State of the Union speeches are...

…usually a pretty big waste of time, and last night was no different. There was one thing that did stand out to me, and that was that GDub actually mentioned the crisis in Darfur. That actually impressed me. Now, how sad is it that I’m impressed when the President of our nation, a world leader, to some he is THEE world leader, speaks of increasing attention to a genocide? Too, let’s not act as though he spoke about it at length, because he didn't...it was pretty much mentioned in passing.

Anyhow, now I'm left wondering if he actually knows or cares about what is going on in Darfur, which leads me to this point: the only reason that GDub hasn't pushed the UN to get involved in trying to put a stop to the genocide that has been occurring in Darfur is because the fields of Darfur are not rich with oil. A statement like that warrants some explanation…which leads me to my State of the Union response:

Let us not forget, why we entered into a second war with Iraq. The first reason GDub was supposedly pushing for war in Iraq was because he thought, according to his intel, that they had weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) and that Iraq, not Iran or North Korea, were/are threats to our national safety. When no WMDs were discovered, the reason for an Iraqi invasion then became that we, the US, are the world’s “good guys”, and like knights in shining armor, we’re there to save the day and liberate the Iraqi people.

Now, I’m all for liberating the oppressed, whether they be Iraqis, Sudanese, Chileans, Vietnamese, etc, but don’t try and sell me that load of crap. I may be dumb, but I’m not naïve. When billion dollar contracts are awarded to Papa Cheney’s “former” employer (an oil company) without going to bid, as a result of our involvement in this war, it causes one to raise their brow a bit…errrr…A LOT

This all leads me back to the crisis in Darfur. The sad reality is that we as a nation are standing by and allowing genocide to occur. After the Holocaust the words “never again” were said and repeated over and over again. We, the US, and many other nations vowed to never let an atrocity like that happen again. Well it’s happening again, and it has been for a few years now, with basically no real response. If we continue to standby and let it happen, we will be left with the aftermath of genocide - hundreds of thousands, possibly millions dead. We will be left begging the question: how could this have happened? We as a nation will only have ourselves to blame, because the US is in fact a world leader, but we have failed in leading the world against atrocities time and time again. This time, the reason for not intervening in this crisis, is that there are no oil fields in Darfur. The US is not the world’s “good guys”, when in true Machiavelli fashion, we only do things when we have something to gain. A Union that operates that way is not something to be proud of. I look forward to continued change in the political leadership of this country, because right now, it is lacking.
(can a brotha get a standing O?)