Quote:
Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
While the thug Hussein is no longer taking shots, it turns that Iraq is much more fucked up than might be suspected by those whose grasp on the situation there reduces to calling the head despot a thug.
Which is to say that if you think Iraq is a big success story, we have a lot to talk about before we get to matters of abiding principle. Which was, after all, my point.
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I don't think you grasp how bad things were in Iraq before we came in. No human rights, no economy and total opressoin. And, I almost forgot, incarceration and torture on a massive scale that makes the "torture" at Gitmo seem like a tea party. And lets not forget the liquidation of hundred of thousands of people. And there was no end in sight to this situation.
So instead of mass incarcertaions of innocent people, we have some insurgents going to jail. Instead of massive torture chambers where people are hung on meat hooks, have wire attached to their genitals, and are slowly beaten and starved to death, prisoners are having their photographs taken while naked next to - oh no - women. Yes the torture has gotten a lot worse.
Today there are daily car bombings where before we had massive killing fields and mass graves. Today civilians are getting caught in the cross fire, where before they were the targest on a massive scale.
Today some people lose their homnes, where under Saddam he drained the swamps of southern Iraq, not only depriving millions of people of their homes but also of their livelihood. Oh, and lets not forget the gassing of the Kurds.
But hey, women had as much rights as men (none) but of course any day they could be picked up by the national guard or one of Saddams sons and raped and beaten to death.
In addition, with all the great things happeneing under Saddam there was no hope that it was going to change. In the current situation things may just get better.
And, I know, the elections in Iraq today are not nearly as free as they were under Saddam, because under Saddam you had a 99% turnout and everyone voted for him. That way no one had to be killed for trying to vote the wrong way.
Hey - you know you are right - things were much better under Saddam.
