Bush strikes again!!! http://www.jimhightower.com/air/read.asp?id=11006 DANCING WITH DICTATORS 1/8/03 Excuse me for noticing, but isn't it dumber than dum-dee-dumb-dumb for Washington to keep arming thuggish regimes around the world that we later end up fighting? Like some rooster choking on a peach pit, George W is now flailing about and squawking that ol' nasty Saddam Hussein has "weapons of mass destruction." Whether Iraq still has such weaponry is uncertain, but he certainly had them 20 years ago, because George's own Daddy was in on the brilliant decision to ship them to Saddam! Back then, Daddy Bush declared Hussein to be our buddy and sent tons of U.S. weapons to him – including chemical agents of mass destruction. Well, here we go again. Skipping along in Daddy's foodsteps, Boy Bush has just declared that the military thugs who rule Algeria are now our buddies, agreeing to ship U.S. weapons to them. These repressive dictators have been in power since 1992, when they overthrew an Islamic group that had won that year's national election. The military not only seized power, but also banned the Islamic party and brutally cracked down on the people – at least 100,000 of whom have been killed in the civil war that has raged since the coup. But Algeria's brutish military rulers became George's "buddies" after September 11, because they quickly and gladly embraced Bush's world war on terrorism, claiming that the Islamic rebels in their country are "terrorists," too. So, once again, you and I are financing military aid to anti-democratic goons so they can retain dictatorial power over the Islamic people of their country. A top Bush official overseeing our cloddish intervention against the people in Algeria's civil war says blithely: "Washington has much to learn from Algeria on ways to fight terrorism." This is Jim Hightower saying... What about learning to respect the democratic values that we're supposedly battling terrorists to preserve? It's hard even to pretend you're standing for democracy when you're dancing with dictators.
If anyone can read this and still think it is not a war on Islam, then they are not looking closeley enough. Islam seems to produce a large portion of radicals, and I think Bush etc...is on a crusade so to speak. DD
The article seems to repeatedly imply that the rulers of Algeria are not Muslims. But, aren't they? The government is secular, but I think the rulers are Muslim of some stripe. Besides that, he also implies that the FIS, which was winning the election, would have preserved the democracy, which isn't the impression I had gotten. He also doesn't mention that there has been some detente between the FIS and the government. The FIS' army disbanded to take advantage on an amnesty program. And, moderate religious parties are allowed to run.
I really hope Bush doesn't receive another four years... His cabinet (excluding sec of state) are a bunch of idiots and I really want them gone along with Bush. I want the Dem's to take control of the House, senate, and have the presidentcy.
