Liberal Voices Silenced by Drums of War

These days I feel like Rip Van Winkle rousing from a long sleep to find a completely unfamiliar country. The newspapers speak of the president not only threatening war but actually--with the assistance of the American military--plotting the best way of destroying a regime (Iraq) that he doesn’t like. I remember a country that was supposedly peace-loving, a country where only the Congress could declare war, where the president’s fits of pique were modified and mollified by more rational individuals. Today the voices of dissent are still.

Where are the so-called liberals who once, in the past, would have railed against this usurpation of congressional power and prerogative? Where are the young protesters, the ones who will make up the army (and the dead) of the 100,000 to 200,000 the military estimates it will need for its Iraqi invasion? Have the lessons of Vietnam escaped them? Where are the prayerful who are always asking for divine assistance? Have they given up on even praying for peace? Where will it all end?

After Iraq there’s still Libya and Moammar Kadafi. How about Somalia? When we finish with the easy ones, how about Pakistan? (There are more Islamic militants in Pakistan than anywhere.) Will we eventually get around to those “reds” in China? I think I’ll go back to sleep. Perhaps while I’m sleeping some of those liberals will develop backbones.

Joseph M. Lenihan

Los Angeles