Rosa Parks died on October 24th and her courage in the face of oppression is inspiring. Her act of defiance helped spark one of the truly great revolutions ever. Her courage in defying an unjust law made this country a better place for us all.
October 25th marks the passing of the 2000th US soldier in Iraq. I know the hawks are saying this is some arbitrary number. That it really doesn’t mean anything. I suppose in a small way they are right all deaths in Iraq are tragic. Unless of course you’re like Ted Koppel and try and read all the names of the fallen and show their faces on late-night television. In which case you’re a total subversive but I digress.
But if I may be so bold I have a few questions. What happened to the swift war we were promised? What happened to be greeted as liberators? What happened to “Mission Accomplished”? What exactly is our “Noble Cause”?
Let us not forget the tens of thousands of dead Iraqis. Their deaths are a tragedy as well.
The war in Iraq is wrong, end of argument.
Iraq was no threat to us.
Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction.
There was no connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda.
Simply disposing an evil dictator is not a reason for war. If it is, shall we invade China next? They have a lousy human rights record and have weapons of mass destruction, so why not them? Maybe we could go in and depose all the corrupt leaders in Africa that are letting their people starve and allowing genocide to occur? Why was Iraq special? Was it oil? Was it a grudge left over from the Gulf War?
It is not better that we fight the war over there rather than here. If this war is keeping them so occupied how did they find the time to attack Britain, Spain and Indonesia? Just because we haven’t been hit again doesn’t mean they aren’t plenty busy attacking elsewhere. Remember this is not a regular army we are fighting. This is a loose band of rebels. They are driven by an idea. It’s awfully hard to stop an idea with bombs and bullets. Plus they don’t need to come to US soil to attack Americans we sent them 140,000.
Rosa Parks wouldn’t leave that seat on the bus because she knew the law was unjust. I will not stop opposing this war because it is unjust. Not that I am even one-hundredth as brave as the great Mrs. Parks. But, I shall continue to fight none the less.
Rest in peace Rosa Parks you have earned it.
October 25th marks the passing of the 2000th US soldier in Iraq. I know the hawks are saying this is some arbitrary number. That it really doesn’t mean anything. I suppose in a small way they are right all deaths in Iraq are tragic. Unless of course you’re like Ted Koppel and try and read all the names of the fallen and show their faces on late-night television. In which case you’re a total subversive but I digress.
But if I may be so bold I have a few questions. What happened to the swift war we were promised? What happened to be greeted as liberators? What happened to “Mission Accomplished”? What exactly is our “Noble Cause”?
Let us not forget the tens of thousands of dead Iraqis. Their deaths are a tragedy as well.
The war in Iraq is wrong, end of argument.
Iraq was no threat to us.
Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction.
There was no connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda.
Simply disposing an evil dictator is not a reason for war. If it is, shall we invade China next? They have a lousy human rights record and have weapons of mass destruction, so why not them? Maybe we could go in and depose all the corrupt leaders in Africa that are letting their people starve and allowing genocide to occur? Why was Iraq special? Was it oil? Was it a grudge left over from the Gulf War?
It is not better that we fight the war over there rather than here. If this war is keeping them so occupied how did they find the time to attack Britain, Spain and Indonesia? Just because we haven’t been hit again doesn’t mean they aren’t plenty busy attacking elsewhere. Remember this is not a regular army we are fighting. This is a loose band of rebels. They are driven by an idea. It’s awfully hard to stop an idea with bombs and bullets. Plus they don’t need to come to US soil to attack Americans we sent them 140,000.
Rosa Parks wouldn’t leave that seat on the bus because she knew the law was unjust. I will not stop opposing this war because it is unjust. Not that I am even one-hundredth as brave as the great Mrs. Parks. But, I shall continue to fight none the less.
Rest in peace Rosa Parks you have earned it.
posted by Eric at 2:15 AM
4 Comments:
Should we only go after Al Qaeda and leave the rest of the terrorists alone? Heck, should we leave Al Qaeda alone while we are at it...they aren't much of a threat to us anymore.
You said: "The war in Iraq is wrong, end of argument." Shall we turn Iraq back over to Saddam and force the Iraqi people to obey him whether they want to or not? If not, why not?
Has nothing good come of our action in Iraq?
Since we are there, and obviously aren't leaving tomorrow, what good things would you like to see accomplished before we pull out? Nothing? Should we not help the Iraqis improve their way of life since we are there?
Whether or not anyone feels that we had any business to go there in the first place is no longer important. We are there and claiming we had no right to invade Iraq changes nothing. Yelling it from the rooftops changes nothing, we still went there...the deed cannot be erased.
Maybe I'm not listening well enough, but I'm not hearing any alterative plan here. All I'm hearing is "it's wrong to have gone there". What shall we do instead of what we are doing. Just leave? Drop everything? No more helping Iraqis to improve their society? Pull out tomorrow. Try to get all our guys out within 3 days?
Just saying that we should never have gone does not solve anything. Demanding that we just "get out now" I think falls short of what needs to be done as well. What is your alternative solution? That's what I'm really interested in hearing. Please don't type the plan too fast, I'm a slow reader :)
Hi Dave.
You wanted answers you got them. You comments are in italics mine are in normal type.
Should we only go after Al Qaeda and leave the rest of the terrorists alone? Heck, should we leave Al Qaeda alone while we are at it...they aren't much of a threat to us anymore.
AL Qaeda should have been our only target. They are the ones who perpetrated the September 11th attacks. Putting Osama and his lieutenants behind bars should have been our sole focus. To attack a country that was not a present threat to us was ludicrous. We took our focus off what it should have been and it’s costing us dearly.
You said: "The war in Iraq is wrong, end of argument." Shall we turn Iraq back over to Saddam and force the Iraqi people to obey him whether they want to or not? If not, why not?
No Saddam in jail is better than Saddam running a country. But answer this, what authority did we have to go in and kill maybe as many as 100,000 Iraqis and totally ruin their infrastructure which was already crippled with a decade of harsh UN sanctions and one war? We didn’t have it as far as I’m concerned. A large portion of the rest of the world urged us to restrain ourselves. We refused to listen and they were right and we were wrong. We should leave the Iraqi people be.
Has nothing good come of our action in Iraq?
Saddam in jail is ok. But as a whole all this war has accomplished is the loss of 2000 soldiers’ lives, 200 billion dollars spent fighting the war and the loss of the trust of a large number of our allies. The bad is much heftier than the good at this point.
Since we are there, and obviously aren't leaving tomorrow, what good things would you like to see accomplished before we pull out? Nothing? Should we not help the Iraqis improve their way of life since we are there?
We should allow this new Iraqi democracy to decide. What they want is what we should give them. If they want some funding or training or technical assistance, then that’s what we should give them. It should be their decision not ours. I can already hear you thinking, “what if they want us to say?” Well then we should do so with a diminished troop number. Most of what I have read however seems to indicate the Iraqis want the American troops to pack up and go home.
Whether or not anyone feels that we had any business to go there in the first place is no longer important. We are there and claiming we had no right to invade Iraq changes nothing. Yelling it from the rooftops changes nothing, we still went there...the deed cannot be erased.
Just because the dead cannot be erased doesn’t make it right.
Maybe I'm not listening well enough, but I'm not hearing any alterative plan here. All I'm hearing is "it's wrong to have gone there". What shall we do instead of what we are doing. Just leave? Drop everything? No more helping Iraqis to improve their society? Pull out tomorrow. Try to get all our guys out within 3 days?
My idea earlier to let the Iraqis decide still stands, we should inform that the pullout starts soon and ask them what we might be able to do in so far as rebuilding their infrastructure and training a police force. Then we should start the pullout from Iraq and go get Bin Laden.
Just saying that we should never have gone does not solve anything. Demanding that we just "get out now" I think falls short of what needs to be done as well. What is your alternative solution? That's what I'm really interested in hearing. Please don't type the plan too fast, I'm a slow reader :)
See above. :)
Thanks for writing.
I think of importance are two things in your reply. First:
"AL Qaeda should have been our only target. They are the ones who perpetrated the September 11th attacks. Putting Osama and his lieutenants behind bars should have been our sole focus. To attack a country that was not a present threat to us was ludicrous. We took our focus off what it should have been and it’s costing us dearly."
I really do think we need to track down every terrorist that we can, by whatever means we can muster, regardless of affiliation with Al Qaeda or not. I really do like the idea of stopping organized terrorists before they can harm US civilians. I guess we just disagree on that point to at least some extent.
Secondly, when you said this, I found myself surprised a bit:
"We should allow this new Iraqi democracy to decide. What they want is what we should give them. If they want some funding or training or technical assistance, then that’s what we should give them. It should be their decision not ours. I can already hear you thinking, “what if they want us to say?” Well then we should do so with a diminished troop number. Most of what I have read however seems to indicate the Iraqis want the American troops to pack up and go home."
I don't know why that surprised me, because I really don't know what I thought your response was going to be!
At this time, I mostly agree. If the new "free Iraqi government" wishes for us to reduce the number of troops, it should be done. It is their country and they should have a final say.
However, if the Iraqis fail to maintain order with help from a reduced US presence...what then? Our remaining troops could be in greater danger than ever.
Hi Dave,
I don't say this as often as I should but I do enjoy your posts even though they make me defend my ranting and raving.
I think we should allow the Iraqis to decide becaue mostly I think our presence there is a catalyst for the insurgents. I could be wrong but that's my theory and I'm stinking to it.
Also I'm not a big fan of pre-emptive measures. Prevention is one thing but aggresive pre-emptive measures might not lead to anything but more violence. It's hard to stop aggresion with aggresion.
Again I enjoy your comments Dave please leave as many as you would like.
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