RONALD AND HIS RAY-GUN
Many modern American historians who have studied his presidency in depth have concluded that
Ronald Reagan's eight-year tenure as Commander-In-Chief caused the United States to go farther
into debt than the fiscal policies of all previous American Presidents combined. By far,
the largest contributing factor to this debt was Reagan's insistence on pouring hundreds of
billions of dollars into nuclear and other catastrophic weaponry, including research into the
Armageddon-bent fiasco missile 'defense' system that came to be known as
"Starwars". Depending on which calculations one chooses to believe, estimates of the total
cost for this unfathomably misguided absurdity range from three to ten trillion
dollars. The total cost including deployment may be well over ten trillion dollars according to
some sources. (Incredible as they may seem, these numbers are conservative.)
Also, as most modern and former historians have concluded, there are at least two realities
that can be more or less, positively concluded from the 'lessons of history ': 1) As long as
there are people who buy and sell on our planet, there is likely to be war and rumor
of war; and 2) As long as we continue to construct weapons to protect what we buy and sell,
most assuredly other individuals will come along down the road and build ever-larger editions of similar implements
of destruction, or worse. One possessed with an eighth-grade intelligence and a
grade-school history primer can readily assess the obvious truth: First the United States
developed an atom bomb and then a competing nation built a similar type of bomb. We then
of course, had to build a greater weapon of 'defense' known as the hydrogen bomb and, as sure as
the sun shines on Los Alamos in July, in less than one year, someone else likewise constructed a
similar bomb. . . Not that it would ever be used, of course, or. . . *
The nation of China recently made public that they have successfully launched a space
vehicle into orbit. And they have made little effort to hide their intended mission of
soon attempting to place a human being into space and returning him to the earth safely.
Considering how long it took the United States to grow from this relatively rudimentary
achievement into our present space venture capability, it is not at all hard to conclude that
within a couple of generations, a nation such as China could likewise, begin deploying their
own space-ray 'defense' system. And, as any historian worthy of his or her profession
will tell you, we will all then be praying for the days of old, when we had multiple-warhead
missiles that were at least, only based on the ground.
Modern scientists inform us that space-based laser weapons, whether originally intended for
defense or offense, can quite readily be used for either purpose. Space-based weaponry
such as the Reagan and now the current Bush Junior administration wants to develop and deploy, can be
used to set entire cities on fire with the flip of a switch or two. Imagine if in our
recent confrontation with China, we could have threatened to train laser beams on Shanghai in
retaliation for holding our military plane and its crew hostage. We might conclude such
capability as being a plus until we also comprehend the possibility of China, Russia, India and the
European coalition having the same ability to incinerate Los Angeles and New York. Can we
really in any logical way claim that a mindless fatuity such as Starwars is going to somehow,
shield us or make us in any way, safer?
It does not take much training as an historian or rocket scientist to surmise that our planet's current political
direction is leading us toward a worldwide nuclear triple-threat of obliteration.
England's Prime Minister Tony Blair recently asked for and received, President Bush's blessing
toward the formation of a European Common Market air force; such force intended to be
independent of NATO and the United States. It is fairly clear that within a decade or
two, the international political lines of tension may well be drawn around the U.S. in one
sector, the European Common Market in another and China perhaps eventually, in the most powerful
position of all. If such a scenario should occur, it is more than likely that other major powers such as
Russia, India and Japan will join forces with one of these three, thus leading our planet to
the brink of ultimate military catastrophe. ¹
It seems that a prophet or two of old once claimed that in the future, the moon will be
turned to blood, seas on our planet will dry up, the stars will fall from the sky and the
foundations that hold our galaxy and planet in space will be shaken. The counterparts of
those scientists who in history's past laughed to scorn such a holocaust scenario are now today,
closer to praying that these prophets were somehow, mistaken. If our current
administration was willing to take the minimum of six trillion or more additional dollars it is
going to cost to usher in the foundation for Armageddon and to instead, invest it in national
health care, into finding a cure for AIDS, muscular dystrophy and paralysis and into educating
our nation's youth toward pursuing the opposite direction of our present example of scorn for
our planet and its present and future inhabitants, then Bush Junior may well be deified as one
of the truly great leaders of modern American and even, human history. We are most unwise
to give ear to the current rush down national suicide road of space-based, ray-gun misdirection while,
in the process, forging the legacy of our country's already highly questionable leadership toward
becoming an example of international historical buffoonery, hell-bent toward planetary oblivion.**
"And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men,
every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains
and said to the mountains and rocks, 'Fall on us and hide us. . .' " ² Will Ronald's ray-gun
blow us all to Kingdom Come? You had best better pray it is not in your generation, nor in
the generation of your son's, son. ***
Greenpeace Corporation Watch
DEDICATED TO: The late Carl Sagan, who did his best to warn us of the incredible dangers
of placing laser and other advanced weapons up in space. If we the people care about the future of our children's children,
we will run any official out of office who supports for any reason, placing weapons in space,
regardless of their position, their party or the merits of anything else they may have
achieved. This is not a partisan issue---this is a matter of survival for our species.
Credits:
1. This article was written before the recent
Bush Administration's Constitutionally illegal war (to be accurate of definition, massacre)
of aggression against Iraq. Obviously to anyone possessing rudimentary intelligence, Bush
Junior is leading us down the same crooked pathway promulgated by Ronald Reagan and Bush Senior
towards national bankruptcy, if not first, nuclear or worse oblivion. Based on their
combined rhetoric and a few scattered memos uncovered by a reluctant press (and for the most
part, deliberately buried in back pages beneath mounds of superfluous pro-war ‘patriotic’
propaganda), it would appear that the only reason that Bush, Rumsfeld and Company have not
already dropped a 'limited' nuclear bomb on Iraq or some other relatively small and defenseless
nation is fear of national and global public outcry. Judging by the administration's own
words and more importantly, actions, it appears that neither patriotism nor common horse sense
have even a remote connection to their maniacal warmongering, corporation coffer-enhancing
neo-conservative agenda. Posing as homeland ‘protection’ and ‘democratization’ of the
world, the obvious goal is more aptly defined as globalization of American economic interests
at the expense of democracy, peace and both homeland and international security.
The destructive legacies of the Reagan and Bush Senior administrations included deliberate
cuts in aid for the sick and poor, heating subsidies for impoverished senior citizens (some of
whom literally froze to death) and programs to feed and immunize poor American
children. Many of these were severely curtailed or dismantled entirely in order to fund
massive build-up of armaments without historical precedent or practical
necessity. Meanwhile, denial of America's growing homeless and jobless populations became
the accepted White House theory of political rhetoric, while ‘supply-siding’ huge tax cuts for
the ultra-wealthy at the expense of everyone else emerged as standard backdoor political
partisan practice. And as bad as these legacies may be, they will more than likely pale
in comparison to the disastrous mess left by the tyrannical thugs of Bush Junior's national and
global wrecking crew, again offering up huge tax cuts for the benefit of less than one percent
of the population at the expense of education and programs for the jobless, homeless and poor
and the economic future of all Americans (including their own offspring). All the while,
in flag-waving step with neo-conservative political corporate cronyism, media advertiser-pleasing
and ratings-protecting bias (more accurately, outright propaganda) and the full blessing of
onward conservative Christian soldiers of the genocidal right, marching us on down the utterly
corrupt deep and wide pathway of historical death and destruction towards international suicide
row.
2. The Revelation Of John 6:15-16.
*FootNote: According to all known historical evidence, if a weapon of warfare is developed,
it is overwhelmingly likely that the weapon or a more powerful derivitive of the weapon will
eventually be used. During World War II, Emperor Hirito of Japan was already
attempting to negotiate peace several weeks prior to weapons of mass destruction being unleashed
on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Premier Suzuki wanted peace at almost any cost
except for President Truman's refusal to guarantee the safety of Hirito, who was viewed as a
god by the Japanese people. General Douglas MacArthur warned that hanging Hirito would
be viewed by the Japanese population as similar to crucifying Christ and General (later President)
Eisenhower stated afterwards that dropping the bomb was not necessary. The only thing that
prevented Japan from negotiating an end to World War II was Truman's refusal to guarantee the
safety of Emperor Hirito. After the horrible weapons were dropped, Truman decided to
allow Hirito to remain in power anyway. Thus, over 200,000 thousand mostly civilian
Japanese lives were lost for no good reason whatsoever (probably well over 300,000 when those
who died from after-effects are included---tens of thousands more survivors were less
fortunate).
There is strong historical evidence that the real reasons that the bombs were dropped
include: 1) Demonstrating to the Russians that we were willing to use what some called "the big
stuff"---that is, to secure U.S. international dominance (this was before the Cold War); 2)
Because 2 billion dollars of research and development (the largest sum ever spent for weapons
development at the time) had to be justified; 3) Revenge craved by the majority of the American
people; 4) To secure Truman's own personal power; 5) Especially in the case of Nagasaki, just to
see what would happen. After the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, Truman called it a "great
day" for the history of mankind. Some sources claim that Truman and his hard-line advisors
(several leading Americans including some of Truman's own advisors were against dropping the
bombs) had no intention whatsoever of giving Japan an opportunity to surrender before detonating
the worst weapons of destruction in the history of warfare. (Sources for this information
include several written and video histories of World War II. One of the best for a general
overview is the A&E video, Hiroshima: The Decision to Drop the Bomb, available online
at HistoryChannel.com.)
In spite of a great many Americans who, due to gross distortion of our own history, tend
to view "give them hell Harry" with a certain unwarranted admiration, in the author's opinion
it is fair to state that Truman is the very worst president in the history of the United States
(so far). It
appears to be the unavoidable historical reality of our species that war and rumor of war is
habitually supported by the 'patriotic' masses (usually), sincerely fought at ground level on
both sides by troops believing in their country and invariably 'just' cause (perhaps more often
than not), while the people at the top actually making the major decisions overwhelmingly range
from wealth, power and glory seeking obvious liars to individuals cunning, callous and cruel
beyond the comprehension of the average human being. The recent illegal and opaquely
economic-driven invasion of Iraq by the Bush Junior administration is a prime example.
**FootNote II: The Lessons of History teach us that the very best defense a nation can
deploy is to provide for the health and welfare of her own people. For those not possessing the
necessary grace to grasp why this is true, it should be pointed out here that a far
better physical defensive use for the trillions of dollars intended to be spent on the Star Wars
fiasco by our nation would be to take the same trillions and pour them into alternative fuel
research. Not only would the discovery of an alternative fuel virtually guarantee us the
bulk of the world's wealth for generations to come, but also, we would be providing for both ourselves
and the entire rest of the globe, a huge environmental bonus in the process, notwithstanding, our
dependence on Middle Eastern oil would be a long forgotten memory of some distant and moronic
past. Unfortunately however, it is the ever-sad fact of history that every time new technology
emerges that carries the promise of positive progress, ever more destructive weapons of war soon
follow.
***FootNote III: Recently (after this article was already written), astrophysicist Joel Primack of
the University of California, Santa Cruz, published a report claiming that the use of weapons
in earth orbit would eventually leave so much space debris that low-flying satellites, including
communications and military satellites, would be crippled into uselessness. He
went on to claim that nations wishing to disable such high-tech systems would merely need to
spread gravel-sized 'space junk' in their orbital pathways. Naturally the United States
military and those in favor of the implementation of the catastrophic absurdity of space-based
weaponry dismissed such claims as being incorrect; those decrying the fallacy of Primack's
argument would ostensibly include much of the same folk who currently dismiss scientific
warnings of global warming and the medical and other adverse effects of modern mass
pollution. Those supporting the claims of Joel Primack include Canadian particle
physicist Sydney Van Den Bergh and American astronaut Sally Ride. It appears that the
main argument against the conclusions of Primack promoted by United States military spokesman
Lt. Col. Rick Lehner is that currently, only a small percentage of total U.S. weaponry is
actually space-based, to which one might entirely correctly respond, "yes, but there are plans
of the future to consider". Yet another rational argumentative nail in the most deserved coffin
of this disastrous debacle of space-based 'defensive' weaponry illusion.
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