... a lot of folks don't put the onus on the US working class and artificially attribute it to some corporate "other" that manages to run US foreign policy apparently without any interference by the actual voters.
I now write:
I more or less agree with this. Which is precisely why I'm not terribly forgiving when I see these populist outbursts of flag-waving and other forms of national chauvinism (notwithstanding the fact that the flag is a fungible symbol and can mean different things to different people and different social groups). Since I don't view members of the working class simply as a host of misled dupes, but as people who are in some sense _studiously ignorant_ about the depredations of U.S. foreign policy, I am less hopeful of building a bona fide mass anti-war movement. It will probably take a steady stream of U.S. soldiers in coffins to mount mass opposition to the emergent "war on terrorism," and for the U.S. anyway this promises to be another series of military (as well as diplomatic, secret op, etc.) actions with a very "favorable" "kill ratio."
In some respects, I also agree with you that tactically it makes sense to not dwell too heavily on a causal anaylsis of why Sept 11 happened ... but one weakness of this approach is that the same precise U.S. policies which "indirectly contributed" to Sept 11 (money and logistical support for the mujahidin) are being replayed as I write (the U.S. boosting the Northern Alliance). Which goes to show that the "war on terrorism" is not simply a "war on terrorism" at all but tied up with the usual games of geopolitics and economic imperialism and hegemonism. I think the great mass of the U.S. still thinks this is about retaliation for Sept 11 and don't see the bigger picture, which is not to say that they will oppose U.S. foreign policy in significantly greater numbers if they had a better command of the facts.
John Gulick