Winston Churchill Bush? Nah. Guess Again.
George W. Bush’s all-in gamble of other people’s stakes in Iraq has become the mother of all disasters. Even relatively conservative members of the Washington establishment have labeled it the biggest foreign policy debacle in American history. Heck, even Henry Kissinger has consigned it to Bummerville. If you’re a Republican president, you know you’re hurting when your foreign adventure is too stinky for even the likes of Kissinger - a guy who hardly ever met an American invasion he didn’t applaud.
Indeed, so ugly is the situation in Iraq, there’s just about only one good thing that can still be said about it, which is that it is not yet nearly as bad as it could turn out to be. One country has been destroyed and turned into a textbook case of a failed state. Perhaps a million of its people have been murdered, several million more have departed as refugees from the violence, and there are now multiple civil wars going on, alongside other wars between Americans and Iraqi forces and militias and al Qaeda elements. Could even Hobbes have envisioned this Hell? Probably not. Probably it’s more Dali’s speed.
But that’s the good news, ladies and gentlemen. The bad news is that the potential for this first-class debacle to go world-class is quite significant. Among the possible exponential exacerbations we’re staring at here is the potential to bring on World War III, pitting Sunnis versus Shiites in a Muslim version of Christianity’s devastating Thirty Years’ War between Catholics and Protestants. Fortunately, only some of those countries have nukes, so we can all breathe a big sigh of relief there. And now that gasoline prices have doubled in the United States, it’s also not hard to envision a serious global depression whacking industrialized countries everywhere, not unlike the effects produced when OPEC cranked down on the spigot twice in the 1970s.
So, in short, there are basically two possible outcomes here. Iraq either turns out to be just a giant disaster, or - instead - it becomes an epic disaster. A thing of biblical proportions. Something for people to fight over two thousand years from now.
This, of course, leaves certain folks in a rather uncomfortable position - namely, George W. Bush and the conservative clones who have celebrated his depravities. In order to avoid appearing (at least to themselves - most of the rest of us are not fooled) as the purveyors of catastrophe they actually are, they are desperately scrambling to find some sort of cover for their cataclysmic foreign policy disasters.
These face-saving inanities take multiple forms, but the leading explanation offered by Bush and his neocon acolytes for their grand failure is that it is actually a brave success that historians will later recognize, even if we wimpy appeasers of the present tense lack the wisdom to recognize Great George’s leadership, courage and prescience.
The model for this, of course, is Winston Churchill, who got a lot of things wrong in his political career, but managed to get one big thing right. While the rest of the world was either admiring Hitler or hoping that if they pretended hard enough he’d just go away, Churchill identified - accurately and early - what was perhaps the greatest menace in human history.
Now comes George W. Bush, comparing himself to Churchill, believing that he (almost) alone recognizes the new epochal peril, and that his policies in Iraq and elsewhere will be judged by history just as Churchill’s lonely vigil of the 1930s has been, despite - or especially because of - the effete public indifference during our time to the grave existential threat only the solitary seer Bush wisely divines. Laughable, eh? It’s actually even worse than that. At least Churchill never claimed - that I know of - that god told him to go fight Hitler. Not so Bush, who has said that his “higher father” told him, “George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq”. Probably you think I’m making this up, huh? I wish.
Apart from the effect that such a comparison to Churchill has of causing legions of people to fall off their chairs in shock and hurt themselves (could that be part of their secret plan for defeating progressives and other thinking members of the species?), this claim has all sorts of logic problems associated with it. Not that either logic nor fact matter any more to our good friends of the post-empirical right, but for those of us still proudly inhabiting the “reality-based community”, a little analysis of this proposition might prove more than a bit enlightening (which is precisely why the other guys find it so very frightening).
So let’s unpack this hail-mary desperation pass attempt at saving the right’s reputation, and see what we find. And what we find are a whole bunch of built-in assumptions that we’re not supposed to question. There’s very good reason for that, of course. The notion of Bush as some sort of latter-day Churchill unravels faster than Jerry Falwell’s soul went south if one departs even slightly from gross superficialities to examine these assumptions.
We have, unfortunately, to start with the assumption that 9/11 was perpetrated by bin Laden and his merry band of jihadists. Most Americans can’t even go there, but if you do, you find that - at the very least - the story told to us by the government as to who did 9/11 (and, more importantly, who didn’t), and how, is chock full of some jaw-dropping anomalies and enormously suspicious behaviors. I’m not prepared to render a verdict on what happened that awful day - and neither are the best scholars on the subject, whose commitment to truth and integrity rightly constrains them from making conclusions which out-run the presently available facts, however tempting such determinations may be. But I would say that there is enough in question from what I’ve read to wonder about the deepest assumption of all - that we’ve even attacked the proper enemy, on any of the fronts of the so-called “war on terror”.
Which brings us to the second great assumption - this one patently bogus - that the war should be against terrorism in the first place. Terrorism is a tool, a weapon, a strategy - and one, by the way, which is almost always employed by the weakest of adversaries, who would otherwise be using conventional weaponry if they had it. So why fight a weapon, rather than those who wield it? If our enemy chose a different weapon, would we be okay with them killing us, as long as it wasn’t by terrorism? And what about when we use terrorism, or Israelis do, or when we harbor an admitted terrorist from extradition? Isn’t it odd that we haven’t been called to a war against al Qaeda (whom we don’t even seem to be concerned about anymore, anyhow) or even Islamofascism? Yes it very much is, but only until you realize that the broader rubric of a supposed war on terror gives you better leverage for selling a war in Iraq that was pre-planned well before 9/11. Then it makes perfect sense.
Third, is Islamofascism really a threat to the United States? Probably, yes, at some level. But the insanity of gun policy in this country takes out ten times the number of people killed in the 9/11 attack, every single year. Cigarettes claim more than one hundred times the three thousand lives lost on September 11th, year in, year out. And while I might actually favor sending the Marines in to invade the NRA building or RJ Reynolds boardroom, I never hear the Bush crowd doing anything other than helping these guys pimp their death machines. So, yeah, there are enemies to America’s health and welfare both at home and abroad, and yeah, we ought to combat them. But we ought to do so in proper proportion to the threat. I do believe that al Qaeda means us harm. But they ain’t Nazi Germany, and this ain’t Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations either, though we can certainly turn it into that if we’re stupid enough. Without question, our invasion of Iraq has pushed us far further down that path than we’ve ever been previously. Even our own intelligence agencies - not exactly bastions of lily-livered, bleeding-heart Neville Chamberlain groupies - have said so. The most credible reckoning recently produced estimates that global terrorism has increased seven-fold since the invasion of Iraq, and in large part because of the invasion of Iraq. If Bush wants to play at being Sir Winston, fine. That makes this his Global Gallipoli.
Next, even if we assume that Islamic radicalism represents a serious enemy for the United States to deal with, the fourth assumption built into the conservative face-saving program is that conventional warfare is the proper strategic response to that threat. So foolish is that assumption that it is hard to imagine it took the Iraq meltdown to make it plain to most Americans. Would anyone believe in advance that you could throw a rock to the moon if you just ate enough Wheaties? Would anyone need to actually test that proposition before dismissing it out of hand? What a surprise, then, to learn from the Washington Post this week that two intelligence assessments from before the invasion predicted chaos in Iraq and a boost to Islamic extremists from the occupation. John Kerry was much ridiculed in 2004 for discussing terrorism as a scourge best (though not exclusively) fought using the tools of intelligence assets and police work. Much as it pains me to say anything nice about Kerry after he ran a campaign so abysmal that it bequeathed us another four years of the Creature from Crawford, in this case he was right.
Fifth, this ridiculous Churchill proposition requires us to assume that any kind of warfare, not just conventional, is the only response to the threat. Bushoids want you to believe that what we do as our country gaily cavorts about the world has nothing to do with the hostility found out there toward the United States. Anytime you hear somebody say something as manifestly absurd as “they hate us for our freedoms” you should immediately have a powerful sense of how bankrupt their casus belli actually is. Is it really imaginable that young people with their whole lives before them would regularly volunteer to blow themselves up into hamburger meat because they’re - what, anyhow? jealous? - of somebody else’s freedoms? I absolutely believe there is plenty of sickness going around amongst Muslim religious radicals. Indeed, I am quite well acquainted with what it looks like from observing our own homegrown religious radicals. But is it such a far fetched idea that Americans would be hated for toppling Middle Eastern governments or propping up brutal and hated puppet regimes in order to drain the region of its one valuable natural resource? (And, no, I’m not thinking of sand.) Is it so absurd to imagine that being the primary sponsor of Israel, and winking as it builds nuclear warheads and colonial settlements in occupied territories, that these aren’t factors driving the hostility America encounters in the Muslim world? And, therefore, would it be such a stretch to reject this assumption that the problem is entirely on their side and can only effectively be countered with more violence? George Bush says yes. In fact, George Bush hopes you’re dumb enough never to even consider the question. My own answer is somewhat different.
He also hopes that you don’t notice what is actually happening in the supposed war on terror. The sixth assumption behind any attempt to equate Bush to Churchill presumes that the former is actually making any sort of serious attempt to deal with terrorists in general, or even just the ones he claims did 9/11. In fact, though, just the opposite is true. He’s even once admitted, regarding bin Laden, “I truly am not that concerned about him”. I would have loved to have been monitoring Ari Fleischer’s EKG when Bush dropped that particular stinker. The poor SOB was probably wondering if there was enough Spic-N-Span in the whole world to clean up that mess. But even leaving rhetoric aside, it’s been clear since 2002 that Bush doesn’t really give a damn about terrorism or even al Qaeda. His long-time obsession has been Iraq and Saddam - neither of which had anything to do with terrorism - and he pulled forces from Afghanistan to indulge that obsession, leaving Osama to roam, and paving the way for a wholesale Taliban/al Qaeda resurgence already rolling across the country. Moreover, he’s never done a damn thing about his pals in the House of Saud, whose relations to Islamic radicalism are far stronger than Saddam’s ever were. Sorry, man, but here’s the deal: If you’re gonna claim that you’re Churchill incarnate, you can’t be doing the WWII equivalent of indulging your personal obsession over Finland, while the Wehrmacht rolls across France, Poland and the rest of Europe.
Which brings us to an entire series of assumptions about the Iraq war, none of which bear any relationship to the truth, whatsoever. If Bush is Churchillian, then Iraq had to have had something to do with Islamofascism. In fact, it actually did, in an inverse way. The guy we removed and replaced with a Category Five Hurricane happened to have feared and loathed al Qaeda types a lot more than we actually do. That is, not only did Iraq have nothing to do with 9/11, but Saddam hated al Qaeda more than we do. Hey, what’s that old line about your enemy’s enemy?
If Bush is a great leader navigating his nation through the perilous waters of mortal danger, based on his uniquely prescient grand vision, then his claim that we only invaded Iraq because he had no choice has to be true. In fact, it is preposterous. We know for a fact that the Bush team knew Iraq was no serious threat. We know for a fact that they had decided long prior to the actual invasion that they were going in, but pretended to still be keeping all the options open, saying they hoped to avoid war. We know for a fact that they were never serious about the WMD inspections, and indeed had only even called for them in order to “wrongfoot” Saddam into rejecting them and thus providing the necessary pretext for a war they craved. We know that it was a lie of the most obscene proportions to claim that we couldn’t have waited another month or two for the inspectors to finish their jobs, so urgent was the Iraqi threat. (All this while North Korea actually exploding a real nuclear warhead produced only endless diplomatic kabuki dances of surreal non-confrontation.) For Bush to be a great visionary of geopolitics whose learned scholarship (imagine using that phrase in the same sentence as this president’s name) and heightened powers of perception prepared him to see what we mere mortals do not, all of these assumptions must prove true about Iraq. In fact, none of them are remotely truthful, nor was there ever anything remotely accidental about their falsity.
But Bush is also the commander-in-chief, regardless of whether history should somehow someday declare him visionary-in-chief. Even if we assume that by some miracle he manages to achieve that latter reputation, can you imagine what will be said of his management of this war? Even if we were to leave aside the fact that his entire legacy is irrevocably joined at the hip to the war’s outcome, it nevertheless remains astonishing how badly Bush has bungled this initiative at every conceivable juncture. From sending in insufficient forces, to allowing looting, to putting complete know-nothing sycophantic boobs in charge of the occupation, to staffing the CPA with an entire legion of more know-nothing sycophantic boobs chosen for their loyalty to the Republican party, to the wholesale dismissal of the Iraqi Army, to alienating friend and adversary alike across the planet, to bungling every rebuilding project while permitting war profiteering American (not Iraqi) contractors to clean out the Treasury - is there anything at all these guys got right in Iraq? This has been a four year long Three Stooges movie. With blood.
Finally, of course, for Bush to be judged by history to have been the Churchill of our time, he bears the burden of showing that his Iraq adventure has left his country more safe, rather than less. This is manifestly not true, and it will become significantly less true as the months tick down to January 2009 when we are rid of this right rollicking cock up of a pretend president, this American Janjaweed, blighting his global sandbox at every turn. Leaving aside the moral balance sheet, the war has already cost half a trillion dollars, and even if it were to end now, the costs in sustained medical care, lost contributions to the economy and the replenishment of war materiel will be staggering, perhaps two trillion altogether, according to the most scholarly estimate. Meanwhile, the Army and the Marines are wrecked, 3,400 good people the less, ten or twenty thousand more gravely wounded, and recruitment is increasingly dependent on lowered standards and increased bonuses. American good will and credibility are spent across the planet. Only six years ago we were the object of near universal affection and sympathy. Now we are hated. Meanwhile, at home, America has never been so badly divided since the last time our presidents lied us into a major war.
In sum, Bush and his army of Stepford robots may think he is the next coming of Sir Winston, but that last-ditch effort to fool us and - especially - themselves depends on a huge series of false assumptions. We have to believe the many absurdities about who did 9/11, how, and why. We have to believe that a ‘war on terror’ is the appropriate response to such an attack. We have to believe that such a war effort has been proportionate to the threat involved, and that the use of massed conventional forces is the best way to fight that war. Indeed, we have to believe that war itself - as opposed to policy changes - is the only appropriate response to such a threat. We have to believe that the US is actually fighting such a war, and that it is winning it. And last, to buy this insulting analogy one has to believe that all the fairytales we’ve been told about Iraq are true, and that in addition to the war having been an absolute necessity, it is being managed well, and is succeeding in improving America’s national security.
But none of this is true. None of it. And therefore neither is it true that George W. Bush is some sort of Churchillian visionary whose keen intellect and learned wisdom allows him to perceive an existential threat that you and I somehow cannot see. How blotto do you have to be to envision that absurd scenario? How falling-down wrecked do we all have to get to blur our eyes sufficiently to see this little punk - lazier and less intellectually engaged than any president in American history - as remotely thoughtful and informed, let alone prescient?
Which brings me to one other thing. In addition to being a famous statesman, Winston Churchill was also a scholar of great repute. George Bush, on the other hand, got “gentleman’s C’s” in college (which means he actually got F’s before his daddy stepped in and bought him a GPA).
Winston Churchill won the Nobel Prize in Literature, and wrote his monumental “History of the English-Speaking Peoples”. It’s hard to imagine George Bush even speaking English to people.
Sorry, Fool. I can’t say that I served with Winston Churchill. I didn’t know Winston Churchill. Winston Churchill was not a friend of mine. Still, one thing is abundantly clear: You’re no Winston Churchill.
Hell, you’re not even a Dan Quayle.
David Michael Green is a professor of political science at
Bingo.
Excellent….Excellent….Excellent….
No doubt about it David Michael Green walks on water….
Great post.
As I was reading it, I couldn’t help thinking of Kurt Vonnegut’s last visit to the Daily Show during which he said he thought it was just terrible that everyone kept saying such bad things about our president. So, in typical Vonnegut fashion, he said he was going to say something nice about our president. And here is the nice thing he had to say, “George Bush is not the most stupid leader we have in Washington. Donald Rumsfeld is the most stupid leader we have in Washington.”
But now that Rumsfeld is gone, there’s probably not much else nice to say about our president. And perhaps he is now, in fact, the most stupid “leader” we have in Washington.
bush is not a leader. bush is not the President. The entire bush Klan needs to be rounded up and dropped off in Iraq.
“Those who are truthful, nonviolent and brave do not cease to be so because of the stupidity of their leader.”
Mahatma Gandhi
“four year long Three Stooges movie. With blood.”
Moe = Cheney, Larry = Rumsfeld, and of course Curly = Bush. The plot line would be:
What would happen if the Stooges sold their souls to become the most powerful men on earth?
Kivals: appropos plot line. About 150 years ago there was a movement that completely convinced its followers (US) that the MESSIAH was about to return. When the prophesied event failed to arrive, the time line was moved. This occured more than once, and is referred to as “The Great Disappointment.” Followers of Bush, apart from those who profit directly from war, tend to come from families that subscribe to a fundamentalist belief that the Messiah is coming back. In my north Florida town a local church happens to have that sentiment up on its present marquis. Bill Moyers spoke in depth about the popularity of Tim Le Haye’s “Left Behind” series. About 50 million Americans (good bet they are the ones who voted for Bush and still make up his deluded supporters) believe Jesus is coming to fix things. Thus the mess in the Middle East to this awfully large contingent is CAUSE for the return of the Messiah. To their logic, if things get bad enough in the holy land, “god” will return to fix things. Some readers have attacked me for making statements like this, but religious “freedom” has to be curbed when it is the primary raison d’etre FOR war. The Bible literalists who think Jesus is coming back and that the war in the Middle East is equivalent to Bush bravely fulfilling a necessary prophecy is not the rant of any fringe group. Our own general Boykin expressed the sentiment that “I knew my god was bigger than his god.” (That was a reference to Islam.) Blair seems to be equally deluded. There was a VERY good reason why our Founders created documents establishing a separation of church from state, but the lines have been blurred and we are living the result. You cannot reason with the faith-based, and for many of these people (ironically intelligent in many other areas) they will not question their faith; and to those whose beliefs have been shaped from the cradle, the belief in the return of a Messiah is sacrosanct. Great Disappointment II, coming to a global theater near you…
I apologize to those who read all the articles on commondreams, but I want to reach as many people as I can. This information has me completely freaked out.
A Presidential Directive was signed by President Bush on May 9th giving him unconstrained powers in case of a national emergency. In the case of a national emergency (terrorist attack), I don’t want that psychopath in charge of anything. How can he get away with this? It’s terrifying!!!
worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55825
© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com
President Bush has signed a directive granting extraordinary powers to the office of the president in the event of a declared national emergency, apparently without congressional approval or oversight.
The “National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive
” was
signed May 9, notes Jerome R. Corsi in a WND column
.
It was issued with the dual designation of NSPD-51, as a National Security Presidential Directive, and HSPD-20, as a Homeland Security Presidential Directive.
The directive establishes under the office of the president a new national continuity coordinator whose job is to make plans for “National Essential Functions” of all federal, state, local, territorial and tribal governments,
as well as private sector organizations to continue functioning under the president’s directives in the event of a national emergency.
“Catastrophic emergency” is loosely defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage,
or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.”
It says the president can assume the power to direct any and all government and business activities until the emergency is declared over.
The directive says the assistant to the president for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, currently Frances Fragos Townsend
, would be designated as the national continuity coordinator.
Corsi says the directive makes no attempt to reconcile the powers created for the national continuity coordinator with the National Emergency Act
,
which requires that such proclamation “shall immediately be transmitted to the Congress and published in the Federal Register.”
A Congressional Research Service study notes the National Emergency Act sets up Congress as a balance empowered to “modify, rescind, or render dormant” such emergency authority if Congress believes the president has acted
inappropriately.
But the new directive appears to supersede the National Emergency Act by creating the new position of national continuity coordinator without any specific act of Congress authorizing the position, Corsi says.
The directive also makes no reference to Congress and its language appears to negate any requirement that the president submit to Congress a determination that a national emergency exists.
It suggests instead that the powers of the directive can be implemented without any congressional approval or oversight.
Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke affirmed to Corsi the Homeland Security Department would implement the requirements of the order under
Townsend’s direction.
The White House declined to comment on the directive.
cosmos
many of us who go to the common dreams site regularly are fully able to get important info as well as pick up on the fairly rapid response of “the community.” i, for one, get annoyed when this venue is effectively hijacked by someone with his/her own pet “epic” crisis. as important as it is. you risk irrelevance due to the saturation of a uniform message onto virtually every article. have a little more respect.
Well thoughtout article.
One doesnt need to be an intectual to make rational judgements, but must have a valid perception of events and effects as had Churchill.
A distrubing parallel to the Bush tactics with those of Hitler is his success in intimitating those who disagree with his policies by branding them as unpatriotic. The character assination and unseating of Senator Max Cleland ( a triple amputee Vietnam vet) for sponsoring an investigation into the causes of 9/11 is only one example.
Responsibilities for the disasterous environmental sellouts ,social policies, & misguided war efforts of this administration lie mainly on those who aided the election thefts by voting for an unlearned president, who is guided by devine power and special intrests.
The final argument against Bush as Churchill is that the Great War isn’t about terrorism at all. This is just a distraction from the overriding geopolitical goal of gaining control over the oil, which of course would accrue to friends of Bush and Cheney.
You mention this obligquely in your piece, but until our country can come clean about why we’re really there, a lot of words will be wasted on mere window dressing, such as comparisons of Bush with Churchill.
born2bewild’
Sorry. I’m relatively new to this. I just hadn’t read anything about the presidential directives on any of the progressive websites I visit. The idea of Bush having assumed the potential of dictatorial power without anyone saying anything about it didn’t seem acceptable. I’ll try to be more appropriate.
Mr. Green
Why is everyone so afraid to go after what really happened on 9/11. “Anomalies” indeed. Prior to 9/11, no steel frame building had ever collapsed due to fire. On 9/11, FOUR collapsed within two hours and two of them weren’t hit by planes. Without going all the other “anomalies” of that painful day, let me just say that the American public is so afraid of the pure, unadulterated evil of the Bush administration that they cannot actually confront it. It says too much about themselves; their greed, their stupidity, their murderous inclinations, and, above all their miserable failures.
IMPEACH THE BASTARD AND TRY AND HANG HIM FOR WAR CRIMES. NO PARDON FOR THIS CRIMINAL.
Jess: wouldn’t his fate as ghost prisoner be more judicious?
WHY DO THEY HATE US SO MUCH?? (the all-time most audacious question asked by supremacist xenophobic Yanks and their Fascist allies)
——————————————————————————–
Read that question w/ some whining noise added to it for fun!!!
This is a response from a world citizen to the all-time most naive question I have heard/read so much from the so-called analysts, writers, politicians, and hands of IMPERIALISM in your dishonest media.
In your undying, never-ending hatred for Iran and drowned in an ocean of narcissism, you simply have forgotten, or yet better, chosen to forget, the crimes, inhumane policies, arrogant attitudes, and pain inflicted by you “patriotic” psychos on many a nation, including Persians.
Well, the Northern Christian hypocrisy and self-love on one side; its harsh animosity and blood thirst for Iran is something else. It was evident in your clownish, arrogant President’s speeches and now it’s epitomized by the most blatantly hateful, Nazi pieces of propaganda which Goebbels himself would love you for ), there it comes, suck it and swallow it w/ AMERICAN (w/ a thick R the way you like it) pride and xenophobia.
By what I have read from the likes of you in your very “OBJECTIVE” media (no shortage in the ” objective, informed, and bright” nation of yours), you completely epitomize what the monstrous Northern Christian imperialism means to billions of impoverished, victimized, oppressed masses of the world and what it has done for the past several centuries only in order to secure its own filthy interests derived from your selfish, self-indulged, self-centered, egotistic, materialist, and Calvinist lifestyles and worldviews. If and only if you were interested in the truth and facts, you could easily find the answer by reviewing your friends’ list and also crimes’ list for decades or centuries (for those Euro liberals!!). It doesn’t take a genius, does it?
YOU are the epitome of unfairness, injustice, governmental terrorism and bigotry. These are some of the crimes against humanity committed by your patriotic asses all over the planet (the list would be only too long but I mention a few here):
U.S. sponsored coup against democracy in Guatemala in 1954 which resulted in the deaths of over 120,000 Guatemalan peasants by U.S. installed dictatorships over the course of four decades.
U.S. overthrew the governments of the Dominican Republic in 1965 and helped to murder 3,000 people.
1973, the U.S. sponsored a coup in Chile against he democratic government of Salvador Allende and helped to murder another 30,000 people.
1965 the U.S. sponsored a coup in Indonesia that resulted in the murder of over 800,000 people, and the subsequent slaughter in 1975 of over 250,000 innocent people in East Timor by the Indonesian regime with the direct complicity of President Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger
U.S. sponsored terrorist contra war (the World Court declared the U.S. government a war criminal in 1984 for the mining of the harbours) against Nicaragua in the 1980s which resulted in the deaths of over 30,000 innocent people (or as the U.S. government used to call them before the term “collateral damage” was invented–”soft targets”).
U.S. war against the people of El Salvador in the 1980s, which
resulted in the brutal deaths of over 80,000 people, or “soft targets”.
U.S. sponsored terror war against the peoples of southern Africa (especially Angola) that began in the 1970’s and resulted in the deaths and mutilations of over 1,000,000.
U.S. invaded Panama over the Christmas season of 1989 and killed over 5,000 in an attempt to capture George H. Bush’s CIA partner, now turned enemy, Manual Noriega.
U.S. sponsored a brutal coup that resulted in the deaths of over 70,000 Iranians from 1952-1978.
This doesn’t even mention the crimes in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Grenada, Bay of Pigs and before that the support for and direct involvement w/ Batista’s regime in Cuba, the 8-year war against Iran -including chemical weapons usage- by (the former friend!!) Saddam, death squads in Central America, the 5 decades of Israeli crimes in Palestine and Lebanon (the veto policy), the “missing” in Argentina, and of course the “silent coup” in Algeria in 91 (w/ deceitful cooperation from the French bastards) that stopped the FIS from winning the elections thus plunging the country into a civil war for years…………….
We can never forget your crimes or undying sense of self-love and ego that make the Yankees and their NATO/G7 lovers the most detested nations on this planet, perhaps galaxy.
Now kill as many innocent people as you want. LAUNCH, LAUNCH as a bastard called JAMES WOODS declared on JAY LENO. Brag about Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Beirut bombings. Brag about killing of the innocent family members of Kaddafi, all the countries’ leaders and revolutionaries who had the guts to say no to your Fascist Empire.
It matters not. The U.S. (and the British disgusting colonialism) will go where the Romans, German Nazis, Mongols, and the rest of the arrogant sorry excuses for humanity went. Now celebrate killing Moslems, Nationalists, and Leftists (not to mention nuns and priests), etc. in your never-ending fire of hatred, supremacy and ego.
Unlike many other foreigners, I am not simplistic enough to think you are just the minority and the “rest” are simply decent, nice, culture-loving individuals. The fact is it’s filth like you that votes for the criminals you call leaders (Reagan and Bushes, Blair, Merkel, Harper and Howard come to mind immediately). Also I don’t think, despite the popular belief, you are ignorant or just stupid; I think you know enough and simply choose to ignore because you are the most selfish, inhumane, robotic bastards this planet has seen for a long time. Your sense of “SELECTIVE MEMORY and JUDGMENT” is proof enough.
I think legendary Orwell got it right in this passage from Nineteen Eighty-Four, an account of the ultimate supremacist empire:
“And in the general hardening of outlook that set in . . . practices which had been long abandoned - imprisonment without trial, the use of war prisoners as slaves, public executions, torture to extract confessions . . . and the deportation of whole populations - not only became common again, but were tolerated and even defended by people who considered themselves enlightened and progressive.”
As a reaction to your actions, our (the South) hatred for you could only be compared to the feelings we have against Serbs, Nazis, Genghis Khan and Alexander the Criminal.
THE NEW ROME WILL FALL…… AND ITS FOLLOWERS, FRIENDS, ALLIES AND APOLOGISTS….. WE’LL MAKE SURE OF THAT. DEATH TO THE U.S. and EU!!!
saladin74
you and cosmos should get together - he caught the drift about multiple formula postings being a rediculous way to make a point - but so far no one has addressed this issue to you, so i will. please stop. eyes glaze over, and the tendency is to simply scroll down to the next posting. it’s counterproductive and insulting to the reader.
cosmos, I don’t think your presenting a news item was so horrible. I’m glad to be informed, as I hadn’t heard anything about it.
saladin 74 — What a well deserved tongue lashing regarding US foreign policy. I feel Sad daily living here, knowing what grief, death, destruction, pollution, etc. that my country’s government and military are doing daily to innocent people all over the globe. There are some people here trying the best they can to stop this madness. In fact, I feel it’s our obligation to do all we can to bring the situation under control.
Enjoyed reading the article, Chavez had it right on, when he called Bush the Devil.
saladin,
“Death to the US and EU?”
You don’t sound that stupid.
I can understand your anger and hatred. But as you can tell, there a progessive movement thats trying to change the long legacy of bad US foreign policy. You should get behind it. Not thwart it with inane comments.
Saladin
Knock off the cut and paste postings. It’s just annoying.
Saladin has succeeded in drawing much attention his way.
Mr. S, I perceive 2 components in your message.
the First:
Quite valid perceptions/articulations of the Hegemonic Ever-Hungry Empire now swaggering/slithering around the world. Along with this, the human feelings of horror at the seemingly endless destruction which appears in its wake.
Second:
The fact that, to the degree you are possessed by your rage and hatred, you present a rather precise mirror image of
the emotional dynamics driving those who drive the Empire.
In a manner of speaking, the same “Demon” that has a strangehold on the pluto/kleptocrats, appears to have his hands around your neck, as well. If you want to “get off it” — (the BS justifications you give yourself, which tell you its more than OK to spew negativity) — it is possible. You can give that Demon the ass-kicking he richly deserves for trying to run you.
“Hatred is never ended by hatred. It comes to an end only and always though Love.”
- Guatama Sidhartha (the Buddha)
2500 B.C.
If you don’t, you’ll simply continue to vent negativity. You’ll cling to what’s comfortable and familiar.You will not make any positive contribution to healing a very wounded humanity on a planet that is increasingly endangered. You yourelf will become a huge part of the problem, not part of the solution. You will be a puppet of your own self-indulgence (yes, that’s right: because rage is energizing and gives us an adrenaline high, it feels good). And, you’ll continue to be a sheeple run by mass collective cliches as well.
Want to be effective? Wake up and stop doing what the oppressors are doing: creating “us and them;” trying to persuade others to think in terms of Enemy.
Ever heard the name of your and my (and everyone else’s) species? Homo Sapiens Sapiens: “the human who can be doubly wise and aware.”
The realities are perfectly clear for those who have eyes to see and a compassionate heart that feels: power is being abused dreadfully by countries and individuals all around the world. Rage/hatred (while understandable) is something which must be be transcended, moved beyond.
As Gandhi said, “An eye for an eye, simply makes the whole world blind.”
What we need are people learning from the voluminous writings of M.K. Gandhi and M.L. King. (Gandhi, by the way, did not decry all forms of violence, although he is rightly seen as “an apostle of non-violence.”) In fact Rev. King based his work on Gandhi’s.
Finally, to quote a western, pleasure-loving, drug-taking, love-spouting, self-indulgent rock group known as “the Beatles:”
“If you want money for minds that hate,
All I can tell you brother, you’ll have to wait”…….
“Why don’t you free your mind instead.”
Or, more precisely, do your inner work, WHILE you work to end outer oppression. Anything else just leads to more of the same suffering.
Sorry to be so hard on you, brother. And I do mean brother. The truth is that the struggle for the survival of humanity and for the biosphere needs you, as it needs every one of us to grow in wisdom, And in skillful compassionate action. Your passion clearly shows. Channel that rage and hurt. Widen your horizon to think at the planetary level. We’re all connected / together in this, now.
Somehow, I know you can do this.
I understand why there is a George Bush. It’s not so unllikely that one delusional, arrogant person came into power. It is harder to understand why hoardes of Congressmen are going along with him.
I can’t even imagine a scenario in which Bush would be vindicated. What fantastical terms could lead to such a conclusion? That possibility ended when no nuclear weapons were discovered.
A senior US military investigator describing the view all along the US chain of command: “Iraqi civilian lives are not as important as US lives, their deaths are just the cost of doing business…”. (Josh White, ‘Report On Haditha Condemns Marines,’ Washington Post, April 21, 2007).
That’s exactly the point. I am not a diplomat and never have been! We are fed up being nice to you people and your cultures, etc. And I know this is supposedly a “liberal, anti-war site”, but it really means nothing to us, for you and your allies simply have too much blood on your hands for forgiveness (not that most Northerners would even for one minute contemplate that). Only this time “YOUR” pile of corpses is getting out of hand, thus the nation that so vehemently voted Mr. Bush in the second time around (after all the crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, etc. I must add) is suddenly growing anti-war. Sadly, you are fooling no one but yourselves.
Every minute, each day we are paying the price for your criminal, Fascist regimes and bloodthirsty, maniacal troops due to the so-called “voter inaction” or the silent approval, a much better term, by you narcissists in the North that cost our brethren, women and children lives, suffering, torture, and mayhem. My side said goodbye to being kind, diplomatic, and other nonsense a long time ago. We have seen the napalms, cluster bombs, tortured and violated bodies way too often. Your freakish bastardly right-wing zealots, ironically, have gotten it right for once! WE ARE AT A HEMISPHERIC WAR.
The lines have been drawn through centuries of your crimes, and hell we are sick of you. You have declared war on us and nothing can turn the clock back. I love physics: “for every action, there’s a reaction equal and as DEADLY AND RUTHLESS”!! Sorry Newton, it’s my version.
And you know what, I lived most of my life in the decadent North; now, if you have successfully!! radicalized me to this point, fathom the rest. You can still imagine, can’t you “peace-loving” Calvinist, McCarthyist patriot??? Await us, (w/ your cruises or w/out) you self-appointed, civilized rulers of the planet!!!!!!!
Saladin74 —
The problem with any dogma is not knowing when you’re barking up the wrong tree.