Ira Chernus at Truthout:
(P)rogressives don’t wrap their policy prescriptions in mythic language that says clearly, simply, and patriotically what they’re for. As a result, they can’t compete with the myth of national insecurity. They’ve got nothing to offer in its place, which is at least one reason why, despite growing opposition to the Afghan War, they can’t build a strong enough constituency to help — or force — Obama to end it.
All they can do is demand that he sacrifice his domestic agenda, and — no small matter for any politician — his second-term chances, on the altar of principle. As a result, they end up in a political never-never-land, which might feel good but isn’t going to save a single Afghan life. (Emphasis mine)
I couldn’t have described the tension between idealism and process-realism any better. As much as I adore the people who turned out in the snow last December and refused to be moved — as much as I yearn for their vision of a world without war — they have yet to capture America’s imagination with their own myth. Chernus describes the “danger” in the minds of the generals:
If the U.S. loses in Afghanistan, the American public might abandon the myth that justifies the military establishment and its gargantuan budget. As a result, the generals prefer to fight on eternally.
“Military establishment” is itself something of a myth, however, and one that only has power in the minds of progressives. Prior to the decade of debacle from which we are emerging, something like 85% of all deployed personnel were in the US Army, which got only 23% of the Pentagon budget. The numbers aren’t much better today. The cost of a single Joint Strike Fighter is about one thousand times as much as a mine-resistant vehicle. The myth maintaining these inequalities is not about war, peace, or containment, but the way a fighter plane creates more jobs in more congressional districts — and that isn’t going away anytime soon.
The idealism-realism tension also plays out in our own national mythology about foreign adventures. L. Frank Baum described it in The Wizard of Oz: Dorothy is the innocent abroad, an accidental combatant whose goodness of character makes up for her ignorance of the world. She is the Ugly American, though she does not know it. The wizard is more world-wise, relying on a balance of power rather than moral force — he is feared rather than loved.
Baum had not lived through the wars of the 20th Century, but his mythological constructs still live among us. Writing about Martin Luther King Jr. last week, I noted the broad separation between American attitudes about Afghanistan on 9/12/2001 and today; right after the attacks, everyone was Dorothy. Today, all of us — even those who advocate wholesale and immediate withdrawal — are playing the wizard.
Is there a way out of our collective mythology? Perhaps, but it won’t come through political activism or organizing. It will have to come though culture — indeed, it will have to subvert the jaded paradigms of Hollywood and television and news media with a story that is meaningful and powerful enough to change the public imagination. But what are the chances?
