Laura Flanders: Iraq Anniversary AARGH (Lack of women voices in Iraq debate)

[marmar]

from The Nation:


BLOG | Posted 03/19/2007 @ 11:30am
Iraq Anniversary AARGH

Laura Flanders

Call me crazy, but it still gets my goat that the entire Iraq debate takes place without the input of the female majority. The Sunday TV talk shows are wall-to-wall male. Tim Russert seems his most relaxed, when--as again on March 18--he's surrounded by white men. Russert's not the only one, on the day before the anniversary of the invasion, three out of five Sunday TV news shows featured no women at all. The sole female on ABC was Senator Dianne Feinstein ?. Fox News Sunday included one woman on their panel of five, and she was representing Barack Obama.

Simple sexism would be infuriating enough, but leaving women out of this debate is also stupid. In which areas have have the good old boys most spectacularly failed? First in the launching of Bush's criminal war (women, when polled, were disproportionately against.) After the disaster of the invasion came the debacle of the reconstruction. I don't believe women are biologically determined to have more expertise in the winning of hearts-and-minds, but barred historically from the killing and slaughtering professions, women have risen to the top in relief and development and before the invasion, just about all the most experienced people in that arena were accurately anticipating what a mess would follow Rummie's rush into Baghdad.

Just what is it about being correct (as opposed to Right) that bars one from the conversation?

Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and erstwhile United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights was right about Bush's "war on terror." I believe it was she who first pointed out that you can't wage a war on a tactic, and besides, the attacks of 9/11 were criminal acts not acts of war. (And acts, of course, that Iraq had nothing to do with.) Retired Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatowski, tried to blow the whistle on Rummie/Feith's failure to prepare for post-Saddam Iraq when she was still working as a Near East expert in the Defense Department. Representative Barbara Lee ? (D-CA) is the one person who voted against Bush on the invasion of Afghanistan. She could see what was coming when the Congress still had time not to abdicate their war-powers authority. Sgt. Kelly Dougherty went to Iraq in 2003 and came back to co-found Iraq Veterans Against the War at age 27, determined to sound the alarm about the troops' lack of armor and the racist attitudes driving much of the occupation. Any one of those women would be a fantastic guest. Why not book the bunch? .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?bid=15

[Skittles]

1. it's a man's world

just check out the results :(