I don't have time to stay and chat, but quickly here's a description of what happened and some criticism of the French position, but note that the US was an ally of Saddam then too. http://mondediplo.com/1998/03/04iraqkn
he must have done it twice then...because i'm pretty sure he did it after the gulf war as well, when he heard the kurds were talking about overthrowing him wow...i don't know if you're right or wrong...but i think life in iraq will be better after we liberate them...so whether it's sincere or not, i think it's a fine reason.
Is Canada with us on this, I forget important stuff all the time. I'm just asking because I don't know if I should call their ham, which I'd love to eat for breakfast, Canadian bacon or Pre-emptive breakfast meat.
I'm not saying that they shouldn't liberate Iraq because they don't liberate anyone else. I'm just saying that the reason they are liberating Iraq is different than the reasons of human rights abuses. I think they are doing it, because Saddam has chem weapons, and isn't willing to disarm, and isn't willing to do what the U.S. wants him to, and may act contrary to the way the U.S. wishes. The countries that they don't liberate only serve to show that that's not one of their main reasons for liberating Iraq. I don't use those to say Iraq shouldn't be liberated.
True, our government may put more weight in other reasons, but I think the American people put much weight in this issue. If the Iraqi government did not torture and murder it's own citizens and was democratic, there would not be enough popular support for this war, IMHO.
I think you can still call it Canadian bacon, but I'm not sure. Grizzled, any comment? It kind of sucks, food wise, that two or our main allies are the UK and Australia. Oh good, English muffins and vegemite. Yum, yum.
No it's not. French and Russian companies like TotalFinaElf and LukOil have, by far, the most to lose in the situation of war. Not only do both countries have massive amounts of debt owed to them by Iraq that could become non-repayeable in the case of war, but the giant oil companies perviously mentioned have the largest % of contracts to develope fields, etc. Some accounts have TotalFinaElf with a 15% stake in Iraqi oil reserves.
I have, in fact, but in this instance I'd like to have some confidence that we're throwing the starfish into the sea, and not from the beach into a bonfire. Yes Saddam should go and the people of Iraq should be liberated, but if the intervention itself kills thousands of Iraqi's and starts civil wars and internal guerrilla warfare, have we really done the people any good? I don't know how the war and post war will go, of course, but given what has happened in the lead up I’m concerned that this hasn't been thought through thoroughly enough and could well backfire. If the motivation is not really to liberate the people of Iraq, for example, and this intervention is really politically motivated, will the US see the "liberation" though to it's end, or just abandon the country in chaos? I hope and pray that my fears are misplaced.
I'm not against our boys going in, all I ask for as little civilian casualties as possible. Treeman keeps assuring that will be the case, I trust him. My point isn't about our troops and what they are going to do, it's about people here in this country suddenly taking on this cause out of nowhere. I just don't like people saying "Look! Look at what Saddam did. How can you not fully support this war. . . hippie?"
well...not everyone reads about human rights atrocities everyday...not everyone reads the paper regularly...most people don't know where iraq is on a map. indict them for not knowing..but don't indict their sincerity. i'm with treeman...and i have to say, our efforts to send food and medicine...our communications to iraqi anti-aircraft that they won't be fired upon unless they turn on their targetting equipment...i'd say those things are pretty extraordinary...we clearly have enough power to not worry about such things. but we spend billions trying to build tactical weapons that reduce collateral damage. that's extraordinary from a historical perspective.
I'm sorry Aussie Rockets fans, but I still have nightmares of the day my host mom in Australia gave me a vegemite sandwich. That stuff tastes so salty. I actually have a little jar at home, it just sits there as a reminder. English muffins are badass, I can put my american eggs and pre-emptive breakfast meat on them and it's all good.
As a side bar, y'all know that we don't call it Canadian bacon, right? It's back bacon to us. Back to the subject. The Canadian official position and actual positions are somewhat different. Officially we won't support a war that is not sanctioned by the UN. But to give this some context, this is the position of our lame duck, outgoing Prime Minister who is making decisions now almost exclusively based on how it will affect his legacy. He's Mr. Do-good now. In reality our navy has some ships in the Gulf as part of the war on terrorism. Our army was never going to be in because they are all committed elsewhere in the world, including Afghanistan. (We have a few more 30 but the general point is true. We don't have many men comparatively to draw on.) From a public support standpoint, the country is quite divided. There are more against a non-UN sanctioned war but there is a significant percentage who are for it.
The liberation of Iraqis is obviously a front for the real reasons for war which are US national interests in an oil rich area of the world and the settling of old scores by Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, etc. Whenever Bush gets into trouble with reasons for war, enforcing irrelevant resolutions passed by an irrelevant body, then he falls back to liberating the people of Iraq. Liberation is popular with Americans because we like to think of ourselves as promoting Democracy and freedom even when we simultaneously support tyrants and murderers. It's unfortunate that Americans buy into that dishonest and completely inconsistent argument.
I'll try, but I make no promises. Man, it's almost luch time. Who wants to go to Katz's? Well, I can't, cuz I'm not in H-town anymore. Last time I went, I had the #1 with that russian dressing. . .errrr evil doer hunting sauce, which is basically mayo and ketchup if i'm not mistaken. That's the last one, I promise. I probably killed the joke already.
