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Posted September 18, 2001
Mistake
I enlisted into the the Marines a few months ago. That was the biggest mistake of my life and now I am trying desperately to get out for my family's sake. Do you know of any organizations I can contact to help me? Thank you so much for your time.
Eric Garris replies:
The most experienced and best group I know of to deal with this issue is the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors.
Clear Delight
Few people in the world have rejoiced what happened on September 11th. It is not difficult to sense that the staff of Antiwar.com is among them. The clear delight is apparent in the we-told-you articles and responses in "Backtalk."
The "Backtalk" editor replies:
You sense the clear and apparent delight, do you? I note that you don't quote any of these expressions of "delight." Are you sure that you don't mean horror and frustration?
Former President and CIA director, George Bush, was interviewed a few days ago and expressed the opinion that Tuesday's disaster proves that -- just as he's been saying for years -- the CIA needs more freedom to hire (and provide prostitutes for) unsavory characters, and needs more freedom from the oversight of civilians who believe that what CIA does is "naughty." The CIA funded and armed the Afghan Arabs, yet it's apparently considered appropriate to adopt an I-told-you-so pose if one is advocating giving this terrorist-funding organization more money and power.
General Butler
I'm an ethnic Macedonian that has gone to grade school, college and grad school all in the states, and for the longest time my parents would say to me, "you are brainwashed," when I would argue a political point of view. I didn't see it back then, since I embodied the ultra-nationalistic porno-puritanistic American. But when the Berlin wall came down and I started paying attention to world politics, all that "patriotism" changed in the light that the US was meddling where it had no right to be meddling.
Case in point, arming Osama Bin Laden and the Afghans against the Russians, and now doing the same by training and arming the ethnic Albanians against the sovereign states of Serbia and Macedonia.
Most of my foreigner friends feel the same way that I do ... including those that are Western European. We all have the knowledge that the US interferes militarily to ensure the big business interests. One of the best articles that expounds on this was by a former US general written back in 1933 [Major-General Smedley D. Butler]. He tells it the way it is. The US is Al Capone and the Military is its Strong Man.
...It's the politicians that deserve our mistrust most of all. Instead, most people live in an ideology that is unrealistic, compromising and delusional.
Bill of Rights
The US Government is trying to use this terrorism as the excuse to attack the last vestiges of the Bill of Rights, as though terrorists won't encrypt their messages just because Americans aren't allowed to. The truth is that wiping out civil liberties won't do a thing to stop terrorism. Of course everyone wants to "do something." I think one idea that might actually help is arming the flight crews and attendants. The Israelis haven't had a hijacking for a long time. Even gun-control advocates can support this, I think.
Of course the truth is that airline terrorism is trivial compared to blowing up dams, releasing viruses, nerve gas, secondhand Kazakh nukes, etc., and many other means of attack that don't even require suicidal fanaticism. But the emotional response now is going to focus on airliners as though they were our only problem, and arming the flight crews will make people feel better without wiping out civil liberties.
Where's Cheney?
Where is Cheney? Why don't we have any media footage on him during this whole episode?
The "Backtalk" editor replies:
There's been some speculation in the media that Cheney stayed out of sight so as not to undermine President Bush's authority. Another possible explanation is that Cheney was under extra-tight security due to a threat or warning involving Air Force One. Reportedly, someone claiming to represent the hijackers phoned in and recited a security code that should only have been known by the people tasked with protecting the president.
It's The Economy
The backward policy will only get worse because every president in a bad economy will have a war. If you have ever been around Arabs and their mindset, [then you know that] they would bomb us even if we had not done anything to them. We give the money to keep them quiet. I'm afraid we will kill a lot more before this is over and the USA will become an isolationist country, but I can assure you that out here in the redneck Midwest, we want revenge and we want it now. This will unite this country. Most people in the Midwest are tired of giving our country away.
The "Backtalk" editor replies:
Couldn't we skip the killing part and go right to the military "isolationism"?