let us suppose we did not go to war against saddam.
#1 we would not have lost any american lives.
#2. we would not be stuck in iraq, a country that will never become anything except what it was, an unimportant part of the world as far as we are concerned.
#3 there is not nor will there ever be any truth to the BS that the attack of 9/11 was either instigated by iraq or that they assisited the saudi's that committed the murders on that day.
#4 the argument that saddam was a cruel despot and gassed the kurds is true, but why didn't his people rise up against him. it's their country.
ghandi got rid of the british rule without firing a shot.
martin luther king helped pass the civil rights act without firing a shot.
we fought for our independence and people died winning it.
#5 why is israel able to find individual terrorists, even as they ride in cars, and eliminate them and we can't.
i refer you to breslin's column.
October 23, 2003
Herewith is the latest list of American soldiers killed in Iraq. The Pentagon stresses that they were killed in "Operation Iraqi Freedom." We are giving Iraqis the freedom to kill us. This list of 13 is for less than two weeks, ending Oct. 21. As I fail to find these names in other public prints, I run them here on the notion that if they have died for your country, the least we all should do is read them and perhaps even remember some of them.
The names today raise anger on two levels, because they died so young, and for so useless a reason. "Operation Iraqi Freedom" is another preposterous lie by the Bush government. Why not say the facts: "Iraqi Oil."
And our troops should be out there enforcing a New York custom that we have lived by for generations.
The patrol guide for the police department of the City of New York has the code 1013. "Officer needs assistance." When this call goes out, the police of the city stop. There ensues a large rush to a hospital to give blood, and a sprawling, frantic search for the person or persons who committed the assaults or killing of a cop in the city.
The search is of such intensity and the cops involved so widespread that comparisons are drawn with the investigation of assaults on normal citizens, which show the thinnest of blue, a detective or two.
Back in March, detectives Rodney Andrews and James Nemorin were shot to death on Staten Island. A 1013 went out. Within minutes, the Island was covered with a layer of blue. They caught the shooters.
That is the way the police of this city always have worked.
Today, we have 23 dead police from the World Trade Center bombing. There is no 1013.
The actual killers are dead, including 15 Saudi Arabians.
But the master of the attack is loose. He is Osama bin Laden and he lives on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
If we know where he is, why haven't we caught bin Laden, the cop killer?
Why haven't they followed the New York tradition and put all the men you need, tens of thousands, tens of thousands more if needed, and nobody stops until bin Laden, the New York cop killer, is caught.
If you want to fight terrorism, then fight terrorists. Get bin Laden. Bin Laden is not in Iraq where the soldiers on this list were sent.
George Bush stood in the World Trade Center ruins and said he would get bin Laden. Get bin Laden as a sheriff would, smoke him out, shoot him cold dead. All the poor cops cheered. What a thrill to have a good tough guy as president! That was over two years ago. Now you never hear bin Laden mentioned.
And the cops who have lost their own do nothing. They are the most extraordinarily gullible of people. They support with all fervor the idea of our president sending troops to Iraq and not where they could capture bin Laden. The cops say nothing about their dead. They are afraid to demand that their government honor the tradition of the 1013 and catch this common cop killer, bin Laden. They are afraid of anybody in authority. They have their dead bodies and they don't have the guts to shout. If they yelled with the emotion used when pushing around a peace demonstration, or anything made up of blacks, their prep school hero, Bush, would quiver and I say he makes bin Laden the goal again.
What is this, bin Laden has killed cops and we don't even catch him, but now we have to listen to tapes of bin Laden threatening to attack us again? Why do we put up with this?
i have not listed the dead soldiers he listed because many of you feel it is an insult to them to be mentioned publicly and recognised for what they did.
#6 why are we pouring money into iraq as gifts to those people instead of loans?
#7 why did halliburtan get so many no bid contracts
for reconstruction?
#8 why is there no impeachment hearing to find out who in the government violated the law and outed a cia agent?
#9 if we are worried about no. korea's nuclear cpabilities, why don't we do what israel did to iran, take out the sites that endanger us, now, before there are too many.
#10 why are we holding those people in cuba and trying to extract information from them. they have been out of the loop, assuming they were ever in it, for a few years. they don't have any idea what is going on. if our military men were captured and held in the same condition they are, we would be doing anything we can to free them.
10 is enough for today.