Another Phony Day of Memories

The drums of war continue to beat in the phony guise of patriotism, peace and justice. Flyovers, flag waving and disingenuous political doublespeak about the “service” and “honor” of “heroes” fighting for peace and protection of the homeland will be in excess today, Memorial Day 2012.

The mainstream media continues to be the megaphone of the masters of war. They portray this as a day to honor those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for their country. They protect the old fools who continue to sacrifice the youth of the nation for the racketeers Smedley Butler so eloquently spoke about in his repudiation of American wars and the use of the military as the thugs for the rich.

Today’s media will show inspiring stories of the young soldiers with lost legs and arms carrying on. They’ll show poignant reunions of parents returning from war surprising their families. Sports stadiums will be used as platforms to beat our chests in patriotic moments of field sized flags, color guards and the singing of patriotic songs. The military will provide uniformed troops to be present for a free game to recognize their service.

The moment that made the strongest statement about the truth of combat came yesterday for me. I happened upon a television story detailing the return of old WWII Marines returning to Iwo Jima for the first time since their combat on that island. A time when over 6,000 of their fellow Marines were killed.

The elderly Marines all wore caps declaring themselves as survivors of Iwo Jima. It all seemed a surreal exercise in patriotism. But then the faces of the old Marines changed as they got their first glimpse of Iwo. That thousand yard stare appeared on their faces. Many of them had tears streaming down their cheeks. It was clear the memories of carnage and death had come rushing back to these Marines and they were no longer old. They were 18, 19, 20 years old again. And the pain of their war was clearly expressed in their faces.

As I watched the old guys I found myself flashing back to my own memories. Tears began streaming down my own cheeks. There was no pride in my heart. No pride in the memories of my war. Only regret and grief.

But today will be an exercise in denial. The people of this nation will not be expected to reflect on the reasons the youth of every generation has been sacrificed for the rich and their puppet government stooges. The American people will not be expected to understand American exceptionalism is merely another way of saying imperialism. Instead they will get a steady dose of patriotic denial and a message it is necessary to consume excessively. And maybe for a short time remember sons and daughters that were fed into the war machine and never allowed to return.

We want to believe we are a righteous and religious nation. We want to believe we follow the ideals of Christ and other prophets of God. We just don’t want to believe none of them ever advocated the insanity and sin of war.

Memorial Day 2012 is just like all the others I’ve experienced since my return from Vietnam in 1969. A damn lie of phony patriotic zeal that fails to understand we sacrificed our young for nothing more than keeping the racketeers of Wall Street, Big Oil, Big Banks and multinational corporations in power.

Learning The Hard Way

It used to be we wanted all our children college educated. I remember when residents of California got free tuition to state funded colleges. And there were many of them. But that all ended around the time Reagan became President. Trickle down economics resulted in trickle down illiteracy and financial barriers to education. Student loans went from government investments in our nation's future to cynical profiteering by banks leading to our young becoming indebted the rest of their lives. Public schools became the holding cells for the poor and lower middle class while the more affluent created a new tier in a caste system for education. Now the private schools, often having connections with the Christian faith, attempt to skim government education dollars and further destroy public education. Visit major state funded universities today and you will discover a majority of the students seem to come from affluent backgrounds. The government now leaves community colleges to the less affluent as a way of obtaining college education. And still the banks seek to profit on the backs of even the poorest students.


Educators have become the evil empire to the right wingers. Many have the audacity to assert themselves by using collective bargaining. Unions have emerged to speak out for teachers and educators. Unions have dared to ask educators be paid living wages. The private educators in the elite church schools aren't usually able to unionize. Their wages are usually far less. So, the government funded educators must be vilified. Look at the test scores! They must be poor educators because they can't teach the hungry and emotionally stressed children to read at age appropriate levels. They must be lacking because they fail to get children in gang infested neigborhoods to stay in school. Public schools are failing and look at all the money wasted on them by tax payers. Let non-union schools take over. Let the private schools profit and discriminate against the poor performing students. Leave those students for the overworked and understaffed public teachers to deal with. Blame those teachers for failure of the public schools.

Education in the US is a reflection of our society. We no longer seek to educate our children to be free thinkers. We no longer seek to have our children think abstractly. We've made education a game where the best team wins because they have wealth and influence. Education is a paper chase where students are indocrinated in capitalism by most schools. Misinformation and fallacy prevails at many schools. Students have come to understand excellence isn't about the ability to think for themselves. It's about the ability to game the system. To get the answers right on the culturally biased tests created by co-opted stooges of the capitalist system.

I've spoken with professors who are threatened if they don't give grades undeserved. Professors who expect critical thinking from their students are hated or dearly loved. Some of our children actually do want to learn. Despite all the barriers.

American education is like American healthcare, unfortunately. European students learn multiple languages. American students learn how to take politically motivated tests. Educators are overwhelmed by the broken system. Like medical professionals they struggle to do the right thing but bureaucracy and politics constantly impede them from doing so. Greed insidiously infects educating our children. The huge amounts of money granted to education is up for grabs and the less spent on the children learning means the more profit.

It used to be we wanted our children educated in colleges and universities. Now that goal has stalled for the first time in many generations. Not only will my kids and grandkids have poorer edcuation opportunities and higher debts they will also be under-employed or unemployed at higher rates. Their generations will be the first generations in nearly a hundred years not to live in better conditions than the previous generation.

We should truly be ashamed.