We do not want the contagion of sympathy for tsunami victims spreading.

[KlatooBNikto]

Especially into Iraq. This is the reason the Bush administration is keeping its response to the tsunami so muted and its aid package is so measly compared to European and other nations.

What if questions were raised about the man-made disaster in Iraq and comparisons started flying about the tsunami and Iraq? That is the question the Bush administration wants squelched.

[Skidmore]

1. This bunch of ignoramuses have blown an excellent

opportunity to at least appear to have compassion and offset some of the bad PR they've put out over this stupid war. Even if they can't work up genuine empathy or sympathy for the poor people of these nations, at leas they should be able to see this for an opportunity to "win hearts and minds". How tone deaf can you get?

[KlatooBNikto]

3. There is a reason for their studied indifference. The images of poor

brown skinned victims of the tsunami will make people identify themselves with these victims and a wave of sympathy would be unleashed not just for the tsunami victims but for the victims of the manmade tsunami in Iraq.

[KT2000]

2. Makes sense

because when I was watching the videos of the tsunami I did start to think about the people in Iraq and how their lives are a mess now too. All is not well in the world no matter what they try to spin.

[KlatooBNikto]

4. What most of our media and the power structure do not want to see is

the depiction of brown skinned people as innocent victims of natural forces beyond our control. If this belief takes hold, the carefully constructed images of Arabs/Muslims/Brown skinned people will fall apart and the demonization of such people will come to a grinding halt. Nature has created an unforeseen obstacle to the Neocon march of hatred for those who are its victims.

[mikh]

5. Sorry...

...but what a mean spirited, cynical response.
The aftershocks are still rolling in, the death toll is still being assessed and such is the level of disdain for your own leadership and bureaucracy that you have categorised it already as incompetent.
The word bigotry shouldn't be loosed perhaps - but it's tempting...

[xchrom]

6. that's funny!

oh, you weren't joking -- you think this admin seriously cares about people?
then why so carelessly kill 100,000 in iraq?
where was the threat -- the wmd's -- where the fuck are they?!?!?!?!

[mikh]

8. ...oh no...

...Of course I'm not joking.

Do you really think that people have been killed or died in Iraq "carelessly"?

As in the 1930's and 40's, your right to freedom, free expression and free speech is under serious threat - and that threat isn't coming from your own country. Kerry recognised that to his credit. He, and the present administration genuinely "...care about people." You may choose to argue about the level of that care, but to stereotype your opponents as inhuman is ludicrous.

Please consider these sentiments...

"Militant Islam derives from Islam but is a misanthropic, misogynist, triumphalist, millenarian, anti-modern, anti-Christian, anti-Semitic, terroristic, jihadistic, and suicidal version of it. Fortunately, it appeals to only about 10 percent to 15 percent of Muslims, meaning that a substantial majority would prefer a more moderate version." (Richard Pipes)

Please, we all share care, although you may doubt it. But let's not ignore the really hateful anti-democratic beheaders and jihadists...

[KlatooBNikto]

10. Can you give me one reason why you consider Iraq was a threat to us?

[mikh]

17. For sure...

WMD's.
He had them. He used them.

[KlatooBNikto]

18. You have lost all credibility as of now.Have you heard of Hans Blix?

or David Kay? The weapons he used on Iranians and Kurds were given to him by none other than Don Rumsfeld himself. He did not have any WMD as the War trumpets were being beaten by the Bush administration.

[mikh]

24. ...Ah hah..

...so he did have WMD. I thought you said "...there were no WMD's prior to the war..." or did I mis-read you?
And they were given to him by the USA were they?
Let's see about that...

[KlatooBNikto]

26. Get your history straight.The WMD's, the poison gas, Sarin, were supplied

to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War .Do you know how long ago that was?
That was during the Reagan Administration.Don Rumsfeld was sent as a special ambassador to Iraq to handle the transcation.

During the run up to the Iraq War, Hans Blix and Scott Ritter throughly searched for WMD's in Iraq and issued a report stating clearly they did not exist in Iraq. David Kay, President Bush's own investigator confirmed it.

Yet, here you are making bogus claims about the existence of WMD's.

[mikh]

27. ...a link to this "factual" information please...

....so Reagan was responsible for the genocidal murder of the Kurds was he?
Blix found no WMD's...so...what did Saddam do with them? He had them, he used them. He killed many people with them. Did he voluntarily destroy them? or use them all up maybe?
I repeat, your proof that your own President and his intermediary supplied Saddam with his WMD's.

[Name removed]

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[KlatooBNikto]

30. I suggest that you read up on the history of those times even on DU's

own archives where the visit by Don Rumsfeld to Iraq in the Reagan Administration, especially the famous photograph of his shaking hands with Saddam Hussein have been published many times. I also suggest going to NYT website to read up on the sale of WMD's by the Reagan Administration to prevent an Iranian victory over Saddam Hussein.

[KlatooBNikto]

7. I think you should be directing your anger at those who talk about

giving $35 M to victims of one of history's greatest natural disasters.This is the same group that thinks nothing of spending 300 Million dollars a day in a war that was based on the flimsiest pretexts. I was just speculating why the difference? You have a better reason than mine? Let us see it.

[mikh]

9. ...let's stand back...

...a little, and see what your country (and mine, and the rest of the developed world) actually do before passing judgement.
I agree, this tragedy is a litmus test for gracious and wise foreign policy.
I wasn't taking too much notice at the time, but remember the Turkey earthquakes (? 2001). I think the death toll was in the tens of thousands. Shall we use Clinton's administration as an example of enlightenment and wise foreign aid?

[xchrom]

11. the history of this country is rooted in shame

we drag goodness out kicking and screaming.
you have a very narrow view of american history -- and iraq in specific.
there is no good or honour in killing 100,000 people to deliver ''freedom'' to them when no threat from radical islam or anything else was offered.

tracking down criminals is appropriate -- sending innocent women, children and men to their graves for a lie is a crime -- and if you support that lie --
well you are in the same boat as far as i'm concerned.

[mikh]

13. ...Guilt for America's past...

...is surely not your central point?
I totally reject that I have the narrow view of American (note the capital) history.
You write "...no threat from radical Islam...was offered"
What on earth was 9/11 all about? Who flew the planes ? Who killed all those countrymen of yours?
The threat to the civilised world from radical Islam is terribly real.
Ask John Kerry. At at least one point in his political life he saw radical Islam for what it was.

[KlatooBNikto]

16. What did 9/11 have to do with Iraq?

[mikh]

21. Iraq and 9/11

Do you really think that the Iraqi regime as an enemy of the US and Israel, lead by a genocidal despot and tyrant felt quite neutral about Al Queda? Or don't you think it far more likely that Saddam encouraged and fostered all the anti-US/Western sentiment that he could?

Don't you think that Iraq sympathised with and supported Osama bin Laden? and the present chief beheader Abu Musad al-Zarqawi? (Mr. Zarqawi is a "hands-on" kind of a guy: He is believed to be, and has claimed to be, the wielder of the murderer's knife in more than one decapitation-porn video.) Zarqawi is an out and out Bin Laden clone. He is Jordanian, operates in Iraq and is known to want to get hold of chemical and biological weapons. Zarqawi is a Bin Laden wannabe, and a rival for the possibly vacant position of most lethal Islamist killer in the world; Abdul Rahman Yasin, who was an Iraqi passport-holder when he skipped bail from New Jersey in 1993 as one of the most wanted men in the United States and made it through Jordan to Baghdad in a matter of hours.

Ignore this, and the common ties that bind the anti-Western philosophy of al Queda and Saddam Hussein and you ignore reality.

[KlatooBNikto]

23. There were no established connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda.

You can manufacture all sorts of connections after the invasion but no connection between 9/11 and Saddam Hussein have been established. In fact there were no WMD's ,no 9/11 or Al Qaeda connections prior to the war.If you claim there were, prove it.

[Name removed]

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[SOS]

32. bin Laden has hated Hussein for years

Not only is there no connection, bin Laden has repeatedly condemned Hussein as an infidel. He even offered his assistance to Saudi Arabia to repel Hussein in 1990.

Even the right-leaning CATO institute understands this reality:

"The administration's strongest sound-bite on Iraq is also its weakest argument for war. The idea that Saddam Hussein would trust Al Qaeda enough to give Al Qaeda operatives chemical or biological weapons -- and trust them to keep quiet about it -- is simply not plausible. Bin Laden, who views the rigid Saudi theocracy as insufficiently Islamic, has long considered Saddam Hussein an infidel enemy. Before Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, Bin Laden warned publicly that the Iraqi dictator had designs on conquering Saudi Arabia. When Iraq invaded Kuwait, Bin Laden offered to assemble his mujahedeen to battle Hussein and protect the Arabian peninsula.

Last summer, when CNN acquired a cache of internal Al Qaeda training videotapes, they discovered a Qaeda documentary that was highly critical of Hussein. That theme continues in the latest audiotape.. bin Laden can't resist condemning that regime: "The jurisdiction of the socialists and those rulers has fallen a long time ago .... Socialists are infidels wherever they are, whether they are in Baghdad or Aden."

Al Qaeda wants the Hussein regime overthrown. There's also good reason to believe they want to incite a U.S. invasion of Iraq to draw new recruits into the Al Qaeda campaign against a so-called "Crusader"-Israeli alliance aimed at conquering the Middle East. Provoking a crackdown by the enemy has been a key terrorist strategy for as long as there have been terrorists.

More: http://www.cato.org/dailys/03-05-03.html

[Name removed]

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[mikh]

25. ...soo sorry

...but the vision you have of your own country as being totally evil is awful and sad.
I repeat, go back to the early campaign, I'll do it for you if I find the time, and read what John Kerry had to say about Iraq before he flip-flopped.
John Kerry remember - the Democratic candidate?

[catmandu57]

33. I'm not in the mood for this bullshit today

and I don't believe you'll be with us much longer, don't let the door hit you on the way out.

[illflem]

12. I feel we should be glad that our government

is acting on the cheap.

Judging from it's track record half the funds will be "lost" and half of the remaining sucked up by bureaucratic red tape.
Better to contribute to private organizations for the aid.
Also anyone who thinks current administration's aid won't come with strings attached is living in a dream world.

[mikh]

14. Point taken.

[KlatooBNikto]

15. If you had called for this government to act on the cheap in Iraq and

spend its way like a drunken sailor on the tsunami victims, your concern for fiscal responsibility might make some sense.

[mikh]

22. ...pardon?

[xchrom]

31. you can't understand that?

you believe in a manufactured history about iraq, zarquawi, bin laden and saddam -- so you can't understand having real compassion for the people of the world when tragedy like this strikes.

your line of reasoning has killed a 100,00 thousand innocent souls -- continues to needlessly kill our own people in an illegal war -- a war without end.

bushco knew iraq was not a threat and i don't think you believe your own version of the history you put out.

[bklyncowgirl]

20. "Keep up the good work George" luvya Osama

Even if the stone hearted war criminals in DC aren't moved by the plight of these poor people, maybe the thought of what those now generally moderate Muslims in Indonesia are going to think of us if we do not lend our sympathy, our aid and our expertise to helping them through this horrible disaester.

Keep it up and they'll turn this into another recruiting poster for Al Queda.