Hughes for America :: We're Those People Now
Joseph Hughes describes how the 'War on Terra' has led the United States to behave exactly like those 'haters of freedom' and 'evildoers' we were supposed to oppose:
Just last month, President Bush said, "The enemy is never tired, never sated, never content with yesterday's brutality." Apparently, after widespread human rights violations at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay and after operating secret prisons, neither is the Bush administration. But when will most Americans, who are clearly dissatisfied with their president, finally tire of yesterday's brutality?
Just last month, President Bush said, "The enemy is never tired, never sated, never content with yesterday's brutality." Apparently, after widespread human rights violations at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay and after operating secret prisons, neither is the Bush administration. But when will most Americans, who are clearly dissatisfied with their president, finally tire of yesterday's brutality?
Tags: War On Terror
posted by Management at 8:27 AM
1 Comments:
I remember watching the macho movies and television programs of the '80s during my childhood. Without fail, the "enemies" in those offerings – typically Russians or Middle Easterners – were ruthless tyrants who would stop at nothing to accomplish their goals. Torturing hostages. Murdering innocent women and children. Committing unspeakable depravity.
We're those people now.
Look, spare me whatever justification the right plans on using or technicality they plan on hiding behind. No amount of spin will overshadow the fact that our armed forces have used chemical weapons in Iraq. On civilians. Chemical weapons that melt their victims' flesh to the bone. And that's morally reprehensible.
Just last month, President Bush said, "The enemy is never tired, never sated, never content with yesterday's brutality." Apparently, after widespread human rights violations at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay and after operating secret prisons, neither is the Bush administration. But when will most Americans, who are clearly dissatisfied with their president, finally tire of yesterday's brutality?
Because, in today's "with us or against us" environment, I can honestly say that if you voted for Bush, if you still support this man, than you are just as guilty of these crimes against humanity as he is. And I don't care how you came about your support for Bush, whether he appealed to your moral values, your economic interests or even your desire to share a drink with the guy. You're supporting a man who stands behind using chemical weapons on innocent civilians. How different are you from a Saddam Hussein loyalist now?
On the eve of the Iraq war, Bush painted a grave picture of Hussein, who had used chemical weapons years earlier on the Iraqi village of Halabja. "With that single order, the regime killed thousands of Iraq's Kurdish citizens," Bush said. "Whole families died while trying to flee clouds of nerve and mustard agents descending from the sky." He later referred to Hussein's possession of "the world's most terrible weapons," weapons he called the "weapons of death" less than a year earlier.
How must those innocent civilians have felt when trying to flee clouds of white phosphorus descending from the sky last year in Fallujah? How many families died as our forces used the world's most terrible weapons – these weapons of death – to help smoke insurgents out of their holes? How many suffered grievous injury in what our own army referred to as "shake and bake" missions?
Administration apologists, ask yourself this: What would Bush have called the attacks on September 11 had the terrorists used white phosphorus instead of hijacked airplanes? Chemical attacks.
Hiding behind blaming the troops won't cut it this time, just as it didn't cut it after Abu Ghraib. Operating under massive stress and in uncertain, ever-changing conditions, they very likely thought the more people they killed, the greater the chance they would return home sooner. And who could blame them for wanting out, as policies like this and many others have led to the grim milestone we passed last month? No, the blame for this begins and ends with the president, the new boss that's looking more and more like the old boss each day.
So let's not be so quick to dismiss American claims that white phosphorus was only used to illuminate. Perhaps it was. But I don't think their definition of "illumination" is the same as mine. I think the use of white phosphorus shed light on the darkness and moral bankruptcy that led our administration to authorize the use of the very weapons we accused Hussein of using on his own people.
Just five days before the invasion of Iraq, Bush cited Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, who had said, "We have a moral obligation to intervene where evil is in control. Today, that place is Iraq." Two years later, knowing what we now know about the Bush administration's actions in Iraq, I would expect Wiesel to say the same thing today. About us.
We're those people now.
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