What The Serfs Should Know

I’m eternally grateful that curious and justice-minded Edward Snowden grew to adulthood without becoming jaded, wedded to power and position, or prescribed into numbness by ubiquitous authority.

His less than stellar performance within the public schooling machine was an early cause for celebration. Despite his nonconformity in state schools – or perhaps because of it, Snowden was and is very interested in serving his country and fellow man.

Believing his country needed him in the military, he enlisted and tried to get through some serious combat training. Perversely, his broken legs in training probably preserved his moral compass. Early on, he noticed his military instructors were more interested in getting trainees to enthusiastically kill Middle Easterners than in preserving and securing the country. This makes sense. Expeditionary volunteer forces, mercenaries for an empire, whatever you want to call the modern American standing army, must emphasize the attractiveness and the excitement of the fight rather than the necessity of it. To do otherwise would be self-defeating and hypocritical. To admit the truth beforehand would be harmful to recruitment, as much as record suicide rates do after recruitment.

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