We lose our soul.

Losing Our Soul
With anti-miscegenation laws still on the books in some states, the United States entered the 1960s hopeful in its fight for civil rights for all of its citizens. A Catholic president, John F. Kennedy, had been elected, some say against all odds. A black Civil Rights leader, Martin Luther King Jr., had risen to prominence, using the non-violent techniques of Ghandi to challenge racism. The brother of the President, Robert Kennedy, took charge of the Justice Department, as Attorney General, promising equality for all citizens. Within eight years, each man would be assassinated.
And now, the United States is thinking of overturning President Gerald Ford’s ban on political assassinations of leaders of other countries. If the ban is nullified, who will decide which political leaders to kill? The President? The Congress? The CIA?
When he left office in 1961, then President Dwight D. Eisenhower from Kansas gave his famous Farewell Address, and issued a stern warning to the country. “We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” Was he also warning us about the dangers of political assassination, a style of government the new President, John Kennedy, would label “Murder Incorporated” before he himself would be assassinated?
Documents released under the Freedom of Information Act have revealed the plans for political assassinations of foreign leaders during the 1950s. And once the approval for such acts was given, only the means and methods remained to be discussed. PBSUCCESS, allegedly authorized by President Eisenhower in 1953 for use in Guatemala, discussed the weapons to be used in the killing and admonished, “Death must be absolutely certain.” The weapons suggested were the following: “bare hands, accidents, drugs, edge weapons, blunt weapons, firearms, and explosives.” For each weapon, exact methods were suggested for maximum effect.
The manual reads like a captured Taliban document, when it targets non-combatants and seems to approve war crimes. Through the years, attacks or assassinations were planned or carried out on Fidel Castro, Patrice Lumumba, Salvador Allende, Rafael Trujillo, Che Guevera and possibly others.
The 1960s began in hope but ended in assassinations and hate crimes. While Eisenhower hoped that we “would not mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without asking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage,” he also urged us to “avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate.”
A return to assassination politics would certainly be a return to fear and hate. While the War in Iraq winds down, we seem to be targeting other leaders, other countries. Political assassinations are being discussed more openly in our society and many citizens approve such methods. In our haste for revenge, we seem to be forgetting Eisenhower’s words regarding the purpose of our free government: “to enhance the liberty, dignity and integrity among peoples and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free and religious people.”
The approval of a policy of assassination flies in the face of our democracy and international law. And in adopting such a policy, we might once again, as we did in the 1960s, find these tactics and techniques turned against our own leaders.