as long as war is sanitized for American public consumption,

[ulysses]

most Americans will continue to care very little about its costs.

Think about it - the last war fought on American soil ended 139 years ago and has long since passed into the stuff of gauzy myth and bloodless statistics most people don't even know. Battlefield photos from WWI and WWII were very heavily vetted of images of mangled bodies (unless they were useful as propaganda) and, much as television coverage of Vietnam changed perceptions then, we're well beyond the point where anyone would associate that with what's happening now in Iraq. Even the collapse of the WTC was mythologized - and put at arm's length - practically before the dust had settled over lower Manhattan.

Even the language of war is sanitized - not that the cachet of the term "smart bomb" or the euphemism "collateral damage" is lost on anyone in particular here, but that's the kind of thing that flies right by most of our compatriots.

Obviously, I don't wish for a war on American soil, but a populace in which no one but a handful of soldiers has seen the toll of war, even at the remove of the mass media, is ripe for exploitation by those who would keep up perpetually at arms...somewhere else.

[sinkingfeeling]

1. You are absolutely right...and that's the plan. I go balistic whenever

some, primp and proper, RW lady writes to the paper to say how 'upset' and wrong it was for the paper to print a picture of the ruin and death in Iraq. Everyone who 'supports' this invasion and occupation should have to look at the damage on both sides every single day. This is not a video game. How could they be so horrified and scared of 9-11 and not think about what it must be like to live in a war zone, where the world's greatest military muscle is being used?

[calimary]

2. Obviously we shouldn't be bothering our "beautiful minds" about it.

[izzie]

5. You would think the US would understand the people in Eur and Asia

These people should know what war is but I think the right wing think it is chargers with brave knights riding in to fight. Did you see the pictures of the Children in Aljazeera? Makes you wish to cry. Taking out mosque is about the silliest thing we could do. What are they thinking? Bush and Co really looked sad today.

[tnlefty]

3. Agreed....kick

kick

[PfcHammer]

4. it's a byproduct of modernity

people have no idea where their
food comes from or that an animal
had to die so that they can have
a hamburger, albeit contaminated
with mad cow disease

[riverwalker]

6. It's like explaining what cluster bombs do

and people just go blank. Remember in Afghanistan when the food packets we air dropped were yellow, but so were the cluster bombs? So when the kids picked it up thinking it was a meal, it blew up into hundreds of little bomb-lets and shredded them. Even other mothers just couldn't relate, and it is something in our culture I will never understand. (Beam me up Scotty.) I have always felt that we need to see nightly graphic horrific images of war. It should be shoved down our throats regularly until we finally get it.

[sweetheart]

7. it was 50 years ago that japanese troops invaded..

american soil in the Aleutian islands.... as much as the military
might wish to forget that defeat.

I agree with your primary premise, however. Without seeing the
close-up impact of war, the public is ill-equipped to nominate
that the government engage in war. Perhaps when there is another
war in north america, and millions die, there will be some memory
that will better assist future generations.

[ulysses]

9. right, but Alaska wasn't a state then.

Yeah, technicality, I know.

[gottaB]

8. for public consumption

There are people in this country who believe that they can make anything into a commodity. Most of the time they don't stick it through--that's not where the money is--so, they don't know whether it actually worked or what happened.

To counter this, I think we should try directing our criticisms at specific brands of war.

FOX-Brand war claims to whiten teeth and prevent moral decay--let's take a look at that.