Reply #207: Who said any Iraqi should miss Saddam?

[Jack Rabbit]

No Iraqi should miss Saddam. Enough said about that.

No Iraqi should miss the Bushies once they're gone, either. Iraq was not invaded with the interests of the Iraqi people in mind. It made for good rhetoric, but such claims just more neoconservative lies. Iraq was invaded to fatten Halliburton's bank account and, indirectly, Dick Cheney's retirement fund.

The fact is that the Iraqi people could run Iraq in their interests better than the Bushies are running it in the interests of transnational corporations. The fact is that the Left knew that and said so. After months of occupation, unemployment is still high, street crime is still rampant and electrical power is still unreliable. All this while funds intended to assist Iraqis are diverted to grandiose projects like converting Saddam's old palace into an American embassy with all the imperial trappings.

The fact is that the 138,000 or so US troops are on occupation duty in a country where 80% of the population thinks things would improve if they leave. They are being killed by Iraqi nationalists instead of finding Osama and his lieutenants.

Do you want to talk about priorities of interests over being righteous? Fine. That's the very point that is made when one says that invading Iraq at this time was not in our best interests because those resources could have been better used on more important matters. Even if the occupation of Iraq were a success story like the Marshall Plan, there would still be that problem.

By invading Iraq, the real problem of terrorism was neglected and, as a result, al Qaida was able to regroup and stage attacks in Turkey, Spain and Arabia. The real problem was not addressed and, like a festering sore, became infected.

The Left said prior to the war that ousting Saddam would be the only thing remotely resembling a benefit to the neoconservative project in Iraq. The Left said that any benefit to the Iraqi people to ousting Saddam would be cancelled by corporate greed and official corruption. The Left said that the reconstruction of Iraq would resemble colonialism, not the Marshall Plan. The Left said that the problem of terrorism would get worse as a result of invading Iraq.

And that is exactly what has happened.

The Left was right, Mr. Along. Deal with it.