Cobb

The poem I wrote about the eyewitness, Mr. Cash is as follows:

Cash

lil ole girl
what the fuck
is you doing here?
must be nobody cares

don't you know this ole world
works on neutrons and valences
and balances of power
up beyond yo lil brown forehead?

i bet you think you cute
i bet you think you special

you don't know this place of chance
is for grown folk
watching for tells and duplicity
with videos and lasers?

of course you don't
you've got enough nerve to spit
as if you got wad
as if you got something i'm bound to respect

take that! and that!
now you dead.

my slack is cut
testimony for immunity
arms for hostages

In retrospect, I could have made it clearer that Cash was not the murderer, or the rapist. He just watched. My revulsion got the better of me. He did, nevertheless, cut a deal with DAs, defended his friend, and continued to study nuclear physics.

It would seem that there is something supernatural about those who would come to understand, as Oppy did, the power of nuclear weapons. Perhaps Cash, like the blackmailers of Pyongyang have something on us. Maybe the world is ordered in such a way as to make certain types of knowledge more valuable than human decency. I think that's part of it, but I don't think that's the primary reason we let Cash off easy.

We Americans simply don't believe in indicting the innocent. For us innocence is a way of life we strive to maintain at all costs. An innocent American is a proper American, goes the thinking. If and when we go to war, we may don the rhetoric, we may agree in principle, we may wish we were part of the action, but in the end we will not be combatants, and we will disclaim all responsibility for whatever slaughter occurs. We citizens will be eyewitnesses. We will be friends and family of the soldiers. We will provide the necessary cash. But we will refuse to be indicted.

I'm not sure I'm such a proper American, despite the fact that I don't like Bush's policy. I want to feel guilty in this. I want to feel responsible as I did so very fully when he presented his case against Afghanistan to the joint session of Congress in 2001. My gung, don't say Ho! any longer.

I know, however, that this all is being done in my name, if not my voice. And I believe the intention to protect my world is real and righteous. So I am not going to pretend for a moment that I'm not a part of this action. I am not going to stand here and tell anyone that Bush is not my president despite the fact that I had nothing to do with his election whatsoever.

You can read my English from anywhere on the globe, if you're interested. Google 'black republicans' and you'll come right here. If you think you don't like people like me, you're welcome to hear what I say and then decide. This is my politics right here. And I say, no to a costly war, and no to GWBush's kind of leadership into war. But Ialso say pull the plug on dictators like Saddam, whether or not they have super weapons. Which brings me to my final points.

Some of you out there, like Ritter, like Tarik Aziz, know exactly what kind of man Saddam is. You have been eyewitnesses to his dastardly deeds and you too have played innocent. I'm not going to forgive you. Bush's war bus is pulling off and that's the big way that the immediate future is going to be shaped, not by words, but by actions. Innocent Iraqi citizens are just as much a part of this as I am. And, I'm sorry to say, I probably won't read your blogs any sooner than you're going to read mine.

One day the numbers of dead are going to come back and haunt us. All of us with ordinary lives to attend to will crank up our DeathOMeters once more and remain aloof to the details of suffering. Not because we are inhuman or incapable, but by choice. While my lower threshold is hovering around 1, as in one murdered child, I offer tears on my keyboard and a moment of silence.

If I were President of the United States, I would send Congressmen and American Citizens to Iraq to attend funerals and bury your dead, and I would have your people come here and do the same. Until then..