WAR ABROAD; DELUSION AT HOME

A former Army private accused of raping an Iraqi woman and killing her and three family members was a high-school dropout from a broken home who enlisted to get some direction in his life, yet was sent home early because of an "anti-social personality disorder."

So reports the AP as the military and propoganda experts in the White House begin the image make-over of Steven D. Green from an honorably discharged Iraq war veteran to an abnormal character suffering from anti-social and even pathological behavior.

We are to believe that War and Anti-social behavior have nothing to do with one another. As in all of the instances of misbehavior in Iraq and Afghanistan we have witnessed before, we will be told that this guy was an "isolated case"...a "bad apple".

Okay, I get it, this guy's behavior has nothing to do with this screwed-up War. Nor does the "Nature of War" have impact on the behavior of the others involved in the rape of an Iraqi girl and the murder of her and her family. Nor does the "Nature of War" have anything to do with the actions of scores of other people involved in four separate war crimes that have come to light in as many months. Nor did did the "Nature of War" affect the behavior of the dozens of people involved in or condoning of the criminal behavior of soldiers in Abu Ghraib prison.

I get it, War does not, by its very nature, foster an anti-social or psychopathic environment.

Yeah, sure. If you believe that, I have some yellow cake from Niger to sell you.

We seem to be committed to accepting war as "normal" because so much of our economy and our political culture depends upon its perpetuation. We struggle to explain rape, murder and suicide among our warriors in the context of our "norms" as a peacetime society. It is not normal for people of murder and rape, therefore soldiers who do it in a war zone must not be "normal".

This meme, that war is an extension of the normative American Culture, moves the spectre of the madness of War "off the table" so our military-industrial complex can wave the flag, reap profit, steal oil, and continuously recruit Armies of One as if all this is an honorable pursuit. So we blame the handful of perps and let the criminal enterprise of this War continue unquestioned.
In my opinion, America is engaged in not only anti-social and pathological behavior, but delusional behavior as well.

Given the fact that we are likely to be engaged in a "War On A Noun" for a long, long time, we can expect this hallucinatory State of the Union to last for a long, long time as well.