Throughout the Iraq War, U.S. officials steadfastly maintained, especially after they failed to find those infamous WMDs, that they were continuing to occupy Iraq out of love for the Iraqi people. Since U.S. troops were there anyway, they said, there was no need to apologize for having invaded a country and killed lots of people based on a wrongful premise. Might as well just shift gears and say that the continued occupation of the country would be based on a deeply seated concern for the well-being of the Iraqi people.
In fact, isn’t that the official justification for all the U.S. government’s interventions in the Middle East? All the chaos, crisis, war, death, and destruction, we are told, have been to bring a paradise of peace, stability, and prosperity to the people of the Middle East.
Of course, the justification has been a sham from the beginning. There certainly was no concern for the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children who were dying from the U.S.-enforced sanctions against Iraq for more than ten years. Moreover, there was never an upward limit on the number of Iraqi people who U.S. officials were willing to kill in the supposed effort to bring the good life to those who survived the mayhem.
But we also get a glimpse of how U.S. officials view people in the Middle East — well, at least the poor people of the Middle East — by the reaction of U.S. officials to the thousands of immigrants who are drowning in in the Mediterranean trying to escaping the chaos in the Middle East and Africa in a desperate attempt to save their lives by getting to Europe.
Have U.S. officials told any of those fleeing immigrants that they’re free to come to the United States in order to save their lives? Of course not! Hey, they love them enough to go over and wreak death, destruction, and havoc in their countries. But come over here? You’ve got to be kidding! They love them … but not that much!
And never mind that much of the chaos, crises, and oppression that these people are fleeing from is rooted in U.S. foreign policy. Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and, of course, brutal tyrannical regimes that the U.S. government supports and partners with. That’s what many of the immigrants are fleeing from. But none of that matters one whit to U.S. officials, who still claim with straight faces that their interventions are born out of love for people in the Middle East.
Needless to say, European countries, some of which were ardent supporters of U.S. policy in the Middle East, have the same air of indifference to the plight of the immigrants as U.S. officials do or, even worse, antagonism toward them. Or like U.S. officials do here in the United States, they blame it all on “human smugglers.”
The European reaction to the immigrants shouldn’t surprise anyone. Europe has a long history of immigration controls to keep the people they consider “riff raff” from polluting European culture.
But wasn’t America supposed to be different from Europe? Don’t we hear the word “exceptional” bandied about sometimes? What is exceptional about being like European countries and like every other country around the world?
It wasn’t always that way, of course. When our nation was established and for some 100 years afterward, our political and economic systems were entirely different from those of Europe. For example, no income tax, IRS, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare, minimum wage laws, public schooling, drug laws, foreign aid, standing army, military industrial complex, national-security state, Pentagon, foreign bases, CIA, NSA, and … immigration controls!
That’s right — no immigration controls, except for a cursory tuberculosis inspection at Ellis Island.
That’s what I call exceptional!
Take a look at this photo of immigrants in the Mediterranean: https://www.shrc.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Migrant-Boat-Deaths-03.jpg
Would you like to know how our American ancestors described those types of people? Here it is:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Sound familiar? That’s because it comes from the inscription on the Statue of Liberty.
Our American ancestors said, “We’re not interested in your rich, pompous, self-important citizens. Send us those who you consider riff-raff. Those are the one we want.”
I’d say: That’s pretty exceptional! In fact, it’s one of the reasons that people all over the world — especially the poor — marveled at the United States and the American people. Americans were different. They were exceptional.
As reflected by the fantastic speech on the Fourth of July 1821 by John Quincy Adams, our American ancestors declared to the world:
We understand that bad things happen all over the world. There are wars, civil wars, tyrants, oppression, famines, starvation, strife, chaos, and crises. But we will not send armies overseas to help you with death and destruction. Instead, we will build a model society of freedom here at home. If you are able and willing to escape, just know that there is one country that you can come to that will not forcibly return you to your countries. Also know that this is a free country, one where you will be on your own and where the government will not take care of you.
Modern-day Americans have turned the founding principles of our nation upside down. Today’s Americans say to the world:
We will send our massive armies to help you with bombs, missiles, bullets, troops, ships, and planes. We will wreak death, destruction, chaos, and crisis in your lands. The survivors of all this mayhem will live in a paradise of peace, prosperity, and harmony. But if things don’t work out as planned, don’t even think of coming here without following the rules and going through 10-15 years of a bureaucratic application process. If you do try to come, we will forcibly return you to your countries or worse. We certainly don’t want you stealing our governmental welfare because that’s for us.
Do you notice any difference in systems? Remind me again: Which one is exceptional?