Sunday, December 19, 2010

Dear Mr. President,

Thursday, while you were giving your little speech about seeing “significant progress” in Afghanistan, demonstrators against the war were being arrested outside. Unfortunately, this is the state of democracy, or what’s left of it, in America nowadays - politicians speaking platitudes and lies while those who don’t agree with you are arrested. You claim to see significant progress in Afghanistan but I don’t. I see only more killing, destruction, and the seeds for more generations of hatred and bitterness. I see a hundred billion dollars a year spent to maim, kill and destroy when that money should be spent to make people’s lives better. I see us propping up a corrupt government whose sole interest is enriching themselves at the expense of the people. The preemptive wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were criminal wars of aggression that you promised to end and didn’t. Instead, you expanded the war in Afghanistan, increased drone strikes in Pakistan and stepped up covert operations in Yemen. These are all criminal acts of aggression, Mr. President, and I want you to know I do not approve nor do I want them carried out in my name. The wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen are illegal, immoral, and destructive not only of those countries but of our own. Every innocent we kill, every home we destroy, every person we brutalize, kills something within us all, kills our humanity, our decency, our morality, our civility. And each day you continue these wars kills a little more Hope, a little more faith. I voted for you because you promised to end this madness. I voted for Hope, for change, for transformation, for reason and justice. But what I got, what we all got, was just another slick-talking politician full of empty promises, a president not much different than the last one, full of arrogance and hubris and visions of Empire. I lost Hope in you some time ago, Mr. President, but for some reason, watching that clip of you making that speech about progress in Afghanistan juxtaposed with the arrest of the protesters outside, really really depressed me. I’m sorry for you, I’m sorry for all of us. I’m sorry for lost Hope and lost dreams. I’m sorry I voted for you.