I think it speaks of how pathetic the OP is that even the regular SDMB Bush apologists aren’t stepping up to the plate and helping friend Don26 here.
In such a construction, it would be well to make clear that “OP” stood for Original Post and not for Original Poster.
Yes. Although I’d likely blame both.
Well, if you are a Kurd, or pro-democracy, or pro-freedom of speech or just plain pro-freedom, certainly. Any of those things would make life very nasty brutal and short under SH.
The current violence is caused by the insurgents themselves. They have chosen to make Iraq a dangerous place for everyone. When SH was in power, no one (other than SH and his sons) had any choice at all.
Note that fighting in a civil war is a choice, and can even be a good and moral choice. It’s true that any of the insurgents do choose targets that make them (the insurgents) into terrorists which is an Evil choice, but again, that is their choice.
The Kurds had no choice.
Overall, I’d choose freedom and choice with added danger; as opposed to no freedom, no choice, and considerable danger. I agree that it’s a little bit more dangerous, but it’s much much much more free. Those willing to give up a little freedom for a little security deserve- and get- neither.
I don’t know a single Iraqi of any religion or ethnicity who thinks things are better or will be better in their lifetime.
Probably not, no. Whomever started the war is responsible for the fallout.
It’s easy to say you’d choose freedom. The problem is that a lot of Iraqis now have targets on their backs, and in addition to the lack of reliable power and water they have to look out for militias and kidnappers. The danger has increased enough that a million people have already fled.
Hear hear.
And everyone else’s choice is the same as it had been under Saddam: to try to avoid the risk of a violent end as best as they can.
Only by all indications that’s a lot more of a challenge now. Instead of being killed for being anti-Saddam, you can get killed for being a Sunni, for being a Shi’ite (that pretty much covers the waterfront right there), for being a woman in public unescorted by a male relative, for being a woman and not wearing a hijab, for being a woman and driving a car, for talking to Americans, for applying for a police job, for having money to be worth kidnapping, for going to the morgue to try to retrieve the body of your murdered relative, and in a thousand ways, just plain being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Doesn’t matter what you’re for or against, death is trying to find you.
I agree that Kurdistan is somewhat better off now: while their actual circumstances haven’t changed much, their de facto independence no longer has the potential to evaporate the moment America should cease maintaining the no-fly zones. Kurdistan’s independence may yet be threatened by Turkey and Iran once we leave, but not immediately.
But in Arab Iraq, things are clearly worse for most people. They’re worse for ALL women, who are now barely more than chattel after having had more or less equal rights with men for decades, and can be punished horribly at whim for, say, going to the grocery store unchaperoned. And men are dying in all sorts of ways, and while they live, they are hard pressed to provide for their families.
There’s a reason why a million Iraqis have fled the country since our occupation began. We have taken a nation that was a prison, but one with rules that one could follow to survive, and turned it into a state of anarchy and chaos where there are no rules for survival.
For most people, this isn’t freedom. Sure, there is no law saying you can’t do X or Y; there are just militias and armed gangs to whom your life can be forfeit because you’re a Sunni and stepped into a Shi’ite neighborhood, or vice versa, or simply at the drop of a hat.
As I was saying four years ago, there are states worse than all but the worst dictatorships. A Hobbesian war of all against all is one of them.
Anarchy is not freedom. It is merely subjugation by thugs at a local level rather than the previous national level.
There sure is a lot of foilhattery at that website. Did you post it as a joke? There are pages on the Illuminati and the Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion, on and on, through just about any wacko conspiracy theory you could name. :dubious:
They at least have the* freedom to leave.* To vote. To offer public opinion.
Freedom isn’t free.
This isn’t freedom, this is warlordism. And voting doesn’t matter if the actual rules you must follow are set not by the government, but by whichever group of men with guns dominates your area.
And women don’t even have the right to leave their home, much less express their opinion. They are far worse off.
Those with sufficient resources do. Most don’t.
To rearrange the deck chairs in a government that’s powerless to control the country.
Yep. And if I were on the 23rd floor of a burning building, I’d be free to express my opinions about the inferno that was about to engulf me. BFD.
Good Lord, that?!? ;):D:rolleyes::eek:
IOW, you got nothin’.
Their country is in a horrible civil war, and they’re free to leave their homes and possessions if they can survive the chaos. What a wonderful gift.
That sounds eerily like Rumsfeld’s “in a free society, people are free to committ crimes” crap.
Does anybody have a cite that would suggest that the Kurds are unhappy with George Bush ?
DrDeth, at the risk of sounding like I’m making this a personal matter - I’m not - that’s the sort of thing a person could only say if they really don’t comprehend the situation and have no appreciation for the suffering those people are going through.
“Well, they have the freedom to leave” to describe the Iraq situation is sort of like saying that being homeless is just like being on a camping vacation all year. “Freedom” in the sense that we mean it in the Western world - the freedom to express political opinion - is not particularly meaningful in a situation of chaos, danger, and material deprivation. A person’s first priority is the safety and survival of their family and themselves; believe me when I say that a person who fears for their life or the lives of their children is gonna tell you to take your claims of “freedom” and jam it. It’s very easy to say things like “Freedom isn’t free” when you aren’t the one paying the big prices.
That’s why dictatorships HAPPEN, after all, and are sometimes quite widely supported; because people usually value staying alive, and keeping their families alive, above most aspects of political freedom. Not getting killed and having enough food to eat and universal concerns. Political freedoms are, if we are being perfectly honest, things that, most of the time, you don’t exercise or notice.
And while we’re on the subject, is what you’re saying even TRUE, anyway? You seem to be saying “well, at least now people are free; they weren’t before.” But that’s not even the case. People in Iraq NOW are being killed for what they believe. And people could leave Iraq before, and did; they’re leaving in greater numbers now because they’re even more frightened than they were before.
Thats why I tossed in another. The point is we are arguing about something with no proof like we actually know what we are saying. I am skeptical of this thread .I do not totally accept anything . Not very trusting. sorry. I am sure Saddam and his ilk was like most dictators ; Ruling by force and controlling by threat. But I fear we will exaggerate to achieve our political ends. I read Iraqi blogs and things are worse now than they ever were. They say so. I do not know because I am here.
In all my years on the SDMB, I can’t recall a time when “OP” ever stood for “original poster”.
</nitpick>