"All things being equal, we are a lot better off with saddam hussein

[tobius]

gone" -Wes Clark on Faux news right now.

????????????

[Martin Eden]

1. Yeah, but all things are NOT equal

Regime change comes with a few strings attached.

[lectrobyte]

4. exactly...

and I'm sure the 560 (and growing) dead and thousands of Americans wounded would agree. No doubt, the world is a better place with Saddam gone. The question is, would the American people have agreed to the invasion without the WMD imminent threat lies?

[Martin Eden]

9. the answer is NO

The American people would not have supported this war if it was depicted as a humanitarian intervention rather than an act of self defense. Hell, most Americans think we spend too much on foreign aid as it is, and the price tag on Iraq (not counting human life and turning the world against us) is already at least 50 times the $3 billion we give annually to Israel.

The selling of the Iraq war was a classic bait-and-switch, and unfortunately most Americans are still buying it.

[ulTRAX]

10. where does Bush's bait and switch start.....

Martin Eden wrote: "The American people would not have supported this war if it was depicted as a humanitarian intervention rather than an act of self defense."

Now would the American People have supported an oil grab or a family grudge match under the guise of a humanitarian intervention. Where does Bush's bait and switch start or end?

[Martin Eden]

13. It all starts with ideology and agenda

Everything else is just political tactics -- the ends to achieve the means. Josh Marshall wrote an excellent analysis of how the Bush administration operates:

The Post-Modern President
Deception, Denial, and Relativism: what the Bush administration learned from the French.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2003/0309.marshall.html

[KissMyAsscroft]

2. I've noticed that they are a lot more cordial to Clark since he dropped

out of the race.

[ThomWV]

3. Iraq Better Off? Who Cares?

Are the people of Iraq better off now that Sadam is gone? Let me suggest this - - - It was never any of our business if they were or if they weren't. If they wanted to do away with Sadam they should have done it. I would not argue and say that we should not have helped them had they tried but apparently he was not so much of a threat to the people of Iraq that they felt they had to do away with him. He was certainly no threat to us.

[tobius]

5. his response was not to a question about Iraq. read "WE". nt

[NoPasaran]

6. I'm not sure I agree with that

Whether the Iraqis are better off or not is an open question.

But whether WE are better off...

With Saddam: A bad guy was running a fairly stable, secular country in a dangerous part of the world. We were keeping him from developing any offensive military capability at some cost in $$$.

Without Saddam: We are occupying an unstable country on the verge of civil war. It's cost us 560 or so American lives so far + thousands of wounded + $200 Billion or so and counting. And at the moment it looks like our two choices at the moment are to continue pouring lives and treasure down this rathole or leave and let the place fall into chaos, which will likely be even worse for us. And in order to do this we pissed off most of the world.

Plus WE ARE NO SAFER.

Sorry, General Clark, I don't see where the advantage for us lies.

[bvar22]

8. Agree.You stole MY opinion.

:shrug:

[zbdent]

7. All things being equal - would that include

a pile of rubble equaling a schoolhouse or hospital?

Yes, if everything had been done in a way without bombing and shooting the living shi* out of the country, being without Saddam Hussein would be better.

Right now, if they ever get wind of where he is, then there will be some serious shi*.

[Michael Costello]

11. Why did Reagan support Saddam then?

Reagan and Bush I were friendly with Hussein (remember the Rumsfeld/Hussein handshake?), and sent him Apache helicopters and tanks. Saddam gassed some Kurds in the north - and they STILL kept sending him arms. They only seemed to start "caring" about how he treated Iraqis when Iraq and Kuwait had a dispute about oil drilling on their border and Hussein invaded Kuwait. They only care about profits, not people. So they use what he did 15 years before, which they not only did care about but sent arms to him after doing it, to justify invading Iraq.

It's a sad commentary on the Middle East, but *relative* to other governments there, Saddam's was not bad. And of course, it was horrible. Which gives one an idea how bad the other governments are. If people wanted to help Iraqis, they should get on Bush for closing down the Iraqi union headquarters, tell him to stop trying to replace where they exist Iraqi workers unions with bogus US-run ones, stop trying to privatize everything in Iraq, stop the massive Iraqi unemployment by giving the reconstruction jobs to Iraqis, not his Halliburton buddies, and get US troops out of Iraq and either hand things over to a temporary UN force, or hand it over directly to the Iraqi people. I think the Iraqi people can handle themselves, I don't think they need the "benevolent" idle class that Bush belongs to, to come and "help" the Iraqis run their country (privatizing, union-busting...hell, it's just like the US).

[tobius]

12. we should have continued our support?

If I hear you right, you would advocate that when we support a murderous dictator that it would be too hypocritical to ever change that position. Hmmmm....something to ponder.

[Michael Costello]

14. umm...

no, it's hypocritical to send arms to a "murderous dictator" (how come the news never calls the guy in charge of Saudi Arabia a murderous dictator? Or Musharraf in Pakistan?), continue sending them to him after he gasses people, and then 15 years later use the fact that he did that (even though the US sent him arms afterwards) as justification for invading him.

What are YOU suggesting, that if the US isn't arming a country it should invade it? Are you saying the US government has to be either arming people or invading them?

[rinsd]

16. Get facts straight......

"Reagan and Bush I were friendly with Hussein (remember the Rumsfeld/Hussein handshake?), and sent him Apache helicopters and tanks"

Hussein didn't have Apache Helicopters or US tanks. Most of the military hardware he had was Russian.

The argument about US involvement in the 80's is assistance in the bio/chem fields and logistical(ie satellite photos) help in the Iran-Iraq war.

[Heyo]

15. I totally agree with what he said.....

Can't people just look at this man's deeds and realize that he needed to go?

regardless of anything else.. the man had to be removed...

I don't necessarily approve of they way they went about it... but I'm damn sure glad it got done...

Heyo