Patriot Corps

This Kid deserves our help.

It strikes me that most Americans talk patriotism while making no sacrifice for country. What does it mean to be a Patriot anyway? Is it just doffing your cap at baseball games? The way your throat catches with the first note of the national anthem? Or getting worked up on a blog and calling someone else a Communist? None of these are partiotic as being a Patriot requires sacrifice.

It also seems obvious to me that we are enriching far too many civilian workers in Iraq at too great an expense to the U.S. taxpayer. So, I have a new Patriotic project to suggest that would save the nation money while allowing coach Patriots to get up and do something about it. Certainly many hundreds of thousands of people volunteered to help during the recovery from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. I bet many of them would love to help with the war effort.

So here is my suggestion: the Patriot Corps. I envision the organization sending civilian volunteers to Iraq to fill the many support roles currently farmed out to International corporations employing mostly non-American citizens to do a myriad of jobs. With a Patriot Corps, Amercans could do any number of jobs: drive fuel trucks, serve food at American bases, sort mail, oversee engineering projects, help rebuild and improve Iraqi schools and clinics, train police officers, etc. We pay food workers--mostly from the third world--as much as $80,000 a year to serve food to our troops. I'm a professor with summers off and would gladly give up a month or two to work in a chow hall. And I would do it for free. For love of country.

I know what folks are thinking; people get killed over there! They blow up guys driving fuel trucks and police trainees. I don't want to to die. Well, neither do our soldiers. That is what being a Patriot means. Risking your life and treasure to ensure the future of the Republic. It is that simple. Moreover, think of the skills that many retired folks--or workaholics with six months of comp time saved up--could offer to the rebuilding effort. If we really want to make that country a better place and want our boys home now, then we had better get off our asses and do something about it. Or we had better come home.

I'm especially sick of listening to the No Tax crowd in Tennessee blathering about what Patriots they are. If you don't pay increased taxes to fund the war, and you don't send your kids, then what is the basis of your patriotism?

My second suggestion is a Patriot Tax. All families who have a family member who has served in the U.S. military--active or reserve--from 9.11.2001 to the present would be exempt. And we should also exempt any veteran of a foreign war. I'd say that the World War II gents have already done their share. The rest of us would have our taxes increased by the yearly cost of all foreign wars. A simple equation: if you don't serve you pay. That would be Patriotism.

American Dream Rejected?

The Lakotah Indian Tribe has declared independence from the U.S.!

Wow! An Indian tribe escaped the reservation. Quick boys, get your Winchesters down. The army is going to need help keeping the savages from your daughter's bedroom door. In fact, if we march now, while it's cold we might find them hunkered down in their tepees. Then it's all "Gary Owen" and good dead Indians freezing in the snow.

Of course we've grown up more than that now haven't we? The Indians haven't actually left the reservation this time, they've up and declared independence. In fact, they may file liens against hundreds of thousands of acres across the Midwest. The Lakotah assert that the land was taken from them through broken treaties and land jumping by white settlers. Now that just can't be right, can it? America is perfect, is it not?

Go back and read the history of East Tennessee before you dismiss the Lakotah. How did our ancestors gain this lush country? Why are there so many funny sounding Indian names all about such as Hiwassee, Telaco, and even Ta-na-si? Does this mean the Cherokees will go next? Would they have a claim on most of Western North Carolina, East Tennessee, North Georgia, North Alabama, and Western South Carolina? Come on, they were traded fair and square: 100 million acres of their homeland for 33 million acres of Oklahoma. Where would you rather live: Knoxville or Oklahoma City? The Seminole are going to want the swamps of Florida back? Heck those pesky Nez Perce might want to go to Canada or something.

Seriously, will we call out the army on this, or just let them go? After all, they are our poorest, fattest, drunkest, and most depressed citizens. 85% of them are unemployed and living off government cheese and fry bread, aren't they?

Actually, they have a perfect model for economic success: Free Sin Zones. A place were Americans could gamble, smoke a joint, do a bump, or God knows what else. Vegas would be through and the Indians would be rich. It sounds crazy, but with no economy, why not become little Amsterdam's all across the land?

They have offered tax-free status to anyone willing to move to Lakotah lands and renounce their U.S. citizenship. I wonder how many rich Americans will soon be sporting Lakotah passports?

Or will we do as our South American allies have done to native movements. Will the Lakotahs become the next member of the family of nations, or will they be the next Zapitistas? Will cannon balls again fly across the land?

They have claimed their independence using Jeffersonian language and asserting the Natural Rights of a people to determine their own fate. Nothing could be more noble than that.


Notes:
I've used the spelling of Lakotah favored by the tribe.

Usatoday announcement:
http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/12/lakota-withdraw.html

The Lakotah Decleration:
http://www.commondreams.org/news2007/1220-02.htm?loc=interstitialskip