Do you ever think about the million people America has murdered?

[Philosoraptor]

It really is staggering, a million Iraqis are now dead by OUR hand. I know, we had nothing to do with the actual murders, or is that a lie in itself? Are our hands bloody? Or are we not guilty by reason of apathy?

Have you ever grieved over someone's death? Have you ever known someone who lost a loved one to murder? Imagine that grief times a million. Is that much grief just too much to comprehend?

The neo cons murdered all those men, women and children, but they are our neo cons. They've spent billions, they've profited trillions, and they've killed a million people, right under our eyes, only we never even saw them. We seem blissfully unaware as a nation that one million people have died by our president's decree, one million souls, and millions more left behind to grieve.

The neo cons would have you believe that every single one of them was our enemy. They are even referred to as 'the enemy', 'our enemies', 'the terrorists', language used to de-humanize a whole group. 'Islamofascists' is a word that reduces millions of human beings to the sub-human level. Have you ever heard someone actually say that they'd like to see ALL Muslims dead? I have.

Do you ever think about those million people who are now gone forever by America's hand? Do you ever think about your taxes being used to murder a million people? Were they actually murdered, or were they just innocent by-standers in an unfortunate situation? Did America actually murder a million people? Could such a bizarre statement be based in fact?

What if those million people had names like Ralph Wilson, or Dave Mallory, or Norma Whitmeyer, or Roger Evans, or Mary Perelli? What if they were Christians instead of Muslims? What if they were Canadians instead of Iraqis? Are they any less human? Did they suffer any less? Do they matter less?

Do you ever think about the million people who were murdered by the great nation of America? Do you ever wonder how many more millions are yet to die horribly before someone finally says, fuck you neo cons, enough is enough?

[thunder rising]

1. 'Scuse me ... why do you think this board exists.

[MannyGoldstein]

2. Sadly, Those Who Back A Candidate That Voted For War Don't Seem To Think Much About It

It blows my mind - most Democrats in Congress voted against the war, yet some of us want to reward the people who voted forit. The most important vote in decades, an easy vote to get right, and they blew it.

[Philosoraptor]

3. Maybe a million is just too incomprehensible.

Maybe if it were just 3000 people, like on nine eleven.

[MannyGoldstein]

4. Stalin Said

"One death is a tragedy. One thousand deaths are a statistic."

I guess we've learned little since the 1930s.

[devilgrrl]

37. You've stated that you thought John McCain was honest - he voted yes - so what's your problem?

eom

[MannyGoldstein]

40. Honest - But Wrong

If he runs against a Dem that also voted yes, I'd have to think about the choice. Otherwise, it's a no-brainer.

[Zywiec]

5. Are you talking about the million dead from US Backed sanctions in the '90's?

Published on Monday, October 23, 2000 in the Hartford Courant
Iraqi Sanctions: Without Medicine And Supplies, The Children Die
by Matthew Hay Brown

-snip-

The U.N. embargo has devastated all of life in Iraq. But nowhere is the deprivation more evident than in the once-modern health care system, where sanctions deny doctors the medicine and equipment they need to save patients dying of the curable diseases burgeoning amid the wreckage of war. U.N. officials estimate more than 1 million Iraqis have died in the last decade as a direct result of the sanctions.

The embargo is harvesting children. Before the Persian Gulf War, when food was plentiful and clean water readily available, the greatest pediatric health problem in Iraq was obesity. Now, with widespread food shortages and contaminated drinking water, undernourished children are stalked by cholera and typhoid. UNICEF blames the sanctions for the deaths of more than 500,000 Iraqi children under 5 since 1991.

Officials in the United States, the strongest supporter of the sanctions, blame the suffering on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. They say Saddam can end the sanctions by allowing U.N. inspections to ensure Iraq is not developing nuclear, chemical or biological weapons

-snip-

I do not think Americans would accept this for their children," Jawad says. "What is the difference between a sick American child and a sick Iraqi child?"

Visitors entering the hospital must step over a crude graffito. "Down USA," someone has painted in sickly yellow across the flagstones of the courtyard.


http://www.commondreams.org/views/102300-103.htm

[Philosoraptor]

7. Hell, if you listed ALL those dead by America's hand....

I'm afraid to contemplate the number. Let's start with the original inhabitants.....

[Zywiec]

11. I was only responding to the OP about Iraq and a million dead

No one ever wants to talk about what happened before Bush and Cheney. I'm not talking about 200 years ago, how about 10 years ago??

While the US was living large in the '90's, we were responsible for a lot of death.

People have such a short memory. It was less than 10 years ago!!


"If we have to use force, it is because we are America! We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall, and we see further into the future."

~ Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright

[Philosoraptor]

13. It has always bugged me.

I'm one of these guys who sits around agonizing about trivialities, but I felt the same during the Clinton years, the first bush years, the reagan years, the Carter years, the Ford and the Nixon years, and the Johnson and Kennedy years, before that, I just liked cartoons.

Bosnia, Nicaragua, Panama, I hate America's murderous history.

[Zywiec]

14. So when you speak about Iraq, why don't you say 2 million?

One million dead Iraqis from 1991 - 2000 and one million dead Iraqis from 2001 - 2008. It's been non-stop for almost 20 years.

I usually assume people on this board knew of a president prior to Bush II, but sometimes I surprised that most think all evil in the world began in 2001.

[Philosoraptor]

15. Forgive me for not mentioning them, thanks for doing so.

[dbt]

6. I did the math before the war.

Using year 2000 census figures, 48 percent of the population of Iraq was age 18 or under. Assuming Equal Opportunity Munitions, that'd be 480,000 children who died at our hands. Musta been especially sweet for Cheney to taste that much young blood.

If an erection persists for more than four hours, call the White House.

[Philosoraptor]

9. 480,000 children.....480,000 children

[Enthusiast]

16. You are just the "blame America first crowd"

Sarcasm, only. We hear that refrain from the talking heads. It's just something they say to explain away legitimate concerns, and it is very effective.

[mmonk]

8. Everytime I hear "the culture of life".

[Philosoraptor]

10. Moloch demands blood....

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://www.shout.net/~bigred/Moloch.htm&h=297&w=399&sz=18&hl=en&start=3&tbnid=Ddjvek2EhtQo8M:&tbnh=92&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dmoloch%26gbv%3D2%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den

Moloch is an ancient god to which some of the Habiru made sacrifice. It is anthropomorphised (materialized, brought down into matter) in the image, left.


In those long-ago times, a man might have many children, through wives and concubines. To sacrifice one of the scores of his children to Moloch, that the harvest (economy) might be good, was not too much.


Rene Girard notes that those doing the sacrificing disguise from themselves what they are doing. "It is the god who supposedly demands the victims; he alone, in principle, who savors the smoke from the altars and requisitions the slaughtered flesh." <1>

[truth2power]

25. Thus...the line "the smell of America's God" from the poem

by Harold Pinter, former Poet Laureate.

God Bless America!
By HAROLD PINTER

Here they go again,
The Yanks in their armoured parade
Chanting their ballads of joy
As they gallop across the big world
Praising America's God.

The gutters are clogged with the dead
The ones who couldn't join in
The others refusing to sing
The ones who are losing their voice
The ones who've forgotten the tune.

The riders have whips which cut.
Your head rolls onto the sand
Your head is a pool in the dirt
Your head is a stain in the dust
Your eyes have gone out and your nose
Sniffs only the pong of the dead
And all the dead air is alive
With the smell of America's God. :cry:


http://www.counterpunch.org/pinter01222003.html

[Smarmie Doofus]

12. I do. It makes me ill so I try not to think about it too much.

It seems as though it is or is/ not murder depending upon what the powers that be decide to call it. Effectively, a holocaust is not a holocaust unless it's labeled a "holocaust".

The disappearance of 60 million indigineous North and South Americans is therefore unexplained in the dominant historical narrative. In the same way, the end of a million or so Iraqis in the late 1990's - early 2000s did not happen, has not happened.

Them's the rules... sad to say. And the wheels on the bus go round and round.

[LynzM]

35. Same here, PaulHo, but I cannot help thinking about it.

Every day, any time I am feeling sad for myself or bad about my life, I remember how much worse my life could be, living in one of the countries that the U.S. has "helped".... Iraq is just the most recent in a long line of forgotten interference on our part.

Hell, it started with coming here, taking the land from the Native Americans and killing them off, because they wouldn't leave their own land. Try explaining that one to your 5 year old sometime. I did that last night. Ugh.

[Annces]

17. Yes

When I hear people talk about how many Americans dead and not Iraqi, I think they are contributing to the sense of us versus them.

[Xenotime]

18. I think about that and the environment that we continue to kill

[Echo In Light]

19. When I find myself in a conversation w/anyone on this, I always say...

That the actions carried out by our representative govt are carried out in ALL of our names, with the aid of our tax dollars. It's amazing how so many have this major disconnect regarding that.

[bdamomma]

20. I think about it and we will pay heavily, if not us,

our children and many generations to come will pay for these crimes.

[Solly Mack]

21. Yes to both. I agree

I think about it and YES! there will be a price to pay for those deaths


and if we add the deaths from the 90's in Iraq, it's far more than a million

[Echo In Light]

22. Karma to burn

[bdamomma]

23. did you catch Frontline on PBS last nite, it was the Return of Taliban

what got me sick was when they mentioned it was American missiles that killed women and children during a raid to apparently getting Al Qaeda leaders. Americans killing innocent people, sickening.

[Solly Mack]

24. No. It's hard to catch Frontline programs here :(

[The Stranger]

26. K&R

[leftchick]

27. but they died because they wanted our freedoms

at least that is how my freeper relatives justify it. It sickens me daily.

:cry:

[lonestarnot]

28. Yes I do.

[NNN0LHI]

29. The Crackhead In Chief only admitted to killing 30,000 Iraqis over 2 years ago on live television

No one even blinked about that.

So he figured he would kill some more. Bush is as dangerous as a monkey with a razor blade.

Don

[Toots]

30. Well we can do Iran next..

I think more people live there than Iraq....

[Orsino]

31. I have blood on my hands.

I helped pay for America's illegal wars, and I haven't done everything in my power to stop them.

I have lots of company.

[MindPilot]

33. Short of armed insurrection what more could we have done?

Marched in yet another rally? Written yet another LTTE? Voted for yet another anti-war candidate? Called yet another congressman?

[Orsino]

36. Another rally.

But with everyone taking to the streets. That's all it would have taken. No violence necessary.

[MindPilot]

32. Evey time I hear how Saddam "gassed his own people".

We have done a thousand times more damage to Iraq than Hussein ever did, but somehow our cause is "noble". The cognitive dissonance is enough to make my head explode.

[bryant69]

34. I try not to think about it. I'm depressed enough already.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[LynnTheDem]

38. Yes.

[BoneDaddy]

39. No NOT AT ALL

I have my Paris Hilton, my MTV, my IPOD, my American Idol, my XBOX, my Beamer, my, my, my, my, my,my

Do I need to put the sarcasm sig?

[justanaveragedude]

41. No.

[happydreams]

42. Ok, a psychopath who alot of people think is a folksy Prez goes on

a killing spree for money and arousal. Is it my fault? Was I responsible for Ted Bundy or any other psychopath?

:shrug:

[OneBlueSky]

43. yes, I do . . . and I get infuriated when someone mentions U.S. casualties . . .

without noting the horrific things we've done to the Iraqi people . . . the murders, the maimings, the destruction of property, the creation of millions of refugees, all of it . . .

this is NOT my father's America . . .

but then again, maybe it never was . . .

[Thothmes]

44. Depending on Your Age

it may well be your fathers America. Think Viet Nam, 50,000 Americans Killed, Millions of Vietnamese killed/wounded. Billions to the military/industrial complex and massive debt to the American people.

[TexasObserver]

45. Yes, I do think about it.

If a person allows his or her government to engage in actions that are morally wrong, then he or she is guilty of acquiesence. I must speak against morally improper war and the death penalty, or I consent to their results, which are known to me. It's ironic that many who believe there is a stern God who will judge all according to rules that include "do not kill" are the primary backers of war.

[Flying Dream Blues]

46. Well said, fellow Texan.