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Our nation is involved in one of the deadliest wars on Earth right now, the war on Iraq. Over 1.3 million Iraqis have been killed in this war, a number that dwarfs the disturbing US death and casualty numbers. The hundreds of billions we have spent destructively in another country are a major contributing factor to our banking crisis and our deep recession.
Yet, our corporate media only mention it on an occasional basis. The economic consequences are censored from coverage entirely. We have so much media consolidation and corporate power over news content, our nation is sleepwalking through one of the biggest crimes ever committed in our name.
However, it isn't just the corporate media that are at fault. The peace movement has focused little on Iraq ever since Obama has been in the White House. Living under the delusion that the Obama Administration and the Democratic controlled Congress are friendly on peace issues, peace groups have put way too much time into pushing ever conceivable issue that interests them, ignoring the political reality that focusing on one or two issues is necessary for any progress in a hostile governmental environment.
It's as if many peace groups have decided to let President Obama put a fig leaf over the continued occupation and slaughter of the Iraqi people. They are more interest to access to politicians and getting invited to meetings than they are in stopping the Iraq War. Every day, every leader of every peace organization should be asking herself or himself the following question.
“What else can I do to stop the Iraq war?”
Blood and Oil 2 by ~shattercat on deviantART
Psycho Woman Throws Knives At Children
13 years ago
Good questions, good art.
Goodbye change we can believe in, hello same crap, different asshole.
I've never heard it put better than on a fictional tv show. On the West Wing, Leo asks a general about war crimes. The general replies, "All wars are crimes."
You ask good questions here. But the will is, obviously, to continue committing the crimes.
Well, we could always ask that nice Mr. Hussein back ... oops, I just remembered ... such a pity, things were so much more peaceful when he was around. Yes, I know there was that unfortunate 8-year war with Iran. No-one knows how many died in that, like the current stats in Iraq, people with an axe to grind pick a figure, double it, then add their birthday.
Plus ca change - and all that jazz!
GDAEman: Glad you liked the art.
Lew Scannon: Yep, the massive corruption in our political system has stymied real change so far.
two crows: Interesting that you mention that. Under international law, wars of aggression such as this war on Iraq are crimes against humanity.
David Duff: So much nonsense in such a short comment. The Iraq-Iran War was started by Hussein with the support of the Reagan Administration. In fact, the same officials (e.g. Rumsfeld and Cheney) who provided Hussein with arms (including chemical and biological weapons) were the Bush regime officials who played a key role in defrauding the US into the war. It also should be noted that the first US war on Iraq and the subsequent deadly sanctions made Iraq so weak that it posed no threat to its neighbors. That's why Kuwait opposed the second US war on Iraq despite its dependency on the US.
Also, the primary responsibility of the US and Americans is to stop the slaughters OUR government is responsible for.
Your denial of the massive scale of the slaughter in Iraq reminds me of the earlier fringe right denials of the peer reviewed Lancet study earlier in the war which showed that over 650,000 had been killed. There was absolutely no scientific controversy over the study, but corporate shills bullshitted like crazy and most rightist bloggers fell for their cheap rhetoric.
Your own blog's denial of the scientifically established fact that global warming exists and is caused by human generated emissions shows that you are unable to accept scientific facts that contradict the far right ideology that you have been suckered into buying into by propagandists corporate and wealthy interests. If 2 + 2 = 4 threatened those same interests, the same propagandists would deny it vehemently.
Remember when rightists actually believed tobacco companies when they said that cigarette smoking doesn't cause cancer, heart desease, etc?
You need to grow up and face the real world. Throwing silly tantrums won't bring the Iraq War dead back to life, nor will it slow the climate changes that humans are causing.
"Silly tantrums"!
Tantrums, maybe, sir, but not on this occasion, and never silly!
I'm not quite sure how "The Iraq-Iran War was started by Hussein with the support of the Reagan Administration given that the Carter administration was in power at the time!
I don't deny the slaughter in Iraq, massive or otherwise, I just do not accept specific statistics from people who may have an axe to grind - from either direction. A fair summary of the problem can be read in this BBC report:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6045112.stm
If I may offer some friendly advice, you should not allow the conversation to be diverted into the AGW debate lest I ask you to explain why the earth has actually cooled over the last 10 years! One debate at a time is probably wise.