Letters to the Editor
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The Iraq war destroyed an illusion I'd previously held about Afghanistan
I used to believe that the Soviet Union never would have invaded Afghanistan if they'd had anything resembling democracy and a free press.
I used to think that if even just the Communist Party alone had been allowed to debate the idea and then vote on it, the invasion wouldn't have been approved, because there was no real Marxist justification for intervention.
Afghanistan was simply not the kind of country that Marx or Engels or even Lenin would have classified as one ready to make good on the promise of a socialist revolution.
Even Andropov made that argument at first. Then he changed his mind for some reason and backed the invasion.
But here we are -- a democracy with a presumably free press -- certainly much better than Pravda!
And we fell for pretty much the same idea -- large scale social engineering at gunpoint.
We had plenty of time to talk it over, we had voters, we had journalists, we had analysts up the wazoo -- and we fell into the same $%@$@#@ trap as a country with no free press and no democracy, led by a cabal of geriatric apologists for Stalin.
How depressing.
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... and a lifetime of consequences
This is as well reasoned synopsis of the shifting justifications used by this administration to frame the dialogue and rationale for continued engagement in Iraq, and speaks honestly to this government's elusive definition of success in the region. It's a useful reminder of how a pliable press and apathetic public enable the worst forces in government.
While the administration has been highly successful in creating the boundaries of discourse on Iraq, defining the effort in terms of national security, democracy, and morality, in fact the United States has never been at more risk for retribution by highly motivated interests in the region as a result of these policies. To this growing threat we have only ourselves to blame. Somehow, our only answer has been to broaden the definition of "terrorist", "terrorist state", and demand new calls for actions against a broader set of "rogue" and "dangerous" powers in the region, like Iran.
Our policies are not only unjust, unconstitutional, and unwise, but have bankrupted our nation and our destroyed our world standing, our dignity, and the individual freedoms that generations before us fought so hard to achieve.
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John McC. Bush
Please preach all this info during the general election. Get enough people to vote for the Democrat. Americans are not rational. They need constant updates. We need 51%.
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Congress Bears An Equal Responsibility
For the majority of the elected representatives of the American people to have uncritically accepted the lies of the Bush Administration and wasted hundreds of thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars enmeshing our nation in a physically and morally destructive quagmire for five years is unconscionable. I'm just some poor schmuck on the street, but I was demonstrating out there and writing letters to them before the invasion, telling them it would be a physical, financial, and moral disaster. And then, in November 2006, when the American people expressed their displeasure with these events by electing a Democratic Congress, the leader of that party emasculated it on virtually day 1 with her "impeachment is off the table" comment. Madam Speaker, in a responsibly run republic, impeachment must ALWAYS be on the table, no matter how honest, wise, and popular the current Chief Executive is judged.
I will be holding my elected representative responsible with my vote for an alternate candidate next November for not signing on to the impeachment movement . He'll win anyway, with his outrageously gerrymandered district, but he doesn't deserve to win by a landslide given the burden of guilt he carries for enabling the criminally insane Bush/Cheney aggression in Iraq.
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The media will flip like a fish out of water
If a Democrat is elected, the wealthy, conservatives who hold the leash of the media, coupled with the correspondents who live on the coasts and are still subconsciously cowering as if they had targets painted on their heads will make sure the narrative continues to follow the same Republican lines. Whatever that Democrat does to cut the losses we've inflicted on our troops, our treasury, and our national honor, not to mention the damage we've inflicted on the Iraqi's themselves will be screamed about by countless hysterical shills as if the sky is falling and the end of the world is just around the corner. In other words, the mainstream media will go from completely subservient unquestioning support of the government to shrill, hysterical opposition. Perhaps the public will get sick of their whining and crying wolf? We can always hope.
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Bush And Cheney Are Criminals
The only thing keeping the criminals Bush and Cheney from prison is the feeble, spineless and pathetic Democratic Party.
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So why are we still in Iraq?
And why haven't Bush, Cheney, et al, been impeached?
Oh, yeah -- the DEMOCRATS have not cut off funding and they took impeachment off the table.
Don't hold your breath waiting for Hillary or Obama to end this crime, either* -- even assuming the miracle that one of them will be elected. With gas prices hovering around $4/gal already and peak oil either here or very near, neither is going to give up our control over Iraq's oil reserves or all those permanent bases we're building.
That is, after all, why we're there.
*SEE:
The Fine Print in Hillary's Promise to 'End the War'
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2007/10/the_fine_print_in_hillarys_pro_1.html
Most Revealing Fibs: Hillary Clinton
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2007/12/most_revealing_bloopers_hillar_1.html
Obama Blurs Definition of 'Combat Troops'
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2007/11/obama_blurs_definition_of_comb.html
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"fool me once, shame on you, etc"
every four years, the jerks line up for 'democracy' drill. "choose a president, you lucky people!" from a selection of two. hmm, maybe not so lucky. still, two is better than one.
unless one is dubya, and the other is disqualified by too much education, intelligence and character. too much for the american voter, any way. twice. but then the american voter backed nixon twice too. do you see a pattern here? americans prefer crooks, fools, good ol' boys. they yearn to be be cheated, stole from and sent to war.
bush is america, his so-called lies are just the fresh paint on the national character: crooked, violent, bigoted, and ignorant of anything going on across the county line. they ain't lies, they're the national country music.