Jones Alley
anniversary wishes
Sixty-one years ago today, on August 6th, 1945, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb used in warfare on the city of Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, on August 9th, the city of Nagasaki suffered the same fate. Between the two cities, over a third of a million people were killed almost instantly, and thousands of more died over the passing years as a result of their injuries, radiation exposure, and crippled immune systems.
The Nagasaki bomb was the second and most recent time that atomic weapons have been used in warfare. I won't dedicate space in this post to the debate over whether or not this was a wise course of action, that's a game that nobody can win.
Today, because of the incompetence, malfeasance, and arrogant stupidity of the man in the White House, the world is closer than it has been in many years to unleashing the nuclear genie once again. The United States government is developing "small" nuclear weapons to use on the battlefield of our churlish president's war on a noun.
We are heading into a crucial election cycle. If the Republican warmongers win again this November, whether legally or by once again manipulating the vote of the American people, there is an extremely high likelihood that humanity will once again see the radioactive mushroom clouds of nuclear war.
The pundits are predicating the results of the upcoming elections on the success or failure of Bush's oedipal invasion of Iraq. They are missing the point.
The simple fact is that the question that people should contemplate at the ballots this November is "can you accept the use of nuclear weapons as a first-strike tactical weapon by the United States or is that completely beyond the pale for a country that presumes itself to be civilized and a leader by example for the rest of the world?"
If you can not tolerate the unilateral use of nuclear weapons by this country, you must go to the polls this November and vote against the Republican incumbency.
The voice of the people has not been as important as it is now since the American revolution. Keep America free and proud and cast your vote against nuclear war on election day, 2006. Your voice has never been needed as much as it is now.
The Nagasaki bomb was the second and most recent time that atomic weapons have been used in warfare. I won't dedicate space in this post to the debate over whether or not this was a wise course of action, that's a game that nobody can win.
Today, because of the incompetence, malfeasance, and arrogant stupidity of the man in the White House, the world is closer than it has been in many years to unleashing the nuclear genie once again. The United States government is developing "small" nuclear weapons to use on the battlefield of our churlish president's war on a noun.
We are heading into a crucial election cycle. If the Republican warmongers win again this November, whether legally or by once again manipulating the vote of the American people, there is an extremely high likelihood that humanity will once again see the radioactive mushroom clouds of nuclear war.
The pundits are predicating the results of the upcoming elections on the success or failure of Bush's oedipal invasion of Iraq. They are missing the point.
The simple fact is that the question that people should contemplate at the ballots this November is "can you accept the use of nuclear weapons as a first-strike tactical weapon by the United States or is that completely beyond the pale for a country that presumes itself to be civilized and a leader by example for the rest of the world?"
If you can not tolerate the unilateral use of nuclear weapons by this country, you must go to the polls this November and vote against the Republican incumbency.
The voice of the people has not been as important as it is now since the American revolution. Keep America free and proud and cast your vote against nuclear war on election day, 2006. Your voice has never been needed as much as it is now.
posted by Milo Johnson at 1:53 AM
1 Comments:
Hm...I was in Japan in 1985 on the 40th Anniversary. I was in the Fuji Lakes district, some friends and traveling companions of mine were invited, and journeyed to the ceremony in Hiroshima. They were very moved by the ceremony, and to have been invited was an honor. I watched the coverage on television while I ate a traditional japanese breakfast in the dining room at the ryokan. I did not understand the dialogue but I was moved, none-the-less.
I noticed everywhere we went as tourists in the 2 weeks we were in Japan, LOTS of the young kids were giving us the "peace" sign (just after WWII known as the "victory" sign). I don't know if that was because Japan was about 15 to 20 years behind us in the American "hip culture" scene, or if it was a message for the time.
Maybe we need to start flashing that sign more again....
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