Right wing Republican extremists sometimes open their mouths and say the funniest things. This satirical piece about Congressman Tim Walberg (R-MI) was posted at KABOBFest on Friday, March 23, 2007.
Whitest Man in America Compares Detroit to Iraq
Congressman Tim Walberg (R-MI), perhaps the whitest person I’ve ever seen, is taking heat for comparing Iraq and Detroit on a Michigan radio station. The Republican congressman representing rural southern Michigan said that most of Iraq “is reasonably under control, at least as well as Detroit.”
Spokespeople from the city were naturally outraged. They rejected the insinuation that Detroit is a war zone — a misconception that has plagued the city since Robocop and other films (and crime data) cast the city as a center of violence.
For nervous white men with sticks up their colonial pasts, governing and “controlling” wild Negroes and Ay-Rabs has always been a source of anxiety. Whiteberg… I mean Walberg, is actually hitting two Michigan Republican talking points with one swift sound-bite: Iraq, the mess created by America, is actually not that bad (for a war zone); but Detroit, which is governed by ungovernable African-Americans, is a relative mess.
What he ignores is the real connection between the two places: both suffer from the profiteering and self-serving abuse of rich white men in suits. Detroit is a disaster created by an overly powerful, and publicly-destructive auto industry in bed with government; Iraq is the outcome of an an overly powerful, and publicly-destructive oil industry in bed with government.
The Detroit Free Press, once a great paper and now a bad tabloid, set about filling in part of the essential statistical context. Thanks Freep, let the readers decide:
There have been 3,223 U.S. military deaths in Iraq since the war began in 2003, and more than 10,000 Iraqi civilian and security forces killed since January 2006, according to the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count. About 1,576 people died as a result of homicide or nonnegligent manslaughter in Detroit since the beginning of 2003.
Apparently, no Iraqis have been killed.
http://kabobfest.blogspot.com/index.html
Permission from Will at KABOBFest. Thanks Will.
