Thursday, December 27, 2007
A THOUGHT FOR THE NEW YEAR
"If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too." -- Somerset Maugham
Sunday, December 23, 2007
MERRY CHRISTMAS
December 21, 2007
Where is Our Tacitus?
Nothing Can Morally Justify the Invasion of Iraq
By JACOB G. HORNBERGER
Neo-con supporters of the U.S. government's war of aggression against Iraq are undoubtedly holding their collective breath in the hope that U.S. military forces have finally smashed any further violent opposition to their conquest of Iraq. The attitude would then be, "You see, this shows that we were right after all to invade and occupy Iraq and kill and maim hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people."
Meanwhile, the Associated Press is reporting that U.S. soldiers have found mass graves next to a torture center north of Baghdad. In the torture center, chains were attached to blood-spattered walls while a metal bed was attached to an electrical shock system.
Hey, who knows? Maybe the torture center prevented a ticking time bomb from going off? And who's to say that chains, blood-spattered walls, metal beds, and an electrical shock system really constitute torture? Doesn't torture depend on each person's subjective determination of the term?
By the way, wasn't there torture in Iraq under Saddam Hussein? I wonder if his justifications for torture were different from those employed by those torturing in Iraq today. I wonder if they were different than those employed by current U.S. torturers.
As Rosa Brooks writes in the Los Angeles Times today, Baghdad has now been divided into "cleansed" neighborhoods, in which Sunnis occupy some areas and Shiites occupy others. The U.S. military is helping to keep the neighborhoods free of violence by constructing walls that separate the respective neighborhoods. What an interesting way for the Pentagon to rebuild a peaceful society that it has destroyed with its invasion.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have fled the country, mostly to neighboring countries given that the U.S. government refuses to let them emigrate to the United States, despite one of the U.S. government's claims (in addition to the WMD one) that it invaded Iraq out of love for the Iraqi people. Hey, what better way to reduce the death toll than by reducing the country's population?
And if things weren't crazy enough, we now learn that the U.S. government is helping Turkey to attack Iraqi Kurds in the northern part of the country. Can't you just hear U.S. officials exclaim when some Iraqi survivor of those attacks retaliates with a terrorist attack against the U.S.: "We're innocent! We're innocent! We haven't done anything to provoke this! They hate us for our freedom and values! God bless America!"
No rational person can deny that Iraq never had any connection whatsoever to the 9/11 attacks, especially given that none of the 9/11 attackers were even from Iraq. Yet, countless Iraqi people are now dead or maimed and their entire country is destroyed. One might easily say that Iraq is the federal massacre of Waco magnified a million-fold. The whole situation in Iraq brings to mind the famous dictum of Tacitus: "They made a desert and called it peace."
Nothing, not even "peace" in Iraq, will ever be able to morally justify a war of aggression against a nation whose people were totally innocent of the 9/11 attacks. Nothing, not even some warped definition of "terrorist," will ever be able to morally justify killing Iraqis who were doing nothing more than trying to oust their country of an illegal invader who had invaded with a thirst for vengeance and regime change relying on fake and false rationales for its invasion. Nothing will ever be able to morally justify the killing of even one single Iraqi, much less hundreds of thousands of them, given that neither the Iraqi people nor their government ever attacked the United States.
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.
Where is Our Tacitus?
Nothing Can Morally Justify the Invasion of Iraq
By JACOB G. HORNBERGER
Neo-con supporters of the U.S. government's war of aggression against Iraq are undoubtedly holding their collective breath in the hope that U.S. military forces have finally smashed any further violent opposition to their conquest of Iraq. The attitude would then be, "You see, this shows that we were right after all to invade and occupy Iraq and kill and maim hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people."
Meanwhile, the Associated Press is reporting that U.S. soldiers have found mass graves next to a torture center north of Baghdad. In the torture center, chains were attached to blood-spattered walls while a metal bed was attached to an electrical shock system.
Hey, who knows? Maybe the torture center prevented a ticking time bomb from going off? And who's to say that chains, blood-spattered walls, metal beds, and an electrical shock system really constitute torture? Doesn't torture depend on each person's subjective determination of the term?
By the way, wasn't there torture in Iraq under Saddam Hussein? I wonder if his justifications for torture were different from those employed by those torturing in Iraq today. I wonder if they were different than those employed by current U.S. torturers.
As Rosa Brooks writes in the Los Angeles Times today, Baghdad has now been divided into "cleansed" neighborhoods, in which Sunnis occupy some areas and Shiites occupy others. The U.S. military is helping to keep the neighborhoods free of violence by constructing walls that separate the respective neighborhoods. What an interesting way for the Pentagon to rebuild a peaceful society that it has destroyed with its invasion.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have fled the country, mostly to neighboring countries given that the U.S. government refuses to let them emigrate to the United States, despite one of the U.S. government's claims (in addition to the WMD one) that it invaded Iraq out of love for the Iraqi people. Hey, what better way to reduce the death toll than by reducing the country's population?
And if things weren't crazy enough, we now learn that the U.S. government is helping Turkey to attack Iraqi Kurds in the northern part of the country. Can't you just hear U.S. officials exclaim when some Iraqi survivor of those attacks retaliates with a terrorist attack against the U.S.: "We're innocent! We're innocent! We haven't done anything to provoke this! They hate us for our freedom and values! God bless America!"
No rational person can deny that Iraq never had any connection whatsoever to the 9/11 attacks, especially given that none of the 9/11 attackers were even from Iraq. Yet, countless Iraqi people are now dead or maimed and their entire country is destroyed. One might easily say that Iraq is the federal massacre of Waco magnified a million-fold. The whole situation in Iraq brings to mind the famous dictum of Tacitus: "They made a desert and called it peace."
Nothing, not even "peace" in Iraq, will ever be able to morally justify a war of aggression against a nation whose people were totally innocent of the 9/11 attacks. Nothing, not even some warped definition of "terrorist," will ever be able to morally justify killing Iraqis who were doing nothing more than trying to oust their country of an illegal invader who had invaded with a thirst for vengeance and regime change relying on fake and false rationales for its invasion. Nothing will ever be able to morally justify the killing of even one single Iraqi, much less hundreds of thousands of them, given that neither the Iraqi people nor their government ever attacked the United States.
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
AFTERTHOUGHT
AFTER MY CHILDREN READ MY POST I DECIDED TO QUALIFY THE PREVIOUS POST,
MY DAUGHTER SAID IT SOUNDED KIND OF THREATENING
BUT SHE LIKED IT.
THAT WAS NOT MY INTENT, TO SOUND THREATENING.
MORE A CALL TO AWARENESS, OR A CALL TO ACTION.
MY POINT IN THIS IS TO REFUSE TO PARTICIPATE
IN THE MADNESS OF THIS WORLDS EVIL MEN.
TO INVALIDATE THEM BY REFUSING TO BUY THEIR GAME PLAN.
AND IT IS A GAME,
ONE IN WHICH THEY WIN AND THE REST OF US LOSE.
THEY, THE GREAT 1% WHO LIVE IN McMANSIONS,
AND LIKE LEACHES SUCK THE LIFE FROM THE REST OF US,
TO FILL THEIR COFFERS PAST OVERFILL.
THEY THE ONES WHO CREATE WARS FOR THREE REASONS
FIRST FOR PROFIT, SECOND FOR AMUSEMENT, AND THIRD
TO ELIMINATE AS MANY OF THE UNWASHED MASSES (in their opinion)
AS THEY CAN.
THEY CAN BE DEFEATED, WE CAN DEFEAT THEM.
BY REFUSING TO ALLOW THEM TO HAVE POWER OVER US,
THEIR PLAN DEPENDS ON FEAR,
THEIR PLAN DEPENDS ON OBEDIENCE,
THEIR PLAN DEPENDS ON OUR BELIEVING THEIR LIES.
THATS ALL FOR NOW, AS MIKE MALLOY ON AIR AMERICA SAYS;
KEEP IT LIT.
MY DAUGHTER SAID IT SOUNDED KIND OF THREATENING
BUT SHE LIKED IT.
THAT WAS NOT MY INTENT, TO SOUND THREATENING.
MORE A CALL TO AWARENESS, OR A CALL TO ACTION.
MY POINT IN THIS IS TO REFUSE TO PARTICIPATE
IN THE MADNESS OF THIS WORLDS EVIL MEN.
TO INVALIDATE THEM BY REFUSING TO BUY THEIR GAME PLAN.
AND IT IS A GAME,
ONE IN WHICH THEY WIN AND THE REST OF US LOSE.
THEY, THE GREAT 1% WHO LIVE IN McMANSIONS,
AND LIKE LEACHES SUCK THE LIFE FROM THE REST OF US,
TO FILL THEIR COFFERS PAST OVERFILL.
THEY THE ONES WHO CREATE WARS FOR THREE REASONS
FIRST FOR PROFIT, SECOND FOR AMUSEMENT, AND THIRD
TO ELIMINATE AS MANY OF THE UNWASHED MASSES (in their opinion)
AS THEY CAN.
THEY CAN BE DEFEATED, WE CAN DEFEAT THEM.
BY REFUSING TO ALLOW THEM TO HAVE POWER OVER US,
THEIR PLAN DEPENDS ON FEAR,
THEIR PLAN DEPENDS ON OBEDIENCE,
THEIR PLAN DEPENDS ON OUR BELIEVING THEIR LIES.
THATS ALL FOR NOW, AS MIKE MALLOY ON AIR AMERICA SAYS;
KEEP IT LIT.
REFUSE
WE WILL NOT GO QUIETLY INTO THE GULAGS.
WE WILL NOT VANISH INTO SECRET PRISONS WITHOUT A FIGHT.
WE'RE GOING TO LIVE ON, WE'RE GOING TO SURVIVE.
WE WILL OVERCOME AND DEFEAT;
THE NEOCONS, THE ELITISTS, ALL THOSE WHO SEEK TO ENSLAVE THE PEACE MAKERS, THE FREEDOM LOVING PEOPLE OF THIS EARTH.
THE STENCH OF EVIL HAS REACHED HEAVEN'S GATE.
AND NOW THE HEARTS OF FREEDOMS CHILDREN
ARE ON FIRE WITH TRUTH AND JUSTICE
BEWARE THOSE OF YOU WHO FOLLOW
THE EVIL EMPIRE'S PLAN FOR
THE NEW WORLD ORDER.
WE, THE GENTLE SPIRITS ARE ANGRY,
ANGRY WITH THE SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS
ANGRY WITH THE DESTRUCTION OF OUR PLANET
ANGRY WITH THE CORRUPTION AND MURDER OF OUR CHILDREN.
ENOUGH!
WE KNOW YOUR PLAN AND WE REFUSE,
WE REFUSE YOUR ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT,
WE REFUSE YOUR VERICHIP,
WE REFUSE YOUR LIES,
WE REFUSE YOUR WARS,
WE REFUSE YOUR HATE MONGERING,
WE REFUSE YOUR FEAR MONGERING,
WE REFUSE TO BE YOUR SLAVE POPULATION,
THE BATTLE FOR EARTH HAS BEGUN.
TRUTH AND JUSTICE ARE AWAKE
AND READY TO DO BATTLE WITH EVIL
AND WE WILL WIN THE DAY.
(laugh if you will)
BUT YOU ARE FEW, AND THE OPPRESSED
ARE LEGION,
WE ARE THE MULTITUDES AND,
WE WILL NOT BE SILENT,
WE WILL NOT BE RULED BY CRIMINALS.
IT HAS BEGUN.
WE WILL NOT VANISH INTO SECRET PRISONS WITHOUT A FIGHT.
WE'RE GOING TO LIVE ON, WE'RE GOING TO SURVIVE.
WE WILL OVERCOME AND DEFEAT;
THE NEOCONS, THE ELITISTS, ALL THOSE WHO SEEK TO ENSLAVE THE PEACE MAKERS, THE FREEDOM LOVING PEOPLE OF THIS EARTH.
THE STENCH OF EVIL HAS REACHED HEAVEN'S GATE.
AND NOW THE HEARTS OF FREEDOMS CHILDREN
ARE ON FIRE WITH TRUTH AND JUSTICE
BEWARE THOSE OF YOU WHO FOLLOW
THE EVIL EMPIRE'S PLAN FOR
THE NEW WORLD ORDER.
WE, THE GENTLE SPIRITS ARE ANGRY,
ANGRY WITH THE SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS
ANGRY WITH THE DESTRUCTION OF OUR PLANET
ANGRY WITH THE CORRUPTION AND MURDER OF OUR CHILDREN.
ENOUGH!
WE KNOW YOUR PLAN AND WE REFUSE,
WE REFUSE YOUR ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT,
WE REFUSE YOUR VERICHIP,
WE REFUSE YOUR LIES,
WE REFUSE YOUR WARS,
WE REFUSE YOUR HATE MONGERING,
WE REFUSE YOUR FEAR MONGERING,
WE REFUSE TO BE YOUR SLAVE POPULATION,
THE BATTLE FOR EARTH HAS BEGUN.
TRUTH AND JUSTICE ARE AWAKE
AND READY TO DO BATTLE WITH EVIL
AND WE WILL WIN THE DAY.
(laugh if you will)
BUT YOU ARE FEW, AND THE OPPRESSED
ARE LEGION,
WE ARE THE MULTITUDES AND,
WE WILL NOT BE SILENT,
WE WILL NOT BE RULED BY CRIMINALS.
IT HAS BEGUN.
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