Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

It’s disturbing to me to see that there are still a huge number of people who believe that the only way they can feel secure is to have their government aim thousands of nuclear missiles, ready to strike at a moment’s notice, at foreign cities filled with millions of civilian human beings. Still others say that the only way that we can reduce America’s nuclear weapons arsenal is to make a new generation of nuclear weapons that are even deadlier than before.

It’s time for us to end this insanity. With Barack Obama in the White House, we finally have the chance for an American President to end the policy of Mutually Assured Destruction, and clear our nation’s stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

We can have a world free of nuclear weapons, but we have to be willing to speak out for what we believe in. Do you part, spreading the message of an end to nuclear weapons wherever you go, wearing this tshirt: Nuclear weapons? This is not security!

I admit that I thought that this t-shirt would become irrelevant after the election of 2008. In 2010, I’m learning that it’s as timely as ever.

In yesterday’s defeat of Martha Coakley, Massachusetts Republicans explained their votes as motivated by a need to keep the United States safe from the threat of foreign enemies. A Massachusetts voter writes, “Scott Brown will do what it takes to keep America safe and never put the rights of terrorists above yours!” Another, self-described “Reaganite Republican” said that Brown’s agenda would focus on “taking-out-the-terrorists”, apparently forgetting that the Republican Party, in its years of controlling both Congress and the White House, failed miserably to do so.

That’s the weird thing about the Homeland Security regime: It’s not required to make sense. Its job is to create a rough bluster of tough posturing in order to make people feel protected, whether they actually are or not.

Some Americans still have the moral strength not to cower under the Homeland security blanket. Some Americans still choose to live in freedom rather than fear. Wearing this satirical Department of Homeland Insecurity shirt to show yourself as one of the stalwart lovers of liberty.