Month: September 2003

Informative reading for the day: David Niewart debunks the “Bush’s family supported the Nazis” meme. He also nails the reasons why it’s important to look into the reality of the connections between Nazi Germany and American industrialism. It’s a fairly lengthy article in four parts (1, 2, 3, 4) but well worth the time.

Turns out the Brits agreed with those dire warnings that the collapse of Iraq might result in the spread of chemical weapons:

“The JIC assessed that any collapse of the Iraqi regime would increase the risk of chemical and biological warfare technology or agents finding their way into the hands of terrorists, not necessarily al-Qaeda.”

Mind you, since it turned out Saddam didn’t have WMD after all, they were wrong. Still, you’ve got to wonder why Blair (and Bush) denied any such possibility pre-war.

I love my freedom so much that I am willing to accept certain risks to preserve it. I want, yes, my medical records to be inviolate. We are willing to send soldiers to die in Iraq if we think it will preserve our freedoms. I ask this: what sort of gutless people are willing to risk the lives of others to protect freedom, but are not willing to risk their own?

Freedom has costs. Brutal, cruel, harsh costs. Freedom is not comfort. Freedom is the most terrifying thing on the face of the earth, and it is damnably hard to truly believe in freedom. “Why, if the people could do whatever they wanted, there’d be anarchy! Chaos in the streets!” Deep down in our souls, we don’t even trust ourselves with freedom.

And so it is that at times like these all too many of us are willing to surrender that freedom. We’re willing to accept the Patriot Act, because after all we’re at war. We know, on an instinctive level, the truth: that freedom and safety are not entirely compatible concepts.

The question, as always, is this: which of the two is more important to you? There’s no wrong answer. But don’t lie about it.

Okay, sure.

“Two years ago, I told the Congress and the country that the war on terror would be a lengthy war, a different kind of war, fought on many fronts in many places. Iraq is now the central front.”
— George Bush

“Don’t you tell me not to worry about bin Laden
Have you forgotten?”
— Darryl Worley

For the record: no, I haven’t forgotten. I remember quite distinctly where I was and what I was feeling that day. I remember thinking that we needed to find the people responsible and do something about it. I still think that. I hope that, someday, we remember that Osama bin Laden was behind the 9/11 attacks. I hope that the White House will someday devote some time to reminding people who our enemy was and is.

We are fighting a war built on lies. Bush took 9/11 and turned it into an excuse for carrying out a plan he’d built well before that tragic day. As a result, our military is overextended and our world credibility is slipping. We are unable to reduce the North Korean threat; only this week we’ve learned that they’ve developed longer range missiles sufficient to reach the heartland of America.

We are not winning the war in Afghanistan. We’re certainly not losing, and the Taliban isn’t in power, but until the country is stable I don’t see how we can claim to have won. We have a smattering of troops in that country, because there aren’t any more available. Contrary to pre-war claims, Iraq really has consumed all of our available military strength.

I remember that we have provided Osama bin Laden with an opportunity to do something he could not do in the year after 9/11: namely, kill Americans. By putting our troops in Iraq, we have provided him with targets he could not have otherwise reached. Consider this. Between 9/11 and the occupation of Iraq, there were no American deaths at the hands of Al Qaeda. Since Bush declared combat operations over, we’re seeing terrorists killing Americans on a weekly basis.

But has Bush forgotten all this? Apparently so.