Civilian Bombing or Tactical Airstrikes?

While watching "People's Century" on Friday about civilian bombing, it was clear where the line was between military and civilian bombing (at least as clear as it can get). Bombing by both sides during WWII included heavy focus on non-military targets, heavily populated cities with no significant military value, to 'break the will to continue'. Here the line between the two was distinguishable, but since then it has become more and more unclear where military battles end and civilian bombing begins. In Vietnam forests were burned to the ground to chase out the enemy, in Korea the situation was very similar. And in Afghanistan NATO forces carry out 'strategic' air-strikes meant to pinpoint and destroy the enemy. But when the enemy is barely distinguishable and living amongst innocent people, is it civilian bombing? How does a military deal with an enemy who lives and blends in with civilians to deter attack? While it is true that NATO uses the most advanced weapons to make the most of each strike by killing the most amount of enemy, least amount of civilians, using the least amount of explosive, these strikes hardly leave the innocent untouched. We occasionally hear of air strikes missing a target and killing innocent Afghans, but what of the rest, the supposedly 'unharmed'?  Dropping 20,000 lbs of explosive will undoubtedly effect anyone living within a mile of the blast. The innocent population lives in fear and stress of the possibility of being bombed at any time, and ruled by insurgents. But if NATO troops were sent in, the situation could turn into a nightmare of not knowing enemy from civilian and going on a goose chase facing a higher death toll than bombing. So the question is, when does tactical bombing become civilian bombing if only insurgents are targeted?

The Original is Always Better

After reading Zoo Story and getting past the initial creepiness I felt, I decided I really liked the short play and wanted to find out more about this Edward Albee whom I had heard so little about before now. So after a quick search on Google and found a plethora of results. Many of them were about Zoo Story and a recent addition by Albee of a second act. The article I ended up in described the new act as a prequel, which opens before the scene we all know and takes place in Peter's house with his "pleasant looking, unexceptional" wife. This prequel is supposed to shed light on Peter's life, but I say, do we really need to know more about Peter's life? He was created to be a pretty unexceptional, middle-class guy whose story we are all familiar with. Even his name, Peter, was made to make him out to be an average guy. Jerry is supposed to be the one whose life is interesting and full of substance, a life too many people like Peter who live in their own bubbles fail to understand. So exploring Peter's life further seems frankly to be a waste of time since we already have a pretty clear understanding and perception of his life, just as Jerry does. In fact, I think it detracts from the value of Peter as a generic middle-class character. By creating him as such a common American ideal life, Albee made Peter into someone that could easily represent many of us or someone we all know. But when his life is explored, you lose some of that generic, mediocre feeling that Jerry indirectly accuses him of being. I think Zoo story is better off without this prequel, and glad that we read the original, the 'good one'.

The Heart of America

After this unit on affluence and poverty, and especially after the artifact 'Roger and Me', it has become apparent to me just how important cars are to Americans. The unit has almost been about the automobile the same as it has been about privilege and affluence. Few, if any, Americans since the beginning of the 20th century have lived their lives without being substantially effected by a car. It is even said that an American remembers two things for their whole life; their first love, and their first car. In many people's cases it is sure to be the same thing. The Roaring twenties were fueled by the industry of the automobile, many people's last hope lay in their car during the depression, and even in 'The Great Gatsby' the automobile played a large role. So what happens when such an important part of America fails? Unsurprisingly, you dont need to look any farther than today's news. GM and Ford crowd the headlines paired with extremely large sums of money, if the American car company were to fail, what would we do with ourselves? 'Roger and Me' documents that case of 'what if', if only on a small scale. But multiply that nationwide, and you have a very very serious problem on our hands. Michigan, the nearly former car center of the world, is one of the hardest hit areas of the country, with a 12% unemployment rate. And the scenes of 'Roger and me' and even 'semi-pro' from the streets of flint have spread throughout Michigan. So when it comes to the question of "what are we supposed to do with these failing former goliaths?" We can use Flint, Detriot, and the rest of Michigan as an example of what America can become if we let such important aspects of Americana fail. So the Automobile may not be the heart of the American economy, but it for sure is one of the critical organs, maybe the liver, or the stomach, or muscles. And AIG can unfortunately be the heart.