Wars We Probably Can't Win

We are a nation that likes to fight wars, or at least to call the fights we take on wars. We do seem to like to fight the real wars as well, in our nation's history, we have fought the War For Independence, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the War Between the States, the Spanish-American War, the Great War, the Second World War, the Korean War, Vietnam War, Persian Gulf War, and the current wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Many so-called neo-cons are hell bent on starting a new war against Iran, and if John McCain is somehow elected as our 44th president in November, the likelihood of that happening increases exponentially. Something about being a prisoner of war that apparently makes you a military genius and qualified to send other people's sons and husbands, daughters and mothers off to battle. Not even counting the Cold War or the War on Terrorism, which are not traditional wars but which require a great deal of time, energy, and resources to wage, we have, by my unofficial count fought in or are currently fighting in twelve wars in the 233 years since the shot heard 'round the world went off by the rude bridge that arched the flood in Concord, MA. That's an average of one war every 19 years, or roughly one per generation.



But we also wage wars on things, such as communism or terrorism, not to mention the wars that don't require M-16's and tanks to fight, and those wars are the topic of today's discussion. The wars I have in mind are the War on Poverty, the War on Drugs, and the War on Obesity. These are all battles that should be fought, but that quite frankly do not seem likely to produce victories anytime in the near future. That is not to say they shouldn't be waged, but I would like to look at the obstacles to success in these endeavors.

Let's start with poverty, since this is the longest running war we have going, not quite 100 years but long enough that you would think it would make John McCain proud. Started in the 1960's, it is now nearing the end of its fifth decade. If I was writing this for publication somewhere I would no doubt do some research and look at poverty rate statistics and the like, but since this is mostly a mental exercise and a chance to share my ideas with my small group of loyal readers, I will go with anecdotal evidence and general impressions. Certainly anyone out there with harder facts is more than welcome to add your two cents to the discussion. My general impression is that there really hasn't been great progress in this war in many ways. While I think the poor are better off from a material standpoint today, cell phones, designer jeans, expensive shoes, Ipods, and other trappings of middle class life were commonplace in my classroom working down in the 'hood for the last six years, they still mostly live a culturally poor existence in neighborhoods that you and I wouldn't want to be caught in after dark, and go to schools we wouldn't send our own kids to under any circumstances. This may sound insensitive and if it is then so be it, it is based on my observations during my time working in South Phoenix, which is the South Central or East L.A. of Phoenix. The main reason we have poverty is because of poor people. While there are certainly exceptions to the rule, the rule is that most of the people I encountered, while good natured and kind hearted, are not terribly interested in rising out of poverty, at least if their actions are any indication.

Many kids do not attend school regularly, and not only are their parents not scolding them for doing so, in many cases it is the parents who are keeping them from school, requiring them to stay home to babysit younger siblings or to attend to other more pressing concerns. Which gets me to my next problem, the incredibly high teen pregnancy rate. There is very little shame in the barrio when a teenage girl gets pregnant, it has become such a common occurrence and is so accepted that nobody even blinks an eye. Kids are having sex like rabbits, which is probably not all that different than it is for middle class kids, but apparently they aren't getting the memo about using some kind of birth control. On average we would have 25-40 pregnancies each school year, out of a population of around 200-250 girls. Do the math on that one at your own peril, it's astounding to me. When I was in high school I remember two girls in four years that got pregnant, and they were both sent away somewhere. I had generally at least one pregnant girl in every class I taught, sometimes more. One of my star soccer players had a baby with one ex-girlfriend, another ex-girlfriend pregnant, and he was going out with a third girlfriend. And you thought only NBA players got busy like that. Black people overwhelmingly oppose abortion, and Latinos overwhelmingly think they are still living in a pre-industrial society where large families are desired, combine those two factors with loads of carefree and apparently unprotected sex and you have alot of babies being born out of wedlock to kids who can barely even take care of themselves. Is it realistic to expect people in such circumstances, uneducated and overpopulated, to lift themselves up by their bootstraps? All the well meaning programs in the world can't help people that aren't capable or are unwilling to help themselves.

Ditto for drug users and the obese. If people are unwilling to tend to their own problems, all the wars in the world won't do much good. We see a similar occurrence in Iraq, where Sunnis and Shiites seem hell bent on blowing each other to smithereens in order to protect their own and retaliate against the other group. Sure, Catholics and Protestants did the same thing, but that was 300 years ago! If people are too lazy and undisciplined to put down the crack pipe, needle or bong, and too uninspired to lay off the McDonald's and other horrendous foods that are out there for the taking, what chance does any kind of war on drugs or obesity have of succeeding? To my way of thinking the answer is, not very much. I'm not saying we should throw in the towel, but we should be realistic about the chances for success. You can enlighten people by educating them, you can give them the tools to do what is in their best interests, but as they old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink. Similarly, you can offer someone a free high school and college education, a condom, sobriety, and some fresh fruits and veggies, but you can't make them take it or use it.