In typical callous Rovian fashion, Bush looks to upstage a slow news cycle to make political gains. Whether it is executing the retarded in Texas or butchering tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) in Iraq, it all about him and his political ambitions without regard for anyone else. He couldn't even give Gerald Ford one last moment in the spotlight to galvanize his meager legacy. What a prick!

Our hands are as bloodied as theirs. The famous picture of Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam. We may as well have been there pulling the lever on the meat grinder. So, get rid of the evidence. First Rumsfeld, then Saddam.

For me the televised death of Saddam Hussein allows a rare glimpse behind the curtain of how we are ruled. It underscores the fact that Saddam Hussein was just a person, like you and I are, and like Bush and Blare are

Somehow, some of us are able to grow up from a child to become a dictator and a world leader before we die.

How does this happen? On a very personal level we each allow ourselves to be led, but what decisions do we make in that process? Clearly there are very strong social mechanisms of control – currently a few thousand people rule over a few billion. So in what way are we controlled and, more importantly, in what ways are we abused?

This is what the death of Saddam Hussein highlights.

Reality, to a large degree, is nothing more than a barely-conscious consensus. We tell each other what to fear – what is good for us and what is bad for us. We tell each other what what the rules are, and what the consequences for breaking those rules are. It is at that level that the mechanisms of control operate most clearly.

One important tool of leadership then is to gain control over the mechanisms by which we inform each other of the basic information that form the boundaries and realities of our lives. That is what dictators do. They define the boundaries of harm. They also stoke nationalism, and they embroil us into war. It is essential to look at these mechanisms in order to inoculate ourselves against their misuse – and I think the current drama in Iraq clearly shows us that we are being misused – all of us.

Was Saddam ever really a threat to us? Was he really a threat to me and you personally? If I were the leader of a nation, I ask myself, would overthrowing him and hanging him be the highest priority onto which I would have devoted the resources and consciousness of my people? The answer is, and always has been, no.

So then – why the war?

I very much doubt the altruism of our current leaders. I doubt their decisions are based on visions for a better society – Saddam’s certainly was not, but what of Bush and Blare? I doubt their intentions too.

Even though it was eventually sold as such, the war in Iraq was never based on a vision of a better, freer society. An honest commitment to a better society would likely never lead to such a war as it has. Instead, I believe this war was based on a grab of power for self-interest. Bush and his circle of associates are profiting immensely from the reins of power they hold. Their lives, as with the lives of so many others tied into the war machine are being defined and enabled by it.

Whether intentionally or not, this war has been orchestrated by the Bush elite in order to give his administration the authority of a war presidency. It has created an embroiling issue, much like gay marriage and other smoke screen issues that engage us and define our dialogues, distracting us from envisioning a world as we might have it. It is part of a larger campaign to instill fear in us from which we will crave protection. This is the way we are controlled. It is the way we define our realities. It has happened so many times before - people are led by their fears. It is a tool that is exploited – and we are being exploited.

Saddam did it when he led his country into a war with Iran. War galvanizes power. The Iraqi people and the American people are led by morally corrupt leaders. They are the same people – two of a kind. They even knew each other personally and in the past they supported each others goals. Our president even has trinkets of the other’s possessions.

This is why it is important to note that we were in fact the people who first armed him – and not just any “we”, but the very same people – Rumsfeld, Cheney… Those are the very same people that armed him and encouraged him into wars with his neighbors – those are the very same people that understand leadership and the mechanisms of power. These are the very same people that have the questionable morals to play shell games with the lives and nations of the people in the Middle East. And they are the very same people that control us in the United States. What’s to say they are not using the same principles on us?

Saddam was hanged because he inverted certain mechanisms of control inwards - he tortured and murdered his own people – and that is the sin for which we lay blame: Never use the tools of death on your own people – only on others. Our message is that if you cross that fine line then you will be hung as a psychopath, but for a brief moment with this hanging it is possible to see past the blinders, past the prejudice of nationalism and see that we are all one people being misled by tyrants.

Stan,

I'm on the fence about the value of the death penalty, for anyone, in any circumstance. But for the sake of argument, let me just say that I won't lose any sleep over his hanging.

Be that as it may, I believe there's a much larger issue than the value of the death penalty at stake here. Was Saddam's hanging worth the cost of the noose?

I've spent no small amount of time trying to understand the magnitude of Saddam's atrocities, as well as the amount of human suffering resulting from the US led invasion of Iraq. Numbers are hard to come by. But when I look at all the fuzzy math involved, it really does appear that more Iraqi deaths can be attributed to the US led invasion than can be attributed to the entirety of Saddam's administration.

Does it feel better to be killed by bombs of a friend than the lead of an enemy? Do mothers weep less when their children are collateral damage in a war of "liberation" than if they were killed by state police? Have the number of blood feuds in Iraq increased or diminished since our fearless leaders decided to intervene in the Middle East? Are democratically elected despots cuddlier than old fashioned dictators?

Saddam's noose has cost the United States its moral standing; greater than $350,000,000,000; has worsened the condition of Iraq; and has made us less safe, both at home and especially abroad.

I predict that Saddam's noose will become a symbol of imperial folly. No matter how just his hanging, the cost exceeds the benefit by many orders of magnitude.

By way of analogy, although on a much smaller scale, the issue is similar to assessing the value of police car chases. Is it worth putting innocent lives at risk to engage in dangerous car chases? I say no. Others disagree, but I simply cannot fathom their reasoning. Justice should value the protection of the innocent more than the prosecution of the guilty.

And with that, I would like to wish that everyone enjoys a happy new year. No matter where we live, no matter what color our skin, no matter how divergent our conception of the universe; we are much more alike than we are different. We all want our children to inherit a better world than we did. Let's make it so.