There has been small talk and minimal reporting in the U.S. mainstream media of collateral damage in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. This talk implies or explicitly states the necessity of this collateral damage in order to accomplish the goals of the U.S. government. There is also nominal reporting on Americans themselves as collateral damage in lost jobs, lost health care, anemic economy, harmful trade policy, infrastructure deterioration, derailing high speed rail, weak financial regulatory system and a mountain of national debt. Is American collateral damage also a necessity and inescapable for the American people?
With the meltdown of the financial system on Wall Street owing in large part from the deregulation of the financial industry, the economy of American people has been severely damaged impacting on private sector jobs. The American people have become collateral damage as the government eagerly and with unprecedented dispatch doled out trillions of dollars during the Bush Administration to prop up the financial "banking" system in Wall Street.
The conventional political wisdom is that the United States is a centrist nation. The American people are neither wholly convinced that liberal nor conservative thought ought to be the guiding principle of national policies. Has the United States deviated from being a centrist nation to engage in two optional wars? With immense executive branch war and police powers the American people are collateral damage.
Commencing two wars costing trillions of dollars against two lesser developing countries is radical. The justification was these countries were a grave threat to the United States. Rather than these countries being a grave threat it is more likely that these countries are a rich resource in oil, gas or minerals and they needed to be within our sphere of influence for political and strategic reasons. Instead the American people are collateral damage in the huge additional multi-trillion dollar debts incurred by current and future generations. Any blowback by unwarranted wars will also be upon the American people in collateral damage.
In domestic policies our government has mismanaged both Medicare and Social Security, for both are deemed economically unsound beyond the next generation. Did our government's policies help cause their early demise as programs? Why is it that vital programs cannot be managed efficiently and effectively for the American people? The American people are collateral damage when these vital programs are reduced because of government mismanagement.
Was it centrist for the United States to overthrow a democratically elected government in Iran in 1953? This is an example of short term strategic benefit to keep oil in the hands of Western companies in a foreign country creating the conditions for a revolution in Iran in 1979. The collateral damage was security of the American people by creating more antagonisms abroad. The collateral damage to our national standing and reputation has seldom been acknowledged by our mainstream news media or our politicians. In fact, our politicians do not accept or regard intangibles as international trust pivotal to our standing as a nation. According to our politicians appeasement means acknowledging a tarnished international reputation because success of military force has become preeminent for many, if not most, of our elected politicians.
Has the country veered off course when political parties and their financial donor constituents become more important than the country and its citizenry? Has the United States government evolved into a government catering primarily to powerful, wealthy and influential interest groups in domestic and foreign policies forsaking the vital interests of the American people? The swagger of being a rich unchallenged superpower may intoxicate many of elected politicians and many of the electorate as the country descends into economic paucity affecting the majority of Americans.
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