by Jordan McGill
Staff Writer

I recently attended a political demonstration demanding that Guantanamo Bay, Cuba be shut down and among other things, the immediate impeachment of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney for their war crimes.

It was nice to see a little free speech, although these days, it appears that protests against the government are more about grabbing air time for self-serving derelicts staging a simulation of waterboarding. (A euphemism: waterboarding is actual drowning, not simulated, as the media likes to call it—the victim is strapped to a bench, a rag is shoved into their mouth and one-gallon-jugs of water are emptied over the rag and face multiple times.)

This quarry of angry individuals could have written a letter to the president and then taken to the streets to riot in a fit of rage. At least that would have been productive. Instead, it came across that those involved were only looking for a distraction from their pale, pathetic lives.

If a group of people think that pouring water on themselves in a ritualistic fashion just because our Bill of Rights allows them to is going to change the way our country’s political system works, they’ve got another thing comin’.

People need to engage in these thick questions and ask themselves what kind of world they want to live in. Then if one feels like pursuing social justice against the system, by all means go ahead. But realize that when digging for the truth, wherever it may lead, the outcome is usually bigger than imagined.

Public apathy is engineered by the mainstream news agencies. It seems to be working just fine. People are glad to hear things that coalesce with their views on the world. We should be shouting shame on ourselves for not gathering in outcry more often or at minimum, for not drawing a crowd that warrants a police force beating.

Violating universal, law-of-theland treaties are everyday occurrences on the job of world dictatorship. Countries contravene against their constitutions every day. Only by standing together, black and white, male and female, being called consumers instead of citizens, will we see the effects of our decay. As for me, I’ve fought the law and the law won.