November 2010

In a recent talk to a conference on better using mobile health technology, Ted Turner, the founder of CNN among other achievements, said that the increasing interconnectedness of the world makes war increasingly undesirable. He pointed out that the media now makes it more difficult for nations to conduct military campaigns. He then cites the example of the Israeli campaign against Hezbollah. “It looked too ugly on television,” he commented. “War is so destructive and so ugly,” he said, “we can’t afford war.”
We tend to talk about peace and much less about what would bring it about, the end of war. It is something that may sound idealistic but when it is thought about through Ted Turner’s eyes, in terms of its destruction, its images, its costs, its danger, its increasing ugliness, it makes us think that not only is he making a point we can’t ignore, he is also making one for something that has to be doable.

There’s a small group of young people who do seem to be a forgotten target of discrimination. They are non-citizens who fought in the armed forces, came back, somehow got in trouble and now face deportation. Had they been killed in action, they would have been given citizenship and buried with appropriate military honors. Even though we are becoming more aware that many returning veterans are prone to engage in violent behavior, these young people do not receive the benefit of our doubts. They come back to conditions that appear to overwhelm them, buy arms, get into drugs, and engage in actions that manage to bring them into the criminal justice system. From then on, the system seems merciless—deportation to a country they left long ago and with which they have little if any ties.
The House Veterans’ Affairs Committee is looking into the possibilities of changing existing laws. Let’s hope they succeed.

The elections are behind us and what remains is for me like a scary taste. It’s not the results per se that scare me, it’s the ignorance that seems to pervade the process. Politicians bend truths to suit their agenda, that’s an old story. But lately it does appear to have often gone beyond that. Christine O’Donnell even though she lost in Delaware stands as an example. What scares me is not her party affiliation, but her ignorance, one that went largely unchecked and uncorrected because often those who could have corrected her did not see it in their political interest. And those who listened, those who have the power to vote, are from all appearances too busy struggling with their lives to often know what might have been wrong with what she said. The price I gladly pay for living in a democracy is that sometimes my side will lose, and will lose fair and square. The price I don’t want to pay is that of ignorance–simply because I believe that ignorance corrodes democracy even more than unchecked power.