We’re doing our best imitation of Rome during its decline

by Barry Hastings

On May 28, a presidential press aide told White House reporters, “We’re involved in a very different kind of conflict.”

You can say that again. It’s a war that’s costing fewer American lives, but costing us unimaginable billions of dollars, much concern on the part of allies as to our determination, and a population of which half is so afraid of “terrorism” they’re willing to surrender several clauses of the Bill of Rights, the first 10 amendments to our constitution.

Most important issues are those dealing with war and war powers of the president. Close behind is government spying (and otherwise snooping). Snapping at snooping’s tail is the relationships between executive branch, and the two individual branches of Congress, each in its own constitutional capacity. For example, the president asking for an OK from congress to wage war on ISIL, when he already has full authority to do so under the War Powers Act.

The president seems so tentative in his replies to terrorist attacks, it’s no wonder more forceful personalities in the House of Representatives and Senate keep trying to usurp his powers, divert them or subvert them. (HILLARY-Y-Y! HELP!)

Republicans, somehow, over the past few years have begun acting and speaking as though they’re America’s great experts on war. But, except for Abe Lincoln (a long, long time ago) they’ve accomplished little with the nation at war.

In fact, they and a love-sick, chicken-shit Woodrow Wilson, kept us out of World War I so long the European democracies were almost beaten, and were bankrupt, before we entered the fray. Then, the victory won, they (Republican controlled Senate) refused to sign-on to the League of Nations, setting us up for World War II 25 years later, against the same enemy.

And as the war temperature rose in Europe through the thirties, they denied France and England aid in rebuilding their respective military capacities, and moral support, until France was in such a state she collapsed at the first German onslaught. The Brits, through the grace of intelligent design (and a nation of seaman), escaped the debacle through what still seems a miracle, at Dunkirk.

By the time FDR was able to finagle Republican support for Lend Lease, Britain, France (and the Soviet Union) were in serious straits — and so were we. A war that could easily have been nipped in the bud in, say 1937, stretched out into seven years of agony for democratic Europe? Four years, much treasure, 500,000 dead American military men, for us.

And don’t ask, “How about William McKinley and the Spanish-American war?” President McKinley had to ask for help finding the Philippine Islands on a map, as we went to war against Spain (a country which was the real ‘sick man of Europe’ in 1898, though Europeans applied the term to Turkey).

Our military was in such sad shape that in two major naval engagements of the war our navy fired thousands of rounds for a hit ratio of under two (yes, 2) percent. The Army was a joke, victorious only because of Spanish military incompetence. Such an army, up against any other major European power of the time, would certainly have been “whupped.” (Just a few years before, due to the poor state of our military, our government went to great lengths to avoid a war with Chile.)

Our “modern” all-volunteer military is an undereducated mass — the only college educated people in it are the officers — and their education is of a very slanted, very narrow nature. The troops (as I’ve noted often before) are heavily indoctrinated in the “Bush’ point of view — many still claim the N-B-C weapons Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld told us were in Iraq actually existed, were found, but facts never publicly revealed. (I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard the claim from young veterans I meet, and speak with, at the VA.) It’s all hogwash.

One of the early signs of decline of the Roman Empire was their reliance on mercenary soldiers to fight their wars. Our mercenaries have proven unreliable in almost every case. Don’t count on democracy arriving soon in either Afghanistan or Iraq. Both are a waste of our soldiers, our money, our (slight) hopes.

The last people to get the word, are us. The American people have often been victims of government lies, but never to the extent we see today. In the old days, they kept the truth covered. Today, they lie. . .  boldly.

We have the oldest, most decrepit infrastructure of any modern nation. No merchant marine (to speak of). The beautiful inter-state highway system built by President Ike has gone to hell in a hand-basket. We love the Internet, but it is not secure — in fact, it is our greatest vulnerability. Everyone believed it would make all things easier, smoother. The nation is more completely fractured than our countryside will be in very few years. The whole infrastructure teetering on the edge — one foot in hell, the other on a banana-peel.

Truth is, hardly a week goes by without someone getting into the web, creating chaos and personal disaster for tens of thousands, and years of stress working to straighten out bank accounts, credit cards, etc., etc., etc. It’s left our military and diplomatic secrets more vulnerable than ever. Much of the carnage is caused by home grown misfits. Much more still, by governments of Russia, China, Iran, N. Korea. Tech-savvy terror organizations ISIL, al-Quaeda, and likely some our spooks don’t even know about, are also getting into play.

It seems to me the public is already psychologically numbed to continuous war, and to horrors of the daily news cycle (we ain’t near as tough as the ‘Greatest Generation’). The nasty, numbing, bloody movies and games, so loved by Americans, send them home to restless nights of violent dreams, or into the street to snipe their neighbors. Many of the young folks I see — very many — move about like the zombies they revel in. People are injecting heroin at record rates (it’s cheaper than ever), and dying of overdose at record rates, as well.

Despite all of the electronic, electrical and mechanical crap we use to entertain ourselves, we’re on the same agonizing (and apparently unstoppable) decline as Rome.