Who Do We Want To Be?

Who Do We Want To Be?

Art Inspires Reflection

Last night I went to see the film Unbroken. I have a somewhat intense interest in this period of history. I knew some of the people that lived large through those trying times. I think of them often and live by many of the lessons they taught me. So this story moved me greatly.

How Americans Do And The World Once Viewed Us.

We were at our greatest at this point in history. We laid our entire civilization on the line based on nothing more than the concept of unalienable rights. We defeated two powerful empires bent on a brutal form of world domination at great human cost.

After such great sacrifice we offered our fallen foe a fair public trial for the most brutal, amnesty for the conscripted and we then paid to rebuild their shattered homes. We turned the most voracious empires into some of the worlds best citizens by acting on the core of our beliefs.

How times have changed. We as a culture are at a crossroads. It seems to me that we have started down the wrong path. We must turn back and find the correct path before it is too late.

We Are No Longer The Good Guy

As I watched the part of the film where POWs are being abused for information I was disappointed to realize the rest of the world now views us in the role of the Japanese. Make no mistake starving a person and then offering food so forcing  them to give what you want is torture. The least brutal treatment in the film.

I am not sure what went wrong. I suspect we all became so flipin' rich we are now afraid.To any reasonable person religious fanatics are few and in no way powerful enough to bring our culture to it's knees. Sure they are mean and crazy and we need to take action when we can to protect the innocent. 

At Pearl Harbor we were attacked by an empire bent on global domination. On 9/11 we were attacked by a few nuts in a cave with a little money. Totally different situations. 

Extrajudicial executions of American citizens, the cowardly indiscriminate use of drone strikes, preemptive invasion of nations that never even had a plan to attack us and the total refusal to apply the Geneva Convention of 1949 to men captured on the field are weak and stupid responses to this less than credible threat to us as a nation,

This is a cultural struggle. In order for us to win we must have the courage of our convictions right up front. We do not preserve our freedom by signing away our liberties out of fear. We do not win the battle of morality by abusing POWs. We do not gain the support of the world and actionable information by torturing anyone. If anything these kinds of behaviors play into the hands of our adversaries. We cannot be both strong and stupid.

How Is This Different From...

This? This Man Is A POW

During a risky incident with some men who lived through the 40's I was freaking out. Ray a combat vet calmly turned to me and almost whispered "Take a breath and find your courage. Because that is the way out of this" His brave, wise and calm manner gave me the courage to do what was hard and to come out the other side. So I whisper to America calm down, take a breath and find your courage. Because it is the only way we are going to come out the other side.