The former allows a cover against criminal charges universally. The latter avoids oversight by Congress in that its role to declare war and superintend the process is stymied by the abstraction of the adversary.
Barack Obama has done his share - his Nobel Peace Prize lecture was on "just war".
Worldwide, corporate speak has acted to cloud our minds.
When the goal is to exert control over a profession - education, say, or healthcare - the buzz word "reform" emerges with inherent connotations of improvement. In practice, "re-form" means restructuring of authority which may not ultimately be an improvement but a hindrance to professionals whose autonomy and creativity is surrendered to management.
In the process, words such as "conservative" are hollowed out of meaning. "Conservative" was understood to embody caution and the necessity of keeping things unchanged.
It was Edmund Burke, father of modern conservatism, who said: "When it's not necessary to do something, it's necessary to do nothing."
Today so-called conservative governments are quick to promote extraction of minerals from earth without safeguards; endorse exploration of fossil fuels from our oceans. Influenced by fossil fuel companies, conservative governments stand opposed to measures designed to save the planet from the destructive consequences of past human activity.
Conservative governments - his progeny unrecognisable to Burke - promote economic policies which have the short-term goal of maximising corporate profit to the long-term expense of general citizenry with resultant increase in economic inequality, thereby threatening democracy itself. In short, such governments have become the opposite of conservative. They've become immoderate and reckless risk-takers, unmindful of future consequence.
Locally, the word "zombie", as applied to this city, invited a lot of heat and perhaps even a little light. My OED defines "zombie" as a soulless corpse, revived by the witchcraft of voodoo cults. Or a dull apathetic person. Whatever the problems we face as a city, we can by no means be described by the terms of those definitions. Not soulless, dead or dull.
The notion that our city has floundered and that central government policies of fostering the urban centres and de-emphasising the regions are increasing unemployment and stagnation is not new, even including this columnist's sometime Cassandra-like warnings.
What's new is the degree of passion evoked by "zombie". From across our diversity of population and ethnicity came pushback of high order. The energy derived from that level of emotional defence of Whanganui needs to be harnessed in a community-wide effort to reinvigorate our small factories, our health care and educational facilities, our normally vibrant arts community.
While we shouldn't have needed the insult of being called "zombies", perhaps Shamubeel Eaqub will have ultimately done us a favour. Not by reviving us, because we don't need reviving and he's not a powerful witch. Rather his "zombie" calling is a wake-up call.
It can be a waking to our genuine potential while refusing, through critical thinking, the lulling sleep of manipulative language. "Regionalisation" is just another word for urbanisation at our expense.
Jay Kuten is an American-trained forensic psychiatrist who emigrated to New Zealand for the fly fishing. He spent 40 years comforting the afflicted and intends to spend the rest afflicting the comfortable.
