This is an op-ed about Iraq, about Dick Cheney and about what could be a psychological pathology that leads right wingers to keep the USA in Iraq, causing the waste of trillions of dollars and tragedy for millions of families.

::::::::

So?

This is an op-ed about Iraq, about Dick Cheney and about what could be a psychological pathology that leads right wingers to keep the USA in Iraq, causing the waste of trillions of dollars and tragedy for millions of families.

But first, a bit of lexical digression. I'm a gigundous quotation addict. If a book lover is a bibliomaniac (I'm on of those too) then I'm a quotatiomaniac.

So it's hard for me to avoid using Dick Cheney's phrase (no, not the "Go f**k yourself" remark he made to Patrick Leahy on the floor of congress,) the "So?" remark he used in response to a question about how the vast majority of Americans want us out of Iraq.


Pardon me while indulge my mania. Samuel Johnson, author of one of the first widely used English dictionaries, which illustrated almost every word with a quotation, said, in his dictionary's preface, "Every quotation contributes something to the stability or enlargement of the language."


Jean Rostand said, "Certain brief sentences are peerless in their ability to give one the feeling that nothing remains to be said."

I went through four quotations books, about about 50 quotations to find two decent ones. All that to comment on one word, uttered by one of the most despised people in the history of the human race, Dick Cheney. Those words, "So What."

Some quotations have power. To use them is to tap the intensity, the authority, or the infamy of the author. And thus it is that we can take just a few otherwise insignificant words and wield them with extraordinary power, irony and poignance.

There. Now that's a quote worthy of a quotation collection. Have I risen to the quotational challenge? History will tell.

But finally, let's discuss the word that titles this op-ed. "So?"

That one word response, the one word uttered as a question, clearly indicates an attitude of indifference. When you say something to me and I say, "So"," I'm telling you that whatever it is you are expressing concern about, it's no big deal, nothing to worry about, not something I care about, or think there is anything necessary to do about it.

It's too short and too commonly used a word to google it alone, but "So what?" is a "longer" version of the same message.

Google the phrase, and before you even click on the search button, you see options, before inserting the question mark:

so, what if,
so what metallica,

I see the "so what" suggestion that drops down from the google search field and my mind expands it to "so what the fuck."

But the first hit, when you add the question mark to "so what" and hit search is Miles Davis & John Coltrane- SO WHAT-- a youtube video of one of Davis's most well known riffs. Why not click it and listen as this op-ed meanders along. It has that stoned on dope feel that the supporters of the war must feel as they go from year to year, with that "So?" attitude about the war, the 4000+ dead americans, the tanking US economy...

Wikipedia adds: "So what?, common phrase used in response to a seemingly irrelevant, uninteresting, or inconsequential statement" and then lists usage by a lot of musical and singing groups.

It also, in the google summary, alludes to a misquote in England's parlaiment, "In March 2008, Balls sparked controversy by appearing to reply to David Cameron's assertion in parliament that the government had presided over the greatest increase in overall taxation of all time with the phrase "So what?" Balls maintained that he had said "So weak!", in response to Cameron's previous questioning, and this was the phrase that was recorded in the parliamentary register Hansard, but the incident remained highly controversial.[2]."

But most important, I find a youtube video and a transcript:

First, the transcript, of Cheney being interviewed, on the fifth anniversary of the start of the war, March 19th, by Martha Raddatz, on ABC's Good Morning America

CHENEY: On the security front, I think there's a general consensus that we've made major progress, that the surge has worked. That's been a major success.

RADDATZ: Two-third of Americans say it's not worth fighting.

CHENEY: So?

RADDATZ So? You don't care what the American people think?

CHENEY: No. I think you cannot be blown off course by the fluctuations in the public opinion polls.

And here's the video:

Note the smarmy, "go fuck yourself, I don't care what you think" face he makes, which I've put higher in the article.

Now, when I say, "So?" as the title of my article, having put the word into quotational context, I'd like you to consider it as the use of the word ala Cheney, but used as a response to right wingers who say that after five years, over 4,000 dead and 30,000 maimed Americans, leaving Iraq without a win, without "victory," will be a disaster, cause chaos, cause hundreds of thousands of deaths.

I say, "So?" And I say it with the full "fuck you" meaning that I believe Cheney gave it-- but to people like George Bush, John McCain, Shelby Chambliss, Joe Scarborough--

So?.... So Go fuck yourself Dubya and McCain and anyone who thinks it's just peachy to keep this abomination in Iraq going. So? Go fuck yourself when you claim that leaving will definitely cause a bigger catastrophy.

Now, I diverge a bit from the Cheney meaning. I do care. I just don't buy the bullshit that all of these war lovers spew. Yesterday, I published an article, Breaking The Commitment Trap in Iraq, By Bernard I. Finel, that said, "Remaining in Iraq demonstrates weakness. Staying the course indefinitely is a policy driven by fear."

The people who keep calling for victory are the cowards, the losers. They are afraid to face and accept the reality that the US-- George Bush and Dick Cheney and all their enablers-- engaged in one of the most horrific judgment errors, the most bungled and poorly planned military actions in human history. They want the people of the US to pay, with trillions of dollars, thousands of lives, tens of thousands of maimings hundreds of thousands of hurt families, and hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, millions of displaced Iraqi families, the price for them to keep striving to turn this monument to epic failure into something salvageable. They seek a victory that General Petraeus could not or would not describe.

I mentioned this op-ed, in the middle of writing it, to a psychologist who described a technique described as the "So what" technique." A patient talks about something. The therapist explains that he is doing an intervention, then asks, "so what?" The patient then talks about what it means, what will happen, how he feels, how he will react. The goal is to go from feeling mistreated or abused to resolving the issue, by coming up with some response to take or making peace with the situation.

Now, imagine I could engage one of these cowards who are prolonging the war to maintain their positive self image and the image of their party, their history, their record.

"SO?" I ask John McCain.

"So," McCain replies, "It would be a shameful disaster if we irresponsibly withdraw."

"So?" I ask again.

"So, Hundreds of thousands of innocent victims would die and our allies wouldn't trust us."

He's hitting the standard right wing keep the war going, hold the course talking points.

But let's think about this. Obama hit the nail on the head with his question yesterday, and I'm paraphrasing him, "What if the situation we have NOW in Iraq could be sustained, even with pulling out the troops in an orderly, planned manner?"

General Petraeus didn't have an answer, as is so often the case. The problem is that these right wing, hundred-year-war addicts, who are terrified of letting go of the war before it can be positively spun, they talk about victory that even Patraeus can't define. They talk about horror stories if we leave before they are ready.

This kind of catastrophic thinking is, in cognitive psychology, is called catastrophization. It's dysfunctional, even an indication of pathology, of irratioinal thinking that can lead to anxiety, stress, depression, obsession.

So maybe, just maybe, the "So what? therapy" can work with these folks too. Or, since they honor and revere Cheney, we can use the abbreviated, "So?" to tap that Cheney energy. So? what if there is a disaster? What if there isn't? What if there will be a disaster if we stay or if we go? Should we stay or should we go?

Two thirds of Americans and a majority of Iraqis want us to go. And then, we have Cheney and his adherents, all saying, by word or deed, the same reply. "So?"

Our answer must be, as the psychologist advises- to work this out. And that means refusing to accept things as they are and to MAKE the changes happen.

Authors Bio:

Rob Kall is an award winning journalist, inventor, software architect, connector and visionary. His work and his writing have been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, CNN, ABC, the HuffingtonPost, Success, Discover and other media.

He is the co-founder of the Arc of Justice Alliance a platform designed to help organizations and individuals working for justice and a better world to discover each other and share resources and strategies, with the hopes that this will build their power.

Check out his platform at RobKall.com

He is the author of The Bottom-up Revolution; Mastering the Emerging World of Connectivity

He's given talks and workshops to Fortune 500 execs and national medical and psychological organizations, and pioneered first-of-their-kind conferences in Positive Psychology, Brain Science and Story. He hosts some of the world's smartest, most interesting and powerful people on his Bottom Up Radio Show, and founded and publishes one of the top Google- ranked progressive news and opinion sites, OpEdNews.com

more detailed bio:

Rob Kall has spent his adult life as an awakener and empowerer-- first in the field of biofeedback, inventing products, developing software and a music recording label, MuPsych, within the company he founded in 1978-- Futurehealth, and founding, organizing and running 3 conferences: Winter Brain, on Neurofeedback and consciousness, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology (a pioneer in the field of Positive Psychology, first presenting workshops on it in 1985) and Storycon Summit Meeting on the Art Science and Application of Story-- each the first of their kind. Then, when he found the process of raising people's consciousness and empowering them to take more control of their lives one person at a time was too slow, he founded Opednews.com-- which has been the top search result on Google for the terms liberal news and progressive opinion for several years. Rob began his Bottom-up Radio show, broadcast on WNJC 1360 AM to Metro Philly, also available on iTunes, covering the transition of our culture, business and world from predominantly Top-down (hierarchical, centralized, authoritarian, patriarchal, big) to bottom-up (egalitarian, local, interdependent, grassroots, archetypal feminine and small.) Recent long-term projects include a book, Bottom-up-- The Connection Revolution, debillionairizing the planet and the Psychopathy Defense and Optimization Project.

Rob Kall Wikipedia Page

Rob Kall's Bottom Up Radio Show: Over 400 podcasts are archived for downloading here, or can be accessed from iTunes. Or check out my Youtube Channel

Rob Kall/OpEdNews Bottom Up YouTube video channel

Rob was published regularly on the Huffingtonpost.com for several years.

Rob is, with Opednews.com the first media winner of the Pillar Award for supporting Whistleblowers and the first amendment.

To learn more about Rob and OpEdNews.com, check out A Voice For Truth - ROB KALL | OM Times Magazine and this article.

For Rob's work in non-political realms mostly before 2000, see his C.V.. and here's an article on the Storycon Summit Meeting he founded and organized for eight years.

Press coverage in the Wall Street Journal: Party's Left Pushes for a Seat at the Table

Talk Nation Radio interview by David Swanson: Rob Kall on Bottom-Up Governance June, 2017

Here is a one hour radio interview where Rob was a guest- on Envision This, and here is the transcript..

To watch Rob having a lively conversation with John Conyers, then Chair of the House Judiciary committee, click here. Watch Rob speaking on Bottom up economics at the Occupy G8 Economic Summit, here.

Follow Rob on Twitter & Facebook.

His quotes are here

Rob's articles express his personal opinion, not the opinion of this website.

Join the conversation:

On facebook at Rob Kall's Bottom-up The Connection Revolution

and at Google Groups listserve Bottom-up Top-down conversation