I'm still working on a post about Bush's speech yesterday. I want to get my points right, as I think everybody is underestimating what may be a telling event in the evolution of America's agenda. Until then, check out this latest article by Harry Browne:
Over and over, George Bush told us that Saddam Hussein was lying, that he was dragging his feet, that Iraq had dangerous weapons, that Hussein was a threat to the whole world...
Now here we are, over two years later. What have we learned?
- The hunt for Weapons of Mass Destruction has turned up exactly nothing, and so the hunt has been called off.
- Everything Hussein said about the weapons has turned out to be true.
- Everything George Bush said about Iraq's weapons has turned out to be false.
The Bush administration is trying to sugar-coat the above conclusions by saying that the recently concluded weapons hunt by Charles Duelfer and the CIA's Iraq Survey Group (ISG) discovered an "intent" by Hussein to renew his WMD programs if the U.S. would only stay out of Iraq. However, Duelfer has provided absolutely no hard evidence of such an "intent." Once again we're getting firm assertions backed up by nothing.
Sure, I'll get some email from Republicans talking about how Harry Browne is a traitor. I'll get some backpedalling from them on what exactly the war was all about. I'll get some rousing speech about America's moral perogative (God help me if an Objectivist reads this).And more than anything I'll probably get called names for even suggesting that Hussein was right and Bush was wrong. Ooh, I'm siding with the terrorists, with the forces of evil.
What I won't get is a valid disproof of any of the above points.
And so anything the Right tries to throw at this argument cannot stick. A proud, noble country - y'know, the one that bush claims to represent - would be humiliated and ashamed by being so utterly mistaken, not to mention disgusted with being a liar where a thuggish dictator was correct.
I'll get back to that post on the Inauguration speech, because an important point in Bush's deception and aggression towards the world is that we are morally superior. Left alone, this attitude will ultimately destroy this country. Or as Browne says:
It's a sorry state of affairs in America when you can trust the words of Saddam Hussein more than those of your own President.
UPDATE: Arthur at The Light of Reason (one of my absolute favorite bloggers of all time) pretty much said what I wanted to say about Bush thinking he is God.
The only thing I would add is that freedom is something that comes from within; it cannot be imposed from without. The Iraqi people will be free when they finally cast off their petty tribal disputes and differences, see one another as (at least potentially) equals, and figure out that life is not a zero sum game. Unfortunately, this is precisely the mindset that is provoking our occupation. Wow, what a fucked up place, huh?
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