printThe American people are not the only dupes to be patronized and bullied by the Empire’s congressional-military-media complex. According to RawStory.com, “A report (PDF) from the International Council on Security and Development (ICOS) shows that 92 percent of Afghans surveyed had never heard of the coordinated multiple attacks on US soil on September 11, 2001. It also shows that four in 10 Afghans believe the US is on their soil in order to ‘destroy Islam or occupy Afghanistan.'”
As the report would have it, these silly people simply don’t understand that the entity we call NATO, but is really the US, needs to be in Afghanistan for their own good; the good of the Afghan people. For example, to destroy their only source of income: the poppy fields.
And so a reeducation program must commence. “‘We need to explain to the Afghan people why we are here, and both show and convince them that their future is better with us than with the Taliban,’ ICOS lead field researcher Norine MacDonald said in a statement.”
Remember “Radio Sawa”? You should. If you are a tax payer, you pay for it. Part of the neocon’s democratic deal in Iraq was that we got to pipe into Iraqi ears pro-American propaganda interspersed with J. Lo’s caterwauling and Jay-Z’s gutter grunts. The idea was to make them both love us and want to be like us.
Why don’t we do the same for the Afghans? We could buy them all little radio transistors, and pipe “Radio Sawa” type propaganda into their long-suffering ears.
But first, let them get high on opium. Where I do agree with the think tank is in its proposal “that Afghanistan license the growing of opium.”
In December 24, 2001 I advocated, “Freedom and choice – not prohibition, incarcerations and coerced treatment – are the best salve for a people that has been infantalized and brutalized for too long. In a country with a poor infrastructure, the ‘relatively stable value of opium and its nonperishability means that it can also serve as an important source of savings and investment among traders and cultivators.'”
UPDATE: For those of you who are new to my opinion on America’s foreign policy, please read up on the term “Reeducation.” After you have searched my Articles Archive under the relevant categories, of course.
We do not need to “EXPLAIN” to the Afghan people why “we” (as in American National Guard members in violation of the US Constitution) are in Afghanistan.
A burglar or trespasser does not need to explain his presence when he has no business being there.
American troops should just leave. Period.
[Good analogy, but you did get that this blog post was meant to be sardonic, right?!]
Perhaps the problem started with Charlie Wilson’s War (its irritating how he was relatively lionized in that movie), i.e. supporting the overthrow of a flawed/socialist but at least secular government there in the 80s.
Another problem is that a lot of people making these decisions (politicians/bureacrats) are detached from experiencing the on-the-ground realities of what they are deciding on (more broadly, this is also true for Congress/its staffers making new rules for business, when most have never run one)
For example, to destroy their only source of income: the poppy fields.
A Tale of Two Substances
Substance A is highly addictive, instantly poisonous to every tissue in the body, is known to cause cancer of the esophagus, heart, and liver, as well as liver and heart disease, has very little medicinal value, and is a factor in many acts of aggression and vehicular crime and death. Substance A is legal to consume.
Substance B is highly addictive, is generally non-toxic (to the point that the only health hazards posed are addiction and overdose, and where the treated addict is often able to return to the state of health he had before becoming addicted), and is the greatest natural painkiller known to mankind. Substance B is illegal to consume.
Substance A is alcohol. Substance B is opium.