I Watched The Lie - No One Listened

I watched George Bush get up before the nation and tell the most obvious political lie I have ever witnessed in my 56 years on this planet. It was not personal prejudice - It was not a lucky guess - it was not an accident, nor even difficult to see. The trite verbal sidestepping, the denial of any details for reasons of “national security,” the incredibly overused duplication of the rhetoric and methods of some of the biggest proven American political liars of the later half of the last century complemented George Bush’s particularly slinky demeanor. Obvious evidence of a complete factual reversal of administration statements within three days, when support was looking shaky, such as the fictitious links between Al-Qaeda, Iraq, and 9-11 made it the most obvious political lie of this century (even from two-thousand miles away through the TV screen I was watching). Yet when I spoke out - I was called names for my trouble.

Our supposed figureheads of “leadership” - spending their lives in politics (as experts, one would assume) - large numbers of them in the “opposition” party - would have you believe they were fooled. Virtually no one spoke out - although their access to clues, indicators, and information were far greater than mine. It was the greatest ducking of responsibility, ethics, and concern for truth I had ever witnessed, even in an arena infamous for a serious shortage of these qualities. A sheeplike public so easily and obviously manipulated still made excuses as everything I said, including details I had pictured but had not bothered to elaborate - such as the enmity of the Arab world, and the reactions of the populace to unwanted invaders, came to pass.

I - who am not any kind of expert, could see these things, aided in part by another and greater tragedy of my generation: Vietnam. I, who only took care to learn and understand the truth of history I had lived, from all sides -15 years after the information had time to mature and settle. All of these things were clear even to someone with a semi-casual interest - so what does this say of our leadership? More sadly, what does this say of our populace? Or the absolute non-response of a pathetically cowed media?

Where is the surging public outcry over this mass betrayal of our political system? What of the millions of lives (including mine) changed forever just a short time ago with lessons once learned denied and made useless by revisionist, flag waving, “feel-good” historians serving to deny the only possible beneficial outcome of an otherwise pointless enormous waste of lives pain and sacrifice? I despair…

[Thomas C. Collins]