Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq?

by Larry 109 Replies latest social current

• 

  roybatty

  So George Bush didn't petition on behalf of a group of concerned republicans for action in Rwanda then? He didn't use his name and position to bring the Rwandan peoples' plight to the fore? Because to hear some people talk, you'd think he and they had done just that.

  Who was in a position to do something, Clinton or Bush? Why didn't Clinton do something? I'm not blinded and saying "well, because he didn't care...blah...blah.." Simply put, Clinton sent troops into Somolia and because of poor planning, some of them were slaughtered. The images of US soldiers being dragged through the streets was fresh in the minds of the American public. Because Clinton worried more about public opinion then doing what was right, he did nothing about it. Clinton's "don't piss anyone off" attitude led to 911. The USS Cole is bombed, nothing done, embassies bombed, nothing done, first attack on the Trade Centers, nothing done. When will people learn? Iraq broke the UN agreement, weren't cooperating with inspectors, were shooting at US war planes. At what point do you wait until? BTW, I'll agree with you 100% about the Repulicans. Shame on those members of congress for sitting on there hands. But my point is we have all kinds of protests going on for the Iraqi people. People are crying out "oh, George Bush's policies have killed a million Iraqi people, US troops are bombing schools and killing children, etc." Where were all these people when for 10 weeks a million Rwandians were slaughtered? Again, I say it's not the people of Iraq that these protestors are concerned about. Rather, they'll back anything anti-Bush. In some ways it reminds me JW thinking. Just as JWs are overjoyed whenever something bad happens (famine, war, terrorist attack) and use it to support their "end is near" message, these anti-Bush people (like Sen. Kennedy) are just hoping for Iraq to slip into civil war, just so they can say "told ya so." I'll give you another example of blind anti-Bush hatred. Had Condoleezza Rice been a security adviser for President Clinton, we'd be seeing all kinds of accusations and protests that the Repulicans are being racists and are attacking her. But since she works for Bush, no such things are happening. The ultimate slap in the face was when I saw CNN bring out Anita Hill the other day on CNN and started asking her question about what Rice would be facing in front of the 911 panel. WTF??? Is CNN asuming that all African-American woman are the same? How racists is that? You can't even come close to comparing the two.
• 

  Thunder Rider

  Bravo RoyBatty
  
  Your wasting your breath though. Libs don't have time to do what is right, their too busy passing the buck, and trying to shift the attention off the putz their trying to get ellected to president.
  
  Thunder ==}>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
• 

  ThiChi

  Soooo true, Thunder
• 

  Realist

  roy,

  Why didn't Clinton do something?

  because he like everyone else inculding bush et al. gave a shit about it.

  Clinton sent troops into Somolia and because of poor planning, some of them were slaughtered.

  it was bush senior who sent the troops.

  The images of US soldiers being dragged through the streets was fresh in the minds of the American public. Because Clinton worried more about public opinion then doing what was right, he did nothing about it.

  what would have been the right answer? nuke somalia? and everyone else who doesn't want to be occupied by the US?

  The USS Cole is bombed, nothing done,

  what is a US warship doing in an arab seaport anyway? besides what should have been done? erase jemen from the map?

  embassies bombed, nothing done,

  wrong....clinton destroyed two baby food factories in retaliation.

  first attack on the Trade Centers, nothing done.

  wrong ...there was a trial if you remember.

  Iraq broke the UN agreement, weren't cooperating with inspectors, were shooting at US war planes. At what point do you wait until?

  iraq was cooperating...even if not 100%. shooting at US planes which had no right to be there (side note no US plane was shot down!)...the no fly zones were illegal. besides the US planes shot back and killed many innocent people.

  But my point is we have all kinds of protests going on for the Iraqi people. People are crying out "oh, George Bush's policies have killed a million Iraqi people, US troops are bombing schools and killing children, etc."

  no one says george bush has killed a million people....the US embargo (kept under clintons admin.) killed a million people (literally)!

  Where were all these people when for 10 weeks a million Rwandians were slaughtered?

  can you not see the slight difference between the 2 cases???? one was a civil war between african ethnic groups where protests would be completely pointless...the other is an attack war committed by your own nation!
• 

  ThiChi

  Bodies of Evidence
  Mass graves will show that the United States was justified in liberating Iraq.
  by Terry Eastland
  04/06/2004 12:00:00 AM

  AS "MUHANED" RECALLS, the year was 1991, and he was south of Baghdad, on a trip to visit his parents, when an Iraqi army unit seized him without explaining why. He was taken to a military camp and thrown into a room with more than 100 other Iraqis. They were loaded onto buses and driven to the edge of a swamp, where they were unloaded and forced to crouch in rows. Soldiers lined up in front of them, and when they started firing, a large man in front of Muhaned jumped to his feet. Sprayed with bullets, the man fell back upon Muhaned, flattening him and pushing him into the swamp. The man's body covered Muhaned completely. Muhaned lay there 30 minutes while the shooting continued. The soldiers then checked the bodies and found one man who had been injured. They killed him. They didn't discover Muhaned, who, having made his way into the cane, watched a bulldozer push the bodies into the swamp and cover them with mud. Muhaned's real name has been withheld to ensure his protection. There are other Iraqis like Muhaned, other survivors of mass executions carried out by the Iraqi regime, other witnesses to crimes against humanity. The U.S. Agency for International Development reports Muhaned's story and those of two other survivors of mass executions in a report issued last month. It is titled "Iraq's Legacy of Terror: Mass Graves," and you can find it here. DURING HIS LONG REIGN, Saddam Hussein ran a government that "eliminated" political enemies and committed mass murders--of Kurds (because of their ethnicity), Shiites (because of their religion), and Sunnis (because of their politics). The regime also murdered thousands of foreigners--chief among them Egyptians, Iranians and Kuwaitis. Down through the years, groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch issued reports on the mass murders. Iraq routinely denied them and refused to let in outside parties to conduct investigations. But now, thanks to the liberation of Iraq, the truth is coming out. Since last May, 270 mass graves have been reported, and 53 graves have been confirmed. Experts in forensic archaeology and mortuary science are settling into temporary quarters at a number of the sites. Some exhumations already have begun. The digging up of the mass graves promises to be one of the big stories coming out of Iraq as it begins the post-Hussein era. We are going to have a better idea of just how many people Saddam Hussein killed. Before the war, the number was estimated at between 300,000 and 400,000. AID Administrator Andrew Natsios says that if those numbers prove accurate, "they represent a crime against humanity surpassed only by the Rwandan genocide of 1994, Pol Pot's Cambodian killing fields in the 1970s, and the Nazi Holocaust of World War II." We also are going to learn a great deal more about how the killing was done. Autopsies of bodies not decomposed will yield answers. So will examination of skeletal remains. Survivors of the executions like Muhaned will provide eyewitness accounts, as will some (now coming forward) who participated in the murders (against their will, they say). We will know which weapons (including nerve and mustard gas) were used. And we will learn more about the unspeakable preludes to the mass executions. Forensic investigations will help establish whether beatings took place or whether there were electrocutions and mutilations. The evidence retrieved from the graves will prove essential to the Iraqi effort to bring to justice those who killed their fellow citizens by the busload, including, eventually, Saddam Hussein himself. The new government scheduled to take over on July 1 will have authority to prosecute the crimes. What's discovered in the mass graves also will bear--certainly it should bear--on any assessment of President Bush's decision to invade Iraq. That decision was based in large part on Saddam Hussein's pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, and much of the criticism of Bush's decision stems from the fact that none has been found so far. But Bush also made a moral case for war. And that case emphasized the large-scale atrocities Saddam Hussein committed against his own people and surely would have continued to commit if we had decided not to invade Iraq. The moral case now stands to be vindicated--mass grave by mass grave.
• 

  Realist

  US officials say Iraq may have up to 260 mass graves containing as many as 300,000 bodies. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3340841.stm

  are these the same US officials who estimated the number of WMDs hussein had?

  first its the WMDs, now they try to claim it was for humanitarian reasons using estimates lacking any solid ground.
• 

  roybatty

  are these the same US officials who estimated the number of WMDs hussein had?

  first its the WMDs, now they try to claim it was for humanitarian reasons using estimates lacking any solid ground.

  Your response is exactly my point. I'm willing to bet you didn't even read the entire article. Here's a personal account of why the world is a better place without Saddam but right away you brush it off.
• 

  talesin

  Food for Thought

  Fact: 56 graves have been found, and approximately 4,000 bodies. Atrocious? YES!! But it is a far cry from the 300,000 that the gov't is claiming are buried.

  These inflated 'guesstimates' are, imho, just a way to get the public all riled up and supporting this invasion. People get a lot more upset about 300,000 than 4,000. Think about it.

  Well, I read the whole thing. I also went to the home page to see who this agency is and this is what I found

  USAID is an independent federal government agency that receives overall foreign policy guidance from the Secretary of State. Our Work supports long-term and equitable economic growth and advances U.S. foreign policy objectives by supporting:

  • economic growth, agriculture and trade;
  • global health; and,
  • democracy, conflict prevention and humanitarian assistance.

  This source could be considered biased, if you read the mission statement above. I would prefer to get my information from independent sources, rather than those who are involved in the conflict.

  I do not say this to be argumentative, but to highlight the point that I try to look at facts, not guesstimates, when forming my opinions. The point made about the WMD, imo, relates to this. Yes, we were told there were - where are they??? Now, where are the graves and bodies??? Of 300,000.

  Let's see what RAWA (Radical Association of Women of Afghanistan) has to say on the issue of US invasion of Iraq. Aren't the Afghani women one of the groups that are being touted as those being 'saved'?

  check out http://www.rawa.fancymarketing.net/index.html to see what those who are LIVING this 'war' have to say. And yes, I know they are not Iraqi, but they are ARAB and MUSLIM and a huge part of this whole mess.

  talesin
• 

  SanFranciscoJim

  Q. Daddy, if China and American corporations are evil, why do you buy cheap Chinese goods at Wal-Mart and support both institutions?

  A. Uh....um...well....um...well, son it's always easy to point fingers and do nothing. It's easy for me to complain about things, buy cheap Chinese goods and not support American made products. But it's still President Bush's fault that all these jobs are being moved overseas.

  Q: Daddy, if it isn't President Bush's fault that so many jobs have moved overseas, then why does the Walton family (which owns Wal-Mart) vote Republican?

  A: Ummmm....errrrrrr.....I.......
• 

  Realist

  roy,

  Here's a personal account of why the world is a better place without Saddam but right away you brush it off.

  BALONEY!

  no one says hussein was a nice fellow but the numbers posted are most likely a rediculous exaggeration. and yes actual numbers do still matter to some people!!! the US gov. cannot just fabricate something and validate its actions with these lies. we will see how many people were killed in the end by the US occupation forces in order to stabilize this country permanently. hussein kept the religious nuts under control plus opposition forces that certainly would have tried to kill him and he kept the kurds in check (YEs any other country would fight against seperatists too...recall the US civil war?).