Counting The Dead

I’m probably going to feel “the wrath” from this post. Hell, I figure it’ll probably get me put on a watch list, if I’m not already on one. But if I didn’t post this I would be a hypocrite, if only in my own mind. I feel someone has to say this.

Personally, I find counting the number of dead soldiers offensive. Hundreds of Iraqi’s are murdered IN MASS, and the response by most Americans is a numb shrug of the shoulders. Yet, when 32 people are killed at Virginia Tech it’s a sad and disturbing event!?!??? This kind of irrational nationalism makes me ill. The Iraqi’s that have died are not much different than you, except for location. How is it that we can strip the humanity from anyone outside our borders? 9/11 sucked and was horrifying, but how does it compare to the war in Iraq? Estimates are that the Iraqi body count is from 50,000 to 600,000. That’s 16 to 201 times the number of dead from the 9/11 attacks.

I’d never wish ill on any soldier, but really, who should I feel sorry for? If you are a soldier in the US military, you have made a conscious choice to join the most powerful killing machine that this planet has ever seen. I’m not a fan of Rush Limbaugh, but he said it best… the military exists to “kill people and break things.” In contrast, the dead Iraqi civilians only crimes were location and existence.

Protests, as they are carried out now, have no weight behind them. The protests of the sixties mattered because they were bold pronouncements against the popular consensus. They also were very disruptive in the lives of your average Joe. The protests of today do neither. Permits are accessed, rules are followed, people talk, then go home. Protests today aren’t disruptive, don’t cause any disturbance, and in that, I don’t think they actually have impact or notice to your average every day Hoosier.

The reality is that those things that have impact, because they come at a cost. Jail time, personal safety, or other personal sacrifice usually follow such a sacrifice. The question is, are people fed up enough to make that kind of sacrifice?

The answer reminds me of a quote from “V for Vendetta”

“Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn’t there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who’s to blame? Well, certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the now High Chancellor…”

“More than four hundred years ago a great citizen wished to embed the fifth of November forever in our memory. His hope was to remind the world that fairness, justice, and freedom are more than words, they are perspectives.”

I don’t know what the answer is. I don’t know what we SHOULD do, I just know that protests and demonstrations aren’t the answer.

I’ve come to a point in my life where I am horrified by what my country is, yet inspired by what it could be. Right now the only thing I know I can give are my words.

1984

Is there an official Ministry of Truth that no one told me about? It seems that they will investigate those bastards that dared to release the actual Saddam video. Does it bother anyone else how they tried carrying it out in what looked like a pit of a basement, with no media coverage, no independent observers… nothing?!?

I don’t support the use of the death penalty. But if we are going to sanction our government to kill, we ought to be able to watch it. If it’s too brutal for us to see, isn’t it too brutal for us to do?

On a connected note, what the fuck is up with Canada.com. Do they get their story lines from Karl Rove directly? It seems to me their bias is quite obvious here, here, and here.

The Cost of War

My blood boils when I read crap from illogical, immoral, blind followers of President Bush. This is the cost of the real cost of war…

(hat tip to Free Iraq by way of A Citizen Of Mosul)

Precise collateral damage my ass…. Try to stop seeing these people as
“towel heads” or “A-Rabs.” Look at them as parents… look past your own ass, and you might understand why I don’t support this war. If you support this war, you did this….

Simple Solution, Water and Oil

Christ, are we too busy robbing Iraq of its riches that we cannot help the people LIVE? From Hnk’s blog:

“‘Day after day the situation in Iraq is getting better,’ that’s what one high ranking military official said. Reality shows the opposite. If things are getting better then why we don’t we have oil, when we live in a country rich with oil? We have two rivers Tigris and the Euphrates, yet we have no drinking water. We are in the 3rd year of the war with no end in sight.

You want to help Iraqi people? Don’t send your cousins and sons to Iraq to fight, because they fight against us, not for us. Did you forget about the WMD’s? Did you forget what happened at Abu Ghraib? Did you forget what humanity means? Did you forget about basic human needs? Don’t bother. I also forget… I forget what peace looks like. I forget what the street looks like. I forget what the night sky looks like. I forget what my relatives look like….

Sometimes I just think if you could see what my eyes see, if you could hear what my ears hear, you would be able to understand what I mean.”

How many enemies will we create by not giving the thirsty, water. How many insurgents are created by the hunger growing in their stomach? The enemy can walk in and prove us to be the devils that they claim we are… simply by providing food, water, and by meeting basic needs of everyday Iraqi’s while foriegn oil companies sit inside the green zone and divide up the spoils.

I wonder, is it that the Bush administration doesn’t know what to do, or just doesn’t want to spend the extra time and effort to win the hearts and minds of Iraqi’s?

Guantanamo Is The Cats Meow!

I recently recieved the following e-mail from the American Family Association:

Dear xxxxxx,

Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second highest ranking Democrat in the Senate, speaking on the Senate floor Wednesday, compared American troops
at Guantanamo Naval Base to Hitler, the Soviet gulags and Cambodian mass murderer Pol Pot.

Hitler murdered two million Christians and six million Jews. Nearly two million prisoners died in the Soviet gulags. And Pol Pot slaughtered as many as ten million in Cambodia.

Durbin compared the American troops to Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot because of alleged mistreatment of prisoners held at Guantanamo. What earned these American troops the disparaging remarks by Senator Durbin? He said that
some prisoners’ air conditioners were turned down too low, some had their air conditioners turned off making the room hot, and loud rap music was played in
a room where there were prisoners.

That a U.S. Senator would compare American military men and women to Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pott is beyond belief. Does he not remember 9/11?

When asked to apologize, he refused. He said it is the military that should apologize for how they were treating the prisoners of war.

TAKE ACTION

Send Senator Durbin an email reminding him that our soldiers are there to
serve their country by guarding the prisoners of war, and that they do a pretty good job.

According to the founder of the AFA, Donald E. Wildmon, Guantanamo sounds like a pretty happy place, eh? That satanic organization, The Red Cross ( ya know that organization founded by that demon, Henry Dunant) seems to think otherwise. They reported that

“Some of the elements the ICRC found ‘were tantamount to torture…. I think you will have different definitions of what torture amounts to; what we feel, and I think what you see from the photographs…is that there were clearly instances of degrading and inhumane treatment.’”

Truthout.org said

The information from the various sources frequently matched, providing corroboration of the use of specific procedures, which included prolonged sleep deprivation and shackling prisoners in uncomfortable positions for many hours. One F.B.I. agent wrote his superiors that he saw such restraining techniques several times. In the most gruesome of the bureau memorandums, he recounted observing a detainee who had been shackled overnight in a hot cell, soiled himself and pulled out tufts of hair in misery.

Military officials who participated in the practices said in October that prisoners had been tormented by being chained to a low chair for hours with bright flashing lights in their eyes and audio tapes played loudly next to their ears, including songs by Lil’ Kim and Rage Against the Machine and rap performances by Eminem.

In a recent interview, another former official added new details, saying that many interrogators used a different audio tape on prisoners, a mix of babies crying and the television commercial for Meow Mix in which the jingle consists of repetition of the word “meow.”

The AFA website states that

The American Family Association represents and stands for traditional family values, focusing primarily on the influence of television and other media – including pornography – on our society.

Is it a traditional family value to torture a prisoner to the point he shits himself? I find it highly ironic that the AFA supports torture including the music of Eminem. In August of 2001 they said

“He’s won awards for singing songs about killing his mother, killing his wife and gang-raping his sister.”

The thought that a supposedly pro-family, pro-Christian organization supporting this type of behavior is appalling. Would Jesus support the torture of these “enemy combatants?”

Matthew 5
39But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

He also said

Luke 22

When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?” 50And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear.

51But Jesus answered, “No more of this!” And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.

52Then Jesus said to the chief priests, the officers of the temple guard, and the elders, who had come for him, “Am I leading a rebellion, that you have come with swords and clubs? 53Every day I was with you in the temple courts, and you did not lay a hand on me. But this is your hour—when darkness reigns.”

Hour of darkness indeed….

When a Christian organization supports torture and shills for an obviously corrupt government administration, another passage comes to mind.

Matthew 7:
5″Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

21″Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ 23Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

So the question remains… are soldiers in Guantanamo doing ” the will” of “the Father?”

Bush Drug Test

“Because of their fierce courage, America is safer. Two terror regimes are gone forever and more than 50 million souls now live in freedom.”

Are you high, Mr. Bush? Granted Saddam Hussein was a tyrant, but his government was a secular one. You haven’t proven ONE SINGLE TIE of Saddam to terrorism, yet you include the Iraqi war as fighting terrorism! The government that is being installed in Iraq will be more of theocracy than Saddam Hussien’s regime. The Abu Ghraib scandal has recruited more Osama bin Ladens’ than any terrorist cell ever could. The Middle East is in more turmoil than EVER BEFORE! Americans have been warned to leave Kuwait and Saudi Arabia because of a rise in anti-American violence.

Even your own administration cries out against your claims of America being safer. On May 26, Attorney General John Ashcroft announced that “Credible intelligence, from multiple sources, indicates that al-Qaeda plans to attempt an attack on the United States in the next few months.”

Safer my ass.

Put down the crack pipe.