Iraq Does Not Penetrate the Bubble of Indifference...

what nobody's been willing to face is that Iraq actually shows the great schism that exists in our country between rich and poor.

Most Americans join the National Guard for one reason: To earn a little money to perhaps get by and earn an education. Therefore, it's about those who don't have the rich daddy who's got a lock on a spot at Princeton or Yale. It's about us, the middle class. The same is true of the reasons anyone of good sense joins the Army. This is despite the fact that the Army has had to lower its standards to fill its quotas.

Iraq shows up in spades what happens when you have a radical redistribution of income. It tells people what they don't want to admit. WARS ARE NOT FAIR....

It shows that many of the GI"s who sign up for this deal are doing so because of sign up bonuses and the chance to get a mostly free education.

For the most part, those who serve are those from the lower rungs of America's economic ladder and nobody is spelling it out that way because, well, it would seem "unAmerican."

The rest of the population of military age has blocked the whole War experience out of their minds if my conversations with college students and others has any bearing. These people isolate themselves from the issues of the day; they don't want to know about alternative fuels; they don't want to know about global warming; they don't want to know about what is really going on in America today,. Not unlike, our estimable leader, they inhabit a bubble that says it's okay to continue your life style and make money hand over fist at the expense of everything elsle. It is selfishness raised to the 26th power!

I've yet to hear anyone bring up the big sacrifice at fancy cocktail parties of the rich and famous. For those in the upper ten percent of the population who own virtually every asset in this country, there is not only a heavy dose of remorse, Iraq simply doesn't occupy their frontal lobes.

If you doubt that just pay attention to the ongoing conversations among the rich and famous.

People still drive gas guzzlers; women still wear fur coats; recycling is sporadic; nobody is volunteering to stick their necks out to change the numbers.

Meanwhile, the poor are doing this nation's heavy lifting and not getting much credit fore it considering the way the government treats their benefits and medical care. And nobody stands behind them.

Some day, moralist that I am, I believe that this country will wake up and have a day of reckoning. We will acknowledge that if we are a nation of "equals" some are a heck more equal than others.

Now, those of us in the Middle Class are just trying to pass by all the windows as they say in Hotel New Hampshire. We are trying to get through the holidays with credit intact and mortgage payments made.

Meanwhile, the young and the capable are doing our nation's dirty work and the rich turn their backs. That's why the Senator from New York urged the draft--the only way to spread the burden to "all of the people..." He also knows were that to happen, the War would be over within weeks!" Guaranteed!...

It's time we faced the truth and stopped kidding ourselves.





Les Aaron
The Committee for Positive Change....