tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13090306.post7172549112116232035..comments2023-10-02T06:13:32.418-05:00Comments on Moline Democratic Maverick: Soul-searching in the militaryDave Barretthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04289405215433867162noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13090306.post-55377093526141331992007-10-15T16:46:00.000-05:002007-10-15T16:46:00.000-05:00hifi, Thanks for your comments. I was focusing o...hifi,<BR/> Thanks for your comments. I was focusing on the professional responsibilities of the journalists but you are correct that everyone in the country has a moral duty as a person and a citizen to speak out about evil being done in our names (and with our tax dollars.)<BR/> I don't think that most Americans expected the generals to speak out before the war started if they anticipated diaster as much as we expected our politicians and journalists to ask questions and raise doubts. I guess the military people are speaking out now because their comarades are being killed senselessly and needlessly and no one else seems to care.Dave Barretthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04289405215433867162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13090306.post-33504842650643138032007-10-15T15:19:00.000-05:002007-10-15T15:19:00.000-05:00Good questions, Dan. What's been lost in our peren...Good questions, Dan. What's been lost in our perennial wartime discussion of what it means to be a good American is what it means to be a good person. Liberal, conservative or other, we all love our country and want to be 'patriots', however we define that. But what we all should be more concerned about than our patriotism is our humanity. As in your example with Katie Couric, or in a recent article where Janessa Gans revealed she watched Blackwater mercenaries wantonly run over an Iraqi woman and her children on the streets of Baghdad, we see examples of people whose concern for being patriotic Americans led them to neglect their duties as a human being.<BR/><BR/>Soldiers have to observe war as a dehumanizing experience, and patriotic furor is its chosen substitute; as only if they are taught to regard American blood as more valuable than their opponents could the average person take part in such an action willingly. But when this patriotic furor engulfs the media and civilian presence in the war zone, any semblance of democracy is neutered. <BR/><BR/>It all serves to remind me of a wonderful and still startlingly relevant scene from the Marx Brother's movie "Duck Soup". Before Groucho Marx leads his country to war, he leads them in a lavish song and dance in a parody of a minstrel show. As moviegoers, we see this as comedy because we watch it, not through the eyes of the characters, colored by their passions, but through the lens of an impartial camera. However, if you were to remove that barrier of impartiality, as various members of the media have done with Iraq, it' would not be hard to find yourself swept away in the song and dance.HiFihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01608114400270032570noreply@blogger.com