Have Americans Been Manipulated, Frozen by Terror?

For our country to continue to move forward it involves going beyond our fears sometimes, into unknown territories. Without inspired leadership and the support of those around us we can quickly get to a point where we feel we have reached our limit, our bodies and minds frozen. We either no longer act, or we at best have no more resolve than what is needed to maintain the status quo.

Political leaders, despots and dictators know how to foment such feelings and use them to their advantage. Has that time come in the United States? Have we become victims of our own political leaders propaganda? Its happened before -

"Naturally, the common people don't want war, but after all, it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag people along whether it is a democracy, or a facist dictatorship, or a parliment, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country."

Herman Goering,
Nuremburg Trials

While it is certainly alarming to compare world events of today with those in Germany prior to and during World War II, its not without merit to ask ourselves if we have been all too blindly following a leader we should be questioning?

Its not easy to do such questioning though when it quickly is stymied by howls of being unpatriotic (sound familiar?) or that such questioning doesn't support our troops. Of course the opposite is true, open and reasonable debate among men is the foundation of a democracy. It also plays a role in protecting our troops.

Brave though they may be, they are in no position to question. Their lives are structured by the top-down commands of military field operations, in many ways for their own protection. They will perform heroically in their duties wherever they are sent. It is you who elects the political leaders who make the decisions on where to send our troops, ultimately they depend on you to not put them in harms unless it is absolutely necessary.

History is filled with so many wars, invasions and military battles where from our perspective now the causes seem flimsy at best, and the actions taken barbaric at least. How will today's family's explain to their grandchildren a "War on Terror" that really should have been a focused manhunt for one man and a small group of followers that should never have gone on for years? How will they explain invading a country, winning the "war" and finding out afterwards that the most critical reasons for the invasion were false. How will they explain prison tortures by our country and unlimited detentions in Guantanamo? How will they explain billions of tax dollars mostly from lower and middle class American families used to rebuild a country whose national and cultural history we never bothered to try and understand once we occupied their soil?

It will soon be time for us to listen, to raise our voices, to question and to partcipate in the elections this fall. Feel comfortable in whatever you decide to believe, but don't be afraid. We all need to find the courage to move forward.