So Saddam was hanged last night. Good riddance. I’m sure the right-wingers are trumpeting that the left is saddened by the loss, despite their inability to provide actual examples of such, but that’s right in line with their “liberals hate America”, “Democrats want the terrorists to win” schtick that nobody listens to anymore anyway.
The local paper today said that Saddam is believed to have killed over 290,000 people in 25 years of rule, which puts him pretty far up there on the list of evil dictators, but he looks like a rank amateur compared to the Hitlers, Stalins, and Maos of the world. Still, maybe the US shouldn’t have worked so hard to put a guy like this in power back in the Reagan days. I mean, since we propped him up, provided money, weapons, and the ingredients to make the infamous VX nerve gas he used on the Kurds, doesn’t that make this nation’s past leaders accomplices to these crimes?
What about the current Iraq war? We’re not beheading people in the street, but torture and death are still daily events in much of the country – not to mention the lack of electricity and running water and the return of Islamic extremism that was largely quashed under Saddam’s rule. The estimated civilian casualty count in “liberated” Iraq ranges from “Who cares? They’re brown-skinned heathens anyway” to 600,000+, depending on who you listen to, so clearly Iraq in the throes of Freedom(tm) is a much more dangerous place than it was under its brutal dictator. It took Saddam a quarter century to ruin as many lives as he did; we’ve obviously brought American-style efficiency to the job, because under our benevolent guidance they’re dying at a much faster rate.
When do the war crimes trials for the Neandro-cons begin?
Of all the comments I’ve seen coming from the pundits on this one, my favorite quote was from Jesse Jackson – an unusual occurrence, because for the most part I have a low JJ tolerance.
“”It will not increase our moral authority in the world. … Saddam’s heinous crimes against humanity can never be diminished, but he was our ally while he was doing it. ….. Saddam as a war trophy only deepens the catastrophe to which we are indelibly linked.”