Afghanistan: Is there anything we can do beyond the Finger-Pointing Olympics we’ve been witnessing?
Can we learn something?
We know one thing for certain. The entire Middle East is a long tunnel with no cheese.
It was a long tunnel yesterday. It is a long tunnel today. It will be a long tunnel tomorrow.
It has been so for centuries, not decades. Name the period, and Western culture — not just us Americans — can be noted only for its delusional, self-righteous and destructive approach to different cultures.
Over the past 20 years, according to a study Brown University study, the combined cost of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has been $6.4 trillion, a mind-boggling figure. Other figures differ, of course, but the cost has always been in the trillions.
To put the trillions in some perspective:
$6.4 trillion would provide Social Security benefits for all retirees, retiree spouses and children of retired workers as well as all disabled workers for more than six years. Yes, years of income for millions of Americans.
It would have done much the same for Medicare, Medicaid and Affordable Care Act subsidies — pay for about six years of benefits. Again, years of benefits for millions of Americans.
SO IT’S TIME to ask some questions.
Could we have done anything differently?
I believe the answer is yes.
Then why didn’t we?
Because we’re stuck in a thinking habit.
We are literally wired to think about more, not less. Equally important, that change in thinking would have needed to start earlier than Sept. 11, 2001.
