BLOG POSTS

Take one devout Muslim of first generation Palestinian descent, clad him in a U.S. soldier uniform, and pretend he’s a full-blooded American hero who’ll fight for his country against all comers. Subject him to harassment from his fellow soldiers because of his religion, then tell him he’s being sent to kill his relatives in the Middle East, and there’s nothing he can do about it. Appear aghast when he goes berserk and shoots people.

That’s the potted history of Nidal Malik Hasan, MD who this week killed thirteen and wounded thirty at Fort Hood in Texas.

Senator Joe Lieberman, on Fox News, said of the incident:^[1]

A couple of years ago, after a two-year investigation, my committee put out a report that said the new face of terrorism in America would not just be the attacks as 9/11, organized abroad and sending people in here. It would be people within this country, home- grown terrorists, self-radicalized, often over the Internet, going to jihadist Web sites.

And there’s concern from what we know now about Hasan that, in fact, that’s exactly what he was, a self-radicalized home-grown terrorist.

Lieberman, and probably most other US politicians, would be happy to turn this incident into a simple case of ‘home-grown’ terrorism. It’s a nice, convenient, solution. It exonerates the US military, the US ‘system’, of any blame whatever.

Sure, there’ll no doubt be some internal inquiries; knuckles will be rapped for not paying closer attention to the warning signs emanating from Major Hasan in the months prior to the massacre. But, a verdict of ‘terrorism’ will mean the matter can be pigeonholed, Hasan locked away for the rest of his life – or, put to death as a sop to the relatives – and everyone can breathe a sigh of relief and get on with their lives.

Senator Joseph Lieberman, as usual, was wrong. It was no act of terrorism. Rather it was the direct result of one man’s agony; ripped apart mentally in multiple directions by a cold, uncaring, system that expects every man to become a robot dedicated solely to the “Flag”; to put aside all other loyalties, no matter how important to the individual, and replace them with absolute devotion and obedience to the ‘Motherland’.

Major Nidal Malik Hasan, MD was no terrorist. He was a man placed in an impossible situation and taunted constantly by his fellows. He was a sick man whose mind snapped.

He long ago ceased to believe in the righteousness of American military actions abroad.

In that, at least, he was certainly not alone.

^{[1] “Sen. Lieberman on ‘FNS'” Fox News Sunday, November 8th 2009}

Filed under: Taking the easy way out

It’s often not easy being what is colloquially known as an ‘ex-pat’. After seven years in America I’m no nearer being ‘an American’, but neither can I honestly say I’m still totally British. I occasionally joke with my lovely American wife that I belong somewhere round about the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean.

‘Twilight’ is another ex-pat Brit. She often comments on Sparrow Chat. Recently she celebrated five years living in the U.S. and wrote about it on her own blog, “Learning Curve On The Elliptic”.^[1]

What she had to say resonated with me and I began to compose a comment. It grew rather long, so I turned it into a post:

You can read on blogs a lot of stuff that resonates, but this post resonated with me more than most; probably because it’s at a very personal level. My seventh anniversary of emulating Columbus ocurred a month before your 5th, on September 18th.

In many ways I believe you’ve adjusted to U.S. life far better than I, even taking the plunge into citizenship – an act that earned my sincere admiration. After all, having been through the trauma of the US Customs and Immigration Dept, I knew exactly the hassles entailed.

I began to hate America very quickly, partly because it stood for so much I despised, but also as a prison from which I knew I could probably never again fully escape.

That hatred has now dissipated. Like you, I’ve grown accustomed to ‘upside-down’ light switches and driving on the passenger side. Dogged British stubbornness still prevents me calling the car boot a ‘trunk’, and a tap a ‘faucet’, though thankfully I stopped telling my schoolkids to ‘stay on the pavement till the bus arrives’, before any of them suffered a nasty accident.

Arriving plum in the middle of the American Heartlands, inside the Bible Belt, and on the edge of Tornado Alley, probably didn’t help me to settle. If the U.S. ever requires an enema I’m convinced it’s in this area they’ll insert the catheter.

Perhaps the circumstance creating my greatest unrest in those early years was the American reaction to 9/11/2001. It was exactly one year and one week after the attacks that I moved here. The plethora of flags, stickers, and vomit-inducing patriotism that greeted my arrival almost caused an about turn while still on the tarmac at O’Hare Airport.

Seven years later, it has subsided to a degree. Even America can’t keep its emotions fully charged indefinitely, despite the best political efforts to do so.

I’ve made five return visits to England. This summer was the first time I didn’t feel the need to go. Of course, I still have aging parents living there, and a daughter and grandson, but the British have never been quite so potty over family ties as their American cousins, and the telephone is a great substitute, given the inevitable upheaval and drama of Chicago’s O’Hare.

I no longer call Britain ‘home’, but something prevents a final surrender to ‘being American’. I still can’t bring myself to fill out the forms for citizenship. I never needed to pledge allegiance to the Union Flag to be British, and I’m damned if I’ll do it to be American. It’s that dogged British stubborness again.

In a comment on Sparrow Chat (October 23rd), you wrote:

“It’s so comforting for me to come here to read, and find that someone else, of similar background, sees things the way I do. We can’t both be wrong – can we?”

No, Twilight, we’re not both wrong. We’re able to see things about the U.S. that Americans are too close to focus on. They can only see the trees, we get a good view of the whole wood.

Finally, let me assure you the comfort is reciprocal. When the going gets especially tough, it’s usually “Learning Curve…” that helps me re-stabilize myself to American life; knowing I’m not the only Brit struggling to adapt to this strange and often disturbing land.

Here’s to the next………however many years?

^{[1] “Remembering A Life Change” Learning Curve On The Elliptic, October 25th 2009}

Filed under: Rolling stones

I recently underwent a routine medical examination as required by my work. The technician who did the initial tests was a boy about seventeen or eighteen years old. He told me he was studying medicine and doing his “pre-med” at the clinic.

He was a pleasant, intelligent, young man eager to hear about Britain and what had brought me to America so relatively late in life.

Eventually, the subject came around to health care. I asked him his views on the issues presently occupying the media and politicians.

“Oh, I don’t agree with the President,” he responded, quickly, “I think his ideas are too much towards socialism.”

“What’s wrong with socialism?” I asked.

“But, this is a capitalist country,” he responded, somewhat hesitantly, “Here, everyone has the chance to make something of their lives, rather than the government running everything.”

“Not everyone has the opportunity to do well,” I said. “What about the poor people in America who can’t afford private healthcare insurance?”

“But they bring it on themselves,” he replied, “they’d rather sit back and do nothing. It’s their own fault, isn’t it?”

“Capitalism can’t make everyone well off. By it’s nature, it relies on large numbers of consumers to provide an upward flow of money to the relatively few wealthy people at the top. Because money is constantly flowing up the prosperity pyramid, away from those at the bottom, they’re denied the opportunities available to the better off – including the chance to become better off themselves. Doesn’t that make it society’s fault, rather than their own?”

The young man pondered my argument. “I’m not sure. You’ve seen a lot more of life than I. I’m still very young.”

“At least,” I said, “should those in need not have the right to basic medical care when they require it?”

“Well, I’m a Christian, so I suppose I should care about everyone……”

Hmmm…” I said, “I’m not. But since coming to America I’ve been puzzled as to why I do care about everyone, but this nation – that calls itself so Christian – doesn’t.”

At that moment, the doctor appeared who was to continue the examination. I left the young man to his pondering.

Indoctrination is a powerful tool. When utilized on a national scale its effects are impressive, not only on the ill-educated and unintelligent, but across the whole spectrum of population. This boy was well-educated and highly intelligent, but my few simple statements left him perplexed, battling the thought processes injected into his brain from the time he began kindergarten.

When I was his age, I was living in a country still reeling from the effects of Hitler’s military might. The inner cities had been blown apart and no-one was left in any doubt who was to blame for the poverty and degradation that resulted from it.

The government of the day had no option but to invest in vast programs of social and economic rebuilding. Out of it all arose the British National Health Service.

In 1946, no-one could accuse the poverty-stricken and downtrodden British of “sitting back and doing nothing”, “bringing it on themselves”, or, of it being “their fault”. One only had to look around at the devastation, the bomb-sites, the derelict buildings, to realize the fault lay squarely on Mister Hitler’s shoulders.

Is that what it will take to convince Americans that their less well-off neighbors are not necessarily ‘bumming’ off the state; that the million or so who die from lack of healthcare every year do not make that choice of their own free will?

America has never endured a modern war on its soil. Let’s hope it never will. Does human life always have to become intolerable on a vast scale before any good arises from that suffering? It would seem so, for only suffering on such a scale will force us to truly think.

Nursery, grade, high school, university – all supposed seats of American learning, yet in today’s modern society they’re utilized primarily for little more than the political indoctrination of the next generation.

Until we radically alter our education system so it helps our children to think for themselves, instead of systematically ejaculating preconceived ideals into their innocent, virginal, minds we will neither improve the society we live in, nor secure a stable and peaceful future for our species.

Filed under: Brainwashing the kids