"In wartime, the word patriotism means
suppression of truth" - Siegfried Sassoon, in
"Memoirs of an Infantry Officer."
Never have these words held more truth than today.
With the Iraq war going strong, with no real end in
sight, our government has bent over backwards to keep
the truth of war from its citizens. Day by day come more
distressing stories, causing a state of numbness.
Americans have been bombarded with false accusations
about which nation is our enemy and which leaders should
be trusted.
This administration has taken the cake for secrecy
and manipulation of the media. No matter how many horror
stories emerge of how staffers try to justify the
secrecy, the general public cannot take much more.
Once the White House was a place where Americans
looked for truth and justice. Leaders of the past used
to worry about the opinions of the people. Once there
was a moral duty to protect the reputation of the United
States by doing the right thing, helping the poor,
caring for veterans and giving people a reason to hope
that tomorrow would be a better day.
Those times have vanished. Since the 1960s, every
administration seems to become more corrupt, there's
more economic instability, and gaps between the rich and
poor grow.
Even the definitions of "rich" and
"poor" have changed. When I was little, having
$1 million put you in the class of the rich. Today it
makes you upper middle class. There are more
millionaires and billionaires today and more low-income
and poverty-stricken people than ever.
First, America invaded Afghanistan to find the
terrorists who killed nearly 3,000 people in one day. A
year later, President Bush claimed Iraq was the real
enemy, with chemical, biological and possibly nuclear
weapons. The war in Afghanistan faded from view, and
Americans supported a new war because of information
later proven false. Everyone continued to play along,
ignoring the truth for fear of being labeled disloyal.
This country was catapulted into a state of overwhelming
mistrust.
In the midst of all this, men and women too young to
remember Vietnam are going overseas to fight a war that
personifies the uncertainty of this nation.
The media have become weary of sugar-coating the
realities of the damage this administration and those
before it have done. There are daily headlines about who
lied to whom, who stole what money from whom, who denied
basic human rights from whom - the list goes on and on.
How do Americans sift through this barrage of
truth-telling? I'm not saying everything you hear and
read is truth, not by a long shot. What took years to
build could take generations to dismantle.
The question at hand for every American is this: Whom
should you trust?
McKee, a wheelchair user, is a freelance writer
and producer. You can e-mail her at chairgrrl@chairgrrl.com.
