"Nuke 'em all!"--my mother-in-law and the power of the media

Easter dinner at my mother-in-law's got a bit exciting yesterday. My mother-in-law is a caring, lovely person. She is not much of a political analyst but, to her credit, hates Bush, has a jaundiced view of government in general, and gets most of her news from Jon Stewart on the "Daily Show." She is also very open to hearing rants from her son and myself about the criminal nature of the cabal that has captured our government.

So imagine my shock when the subject of Iraq came up last night and my teenage nephew brought up the subject of the four contractors who had been brutally murdered, and wondered whether we should use a tactical nuke in Fallujah. My m-i-l got very agitated and started shouting, "I think we should nuke 'em all!" She was yelling about what brutal animals they were, and about the threat to burn the Japanese hostages alive.

I got just a wee bit upset in response, and reminded her that we should never have been in Iraq-- which she agrees with-- that if our country was being invaded we would have a right to fight back, and that there were THOUSANDS of Iraqi children and other civilians being MURDERED by our government, in our name, and that Faux News --which my nephew had on-- NEVER showed those pictures.

She cooled down and said of course she didn't really mean it, but I was left pondering the incredible bias of our media, and the fact that, instead of being repulsed by the carnage we have unleashed, many people who are glued to their TVs are just looking at us as the victims and them as the beasts. Depressing lesson for an Easter afternoon.

good, well-meaning people watch because they think it's 'news' and they get brain-washed

the typical american reaction.
and as toni morrison pointed out it's a lazy one.
you don't have to think if your response to difficult, painful, critical situations is to lash out with everything you've got.
american's are fatally flawed in this regard -- john wayne wins over martin luther king jr. every time.
i'm glad you were able to bring her back to the light.

edit: that would be john not jobn

I know she probably "really" didn't mean it. But why do so many people say that so easily? Kill em all or bomb em as an emotional response, but "nuke em"? To want to use a nuclear weapon in an area that has so many civilians, old people, children. I just don't understand how that much hatred could come out of someone's mouth and heart. Saddam wasn't even killed and he was supposed to be Hitler Part 2.

You can literally talk to certain people and, within the course of 5 minutes, have them agreeing totally with you about the utter depravity of this junta, and then in the next breath they come out with something about terrorism or the military that shows that part of their brain has been captured by the dark side.

Makes my head spin. . .

They are pretty non political. They would call themselves independents but probably don't vote.

My mother in law, while we were discussing how awful things are in Iraq right now, said: "They are so ungrateful. America is just there to help them and they don't appreciate that at all."

I went ballistic. You can't expect them to forgive and forget when we come over there with guns ablaze and kill their children to get rid of the guy we put in power. She backed down. (Note to self: I might have been more effective had I not started ranting. I think I scared her into submission.)

The good news? Sister in law is active in the PTA and HATES the no child left behind law. Is furious over it.

And, as we were saying goodbye at our cars, SIL said "we need to buy smaller cars and break our dependence on oil from the middle east ("without drilling in Alaska" my BIL piped in) or we will be fighting with them forever. My next car will be a mini or a hybrid." (I was shocked as I looked over a driveway full of huge cars.)

When my niece said she was an independent I said "what does that mean" and she said she liked some of the things about dems and some of the positions of the republicans. I said what do you like about the republicans? All morning she thought about it and as I was leaving she said "I can't think of a thing I admire about the GOP. I guess I'm really a dem." I said "and you tell people you are an indenpendent for social acceptance which is a horrid reason. Come out of the closet and learn to stand up for your beliefs." She nodded enthusiastically.

This is the same niece who in 2000 announced she was voting for Bush (her then current boyfriend was voting Bush). I took them both on and she called me the day of the election to tell me she had voted for Gore.

We just got to keep on 'em.

"The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers." Princess Leia to Governor Tarkin.