A look in the mirror for America

[Mass]

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/07/08/a_look_in_the_mirror_for_america/

A look in the mirror for America

By Derrick Z. Jackson | July 8, 2005

IN HIS INITIAL reaction yesterday to the London transit bombings, President Bush decried ''people killing innocent people." He said: ''The contrast couldn't be clearer between the intentions and the hearts of those of us who care deeply about human rights and human liberty and those who kill -- those who have got such evil in their heart that they will take the lives of innocent folks."
...


The United States waged its own war of propaganda by refusing to conduct a legitimate, authoritative, honest accounting of the deaths of innocent civilians. As it urged people to change the channel, the Bush administration cut off all channels to finding out what we did to women, men, and children who were shopping, working, or leaving their mosques. In an invasion based on falsehoods, the truth of the civilian carnage might have been too hard for Americans to take, and support for the war might have ended in the first few weeks.

The propaganda of an invasion with invisible innocents surely allowed Bush to seamlessly switch his stated reason from the unique horrors of WMD to liberating an oppressed people. It is a lot easier to tell the world you are their great liberator if you do not have to own up to the thousands of dead people who will never get the chance to vote in that free election. It sounds a little bit like people who say African-Americans should be thankful for slavery because they are no longer in Africa.

Worse, this denial of death, in a war that did not have to happen, is sure to fuel the very terrorism we say we will defeat. The innocents in the so-called war on terror are always ''our" citizens or the citizens of our allies. The only innocent Iraqis are those killed by ''insurgents." Our soldiers clearly did not intend to kill innocents. But this posturing of America as the great innocent, when everyone knows we kill innocents ourselves, is likely only to make us look more like the devil in the eyes of a suicide bomber.

Derrick Z. Jackson's e-mail address is [e-mail].

[BeyondGeography]

1. "We don't do body counts" of Iraqi deaths

Per Tommy Franks.

Jackson hits the nail on the head here. I had the same reaction to Bush's lament over the loss of innocent lives. We know he doesn't read the papers, but it would be good for all of us if, just once, he evinced the slightest bit of awareness over the impact of our presence in Iraq.

Thanks to us, the most dangerous occupation outside of the military and police is being a barber in Baghdad. Barbershops get blown up all the time by religious zealots who view Western-hairstyles and the shaving of beards as an act of heresy. Four-year-old kids getting a haircut didn't get blown to bits before we got to Baghdad. This is a tragedy of our own making.

[cyberpj]

2. “Change the channel”

- Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt's advice to Iraqis who see TV images of innocent civilians killed by coalition troops.

[OneBlueSky]

3. and then there was Barbara Bush's comment about . . .

not wanting to pollute her "beautiful mind" with thoughts of death and body bags and such . . . the nut certainly didn't fall far from this particular tree . . .