What Europeans hate about America and why

Just this morning, an American expatriate sent me a link to a site called "Take Me Back to the Sixties". I was enchanted to hear songs that I hadn't heard in years -Percy Faith's "A Summer Place", Elvis' "It's Now or Never", The Animals? "House of the Rising Sun", the Lovin' Spoonful's "Summer in the City", and Buffalo Springfield's "For What it's Worth". Like Thomas Wolfe, abroad back in 1926, I was very nearly overcome by a flood of impressions and memories, some vivid, some only half recalled but felt. (See: The Story of a Novel, Thomas Wolfe, The Creative Process, Brewster Ghiselin) I grooved with the head phones on. At last, sadly, the music turned out to be a right wing come on. Sacrilege.

Earlier, I had witnessed an angry protest of Bush's aggressive war against Iraq. It was a considerable crowd with banners marching peaceably just outside the Palais des Nations. But, again, I had seen a much bigger protest -some 5,000 to 10,000 -in the belly of the beast, Bush's "hometown" of Houston. And, as if to underscore the point a couple of hours later, a BBC program lampooned the growing rift with America. To be fair, the British comics singled out things that even Americans can't stand. I wish I could recall them.

While I admire Voltaire, the spirit of the "Enlightenment", French art, wine, as well as Edith Piaf, it must be pointed out that the French are not always right. French philosopher Jean-Francois Revel, for example, sounds like a NEOCON when he writes: "Democracy may, after all, turn out to have been a historical accident, a brief parenthesis that is closing before our eyes." Hasn't Dick Cheney said something similar of late? Indeed, Revel is considered to be one of the most important conservative thinkers in France. Like the "neo-conservative" movement in America, Ravel saw in America's left wing a threat to what he would call "...the foundations of democracy". Naturally, I see it the other way 'round. It's just as wrong as if Dick Cheney had said it. And he probably did. You shouldn't be surprised if I should tell you that Revel is quoted in The Free Republic.

I've also been channel surfing. Not having counted, I hesitate to say that most of the programming comes from America, specifically Hollywood. But, certainly, much of it consists of US stars dubbed in French. I have seen as many car chases, blonde bimbos, and gangster rappers as I saw in America. If Europe is as appalled by American culture as it claims to be, then why does it insist upon importing the very worst that America has to offer? For example, I have yet to see a Ken Burns documentary on the BBC, though I had seen many BBC programs on American TV. It occurred to me that perhaps I could do both America and Europe a service by enumerating some of the better things about American culture.

At this point, I have only random flashes of American excellence that are too often ignored by the merchants of crap back home and the buyers of crap in Europe. From time to time, however, I will see, on TV, someone of the stature of John Coltrane, Roy Orbison, or Gerard Schwarz. Musicians, whose stock and trade is a universal language, fare better than those whose greatness is language and speech. Even the American intellectual has a bit of metaphorical prairie dust on him/her but, sadly, that is all lost in translation.

I found just such greatness in the works of a lesser known writer, J. Frank Dobie

James Frank Dobie (September 26, 1888–September 18, 1964) was an American folklorist, writer, and newspaper columnist best known for many books depicting the richness and traditions of life in rural Texas during the days of the open range. As a public figure, he was known in his lifetime for his outspoken liberal views against Texas state politics, and for his long personal war against what he saw as bragging Texans, religious prejudice, restraints on individual liberty, and the assault of the mechanized world on the human spirit. He was also instrumental in the saving of the Texas Longhorn breed of cattle from extinction.

J. Frank Dobie, a self-made man, a gentleman, a scholar, may have been the first Existentialist Cowboy.

Dobie is provincial, to be sure, but his writing is universal as is his wit, his widom, his empathy. And, unlike the phony cowboy who presumes to rule, Dobie was a thorough-going liberal. Nevertheless, he will remain virtually unknown in Europe though he conducted classes at Cambridge during World War II. (See: A Texan in England) His Cambridge students asked him: "Do we sound as strange to you as you sound to us?" It was Dobie who wrote movingly of British honor during that time of war. He said of life at Cambridge: "Three thousand young men, all of whom would rather lose a game than win it unfairly".

Despite the fact that Dobie was of another generation, I share a certain "base" with him. Dobie writes of a Texas that was unspoiled as it very nearly was when I was a child. His sweeping vistas were my sweeping vistas. His stories of lost Spanish gold became my mythology and I often saw, in the distance across the dusty plain, the very sprawling mesas where Maximillian's Gold might have been buried. When I read Dobie today, I hear my father's voice reading from Coronado's Children (Dallas: The Southwest Press. 1930) by the light of a Kerosene lamp.

I have no quarrel with European critiques of American culture. In fact, in most cases, I share them. I disdain Bush and his stupid, tragic war. But Bush is not, in fact, representive of American values. He is a perversion of them. The same is true for most of the GOP. Here's a clue. Bush is no cowboy. He's a poser and fraud and, as such, he is symbolic of what often passes for American culture abroad.

I would say this to interested Europeans who would see American culture for what it was and might yet be again. Stay tuned. Even Rome fell. And so too will American imperialism.

The Existentialist Cowboy

Conservative Lies
Indict Bush
Why Conservatives Hate America
GOP Crime Syndicate
Iraq

Spread the word:

Of liars, idiots, Bush and Goering

A man who does not know the truth is just an idiot but a man who knows the truth and calls it a lie is a crook!

--Bertolt Brecht

The sane and insane alike act upon what they believe to be true. Mankind's greatest atrocities, crimes, and inhumanities invariably follow from irrational beliefs, namely lies. ignorance, bigotry, and superstition.

The GOP, meanwhile, is a party of ideology. It would be one thing if life-long members of the GOP were merely deluded. But what is most pernicious about the party is this: most members know better.

Educated "goppers" know, for example, that wealth does not trickle down but they will work for Reaganesque tax cuts anyway. Most Republicans knew that Bush was lying when he said that attacking and invading Iraq was a part of the war on terror, that Saddam had WMD, that US troops would be killing bona fide terrorists in Iraq. But they supported Bush anyway knowing that he was lying.

What can be said of an entire class of people who act upon beliefs that can easily be shown to be misinformed, misunderstood, or just plain wrong? Others simply refuse to confront facts or evidence contrary to their beliefs and prejudices. Some will believe whatever "...makes them feel better about themselves." Many will continue to act upon falsehoods and hold to them even when the results are catastrophic as they have proven to be in Iraq. Paid liars like Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh spread lies for money --a Faustian bargain! Those making them are in hell already.

Many people in the "right wing" believe assorted black-hearted lies that a black person, a homosexual, or an Iraqi is either a lower form of life, an "abomination to God!", or an "infidel". Thus discrimination and murder are justified. Likewise, many Islamic extremists are taught the same thing about Americans.

I make a distinction between a purposeful Hitler and those who merely make mistakes. Hitler must surely have known that the racial myth with which he justified the murder of some six or seven million Jews in Europe was a black hearted lie. Yet, when he acted upon the lie, millions of "good Germans" followed him into hell. Similarly, Ronald Reagan must have known that "supply side economics" was a bogus rationalization that would throw millions of people out of work. The "clever dicks" who invented "trickle down" theory most certainly knew better but supported whopping tax cuts for rich folk anyway.

It is not only disingenuous Republicans who swoon about how "Reagan made us feel good about ourselves", it is media shills who must certainly know better. Some people ought to lose sleep at night. Some people ought to have bad dreams and night terrors--a phenomenon that recent studies have shown is commonplace among Republicans.

In medieval times, the European Continent was an unlikely birth place for an enlightenment that was not to come for another 1,000 years. A trial, for example, was based less upon evidence or witnesses than upon the outcome of an ordeal in which it was believed God would assert his powers. Disputes, for example, were resolved by combat, and it was believed that God would favor whomever was in the right. Suspected witches were often subject to trial by water in which those found innocent were no better off than those judged guilty. Those who survived drowning were guilty because the "pure" water had rejected them. Only by sinking and drowning could one be "proven" innocent. Certain death is a high price to pay for acquittal.

The insane logic behind this may be forgiven a primitive culture, but what of modern Republican demagogues who smear innocents with the incredibly insane and medieval assertion that no evidence is, in fact, evidence of guilt? Perhaps Republican malice and ill-will might have been satisfied if Gary Condit and Bill Clinton had been subjected to trial by fire, water, or joust and only by death is innocence proved! By contrast, the case against George W. Bush is overwhelming and consists of real probable cause and real evidence that Bush has with "...malice, aforethought" ordered war crimes resulting in death. I suggest that whomever finds this trivial read US Codes, Section 2441 having to with War Crimes and the penalty for those war crimes that result in death. It is a capital offense.

The Nuremberg War Crimes Trials were significant for several reasons. It affirmed a standard of personal responsibility. The trials discredited the defense: but we were only following orders. (See: The Avalon Project at Yale Law School, The Nuremberg War Crimes Trials)

Nuremberg was a study of the very face of evil. Gustave Gilbert, the American psychologist had the thankless job of counseling the rogues' gallery of Nazi criminals, thugs and perverts. Gilbert had been granted free access to all those who would stand trial at Nuremberg. He said that as a result of his interviews, he was able to arrive at what he thought was the very source of evil: a complete and utter lack of empathy. I can only add that it is empathy that prevents us acting upon our worst motives and impulses, and upon the lies we cite to make us feel better about ourselves when we have done so.

Gilbert's interviews with Hermann Goering also reveal the essence of the cynical, political lie. The well-known quote from Hermann Goring is often said to be apochryphal. But it is not. It comes from an interview that Gilbert held with Hermann Goering in his cell on the evening of April 18, 1946 and it may be found in his book --Nuremberg Diary:

Sweating in his cell in the evening, Goering was defensive and deflated and not very happy over the turn the trial was taking. He said that he had no control over the actions or the defense of the others, and that he had never been anti-Semitic himself, had not believed these atrocities, and that several Jews had offered to testify in his behalf. If [Hans] Frank [Governor-General of occupied Poland] had known about atrocities in 1943, he should have come to him and he would have tried to do something about it. He might not have had enough power to change things in 1943, but if somebody had come to him in 1941 or 1942 he could have forced a showdown. (I still did not have the desire at this point to tell him what [SS General Otto] Ohlendorf had said to this: that Goering had been written off as an effective "moderating" influence, because of his drug addiction and corruption.) I pointed out that with his "temperamental utterances," such as preferring the killing of 200 Jews to the destruction of property, he had hardly set himself up as champion of minority rights. Goering protested that too much weight was being put on these temperamental utterances. Furthermore, he made it clear that he was not defending or glorifying Hitler.

Gilbert noted Goering's thoughts about how easily common people are manipulated, how easily they are duped into supporting and fighting various political wars:

We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and destruction.

"Why, of course, the people don't want war," Goering shrugged. "Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship."

"There is one difference," I pointed out. "In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars."

"Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

--Gustave Gilbert, Nuremberg Diary

The Existentialist Cowboy

Terrorism, Imperialism
Bush, War Crimes, Iraq

Four years on: right wing lies about Iraq exposed

NEOCONS and other GOP politicians are still in psychotic denial. Interviewed by Tim Russert on NBC's Meet the Press, former House Majority Leader Rep. Tom DeLay and Richard Perle, the former Chairman of the Defense Policy Board still carry the moribund Bush banner, the same old slogans, the same old lies. Most noticeably, they say, pulling American troops out now will create chaos in Iraq. It will embolden terrorists and make terrorism worse. It is better, they say, to fight them in Iraq.

Let's answer those points in turn.

• Leaving the troops in Iraq creates chaos.
• Terrorism is, in fact, made worse by our presence.
• Finally: there is absolutely nothing to be gained by leaving American troops trapped in the crossfire of a civil war.

Clearly, neither Perle nor DeLay understand the nature of the Iraq Civil War. US troops now find themselves in the no man's land between warring factions: Sh'ia and Sunni. The U.S. loses the war when it gives up the role of "honest broker". Bush has painted himself into a corner, "... committed to propping up the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki".

In the middle of a civil war, the Americans have only two choices: a) Choose one side against the other and hope for the best, or 2) Get out of the way. Some four years ago, I asked: when the civil war breaks out, which side will Bush choose to be on? There are no good choices. Choosing one side over the other puts US troops in harm's war and at war with the other side. Not having good options is the very definition of "losing".

Where were the Iraqi terrorists before the US invaded Iraq and gave them a convenient target? DeLay and Perle will not address that issue. They prefer to regurgitate a tired, old rhetoric that they don't believe themselves.

Bush policies, in fact, make us less secure; we have not engaged terrorists in Iraq; Iraq had nothing to do with 911, most of the violence in Iraq is sectarian in nature.

The opposition to the US is that of a resistance to an illegitimate occupier. I have yet to see convincing evidence that in over four years the Bush administration has done anything at all to make the US safe from terrorist attacks or that a bona fide terrorist has ever been "...brought to justice." By making terrorism worse, we increase the chances of major attacks on US soil.

Nor will pulling American troops make terrorism any worse than our presence there has already done. A recent report indicates that the reverse is true, i.e. the US presence makes terrorism worse.

Washington - A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks.

The classified National Intelligence Estimate attributes a more direct role to the Iraq war in fueling radicalism than that presented either in recent White House documents or in a report released Wednesday by the House Intelligence Committee, according to several officials in Washington involved in preparing the assessment or who have read the final document.

The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled "Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States," it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe.

An opening section of the report, "Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement," cites the Iraq war as a reason for the diffusion of jihad ideology.

The report "says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse," said one American intelligence official.

--Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terror Threat, Mark Mazzetti, The New York Times

Delay and Perle continue to raise the same tired old GOP strawmen even as , every day, Iraqis will tell you that every day is worse than the day before.

Indeed, the Civil War has begun and no amount of wishful thinking or GOP propaganda will change the facts in Baghdad:

The White House still avoids the label, but by any reasonable historical standard, the Iraqi civil war has begun. The record of past such wars suggests that Washington cannot stop this one -- and that Iraqis will be able to reach a power-sharing deal only after much more fighting, if then. The United States can help bring about a settlement eventually by balancing Iraqi factions from afar, but there is little it can do to avert bloodshed now.

--The United States Can't Win Iraq's Civil War, James D. Fearon, Foreign Affairs

Significantly, Tom DeLay did not get away with trying to tie the US attack and invasion of Iraq to the events of 911. It was Russert who set the record straight. It has been learned, Russert said, that Iraq had nothing whatsoever to do with the events of 911. But how many times have we heard George W. Bush imply that the US presence in Iraq is in response to the events of 911? How many times will Bush try to connect the US created chaos in Iraq to the war on terrorism?

On an optimistic note, Perle and DeLay clearly lost the debate to former Rep. Tom Andrews (D-ME), the director of the anti-war coalition "Win Without War" and Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA), a retired Vice Admiral of the U.S. Navy who is the highest ranking former military officer to serve in the House.

It is increasingly clear, even in mainstream reports like Meet the Press, that Bush is still playing the wrong game in Iraq. As in Risk and Poker, Bush has tried recently to raise the stakes with renewed attacks on the old nemesis, the "Axis of Evil". Doing so confuses the nature of the American involvement; it ensures our ignominious retreat now or later. Now is the time to think clearly. Now is the time to stop listening to paid psychotics. Now is the time to face cold, hard facts.

Bush saw himself as a conquering hero, just one of his many delusions. By pressing the issues, Bush made of his domestic opposition true heroes at a time when it was not fashionable to "bash" Bush. For too long now, America has been at odds with the rest of the world because America has not seen the world and its role in it clearly. Iraq is the most tragic example. As long as the GOP continues to buy into sloganeering by the likes of Perle and DeLay, there will be no end to American trouble abroad. As I've said so many times: the GOP is not a political party, it was and remains under Bush, a criminal conspiracy.

-The Existentialist Cowboy

Bush,
War Crimes,
Iraq

On the Edge of Doom: The End of American Community

In his essay on Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, W.H. Auden observed that theatrical directors throughout the 30's found it quite natural to make of Caesar a great fascist dictactor, perhaps more like Mussolini than Adolph Hitler. The conspirators, he says, were "liberals". Up to date analogies are irresistible. There was a very brief period of time not long ago, before Iraq fell into utter chaos, that it could be said that George W. Bush had "...crossed the Rubicon". There are, however, even better analogies to be made.

In 1947, Auden would say of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar that it had "great relevance to our time". That is still true, though Auden believed that Julius Caesar was about a society, the society of ancient Rome, on the very edge of doom. Auden did not believe that to be true of Western Civilization in 1947. But --is it true of the US, Britain, and Western Civilization today? Are we perched on the edge of doom?

Historically, of course, Octavian would "ride the storm" eventually prevailing at Actium, and, upon assuming the title Augustus would give to Rome another 400 years. The prospects thus were not nearly as gloomy as those we face today.

Auden would write of the post Roman-Hellenic world that it collapsed of a spiritual failure, a lack of nerve, an inability to make sense of what was going on. This is the analogy that is to be made with the present. It is not surprising that a far flung war begun upon a pack of malicious and deliberate lies would drag on for four years. It has done so because it would appear that few in power understand what is going on. And those who do are afraid to speak. The BBC states flatly: the Iraq war has sent shockwaves throughout the Middle East that will be felt for a generation. That is, in fact, an optimistic assessment.

There is yet another layer of complication. It has to do with the sense of community that is lately found lacking in America and, perhaps, to a lesser degree elsewhere. Auden makes much of the manner in which Shakespeare begins his plays. "First things in Shakespeare are always important", he writes. It is, therefore, significant that Julius Caesar begins with a crowd scene.

The crowd is among three important types: societies, communities, and crowds. One belongs to a society in which the individual has a function or to which one contributes in one way or another. Communities are composed of people who share a common love. Crowds, by contrast, are composed of members who neither belong nor join. Members of crowds merely add numerically to the crowd. The crowd, Auden writes, has no function.

Crowds arise when communities break down, when individuals for various reasons cannot share a common love or enthusiasm with others. Education, says Auden, has little to do with it. Knowledgeable, highly educated people often become members of crowds for various reasons and thus often help drive the enigma of fascism.

An over-simplification is tempting. Crowds are often fertile ground, nurturing fascism and other forms of authoritarian governments and regimes. If the manner in which Shakespeare begins his plays is important, then it must be pointed out that Julius Caesar begins with a crowd scene and ends with the loss of Republic.

A "crowd" is most often ugly, fickle, angry yet manipulable. Kierkegaard would write of the public as merely a large crowd "...a Roman emperor, a large well-fed figure, suffering from boredom, looking only for the sensual intoxication of laughter." He would call the "press" the "public's dog" that is often set upon the truly great. Thus, the crowd, manipulated by demogogues and charlatans, becomes a mob.

The increasingly isolated, suburban nature of American society, in the midst of plenty, devolved into islands of isolation. The word community merely attached to a souless suburb does not make a real community. It's only a sub-division at best. At worst --a dormitory. An affluent America became a nation of crowds, a public only loosely held together, isolated by the science of demographics whose very purpose is separation and analysis. Given those conditions, the events of 911 were highly exploitable and America became an angry mob.

The conditions were ripe for a would-be dictator to seize "the crown", vowing as he did to "...export death and destruction to the four corners of the earth." This would-be Caesar was hardly swept into office with a popular mandate. The election was stolen. Certainly, Al Gore received more popular votes in Florida. But for 911, Bush would already be retired.

There is some hope that a new Congress will force a positive change. But that assumes that they know what is really going on. Until America finds its soul, its sense of real community, it will remain like the Roman-Hellenic world on the very edge of doom. There is no Octavian in the wings who might give us another 400 years or so.

-The Existentialist Cowboy
Bush,
War Crimes,
Iraq

Losing the War on Terrorism

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

Six months ago, 100 of America's top foreign-policy professionals told Foreign Policy magazine that the United States was losing the war on terrorism. Six months later, the prognosis is even worse:

...surveyed again today, this bipartisan group sees a world that continues to grow more dangerous and a U.S. national security strategy that is failing on several fronts.

-Foreign Policy

Some highlights from the report: 80 percent disagree with Bush that the US is winning the "war on terrorism". Some 47 percent see nuclear prolileration to be the greater threat. Eighty-six percent believe the world has become a more dangerous place. Seventy-one percent of those calling themselves "conservative", likewise, believe that the US is losing the war on terrorism.

Just one month after 9/11, FP reports, 4 percent of Americans told an ABC News/Washington Post poll that "...they approved of how the fight against terrorism was being handled." How things have changed! That was before the US invaded Afghanistan, long before the US attacked and invaded Iraq. It's all gone to hell since. Clearly -war was not and is not the solution. War has solved nothing and made things worse.

Foreign Policy published a laundry list of disasters, all of which sour the public mood.

...a bloody war between Israel and Hezbollah, a plot in Britain to explode liquid bombs aboard airliners bound for the United States, North Korea’s nuclear test, a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan, and Iraq’s downward slide into deadly sectarian strife.

Why are Democrats afraid to take on Bush on the "support the troops" issue? Democrats are still trying to walk a thin, narrow line, triangulating a center that has clearly moved to the left.

Nothing is gained by staying in Iraq. It imperils the troops. It does not support them. Troops are best supported by taking them out of the killing fields and, in the process, ending those policies that have created terrorism and opposition where none had been before.

Bush may be but another ideological terrorist but he's a more dangerous one. The militant Ayatollahs, Bin Laden, and numerous anonymous bombers are not so different from Bush, nor he, them. On all sides, "combatants" eschew doubt, when it fact, it should be cultivated. Certitude is the first refuge of idiots.

Monsters from the id are very real. Bush cannot escape the consequences of his ill-conceived policies. Nor can we. Terrorism gets worse by the minute and, by the minute, the American occupation bogs down. Terrorism is said to have increased some seven fold since the conflict on the ground began. [See: The Iraq Effect: War Has Increased Terrorism Sevenfold Worldwide.]

Enough is enough.

Democrats must seize the moral high ground. Democrats must cut off funding for additional troops and additional campaigns. Tacking "social spending" onto the latest funding bill is all fine and good but more must be done. Democrats must tax our way out of the war with a "Victory Over Terror" tax levied on incomes of $5 million a year or more. Levied on all income, it would include stock options, jet plane rides, company-paid-for health and life insurance, retirement programs, golden parachutes, the use of apartments in Paris, cars and drivers.

In the meantime, we all continue to pay a high price for the Bush/Blair follies. Terrorists, we are still told, just hate freedom and, should they win, will rob us of those freedoms. But we are losing those freedoms anyway. To Bush, Blair and similar ilk. Consider the following from George Galloway's web site.

The BBC have banned the hit single 'War', which features a Tony Blair lookalike in the accompanying video, over fears that its pro-peace message will offend the government .

It is bad enough to lose freedom of speech during a real war! But a phony one? I remember when Britain was free. If you doubt the extent to which Blair has subverted Britain's proud heritage, consider yet another item from the Galloway site:

Cable TV Screens go blank as Murdoch and Branson battle for pay-TV market

An excerpt:

While insisting there is "mutual respect" between him and Rupert Murdoch, Sir Richard has made clear his views about the media mogul's role in British public life. Pointing out Mr Murdoch's ownership of four national newspapers and controlling stake in Sky, Sir Richard Branson said: "If you tag on ITV to that as well, basically you've got rid of democracy in this country and we might as well just let Murdoch decide who is going to be our prime minister."

How surreal the recent global market crash seemed --especially its choreographed appearance. We are reminded of the true nature of both globalization and global fascism. Here's a timely excerpt from Mike Whitney`s The Great Dollar Crash of '07: "

The so-called ‘global economic system’ has nothing to do with competition, free markets or private enterprise; that’s just public relations gobbledygook. In practice, it is the world’s biggest extortion racket, wherein, the “Godfather”-- Uncle Sam-- holds a gun to the heads of his subjects and forces them to use our fiat-paper to purchase the oil that lubricates their economies."

I refuse to believe, meanwhile, that Western Civilization will succumb to the new barbarian within, namely Bush and his fascist, global corporate sponsors. That Bush pays only lip service to the Constitution belies his true allegiance: the idea of the global corporation. It is the corporation which has allied itself with older cultures distinctly anti-Western in tone and spirit. Some have called it corporate feudalism. But, for my part, the word fascism does quite nicely. It was Mussolini who defined fascism as corporatism and he did so in both word and deed.

Bertrand Russell stated that Western Civilization was essentially Greek civilization, writing:

"There is no civilization but the Greek in which a philosophic movement goes hand in hand with a scientific tradition. It is this that gives the Greek enterprise its peculiar scope; it is this dual tradition that has shaped the civilization of the West."

Fast fowarding through my own rather lengthy take on this, I have come to the conclusion that there is a certain introspective reflection shot-through the Western tradition. Clearly there is no such self-consciousness in either Christianity or Islam. Significantly, the origin of both religions are both geographically and philosophically outside the "Western" tradition and the civilization of which Russell speaks. The fly in the ointment is the global corporation playing both sides against an amoral middle. It must be pointed out that while Christianity is practiced in the west, its origins are middle eastern. Fundies who demonize the Middle East have apparently forgotten that.

The Greece of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Phidias, Solon, Aristophanes, Sophocles was secular. From time to time in Western society, the fault lines will appear. When Salman Rushdie published his "Satanic Verses", he became the object of a fatwa. Later, when a cartoonist lampooned the "Prophet", the millions who supported the Greek ideal found themselves ill-equipped to defend it against an entire civilization which is outside their own tradition, a tradition so well described by Thomas Jefferson who wrote: "We hold these truths to be self-evident..." I leave it to a detail oriented scholar to trace Jefferson back to Locke, indeed, to Greece. Nor can we conclude that because Socrates lost his battle with the *religious right" that Greece was just another state. The point, rather, is that it was the Greek ideal of free inquiry that survived to shape the west -not the authoritarian, "Eastern" tradition that persecuted Socrates as surely as the Church in Rome would burn Giordano Bruno.

Meanwhile, a new motion picture, 300, has drawn fire from Iran for depicting a hand full of brave Greeks holding off a vast Persian army. I see another analogy. I see a handful of guerrillas holding off what had been the most powerful nation on earth. I see George Washington holding out long enough for the French to win the American "Revolution". I see Gen. Sam Houston attack with but a handful of scrappy "settlers" to defeat a vast Mexican army lead by Gen. Santa Anna of Mexico. (See:' Alamo' touches raw nerve in Mexico; The Battle Of San Jacinto ) In five years, ten years, a generation -what will be said of the US defeat in Iraq?

Some additional resources:

Lie by Lie: The Mother Jones Iraq War Timeline
Bush Has Lost the War on Terrorism
Bush lost the war on terrorism because he dare not win it

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It's Official: The Hottest Winter on Record

A recent television news report may have summed up the sense of malaise and disgust in America today. A video clip depicted a rural family watching George W. Bush on the family television set. When Bush got to the topic of Iraq, the man seized the remote, clicked it off, and declared loudly: "I am sick of this guy!" This is interesting because there is a very real possibility that the man may have voted for Bush.

Enough is written of his numerous war crimes and torture -all pulled off under the cover of war on Iraq. But what of the war he wages daily on Americans?

At home, Bush has waged war on the environment -a fact brought home by the news today that this past winter has been the hottest since record keeping began some 125 years ago. Is it a fluke- as the GOP would have you believe -or is it global warming as a result of greenhouse gas emissions?

Until Al Gore took climate change on the road, Bush's abrogation of the Kyoto treaty had been all but forgotten. (see: An Inconvenient Truth) But a recent report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change changed all that. Signed by some 2,500 scientists from 130 nations, it paints a stark picture. It's hard to sum up this vision of apocalypse, so here are just a few highlights.

Greenhouse gases - from industry, transportation and agriculture -are most certainly to blame for global warming. This so called Greenhouse effect is the label given the increase in such gases over time. Primary sources of greenhouse gases are clearly due to human activity and include:

• deforestation and the burning of fossil fuels leading to higher carbon dioxide concentrations;
• landfill emissions leading to higher methane atmospheric concentrations. Newer fully vented septic systems have become a major source of methane;
• the use of fertilizers in various agriculture lead to higher concentrations of nitrous oxide.

The best source for information on emission can be found in the Special Report on Emissions Scenarios The following excerpt is related to the graphic that accompanies this article.

Figure 1-2: Energy-related and industrial global CO2 emissions for scenarios reviewed in the IPCC Report Climate Change 1994 (Alcamo et al., 1995). The shaded area indicates coverage of IS92 scenarios while the "spaghetti-like" curves indicate other energy-related emissions scenarios found by the IPCC review to be representative of the scenarios available in the open literature at that time. (Individual scenarios are listed in the Appendix of Alcamo et al., 1995.)

-Figure 1-2: Energy-related and industrial global CO₂ emissions for scenarios

It is easy to get lost in the many numbers, many of which are meaningless to non-scientists. But here's an easy one: an average coal fired plant pumps about ten mllion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year.

One of the most pernicious effects will be rising sea levels. That's easily visualized -having witnessed a tsunami and, later, Katrina. If nothing is done to correct the trend, if gas emission do not peak before 2030, it may be too late to do anything about it. But Bush's position on this issue has given cover to the world`s other great polluters --China and India. China is at least as dependent on coal as the US is addicted to oil and gas. What leverage will the US have on two nation's eager to out "US" the "US"? Aggravating the situation are the traditional tensions between China and India.

In the meantime, the numbers are in on what has turned out to have been the warmest winter since record keeping began in the US some 125 years ago. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says temperatures continue to rise by a fifth of a degree every decade. The 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 1995. And while NOAA does not blame "global warming", weather experts predict that 2007 might very well be the hottest year on record. The IPCC report must be taken into consideration before these numbers can be blamed on El Nino.

Would things have been different if Bush had not thumbed his nose at Kyoto? Consider the fact that United States is among the world's leading producers of greenhouse gases.

-The Existentialist Cowboy

Bush, Iraq

Bush Kills Off American Optimism

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

Bush has robbed Americans of that most American trait -optimism. In the worst of times, Americans shrugged off deprivations and hardships with both a complaint and a wisecrack.

Not quite the British "stiff upper lip", it nevertheless struck back at bad times with a smart ass remark amid faith that things would get better. World War I would make the world safe for Democracy. The Axis powers would be defeated. We would get rich.

At the height of the depression, the movies had a hit with a little ditty called "We're in the Money". It made Ginger Rogers a star.

"We're in the Money," lyrics by Al Dubin, music by Harry Warren (from the film Gold Diggers of 1933, 1933)

We're in the money, we're in the money;
We've got a lot of what it takes to get along!
We're in the money, that sky is sunny,
Old Man Depression you are through, you done us wrong.
We never see a headline about breadlines today.
And when we see the landlord we can look that guy right in the eye

We're in the money, come on, my honey,
Let's lend it, spend it, send it rolling along!

Oh, yes we're in the money, you bet we're in the money,
We've got a lot of what it takes to get along!
Let's go we're in the money, Look up the skies are sunny,
Old Man Depression you are through, you done us wrong.
We never see a headline about breadlines today.
And when we see the landlord we can look that guy right in the eye
We're in the money, come on, my honey,
Let's lend it, spend it, send it rolling along!

But if you might not get rich, an American might provide for his children a better education than he got. An American might indulge fantasies of equality, an education, a career. An American rarely feared that he would be locked up unfairly, beaten, deprived of his rights as an American.

Unless he was black.

But in those days, as E.L. Doctorow would say satirically in "Ragtime", "...there were no negroes."

An American might sleep soundly at night knowing that his government would not be reading his mail or conspiring to break into his home. He might never be accused of treason for supporting a Democratic candidate. He might even dare to join his local union shop.

Of course, even then, such optimism was often misplaced. Black people were lynched. Education was difficult to get. Many died in the dust bowl. Others starved. During the Great Depression, my own relatives lived on wild game in the "Big Thicket" of southeastern Texas. One of my own ancestors might have killed a game warden. I will never know the truth of it. Out of that national experience, another great song became emblematic:

"Brother, Can You Spare a Dime," lyrics by Yip Harburg, music by Jay Gorney (1931)

They used to tell me I was building a dream, and so I followed the mob,
When there was earth to plow, or guns to bear, I was always there right on the job. They used to tell me I was building a dream, with peace and glory ahead,
Why should I be standing in line, just waiting for bread?

Once I built a railroad, I made it run, made it race against time.
Once I built a railroad; now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once I built a tower, up to the sun, brick, and rivet, and lime;
Once I built a tower, now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?

Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!

Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time.
Why don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?

Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!

Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time. Say, don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?

The ghosts of the often tragic struggles for equality, civil liberties, the right to join a labor movement, still haunt America. The struggles were engaged because we believed the ideals might be achieved. Labor might achieve a living wage. Minorities might achieve equality. And, during the long Viet Nam debacle, we took to the streets in Chicago because we believed peace might break out. That was the real meaning of flowers placed in gun barrels.

During the administration of Bush Jr, it was difficult to be so optimistic. Bush did not merely eschew American ideals, he openly derides them. Most perniciously, he said "This would be a whole lot easier if this was a dictatorship...just as long as I'm the dictator." Thus Bush declared the anti-American nature of his regime at the outset and, true to form, he waged war on the U.S. Constitution.

Bush is not content to crush American optimism. He seeks to replace it with fear and despair, powerful negative emotions that he and his party eagerly embrace and exploit. Dick Cheney's infamous "snarl" is but a symptom.

By contrast, Franklin Delano Roosevelt -at the height of the depression -said: "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." Bush, by contrast, seems to be the physical manifestation of the American anxieties that he exploits. He is nothing without the phantom menaces that he summons. His very image is enough to trigger a shot of adrenalin, a "fight or flight" reaction that goes right to the gut.

It is no wonder than his recent trip throughout Latin America was notable for the violent demonstrations that it inspired. And, in Europe, you will find graffiti stating "Bush is Satan".

It does not matter that Bush is or is not Satan. What matters is that millions of otherwise intelligent people believe that he is. In fact, he is more loathed than Satan.

The really bad news for Bush? When the same pollsters asked Americans to name a "famous person" as their "biggest villain of the year," 25 percent of them volunteered the president's name. That put Bush way out in front on the biggest-villain list. Rounding out the most villainous five: Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Kim Jong Il, who combined couldn't match Bush's 25 percent level..

--Tim Grieve, War Room, More popular than Jesus, more hated than Satan,

Bush is thought by billions to be a most powerful force for evil. Clearly, he inspires fear at home and terrorism abroad,. He has made of America, an un-American state. Bush himself summed up his agenda:

We will export death and destruction to the four corners of the earth.
-George W. Bush

It just keeps getting harder to remain optimistic.-The Existentialist Cowboy
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

How the GOP Made the World a More Dangerous Place

Bush has repeatedly compared what he calls his war against "Islamic extremists" to previous struggles against Nazism and Communism.

Nonsense!

The GOP has never forgiven FDR for having prevailed in World War II. Recently, the GOP would conspire with conversative media conglomerates to perpetuate a counter-myth: it was Ronald Reagan who prevailed in a cold war against "communism".

More nonsense.

This simplistic, jingoistic view ignores a remarkable leader by the name of Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev who waged quiet revolutions at home and abroad. At Rekjavik, it was Gorbachev -not Reagan -who proposed "...a total elimination of Soviet and American intermediate-range missiles in Europe, and strict compliance with (and non-withdrawal from) the ABM Treaty for not less than ten years." (See: The Eighties Club) It was a nuclear showdown but not the type that we had prepared for since the 50's.

We had been threatened with peace --and were frightened by the prospect.

At the end of the Rekjavik sessions, it was a "...a tight-lipped Reagan" who escorted Gorbachev to the limousine. Gorbachev is reported to have said "I don't know what more I could have done."

"You could have said yes," Reagan replied, having already rejected the Soviet leaders proposals. It was Reagan -fearing the loss of his arch conservative base -who blinked. It was Reagan who left Rekjavik bearing the responsibility for having left a long and dangerous cold war intact.

It is true that the Soviet Union possessed considerable nuclear capabilities. In the event of a missile exchange, it might have destroyed the U.S. in the course of an hour. But, as we have said, it was Gorbachev who put that very capability on the table. It was Gorbachev who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990. It was a Republican, Ronald Reagan, who blinked.

Consider the many Bush lies and exaggerations. Bush, like his GOP forebears, would like to compare his quagmire in Iraq to the war Roosevelt waged against the Axis powers. The truth of the matter is the Nazis had launched a world war with an awesome military machine -the most powerful military force that the world had yet seen. Nazis slaughtered millions of civilians in support of Hitler's quest for world domination and Russian oil. To liken Bush's many follies to WWII, to the world wide effort to crush the the very real threat of Nazism, is just absurd. Rather, Bush, by exploiting the extremist acts of of tiny minority, has empowered and legitimized their struggle. Bush has not only made terrorism worse, he has given it a megaphone.

Now we find ourselves bogged down in what may prove to be this nation's worst catastrophe. In the Middle East, Bush wages a brutal war crime against a civilian population and he does so upon a pack of malicious lies and transparent pretexts. Opposition to US aims in the Middle East cannot be compared to either WWII or the Cold War. If there are analogies to be made, they are Bush to Hitler, Halliburton to stormtroopers.

There is hope that the many throughout the Middle East who sincerely seek a positive change will find a voice. Only a united regional effort can expel the "crusader". If Bush is concerned about his legacy, he should keep this in mind: he will be remembered as the western crusader who re-united the disparate peoples who make up the region. He will have united "enemies" against us. He will have given them common cause to wage Jihad. Like Reagan who blinked at Rekjavik, Bush will have made the world a very, very, dangerous place, indeed'

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Spread the word:

BBC: The World Rejects Bush's Policies

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

For a brief time following the events of 911 the United States enjoyed widespread support throughout the world. It took a George W. Bush to squander all that goodwill. It is not surprising that along with a Congressional majority and over 90 percent approval rating, the policies of George W. Bush are now almost universally reviled. A new world wide poll by the BBC suggests that US policies are almost universally rejected, denounced by majorities as high as two-thirds or more on most issues and much higher on still others.

Bush may have enjoyed a longer honeymoon with the rest of the world had he not insisted upon waging a war of aggression against Iraq, a nation having nothing whatsoever to do with 911, a nation about which Bush lied repeatedly in order to wage his war. Bush's numbers have gone down as the war rages on and on without end and, increasingly without hope. The numbers prove that the world now views the US, under Bush, as a rogue nation.

Getting reviews as bad as those for the Iraq war is the the issue of global warming. On this issue, often denied and derided be the GOP, Bush is proven as wrong, armed, and dangerous as he was on Iraq. Bush is now escalating his failed war on Iraq but failure on global warming carries with it even more catastrophic results.

Everyone can be wrong once in a while. And almost everyone is wrong from time to time with regard to issues less critical to the very survival of the planet. It takes a particularly evil genius to be so consistently wrong about almost everything and with such dire consequences.

Ironically and tragically, it is the magnitude of Bush's crimes that afford him a measure of invincibility. Those who are merely and routinely wrong about mundane issues are promptly sacked. Those, like Bush, who are monumentally wrong, are often promoted by a small and still powerful cabal who fear drowning in the wake of a sinking Titanic. Clinging tenaciously to power, this class of conscienceless courtiers will prop Bush up until all are swept away in the inevitable political Tsunami.

Such a political apocalypse was described by the great British screenwriter Sir Robert Bolt, whose script for A Man for All Seasons portrayed a frightened nobility in danger of being swamped in Wolsey's wake. As the execution of Sir Thomas More proved: there is rarely a convenient escape for fence-sitters. As in a play by Ibsen, Shakespeare, or, indeed, Bolt himself, Bush set into motion a tragic dialectic with the words: "You are either with us or you are for the terrorists".

On every issue, however, the world has rejected Bush and his divisive policies. Is Bush so stupid that he would suggest that some two thirds of the world's population are terrorists?

It is most certainly a mistake to divide up the world into black and white, good and evil. Yet that is what Bush has done. Though he would not compromise when pressed against the wall, Bolt's portrayal of Thomas More is that of a man who would have avoided the "either/or", a man who would have preferred the life of the common man to that of the existential hero.

More: God made the angels to show Him splendor, as He made animals for innocence and plants for their simplicity. But Man He made to serve Him wittily, in the tangle of his mind. If He suffers us to come to such a case that there is no escaping, then we may stand to our tackle as best we can, and, yes, Meg, then we can clamor like champions, if we have the spittle for it. But it's God's part, not our own, to bring ourselves to such a pass. Our natural business lies in escaping.

-A Man for All Seasons, Screenplay by Robert Bolt

---

"This would be a whole lot easier if this was a dictatorship…just as long as I’m the dictator!" —George W. Bush

As the world is distracted with wars and rumors of wars yet to come, Bush, who peddles those wars while exploiting the very fear of war, works quietly behind the scenes to consolidate his dictatorship.

The following video of Sen. Diane Feinstein on the floor of the U.S. Senate blows the whistle on yet another Bushco power grab -the latest chapter in Bush's Hitler-like attack on the independence of the American judiciary.

Watch this video and tremble -fear for the future of Democracy, Due Process of Law, freedom itself:

When the end nears, depend on Bush to defy the Supreme Court of the United States in a critical case, a divisive case in which the stakes are very high. As Bush said of his jihad against a mythic "Axis of Evil", this case is of the form either/or. It will make or break his would-be dictatorship in a scenario best left to the game Risk. Bush is willing to wager the farm that his weak-kneed opposition will make the wrong choice.

The American people, the Congress and the courts must prove him wrong -just as he has been wrong about everything else. The American republic is in play in a cynical Bush/GOP game.

The stakes are very high. If Bush wins, the people lose. America will no longer have the legal recourse of removal; impeachment will be a dead issue. If impeached, Bush will not leave the office. Having subverted every protection afforded the people by our founders, Bush and company seem determined to leave us no choice but slavery under a dictatorship or a popular uprising. Bush will leave us no choice but revolution. It's his modus operandi.

…whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the
Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.

—Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence

Nixon was called an “imperial President”. Interestingly, the articles of impeachment against Richard Nixon were concerned with his abuse of the IRS, obstruction of justice in connection with the Watergate Scandal, and his various abuses of agencies to include the CIA.

When the final us v them showdown occurs, I wonder: will the Congress stand up for the restoration of the U.S. Constitution, American Democracy, Due Process of Law?

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How Bush Aided Al Qaeda and How the Democrats Can End the War

Bush antes up the lives of US soldiers to play out the two deuces he holds. Cynically sacrificing American lives, a treasonous and illegitimate "President" hopes to salvage his legacy -a legacy not worth salvaging at any price on any bet with any hand. Legally, the illegitimate "President" who lied the nation into the commission of an ongoing war crime compounds his venal crimes and ventures once again into high treason.

Why did Bush lose the war in its very planning, inception, and execution? Greed? Arrogance? Idiocy? Vainglorious visions of conquest and dictatorship? At this point -who cares? We must all work together to bring this miscreant and liar to justice in the Senate and, later, in the international court.

The record is clear when seen outside the prism of mass media -especially Fox and all the lying minions who toil there. The facts are these:

• The Iraq war is lost. Iraq itself may be a lost cause. Bush broke it irreparably.
  
• Iraq has become a virtual automated recruiting machine for Al Qaeda in those places where it actually exists. Moreover, Al Qaeda is now joined by numerous other groups who are similarly inspired by Bush's ongoing crimes. Bin Laden's number one ally is Bush's hamfisted conduct of middle east policy. The failed war in Iraq is only the most publicized aspect of it. Bin Laden -literally a creation of the CIA -has been made a gift of Iraq by Bush. Bin Laden and his wannabes alone have benefited from this most tragic war, this most tragic failure in American history.
• There may nothing left Bush now but to bow and deign to talk to the villified Al Qaeda.

When the surge fails (and it will) Iran wil fill the vacuum having grown stronger as a result of Bush's counter-productive campaign of villification. As expected Iran has already formed an alliance with the Shias of Iraq -an outcome sure to alienate Bush's Sunni allies in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere.

If Bush's goal was the usurpation of Iraqi oil, it is hard to see how he might deliver those resources to his cabal of oil barons when both Sunnis and Shias oppose him and his evil campaign to make the Middle East safe for the theft of oil -not Democracy.

Some 70 percent of all Americans oppose the surge. Democrats, therefore, must seize the moral high ground by cutting off funding for additional troops and additional campaigns. Democrats -it has been suggested -can tax our way out of the war with a "Victory Over Terror" tax levied on incomes of $5 million a year or more. Levied on all income, it would include stock options, jet plane rides, company-paid-for health and life insurance, retirement programs, golden parachutes, the use of apartments in Paris, cars and drivers.

The GOP will hate it and, therefore, it must be good. Those targeted have enjoyed the big GOP tax cuts since the days of Ronald Reagan who made them feel good about being greedy. This group has never been expected to sacrifice in times of war; rather, they have been enriched by it repeatedly. It's time to put a stop to it. Power to the people'

To close, the following is the video referred to by Sadbuttrue in the comments to this article:

The Existentialist Cowboy
Saddam Hussein, Imperialism
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Bush's Last Gasp Amid a Lost War

A strong voice has emerged that lays bare the fraud and incompetence behind Bush's Iraq strategy from the bombing campaign to the surge -a last desparate grasp for illusory "victory". The voice is that of Rory Stewart of Britain's Foreign Office. He brings to the table his experiences in Afghanistan and in Iraq as a Deputy Governor.

Stewart declares flatly that the Bush/Blair war on Iraq is already lost, there are no good options left Bush. A civil war has been underway for some time now. That opinion, of course, is also that of this blog and has been since its inception. Stewart made his case on BBC's Hardtalk where he was cross-examined by Steven Sackur. Stewart says of the surge that it will "...only kill a lot of people" (See: All the King's Men Sign a Death Warrant on American GIs) It is a failed strategy. Citing experiences in Fallujah and elsewhere, he says that Bush's proposal is doomed to fail.

"I see no reason to believe that this will not be the case again," Stewart says. He is correct to point out that so-called insurgents have always been unaffected by surges. Insurgents always return to an area when coalition forces pull out.

It is not only the sectarian nature of the conflict but Bush's inability to define victory that makes winning impossible. Certainly it has been noticed that when Bush administration officials used to talk of victory now they talk only of security. Even when expectations are thus scaled down, the Bush administration is mute on how security is achieved when warring sects comprise the government itself. As this blog asked long ago: when civil war breaks out in Iraq, which side will Bush be on?

Ideological slogans marked the run up to war. Tragically, no slogan defined success but all them may have been designed to make GOP ideologues feel good about supporting a war of aggression and the ongoing war crime in the wake of attack and invasion.

Stewart comes to the point. Stated US goals, he says, are not achievable. Indeed, it may be too late for the US to shape Iraq's future in any way whatsoever. The surge which we now know will involve some 21,000 additional troops is called a "grave mistake." Underscoring the point, Stewart states: "What we can do, we have done." I wonder if Stewart might also have been thinking about how the irreparable harm that has been done might be undone. That, of course, is impossible. The enemy is hard to identify. Conventional forces cannot just go in, Stewart says, and have any effect.

Sunnis and Shias have at least this much in common. Both want the Americans out! Both sects have other things in common but we may never know about them. According to Stewart, Britain actually stopped talks between the warring factions. Why would the coalition fear the possibility of peace breaking out in the war zone? When something might have developed, nothing was. Stewart concludes: "Getting rid of Saddam is pretty much all that we have accomplished." It is my opinion that even that is tarnished by the ludicrous nature of the kangaroo court that tried Saddam and, of course, the farcical and cruel nature of the lynching that followed. It is hard to imagine that Bush would have wanted to make of Saddam a martyr.

Bush claims that pulling out now would result in disaster. Stewart, however, sees a phased withdrawal as Iraq's only hope at this point. BBC's Stephen Sackur pressed the issue, asking if such a pullout would result in a terrible civil war. Stewart's answer: "There is a terrible civil war now."

Indeed, some 3,000 Iraqis die every month. Stewart asks: "What is achieved by staying another year, three years, or six years?" That question may have been answered by Edwin Starr at the height of American involvement in Viet Nam. War! What is it good for? Absolutely Nuthin'.

At last, the opinion of the world has turned against the Bush/Blair conspiracy to occupy Iraq.

Agree with many of your points written above, but no-one 'dragged' this country into the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Yes, Blair acquiesced to US foreign policy, but the invasion was also supported and voted for by a huge majority of our MP's.

The choice to invade and occupy Iraq was made by the elected representatives of Britain. No-one else is to blame for this idiocy - it's Blair and our MP's.

Still, every cloud has a silver lining . . . I hope to see Blair eventually prosecuted by an energised International Criminal Court. Subsequently, I look forward to the day when I, and other British taxpayers are forced to pay reparations to Iraqis for the horrendous consequences of this immoral and illegal act.

-Comments, Defiance and Delusion, The Guardian

The Existentialist Cowboy

Saddam Hussein, Imperialism
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