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<p><font face="Times,Times New Roman"><b>Imperial Cancer</b><br>
by Jacob G. Hornberger
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">With the welfare state cracking
apart and with rising concerns among the citizenry about federal
spending and debt, count on federal officials to provoke more overseas
crises as a way to frighten people into rallying toward the government.
It is an old tried-and-true trick that government officials use to
distract people’s attention away from the problems government is
causing and toward supporting the government’s efforts to keep people
“safe.”
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">U.S. officials are not the only ones
who have used this trick effectively. James Madison pointed out that
officials in the Roman Empire did it too: “Among the Romans it was a
standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended.
Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of
defending, have enslaved the people.”
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">In the war on terrorism, fear is the
coin of the realm. “Be afraid, be very afraid” has become the standard
catcall of the statists. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">One option, of course, is for the
citizenry to resist the fearmongering and steadfastly oppose all
governmental efforts to infringe liberty and privacy in the name of
keeping people safe. The problem with that approach, however, is that
it can be endless since the government can use its forces to provoke
new overseas threats whenever it wants. It can do things constantly to
keep the people afraid.
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">Therefore, the only real long-tern
solution is to dismantle America’s disastrous experment with empire,
interventionism, and a warfare state. That would entail an immediate
withdrawal from Afghanistan and Iraq, bringing all the troops home from
everywhere around the world and discharging them, closing most of the
military bases here in the United States, ending all foreign aid, and
ridding our nation of a standing army. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">That was the type of nation — a
constitutional republic — our American ancestors intended for America
to be. By embracing empire and foreign interventionism (and a welfare
state), America has deviated from the vision that the Founding Fathers
had for our nation, and the results have been disastrous. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">Think of the advantages that would
acrue from exiting Afghanistan, Iraq, and the rest of the Middle East
and the world, and from dismantling the entire U.S. military empire:: </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">1. The biggest benefit would be that
the threat of terrorism against the United States would evaporate.
That’s where motive is so important. From the get-go, U.S. officials
wanted Americans to believe that the 9/11 terrorists attacked America
because they hated our freedom and values. Nonsense. The attacks were
“blowback” or retaliation for the bad things the U.S. government was
doing in the Middle East.
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">The empire-intervention crowd claims
that the Empire must remain occupying Afghanistan indefinitely to
ensure that the Taliban doesn’t regain power. They say that the Taliban
might make Afghanistan into a haven for more 9/11-type terrorists. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">But that’s just nonsense. For one
thing, the U.S. didn’t attack Afghanistan because the Taliban were
complicit in the 9/11 attacks. It attacked because the Taliban refused
to unconditionally comply with President Bush’s demand to deliver bin
Laden to the CIA. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">Thus, the fear that drives statists
to call for a permanent occupation of Afghanistan is that the Taliban
must now be so angry over what the U.S. Empire did to them that they
migth want to retaliate by offering a base from which terrorists can
initiate strikes against the United States. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">But that’s just speculation and
empire talk. There is no reason to believe that the Taliban will engage
in such actions after the U.S. Empire exits the country. After all, do
we see any terrorist strikes against Russia despite the fact that the
Soviet Union wreaked untold death and destruction during its occupation
of Afghanistan. Do we see any terorist strkes against the United States
by North Vietnamese people who lost friends and relatives from U.S.
bombs and bullets during the Vietnam War?
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">Moreover, since terrorism against
the United States is rooted in what the U.S. government is doing over
there, once the U.S. government is no longer over there, there won’t be
any more terrorist threat against the United States. In other words,
what difference would it make if the Taliban were to announce
Afghanistan as a haven for terrorists if nobody cared anymore about
planning terrorist strikes agaisnt the United States?
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">Anyway, as we’ve seen time and time
again, people who are determined to do harm to the United States can
plan terrorist strikes from a hotel or house anywhere in the world.
They don’t need an entire country to serve as a safe haven for them. </font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">2. With the anger and hatred that
gives rise to terrorism having dissipated, the entire war-on-terrorism
edifice could be dismantled, beginning with the Patriot Act and the
Department of Homeland Security. Life could return to normal, without
all the perpetual crises and fear-mongering.
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">3. An enormous amount of taxpayer
money could be saved, perhaps as much as 1/3 of the federal budget.
</font></p>
<p>
<font face="Times,Times New Roman">When a person is stricken by cancer,
it’s important to attack the source of the cancer cells. The same
principle applies to when the body politic is attacked by cancer. The
source of America’s cancer is the U.S. Empire. It’s time to attack the
cancer at its source by bringing all the troops and contractors home
now, dismantling Americas’ military empire, and ending its foreign
policy of meddling and interference. That would go a long way toward
restoring health to our nation, along with peace, prosperity, harmony,
and normality. </font></p>
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