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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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 Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 11:17 am Post subject: W. Bush's Long-Term Legacy in Iraq...? |
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BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Voting ended Saturday evening for Iraqi provincial elections and the mood was festive in some places, unlike the violence, intimidation and apathy that marked the balloting in 2005.
"Politics has broken out in Iraq. ... It's truly a proud moment," Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh told CNN. "The distance that we have come is truly inspiring."
Preliminary results were expected within a week, members of the Electoral Commission said at a news conference Saturday night.
Only two instances of violence were reported.
CNN's Arwa Damon, who toured polling stations with U.N. observers, said she noticed an increased sense of awareness and optimism among voters, who felt their participation would have an impact on their lives and country...
"We are trying to build a new system of government in the heart of the Islamic Middle East," Saleh said... |
CNN Reports |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 11:23 am Post subject: |
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At the time of the invasion, I was deeply sympathetic to the goals being discussed (democracy, and a domino effect). I didn't think it was worth the cost (which was more than my worst expectations).
I hope America was successful in remaking that country. I am very skeptical for a variety of reasons. |
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Chuvok
Joined: 25 Jan 2009
Location: Russia
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 11:42 am Post subject: |
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| mises wrote: |
I hope America was successful in remaking that country. I am very skeptical for a variety of reasons. |
Iraq is a complete failure. There is no success at all. None.
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead, millions have had their lives ruined. People who were once secure in life are now living in poverty across the country.
Only a fool would suggest there has been positive change in that country. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 12:18 pm Post subject: |
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| mises wrote: |
| I am very skeptical for a variety of reasons. |
Our friend's pessimism and talk of "fools," notwithstanding, my own feeling is this: too soon to tell for certain. We need to wait and see for at least a decade or so.
But, preliminarily speaking, the W. Bush administration's Middle-East-wide response to 9/11 seems to have created profound change in Iraq. Can you imagine Iraq going from where it was under Saddam's despotism to where it is today any other way? |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 1:09 pm Post subject: |
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my own feeling is this: too soon to tell for certain. We need to wait and see for at least a decade or so.
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That reminds me of Zhou Enlai's answer(possibly apocryphal) when asked about the French Revolution.
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| Can you imagine Iraq going from where it was under Saddam's despotism to where it is today any other way? |
Well you know, Khruschev/Brezhenv era Russia was astronomically more liberal than Stalin-era Russia. Ditto when you compare post-Mao China to China at the time of the Cultural Revolution. Granted, those liberal Communist states weren't(and in the case of China, aren't) holding free elections, but then you should also factor into the equation that the process of liberalization in those countries didn't entail hundreds of thousands of deaths. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 1:35 pm Post subject: |
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But this is not about Soviet Russia or theoretical analogies. It is about one specific trajectory: Iraq 2003-present.
And but for the W. Bush administration's Middle-East-wide response to 9/11, we would almost certainly see Saddam in Iraq today. And we would not see the kind of democratic processes CNN reports, above. This remains interesting to follow because this is exactly what W. Bush said he intended to create there. |
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bucheon bum
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 2:06 pm Post subject: |
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but at an incredibly high cost. And it remains to be seen if a democratic Iraq is beneficial to the United States.
So yes, we'll have to wait at least a decade, assuming the country does not "regress" back into some type of authoritarian gov't before then. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 3:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Chuvok wrote: |
| mises wrote: |
I hope America was successful in remaking that country. I am very skeptical for a variety of reasons. |
Iraq is a complete failure. There is no success at all. None.
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead, millions have had their lives ruined. People who were once secure in life are now living in poverty across the country.
Only a fool would suggest there has been positive change in that country. |
How many Iraqis had a secure life under Saddam?
How many Saddam killed and intended to kill needs to be counted in. and Saddam had ambitions far beyond Iraq. |
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Chuvok
Joined: 25 Jan 2009
Location: Russia
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 3:32 pm Post subject: |
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| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
How many Iraqis had a secure life under Saddam?
How many Saddam killed and intended to kill needs to be counted in. and Saddam had ambitions far beyond Iraq. |
B.S.! That's dirty Fox News talk!!
Whether Saddam was good or bad, it wasn't any of the Bush family's business. Millions of Iraqis fled and are still scattered around the world as refugees, millions more are living in daily terror of being killed in the streets or while they sleep. Nearly every Iraqi family has lost someone to this foolish american invasion.
Do not insult those people by claiming their suffering is better than when Saddam was still around. People had normal lives under Saddam, even though the US was making every effort to sanction them to death for 10 years. It was the US who created and sustained the pain in Iraq, and YOU as an american are to blame for it. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 4:32 pm Post subject: |
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| Chuvok wrote: |
| ...and YOU as an american are to blame for it. |
We have blood on our hands, no doubt. Where are you from, by the way? Are you Canadian?
In any case, we may also claim credit for cultivating and nurturing such developments as this...
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| BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Four thousand women are running for office in Iraq's provincial elections Saturday, and many of them will be guaranteed seats under an electoral quota system... |
CNN Reports |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 4:47 pm Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| Chuvok wrote: |
| ...and YOU as an american are to blame for it. |
Where are you from, by the way? Are you Canadian?
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He is Canadian. Has all the signs. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 5:27 pm Post subject: |
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[quote="Chuvok"]
| Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee wrote: |
How many Iraqis had a secure life under Saddam?
How many Saddam killed and intended to kill needs to be counted in. and Saddam had ambitions far beyond Iraq. |
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| B.S.! That's dirty Fox News talk!! |
and yours is Saddam apologist talk.
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Whether Saddam was good or bad, it wasn't any of the Bush family's business. Millions of Iraqis fled and are still scattered around the world as refugees, millions more are living in daily terror of being killed in the streets or while they sleep. Nearly every Iraqi family has lost someone to this foolish american invasion. |
Saddam killed 300,000 if you include his war with Iran and Kuwait the numbers are much higher. He would have killed off the Kurds had he not been stopped by the US.
. Iraq's demographics 20% Sunni Arabs , 20% Kurds and 60% Shia .
80% of Iraqis are glad the US took down Saddam.
Why is what Saddam did none of Bush's business more than that Saddam incited violence , and was out to conquer the gulf in part cause he wanted to blackmail the US with oil.
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Do not insult those people by claiming their suffering is better than when Saddam was still around. People had normal lives under Saddam, even though the US was making every effort to sanction them to death for 10 years. It was the US who created and sustained the pain in Iraq, and YOU as an american are to blame for it. |
Saddam was as much a killer as Idi Amin.
Normal lives .
And Saddam starved his people intentionally in order to get the sanctions off.
Saddam sells UN drugs on black market[/size][/b]
By Christina Lamb [/size]
(Filed: 24/09/2000)
CHILDREN'S medicines sent to Iraq by a British pharmaceutical company under a United Nations programme are being smuggled out of the country and sold on the black market in Lebanon to fund the lavish tastes of Saddam Hussein.
Glaxo-Wellcome has made official complaints to the Foreign Office and to the UN which oversees the Oil for Food Programme. This allows Baghdad to sell limited quantities of oil to buy vital humanitarian supplies for children, the sick and elderly.
The UN Security Council set strict controls to ensure that the medicines went to civilians and not the regime. But a spokesman for Glaxo-Wellcome told The Telegraph that the company has so far traced 15,000 units of Ventolin, part of a consignment of asthma medicine shipped to Iraq, circulating on the black market in Beirut.
The medicines had been transported to Lebanon using vehicles belonging to Iraq's ministry of transport. This indicates that the smuggling is being masterminded at the highest levels and undermines Saddam's claims that people are dying in Iraq because of shortages caused by the trade embargo imposed in 1991 after the invasion of Kuwait. However, with the Iraqi dictator still firmly in power despite a decade of sanctions, Britain and America are increasingly isolated as they continue to insist on the embargo. A Foreign Office official acknowledged: "Sanctions are clearly not working but they are desperately clinging on because no one knows what else to do."
Saddam is using the supposed shortages as a propaganda tool, showing pictures of sick children and blaming the West for his people's suffering when his regime is actually smuggling out medicines that it does receive. The Ventolin is thought to be just a fraction of the UN- approved Western medicines illegally sold on by Saddam's lieutenants in a scheme run by his son Uday. The Iraqi opposition estimate that millions of pounds are being raised in this way and used to finance Saddam's regime and the activities of his intelligence services as they step up their work in London and other European capitals.
Glaxo-Wellcome has launched a campaign to warn pharmacists in Lebanon and other Arab states not to sell the smuggled goods. The company is concerned about the safety implications of prescription drugs being sold over the counter as well as being undercut in markets to which it already exports. Last week the Lebanese authorities arrested a number of those involved in selling them.
"Obviously this is a worrying development," said an official at the UN programme office for Iraq. A recent report by the office to the Security Council projected oil revenues for Iraq from December 1999 to June 2000 at �6 billion, which should be spent on health and food, and complained that medicines worth �180 million were still lying in Iraqi warehouses and had not been distributed.
However, there is now increasing pressure to end sanctions both in the Arab world and beyond. Iraqi trade with Syria, Egypt and some Gulf countries has been increasing, as has support for an end to the embargo, and there have been several reports of oil being smuggled through Turkey and the UAE.
Last week Saddam's regime celebrated the arrival of a Russian flight at the newly-reopened Baghdad international airport and Aeroflot executives are awaiting Kremlin approval for the resumption of what will be the first regular commercial flights since the Gulf war. Passengers on last week's flight included oil executives interested in making deals with Iraq.
On Friday, a French plane flew from Paris to Baghdad, carrying doctors, athletes and artists defying a request from the UN committee that upholds the sanctions regime against Iraq. The sanctions committee was informed only on Thursday night of the Friday morning flight and France refused a request to delay the flight for 12 hours so that the issue could be studied. Welcoming the flight at Baghdad, Hussein Saeed, an Iraqi Olympic committee official, said the French had taken "a big initiative in breaking the embargo".
At the same time, boosted by record oil prices and the protests in Britain and across Europe over high fuel costs, Saddam has begun an intensive lobbying campaign to weaken the sanction regime. His efforts already seem to be having some effect. Hugo Chavez, Venezuela's new president, recently made a trip to Baghdad, the first elected head of state to visit since the Gulf war. Known for his anti-American rhetoric, President Chavez claimed his visit was necessary because Venezuela currently holds the presidency of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries and suggested it was time to end Iraq's isolation.
23 September 2000: French jet breaks UN embargo on Baghdad
19 September 2000: Oil price new weapon for warlike Saddam
18 September 2000: Russia breaks UN sanctions
11 August 2000: Venezuela breaks Saddam ban
2 August 2000: Britain and US isolated over tottering trade embargo on Iraq
17 February 2000: Saddam to blame for sanctions, says FO
24 May 1998: Saddam tries to set up phone network with cash for sick children
21 May 1996: Iraq oil-for-food deal to benefit Gulf War victims |
NO PROOF?
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b]Impact of Sanctions [/b]
Sanctions are not intended to harm the people of Iraq. That is why the sanctions regime has always specifically exempted food and medicine. The Iraqi regime has always been free to import as much of these goods as possible. It refuses to do so, even though it claims it wants to relieve the suffering of the people of Iraq.
� Iraq is actually exporting food, even though it says its people are malnourished. Coalition ships enforcing the UN sanctions against Iraq recently diverted the ship M/V MINIMARE containing 2,000 metric tons of rice and other material being exported from Iraq for hard currency instead of being used to support the Iraqi people.
� Baby milk sold to Iraq through the oil-for-food program has been found in markets throughout the Gulf, demonstrating that the Iraqi regime is depriving its people of much-needed goods in order to make an illicit profit.
Photo 1: click here or on image for enlargement and caption
� Kuwaiti authorities recently seized a shipment coming out of Iraq carrying, among other items, baby powder, baby bottles, and other nursing materials for resale overseas (see photo 1).
Saddam Hussein's priorities are clear. If given control of Iraq's resources, Saddam Hussein would use them to rearm and threaten the region, not to improve the lot of the Iraqi people.
There is ample proof that lifting sanctions would offer the Iraqi people no relief from neglect at the hands of their government
� Sanctions prevent Saddam from spending money on rearmament, but do not stop him from spending money on food and medicine for Iraqis.
� Saddam's priorities are clear: palaces for himself, prisons for his people, and weapons to destroy Iraq's citizens and its neighbors. He has built 48 palaces for himself since the Gulf War. He would not use Iraq's resources to improve the lives of Iraqis. Saddam Hussein would use them to rearm and threaten the region. |
http://www.fas.org/news/iraq/2000/02/iraq99.htm
http://www.fas.org/news/iraq/2000/02/photo1.jpg |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 6:35 pm Post subject: |
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"Politics has broken out in Iraq. ... It's truly a proud moment," Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh told CNN. "The distance that we have come is truly inspiring."
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This is a majorly good event being reported. We can keep our fingers crossed that the improvement is permanent. It's important evidence that our troops can leave. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 6:35 pm Post subject: |
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| mises wrote: |
| Gopher wrote: |
| Chuvok wrote: |
| ...and YOU as an american are to blame for it. |
Where are you from, by the way? Are you Canadian? |
He is Canadian. Has all the signs. |
Apparently.
Would you like to wager whether he is one of those Canadians who stresses Canadian-American friendship and goodwill and really wants B. Obama to embrace "Canadian content" in his music...? |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Sat Jan 31, 2009 6:39 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| ...our troops can leave. |
I believe they are in fact leaving. The war is now in Afghanistan and Pakistan. I understand the Obama administration is preparing to redeploy American forces in Iraq as we speak. |
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