DRONES! ???

Everywhere, on the tv and online news, we are hearing about a leaked memo (to begin with), followed by todays briefing by the President (to minimize the damage I suspect) that brought to center stage, closer scrutiny of our Gov’t’s Drone Program. In one news story I learned the govts Drone Program has grown by 400% in the past 4 years. I find the issue deeply troubling, how quickly we have evolved from a basic awareness of the program and its ‘effective’ use in limited, ‘justifiable’ situations (by some accounts) to (as Joe Scarborough has commented re the laws allowing discriminant killing by drones, as ‘having just raced thru how many stop lites??”) being a legal tool in our ansenal to kill anyone, anywhere in the world, our own citizens included, merely ‘suspected’ of terrorism. Bypassing 'due process' in even the most limited sense in the word.

Call me crazy, but this news is stunning and shocking to me. Are there no limits to the massive powers of our federal Govt and the military? Does keeping our nation forever in a ‘state of war’ legally allow all and any actions, no matter how unconsciounable? Clearly we aren’t seeing a Govt and a Congress interested in any transparency, despite that being a major promise of current President elect Obama as he campaigned the FIRST time. The information we all should be privy to (albeit with some limitations befitting national security) we ONLY learn about through ‘leaks’ and from whistle blowers who are swiftly dealt with, again, with new laws the Administration and Congress has strengthened since the Bush years.

I was actually stunned to hear Polls show only 11% of Americans DISagree with the drone program! I don’t know when that poll was taken, or if now, with the recent information we are hearing, more will rethink their stance. I hope they will. Its not that I don’t understand how many might feel American lives are saved by using unmanned killing machines, how we can dispose of ‘terrorists’ that plot against us, while not risking the lives of our loved ones. How very convenient, how very ‘modern’. But let us not forget, what acts we allow our Govt to carry out, they carry out in the names of ALL Americans, we are ALL culpable and responsible and how can we not at some point, expect there to be consequences. And more wars! Forever wars! When we do not have to see, feel or even ‘imagine’ the pain of the innocent victims (the ‘collateral damage’ that is inevitable in war) or our own soldiers, all those who suffer, it all becomes a game, something not quite ‘real’, much like the popular war video games that proliferate.

I suspect most in this country are happy we no longer employ a ‘Draft’ system in our military, that we have an all volunteer army, along with mercenaries and all manner of robotic and unmanned killing machines, but I believe they fail to understand the most important aspect of the ‘Draft’, how with conscription we are less likely to rush to war, less likely to send our young men and women into situations they may never return from. How effective this one tool used to be in keeping the peace, making the decision to go to war a last resort!

I would expect it would benefit everyone, as we seem unstoppable in embracing this new frontier, this new modern warfare, to educate themselves on what the consequences could be. Just google DRONES and you will be deluged with information. To think for one minute we can’t expect that other countries, friendly or foe, won’t employ similar meaures against others and against us is pure folly. Where will it all end?