2003-03-11

I keep asking, who are these people? Where do these people live? How many are there? Are they real? People who are actually in support of this supposed war that our President wants to start, lining up his green plastic army men in the sand box, bossing all the other kids around to play his way or else daddy's gonna fire their daddy's from the factory.

55 percent of respondents in the latest poll would support an American invasion of Iraq, even if it was in defiance of a vote of the Security Council.

I want to know where this 55 percent lives, what they do with their lives and precisely how much crystal meth their mothers did while they were in the womb. Some people say that the 55 percent are part of the great expanse of land that connects New York to Los Angeles (and other lesser cities on the respective coasts like Boston and Seattle). Mostly because no one has actually ever seen those lands between here and there, and therefore it must be from some foreign place we insist is less sophisticated, maybe even yokel-like, than us. I have trouble believing that it is that concentrated, that there is this core of people in the middle of the country desperately wanting a war so that there is something to do than watch corn grow. I can’t imagine them all standing around the entrance to the WWII era bunker saying they support war because there’s still 5 cases of pineapple and boxes of Tang waiting if anything should happen.

I believe they are among us, that they live side-by-side. I believe they sit next to me on the train and read dusty novels. They bend over to pick up and hand me back change that I have dropped. They cough without covering their mouths in an uncomfortable radius to my face. They must be somewhere but remain silent to only answer pollsters, to let their thoughts be broadcasted then.

Either that our there are people who don’t care and just answer “yeah, sure I’ll support it” without really thinking or caring because it doesn’t really matter to them. The people who can’t be bothered with the world out there. This is probably 10 of the 55 percent. Then there are liars who get a big kick out of interfering with anyone who is trying to quantify human thought into percentages. They just say whatever comes to mind and may very well be skewing the results, but only constitute 5 percent of the 55.

What remains then would be the drones that answer back whatever has been given to them, mocking birds of the society. “Big Mac” and “Support Bush” just come out without thought. “Beef, it’s what for dinner” they say when friends call to ask what the plan is for the evening. This is called the average American who differs from the people who don’t care because they actually believe that Saddam might come and steal them from their beds, or at least the oil out of their SUVs.

This is about 30 percent of the total 55, leaving us with 10 percent of Americans that support this war for good cause, what they see as just reasoning and with honest conviction. This is the 10 percent I want to know, this is the 10 percent that might actually give me an honest answer to what good might a war actually do.