Why the IWR vote is still relevant

[cali]

There are so many reasons, but here is one very tragic and topical one;

The refugee crisis is a direct result of handing bushco a blank check to go to war.

If you voted for the IWR, you share in the responsibility of this horrific tragedy. You cannot, in good faith, argue that the iraq war is not the proximate cause of the refugee crisis.

The ramifications of that vote will keep rolling in for years.


http://www.aljazeera.com/blogs/middleeast/2015/09/iraq-war-root-europe-refugee-crisis-150908151855527.html

[Gman]

1. Not years, decades

[cali]

2. you're right. I almost wrote decades, but it just horrifies me to

think in those terms

[Gman]

3. The Iraq invasion upset a balance that had been in place

For 100 years. It will not soon sort itself out.

[bvar22]

13. How about "changed forever", and not for the better.

There is no way to replace the Million or so innocent people that were killed by our irresponsible politicians.
I believe that there were 5 Million innocent people displaced by the US Warmongers.
Most of them will never return.

Irreplaceable works of ancient art from the "Cradle of Civilization" were destroyed or stolen.
They will NEVER be replaced.

When one country gets destroyed by a Superpower from the other side of the globe for NO REASON,
the neighboring countries become more radicalized and militant, especially if any had children, parents, or friends killed in Iraq.

The Middle East will never be the same again.
We took out the two most liberal Islamic countries in the Middle East. Iraq was actually non-sectarian,
with Shia, Sunni, and Christians living peacefully side by side.
Saddam hunted down and outright killed radical extremists, like Al Qaeda.

Libya had the highest standard of living in North Africa and most of the rest of the Middle East,
some privileges for women and more in the pipeline before we "took him out".
Now, Libya has Sharia Law and radical, militarized Muslims running the show.

No. It will never be the same.
The more we fuck around killing people that live in the ME,
the worse it will become.

In reality, this has become another "Western Crusade" of killing Muslims and stealing their wealth.
Another thing that will NEVER be the same is the USA.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

4. But, now, it's evolved into a "mistake". A faux pas. A mere bagatelle.

It's like what Stalin said, "One mans death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic."

Forget the wars. Forget the deaths. Forget the torture. Forget the collaboration with the Republicans. Forget the collaboration with the corporations. Forget the pursuit of whistle blowers. Forget the poor. Forget the persecuted. Forget the police state.

Again, we are told to be patient. That the other side is worse.

Again, we are told to shut up and vote for the candidate who can win and ignore their record.

And, again, we are told that "this time it will be different."

[brooklynite]

5. Disagree...

The Syrian conflict did not derive from instability in Iraq; it was actually quiet peaceful when I visited five years ago. It derived from protests inspired by the Arab Spring (Egypt in particular) which as I recall was a big hit around here.

[JI7]

12. i know people from there and i think about 5 years ago

was the last time they visited also. They use to go more often.

[oberliner]

6. "Had the Iraq war not happened, then Saddam Hussein would have been contained as he was."

Moral: Let brutal dictators brutalize their own people and don't get involved.

Is that the takeaway here?

[jeff47]

7. Do you like the alternative that has arisen in his place?

Saddam was awful. ISIS is worse. Iraq splitting into three countries is going to create a lot more violence, instability and refugees in the area. There will be civil war in Turkey due to the newly-founded Kurdistan, for example.

What should we have done? Fuck if I know. The British and French really fucked up the Middle East at the end of WWI. The only way the borders they drew were sustainable was rule via strongmen.

That collapsing was always going to be violent, destructive and extremely painful to enormous numbers of people. But we didn't have to be the ones to light the fuse in order to satisfy the dreams of delusional morons.

[oberliner]

17. No

It's just a sad state of affairs when violent dictators are pretty much free to be violent dictators without consequence as long as they can keep the people from rising up (brutally, if necessary).

This is not meant as an argument for interventionism - just a reflection of a very sad state of affairs in the world.

[rhett o rick]

9. That's got to be a logical fallacy or three. First of all we need to establish that trying to

intervene to help people perceived being brutalized by their government is a good thing. Most often, as in Iraq, our "intervention" is for selfish reasons and it's not in the best interest to intervene. Our history of successfully intervening is dismal.
Second, we put a lot of brutal dictators in place, like Hussein, and even gave them weapons to brutalize their people.

The disaster in Iraq did not come from killing Hussein, but from our destruction of their government, police, army, and physical infrastructures.

I believe that Iraq would have been much better off, if we hadn't invaded. We did far more damage than Hussein would ever have.

Are you trying to rationalize the invasion?

[oberliner]

18. As I wrote above, I am not suggesting any rationalization for the invasion

I am just reflecting on what a sad state of affairs the world is in when brutal dictators are essentially free to be brutal dictators without consequence as long as they are brutal enough.

North Korea is another sorrowful example of this.

[rhett o rick]

23. So do you agree that the IWR vote is still important? nm

[oberliner]

24. Absolutely

Though I do give HRC credit for acknowledging her mistake.

Aside from the politics of it all, though, I just find the international situation in general to be so depressing.

I mean, there are currently dictators ruling countries that most Americans haven't even heard of and behaving with shocking levels of brutality, and no one much cares.

Gambia being one of the more prominent and tragic examples.

[rhett o rick]

25. She gets zero credit for her lousy "I wish I could have the vote back."

She needs to apologize to many people. It wasn't just a mistake, it was a disaster. She still won't say that Bush didn't keep us safe.

[oberliner]

27. At least she acknowledges her error in judgment

She can't undo the past, but I can certainly understand why some folks might not vote for her for the reasons you mention.

[Fumesucker]

10. Saudi Arabia isn't a brutal dictatorship?

Or are some brutal dictatorships more equal than others?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raif_Badawi

On January 9, 2015, Badawi was flogged 50 times before hundreds of spectators in front of a Jeddah mosque, the first in a series of 1,000 lashes to be carried out in over twenty weeks.[3] The incident was condemned by Amnesty International's Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa, Said Boumedouha who said, "The flogging of Raif Badawi is a vicious act of cruelty which is prohibited under international law. By ignoring international calls to cancel the flogging, Saudi Arabia’s authorities have demonstrated an abhorrent disregard for the most basic human rights principles."[36] Philip Luther, also of Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa section, said: "It is horrifying to think that such a vicious and cruel punishment should be imposed on someone who is guilty of nothing more than daring to create a public forum for discussion and peacefully exercising the right to freedom of expression."

[oberliner]

19. It absolutely is

And there are countless others.

And the US chooses to be friends with some and works to overthrow others.

What is unfortunate is that essentially the most brutal of dictators are able to get away with their behavior without consequences unless their actions intersect with some other international political consideration (like oil reserves).

[restorefreedom]

11. false choice

many brutal dictators exist around the world, and very few people other than the neocons would suggest that we get involved in all of those conflicts. In fact even the neocons wouldn't in countries where there was no oil to be snatched up.

The Takeaway is that we don't wage a war and invade a sovereign country when we haven't been attacked. Most people agree that Afghanistan was justified, although I did not agree that invading and occupying a country that even the Soviets couldn't handle was the best way to get bin laden. But the Iraq war was a war of choice, it was dicks war for oil. The first conflict was a multination effort to stop a dictator that had invaded another country. There was a lot of support for it. Iraq 2 was all for Dick Cheney and had no justification.

[oberliner]

20. I agree

I am just bemoaning the tragedy of it all.

[restorefreedom]

22. it sucks to see stuff like this happen

and not be able to do anything about it

[PowerToThePeople]

14. ^ This makes DU suck.

[oberliner]

21. What does?

I don't know what that means.

[JI7]

8. the drought was a big reason for it

Same happens with Somalia

[reddread]

15. MULTI TRILLION DOLLAR REPARATIONS

mark my word.

[DrBulldog]

16. Yes, after 13 years, we are ALL (us and Europe!) still cleaning up George W. Bush's horrible mess.

And that man is still walking around free! As Bernie says, the United States has become a nation of injustice. W should have been locked up for life by now.

[rhett o rick]

26. Yes and we have someone that was by his side when the decision was made, someone that agreed with

his goal to kill hundreds of thousands of innocent people, and enrichen the 1%. Someone that helped promulgate the lies and she is running as a Democrat for the presidency. What audacity.