Darfur, the DLC, Missing Blondes, No More War, and Rush Limbaugh... [View All]

[Totally Committed]

As one gets closer and closer to the end of life, it gets tougher and tougher not to see everything that happens in that life as a lesson. When you are younger, there are other things that occupy the part of your brain that notice these lessons: kids, a half dozen loads of laundry, what to fix for dinner, that proposal you need to write for work, paying the bills. All those things clog up the "Life Lesson" lobe of the brain. Maybe that's why some people get "wiser" as they get older -- they can afford to pay attention more to the wisdom that the Universe sends their way as the kids move on, etc.

I got a huge life lesson yesterday, and I'd like to share it with all of you. I'll say that I'm sharing it, if for no other reason than to let you know that I got it. I got it bigtime. Anyway, here it is: No good deed goes unpunished. Or, in this instance, no good intention expressed goes uncriticized, and that is putting it mildly.

I don't know what each of you, individually, knows about Darfur. But, the short story of Darfur is this: What is going on there is hideous. Horrendous. Monstrous. Simply, as human beings, our hearts should be broken for the suffering, degradation, and death that happens there every day. World leaders know what's happening there. And yet, sadly, few have the slightest compunction to think about stepping in to help. Yesterday, I posted news that I felt would finally be accepted with open hearts here. Usually, a positive thread about Wes Clark brings out the flamers and the detractors, but this time I felt, surely, everyone would be relieved (pleased, even) that someone like Wes was calling for direct action to stop the suffering of these people. So, I posted the news:

NPR "Morning Edition": Wes Clark on the On-Going Tragedy in Dafur
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2025864&mesg_id=2025864

My friends, what I woke this morning to find has saddened me beyond belief. As I left to go to bed last night, one of the usual anti-Wes-ers had shown up and was doing his usual thing. I bantered with him for a while, but then gave up. I felt that, surely, most would read the wonderful post and appreciate what was there in spite of the posts by this one detractor. That thread devolved into something we should all be ashamed of. The vile and disgusting things that are posted on that thread shame me as a human being. They should shame each and every person who reads them, and doubly, those who posted them.

That thread is a wake-up call for what we, as human beings are becoming. People are dying, and yet we argue about the "the geopolitical implications of using NATO..." to go in and help. Those of you who are parents, and posted in opposition to Wes's plan on that thread just because it is Wes's plan, let me ask you to consider this: If it were your children suffering and dying in Darfur would you give a flying fig whose plan it was that saved them? Or would you sit there and piss and moan about "geopolitical implications", "virtual empires", "Pan-African relations", what books have to say about the situation, and finally, just fall into into the garbage pail of half-truths and innuendo that some here spout about Wes Clark to talk about depleted uranium, the School of the Americas, and all the other trash spouted every time a thread is started with his name in the title. It's all just so much mental masturbation, a virtual pissing contest, and over what -- exactly???? Where the hell are our priorities these days? What if these were your own sweet, beloved children dying? What did you, who posted that shit, just tuck your own kids in, sit down at the computer and forget that each and every person in Darfur that is dying is someone's child, mother, brother, sister or father? Where the hell are your hearts? When the hell did taking Wes Clark down a peg become more important than saving living, breathing, human beings?

Are we smug, arrogant, intellectual, heartless assholes the other side sees us as, or are we the compassionate, loving, generous, giving and unprejudiced human beings we know most Democrats to be? It's time to back up, take a deep breath, and decide who we are. All the wonderful "make love, not war" feel-good Camp Casey feelings going on here is just a bunch of bullshit if we oppose the war, but sit back and argue about personalities while genocide rages on.

That's my opinion, anyway. I really did think a plan to end genocide was something we could all agree on, and posted that news in good faith expecting hope and love to pour forth in this time where little hope and not a lot of love was coming our way. I was wrong. It was a life lesson. And, yes, I got it. Bigtime.

Think hard before you reply. Your humanity, or lack of it will be showing.

TC

edited for a title that would actually interest most enough to open and read this