America's Loves and Hates
—And why we're so hard for people to understand
by Andrew G. Eggleston Sr.
whitesage12@hotmail.com

Attribute to The Libertarian Enterprise

America loves her automobiles for a multitude of reasons; that new car smell, Freedom of mobility and all of its connotations, independence and renewed sense of purpose, picking-up our loved ones to share time with, the ability to respond to emergencies and dependability in time of crisis. All go together to describe a love-affair as deep and moving as any marriage—or as passionate and disruptive as a June-September romance. Millions of words have been written, and an infinite number more will be written about personal transportation.

America hates war, she is not shy about war, and Ladies Liberty, Justice, and Freedom have adorned our coins with our other war heroes. These are to remind us why we war and what it will ultimately cost us. The first casualty in war is Freedom, followed by Justice in a vulgar and simple, black and white, bloodless coup. Liberty is the she-wolf protecting her cubs; she does not go quietly into that good night. Liberty sends out the alarming shriek of alert to awaken the populace, to rouse them to respond. America's citizenry are very loud when they feel threatened, and we scream the loudest about wanting to end war. Far too many people are killed in war. In four years in Iraq alone we've lost 3100 American's. Good, responsible, brave American's, and this makes us angry. America hates war.

America loves her cars, she's famous the world over for good old American muscle cars. Some of the fastest, toughest, and most exciting cars ever built are American, and we are proud. But in 2005 we lost 43,443 Americans to traffic accidents. That's a bit more than 14 times as many Americans lost in Iraq. Good and responsible? Okay, lets remove the number of drunk driving deaths, (though we all know that drunk drivers kill far more people than just themselves) some 16,885 Americans—irresponsible Americans. That still leaves us with 26,558 good and responsible Americans lost to automotive death. So, are we at war with the automobile makers, or any other of the vast multitude of people and industries that support and enhance automobiles? We lost 8 times as many Americans to them than we did to the Iraqi insurgents (whoever they are this week). Now hold on a minute, I was comparing 1 year's worth of accidents to 4 years worth of conflict.

America hates war, and she hates the loss of brave young American men and women who volunteered their time to defend Democracy. They volunteered to protect America and her interests overseas, regardless of the implications of such a broad sweeping statement, a brave effort indeed. They volunteered to be paid less than professionals who are their equal in civilian life out of an admirable sense of duty, patriotism and honor. America runs the largest volunteer militia in the world, Americans are very proud of their volunteer heritage; it is much of what created this great country. The courage that America's volunteers have demonstrated time and time again in the face of death is more than enough reason to keep stoneworkers around. We celebrate their achievements in song, movie, and book to remind all of the cost to keep us free.

America loves her cars, almost as much as she loves her veterans, they both make her very proud. Why just last year the American automotive industry won several awards for excellence from the prestigious American firm of J. D. Power and Associates. The American automotive industry is excellent at responding to their consumer's wants and needs and changing in response. So it should follow that the American automotive industry should be answerable for not making their cars safer, more fuel efficient, more idiot-proof. We lost so many young Americans (15 to 20 years old) in the year 2003 (the first year of the Iraq war) to automobile accidents 6409, as to surpass by twice the number of deaths due to the war. Four years of war do not match by half the number of deaths in America's automobiles. Good and responsible young people? So, we again deduct the number of drunk driving deaths, a total of 2283 for 2003, and are left with a total of 4126. So America's cars that she loves are responsible for a danger ratio of 5.32 to 1 against the Iraq war. It's safer for America's young adults to be in a war zone than in one of America's cars.

America hates war, it cost far too much in people, and time and money. So there's the key, war costs too much time out of our day to pay attention to, and cost too much of our tax money to pay for. What this means is that Americans are tired of paying other Americans too much money for producing newer and deadlier toys for our volunteer militia to use-up like so many MREs. Capitalism, nepotism, and cronyism are just a few things that prosper in a government-operated war. But not everybody hates these aspects of war, and some folks get downright wealthy off of the wartime production—I say good for them, that's just plain good capitalism. Though the money and orders are coming from the government, the tent-makers don't seem too unhappy, nor do the people who work in their factories. This creates an economic boom, people can afford to drive themselves to work, take the family on an outing in the mountains with the truck and have an excellent vacation. America hates war; though she went to war in Vietnam, Desert Storm, and Iraq to protect the interests of those who support the American Automotive industry

So, America loves cars, she has more of them per capita than any other country. American car companies fall behind foreign automakers every year, for safety and fuel economy. American automakers and her sister companies are supported every year with hundreds of billions of dollars in; tax incentives, grants, low-interest loans, and a host of federally run programs to keep the beast alive and well. Americans buy cars, ever since Mr. Ford promoted the Model-T as an everyman's car in any color you wanted as long as it was black, but we're buying fewer and fewer American cars. Americans may spend as much as 400 Billion dollars on the Iraq war, but last year the Automotive industry and her supporting industries received that much and more, just to "stay competitive" with the world market. On a year-to-year basis that comes to almost 4 dollars spent on automobiles for every dollar spent on war. America loves her cars; in comparison to war she spends 4 times as much money every year on automobiles and kills 5 times as many young adults in automobiles than in war each year.

America hates war, but she's one of the best in the world at it, her people are killed less frequently than any other country in the world when engaged in combat. And though America hates war she has some smart people working for her when she has to go to war, from the suppliers to the soldiers in uniform. We hate seeing our people die in war and will do much to change it; we protest, lobby and vote, in response to war, because Americans get focused on what's put in front of them, it's easier and less responsibility, it's lazy—but that's our right too. Americans don't see the truth in front of them, and sometimes will go out of their way to avoid seeing the truth, so we watch the war and avoid any other bad news that we can, it's less stressful that way. But we need stress to keep us motivated; it's what reminds us of our responsibility. If we were to weigh the dangers to our children responsibly, then we might consider allowing them to join the military but not to drive the minivan. After all, they would be safer in Iraq than they would be two miles from home in a car. Also, in Iraq they wouldn't be going anywhere alone, wouldn't care about the color of their friends, would trust the person beside them with their life, and they go with the best protection (a loaded firearm) an individual can obtain. I would be proud to say that my children; don't go anywhere alone, don't care about the color of their friends, trust the people their with, and are carrying protection—I think we should all be proud to say those things about our loved ones.

I want us to be safe just two miles from our front door, safe in our front room, and safe in our Liberty, Justice, and Freedom wherever we go in the United States, I support Bill of Rights Enforcement, the Zero Aggression Principle, and Capitalism. The application of these would easily solve the problems facing America today and renew the sense of responsibility for another generation. Sure it's hard, but damn is it worth it!

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