01/22/03
Okay, time for me to get back up on my soapbox. This whole thing with Bush trying to push us
into a war which frankly, nobody really wants, is driving me nuts. Look, I have no doubt Iraq is
a threat to its neighbors, and it's probably a threat to us as well. But never, NEVER, in the
history of this nation, have we ever gone off and started a war. We've started wars in response
to attack, we've started wars to help other countries who are under attack, but never have we done
it like this. It's wrong. Nearly every other nation sees that, and a good number of people in this
nations see it, but Bush is completely blind to it. The administration talks about things it "knows"
but then doesn't go on to tell us or anyone else what those things are.
This country is based on principals, and right now we're not paying enough attention to those
very principals. We're going to start a war because Bush wants war. I honestly believe it's because
Bush thinks this will help get him re-elected. I don't think there's any overriding threat to anyone
that justifies it and even if the Iraqis complied 100% with U.N. inspections, I think we'd still
be going to war. Bush has made up his mind. He made up his mind a long time ago.
He wants to send Americans off to die and to have a lot of innocent Iraqis die, so he can get
re-elected and that makes me sick. I think George Bush is incapable of understanding the wrong
he is doing. I think he lives in his own universe where he is master and nothing is more important
than what he wants for himself.
I'll be the first to admit that I think we should have finished the job when his father was
president. Leaving Hussein in power was a mistake. But our nation doesn't condone assassination of
foreign leaders, and rightly so. That's what the new Bush wants to do. He'll do it with billions
of dollars in bombs instead of a bullet, but that's his goal and he's made it no secret. Why aren't
Americans up in arms about this?
I'll tell you what brought this essay on. I was sitting around yesterday looking for work. Like
many other Americans, I'm suffering a bit because of the economy. It just won't quite recover and
it's making it hard for a lot of peple to find work. And the main reason I think it hasn't recovered
yet is that nobody wants to commit to anything with a war looming on the horizon. I found myself wishing
we'd just go ahead and go to war and get it over with. How sick. How could I think something like that?
Here I'm wishing we speed up the process of killing a bunch of people so that I can find a job. But
it's inevitable, isnt' it? I mean Bush hasn't left any way out for Hussein. So what is he waiting for?
I really hope this war comes back to bite him in the ass. I'll be sorely disappointed in the American
people if Bush gets re-elected. You can say everything you want about Clinton, and I will admit that
the tech bubble would have crashed, no matter who was president at the time, but I'm convinced that
Clinton would be making progress in getting the economy back in order, not beating his chest and talking
about how we have to go off and pick a fight.
Afghanistan was different. I think most Americans feel justified in what we did there, and I believe
it was justified. Al Queda was directly responsible and the Taliban indirectly, at least, for 9/11. There
was no love lost when the Taliban fell, either here or in Afghanistan. I think most Afghanis were happy
to see them leave. We did a great deal of damage to Al Queda. We killed a lot of very bad people.
I saw a video taken from an AC-130 gunship. It's one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. It
was shot with infrared and they were flying high enough that nobody could hear them. The target was an
Al Queda group. From the air, this AC-130 is firing 40mm and 105mm shells at these people on the ground.
You can see them scatter and then they chase down individuals, one by one, blowing them to pieces.
One guy they chased for about two minutes, with shells landing behind him and in front of him, but never
quite hitting him until he made the mistake of stopping and hiding on the side of a hill. Once he was
an immobile target, they just lined up the sites and blew him up. None of these guys had any idea
where the shells were coming from.
I'm watching this thinking, "Oh my God, this is horrible." I mean, these are real human lives. It may
look like a video game, but these are human beings. But then I started to remember 9/11 and I suddenly
didn't feel sorry for them anymore. These were animals that killed thousands of innocent people.
I bring this up simply because it clarified a lot in my mind about when war is right and when it's wrong.
And honestly, I don't know if I can even use the word "right." I hate the thought of killing people,
even if they're bad people, but I think these people posed a very direct threat to our country. No
question. They proved what the threat they were and something had to be done.
I think Hussein is more of a threat to his region and less of a threat to us. And I doubt he
would try to pull an attack again like he did in Kuwait because he now knows where that will lead.
So it makes me question why we're so ready to attack.
The administration keeps talking about how Hussein wants to build nuclear weapons. I guarantee you
that Hussein will NEVER build a nuclear weapon. The only way he could do it is to build a nuclear
reactor to get the enriched uranium. If he did that, it would never get online. The Libyans tried
to build a reactor, and what happened? The Israelis flew in, blew it up, and flew out. The end.
If Hussein built a reactor, we'd blow it up if the Israelis didn't get there first. It just
wouldn't ever happen.
And make no mistake, we decimated his army. Iraq had the third largest army in the world before
the Gulf War. I guarantee you he hasn't rebuilt it yet. He doesn't have the money and nobody would
be able to ship that many tanks without the U.S. and most of the rest of the world knowing about it.
So why are we trying to start a war?
Again, I think it comes down to Bush having some twisted idea that this is somehow going to do
for him what the Gulf War did for his father. But his father did the right thing. Iraq invaded
another country and we came to their rescue. It was a valid reason to go to war. We didn't pick
the fight, we simply stood up for the right side. Our reason for doing it, oil mainly, may not
have been very noble, but it was the right thing to do for other reasons, namely to free the
Kuwaitis.
I don't have all the answers. I'll be the first to admit it. I don't know how you handle the
situation with Iraq. Hussein does need to be removed from power, but I just don't believe it's
our responsibility to do it without some overriding, compelling reason. And I don't think such
a reason exists now.
