It Seems To Me

Thoughts and Rants on Technology, Business and Politics

ast year I had the opportunity to watch The Fog of War, the Errol Morris documentary interviewing Robert McNamara. I can't really comment on the Vietnam War since I grew up in Canada and was too young to understand much of what was going on at the time.

However, I heard an excerpt from the film recently in which McNamara made a haunting and prescient statement. He said,

We are the strongest nation in the world today. I do not believe that we should EVER apply that economic, political, or military power unilaterally. If we had followed that rule in Vietnam, we wouldn’t have been there. None of our allies supported us: not Japan, not Germany, not Britain or France. If we can’t persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause we had better re-examine our reasoning.

What else can you add to that?

I finally finished Bill Clinton's biography today. It took my over 6 months to get through this lengthy tome. It was a long, slow, haul but rich and satisfying all along the way. Clinton comes from roots similar to my own and shares my idealistic outlook on life in his passion to make the world a better place.

The highlight of the story comes in the final pages when Clinton explains his core beliefs about life and politics. With his interpretation of "a more perfect union" in the preamble to the US Constitution, he says that our fundamental mission is . . . 

to widen the circle of opportunity, deepen the meaning of freedom, and strengthen the bonds of our community.

One could argue whether this is the best definition of "a more perfect union." One could argue a lot of things but these ideas resonate with me. In many ways, much of my life has been in pursuit of the same ideals, albeit on a much smaller scale.

But it seems to me that the forces that have risen to power in America of late are antithetical to these principles. The circle of opportunity seems to be shrinking in America while the meaning of freedom is being challenged to its core. And the bonds of community, especially the global one, have been all but shattered. It will take more than a few field trips by Bush, Rumsfeld and Rice to repair them.