On The Iraqi Civil War

From our Red Letter Rev:

G'day, {{Y'all}}...

Yes, there has been civil strife between the Shi'ites and Sunnis for decades, if not centuries. We can thank British imperialism and redrawing up political maps for monetary gain for that. The administration should have realized how well nation-building and imperialism worked out for the British (not so well, actually) and taken a note from that. But nooOOOOOooo.

As rotten a sumbitch as Saddam was, he at least had a lid on it (equal-opportunity oppression). There was not the wholesale sort of slaughter during his regime as there is now. What ShrubCo did in removing him (IMHO because he quit playing ball and they wanted the oil), was to remove the cork from the bottle penning up the evil genie. Now instead of one dude committing the slaughter over there, they're all doing it (with our active participation) -- and our resident is responsible for allowing it to happen, if not actively inviting it to happen.

If Saddam had suddenly been offed by someone else (who'd'a missed him?) I believe the same civil strife would probably have started. But they didn't; our government did, and as the party responsible for releasing the genie from the bottle, the stank is on us. Otherwise, our hands would have been clean and the trillions of dollars spent on trying to clean up the wholly-predictable and inevitable mess would have stayed here in our pockets. Now, they're going to Cheneyburton, where ShrubCo wanted them to go all along.

From this end of the cheap seats, it looks like a carefully planned heist of taxpayer money.

No, we didn't start the civil war over there, but the buck clearly stops at the desk of our resident for concertedly and premeditatedly enabling it to resume in full force for the benefit of no-one but Cheneyburton with the American taxpayer footing the bill.

Just thinkin' out loud here, trying to find a middle ground.

It always slays me when someone talks about "winning" in Iraq. To win usually means to obtain something of value, with or without personal effort ("win" like lotto, no effort vs "win" like a basketball game, sweat-effort). Since we have been involved in an act of aggression, with neither the consent of Congress nor the American people, I have to ask what is it that we're supposed to "win"?

Peace? Hardly. There was a sort of peace in place before Shrub went in.

Protection from turristesses? Nope. Acts of terror (which were zero in Iraq before the invasion) increase on a weekly basis. Thousands of new terrorist training camps have sprung up in Africa and the Far East since and directly because of the invasion. We're in far more danger than ever because of the invasion.

To strike back at those who attacked us? Wrong! All but one of the attackers were Saudi -- y'know, Bush's handholding buddies, the ones his oil-buddies get a chunk of their profits from and the ones we sell arms to. Well, that makes a load of sense, dudnit (snark!). The funding for the attacks was laundered through Dubai -- y'know, the new home of Blackwater (offshore, where they can't easily be prosecuted for war crimes, how convenient). To attack Iraq in retribution for the attacks on 9/11 is the same as you stepping on my foot, then I go to your neighborhood and slap some poor sod down the street for it.

To combat Islamic Fundamentalism? To what end? Replace it with our own, equally nuts version of Christian Fundamentalism? Yah, there's a real improvement (again, snark!). I'd rather we keep a close eye on the volatile nutcases right here in our front yard than go stirring up somebody else's on top of the trouble and irritation we already have. There is absolutely no question that the invasion has done more to increase Islamic Fundamentalism, whilst cynically using Christian Fundamentalism to achieve that end.

To export democracy? It is philosophically and physically impossible to "export" democracy at the point of a gun. The concept is insane, even on the face of it. Then again (while I'm in a wry and snarky mood), why not? We're not using it much here. We allow obvious criminality in the administration and intelligence arms to go on in full view and unpunished. We allow election fraud and obvious rigging to go on in full view and unpunished. We allow torture and war crimes to go on in full view and unpunished. Our government then cynically uses doomsday-cult fringe-religion and a complicit media to justify it all.

Gee, except for the choice of religious writings, there's little difference between the government that the Islamic fundamentalists are trying to achieve over there and one that the Christian fundamentalists are trying to achieve here, with BushCo's full blessing and support. In either case, the only ones who benefit are of the plantation-owner class.

It's a funny twist of events to me (funny-crazy, not funny-haha). I was in the military during the Cold War and went through school during the 60's. These are exactly the actions for which we castigated Communist Russia and China. They were the Great Enemies, simply because their governments were doing exactly what ours is now. Yet, somehow, and completely inexplicably to me, these actions which were burn-for sins then are justifiable practice now. Isn't a sin still a sin?

I'm Quaker to the core; unprovoked acts of aggression are abhorrent to me, from the skin all the way to my soul. While, like my ancestors during the Revolutionary War, I will defend myself if I am the victim of unprovoked violence, I cannot understand how anyone who calls him/herself Christian can justify committing an unprovoked act of murderous aggression -- and still lay head to pillow at night or expect the rewards of Heaven later. From where I sit (and I may be completely biased due to my practice of faith), but cheering on a sin carries equal damnation to committing the sin itself.