A New National Holiday

December 11, 2001, America was celebrated in political capitals around the world. I saw it on television news. While I did not doubt the origin of this celebration and its careful timing, I did wonder what exactly was being celebrated? The World War on Terrorism? The defeat of the Taliban? The marvel of American military force? American Imperialism? Or driving home the final nail in the coffin of the American Revolution and of the Republic for which it stood. The Republic is dead and gone. American political government is now officially a tyranny.

Tyranny is defined as: 1. A government in which a single ruler is vested with absolute power. 2. The office, authority, or jurisdiction of an absolute ruler. 3. Absolute power, especially when exercised unjustly or cruelly. 4.a. Use of absolute power. b. A tyrannical act. 5. Extreme harshness or severity; rigor.

Don’t expect anybody to admit it anytime soon. Some Senators bristle at the term, although they delivered absolute power to the President without a qualm. One wonders why? But then the U.S. Congress has acted like a bunch of hapless schoolboys with their hands in the candy bowl for years; maybe their quid pro quo this time was the generous raise they gave themselves during this wartime recession, something else nobody is going to admit anytime soon.

So we, the viewing audience, are entertained by the spectacle of the Star Spangled Banner being played in Pakistan, recently an enemy, but now an ally, and everywhere else. The media claims that sixty nations are rallied around our flag and our anthem and our purpose and that the overwhelming majority of American taxpayers are likewise supporting World War Three, no matter what the cost in life, liberty, and property. This spectacle reminded me of something.

In 1959, William L. Shirer published his massive history called The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich. Toward the end of Chapter Seven, he wrote: (1934) u201COn August 19, some 95 per cent of those who had registered went to the polls, and 90 per cent, more than thirty-eight million of them, voted approval of Hitler’s usurpation of complete power.u201D

On September 4, a smiling Hitler appeared at the Nurnberg Reichsparteitag amidst the colorful waving flags and the patriotic anthems and thirty-thousand cheering Germans and he announced The Thousand Year Reich. Remember the film clips?

It makes me sad as we repeat the mistakes of our forefathers. I recall Mr. Shirer’s warning: u201CThere will be no conquerors and no conquests, but only the charred bones of the dead on an uninhabited planet.u201D He was a wise man. Read his book.