What is the greatest threat facing us now? People will say it’s terrorism. But are there any terrorists in the world who can change the American way of life or our political system? No. Can they knock down a building? Yes. Can they kill somebody? Yes. But can they change us? No. Only we can change ourselves.
Now, before we all get friendly and start hugging one another, I need to make clear that I think Colin Powell has much to answer for, most especially his egregiously fact-free presentation before the United Nations on the eve of war back in 2003. We are where we are now partly because Powell, who had his doubts about this venture from the beginning, never once spoke out clearly about his own doubts. He allowed himself to be used by Bush as a sock-puppet for Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and the President.
His moral and political culpability do not negate the correctness of his words here, however.
I have heard over and over in the time I have been blogging of the threat to our very existence posed by "Islamofascists" who "want to kill us" and/or "convert us" and "put our women in burkhas". My initial reaction to this has always been laughter. No amount of laughter, however, seems to deter those who profess these beliefs from repeating them, ad nauseum, like a Zen koan, clearing the mind of thought.
It is undoubtedly true there are many, not just Muslims, but a whole host of different people for a whole host of reasons, who wish harm upon the United States and/or the people of the United States. Constructing an entire foreign, and now domestic (all those brown people swimming the Rio Grande want to force-feed us tamales mariachi music, don't you know), policy around such threats is without a doubt stupid, demonstrably counter-productive, and corrosive of our best traditions and laws. It is one thing to admit that there are threats out there - whether they are lurking serial killers, pedophiles, terrorists, or whatever - but it is another thing entirely to surrender to our fears of these and make them the center of our lives, whether private or public.
We should be better than that. The past six-and-a-half years have been an unmitigated disaster, an object lesson in what happens when the power-hungry exploit the fearful for political purposes. We would do better if we recognized that we can only destroy ourselves, as we have been doing piece by piece since September 11, 2001. No number of buildings collapsing can unmake the United States; only the careful manipulations of fear-mongers have been able to achieve that.
