Americans are getting upset over the TSA gropers and porn scanners. But are they now ready to support the libertarian call to dismantle the U.S. government’s overseas military empire, which is the root cause of the TSA groping and porn scanning?
After the 9/11 attacks, the immediate cry from U.S. officials was, “We’re innocent! The terrorists have attacked us because they hate our freedom and values.”
Nonsense. As libertarians have consistently maintained, both before 9/11 and after 9/11, the terrorists attacked on 9/11 because of the bad things the U.S. Empire had been doing to people in the Middle East for decades. In fact, here at The Future of Foundation we repeatedly warned, prior to 9/11, that if the U.S. Empire continued doing those bad things to people in the Middle East, the inevitable result would be terrorism on American soil. See here, here, here, here,here, and here.
With the 9/11 attacks, we were proved right. And we weren’t the only ones. Chalmers Johnson, author of the pre-9/11 book Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, said the same thing: U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East would bring about a terrorist attack on American soil.
Immediately after 9/11, when President Bush and other U.S. officials were exclaiming about how the terrorists hate us for our freedom and values, FFF was publishing articles like, “Is This the Wrong Time to Question Foreign Policy?”
Of course, U.S. imperialists and interventionists didn’t want to hear any criticism of the U.S. Empire. In their minds, the U.S. government and our country were one and the same thing. They suggested that critics of the U.S. government were traitors to America. To the statists, it was inconceivable that genuine patriotism and a love of country sometimes entail standing up to one’s own government and opposing its wrongdoing.
What was the U.S. Empire doing to people in the Middle East prior to 9/11? Here’s a partial list: (1) partnering with the brutal dictator Saddam Hussein and even delivering to him those infamous WMDs that Saddam later destroyed; (2) intervening in the Persian Gulf War, killing countless Iraqis; (3) intentionally bombing Iraq’s water and sewage facilities with the intent to spread infectious illnesses among the Iraqi people; (4) enforcing one of the most brutal embargoes in history against Iraq, preventing the repair of the water and sewage facilities and leading to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children — yes, children; (5) announcing to the world that the deaths of half-a-million Iraqi children from the sanctions were “worth it”; (6) enforcing the illegal no-fly zones, killing more Iraqis in the process; (7) stationing imperial troops near Mecca and Medina, the holiest sites in the Muslim religion; and (8) providing unconditional military and financial aid to the Israeli government, year after year.
What did the U.S. government do as a result of 9/11? Did it stop all these actions?
Are you kidding? Hey, don’t forget: U.S. officials claimed that these things didn’t have any adverse effect on people in the Middle East. No, it was all because they hate us for our freedom and values, they steadfastly maintained.
So, they used the 9/11 attacks to justify doing the same sorts of things they had been doing prior to 9/11. Given that the Iraq embargo and the killing of the Iraqi children had failed to secure the ouster of Saddam Hussein, they used the 9/11 attacks to justify an invasion of the country. And they did the same thing in Afghanistan after the Taliban refused to comply with President Bush’s unconditional extradition demand for Osama bin Laden, the man who they still haven’t captured or killed after 10 years of death and destruction.
What has been the result of the 9 or 10 years of military occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan? Death, mayhem, chaos, crisis, torture, tyranny, and destruction in both countries, which means constant anger and hatred, which means constant threat of terrorist retaliation.
Which brings us to the TSA gropers and porn scanners.
Hey, they’re just keeping us safe from the terrorists, aren’t they? Isn’t that what they’re supposed to do? Isn’t that their job? If the terrorists can carry liquid explosives, what are the TSA gropers and porn-scanners supposed to do — stop searching people’s private parts? Wouldn’t that then become a likely place for terrorists to carry liquid explosives?
Anyway, don’t forget what the statists often remind us whenever they’re justifying the latest assault on civil liberty and privacy in the name of the war on terrorism: If you’re not guilty of anything, then why should you care that they’re groping your private parts or peering at your naked body … or doing it to your 12-year-old daughter?
Today, America’s overseas empire is helping to bankrupt our nation. The empire encompasses 700-1000 overseas military bases in more than 130 countries. The statists call it the “Department of Defense.” That’s a delusion. In reality, it’s the Department of Empire and War.
Coups, assassinations, support of brutal dictatorships, torture, sanctions, embargoes, interference in foreign elections, secret prison camps, kangaroo tribunals, dual judicial systems, invasions, occupations, assassinations, renditions, kidnappings, cover-ups, lies and deception, death, destruction, crisis, chaos, and mayhem.
It’s all part and parcel of the U.S. Empire, the empire that continues to produce anger and hatred among the victims, which then produces the threat of terrorist retaliation, which then produces the need to protect us from the terrorists with all those TSA gropers and porn scanners.
The solution to this inanity is plain: Dismantle the empire, close the bases, and bring all the troops home and discharge them. The anger and hatred disappears, along with the threat of terrorist retaliation. Things return to normal. No more TSA. No more body gropers and porn scanners.
The question is: What’s more important to you: an empire or your freedom, prosperity, and privacy?
