Sunday song

 

I often share the story (from the excellent book above) about Lakota warrior Crazy Horse and the military-industrial complex that existed in the late 1800s. Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull had been brought onto the reservation in South Dakota. They only surrendered to the U.S. Army because their people were starving. Washington had sent snipers on trains to ride across the western plains and shoot any buffalo they came in contact with. The army decimated the herds. The hearts of the native people were broken – they saw the evil enemy they were facing in the flesh.

Piles of buffalo bones

The U.S. Civil War ended in 1865 and the Indian Wars soon after. The military-industrial complex was worried about its future. They had artists make renderings of Crazy Horse supposedly back on the warpath.

Newspapers in the big east coast cities across the U.S. printed stories about Crazy Horse raping white women and killing children. Soon the public was led to express their outrage and “the people demanded something be done”. Doesn’t that sound familiar? The Congress in Washington immediately swung into action and appropriated more funds for the Indian Wars – while Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull were sitting on the reservation in South Dakota without a gun to their name.

This story has been repeated legions of times since –in Korea, Vietnam,  Panama, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Palestine and Lebanon. And the public relations script coming from Washington is always so familiar.

Writer and humorist Mark Twain became an anti-imperialist during the U.S. occupation of the Philippines (1898-1946). You might check out his writings.

The citizens of the U.S. could have full employment, a clean environment, Medicare for All, real social justice, and much more, except the U.S. has long been a fascist nation. Italy’s WW2 leader Benito Mussolini defined fascism as the “wedding of corporations and government”. That definition fits the United States of America.

America’s original sin was the genocide of the native people and the institution of slavery. The only way out of this 'forever war cycle' is to confront this addiction. 

“Hello, my name is America and I am addicted to lies, violence, greed, and endless war”. 

Where is the leadership to make a real change in this wretched nation?

Bruce