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The
man who drives me to and from work is named Woody, too. A relief
to me, as it minimizes the chance of my forgetting his name. I
call him 'Woodman' and he calls me 'Wood'. He has become my best
friend here, even though he's upset that I have quit drinking
beer. He's smart, funny, and there's nothing he hasn't seen in
33 years behind the wheel of his black cab. He drove me for a
while before I felt confident he liked me; he doesn't like people
easily, especially if they have a rap for busting up black cabs.
Woodman and I agree about a lot of things, but one thing we can
never agree about is Iraq. He thinks the only language Saddam
understands is brute force. I don't believe we should be bombing
cities in our quest for one man. We've killed a million Iraqis
since the start of the Gulf war—mostly by blocking humanitarian
aid. Let's stop now. Thankfully, most of the Brits I talk to about
the war are closer to me than to Woodman. Only your prime minister
doesn't seem to have noticed.
I have been here three months doing a play in the West End. I
am having the time of my life. I love England—the people,
the parks, the theatre. The play is great and the audiences have
been a dream. Probably I should just relax, be happy and talk
about the weather, but this war is under my skin; it affects my
sleep.
I remember playing basketball with an Iraqi in the late 80s while
Iran and Iraq were at war. I didn't know at the time that the
US and Britain were supplying weapons to both sides. I asked why
they were always at war with each other and he said something
that stayed with me: "If it were up to the people, there
would be peace. It's the governments that create war." And
now my government is creating its second war in less than a year.
No; war requires two combatants, so I should say "its second
bombing campaign".
I went to the White House when Harvey Weinstein was showing Clinton
the movie Welcome to Sarajevo, which I was in. I got a
few moments alone with Clinton. Saddam throwing out the weapons
inspectors was all over the news and I asked what he was going
to do. His answer was very revealing. He said: "Everybody
is telling me to bomb him. All the military are saying, 'You gotta
bomb him.' But if even one innocent person died, I couldn't bear
it." And I looked in his eyes and I believed him. Little
did I know he was blocking humanitarian aid at the time, allowing
the deaths of thousands of innocent people.
I am a father, and no amount of propaganda can convince me that
half a million dead children is acceptable "collateral damage".
The fact is that Saddam Hussein was our boy. The CIA helped him
to power, as they did the Shah of Iran and Noriega and Marcos
and the Taliban and countless other brutal tyrants. The fact is
that George Bush Sr continued to supply nerve gas and technology
to Saddam even after he used it on Iran and then the Kurds in
Iraq. While the Amnesty International report listing countless
Saddam atrocities, including gassing and torturing Kurds, was
sitting on his desk, Bush Sr pushed through a $2bn "agricultural"
loan and Thatcher gave hundreds of millions in export credit to
Saddam. The elder Bush then had the audacity to quote the Amnesty
reports to garner support for his oil war.
A decade later, "Shrub" follows the same line: "We
have no quarrel with the Iraqi people." I'm sure half a million
Iraqi parents are scratching their heads over that. I'm an American
tired of lies. And with our government, it's mostly lies.
The history taught in our schools is scandalous. We grew up believing
that Columbus actually discovered America. We still celebrate
Columbus Day. Columbus was after one thing only—gold. As
the natives were showering him with gifts and kindness, he wrote
in his diary, "They do not bear arms...They have no iron...With
50 men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we
want." Columbus is the perfect symbol of US foreign policy
to this day.
This is a racist and imperialist war. The warmongers who stole
the White House—You call them "hawks", but I would
never disparage such a fine bird—have hijacked a nation's
grief and turned it into a perpetual war on any nonwhite country
they choose to describe as terrorist.
To the men in Washington, the world is just a giant Monopoly board.
Oddly enough, Americans generally know how the government works.
The politicians do everything they can for the people - the people
who put them in power. The giant industries that are polluting
our planet as well as violating human rights worldwide are the
ones nearest and dearest to the hearts of American politicians.
But in wartime, people lose their senses. There are flags and
yellow ribbons and posters and every media outlet is beating the
war drum and even sensible people can hear nothing else. In the
US, God forbid you should suggest the war is unjust or that dropping
cluster bombs from 30,000 feet on a city is a cowardly act. When
TV satirist Bill Maher made some dissenting remarks about the
bombing of Afghanistan, Disney pulled the plug on him. In a country
that lauds its freedom of speech, a word of dissent can cost you
your job.
I read in a paper, here, about a woman who held out the part of
her taxes that would go to the war effort. Something like 17%.
I like that idea, though in the US it would have to be more like
50%. If you consider money as a form of energy, then we see half
our taxes and half the US government's energy focused on war and
weapons of mass destruction. Over the past 30 years, this amounts
to more than ten trillion dollars. Imagine that money going to
preserving rainforests or contributing to a sustainable economy
(as opposed to the dinosaur tit we are currently in the process
of sucking dry).
I give in to Woodman, and we stop for a few beers. He asks me
what I'd do in Bush's shoes. Easy: I'd honor Kyoto. Join the world
court. I'd stop subsidizing earth rapers like Monsanto, Dupont
and Exxon. I'd shut down the nuclear power plants. So I already
have $200bn saved from corporate welfare. I'd save another $100bn
by stopping the war on non-corporate drugs. And I'd cut the defense
budget in half so they'd have to get by on a measly $200bn a year.
I've already saved half a trillion bucks by saying no to polluters
and warmongers.
Then I'd give $300bn back to the taxpayers. I'd take the rest
and pay the people teaching our children what they deserve. I'd
put $100bn into alternative fuels and renewable energy. I'd revive
the Chemurgy movement, which made the farmer the root of the economy,
and make paper and fuel from wheat straw, rice straw and hemp.
Not only would I attend, I'd sponsor the next Earth Summit. And,
of course, I'd give myself a fat raise.
Woodman drops me at home and I ask if he likes my ideas. He offers
a reluctant "yes". As he pulls away he yells out, "But
I'd never vote for a man who can't handle a few pints at the end
of the day!"
Guardian
Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
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