What We've Purchased

What We've Purchased
With Our Treasure, Our Life, and Blood

Ignatieff Employs Fantasy-Shame to Belittle Iraq Naysayers

Ignatieff Employs Fantasy-Shame to Belittle Iraq Naysayers

Michael Ignatieff ("Apostle of He-manitarianism") has written a piece for today's New York Times magazine that reflects a Bushworld view of today's election in Iraq. He plays the role of Daddy scolding the bad, bad liberals who see the sham-election as any less than a glorious exercise. (How COULD they?!?)

The article's called The Uncommitted. (He should be 'committed' for having written it).

Warning: If you're looking at matters with any kind of realistic focus, you'll wind up either laughing hysterically, puking, or throwing the magazine directly into the trashbin.

I wish Kerry had supported Kennedy

I wish Kerry had supported Kennedy

Senator Ted Kennedy was one of John Kerry's strongest supporters and campaigners in 2004.

On this morning's Meet The Press, I would have liked to have seen Sen. John Kerry give his full support to the ideas which Senator Ted Kennedy had shared in a speech last week, suggesting we send 12,000 troops home here and now, in order to show the Arab nations that we mean what we say [when we say we are not occupiers.] There is solid truth to what Senator Kennedy was saying in that speech.

Senator Kerry elected to politically separate himself from Senator Kennedy on the issue of Iraq, emitting that "waffling" attitude that has harmed him in his political past.

I don't think it will win any political points for Sen Kerry with the true progressives of his party.

Part of Karl Rove's "genius" in Campaign 2004, if you ask me, was using adequately offensive rhetoric (and getting it out to mainstream media)in order to get the Democrats to scramble to respond defensively, thus revealing/exposing their non-united front on the issue of National Security and foreign policy.

I wish Senator Kerry would have been more firmly supportive of senior Massachusetts Senator Kennedy today. The Democrats still haven't learned.

You'll hear a lot about 'fantastic Iraqi voter turnout' in the mainstream media today. While that may be true in regards to Iraq's Kurd population and more-secure Shi'ite-majority locations (the people and places who stand to politically gain the most), there were polls in some towns that not even opened at the set time; many unvisited due to either fear or sheer protest. This election was a sham, albeit a smart-looking symbolic move toward Bush-propaganda's version of "freedom".

According to an Aljazeera.com report, there was low turnout in polling places such as Baghdad, Baquba and Samarra, which could have been prevented if there had been more time to create "a genuine election".

This statement is from a Muslim scholar - not a violent insurgent:

"The elections are not a solution to the Iraqi problem, because this problem is not an internal dispute to be resolved through accords and elections … it lies in the presence of a foreign power that occupies this country and refuses even the mere scheduling of the withdrawal of its forces from Iraq", [Muhammad Al-Kubaysi/AMS spokesman] said.

Al-Kubaysi said AMS believed political consensus among Iraqi parties could only be reached once the foreign military presence left the country and all parties had to rely on debate rather than force of arms.

"We have consistently argued that elections can only occur in a democracy that enjoys sovereignty. Our sovereignty is incomplete. Our sovereignty is usurped by foreign forces that have occupied our land and hurt our dignity."

Asked whether the influential group was looking to upset a transition to democracy by rejecting elections, al-Kubaysi replied: "These elections … are a means of establishing the foreign forces in Iraq and keeping Iraq under the yoke of occupation … they should have been postponed."

I consider Senator Kennedy's suggestion to be realistic and made in utmost good faith and judgement.

The sham is complete.

Let's start moving some of those troops away from where they've never belonged, and aim them toward home, where they've always belonged.

Enjoy the Propaganda Today - Remember Tomorrow Will Arrive

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."

– John F. Kennedy

(It was not the U.S.'s place to spark or to aid a violent revolution in Iraq - or battling the resistance we knew would come. After the smoke and mirrors are cleared, we have come to understand that this was the real goal of our nation in our occupation of Iraq.
The Bush administration must be made accountable for their lies to the American people).


Enjoy the Propaganda Today - Remember Tomorrow Will Arrive

Today's news seems like an an endless video stream of hands dipping ballots into boxes followed by raised purple fingers. On a day when we are seeing maximum propaganda about an election in a land where democracy's been promoted by bombs and guns and U.S. occupation, we come to understand that authentic democratic revolutions (producing meaningful reform) must be sparked by the hearts of the people of the nation that is being changed. Could the Iraqis have achieved this on their own? Of their own free will? Not a chance. To this day, we cannot spark enough Iraqi fortitude for the "guts-n-glory" attitude that's necessary to maintain a "free Iraq". Look at the Iraqi security forces (Ahnold would call them "girly-men") who run at the first sign of danger!

What we are seeing is a violent and manufactured revolution waged by America on behalf of a foreign (hoped-for) power. The Bush administration created a violent revolution on behalf of the Iraqi people, while lying to the American people about the "national-security" reason our military was being used. President Bush deserves no less than impeachment for what he has done to the American people.

What was manufactured will become real. There will be a new Iraqi elected government as of tonight (or whenever the results are complete). And Monday will arrive. There will be freshly-elected shooting targets for insurgents who are determined to prove that violent revolutions created by foreign governments do not meet peaceably with reality.

I was reading an article at LeMonde Diplomatique titled Ukraine: the practice of protest. The truth it contains is an appropriate topic for a day like today. It reminds us that very little altruism can truly be expected from governments. It makes Bush's “Greater Middle East” policy suspect. While the project allegedly aims to “bring democracy” to the region, it has few chances of finding local allies given the level of animosity toward the US and its policies in both Palestine and Iraq.

The article states, and I agree, that it's wrong to claim that mass protests can be imported from abroad, whether we're talking a violent OR non-violent revolution. The decision to follow the politicians in one's nation, or not, must be taken by the people.

I am reminded of the real and earnest foreign-policy success of President Clinton's administration, along with the blessing and participation of the international community, which was well-proven in Serbia, 2000 (after bombs failed to produce real democracy):

From the article:

The recipe for non-violent revolution had been perfected in Belgrade. In 1999 Nato’s bombardment of Serbia failed; the US and the European Union decided to overthrow Slobodan Milosevic, which they did in the presidential elections of September 2000. Milosevic, convicted of electoral fraud, faced powerful, carefully organised demonstrations. A few skilfully prepared ingredients and a year of preparations were more effective than bombs.

Once success was certain in Belgrade, the sky was the limit for the Georgian opposition and activist movement. They made contacts in Serbia, went to look and borrowed the recipe. It worked, thanks in no small part to several million dollars from US organisations (the cold war was not yet over). Even so, these revolutions, inspired by Gandhian tactics or by the uprisings of the 1990s in eastern Europe, were more than a matter of manipulation. To believe that would imply ignorance of the social and historical context of the countries.

How different than what we're seeing today in Iraq.

9/11 allowed a mistaken and misleading administration to lead the fearful and shocked U.S. in the wrong direction. Deliberately and decisively.

A sham, I'm sad to say. By acting as de facto revolutionaries on behalf of Iraq, and by setting up these sham elections, we have eliminated the opportunity for dissenting Iraqi citizens to peacefully revolt.

We have created the perfect atmosphere for decades of civil unrest and violence in a land about which our President resorted to lying to the American people in order to spark manufactured (violent/radical) revolution there.

When Bush taunted "Bring it on", he meant it. He knew what he was saying, even if he has now apologized for it.

God help America. I'm convinced we have a mad dog as our President.