How far have we come in the past two hundred years? Many of us look back in horror at the sins of our predecessors here in the United States of America, those who displaced or dispatched tens of millions of native people from this land in the name of Manifest Destiny. No president has ever apologized, much less made real reparations for this genocide. No treaty ever drawn between the Native inhabitants and the U.S. government was ever fully honored by Washington. And, as if to erase history, few public school curriculums ever gave these issues a proper hearing. Such is some of the worst soiled laundry of the most powerful nation on Earth. Yet, the arrogance that prompted such immorality, such evil, lives on. It lives on in the seats of power as it does in the depths of many psyches.
In the past, the adherents of Manifest Destiny violated and drove off the people of this land. Today, they assault the very land itself. The spokesmen of yesterday who advocated for white supremacy and the denial of equal rights to their fellow men and women, are the far-right zealots of today who promote the mindless exploitation of our forests, waters, life forms, the very air we all breath. Their endless justifications for unsustainable exploitation ring as hollow as those of their racist predecessors. They foul the nest and thus, they assault all of us in the process.
The latest mind-boggling environmental policy proclamations by the Bush Administration lend further proof to this destructive, nay, SUICIDAL mindset. Being the product of Big Oil, we should not be surprised that George W. Bush will do all within his power to promote the wishes of his masters. Reversing policy meant to protect public health with regard to arsenic levels in drinking water, or CO2 emissions into the atmosphere, Bush proves to be more of an Old King Coal than a President Select. Yet, selected he was, and those who did the selecting are no different than those who view our planet as a commodity rather than the source of our existence, our very sustenance
As Old King Coal’s rein begins taking hold, we learn that it may be the most conservative administration in decades. That’s not conservative as in conservation , it’s conservative as in dominion ideology. Bush’s various appointments and the mentality of those individuals belie the worst: trash Earth first, do the other planets later.
Some weeks ago we learned that an addition to the euphemistically named “International Space Station” is a science lab called “Destiny”. Not satisfied with the near destruction of most species and much of their land on planet Earth, the spawn of Manifest Destiny adherents now look skyward. O, that they might remove themselves from this planet without too much collateral damage, and rise heavenward to that place so many of them value far more than the Earth which sustains them. If only they could do it instantly and leave the rest of us, and the planet, in peace.
Checkout:
MSNBC on Bush ultra-conservatism:
http://www.msnbc.com/news/549439.asp?bt=prgy
MSNBC on Bush backslidding:
http://www.msnbc.com/news/543793.asp
Take action and tell Bush to live up to his CO2 promise
http://www.gristmagazine.com/grist/dogood/climate.stm#promise
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