Cohen + glynch: good points!! Well about Iraq and Saddam of course he's an idiot dictator who killed more of his people than anyone ever will but then there is a big problem with the sanctions.. they are making him only stronger! under the oil for food program all the transactions are put in the hand of the government and anyone can guess where the money goes.. to Saddam's own pocket (and am guessing into developing weapons of mass destruction which he will probably end up using against his own people like in Halabja in the 1980's when he was still a friend of the U.S. so no one said anything to him then!) While the people are starving, he's only growing stronger under the sanctions while his people are getting weaker: how are they going to be able to rise against the government if they are struggling to survive day by day. Personally I don't think he will ever allow inspectors.. and making this a condition to lift the sanctions is assuming that he wants to end them which is soooooo wrong!
Originally posted by SAROONA ... using against his own people like in Halabja in the 1980's when he was still a friend of the U.S. so no one said anything to him then!) Was that the Kurds? Very, very sad. Why didn't anyone else speak up about that deplorable and inhuman event either? The US does not have a monopoly on the media. While the people are starving, he's only growing stronger under the sanctions while his people are getting weaker: how are they going to be able to rise against the government if they are struggling to survive day by day. Personally I don't think he will ever allow inspectors.. and making this a condition to lift the sanctions is assuming that he wants to end them which is soooooo wrong! What is amazing that most of the Arab world blames the US totally and the evil, militaristic ruler not at all. Saddam could feed his people if he chose to do so, but he would rather win a PR war and let his own people suffer. Do other Arab countries have NO influence over events in Iraq? Can't Arab nations take him out? What is the alternative for the US? Turn our backs? If he develops weapons of mass destruction and threatens Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iran, who will be the ones to come in and protect these countries? The US. Regardless, I pray that somehow the Iraqi people have relief soon.
Cohen no one blames exclusively the U.S. for Iraq's suffering.. the problem of removing Saddam is essentially an Iraqi issue and is not the responsibility of the United States.. Yet as the world's only super power, its policies are seen as having the most effect in any region where it is directly involved.. An ideal solution I think will be for it to lift the sanctions (and avoid bombing Iraq, like a year ago when the missiles hit civilian targets by mistake) which will a. deny Saddam his PR victories among some misled Arabs/Muslims and b. free the people of Iraq from the cycle of hunger and disease so they may eventually be able to rise up against their dictator. As with Arab regimes, they are either too weak to try to remove him (Iraq's army is still stronger than that of the Arab Gulf armies combined.. hence the US forces in the region) or unwiling (as in Egypt and Syria where the dictatorships are just too preoccupied with holding on to power and suppressing their own populations).. the arguments there never end.. but I join you in prayer for relief of all the oppressed people
please tell me i read this wrong...please tell me he didn't say that the US ultimately got what they deserved, despite the fact he's sorry that it happened. if this is the mentality in the middle east, it is time to go to war on a broader scale. once again, i must point out...i desperately hope we pursue a combination of domestic drilling and research into new energy technologies so we can avoid reliance on these nations for anything ever again.
MadMax, Who? The journalist? He didn't say that we got what we deserved, he stated that it was a perception in the ME. As far as doemstic oil, did you read my reference above? Apparently, the US may very well have more reserves than Saudi Arabia (I don't think that I have read anything that exciting in a long time). It is more expensive to produce than ME oil, so I imagine that to some extent the companies are just waiting for a rise in oil prices.
