Halfway There: Rooting for the Enemy

Two columns well worth the reading:

Over at Halfway There is an unsettling post called Rooting for the Enemy. It recalls a 1971 Art Hoppe column that began

The radio this morning said the Allied invasion of Laos had bogged down. Without thinking, I nodded and said, “Good.”

And having said it, I realized the bitter truth: Now I root against my own country.

Zeno goes on to discuss the parallels between that column's time and today's, which is, of course, to discuss the parallels between that time's war and today's:

We are frequently told it is a mistake to try to draw comparisons between Vietnam and Iraq, but comparisons are inevitable. Both conflicts were launched on pretexts later exposed as false (the Gulf of Tonkin incident in the case of Vietnam, the infamous “weapons of mass destruction” in the case of Iraq). In both wars critics of the federal administration were accused (and are being accused) of favoring the enemy. As Art Hoppe explained, however, “I don't root for the enemy.” Rather, “I hate what my country is doing....” Hoppe was rooting against the war and against the mendacious leaders who took us into it. The bitter truth is that the liars who lead us into disaster suffer no great consequences from their incompetence. We cannot take much satisfaction in being proved correct in our positions when confirmation comes in the form of casualties and body counts. George Bush ends up with lower approval numbers in the polls. The men and women in uniform end up dead or maimed in mind and body. Their suffering leaches all the smugness from shouting “I told you so, asshole!” at the president and his minions. We have anger. We do not have joy.

Zeno ends his post by saying:

I think I would be able to endure any embarrassment that I might experience if it were to turn out that Bush is the brilliant war leader that his apologists claim. It would be worth it. Rather than have the continuing opportunity to denounce a president I don't support, I'd much prefer to have my former students, based now in Iraq and Pakistan, back home safe and sound. When Bush screws up, they are the ones who get screwed.

Unfortunately, our nation's fate (and the world's) is to endure thirty months more of Bush disasters.

Hoppe ended his column by saying:

But I would hope the day will come when I can once again believe what my country says and once again approve of what it does. I want to have faith once more in the justness of my country's causes and the nobleness of its ideals.

What I want so very much is to be able once again to root for my own, my native land.

I'll end mine: what they said.