Friday May 21, 2004 at 11:35 AM

Start Talking

Appearing in  Politics

With events in Iraq unraveling so quickly that even Donald Rumsfeld is looking a bit defeated, it’s hard to find something to say that’s not a simple recitation of the news or a mere echo of the ever-popular:

“Gee, things sure are turning to shit quickly.”
“How could you geniuses in the White House have been so stupid?”
“Dang, this is getting awfully expensive.”

But as much as I’d like to climb on the bandwagon and join the chorus calling for a quick fix and an early retreat, it’s all too apparent that the stakes are too high, the situation too important, the consequences too dire.

We have to find a way to make this thing in Iraq work.

Having let our President lead us into this fiasco, we must now make the required sacrifices to see this through. As members of the American democracy we all have an obligation and responsibility to hold our leaders, our troops, and ourselves accountable for all that has happened. We can’t tolerate the abuse of prisoners, the stream of misinformation, the ongoing death of civilians, the isolation from the rest of the world, or the death and dismemberment of our own armed forces.

We cannot turn our eyes, avert our gaze, and just hope that our government is going to “do the right thing”. The evidence is all too clear that they will not.

So what’s a citizen to do? Voting is of course a good place to start. Beyond that, donating money to honorable candidates is probably even more important. But more than that, you can start talking about politics again.

This idea that you don’t discuss politics in polite company is an idea foisted about the citizenry by the power-elite who don’t want us talking about what they’re doing. We can’t afford to be quiet any more. There’s simply too much at stake.

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