DRANT #222: COALITION OF THE SHILLED

"Your silence will not protect you..."
Audre Lorde

"...The trouble with Eichmann was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal. From the viewpoint of our legal institutions and of our moral standards of judgment, this normality was much more terrifying than all the atrocities put together..."
Hannah Arendt
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If you ever needed another nose hair of evidence that we can NOT look to Congress to end our crimes in Iraq - just watch the loathesome charade that is to be staged in its' hallowed halls today.
Today the House will pass a bill that will - in our name -- prolong the war, and will -- with our money - provide the billions to kill yet more innocent thousands.
Don't tell me about realpolitik, and the art of the possible.
That's exactly what got us to this place.
Our compromise of principle in the name of expediency, our meek acceptance of the lesser of two evils, our eager complicity in the gross lie that there is participatory democracy to be found anywhere within vomiting distance of the US of A, our willingness to sacrifice what we know is right for some propaganda the grownups are feeding us that this is the best we're gonna get.
Barbara Lee caved in in DC last week, just like I toldya.
And today she did even worse, by trying to justify her betrayal of what she knows is right, and of what we told her we wanted her to do.
"I find myself in the excruciating position of being asked to choose between voting for funding for the war or establishing timelines to end it,"
said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.).
"I have struggled with this decision, but I finally decided that, while I cannot betray my conscience,
I cannot stand in the way of passing a measure that puts a concrete end date on this unnecessary war."

What ? What what what what ?
Unnecessary ? This war is un fucking necessary ?
Oh is that what it is ?
Timelines to end it ?
Here's a timeline- it ends NOW. Today.
STOP giving them OUR money to fight it.
Stop giving them OUR money today.
All the money.
Stop.
The justification for this betrayal is that its the best deal we're gonna get. This or nothing.
And who is telling us this ?
The biggest collection of liars, grafters and mendacious manipulative cheats ever assembled in one room- Congress.
We are taking their WORD that this is the best we're gonna get ?
We are willing co-conspirators in our own betrayal. A coalition of the shilled.
Excruciating ? Poor Barbara, poor US. How excruciating it is for us all.
How about those for whom it is truly excruciating- for we are far far from the worst betrayed.
We and Congress, and Barbara Lee and all the others, are most betraying our victims- those we are murdering and poisoning and torturing and raping and displacing. Those truly in excruciating agony.
How do you say to innocent people that, gosh, shucks, we are really, ummmm, terribly sorry, but we ummmmm well, it's the best we can do right now.
I say fuck that.
And fuck all of those who are not only perpetrating this genocidal hoax, but their explainers and justifiers and apologists.
We must not continue to pursue our enduring and self-defeating expectations that Congress, or a candidate, or the law, or courts, or media, or ANYONE other than US will do anything. We have only ourselves.
It is time to lay our bodies on the line. No more symbolic marches and t shirts and signs and NY Times ads. No more petitions, chain letters, no more blogs.
Every minute that passes, another victim will die, another child will be born deformed from DU toxins, another family will disappear, another oil company will announce record profits, and we will find more justification for our crimes.
We will not end the war from our cell phones or by email.
What Barbara Lee did today is exactly what she has fought against her whole life.
She made a deal with The Possible.
That's what got us to this place. Not doing what's right, but what we are told is possible.
And that's exactly what has to stop.