When it comes to national spending, we are in sore need of straightening out our priorities.  We hear the anger and frustration over the stimulus package, healthcare and Wall Street bonuses, but I recently came across a couple of sobering figures that show just how out of whack our government spending really is.

My premise, and I don’t think there is anyone outside the Wall Street environs who will disagree with me, is that the job situation in the U.S. passed critical a long time ago and hasn’t shown any signs of getting better.  Washington and Wall Street may tell us the economy is recovering, but try telling that to the family who lost their home sometime in the past two years, or to those whose unemployment benefits have run out and are still out of work, or even to those who are drawing unemployment benefits but can’t find a job.  The problem is staggering.

Worst of all, it is not expected to go away for at least two more years, if then.  Although I remain a passionate supporter of President Obama, I am extremely disappointed in his failure to address the rebuilding of our national infrastructure and, in the process, putting people back to work doing that rebuilding. 

We hear repeatedly the problems with the National Debt, the cost of healthcare reform and the economic burden the stimulus package has placed on our children and grandchildren.  But no one talks about taking from the sacred cow of the American budget, the American Military, in order to help address any of these issues.  Why in the world are we continuing to spend nearly a Billion dollars a month in Iraq and Afghanistan when there is no credible evidence (I don’t consider Dick Cheney’s statements to the contrary as credible) that these efforts are doing anything to secure our safety?

On the contrary, there is significant evidence that our involvement in these two countries has done much to alienate large portions of the world’s population and has provided a powerful recruiting rationale for those who seek to perpetrate another 9/11 on the West.  Why haven’t we considered using the money we are blowing up in Iraq and Afghanistan to address our failing infrastructure and our jobless situation at home?

Over the weekend, Bob Herbert, addressing the need to rebuild our worn out road system, wrote in the New York Times, “The Federal Highway Administration has estimated that every $1 billion of investment in the Federal Highway Aid program generates 42,100 full-time equivalent jobs.”

I decided to try to contrast that with the number of military personnel serving in Iraq and Afghanistan that can be employed for $1 billion.  A recent study by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Analysis, a Washington-based think tank, concluded that the cost for a single soldier to fight in Iraq or Afghanistan is $775,000 per year, and increasing.   This means that for $1 billion we can either employee 1,290 soldiers to fight in two meaningless wars, or we can employee 42,100 people to re-build our roads.

Furthermore, according to a 2007 article by the New Statesman, America won’t simply be paying for Iraq and Afghanistan with today’s dollars and with dead soldiers.  The Pentagon attempted to silence economists who predicted that several decades of after-service care for the wounded from these two wars will amount to an unbelievable $2.5 trillion.  Kinda makes the economic burden we’re passing on to our grandchildren because of the stimulus and healthcare pale, doesn’t it?

Now, I’m not so naïve as to presume the problem is really this simple; nor do these few facts begin to cover the myriad of intersecting issues with which we need to deal.  But, to my simple mind, it would make a whole lot of sense for us to take a hard look into making some trade-offs.

I graduated from a high school named for the man who was, perhaps, Kentucky’s greatest statesman, The Great Compromiser, Henry Clay.  This may be one of the reasons I’ve always felt the best way for people with disparate views to successfully live together is by learning to compromise.  Never has there been a greater need for the art of compromise than today in Washington.

To many people, Henry Clay is best known for his 1839 declaration on the floor of the Senate, “I had rather be right than President.”  Some will say he must have been right almost all the time because he took aim at the presidency five times, never succeeding.  But whether he was right or not, Clay’s most admirable statesmanship came from his ability to negotiate compromise. 

Henry Clay’s first major compromise was the negotiation of the end of the War of 1812.  Between the beginning and the end of the war, Clay found himself in somewhat opposing positions.  In 1810, he was the leader of the Congressional War Hawks of whom a Federalist politician once commented, “Henry Clay was the man whose influence and power more than that of any other produced the War of 1812.” 

By 1814, under the strain the war placed on the young nation, and with Napoleon defeated leaving the British with more forces to send against the Americans, even Clay, the radical War Hawk, was ready for the war to end.  He accepted a position on the five-member American delegation sent to Europe to negotiate peace. Although he did not always see eye-to-eye with the other U.S. diplomats, Clay was a shrewd and stubborn spokesman for the American position and it was largely his ability to convince those around him to compromise that produced the Treaty of Ghent, ending the war.

Although he was unable to thwart the eventual storm of Civil War, between 1820 and 1850 he successfully guided the nation away from that conflict three times.  His was the hand that wrought the Missouri Compromise in 1820, allowing the tensions over slavery to pull back, at least for a while, from the brink of conflagration.

In 1833, Clay brought abouth The Compromise of 1833, an American tariff measure passed by Congress as a compromise for the high tariff act of 1828.  The 1828 act had caused intense dissatisfaction throughout the South and had brought about nullification by South Carolina and the threat of secession.  For the second time, Clay was instrumental in pulling the nation back from the brink of Civil War.

In the 1840’s, after the United States acquired most of the present-day Southwest as a result of the Mexican-American War, tensions over slavery again threatened to escalate into Civil War as North and South debated the extension of slavery into the newly acquired territories.  When California applied for statehood in 1849, the situation became a powder keg with a burning fuse.

To settle the differences between North and South, Clay, now a U.S. Senator, introduced a series of resolutions in the Senate with the express purpose that some would gain support from the North, while the South would support the others.  After some initial debate, the Senate formed a special committee with Henry Clay as chairman.  Seven months of debate took place before Northerners and Southerners finally agreed to a compromise and the committee submitted to the remainder of the Senate a series of measures based upon Clay’s original proposals.

Although these measures were rejected by the Senate, Clay continued working.  Enlisting the aid of Abraham Lincoln’s nemesis, Stephen Douglas of Illinois, Clay was eventually able to fashion the Compromise of 1850, again averting Civil War.

Henry Clay was one of the leaders of the Whig Party, which became Abraham Lincoln’s Republican Party.  And today, Republican politicians are fond of extolling the virtues of their “Party of Lincoln.”  Perhaps if they were to also extol the virtues of the “Party of Henry Clay,” they could find the wherewithal to do more than giving mere lip service to “bi-partisanship” and, in doing so, resurrect the stewardship for the United States practiced by both Henry Clay and Abraham Lincoln.

Beyond the invasions of two countries; beyond the trashing of the budget surplus handed them by the Clinton administration in order to give even more to the wealthiest members of our society; beyond the shredding of the Constitution and trampling of individual rights, the most heinous legacy of the Bush/Cheney years will be the mentality of fear the Bush administration foisted on the American people. Bush/Cheney managed to make fear of terrorism so pervasive that we have become like lemmings in our willingness to accept that if the government merely labels an individual as a Terrorist, then that person must, indeed, be a Terrorist. There can be no greater affront to our Democracy than the ready willingness to change our presumption of innocence until proven guilty to a presumption of guilty until proven innocent.

Even with only the basics of our Democracy elucidated in a middle school civics class or a high school American history class, the proposition that our legal system is based upon a presumption of innocence should be intrinsically understood by anyone who calls himself/herself an American. One of our most valuable safeguards against governmental abuse of power has always been this presumption of innocence. For it is not sufficient, under the law, for the government to simply accuse someone of a crime and throw them into jail. The government is required to prove the guilt of the accused.

During the Bush/Cheney years, we somehow lost sight of this basic tenet of our Democracy. When objections were raised to illegal eavesdropping, torture, rendition, indefinite detention or denial of civilian trials, the response from Bush followers was always the same, ”These are Terrorists, and Terrorists have no rights.”  The truth, though, was that the Government only claimed they were Terrorists without offering up irrefutable proof. In the minds of Bush followers, the claim became accepted as proof.  No distinction was made between an accusation by the government and an unchallengeable truth. The fear fed us by Bush/Cheney allowed us to see the Claim and the Truth as being synonymous.

The whole point of the Bush-era controversies is just this - the Government should have to demonstrate someone’s guilt before it is assumed and, most certainly, before that person is subjected to punishment. The Government should have to show probable cause to a court and obtain warrants before eavesdropping. The Government should have to offer evidence that a person actually engaged in Terrorism before locking him or her in a cage. And the Government should have to obtain a conviction in a court of law before any individual is whisked away in the dead of night to be tortured or killed.

Too many of us have come too easily to equate unproven government accusations with proof. And once we accept that, legal due process becomes entirely unnecessary.  We have decided we know these persons are Terrorists.  And how do we know it?  Because the Government says it is so!  This has become all the “proof” that is needed.

But when the light of day is shed on many of these cases, we find the truth is much different from what we wish to believe. Fifteen months after the U.S. Supreme Court rebuked the Bush administration by ruling Guantanamo captives could sue for their freedom, civilian judges ruling in 36 cases ordered the release of 29 detainees, siding with the Defense Department only seven times. In other words, the Government’s assertion that someone was a terrorist was held to be proven less than 20% of the time!

In one federal courtroom last August, a defense lawyer successfully argued the U.S. military had coerced a false confession out of a 50-year-old Kuwaiti who had been at Guantanamo for seven years. The man was set free.

Since Bush/Cheney, the Government can literally just flash someone’s face on TV with the word “Terrorist” over it, as was done with U.S.-born American citizen and Islamic cleric Anwar al-Awlaki. If the face is Muslim-looking enough, no other proof need be offered to convince us of the danger this person poses to our Democratic way of life. So far as we are concerned, he is a declared enemy of the United States working to kill Americans and should be “shot on sight; no proof required.”

The blog sphere, sounding much like Dick Cheney himself, screams, “Of course al-Awlaki should be killed without charges; he’s a Terrorist who is trying to kill Americans!!!” Even now, beyond Government assertions about his associations, we know virtually nothing about al-Awlaki other than the fact that he’s a Muslim cleric with a Muslim name dressed in Muslim garb, sitting in a Bad Arab Country expressing anger towards the actions of the U.S. and Israel.  But that’s more than enough.  We are not only willing to mindlessly embrace the Government’s unproven accusation, but we cheer for his due-process-free execution like drunken fans at a football game.  

Our mantra has become, “No civilian trials are necessary for Terrorists (meaning people accused by the Government of being Terrorists). It’s OK:  they’re Terrorists, because the Government says so.”

In order to keep our Democracy safe, we are willing to abandon the principle that is its very lynchpin. And we justify it in the name of FEAR.

As the first flakes of winter begin drifting gently to earth, we stare at the tangle of lights on the floor, the result of one cat’s desire to redecorate the Christmas tree; and in the quiet of early morning, we slowly sink into our annual reflection on the year gone by, thinking fondly of unseen friends far away but nevertheless held close in our hearts. 

The year has not been unkind; nor has it been uneventful.  Amidst economic chaos, two wars we too seldom think about and the ever increasing encroachment of passing years, we have much for which we are thankful.  Chief among these are you who have touched our lives over the years.

The year began with my knee surgery.   Two arthritic knees that retained very little of their original cartilage had reduced my walking to a painful, oftentimes nearly impossible, undertaking.  So, on February 12, both joints which had been mine since birth were replaced with man-made titanium substitutes and I joined my wife, who had her left hip replaced in 2004, as a member of the aging bionic set.  After a five-hour surgery, four days in the post-surgical unit, one week in the rehab hospital and two months of outpatient rehab, I returned to work full time.  After one more month, I gave up my cane and I’ve been virtually pain free ever since. The only down side has been that, absent the knee pain, my mind is now free to focus on the other aches and pains that come with the passing years.

My wife continues teaching at a local college where, after my recovery, I spent several weekends constructing a new work area for her in her cubbyhole “office.”  Together, we did a pretty good job stretching her available workspace beyond the limits one would expect from such a small area.

The kids are still gainfully employed – one at UPS; one at a local bank.  Given the economic hardships faced by so many of the population, we are all thankful none of us is counted in the monthly unemployment statistics.

In August, I had the opportunity to participate in a vital project being conducted by the Library of Congress, the Veteran’s History Project, by giving a one-hour interview recounting my Vietnam experience.  Eventually, the  interview will be part of the Library’s resources that will “make accessible the personal accounts of American war veterans so that future generations may hear directly from veterans and better understand the realities of war.” 

I found the exercise extremely moving and was been motivated by it to begin a second blog (Thunder Road Anthology) to further record some of my memories of my time in Vietnam.  Still in its infancy, my hope is this venue will eventually contain the essence of that book I have never been able to write. 

My wish for you is a peaceful Holiday Season, health and prosperity in 2010 and the comfort of loved ones, both near and far, surrounding you. 

Merry Christmas.
Dennis Perkinson

We have become a nation shaped by war. The warrior mentality permeates our society as surely as it did that of the Visigoths who sacked Rome in 410. The foundations of our democracy which originated in the view of human beings as individuals deserving of respect, dignity and human rights have been sacrificed to a mode of politics and culture that has become simply an extension of war, both at home and abroad.

In the past decade, we have seen a punishing state increasingly replace the welfare state. No matter how ill-conceived that welfare state might have been, more and more individuals and groups are now treated as disposables who are not deserving of the safety nets and basic protections that provide the conditions for living with a sense of security and dignity. Basic social supports have been replaced by an increase in the production of prisons, the expansion of the criminal justice system into everyday life and the erosion of crucial civil liberties.

Where once we viewed shared responsibilities, the dominate sharing is now that of fear. We have adopted an attitude that if you share my views, you are my friend and a patriot; if not, you are my enemy. Civil discourse has been replaced with frustration and anger which has led to an attendant cave mentality striking out at that which is different and shrinking from that which goes bump in the night.

State violence has not only become acceptable, it has become the norm as our government spies on its citizens, suspends the right of habeas corpus, sanctions police brutality against those who question state power, freely tortures those it fears and hides behind the “state secrets” privilege to hide its crimes. Fear has both altered our democratic principles and dehumanized a population that is increasingly willing to look the other way as large segments of the population are simply tossed aside.

Every day we are bombarded with a seemingly endless stream of tragic stories about decent people losing their homes, more and more young people being incarcerated and increasing numbers of people living on the streets. The media writes a front-page story about young people leaving their recession-ridden families to live on the street, often surviving by selling their bodies for money. On the evening news, we hear of unspeakable horrors being inflicted on children who have been tortured in the “death chambers” of Iraq, Cuba and Afghanistan. And we barely blink.

The Bush administration succeeded in eroding a culture inspired by democratic values and replacing it with a culture of war and fear. During the last decade, our insipid “war on terror” became all-embracing, and in doing so, it eroded the distinction between war and peace. It put into play a culture increasingly shaped by militarized values and ideals. The notion of the common good has been made subordinate to the values and the dictates of the national security state. War is now no longer the last resort of a state intent on defending its territory; it has morphed into a new form of public pedagogy - a cultural war machine designed to shape society.

War is now the foundation for a body politic that employs military language, military concepts and military policing actions to address problems far removed from the battlefield. We have become so inured to the constant bombardment of the warrior culture that we now view the culture of war on the same level as we do an advertisement for tourism. The result is that the meaning of war has been expanded rhetorically to name, legitimatize and wage battles against social problems. We now fight The War on Drugs, The War on Poverty and, tragically, The War on our newfound enemy, Mexican immigrants.

The Bush/Cheney regime succeeded in making war the normalized central function of power and politics; it has become the norm of American society rather than the exception. War has become legitimated by a state of exception and emergency that has become permanent rather than temporary. There has yet to be a year in the 21st Century in which we have not been engaged in war.

Where once violence was aimed at traditionally defined enemies and threats, The State now wages war on concepts, focusing not on a specific state, army, soldiers or location but on mercurial concepts spawned by the fear emanating from that reptilian part of our psyche. The enemy has become omnipresent. And the more difficult it is to root out, the more convenient it is for The State to expand the culture of fear and the resources dedicated to violence. War is now the centerpiece of American domestic and foreign policy. We are engaged in a battle that has no definitive end and which not only demands but provides self-justification for the constant use of violence.

We have become a society increasingly dedicated to both the production and promulgation of violence. A culture of cruelty has emerged in the media, especially in the talk radio circuit, where a sordid nationalism has merged with a hyper-militaristic attitude that rejects reason and scorns all those who do not fit into the stereotype of White, Bible-thumping Christians. Dialogue, reason and thoughtfulness have disappeared from the public realm and we now stage each and every encounter as a fight to the death. The civic and moral centers of the country that disappeared under the Bush administration have been replaced by a warfare centric economy with no reverence or understanding of the obligations of citizenship and global responsibility.

By making war and state violence the organizing principle of our society, how long can we hope to survive as a democratic entity?