Trouble in River (Euphrates) City?
From the Washington Post:
Well, duh. All you have to do is pay attention to the news and you can be well aware that what the Dubya Administration says and what reality is are quite two different things.
We are over 1,000 American deaths. The Iraqi death toll must be in 10s of thousands. And the bombings, shootings etc. continue while the interim government hides behind concrete walls surrounded by American soldiers. Saigon was in better shape during the Tet Offensive.
A telling story: the killing of Iraqi civilians (including at least two children) AND a Iraqi news crew cameraman by a U.S. Blackhawk as they stood around or on a burning American vehicle. We know why. A stressed out pilot angry at the attacks decided to take it out on the demonstrators by gunning them down. No action is taken by the military, who in fact denies it ever happened. And the shootings are seen on local television. How can you win their hearts and minds when you consistently kill innocents because they get in the line of fire?
Our poor, young soldiers are in a hell hole with no quick exit. And we continue with the big lie that all is OK.
My brother sends me a chain letter making the rounds of the internet showing multiple pictures of American soldiers sleeping in coffin-sized holes in the hot sun or eating lunch in ankle-deep mud. The message is that it's un-Christian and un-patriotic to complain at home when they have so little. Support our troops, the chain letter demands. I also think if I don't forward it, there is a penalty like seven years of bad luck, or some such. I'm risking it.
Actually, my spouse wants to send it back and say after much thought, it would be better to bring those poor boys and girls home. Why inflict upon them this awful life while their lives are in jeopardy daily, and all because an Administration made a very bad decision.
For reasons not clear to me, I am recommending she not do so. I do not want to cut off total communication between me and my blood relatives . . . but it is tempting.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 — Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said today that the Bush administration's request to divert more than $3 billion from reconstruction work in Iraq to security measures was a sign that the American campaign in Iraq is in serious trouble.
"Although we recognize these funds must not be spent unwisely," the committee chairman, Senator Richard G. Lugar, Republican of Indiana, said, "the slow pace of reconstruction spending means that we are failing to fully take advantage of one of our most potent tools to influence the direction of Iraq."
Well, duh. All you have to do is pay attention to the news and you can be well aware that what the Dubya Administration says and what reality is are quite two different things.
We are over 1,000 American deaths. The Iraqi death toll must be in 10s of thousands. And the bombings, shootings etc. continue while the interim government hides behind concrete walls surrounded by American soldiers. Saigon was in better shape during the Tet Offensive.
A telling story: the killing of Iraqi civilians (including at least two children) AND a Iraqi news crew cameraman by a U.S. Blackhawk as they stood around or on a burning American vehicle. We know why. A stressed out pilot angry at the attacks decided to take it out on the demonstrators by gunning them down. No action is taken by the military, who in fact denies it ever happened. And the shootings are seen on local television. How can you win their hearts and minds when you consistently kill innocents because they get in the line of fire?
Our poor, young soldiers are in a hell hole with no quick exit. And we continue with the big lie that all is OK.
My brother sends me a chain letter making the rounds of the internet showing multiple pictures of American soldiers sleeping in coffin-sized holes in the hot sun or eating lunch in ankle-deep mud. The message is that it's un-Christian and un-patriotic to complain at home when they have so little. Support our troops, the chain letter demands. I also think if I don't forward it, there is a penalty like seven years of bad luck, or some such. I'm risking it.
Actually, my spouse wants to send it back and say after much thought, it would be better to bring those poor boys and girls home. Why inflict upon them this awful life while their lives are in jeopardy daily, and all because an Administration made a very bad decision.
For reasons not clear to me, I am recommending she not do so. I do not want to cut off total communication between me and my blood relatives . . . but it is tempting.
posted by Robert | 1:36 PM
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