The insignia of the “American Eagle,” head facing “toward the olive branch,” “advocating peace rather than war,” is an illusion, no more a reality than that unrealized ideal - American Democracy. There is, however, a more appropriate representation of the American Eagle as seen and experienced by a majority of the world and as depicted by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is not an ideal symbol but one far more accurate. In this representation, the American Eagle is “an enormous specimen…with outspread wings, a shield before her breast [and] a bunch of intermingled thunderbolts and barbed arrows in each claw.”

“With the customary infirmity of temper that characterizes this unhappy fowl, she appears, by the fierceness of her beak and eye and the general truculency (sic) of her attitude, to threaten mischief to the inoffensive community; and especially to warn all citizens, careful of their safety, against intruding on the premises which she overshadows with her wings...[M]any people are seeking…to shelter themselves under the wing of the federal eagle; imagining…that her bosom has all the softness and snugness of an eider-down pillow. But she has no great tenderness, even in her best moods...” (The Scarlet Letter)

“Let the Eagle Soar”…”like she never soared before...” sang former U.S. Attorney General, John Ashcroft.

The old symbol of the American Eagle faded in the Philippines and then again in Japan. It faded even more in Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq (1991). The old symbol of the American Eagle, looking toward the olive branch, went up in flames on September 11, 2001.

The U.S. government’s catastrophic response to a non-peaceful response was unequivocal.

The Elephants and Donkeys, representing U.S. leadership, can no longer control the American Eagle. They sing to the new symbol, the Eagle of thunderbolts and arrows, and make it clear that peace is no longer an option, if it ever was an option.

Today, the American Eagle refuses calls from a Dennis Kucinich or a Barbara Lee or a Cindy Sheehan or Cynthia McKinney. This bird of prey could never hear the voice of a Howard Zinn. It answers only the corporate warlords and, as such, it is no longer concerned with concealing the objectives of the U.S.

The American Eagle of thunderbolts and arrows symbolizes the world’s most notorious warlords, for her interests are the interests of the corporate warlords, and as such, she is not of nature, this bird of prey that creates thunderous crises to enrich bankers and corporate warlords while aiming arrows at the Earth and its inhabitants to stifle life.

The American Eagle most of us know is a creation of the “free market revolution” (Peter McLaren) that has left “the social infrastructure of the United States [and the world] in tatters [and the] ‘military-industrial-financial interests’” sucking the “lifeblood” (Che Guevara, Paulo Freire, and the Pedagogy of Revolution) from workers and the poor. There is nothing of “tenderness” in this bird of prey.

She cannot keep the world safe because she does not intend to do so. That is not her assigned mission in the world. To use Peter McLaren’s words, the American Eagle’s goal is to “democratize suffering, obliterate hope, and assassinate justice” here and abroad.

In the meantime, the American Eagle takes flight daily, shaped as a drone here and a Tomahawk missile there and a taser blast in passing on urban streets in the U.S. On her daily runs, she inflicts as much terror as she can muster - and in plain sight, dominating the airwaves with images of spectacle feats, particularly when she landed in Pakistan May 1, 2011, hurling thunderbolts and arrows and peck at the target of all targets - not Osama bin Laden!

No, not bin Laden. This mission for the bird of prey, codename “Geronimo” Geronimo!, led by the U.S. Navy’s “legendary” Seal Team Six (ST6) or the Navel Special Warfare Development Group (if you are looking for the transparent title), cornered and then killed the world’s #1 terrorist, Osama Bin Laden, according to BBC News. He is dead. This time, we guess. Let us focus on the Navel Special Warfare Development Group, (not the gruesome pictures), but the guys, the Seals, with “gifted eyesight, above average intelligence, and [who] are genetically built to withstand a lot of punishment…Those are the guys that are qualified to get in but the guys that ultimately come out are thoroughbreds, they’re racehorses.” The American Eagle today would not settle for less!

 

For the Free Republic and other State media outlets, ST6 guys are “bad asses.” The BBC News again: “They’re the finest guys America has. Your average guy walking down the street just doesn’t have it.” Well, no. Tough is just not good enough!

 

I overheard a young Black librarian say that he wished he has been on that team, confronting the “rag head.” And the people gathered in New York and in Washington to cheer, chanted: U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

“When fascism comes to America, it will come wrapped in an American flag,” (Sinclair Lewis, It Can't Happen Here).

The “death” of bin Laden scores a “victory” for the Donkey - but the American Eagle will not stop flying anytime soon. War in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and Libya will go on. Business as usual, but the war against the working class is stepping up even more because all along the target of this American Eagle has been her people, her workers, her poor, her incarcerated, her children. But, then, she is a creation not of this Earth. Her offspring can only breed evil!

No, the American Eagle’s latest and cruelest crusade on behalf of the corporate capitalist warlords, strikes down social services and civil liberties - justifying the necessity for massive security measures ending in “targeted” raids by the “finest guys American has.” Now, in this strange universe, the Elephants and the Donkeys openly quip - our base consists of the “haves and have mores” (Bush Jr.), “fine guys” (Obama) as fine as the ST6 killing machine, the Tomahawk missiles, the drones - “thoroughbreds” and “racehorses” all!

Nothing galvanizes a collective more than a symbol to join disparate classes and racial groups in identifying with its oppressors!

But the events of September 11, 2001 liberated moral regulations against the use of COINTELPRO tactics that once hovered around dissenting communities in the Americas. In its darkened corners, darkened by the presence of the Iron Heel, people once necessary for the development and growth of the U.S. economy and who demanded rights, were treated to the “shock and awe” of regime change not limited to democratically-elected leaders, but also including community activists and internationally recognized leaders committed to the poor and working class. On-going repressive tactics stifle resistance and thought and has resulted in severely restricting the development and growth of the masses of Red, Black, and Brown people. An ever daily reminder remains: The Iron Heel crushes what the American Eagle pecks at to fuel her flights.

Few outside those communities recognized that the U.S. government’s catastrophic response to a peaceful response (non-violent efforts of the protesters) was unequivocal. Long ago, from his perch in Massachusetts, Hawthorne’s America was engulfed in the flames of genocide and slavery, and he witnessed a nation giving birth to the eaglet that would become the corporate warlords’ symbol of triumph.

Evil can disguise itself as evil these days when the thunderbolts and arrows are cheered!

Citizen warning: terrorists could retaliate! Be wary of your neighbors, your co-workers, your friends not chanting U.S.A!

But the “fierceness” the American Eagle’s “beak and eye” and the “general truculency (sic) of her attitude” do not fool everyone!

BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board member, Lenore Jean Daniels, PhD, has a Doctorate in Modern American Literature/Cultural Theory. Click here to contact Dr. Daniels.