaching improvements to our ability to thwart the introduction of WMD’s into our country. Instead, here we are fighting the “last war”, searching geezers and babies for bombs in their underwear. These are symptoms of organizational panic and short-sighted leadership. OMG.
It’s always the “last war” until the next one comes along. And we know it will, likely sooner than later. And here we sit on our crumbling infrastructure, and our crumbling economy, with our drawn-down armies spread too thin all over the world … helluva mess we’ve got. And our leaders seem interested only in winning the next election.