World Skeptical of Delusional Bush Reign

[RedEarth]

A substantial nit to pick with President Bush's second Inaugural Address and some questions about his theme:

"From the day of our founding, we have proclaimed that every man and woman on this earth has rights, and dignity, and matchless value, because they bear the image of the maker of heaven and earth. Across the generations we have proclaimed the imperative of self-government, because no one is fit to be a master, and no one deserves to be a slave."

The Bush theme of what someone else christened "evangelical democracy" is rather like the "From the day of our founding ..." passage — actually, it's more complicated than that. I, too, am happy to proselytize for freedom and democracy, but I don't think we can export it by force and I don't think we can expect the world to accept our noble intentions.

Nor is democracy necessarily the cure for terrorism. As a British journalist pointed out, if Britain had been following the Bush plan, it would have nuked us years ago for being the largest single source of money for the Irish Republican Army. Reality is so often much more complicated than George W. Bush thinks it is.

Why didn't the Iraqis welcome us with flowers? Wasn't Saddam Hussein about as nasty a dictator as you can find? Because we invaded their country and are now occupying it. It is extremely difficult to convince people that you are killing them (and torturing them) for their own good. How would you feel? The British medical magazine Lancet estimates Americans have now killed well over 100,000 Iraqis. We don't know for sure, because America has several policies that prevent anyone from keeping an accurate count.

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0127-33.htm

[whistle]

1. Wait until this Sunday and see what develops from Iraq...

...I saw on the evening news that U.S. marines are guarding the voting precincts in Iraq because the Iraqi people whose jobs that is have all disappeared for their lives, so Bush thinks nothing of sending our boys in to put their lives at rise. It is looking like and sounding like and smelling like Vietnam more and more. The American people will get sick and tired of this pretty fast.

The latest neo-conservative posturing is that we democrats and opponents of the war in Iraq are brining on this failure by sending out the wrong message of not supporting the president's policies and decisions about the war. Sorry, he is making those decisions and we are not standing in his way, so he will reap the consequences of whatever happens.

[bahrbearian]

2. Thanks for the Excellent post.

[indepat]

3. I would argue a large segment of the American people is more delusional