THE BLOOD ON GEORGE BUSH'S HANDS

[babylonsister]

http://www.niagarafallsreporter.com/gallagher332.html

THE BLOOD ON GEORGE BUSH'S HANDS
By Bill Gallagher

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Bush and his supporters always ignore or play down the bloody cost of this brutal war for the Iraqi people. Their suffering is an afterthought. "We don't do body counts," Gen. Tommy "The Jerk" Franks famously said after he conquered Baghdad and went home to smoke cigars and play golf.

But others are counting, and the numbers are staggering. A British polling organization now pegs Iraqi civilian deaths in more than four years of war at 1.2 million people. The ORB poll surveyed Iraqi adults and determined nearly one in two households in Baghdad had lost at least one family member to war-related violence, and nationwide 22 percent of the households had suffered at least one death. Do we really expect "political stability" when people are enduring such promiscuous violence?

Last year, when the British medical journal "Lancet" put the number of Iraqi deaths at 654,965, Iraqi officials called the count "ridiculous" and Bush dismissed the number as "not credible" without challenging the methodology of the scientists who prepared the survey for the reputable publication.

In his speech, Bush made no mention of the more than 2.5 million Iraqi refugees who have fled their homes. That number continues to grow, especially among professionals and the more educated. Bush never mentions his war has virtually eradicated the Christian population in Iraq, a faith community rooted there two thousand years ago.

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The truth is we are not safer in any measurable way, spending $3 billion a week, wasting countless lives in a monumental historic debacle. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Mark Morford wrote, "Iraq is, was and forever will be our very own massive strategic blunder, a failed land grab for position and power in a tinderbox region defined by furious instability and corruption and death. ... Iraq has always been a war between our dueling national identities, a battle over how we are to move and breathe and behave in the new millennium. Are we really this violently paranoid bully, this rogue pre-emptive screw-em-all ideological war machine defined by the dystopian Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld vision of permanent, ongoing global conflict?"

Or are we something better: a nation committed to peace, willing to change the failed strategy in Iraq by ending the war that should never have been started in the first place.

[OwnedByFerrets]

1. K & R

I dont care whether we are safer or not, it wasnt worth the cost in life lost.

[lazer47]

2. For the same amount of money we could have bougnt off,

the insurgents and saved 3700 lives

[PDJane]

3. For the money,

you could have fed everyone, paid for the oil wells to get up and running, continued the state-run businesses as state run, and convinced the Iraqis of benevolent intent.

[fenriswolf]

4. dont forget

repairing americas failing infrastrucer including roads and spans( did we just see something about bridges falling down in the news) update our water system and put much needed funds into real research that would help the environment.

[3waygeek]

8. Not to mention universal health care n/t

[superkia]

5. Be careful not to acknowledge his enablers, it could be dangerous...

to our future. He was handed a loaded gun and ammo every time he asked for it. I know Kucinich is Mr 3% to everyone but he called it right in 2002 and voted no while saying that the war was about oil. Others sounded just like Bush and Cheney in their 2002 speechs. Why is it that peoples lives weren't that important to Bushs enablers back then, did they have a hand in the cookie jar? If we give a free pass to our folks and then empower them, we could be in for another rough ride. Everyone responsible should be held accountable so it doesn't happen again.

[truedelphi]

6. I think the K-man is our only hope

I still believe in Democratic politics because of the few: Barbara Boxer,
Maxine Waters, Barbara Lee, Lynn Woolsey.

And Dennis Kucinich.

It might take a miracle for him to get his party's nomination, but unless he does the
working class in this country is screwed for good. Also without Dennis as President: The middle class will continue its decline into oblivion. And the corporate mindset will engage its final victory of perpetual war, stolen lives and futures, no consumer oversight, rip off banking policies, further media consolidation, fear and greed as the predominating over-arching energies.

With image and slogans about women and minority rights, with image and slogans about health and safety and environment. But it will be only image and slogans, the reality will be the corruption and chaos of Big Industry/Military over everything.

[superkia]

7. I agree and fear whats to come. I dont think people will open...

there eyes and minds to what the man stands for and represents. When compared to the others, I don't see how anyone else is above him but the I am part of that working class. My guess is that the media did their job as instructed and ignored him. Out of sight, out of mind. But people will never accept they have been duped by the media, not me, I'm not one of the sheeple. :eyes: