Crumbling Walls

Originally published on January 29th, 2003.

The Republican Party will not survive its invasion of Iraq, its commitment to open borders and its pandering to preferred minorities.

An invasion of Iraq is likely the most thoughtless action in modern history. It has the support of only two overlapping small groups: neoconservatives infused with the spirit of 18th century French Jacobins who want to impose American “exceptionalism” on the rest of the world, and foreign policy advisers who believe that the primary aim of U.S. foreign policy is to make the Middle East safe for Israel.

No one else sees the point of the pending conflict. Abroad, there is no meaningful support. Nuclear powers Russia and China are in opposition, as are NATO allies Germany and France. The Bush administration is reduced to boasting of support from Hungary and Poland.

What is the invasion all about? The administration’s answer strains credulity: Iraq has weapons of mass destruction that threaten the United States. These weapons are yet to be discovered by the UN inspectors who are combing the country. The paucity of evidence caused the Bush administration to declare a few empty artillery shells found in a bombed-out bunker to be the evidence necessary to launch an invasion.

The back-up excuse is that Saddam Hussein is a bad man. No doubt he is a brute, but any secular ruler, who has to sit on three separate groups (Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds) ready to split Iraq apart, is likely to resort to harsh measures.

With or without casualties, U.S. military forces can overthrow Saddam Hussein. But what comes next? What government takes over? How does that government remain in power? How do we get out?

George W. Bush and his gang of neocon warmongers have destroyed America’s reputation. It is likely to stay destroyed, because at this point the only way to restore America’s reputation would be to impeach and convict President Bush for intentionally deceiving Congress and the American people in order to start a war of aggression against a country that posed no threat to the United States.

America can redeem itself only by holding Bush accountable.

Bush’s lies have caused the deaths of tens of thousands of people, injured and maimed tens of thousands more, devastated a country, destroyed America’s reputation, caused 1 billion Muslims to hate America, ruined our alliances with Europe, created a police state at home, and squandered $300 billion dollars and counting.

America’s reputation is so damaged that not even our puppets can stand the heat. Anti-American riots, which have left Afghan cities and towns in flames and hospitals overflowing with casualties, have forced Bush’s Afghan puppet, “President” Hamid Karzai, to assert his independence from his U.S. overlords. In a belated act of sovereignty, Karzai asserted authority over heavy-handed U.S. troops whose brutal and stupid ways sparked the devastating riots. Karzai demanded control of U.S. military activities in Afghanistan and called for the return of the Afghan detainees who are being held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.