Cowardice
Nonviolence and universal human justice take great courage and sacrifice. Cowardice is taking the easy, most conventional course against one's higher instincts and ethics.
Why is an American president with unusually high popular approval and international enthusiasm waffling on bringing an end to our wars of aggression in Afghanistan and Iraq? Where is his loyalty based? Is it based in the people who elected him? Or is it based in the political class to which he belongs? The same questions can be asked of the Congress and all politicians in America.
Why is America rated 13th in international quality-of-life polls? Why is the American middle class being reduced to poverty and high debt to the wealthy who are 10% of the population? Why does the American government refuse to provide affordable health care to all its citizens?
Look to the banks. Look to the insurance companies. Look to the corporations in the energy and military-supply sectors. Look to the private contractors in the war zones.
Has cowardice led the leaders of America to bow to greed and corruption?
Although I usually enjoy just reading your postings, I feel compelled to reply to your Oct 7th paragraphs on cowardice.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I agree going against ones ethics can be cowardice. However, higher instincts? My instincts are the things that keep a watch out for my preservation. Animals have instincts. When I run from a fire, it is my instinct that takes over. When I run into a fire to save another, it is my ethics, mores, beliefs or ideals that allow me to move against my instincts.
I do believe Obama is working on bringing the war in Irag to a close. However, I also believe that he said during the campaign that the war in Afghanistan was the war we should be concentrating on. Despite growing pressure from the populace and some in Congress, he seems committed to finding the right thing to do whether it is withdrawing or attempting to “win” it. I find this attitude in the face of pressure a sign of leadership, not cowardice.
Please take a closer look at the UN’s Human Development Report which incidentally is based on 2007 data. The difference between Norway at #1 (.971) and the US at #13 (.956) is 0.021 points or 2.1%. Is this meaningful? I do not know. Can we improve in life expectancy, educational attainment and income? Of course. One can also ask do we need to be #1? And at what cost? Take a look at the 12 countries above the US in the rankings. None of them have as much expected of them in world affairs as the US. I would welcome the kind of world where the US could concentrate on our human development internally and withdraw from the outside. Would shirking our external commitments constitute cowardice?
Providing health care to all US citizens is a bold and expensive step. Ignoring the question whether health care for all is mandated in the Constitution (“promote the general Welfare” is the generally quoted reference), I could still question as before whether providing something just because a vociferous group ask for it is a sign of leadership or cowardice when the cost is to society is also in question. Remember, the cost for this step will eventually be borne by the middle class, not the 10% rich.
As for the greed of the politicians, banks, insurance companies, military suppliers et al, I think we can all agree that they have demonstrated a lack of ethics or a disregard for them. If they have ethics and act contrary to them, then it is cowardice. I do not think we answered your last question here today.
Please do not take these thoughts as a letter from a rabid Obama-ite or love-it or-leave-it American. I have misgivings about Obama and question the Afghanistan war’s wisdom. Everything here does not work perfectly. I just thought your cowardice musings deserved a different and grayer viewpoint. All is not black and white.
Thank you for responding to my post.
ReplyDeleteGray is the color of negotiation and cooperation. It can be the color of nonviolence, non-aggression, and justice, but only within the presence of those ideals.
My post addresses the lack of justice in our domestic policy and foreign policy, the lack of nonviolence in those policies,and the lack of non-aggression in those policies. Presence or lack is a matter of black or white, using that paradigm.
I am calling out for the overt and courageous injection of non-aggression, nonviolence and universal human justice in those policies without equivocation or self-justification for being aggressive, violent and unjust.
The quality-of-life issue in the US is cited as an example of the prevailing myth of America, the Supreme Arbiter of Justice and Culture. America is increasingly out of touch with its place in the world. The American government is out of touch or indifferent to the quality of life of its population. If you doubt this, look at the attitude in government pronouncements on unemployment statistics. Consider that full-time-worker unemployment is actually closer to 17%!
You seem shy about paying for universal health care, but gung-ho about military commitments aimed at protecting US capital investments. Afghanistan is about petrochemical commerce. Iraq and Iran are about the Sauds, petrochemical commerce, Dubai and Israel.
I would like to see the government have the courage to stop lying about these policies, just for a start. Perhaps that would be a gray area we could agree on?
As for Capital, I sense that you are dismissing or excusing the lack of ethics in capitalism. Part of the government's cowardice is its failure to enforce rules and laws on the books to keep the ethics in US capitalism. Had these regulations and laws been universally enforced, justly, the country would be in a much better condition for the people. The present language of the government about enforcing new and old regulations ia wishy-washy at best.