Political Rant

Can things get any worse in Iraq?  On second thought, I don't want to ask that question.  Because they can and they probably will. 

The whole tenor of this war has been ugly from the beginning.  We have a president who was determined to invade Iraq almost from the moment he took office.  I don't pretend to understand why, but I suspect it had more to do with a certain natural resource with which Iraq is richly endowed, than with George II's desire to finish up where his father left off.  As I heard many times before the invasion, "When they say, 'It's not about the oil', you can be sure it's about the oil."

September 11th, as ghastly and horrible as it was, played perfectly into Bush's hand.  He carried out his plan to invade Iraq, borne on the tide of bloodlust of the American people.  It didn't matter to most Americans that Iraq had nothing to do with the terrorist attacks...they just wanted to go kick some Middle Eastern butt.  A Moslem is a Moslem...doesn't matter what country he's in.  Americans were willing to swallow Bush's lame WMD excuse--to which he turned only because exhaustive investigation failed to turn up any connection between the Saddam Hussein regime and Al Quaeda--because they wanted revenge.  On somebody.  Anybody.  Let's show the world that you can't mess around with the United States of America!

Let's face it...many Americans have been absolutely lost since the end of the cold war.  They HAVE to have someone to hate.  Didn't you notice how racism seemed to gain momentum in the early part of the last decade, after the fall of the Berlin Wall?  People didn't have the Commies to kick around anymore, so they had to look elsewhere for the insidious "enemy within."  They NEEDED someone to hate!  Someone whose throats they could stand on, beat their chests and say, "I'm better than YOU!!!"  We witnessed the proliferation of Skinheads, Neo-Nazis, The Klan, and Conservative talks shows that condemned affirmative action as racism against whites.

And then, Al Quaeda stepped up to the plate, and handed these idiots a new race hatred to feed on.  And George W. Bush and his administration scooped up bucket upon bucket of "September 11th Pie," and poured it down their throats until he got what he wanted...public approval of HIS Iraq war.  Right down to the entire United States Congress, who became so afraid of the political liability of NOT backing up the president's call for war, that they voted him carte blanche on the issue of using "military force" in Iraq.  (I listened to those Senate debates, and I was flabbergasted that not a one of those men was brave enough to get up and say, "Mr. President, I have grave misgivings about the reasons behind your desire to invade Iraq.") 

The situation in Iraq has now deteriorated to worse than a horror.  The administration had no idea what they were going to do with Iraq once they had it.  They had no understanding of the region or its people.  Didn't listen to the advice of countries like France and Russia who had been mired in Middle Eastern conflicts in the past, and knew what a bad idea it was to go in at all, much less to go in totally unprepared.  Arab nations, who had always looked askance at the US and our "Western" ways, have REAL reason to hate us now.  We have completely destabilized the region by sticking our noses (guns, bombs, military personnel) in where they did NOT belong.  And this is going to promote the spread of democracy, and reduce the danger of terrorist attacks on American soil how?

Now we have American military personnel torturing and humiliating Iraqi prisoners.  Why is this such a shock?  What is the noble cause behind this war?  What higher ideals are there to inspire our military to be just and righteous in their dealings with the indigenous people?  This is a war of revenge...of misdirected revenge on a race of people in the wrong country.  Of a super-power nation showcasing its superior military strength by literally squashing a smaller, almost powerless (by comparison) enemy.  Our government has set a terrible example, to its own people and to the world.  And we as a people, in our everyday lives, embrace rudeness (listen to AM radio for fifteen minutes), violence (watch tv or go to a movie), poor sportsmanship (follow our professional sports), and political divisiveness (read the AOL message boards.)  Take rude, violent, angry men, send them across the world and put them among a race of people they think they have reason to hate...what would you expect the result to be?  Can you say, "Let's set our military up to fail?" 

The United States of America is in a precarious position in the world today.  And it was put there solely on the whim of President George W. Bush.  Yes, he needs to be fired in November.  But how many years will it take ANY administration to undo the damage that Bush has done?  I don't know that John Kerry is necessarily the answer.  But even if the only thing he has to recommend him is that he's NOT George Bush...that's enough.