"I must _____ or the terrorists will win!" steadfastness, or stupidity?
According to television, they seem to have become popular slogans and signs of nationalistic pride. "We can't change our way of life or our tactics, because if we do, the terrorists will win!" Or my favorite: "I'm not gonna let gas prices alter my way of life." I guess if you do, the terrorists somehow win. Are these signs of strength, or are they signs of ignorance?
Simple one first: "I'm not gonna let gas prices alter my way of life." I started with this one because you can easily throw it into the dumb-as-a-bag-of-bricks pile. That's like saying, "I'm not gonna let the price of Broadway shows stop me from going as much as I want!" (Do the terrorists win there too?) Broadway seats are about $90 a pop, and if you're working 9 -5 like most of us, looking for deals on chicken breasts at the supermarket, it's probably not the smartest thing to do to take your family out to the theatre every two weeks. Everyone would agree. But somehow wasteing money in our gas-guzzling, school bus sized SUVs has become a sign of National pride and resiliency (if we give them up, the terrorists will surely win!). If you stand on the outside and look in at it, it's more like complete senselessness than anything else.
If you wanted to look at it in a "War on Terror" sense, the very people our President is labelling as terrorists, like Hugo Chavez (who is practically giving away fuel-oil to poor American families, which is another issue all together), Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (President of Iran), and even Osama Bin Laden, are all oil profiteers. So if you REALLY want to beat the terrorists, ride a bike!
But this isn't an accident. Logically, telling Americans we can undermine governments and terrorists in the middle east more effectively by conserving fuel than by blowing up bombs would mean no more campaign contributions to the GOP from Big Oil. They're the Grand Oil Party. It follows. They have effectively used the media as a way of indirectly convincing the American public that owning a huge car and consuming oil regardless of price are signs of strength and resolution. And their rhetoric gives the impression that we are moving steadily into an age of oil independence. The President talks about "alternative energy sources" like corn and grass clippings. This gives people the impression that everything is fine, that one day we will all be flying around in cars fueled by our pulled weeds. So people simply wait to be ushered into that period. It is whitewash, and nothing more.
What the President fails to mention is that we already have the technologies to be completely independant from outside energy sources. Most of these technologies have already been implimented into many other countries as far back as the 80's. Switzerland has pledged to be completely oil free by 2020. We aren't Switzerland, but if the technology exists for them it exists for us. We have American auto manufacturers suing the state of California for mandating that all cars within the state meet China's emissions standards in ten years. China's emissions standards are one of the lowest in the industrialized world. That doesn't sound like progress to me. Sounds more like stupidity.
Simple one first: "I'm not gonna let gas prices alter my way of life." I started with this one because you can easily throw it into the dumb-as-a-bag-of-bricks pile. That's like saying, "I'm not gonna let the price of Broadway shows stop me from going as much as I want!" (Do the terrorists win there too?) Broadway seats are about $90 a pop, and if you're working 9 -5 like most of us, looking for deals on chicken breasts at the supermarket, it's probably not the smartest thing to do to take your family out to the theatre every two weeks. Everyone would agree. But somehow wasteing money in our gas-guzzling, school bus sized SUVs has become a sign of National pride and resiliency (if we give them up, the terrorists will surely win!). If you stand on the outside and look in at it, it's more like complete senselessness than anything else.
If you wanted to look at it in a "War on Terror" sense, the very people our President is labelling as terrorists, like Hugo Chavez (who is practically giving away fuel-oil to poor American families, which is another issue all together), Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (President of Iran), and even Osama Bin Laden, are all oil profiteers. So if you REALLY want to beat the terrorists, ride a bike!
But this isn't an accident. Logically, telling Americans we can undermine governments and terrorists in the middle east more effectively by conserving fuel than by blowing up bombs would mean no more campaign contributions to the GOP from Big Oil. They're the Grand Oil Party. It follows. They have effectively used the media as a way of indirectly convincing the American public that owning a huge car and consuming oil regardless of price are signs of strength and resolution. And their rhetoric gives the impression that we are moving steadily into an age of oil independence. The President talks about "alternative energy sources" like corn and grass clippings. This gives people the impression that everything is fine, that one day we will all be flying around in cars fueled by our pulled weeds. So people simply wait to be ushered into that period. It is whitewash, and nothing more.
What the President fails to mention is that we already have the technologies to be completely independant from outside energy sources. Most of these technologies have already been implimented into many other countries as far back as the 80's. Switzerland has pledged to be completely oil free by 2020. We aren't Switzerland, but if the technology exists for them it exists for us. We have American auto manufacturers suing the state of California for mandating that all cars within the state meet China's emissions standards in ten years. China's emissions standards are one of the lowest in the industrialized world. That doesn't sound like progress to me. Sounds more like stupidity.
posted by adampaul at
3:08 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home