Curing the Political Disease of Terrorism

Since the U.S. government’s bombing of Afghanistan has failed to bring Osama bin Laden to justice “dead or alive,” the U.S. government has now decided to permanently extend its empire to that part of the world. Moreover, the bombing has killed thousands of innocent civilians, whose surviving friends and family members now have the incentive to hate the United States and commit acts of terrorism against Americans. The U.S. government will undoubtedly continue to use its “war on terrorism” to justify ever-increasing assaults on the liberties of the American people. Caught in this vise between terrorism and their government, the American people would be wise to use this period of time to do some serious soul-searching about how to cure the political disease of terrorism. Some people insist on focusing only on the symptoms — that is, capturing or killing people who do bad things (Timothy McVeigh and Osama bin Laden) in retaliation for bad things that the U.S. government does to people (Waco and the Iraqi embargo). But in order to cure the political disease of terrorism, it is necessary for the American people to also focus on the root cause of the disease by putting a stop to the bad things that the U.S. government does to people, both at home and abroad. Otherwise, Americans might as well resign themselves to spending the rest of their lives waging perpetual war against perpetual enemies and losing ever-increasing parts of their liberties in the process.