Monday, May 16, 2005
The Science Fiction of Condi Rice In Iraq
On holiday from the Sunday pundit shows, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice "paid a surprise visit to Iraq." Usually you hear about movie stars paying surprise visits to the Tonight Show, not Secretaries of State doing likewise.
Whoops. I forgot. Condi's a "rock star".
It's a good thing that Condi doesn't have to face another confirmation hearing anytime soon. Condi's probably mighty psyched that Senator Barbara Boxer won't be "impugning [her] credibility or [her] integrity" for this stupid speech:
"You see, this war came to us, not the other way around. The United States of America, when it was attacked on September 11, realized that we lived in a world in which we cannot let threats gather, and that we lived in a world in which we had to have a different kind of Middle East if we were ever to have a permanent peace."
I'm confused.
First it was al qaeda. Then it was Afghanistan. Then it was Iraq, too. Countries like Iran, Syria and Lebanon have been tossed around as future projects. Many Saudi Arabians and Palestinians have also been demonized.
But I thought that was the extent of the "evil-doers."
Is our Secretary of State now blaming the whole Middle East for September 11th, 2001? Is the entire Middle East being held responsible for this now? Are we now including Bahrain, Cyprus, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, and the not-to-be-named country in the list of co-conspirators?
As Ben Kenobi might say, "Only a Sith lord deals in absolutes."
Speaking of science fiction. More from Condi:
"And our children, and our children's children, will look back, and they will say, we are so grateful that there were Americans willing to sacrifice, so that the Middle East could be whole, and free, and democratic, and at peace. And that never again would we have to fight terrorists on our soil, in America."
Why don't the Sith Lords just promise to eradicate cancer, crime, famine and genocide while they're at it?
On my last post about Star Wars and Iraq - Sith Lords At The Levers? - Alfdom left this cool reworking of Condi's preposterous speech:
"This Star war came to us, no[t] the other way around. The absence of freedom in the Middle Space -- the freedom deficit -- is what produced the ideology of hatred that allowed them to fly spaceships into a building on a fine September day. The old policies of the Jedi and "the rest of the free world" allowed "ideologies of hatred" to fester, sith said."
You gotta love this line from Condi's "surprise visit" to the Empire's new territory: "It just could not continue to be a Middle East in which dictators like Saddam Hussein paraded around, lived in great palaces, and yet tortured, and oppressed, and just made mincemeat of this wonderful infrastructure here in Iraq."
Who parades around now? Who lives in the great palaces now? Who oppresses now? Who made mincemeat of this "wonderful infrastructure" now?
Who tortures now?
"There is no point on the Earth where people do not want to be able to say what they think" claimed Condi in her speech.
So let me say what I think (while I still can).
I think only the evil and the wicked engage in torture.
Amnesty International just released a report entitled "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA Guantánamo and beyond: The continuing pursuit of unchecked executive power" which probably won't get that much play in the MSM:
"Over a year after the Abu Ghraib torture scandal broke, and as evidence of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment by US forces in the "war on terror" continues to mount, not one US agent has been charged with "war crimes" or "torture" under US law (see Section 12). In over 70 per cent of announced official actions taken in response to substantiated allegations of abuse, the punishment has been non-judicial or administrative. While a small number of mainly low-ranking soldiers have been subjected to courts-martial, members of the administration, who from the outset have claimed that the USA treats all detainees humanely and that any abuses have been the actions of a few aberrant soldiers, have remained free of independent investigation despite possible criminal responsibility in abuses. Congress has failed to initiate an independent commission of inquiry, as Amnesty International has sought. The current Attorney General, like his predecessor possibly involved in a conspiracy to immunize US agents from criminal liability for torture and war crimes under US law, has not appointed a special prosecutor to pursue this matter as Amnesty International and others have urged."
Indeed.
What keeps me sane these days when science fiction trumps news?
Hip hop.
So like the best rapper alive, Jay-Z, spat in the spring of 2003 (when most elected Democrats were afraid to say much of anything): "We rebellious, we back home, screamin' leave Iraq alone/But all my soldiers in the field, I will wish you safe return/But only love kills war when will they learn."
Unfortunately, it seems like they will never learn that democracy isn't created by bombs, torture is ALWAYS wrong, and that future generations and history will never forgive their unjust actions.
We just have to somehow wait this out.
All we can do is keep reporting the crimes. And keep fighting for real election reform.
That's all we can do.
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