Just Foreign Policy maintains a running estimate of the number of Iraqis who have perished as a result of the American invasion and occupation of Iraq, based on surveys in Iraq conducted by the Lancet and ORB, and for the typical holocaust deniers who always show up asking for proof, proof, proof, and more proof, and still more proof, and even more proof endlessly and forever, my response is... Eat shit and die!
Americans have been obsessing month after month about a "public option" for healthcare, and every other issue has been relegated to niche blogs and the back pages of a few newspapers, and meanwhile in Iraq, which has one hospital bed for every five patients, children die every day from injuries which could have been treated with simple antiseptics and a bandaid, if half of Iraq weren't so completely devastated that you can't even find a bandaid or a bottle of iodine, and if you're looking for links, links, links and still more links because you still don't know fuck-all about Iraq after 6 long years of the genocidal American occupation and you want me to prove everything step by step for the fiftieth time on the blogs... Go fuck yourself!
And in other news, Project Censored chose the annihilation of more than one million Iraqi men, women, and children under the American occupation of Iraq as the most censored story of 2009.
Earlier today, these five members of Congress - all of whom are members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus - were arrested for civil disobedience protesting the expulsion of aid workers from the Sudan. These are our champions, people who have dedicated their lives to human rights and justice, who are, in every sense of the word, leaders.
I have spent nearly all of my time lately thinking about how as progressives we should approach governing - and these and the other members of the Progressive Caucus are our strongest allies.
In all the handwringing that's going on about withdrawal from Iraq, the question of leaving behind the potential for genocide seems to be the emotional argument that has gained the most traction. This is clearly evident in Ambassador Crocker's pessimistic statements about the aftermath should the U.S. withdraw our troops.
Hopefully a blogger or journalist with more punch than I has already asked and answered this question, but I haven't heard it yet...
Why? Why would one think to compare the situation in Iraq upon US withdrawal with the other major national genocides that have occurred in modern times?
The key fundamental difference between an Iraq with no U.S. presence and the aforementioned genocidal situations is that in Iraq, all sides are armed to the teeth.
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