My take on Saddam's execution...

[Dangerman]

Say what you will about Saddam...

But he acted like a human being and a sympathetic figure in the end. And like or not, I shed a tear for him. Since he is one of the leaders the Arab world praised for standing up against America, he won the compassion of Sunni Muslims everywhere.

And in my opinion...

I don't care how many times you call Saddam a "murderer"...

His execution is itself a murder.

In my point of view, when an execution takes place in the shadow of an immoral, illegal and unjust foreign military occupation based on false pretexts, it counts as cold-blooded murder. And his murderers, the fanatical Shiites and George W. Bush, are getting away scott-free.

Again, say what you want about Saddam. But he is more victim than villain: another tragic victim of Bush's illegal and immoral war.

Flame me if you want, but I will always feel sorry for Saddam, the Iraqi people, and our troops. All of them sorry figures doomed to die under that ruthless watch of the cold-hearted scumbag from Washington that is George W. Bush.

[CJCRANE]

1. Well

I think Saddam has gained more respect in death than he had in life, simply by the way he met his fate with dignity.

Ironically, in the long run he may even be looked on as a better leader than *.

[lvx35]

2. I'll tell you how I feel, because I'm pissed.

I'm pissed about Saddam Hussein, whatever he may have done or not done, NOT geting justice. His defense attorneys were intimidated and even killed, and the verdict was released JUST in time for the 2006 elections...I am incredibly insulted that I am supposed to think this is just a coincidence...I'm insulted about a fake trial against a fake dictator who had fake WMDs and fake ties to Al Queda. I'm insulted for having to watch Bullshit being fed to the Iraqis and the US people.

So, I don't necessarily shed a tear for Saddam, there are too many dead kids over there for my tears to go elsewhere. But I certainly share you indignity with this whole sham.

[flordehinojos]

3. i cannot flame you ...

what you express happens to be in synchronicity with what i think.


i am astounded, shocked, and otherwise left in disbelief that people around me happen to think that,
"finally" saddam hussein was put to death and discount the fat that whoever put him to death (GWB and the Bush Crime Family) have killed more Iraqis in their illegal occupation of Iraq that hussein did in the crime that he was tried, found guilty of, and hanged for.

this is an upside down world where right is might and might is right, the rest be damned... it doesn't matter if the rest is filthy stench muck.

[VOX]

4. I'm as liberal as they come, but I do not find Saddam a sympathetic character...

Very few people in the world mourn the death of Saddam. He's been in league with the dark side for decades. When Saddam shook Rummy's hand back on 12/20/83, he sealed his own fate.

Does his execution justify the death of thousands of Americans, hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis, and a cost of $350+ billion? Absolutely **not**!!! Saddam has been irrelevant to the conflict from the start. He's been nothing more than (yet another) phony excuse for BushCo's folly.

But as for Saddam's character, the following is from the BBC (hardly a right-wing source), and it predates 9/11:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1100529.stm
Thursday, 4 January, 2001
Saddam Hussein profile
By Middle East analyst Gerald Butt

Saddam Hussein, President of Iraq for the past two decades, has the dubious distinction of being the world's best known and most hated Arab leader.

And in a region where despotic rule is the norm, he is more feared by his own people than any other head of state.

A former Iraqi diplomat living in exile summed up Saddam's rule in one sentence: "Saddam is a dictator who is ready to sacrifice his country, just so long as he can remain on his throne in Baghdad." Few Iraqis would disagree with this. Although none living in Iraq would dare to say so publicly.
<snip>

[malaise]

6. You need to check some non-Western

sources.

[VOX]

8. The reader posts on Al Jazeera are very interesting...

It seems that many of the posts objecting to Saddam's execution do so not because of any love for Saddam (many go out of their way to distance him), but rather because the execution is perceived as another U.S./Bush intrusion into ME affairs.

Link here: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E9A36960-AB5A-43E7-A637-4628328249EB.htm?choice=3&dgDiscID=108&dgPoolID=03D233F1-EE9A-4BC2-8417-D80A98579DB2

[malaise]

5. I agree with you but am concerned about your

beginning. 'But he acted like a human being'???

[Dangerman]

7. I actually meant was...

He acted more human, more venerable, and in the eyes of the Sunnis, acted more of a courageous figure who will motivate the Sunnis to take vengeance on the sectarian violence and the fanatical Shiites.

[cali]

9. I think your tears are hideously misplaced.

Don't get me wrong; the show trial and circus lynching were revolting, counter-productive and profoundly wrong, but no matter with what "dignity" Saddam faced his death, my sympathies do not extend to Saddam, revolted as I was by his lynching. I prefer to restrict my sympaties to his victims- and if we rightly attribute the deaths in Iraq to bushco, we must also attribute a million deaths to Saddam. Yes, a million: All the Iraqis he perished in his misbegotten and terrible war against Iran, his stupid invasion of Kuwait- despite Glaspie's and the bush I admins ridiculous doublespeak- his Kurd and Shi'a victims, and others. My sympathies lie with those people and the citizens of Iraq who have suffered and died because of bushco. I don't weep for strongmen who oppress and kill their own people and send them off to misbegotten wars.

Sorry that you do.

[Dangerman]

11. Yeah.

But Saddam is a far lesser "monster" compared with George W. Bush and his father, who, along with Clinton, killed more Iraqis than Saddam did. And let's not forget Ronald Reagan. America wants us to think that Reagan is a good man. But he supported Saddam and he, Rumsfeld and Bush I happily armed him chemical weapons and they don't really care about the Kurds, as they are allies with Iran. So Reagan is more of a bastard than a "good" man.

Saddam may a brute, but he is a pillar of virtue compared with those bastards.

Bush Jr. now outnumbered the "butcher of Baghdad" in victims.

And I agree with you. Not even Saddam deserves to be killed in this barbaric way. It was a murder. Any execution ordered in the shadow of a brutal and unjust foreign military occupation counts as a murder. If any conservative called this execution an "appropriate" end to Saddam, then I say to them that they're crazy and nuts. Unlike all the said persons, I value human life, an no matter how bad a person is, like Saddam, he or she deserve to be treated humanly. God, I hate this corrupted new Iraqi government.

In the end, the execution proved that we're no better than he is.

[NaturalHigh]

15. A pillar of virtue?

Why don't we ask some of the people whom Saddam tortured? Of course, most of them are dead.

[cali]

16. It's not a competition, and

it's pointless to look at it that way. As for being a pillar of virtue- what bullshit. Sorry, there's no other way to put it. And if you don't think that Saddam is as much to blame for the deaths under sanctions as Clinton and the world community, repectfully, you don't have a clue.

And no, just as a matter of fact, bushco still hasn't outdone Saddam in terms of numbers of people dead, but as I said it's not a competition. Saying that Saddam is a pillar of virtue in comparison to bush is like saying that Charles Manson is a pillar of virture compared to Jeffrey Dahmer.

Mawkishness is NOT empathy, and it's not compassion.

[Dangerman]

20. It's also BS when...

People say the Saddam killed MILLIONS. It is also BS when Ronald Reagan is a "good man" when hem Bush and Rumsfeld happily armed Saddam with chemical weapons. It is also BS and people say George Bush is a good president.

[cali]

17. self-delete dupe

[LeftishBrit]

29. I agree with every word, Cali

[cassiepriam]

10. Bingo. nt

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

12. "But he is more victim than villain". Biggest Crock Of Shit I've Ever Heard.

Utterly disgusting to read. Just disgusting.

[cali]

18. Yeah, but it's

becoming all too predictable, isn't it? I really have a loating of mawkish sentimentality posing as empathy and compassion. Sickening stuff.

[Raskolnik]

13. "more victim than villain"!? That is some Grade-A baloney.

Saddam was one of the most brutal dictators of the 20th century.

Bush's actions do not negate Saddam's.

[NaturalHigh]

14. Just what we need...

another "Oh, Poor Saddam" thread. The guy was a monster. Even MOST people who are against the death penalty will admit that.

[Dangerman]

19. Oh...

What about Fidel Castro? Is he a monster, too?

How about this... What about the corrupted Shiite-infested Iraqi government? What about president Musaraff of Pakistan? What about the Saudi Royal family? What about every damn dictator in the globe America still support? Are they monsters, too?

[leftchick]

24. my favorite bush loved monster

It can not get much uglier than this....


In His Own Words

"The OSCE focuses only on establishment of democracy, the protection of human rights and the freedom of the press. I am now questioning these values." - President Karimov, after the OSCE criticized the 1999 parliamentary elections. Agence France-Presse, January 8, 2000.

"Such people must be shot in the forehead! If necessary, I'll shoot them myself…!" - President Karimov, upon the 1998 adoption of a highly restrictive religion law, warning parliament not to be soft on "Islamic extremists." Many peaceful Muslims have also been rounded up in the sweeps of "fundamentalists." BBC Monitoring report of Uzbek Radio second program, May 1, 1998.

"I'm prepared to rip off the heads of 200 people, to sacrifice their lives, in order to save peace and calm in the republic…If my child chose such a path, I myself would rip off his head." - President Karimov reacting to acts of violence in Uzbekistan in March 1999. The government originally blamed the incidents, including a bus hijacking, on "criminals" and later on "Islamic extremists." Agence France-Presse, April 2, 1999.


http://www.hrw.org/press/2002/03/karimovprof.htm



Growing evidence U.S. sending prisoners to torture capital
Despite bad record on human rights, Uzbekistan is ally


Immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks, however, the Bush administration turned to Uzbekistan as a partner in the global fight against terrorism. The nation, a former Soviet republic in Central Asia, granted the United States the use of a military base for fighting the Taliban across the border in Afghanistan. President Bush welcomed Uzbek President Islam Karimov to the White House, and the United States has given Uzbekistan more than $500 million for border control and other security measures.

Now there is increasing evidence that the United States has sent terror suspects to Uzbekistan for detention and interrogation, even as Uzbekistan's treatment of its own prisoners continues to earn it admonishments from around the world, including from the State Department.

The so-called rendition program, under which the CIA transfers terror suspects to foreign countries to be held and interrogated, has linked the United States to other countries with poor human rights records. But the turnabout in relations with Uzbekistan is particularly sharp. Before the Sept. 11 attacks, there was little high-level contact between Washington and Tashkent, the Uzbek capital, beyond the United States' criticism of Uzbekistan.

Uzbekistan's role as a surrogate jailer for the United States has been confirmed by a half-dozen current and former intelligence officials working in Europe, the Middle East and the United States. The CIA declined to comment on the prisoner transfer program, but an intelligence official estimated that the number of terrorism suspects sent by the United States to Tashkent is in the dozens.

There is other evidence of the United States' reliance on Uzbekistan in the program. On Sept. 21, 2003, two American-registered airplanes -- a Gulfstream jet and a Boeing 737 -- landed at the international airport in Tashkent, according to flight logs obtained by the New York Times.

Although the precise purpose of those flights is not known, over a span of about three years, from late 2001 until early this year, the CIA used those two planes to ferry terror suspects in U.S. custody to countries around the world for questioning, according to interviews with former and current intelligence officials and the planes' flight logs. On the day the planes landed in Tashkent, the Gulfstream had taken off from Baghdad, while the 737 had departed from the Czech Republic, according to the logs.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/05/01/MNGE5CI9MO1.DTL

[leftchick]

27. holy fuck!

the more I look the worse it gets...

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article3943.htm

06/26/03: Let me introduce you to our presidents new best friend, President Karimov of Uzbekistan.

President Karimov government was awarded $500m in aid from the Bush administration in 2002. The SNB (Uzbekistan's security service) received $79m of this sum.

The U.S. State Department web site states "Uzbekistan is not a democracy and does not have a free press. Many opponents of the government have fled, and others have been arrested." and "The police force and the intelligence service use torture as a routine investigation technique."

Now I would like to introduce you to Muzafar Avazov, a 35-year old father of four. Mr Avazov had a visit from our presidents friends security force (SNB), the photographs below detail the brutality and inhuman treatment our tax dollars subsidize, with the full knowledge of our president and his administration.

Muzafar Avazov, body showed signs of burns on the legs, buttocks, lower back and arms. Sixty to seventy percent of the body was burnt, according to official sources. Doctors who saw the body reported that such burns could only have been caused by immersing Avazov in boiling water. Those who saw the body also reported that there was a large, bloody wound on the back of the head, heavy bruising on the forehead and side of the neck, and that his hands had no fingernails.

[Rex]

28. I can see where your anger comes from.

What gives us the right to decide which dictator lives or dies? What gives us the right to occupy a country and kill it's leader?

These are very serious questions, some of which will eventually see their way into a court of law. I hope.

[NaturalHigh]

30. Yes to all of the above.

I wouldn't waste my sympathy on any of them either.

[kentuck]

21. Delete

misplaced post - will re-post at the bottom

[Dangerman]

22. As for this "more victim than villian is BS"...

I meant in the end, Saddam has been turned from a ruthless dictator to a sorry figure thanks for the vicious warmongering of George W. Bush.

It is not good truimphing over evil...

It is the greater evil truimphing over the lesser evil.

The present evil over the past evil.

The new bully over the old bully.

Personally, I'm not a fan of Saddam, he did some very aeful things in the past. But Bush is worse, and half of this country still supports the commander-in-thief for his heinous war crimes. So Bush and his father is a slightly more bigger monsters than Saddam. I hate defending Saddam myslef, but this war is wrong and totally out of control that desperate acts have to be made.

I'm sorry for this.

[Rex]

23. Saddam was a villain! Let us not cloud the truth with emotions.

Saddam was a very evil person, he had thousands executed as a brutal dictator. Saddam was an assassin and won the country by killing his mentor. He patterned his rule over Iraq by studying the leadership of Joseph Stalin, a man he admired.

Saddam was an evil fucker. Despite what happen to him, the truth is he was evil and no one here should be surprised he died a violent death.

I personally don't think they should have hung him. He knew where a LOT of the BFEE bodies are buried. Even thought I believe they should have given him life in prison, he was an EVIL man!

[kentuck]

25. Sorry...

Although your anger may be justified, your sympathies are misplaced...

[LeftishBrit]

26. Well, I don't believe in the death penalty

and think that Saddam should have been tried by the International Criminal Court, where he would presumably have received a life sentence.

But 'sorry for him'? No, he was a murderous evil dictator, which does NOT mean that we should have invaded Iraq. There are many evil dictators, and it doesn't justify invading their countries and usually causing much more harm, with war and all manner of disruption. But it doesn't make these people 'good guys' either.

[Blue-Jay]

31. I think I'll save my tears for those who are more deserving.

The whole invasion, capture, trial, and execution was (and IS) a big sham. I am 100% against the death penalty, but I'm still not going to shed any tears over that sorry asshole.

Oh...and calling him a "sympathetic figure"?!? That's a new one, I'll give you that.

When evil is committed against an evil person, it's still evil.