Sam Smith
                                 UNDERNEWS
                               Oct. 17, 2001


     WORD

     The man who can face vilification and disgrace, who can stand up
     against the popular current, even against his friends and his
     country when he knows he is right, who can defy those in authority
     over him, who can take punishment and prison and remain steadfast
     -- that is a man of courage. The fellow whom you taunt as a
     "slacker" because he refuses to turn murderer -- he needs courage.
     But do you need much courage just to obey orders, to do as you are
     told and to fall in line with thousands of others to the tune of
     general approval and the `Star Spangled Banner?' --Alexander
     Berkman


     OPERATION CYA

     CAREFULLY CONCEALED in the theatrics of war, the bombast of
     propaganda, and the lights and sirens of new security measures is
     the simple fact that America has suffered an unprecedented defeat
     at the hands of those armed with the most meager of weapons. It
     was a defeat not only deeply humiliating in its character but
     totally unnecessary in its origins.

     These facts are not erased by the moral failures of our foe. We
     have not been the victims of the unpredictable, spontaneous
     combustion of evil, but rather of a long series of missteps and
     misjudgments of which the angry, bitter, and deranged simply took
     advantage.

     Neither can these facts be mitigated by a continued loyalty to the
     very leadership that so endangered the country by its disastrous
     policies, inadequate preparation, and taunting arrogance. What
     happened on September 11 did not have to happen and until we face
     that truth, and deal with its implications, we will leave in fear
     and danger.

     Those in power -- in government, media, corporations, and academia
     -- have made terrible mistakes. If they had true capacity for
     shame, most of the membership of the Council on Foreign Relations
     would go into monasteries to repent, the editorial boards of the
     New York Times and Washington Post would resign en masse, and most
     members of Congress would have the good grace not to run again.

     These after all, are the people who have assured us that if we
     were merely loyal enough to Israel, if we merely spent enough on
     the military, and merely gave up enough rights in the name of
     security, everything would be fine. These are the people who said
     it was okay to build the largest buildings in the world without
     observing the city fire code.

     These are not new mistakes. Our unbalanced Middle East policy has
     a half century provenance, backed by the best and the brightest
     that the American establishment could produce. They were dead
     wrong. To this day, for example, the elite rhetoric on the subject
     presumes an irreversible dichotomy in the Middle East, as though
     it is impossible to be simultaneously as fair and decent to Arabs
     as it is to Israelis.

     And it's far from just a matter of intellectual error. For decades
     a sane military policy has been subverted by a voraciously greedy
     defense industry with its Vichy enclaves in the Pentagon where
     tens of billions of dollars are misspent, misdirected, or just
     plain missing. For decades, criminal or corrupt combinations have
     infested our politics -- including Watergate, Iran-Contra, and the
     Arkansas Mafia -- badly distorting direction, destroying
     integrity, and damaging programs, including those designed to
     protect the citizen in times of emergency. For decades a corporate
     coup against democracy has been underway subverting both our
     domestic and foreign policies. Throughout this period a culture of
     impunity has arisen among our leaders that permits them to
     function outside the constraints of our constitution, ideals, or
     traditions. And throughout this period, the major media have
     preferred to share in the power rather than to speak the truth.

     America, under this tawdry, corrupt, intellectually vacuous, and
     morally decadent leadership, became an extraordinarily easy mark.
     Easy to hate, easy to target, and easy to attack.

     Blaming bin Laden for taking advantage of this does not add one
     iota to either our sanity or our safety. Neither does applauding
     those whose arrogance, ignorance and carelessness led us to this
     disaster. They should not be cheered but accused, called to
     account, and judged severely. Only when we start to understand how
     we got in this mess will we start to find the way out





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