Can We Cure Ourselves of the Deadly Viruses of Greed and Militarism?

Societies, like the people who populate them, can be become quite ill—especially if their condition fails to receive the proper treatment.

Back in 2003, with our nation still reeling from the terror attacks of 9/11, we became quite sick. We fell victim to one of the most virulent germs ever known to humanity, the illegal war virus.

This virus soon had our nation embarking on a disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq, an illegal and immoral disaster that left hundreds of thousands killed and wounded and destabilized an entire region.

George Bush and Dick Cheney initially infected us with this deadly virus. But then, just as we thought the epidemic had passed, a new contagious strain of the virus infected Barack Obama. So instead of trying to finish the virus totally off by quarantining Bush and Cheney in prison, Obama proceeded to bomb Libya and double down on drone warfare. And the virus survived, with a particularly virulent strain that went on to infect Donald Trump, who would quickly deny he had become sick.

Out of the quagmire our society has become, a pathogenic demagogue has arisen.

But didn’t the American bombing of small boats in the Caribbean, a reporter asked Trump, show that you have most definitely caught the virus? Nonsense, answered Trump, who went on to explain that he only bombed the Caribbean small boats because Obama had already set a presidential precedent for such attacks with his extensive drone strikes in Yemen.

But what about, another reporter asked, your threat to violently attack Venezuela? Didn’t that prove that you have also caught the virus? Not at all, responded Trump. Just following precedent. Didn’t Bush and Cheney walk away scot-free from their attack upon Iraq?

Viruses, of course, haven’t been the only plague on our nation’s health. In 2008, we suffered an attack from the deadly Wallstreetium Corruptus bacterium, a microorganism that flourishes in greedy, secret environments that get precious little sunlight. This bacterium initially attacked only the United States, but the infection spread quickly to many other countries, nearly destroying the global economy and costing many millions of people their jobs and homes.

President Obama contracted this pathogen early on when he took in more Wall Street campaign cash than his opponent John McCain—and then didn’t take any of the necessary steps to neutralize the microbe. Instead of isolating the Wall Street carriers of this toxic bacterium, Obama judged these financial kingpins as too big to fail and left them free to continue incubating one deadly germ after another. Wall Street’s investment in his campaign paid off handsomely.

And now we find ourselves facing perhaps the most dangerous threat to our health of all, our addiction to fossil fuels. This addiction is overheating our entire planet and destabilizing our global life support system. Catastrophe lies ahead.

We have, in effect, sunk into a festering, feverish swamp of untreated disease. Our body politic, not surprisingly, is now manifesting the ultimate symptom of a sick society. Out of the quagmire our society has become, a pathogenic demagogue has arisen. In the White House now sits an old-fashioned quack offering phony treatments for chronic ailments.

We have had in the past, of course, deadly pathogens within our social system. We still suffer from one of the oldest and worst of these: the virulent and highly resistant virus of racism. We once had a leader in Dr. Marin Luther King Jr. who understood how to treat—and beat back—this vile virus. We need to practice, Dr. King taught us, nonviolent civil disobedience.

Dr. King was murdered before his noble cure for racism could go into total effect. But he knew that the path forward to full recovery demanded that we also treat the equally deadly and symbiotic germs of greed and militarism. Let’s heed his legacy and follow his shining example—before time runs out.