A Government out of Control

2002-10-02

We are faced here with a government, ours, that is out of any rational control, that is pursuing the most insane and blindsided of policies which can only have the most negative, reactionary results for the people of all the countries involved, the West Bank and Israel included. This is a government, ours, that produces "bunker-buster" missiles as part of its new arsenal, touting them as newly useful against underground or "hardened" targets, a weapon which blurs the distinction between nuclear and conventional war, eroding the historic taboo against nuclear warfare.

This is a government, ours, that talks about the easy tactic of "taking out" Baghdad as cavalierly as if the spokesman were talking about a little computer game, a government that can commend itself for the brilliance of its military achievement in blasting creatures huddling in caves. This is a government, ours, that makes no secret of its intention to use any and all the means of violence at its command, to show "our resolve", to establish our "credibility." This is a government, ours, that has shown a brazen contempt -- purposeful -- for the basic historic principles of law and world order than an earlier generation had presumably fought for in the second world war.

This is a government, ours, that has manipulated the grief and rage of its population after 2001/9/11 -- also massively enlisting the media for its purposes -- to use as a justification to launch an illegal war of aggression which Nelson Mandela called the beginning of global anarchy. This is a new Barbarism. The US now in spite of itself has been forced to first go to the United Nations for its "consent." But who can doubt that it will in the end get that "consent" by the use of its traditional manipulations, bribes and other non-public mechanisms it has always used for its purposes.

To support an invasion after the US achieves the "consent" of the UN and of our (mostly) craven Congress is terribly wrong. It is for the Iraqi people alone to work to remove their dictator, which can only happen if the country is allowed to return to a normal economic state of health which would allow for the expansion of political possibilities and political perspectives -- something the US is not interested in doing. Iraqi lives are cheap to the Rumsfeld-Bush-Cheney junta. All they care about is the projection of their power.

The US/UK claims of the terrible threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of the Iraqi dictator ring hollow when looked at by serious government and non-government technical critics and also the fact of these same WsMD in the hands of other totalitarian dictators in the world, some of whom are US client states. I guess I could go on for reams about the fatuous arguments put forward by our government. But my reasons for saying one should oppose the whole enterprise is basically that of outrage. People of conscience should oppose this barbaric policy.