I know everyone is gearing up to enjoy the Thanksgiving feast and I don’t want to be a downer, but things are still kind of stinky over in Iraq. I think a good portion of the right-wing thinks the following is a good sign because their goal is to kill Muslims and they’re happy when Muslims do their job for them. I’d just like to note that that is a less than noble attitude.
More than 140 bodies have been found dumped across Baghdad over the past three days, police said Wednesday.
Police said 52 bullet-riddled bodies were found Wednesday, with 20 of them blindfolded, tied up and possibly tortured.
Police also discovered 29 bodies on Tuesday and 60 on Monday.
The dead are thought to be victims of Sunni-Shiite sectarian revenge killings.
That word came as the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq issued a grim bimonthly human rights report that underscored the instability and death resulting from sectarian violence.
The report said 7,054 civilians were killed violently in September and October in Iraq, with almost 5,000 in Baghdad alone — most of them shot to death and showing signs of torture.
November’s death toll continued to rise Wednesday as gunmen in Baghdad shot and killed a bodyguard of Iraq’s parliament speaker and a journalist for a state newspaper.
I know that America no longer has any moral objection to torture, and I know that inserting our armed forces into Iraq is what caused this mess in the first place, but I would like to register my misgivings about the wisdom of our political leaders, who I am coming to suspect are not as smart as they think they are.
For example, the President told us this:
Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. This regime has already used weapons of mass destruction against Iraq’s neighbors and against Iraq’s people.
The regime has a history of reckless aggression in the Middle East. It has a deep hatred of America and our friends and it has aided, trained and harbored terrorists, including operatives of al-Qaida.
The danger is clear: Using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfill their stated ambitions and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country or any other.
The United States and other nations did nothing to deserve or invite this threat, but we will do everything to defeat it. Instead of drifting along toward tragedy, we will set a course toward safety.
Before the day of horror can come, before it is too late to act, this danger will be removed.
See, in retrospect, that part of Bush’s explanation for invading Iraq just isn’t wearing very well. As for this next part, you’d have to ask a living Iraqi how they feel about it.
Many Iraqis can hear me tonight in a translated radio broadcast, and I have a message for them: If we must begin a military campaign, it will be directed against the lawless men who rule your country and not against you.
As our coalition takes away their power, we will deliver the food and medicine you need.
We will tear down the apparatus of terror and we will help you to build a new Iraq that is prosperous and free.
In free Iraq there will be no more wars of aggression against your neighbors, no more poison factories, no more executions of dissidents, no more torture chambers and rape rooms.
The tyrant will soon be gone. The day of your liberation is near.
I’m not a betting man (actually, that’s not true) but I’d take a wager that few Iraqis are seeing those promises come true. I know they aren’t getting the food, water, electricity, or medicine they need, there are still rape rooms, and constant terror, and prosperity and freedom are nowhere to be found.
But since this is Thanksgiving and we’re supposed to find something to be thankful about, I guess we can be happy that the war has only cost us $344,443,035,399 so far.
I do want to extend a Thanksgiving greeting to our troops over there and in our various medical and rehabilitation facilities across the world. I know you guys and gals didn’t ask for this. We are trying to get you out and get you home. I hope you have a good day tomorrow. Happy Thanksgiving.
