How to explain Iraq to your child

[RGA]

Q: Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq?
A: Because they had weapons of mass destruction, honey.

Q: But the inspectors didn't find any weapons of mass destruction.
A: That's because the Iraqis were hiding them.

Q: And that's why we invaded Iraq?
A: Yep. Invasions always work better than inspections.


Q: But after we invaded them, we STILL didn't find any weapons of mass
destruction, did we?
A: That's because the weapons are so well hidden. Don't worry, we'll find
something, probably right before the 2004 election.

Q: Why did Iraq want all those weapons of mass destruction?
A: To use them in a war, silly.

Q: I'm confused. If they had all those weapons that they planned to use in a
war, then why didn't they use any of those weapons when we went to war with
them?
A: Well, obviously they didn't want anyone to know they had thoseweapons, so
they chose to die by the thousands rather than defend themselves.

Q: That doesn't make sense Daddy. Why would they choose to die if they had
all those big weapons to fight us back with?
A: It's a different culture. It's not supposed to make sense.

Q: I don't know about you, but I don't think they had any of those weapons
our government said they did.
A: Well, you know, it doesn't matter whether or not they had those weapons.
We had another good reason to invade them anyway.

Q: And what was that?
A: Even if Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein was
a cruel dictator, which is another good reason to invade another country.

Q: Why? What does a cruel dictator do that makes it OK to invade his
country?
A: Well, for one thing, he tortured his own people.

Q: Kind of like what they do in China?
A: Don't go comparing China to Iraq. China is a good economic competitor
where millions of people work for slave wages in sweatshops to make U.S.
corporations
richer.

Q: So if a country lets its people be exploited for American corporate gain,
it's a good country, even if that country tortures people?
A: Right.

Q: Why were people in Iraq being tortured?
A: For political crimes, mostly, like criticizing the government.People who
criticized the government in Iraq were sent to prison and tortured.

Q: Isn't that exactly what happens in China?
A: I told you, China is different.

Q: What's the difference between China and Iraq?
A: Well, for one thing, Iraq was ruled by the Ba'ath party, while China is
Communist.

Q: Didn't you once tell me Communists were bad?
A: No, just Cuban Communists are bad.

Q: How are the Cuban Communists bad?
A: Well, for one thing, people who criticize the government in Cuba are sent
to prison and tortured.

Q: Like in Iraq?
A: Exactly.

Q: And like in China, too?
A: I told you, China's a good economic competitor. Cuba, on the other hand,
is not.

Q: How come Cuba isn't a good economic competitor?
A: Well, you see, back in the early 1960s, our government passed some laws
that made it illegal for Americans to trade or do any business with Cuba
until they stopped being Communists and started being capitalists like us.

Q: But if we got rid of those laws, opened up trade with Cuba, and started
doing business with them, wouldn't that help the Cubans become capitalists?
A: Don't be a smart-ass.

Q: I didn't think I was being one.
A: Well, anyway, they also don't have freedom of religion in Cuba.

Q: Kind of like China and the Falun Gong movement?
A: I told you, stop saying bad things about China. Anyway, Saddam Hussein
came to power through a military coup, so he's not really a legitimate
leader anyway.

Q: What's a military coup?
A: That's when a military general takes over the government of a country by
force, instead of holding free elections like we do in the United States.

Q: Didn't the ruler of Pakistan come to power by a military coup?
A: You mean General Pervez Musharraf? Uh, yeah, he did, but Pakistan is our
friend.

Q: Why is Pakistan our friend if their leader is illegitimate?
A: I never said Pervez Musharraf was illegitimate.

Q: Didn't you just say a military general who comes to power by forcibly
overthrowing the legitimate government of a nation is an illegitimate
leader?
A: Only Saddam Hussein. Pervez Musharraf is our friend, because he helped us
invade Afghanistan.

Q: Why did we invade Afghanistan?
A: Because of what they did to us on September 11th.

Q: What did Afghanistan do to us on September 11th?
A: Well, on September 11th, nineteen men, fifteen of them Saudi Arabians
hijacked four airplanes and flew three of them into buildings, killing over
3,000 Americans.

Q: So how did Afghanistan figure into all that?
A: Afghanistan was where those bad men trained, under the oppressive rule of
the Taliban.

Q: Aren't the Taliban those bad radical Islamics who chopped off people's
heads and hands?
A: Yes, that's exactly who they were. Not only did they chop off people's
heads and hands, but they oppressed women, too.

Q: Didn't the Bush administration give the Taliban 43 million dollars back
in May of 2001?
A: Yes, but that money was a reward because they did such a good job
fighting drugs.

Q: Fighting drugs?
A: Yes, the Taliban were very helpful in stopping people from growing opium
poppies.

Q: How did they do such a good job?
A: Simple. If people were caught growing opium poppies, the Taliban would
have their hands and heads cut off.

Q: So, when the Taliban cut off people's heads and hands for growing
flowers, that was OK, but not if they cut people's heads and hands off for
other reasons?
A: Yes. It's OK with us if radical Islamic fundamentalists cut off people's
hands for growing flowers, but it's cruel if they cut off people's hands for
stealing bread.

Q: Don't they also cut off people's hands and heads in Saudi Arabia?
A: That's different. Afghanistan was ruled by a tyrannical patriarchy that
oppressed women and forced them to wear burqas whenever they were in public,
with death by stoning as the penalty for women who did not comply.

Q: Don't Saudi women have to wear burqas in public, too?
A: No, Saudi women merely wear a traditional Islamic body covering.

Q: What's the difference?
A: The traditional Islamic covering worn by Saudi women is a modest yet
fashionable garment that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes
and fingers. The burqa, on the other hand, is an evil tool of Patriarchal
oppression that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and
fingers.

Q: It sounds like the same thing with a different name.
A: Now, don't go comparing Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are our
friends.

Q: But I thought you said 15 of the 19 hijackers on September 11th were from
Saudi Arabia.
A: Yes, but they trained in Afghanistan.

Q: Who trained them?
A: A very bad man named Osama bin Laden.

Q: Was he from Afghanistan?
A: Uh, no, he was from Saudi Arabia too. But he was a bad man, a very bad
man.

Q: I seem to recall he was our friend once.
A: Only when we helped him and the mujahadeen repel the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan back in the 1980s.

Q: Who are the Soviets? Was that the Evil Communist Empire Ronald Reagan
talked about?
A: There are no more Soviets. The Soviet Union broke up in 1990 or
thereabouts, and now they have elections and capitalism like us. We call
them Russians now.

Q: So the Soviets, I mean the Russians, are now our friends?
A: Well, not really. You see, they were our friends for many years after
they stopped being Soviets, but then they decided not to support our
invasion of Iraq, so we're mad at them now. We're also mad at the French and
the Germans because they didn't help us invade Iraq either.

Q: So the French and Germans are evil, too?
A: Not exactly evil, but just bad enough that we had to rename French fries
and French toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast.

Q: Do we always rename foods whenever another country doesn't do what we
want them to do?
A: No, we just do that to our friends. Our enemies, we invade.

Q: But wasn't Iraq one of our friends back in the 1980s?
A: Well, yeah. For a while.

Q: Was Saddam Hussein ruler of Iraq back then?
A: Yes, but at the time he was fighting against Iran, which made him our
friend, temporarily.

Q: Why did that make him our friend?
A: Because at that time, Iran was our enemy.

Q: Isn't that when he gassed the Kurds?
A: Yeah, but since he was fighting against Iran at the time, we looked the
other way, to show him we were his friend.

Q: So anyone who fights against one of our enemies automatically becomes our
friend?
A: Most of the time, yes.

Q: And anyone who fights against one of our friends is automatically an
enemy?
A: Sometimes that's true, too. However, if American corporations can profit
by selling weapons to both sides at the same time, all the better.

Q: Why?
A: Because war is good for the economy, which means war is good for America.
Also, since God is on America's side, anyone who opposes war is a godless
un-American Communist. Do you understand now why we attacked Iraq?

Q: I think so. We attacked them because God wanted us to, right?
A: Yes.

Q: But how did we know God wanted us to attack Iraq?
A: Well, you see, God personally speaks to George W. Bush and tells him what
to do.

Q: So basically, what you're saying is that we attacked Iraq because George
W. Bush hears voices in his head?
A. Yes! You finally understand how the world works.
Now close your eyes, make yourself comfortable, and go to sleep. Good night.

[Chris]

That's a very opinionated child there - how old is he/she?

[RGA]

These kids are just smarter these days - let's hope.

[karl k]

I need a cigarette!


It's alot like the English language... full of rules... and exceptions. Maybe this is all about a lack of communication. Others just don't understand rules and exceptions and when they apply!


Yippy kiya!

[piece-it pete]

Q: Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq?
A: Because they had weapons of mass destruction, honey.

Pete answer (pa): Many reasons, though largely because he was a threat to regional stability in a part of the world that is vital to the well being of most people worldwide. The tool he gave us to invade was his refusal to abide by the terms of his earlier defeat, among them accounting for & destroying weapons of mass destruction.

Q: But the inspectors didn't find any weapons of mass destruction.
A: That's because the Iraqis were hiding them.

pa: Well one could say that the shell used a couple of weeks ago ended that issue. But overall the fact is it looks like we, along with the rest of the world, including France, Germany, Russia, Canada, and the UN, were mislead by our Iraqi contacts to get us to invade sooner. We KNOW from his own records he had them.

Q: And that's why we invaded Iraq?
A: Yep. Invasions always work better than inspections.

N/A

Q: But after we invaded them, we STILL didn't find any weapons of mass
destruction, did we?
A: That's because the weapons are so well hidden. Don't worry, we'll find
something, probably right before the 2004 election.

ahem. the warhead?

Q: Why did Iraq want all those weapons of mass destruction?
A: To use them in a war, silly.

pa: It was no secret he emulated Hitler and had plans to "unify" the Middle East.

Q: I'm confused. If they had all those weapons that they planned to use in a
war, then why didn't they use any of those weapons when we went to war with
them?
A: Well, obviously they didn't want anyone to know they had thoseweapons, so
they chose to die by the thousands rather than defend themselves.

pa: His Generals decided they'd rather have a US lead Iraq vs. a radioactive wasteland.

Q: That doesn't make sense Daddy. Why would they choose to die if they had
all those big weapons to fight us back with?
A: It's a different culture. It's not supposed to make sense.

N/A

Q: I don't know about you, but I don't think they had any of those weapons
our government said they did.
A: Well, you know, it doesn't matter whether or not they had those weapons.
We had another good reason to invade them anyway.

pa: You may be right. But that doesn't change the main reasons we invaded.

Q: And what was that?
A: Even if Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein was
a cruel dictator, which is another good reason to invade another country.

pa: already addressed.

Q: Why? What does a cruel dictator do that makes it OK to invade his
country?
A: Well, for one thing, he tortured his own people.

pa: already addressed.

Q: Kind of like what they do in China?
A: Don't go comparing China to Iraq. China is a good economic competitor
where millions of people work for slave wages in sweatshops to make U.S.
corporations
richer.

pa: Absolutely yes. However, China is not an immediate threat.

Q: So if a country lets its people be exploited for American corporate gain,
it's a good country, even if that country tortures people?
A: Right.

pa: See above. However, it is a free market. The Chinese are flocking to the cities to work in sweatshops because it is much better than the rice paddies, were they could stay if they wished. This is the first step to industrialisation.

Q: Why were people in Iraq being tortured?
A: For political crimes, mostly, like criticizing the government.People who
criticized the government in Iraq were sent to prison and tortured.

pa: To control the majority of people, to terrorise them into submission. I suggest you research the Nazi SS (remember, Saddam loved Hitler) and the Russian KGB (Hilter admired Stalin).

Q: Isn't that exactly what happens in China?
A: I told you, China is different.

pa: Yes, but to a lesser degree.

Q: What's the difference between China and Iraq?
A: Well, for one thing, Iraq was ruled by the Ba'ath party, while China is
Communist.

pa: China is trying to join the world community. We believe that by letting them in in steps, IE they do one little thing, we give a little, we can coax them into respectablity. It appears to be working.

Q: Didn't you once tell me Communists were bad?
A: No, just Cuban Communists are bad.

pa: Yes, they are. They will tell you they want equality for all, just to replace the current rich with themselves. We hope that eventually the so-called Communists in China will fall. I say so-called because they are currently a dictatorship, communism in name only.

Q: How are the Cuban Communists bad?
A: Well, for one thing, people who criticize the government in Cuba are sent
to prison and tortured.

pa: Well they're better than some, worse than others. Castro (their dictator) because friends with our mortal enemy, the USSR, and allowed them to place Nukes there.

Q: Like in Iraq?
A: Exactly.

pa: Well, yes & no. The Russians could have started WW3 & killed millions & millions. In Iraq, if Saddam would have been able to carry out his plans for a "Pax Saddam" [pete note: now THAT would have been a hell of a "peace"!] the world economy would be thrown into turmoil leading directly to the deaths of AT LEAST hundreds of thousands of poor worldwide, and much of the current middle class would become poor again. Interestingly, the US and most 1st world countries like Germany & Canada would survive largely OK. The 2nd & 3rd world countries would bear the brunt. So the poor would bear the actual deaths, with us taking an economic hit.

Another senario is that as Saddam became more & more insane his WMD would end up in even worse hands, like those who blew down our buildings.

Q: And like in China, too?
A: I told you, China's a good economic competitor. Cuba, on the other hand,
is not.

pa: Somewhat. However, China appears to be trying to be good.

Q: How come Cuba isn't a good economic competitor?
A: Well, you see, back in the early 1960s, our government passed some laws
that made it illegal for Americans to trade or do any business with Cuba
until they stopped being Communists and started being capitalists like us.

This question would not have come up. However: pa: Communism has proven to be a miserable failure.

Q: But if we got rid of those laws, opened up trade with Cuba, and started
doing business with them, wouldn't that help the Cubans become capitalists?
A: Don't be a smart-ass.

pa: Any money a dictatorship or communism makes goes into the pockets of it's rulers. It does not help the masses.

Q: I didn't think I was being one.
A: Well, anyway, they also don't have freedom of religion in Cuba.

N/A

Q: Kind of like China and the Falun Gong movement?
A: I told you, stop saying bad things about China. Anyway, Saddam Hussein
came to power through a military coup, so he's not really a legitimate
leader anyway.

I don't see how this follows. However: pa: Every society has its lunatics & misguided people. Some more than others.

Q: What's a military coup?
A: That's when a military general takes over the government of a country by
force, instead of holding free elections like we do in the United States.

pa: Ditto.

Q: Didn't the ruler of Pakistan come to power by a military coup?
A: You mean General Pervez Musharraf? Uh, yeah, he did, but Pakistan is our
friend.

pa: Pakistan is currently our ally.

Q: Why is Pakistan our friend if their leader is illegitimate?
A: I never said Pervez Musharraf was illegitimate.

I never would say that a ruler is "illlegitimate". However: pa: “Nations have no permanent friends and no permanent enemies. Only permanent interests.” - Benjamin Disraeli

Honey [I'm talking to a kid here] : It's a cold, hard world where bad people are the rule, and sometimes we have to take what we can get. It's not perfect, but we will not find perfection here. Musharraf is currently working with us. Without him, many more of our soldiers will die. Plus, we have an oppretunity to help the Pakistanis. An election will be held there soon. It might work, it might not, but it wouldn't happen at all if we weren't involved.

Q: Didn't you just say a military general who comes to power by forcibly
overthrowing the legitimate government of a nation is an illegitimate
leader?
A: Only Saddam Hussein. Pervez Musharraf is our friend, because he helped us
invade Afghanistan.

I don't say this (illegitimate).

Q: Why did we invade Afghanistan?
A: Because of what they did to us on September 11th.

pa: The orginisation that is responsible for 9-11 was working openly in Afganistan with their direct consent. This was the first step in destroying, or at least controlling, Al Qida.

Q: What did Afghanistan do to us on September 11th?
A: Well, on September 11th, nineteen men, fifteen of them Saudi Arabians
hijacked four airplanes and flew three of them into buildings, killing over
3,000 Americans.

pa: Ditto. And they have hit our ships & embassies as well.

Q: So how did Afghanistan figure into all that?
A: Afghanistan was where those bad men trained, under the oppressive rule of
the Taliban.

See above.

Q: Aren't the Taliban those bad radical Islamics who chopped off people's
heads and hands?
A: Yes, that's exactly who they were. Not only did they chop off people's
heads and hands, but they oppressed women, too.

pa: ditto

Q: Didn't the Bush administration give the Taliban 43 million dollars back
in May of 2001?
A: Yes, but that money was a reward because they did such a good job
fighting drugs.

pa: ditto

Q: Fighting drugs?
A: Yes, the Taliban were very helpful in stopping people from growing opium
poppies.

ditto

Q: How did they do such a good job?
A: Simple. If people were caught growing opium poppies, the Taliban would
have their hands and heads cut off.

ditto

Q: So, when the Taliban cut off people's heads and hands for growing
flowers, that was OK, but not if they cut people's heads and hands off for
other reasons?
A: Yes. It's OK with us if radical Islamic fundamentalists cut off people's
hands for growing flowers, but it's cruel if they cut off people's hands for
stealing bread.

pa: Not exactly. Heroin hurts ALOT of people. This still does not make it right.

Q: Don't they also cut off people's hands and heads in Saudi Arabia?
A: That's different. Afghanistan was ruled by a tyrannical patriarchy that
oppressed women and forced them to wear burqas whenever they were in public,
with death by stoning as the penalty for women who did not comply.

pa: Yes.

Q: Don't Saudi women have to wear burqas in public, too?
A: No, Saudi women merely wear a traditional Islamic body covering.

pa: Yes.

Q: What's the difference?
A: The traditional Islamic covering worn by Saudi women is a modest yet
fashionable garment that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes
and fingers. The burqa, on the other hand, is an evil tool of Patriarchal
oppression that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and
fingers.

pa: None.

Q: It sounds like the same thing with a different name.
A: Now, don't go comparing Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are our
friends.

pa: It is.

Q: But I thought you said 15 of the 19 hijackers on September 11th were from
Saudi Arabia.
A: Yes, but they trained in Afghanistan.

pa: ditto

Q: Who trained them?
A: A very bad man named Osama bin Laden.

ditto

Q: Was he from Afghanistan?
A: Uh, no, he was from Saudi Arabia too. But he was a bad man, a very bad
man.

pa: Yes. However, the Sauds kicked him out.

Q: I seem to recall he was our friend once.
A: Only when we helped him and the mujahadeen repel the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan back in the 1980s.

pa: ditto

Q: Who are the Soviets? Was that the Evil Communist Empire Ronald Reagan
talked about?
A: There are no more Soviets. The Soviet Union broke up in 1990 or
thereabouts, and now they have elections and capitalism like us. We call
them Russians now.

pa: ditto, except it is not like us.

Q: So the Soviets, I mean the Russians, are now our friends?
A: Well, not really. You see, they were our friends for many years after
they stopped being Soviets, but then they decided not to support our
invasion of Iraq, so we're mad at them now. We're also mad at the French and
the Germans because they didn't help us invade Iraq either.

pa: Yes. We are having a minor difference with them, but they let us use their bases for invasion.

Q: So the French and Germans are evil, too?
A: Not exactly evil, but just bad enough that we had to rename French fries
and French toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast.

pa: No. The powerful there had deep financial ties to Saddam, and since WW2 have not had to make hard decisions. They are also very controlled, and have been told since before your age that war is always wrong, even if in self protection.

Q: Do we always rename foods whenever another country doesn't do what we
want them to do?
A: No, we just do that to our friends. Our enemies, we invade.

pa: ditto.

Q: But wasn't Iraq one of our friends back in the 1980s?
A: Well, yeah. For a while.

ditto

Q: Was Saddam Hussein ruler of Iraq back then?
A: Yes, but at the time he was fighting against Iran, which made him our
friend, temporarily.

ditto

Q: Why did that make him our friend?
A: Because at that time, Iran was our enemy.

pa: It was a balance of power issue, the same reasons we had to depose Saddam now.

Q: Isn't that when he gassed the Kurds?
A: Yeah, but since he was fighting against Iran at the time, we looked the
other way, to show him we were his friend.

pa: Yes.

Q: So anyone who fights against one of our enemies automatically becomes our
friend?
A: Most of the time, yes.

pa: Sometimes, depending on what our interests are.

Q: And anyone who fights against one of our friends is automatically an
enemy?
A: Sometimes that's true, too. However, if American corporations can profit
by selling weapons to both sides at the same time, all the better.

pa: Sometimes. See above. [Both China & Russia are HEAVILY involved in weapons sales, as is Germany]

Q: Why?
A: Because war is good for the economy, which means war is good for America.
Also, since God is on America's side, anyone who opposes war is a godless
un-American Communist. Do you understand now why we attacked Iraq?

pa: There are many reasons. Sometime mutual protection is necessary because our enemies are powerful. Sometimes we believe the enemy will continue. Sometimes, to contradict Disreali, and sometimes logic, you fight because they ARE your friend.

Q: I think so. We attacked them because God wanted us to, right?
A: Yes.

pa: Would not come up in this context. How patently absurd.

Q: But how did we know God wanted us to attack Iraq?
A: Well, you see, God personally speaks to George W. Bush and tells him what
to do.

Q: So basically, what you're saying is that we attacked Iraq because George
W. Bush hears voices in his head?
A. Yes! You finally understand how the world works.
Now close your eyes, make yourself comfortable, and go to sleep. Good night.

See above.

Pete

[trollgirl]

Pete, how LONG did you work on that post? My eyes glazed over...

Laz

[woodman]

Pete:
I can hardly believe that you spent all of that time trying to rebut what I found to be a very concise, to the point (albeit tongue-in-cheek) "explanation" of world affairs, put into language that most any child of reasonable intelligence would understand. Why would you do so? Doesn't it bother you even a little that there's so much hypocrisy going on in world affairs? Over the course of decades, we've supported all sorts of "evil-doers" until we decided that we didn't want to support them any longer ... then, more often than not, they became our "enemy". What a sham! In fact, to quote Woody Allen from the film "Bananas" .... "what a mockery of a hoax of two shams of a mockery" or something like that.

Did you go to all that trouble because you felt that the "explanation" made Dubya's decisions look as imbecilic (to a child or anyone else) as they actually were?

[trollgirl]

Pete must have come here for an Argument, the full half-hour...

Laz

[Chris]

Pete, that was a long ass response!

I don't normally agree with Pete, as he's a bit deep into the conservative side for my taste, but he's got some points here that many people (specifically the people with more liberal views) don't like to acknowledge...

Just like our own popular political parties, the US government has it's own set of "interests". We gain allies and lose allies every now and then, but our interests usually stay pretty much the same, even when the political parties in power change. We've helped allies in the past who shared our same interests at one point (like Saddam and like Al Queda), but eventually, times change, situations change, and their interests changed (or maybe they just became more apparent over time). Though at first glance, it's easy to see our turning against them as being "hypocritical", but you simply cannot expect allies to continuously share the same interests forever. As Pete said, it's give and take - and you take what you can get for as long as you can - once the situation changes and interests no longer align, we have to reevaluate the situation and determine if the alliance is in the best interest for our nation, as do our allies. We took out a leader who didn't share our interests anymore and are trying to put a government in place that shares our interests.

With that said, I still don't feel confident that our government made a solid case for this war. War is horrible and should always be a last resort. The worst of humanity comes out in war time. I don't think that you can always avoid war, but I do think that if it's unavoidable, it should be clear to most everyone as to why without having to exxagerate on issues in order to sell it. Of course, you will never convince everyone, but you should be able to provide more "convincing" proof to more people than Bush had done. In my opinion, the accusations didn't seem very strong, and we seemed to be intent on invading before proof had even been established. I'll refer to Pete's posts on this:

"The tool he (Saddam) gave us to invade was his refusal to abide by the terms of his earlier defeat, among them accounting for & destroying weapons of mass destruction."

And yet, Pete's response to people who don't believe there were WMD:

"You may be right. But that doesn't change the main reasons we invaded."

Yet, the WMD issue was always the most emphasized immediate threat to us. I want to find the weapons that Saddam failed to account for and destroy since that was explained to me as being the biggest threat. When we do, I'll feel more comfortable that we've eliminated that immediate threat.

Until that happens, it seems to me Saddam was more of an easy target than an immediate threat. The American people like victories, and having knocked off a leader and supporter (one of the many supporters) of the extremist groups who attacked us made some feel like we achieved a big victory on the anti-terrorist front. I think it helped, but not as much as others think. Saddam was painted to be the main supporter of the terrorist movement, and we all know that isn't necessarily the case. Pete and others can justify Saddam's ousting as much as they want, and I will agree to various points made and with the fact that we're better off without him in power, but I don't feel that this alone completely justifies a war effort. I think it could have been handled better. And I think it is our complete responsiblity now to make sure the region becomes stable and that civil war is prevented. We can't just go take out a leader of a nation who doesn't share our interests and leave it up to them to clean up the instability.

Anyway, good debate. I think Pete poked holes in some of the points made. However, I think he came close to contradicting himself a little bit as well. The conservative view seems to be "we're better off for doing what we did regardless of the WMD issue - Saddam was just plain evil anyway". The liberal view seems to be "if we don't find all those WMD, the preemptive attack cannot be fully justified as it was sold". I agree more with the liberal view on this issue. I know that we as a nation wouldn't be where we are today if the US government didn't make similar questionable decisions in the past. I just want to make sure our best interests are "good" and not just greedy.

[piece-it pete]

Pete:
I can hardly believe that you spent all of that time trying to rebut what I found to be a very concise, to the point (albeit tongue-in-cheek) "explanation" of world affairs, put into language that most any child of reasonable intelligence would understand. Why would you do so? Doesn't it bother you even a little that there's so much hypocrisy going on in world affairs? Over the course of decades, we've supported all sorts of "evil-doers" until we decided that we didn't want to support them any longer ... then, more often than not, they became our "enemy". What a sham! In fact, to quote Woody Allen from the film "Bananas" .... "what a mockery of a hoax of two shams of a mockery" or something like that.

Did you go to all that trouble because you felt that the "explanation" made Dubya's decisions look as imbecilic (to a child or anyone else) as they actually were?

Woodman,

I know you'd agree with this post!

My "rebuttal" sprang from the basic fact that I disagree with it. This makes me- what? Has the US done awful things? Of course. And no Democrat will change this, OR do things much differently than currently being done.

Changing allies in a hard world is a fact of life, or death, depending on your point of view. Both are accurate.

One things' for sure: the world the US has built is far superior to ANY other model. You could have Communism. You could have European socialism, the view I see in this thread, that has Autocratic gov't spoon feeding the population, the same people who led us to 2 world wars (and many, many others before it), and now possess the leadership ability (and authority) of a spoon. You could have Islam. How about Nazi-ism? Or pick a number of utopian pie-in-the-sky alternates the elite would sell us, which in reality WILL sell us, as in out, no longer to be free.

Pete

BTW, I'm not out to be a hater. It's all in the family.

[depressed]

I just hope that there aren't too many people that buy every bit of propaganda coming from the White House.
Here is an advice: Learn one foreign language (italian, german, spanish etc.) and compare the news from countries where those languages are spoken with the U.S. ones.

Oops, I have to interrupt my post because the president has an urgent message for all of us:

[oakley#36]

Q: Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq?
A: Because they had weapons of mass destruction, honey.

Q: But the inspectors didn't find any weapons of mass destruction.
A: That's because the Iraqis were hiding them.

Q: And that's why we invaded Iraq?
A: Yep. Invasions always work better than inspections.


Q: But after we invaded them, we STILL didn't find any weapons of mass
destruction, did we?
A: That's because the weapons are so well hidden. Don't worry, we'll find
something, probably right before the 2004 election.

Q: Why did Iraq want all those weapons of mass destruction?
A: To use them in a war, silly.

Q: I'm confused. If they had all those weapons that they planned to use in a
war, then why didn't they use any of those weapons when we went to war with
them?
A: Well, obviously they didn't want anyone to know they had thoseweapons, so
they chose to die by the thousands rather than defend themselves.

Q: That doesn't make sense Daddy. Why would they choose to die if they had
all those big weapons to fight us back with?
A: It's a different culture. It's not supposed to make sense.

Q: I don't know about you, but I don't think they had any of those weapons
our government said they did.
A: Well, you know, it doesn't matter whether or not they had those weapons.
We had another good reason to invade them anyway.

Q: And what was that?
A: Even if Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein was
a cruel dictator, which is another good reason to invade another country.

Q: Why? What does a cruel dictator do that makes it OK to invade his
country?
A: Well, for one thing, he tortured his own people.

Q: Kind of like what they do in China?
A: Don't go comparing China to Iraq. China is a good economic competitor
where millions of people work for slave wages in sweatshops to make U.S.
corporations
richer.

Q: So if a country lets its people be exploited for American corporate gain,
it's a good country, even if that country tortures people?
A: Right.

Q: Why were people in Iraq being tortured?
A: For political crimes, mostly, like criticizing the government.People who
criticized the government in Iraq were sent to prison and tortured.

Q: Isn't that exactly what happens in China?
A: I told you, China is different.

Q: What's the difference between China and Iraq?
A: Well, for one thing, Iraq was ruled by the Ba'ath party, while China is
Communist.

Q: Didn't you once tell me Communists were bad?
A: No, just Cuban Communists are bad.

Q: How are the Cuban Communists bad?
A: Well, for one thing, people who criticize the government in Cuba are sent
to prison and tortured.

Q: Like in Iraq?
A: Exactly.

Q: And like in China, too?
A: I told you, China's a good economic competitor. Cuba, on the other hand,
is not.

Q: How come Cuba isn't a good economic competitor?
A: Well, you see, back in the early 1960s, our government passed some laws
that made it illegal for Americans to trade or do any business with Cuba
until they stopped being Communists and started being capitalists like us.

Q: But if we got rid of those laws, opened up trade with Cuba, and started
doing business with them, wouldn't that help the Cubans become capitalists?
A: Don't be a smart-ass.

Q: I didn't think I was being one.
A: Well, anyway, they also don't have freedom of religion in Cuba.

Q: Kind of like China and the Falun Gong movement?
A: I told you, stop saying bad things about China. Anyway, Saddam Hussein
came to power through a military coup, so he's not really a legitimate
leader anyway.

Q: What's a military coup?
A: That's when a military general takes over the government of a country by
force, instead of holding free elections like we do in the United States.

Q: Didn't the ruler of Pakistan come to power by a military coup?
A: You mean General Pervez Musharraf? Uh, yeah, he did, but Pakistan is our
friend.

Q: Why is Pakistan our friend if their leader is illegitimate?
A: I never said Pervez Musharraf was illegitimate.

Q: Didn't you just say a military general who comes to power by forcibly
overthrowing the legitimate government of a nation is an illegitimate
leader?
A: Only Saddam Hussein. Pervez Musharraf is our friend, because he helped us
invade Afghanistan.

Q: Why did we invade Afghanistan?
A: Because of what they did to us on September 11th.

Q: What did Afghanistan do to us on September 11th?
A: Well, on September 11th, nineteen men, fifteen of them Saudi Arabians
hijacked four airplanes and flew three of them into buildings, killing over
3,000 Americans.

Q: So how did Afghanistan figure into all that?
A: Afghanistan was where those bad men trained, under the oppressive rule of
the Taliban.

Q: Aren't the Taliban those bad radical Islamics who chopped off people's
heads and hands?
A: Yes, that's exactly who they were. Not only did they chop off people's
heads and hands, but they oppressed women, too.

Q: Didn't the Bush administration give the Taliban 43 million dollars back
in May of 2001?
A: Yes, but that money was a reward because they did such a good job
fighting drugs.

Q: Fighting drugs?
A: Yes, the Taliban were very helpful in stopping people from growing opium
poppies.

Q: How did they do such a good job?
A: Simple. If people were caught growing opium poppies, the Taliban would
have their hands and heads cut off.

Q: So, when the Taliban cut off people's heads and hands for growing
flowers, that was OK, but not if they cut people's heads and hands off for
other reasons?
A: Yes. It's OK with us if radical Islamic fundamentalists cut off people's
hands for growing flowers, but it's cruel if they cut off people's hands for
stealing bread.

Q: Don't they also cut off people's hands and heads in Saudi Arabia?
A: That's different. Afghanistan was ruled by a tyrannical patriarchy that
oppressed women and forced them to wear burqas whenever they were in public,
with death by stoning as the penalty for women who did not comply.

Q: Don't Saudi women have to wear burqas in public, too?
A: No, Saudi women merely wear a traditional Islamic body covering.

Q: What's the difference?
A: The traditional Islamic covering worn by Saudi women is a modest yet
fashionable garment that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes
and fingers. The burqa, on the other hand, is an evil tool of Patriarchal
oppression that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and
fingers.

Q: It sounds like the same thing with a different name.
A: Now, don't go comparing Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are our
friends.

Q: But I thought you said 15 of the 19 hijackers on September 11th were from
Saudi Arabia.
A: Yes, but they trained in Afghanistan.

Q: Who trained them?
A: A very bad man named Osama bin Laden.

Q: Was he from Afghanistan?
A: Uh, no, he was from Saudi Arabia too. But he was a bad man, a very bad
man.

Q: I seem to recall he was our friend once.
A: Only when we helped him and the mujahadeen repel the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan back in the 1980s.

Q: Who are the Soviets? Was that the Evil Communist Empire Ronald Reagan
talked about?
A: There are no more Soviets. The Soviet Union broke up in 1990 or
thereabouts, and now they have elections and capitalism like us. We call
them Russians now.

Q: So the Soviets, I mean the Russians, are now our friends?
A: Well, not really. You see, they were our friends for many years after
they stopped being Soviets, but then they decided not to support our
invasion of Iraq, so we're mad at them now. We're also mad at the French and
the Germans because they didn't help us invade Iraq either.

Q: So the French and Germans are evil, too?
A: Not exactly evil, but just bad enough that we had to rename French fries
and French toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast.

Q: Do we always rename foods whenever another country doesn't do what we
want them to do?
A: No, we just do that to our friends. Our enemies, we invade.

Q: But wasn't Iraq one of our friends back in the 1980s?
A: Well, yeah. For a while.

Q: Was Saddam Hussein ruler of Iraq back then?
A: Yes, but at the time he was fighting against Iran, which made him our
friend, temporarily.

Q: Why did that make him our friend?
A: Because at that time, Iran was our enemy.

Q: Isn't that when he gassed the Kurds?
A: Yeah, but since he was fighting against Iran at the time, we looked the
other way, to show him we were his friend.

Q: So anyone who fights against one of our enemies automatically becomes our
friend?
A: Most of the time, yes.

Q: And anyone who fights against one of our friends is automatically an
enemy?
A: Sometimes that's true, too. However, if American corporations can profit
by selling weapons to both sides at the same time, all the better.

Q: Why?
A: Because war is good for the economy, which means war is good for America.
Also, since God is on America's side, anyone who opposes war is a godless
un-American Communist. Do you understand now why we attacked Iraq?

Q: I think so. We attacked them because God wanted us to, right?
A: Yes.

Q: But how did we know God wanted us to attack Iraq?
A: Well, you see, God personally speaks to George W. Bush and tells him what
to do.

Q: So basically, what you're saying is that we attacked Iraq because George
W. Bush hears voices in his head?
A. Yes! You finally understand how the world works.
Now close your eyes, make yourself comfortable, and go to sleep. Good night.

That was beautiful RGA! Although, in the past I've disagreed with you on some Iraq/ terrorism issues, I take it all back. That little post was nothing short of a masterpiece! Your the man. Oakley#36