What does Patriotism Call For?

There was a time in Western Civilization, when patriotism meant complete, unquestioned loyalty to a nation's monarch or dictator. The result? Senseless, never ending battles that scourged the European landscape, often at the whim or mad dream of the aristocracy. The will of the people didn't matter. That's because their lives didn't matter either-not to their leaders. Blind loyalty was indoctrinated as the only possible choice.
     The American Revolution was supposed to change all that. Our forefathers produced something unique, a government "of, by and for the people" designed to enact their will. We were fortunate back then in many ways. The will of the people preferred peace and commerce to the ravages of insurrection. Even though our own Civil War was inevitable in the end, it did not reflect our first compulsion. American patriotism was based on idealism, not power plays.
     Unfortunately, a tendency for that old patriotism still lingers-the kind that asserts national loyalty not only for right, according to our ideals, but for what is wrong. They tend to label the wrong under the auspicious title of national interest.This kind of patriotism has no problem ignoring moral imperatives for reasons of profit or pride. It tries to appeal to our baser, more adolescent instincts.
     It uses terms like cut and run in order to confound intelligent debate, no matter how pertinent it might be. In this way, they challenge our better instincts with concern for how it might look if we withdraw.
     Another example of this "loyalty without a cause" urges expansion of a wrongful war in order to support troops already in combat. This implies, of course, that our primary reason for being in that war is to protect our troops, when they shouldn't be there in the first place.
     Even well-meaning politicians shirk from such accusations. Why? Because they think the American people are so ignorant, our thoughts so limited to cheap jingoism, that we can't see right from wrong.
     Is it true?
     Do we have to escalate violence for the sole reason of protecting our troops? It's possible under some circumstances. But is it true now, in the light of so much failure and lack of planning? Wouldn't they be safer here at home? Of course they would! This is just a convenient dodge that no one seems to challenge.
     It makes me wonder who's worse! The Republicans who banter these words, convinced that the American people won't see beyond them? Or the Democrats, who believe the same thing, failing to stand up for their own principles. Both insult the intelligence of the American people.
     Why do we put up with it?
     Advocates for war tell us that they what they really want is victory. The inference? Our team is the best in the world. If we lose, how would it look?
     Even superficially this falls short. We were drawn into a war in Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein from power. We defeated his armies, captured him, and made it possible for the nation of Iraq to execute him for war crimes. The Iraqi army was disbanded. It seems to me, victory was ours.
     But for some reason, war proponents raise the ante, insisting we are still at war because we failed to "win the peace. Their supporters nod on cue.
     We have to ask ourselves, is it possible for an alien nation to impose peace on a country where a significant portion of its inhabitants don't want it. What exactly is our mission, now that we've freed them from Saddam and given them a new government? Is there any way possible to stop the killing?
     It's time we realize that Iraqis are not Americans. Their discordant cultures differ significantly from ours. Their political perspectives and expectations are their own. If they shared American values, they would have formed their own democracy years before, or make their system work now.
     Another retort used by hardcore advocates is this: at least we have a plan. The other party doesn't.
     The answer to this is so blatantly obvious it boggles the mind: that's because there is no good plan. There are only bad ones, with varying degrees of failure. "Not all the king's horses or all the king's men…" A grim reminder why we had no business going into Iraq in the first place.
     The reason we have to leave Iraq stares us in the face. There's no good plan to be had in the forecast. When almost all the factions in a country are committed to killing one another, for whatever reason, and see us as the enemy who caused these problems… well then, it's definitely time for us to go. This is not weakness. It cannot be judged by the prepubescent chant of cutting and running. It's looking at the facts squarely in the eye and admitting that it's wrong for us to be there. The real shame to be found in how we are still there now. It was the prideful, closed-minded rush to war that led to this quagmire in the first place, and a similar frame of mind keeps us there. That is our shame. No hoped-for victory, no matter how satisfying to our pride, will ever to compensate for the hundreds of thousands of lost lives brought about by the administration's poorly conceived vision.
     It's time we step back and re-examine our own values, our own American beliefs. Fear and confusion high-jacked them for a while. They revert to bellicosity because we believed we had all the answers. The fact is, we never even asked the right questions.
     The world is a dangerous place. We can't change that no matter how smart we make our bombs. The best we can and should do is inspire the world to a better way of life. That means we have to make our own way of life more seriously. We have to live up to our own ideals, and prove to the world how well they work.
     Right now, the people that we used to inspire are disappointed in what they see. They don't trust us anymore and are looking elsewhere for inspiration. That is the most dire challenge that we face during what amounts to be a war of ideologies. While it's true that power demands respect, the kind of respect it generates only breeds contempt.
     This is not to say that the United States is a bad country, filled with bad people. Quite the opposite. I still believe we are the last great chance for humanity to live in peace and happiness. The problem we face is this: when we fail to live up to our own ideals, hypocrisy ruins even our finest efforts. We may be light years ahead of our enemies in every moral aspect you can think of, but if we fail to true to our own beliefs, our own moral standards, we will always be maligned.

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