What is it good for?

I don’t know how much to say about the war -- I should say “the coming war,� or “the war that everyone expects to happen.� It’s in the news all the time now, and on my mind. But it’s difficult to put my thoughts and feelings in words. Maybe if I try to make some simple declarative statements. The following is true of my feelings or true from my biased perspective:

1. I don’t want the war to happen, and I attended a peace march last weekend as a sign of my opposition. I also wrote Bush a letter a couple of months ago. Aside from those actions and a few desultory comments to friends and in my weblog, I haven’t done anything about my feelings of being opposed to the war.
2. I’m opposed to the war because I feel it is needless, because of the suffering it will cause, and because I believe the economic impact will likely extend the recession the U.S. is in. (Some commentators say the U.S. is actually now climbing out of the recession and that if we fell back in it would be a “double-dip� recession. Others say we’re pretty darned close to a depression; but I don’t think the government would ever admit that unless it were painfully obvious, because they don’t want people to become pessimistic and stop spending. Consumer spending is the only thing that is keeping the economy going now.)
3. Judging from the two above comments, my anxieties also extend to the economy, which is natural because I’m unemployed, but I think even if I still had a job, I would feel the same way, which is to say, nervous about the economy and the effect of a war.
4. In addition to the usual and already large enough number of casualties most people anticipate, I think there is a small but significant chance that as part of, or as a result of, the war, there will be a major catastrophe. Not necessarily a nuclear bomb going off, although that is possible, but at least a very large chemical weapons attack somewhere that will kill thousands of civilians. The horrific nature of such an attack could make it one of the touchstones of the early 21st Century. In fact, one reason I’m forcing myself to state how I feel about current events is because I fear that the war will be more momentous, in a bad way, than people seem to expect, and that I’ll want to look back someday at how I felt.
5. By saying I fear the war and/or its aftermath will be worse than most people expect, I refer to the fact that there is actually very little doomsaying in the press. No one is seriously talking about the possibility of, for example, a major chemical weapons attack on a city -- say, Tel Aviv -- and the suffering it would cause, much less the consequences. By consequences I mean that if Tel Aviv were to suffer such an attack, Israel -- which is widely acknowledged to have nuclear weapons -- might very well retaliate by nuking Baghdad. This is the “worse than most people expect� to which I refer.
6. I don’t feel the American presidential administration really wants to recognize the very real lack of support for the war. All the polls show support for a unilateral war is low; support for a multilateral war is higher, but still soft, especially when asked with the qualifier about letting the weapons inspectors do their work, or the one about the U.N. officially voting to make war. Despite this lack of support, I feel the President and his advisors have blinders on and are rushing toward war as fast as they can.
7. I think the war can start anytime -- even this weekend. News reports have started using words like “imminent.� This increases my foreboding.
8. In response, I have the urge to do something dramatic, like shave my head and go sit zazen in front of the Chevron building for the duration. I also have all the other urges, of course, including to see movies, work on my book, masturbate, clean the house, take a road trip, etc. etc. There’s something I always remember when I think about the last war, and that’s how Christine, on the day the Gulf War started, responded by completely repainting her room. (She still lived on Valencia St. then.) This urge to do something constructive, even on the most private level, is something I admired greatly. By contrast, my own urge to demonstrate, and in silence, is theatrical and unconstructive.