Is today's helicopter disaster a turning point???

[Gloria]

Frankly, I've been waiting for the first "mass death" incident to occur. Sadly, it happened today. I must admit, that when I woke up to the news on the BBC World Service, I was still shocked.

This is the sort of thing that can't be totally swept under the carpet.
It's not one or two deaths hidden on the back pages of the newspaper or the crawl at the bottom of the TV screen.

Does our "leader" finally come out of his bubble and go to a memorial service??? How can he not??? If he does, his image is linked to this sad day. If he doesn't his detachment and lack of feeling speaks even louder.

Today, I was listening to Talking Points on the BBC WS and Iraqi citizens were calling in. The host asked if "ordinary Iraqis" could support the insurgent attacks. One man said, "Sure they can...The Americans have take our jobs, our money..." And there were more callers from Iraq who expressed similarly negative thoughts.

We've stolen Iraqi businesses, resources from the people of that tortured country, we've robbed them of their health and cultural treasures.....and now, the lives of our men and women continue to be stolen by a fool and his greedy mission.

[wuushew]

1. No

Only a beruit style barracks bombing will shift public opinion.

On a side the next polling data will allow me to test a public support hypothesis based on casualty rates.

[Tyler Durden]

30. Wait.

It'll happen. Only a matter of time. The Iraqi (insert your favorite name for our opponents here) are much better armed and organized than the Lebanese were.

[wtmusic]

2. Could be--I bet it took * down a point

Approval is at what, 48%? After the 'Fallujah Massacre' he lost two and never got 'em back.

[Terran]

3. Good points

It'll be virtually impossible for Bush to remain aloof from this. On some weird level, one death per day is easy to dismiss, but 15 soldiers? in a repeat of Mogadishu? He has to say something. He has to attend a service. It won't look good for him, either way.

[brainshrub]

16. It's not 1 per day

It's 1.91.

http://lunaville.org/warcasualties/Summary.aspx

But who's counting? Bush isn't.

[hang a left]

20. 20 were killed today 4 in fallujah, 15 in helicopter and 1 somewhere

else, I forgot.

[karlschneider]

4. It sure as hell was for at least 15 families.

:grr:

[Postman]

5. Is it "terrorism" when soldiers are attacked?

I call it a legitimate military target.

Tragic nonetheless.

Fact is this occupation was lost from the getgo.

Big lies to launch it, undermanned to continue it, no post-invasion plan

This is one big political tar-baby and Bush ain't gettin out of this ine unscathed.

[PurityOfEssence]

29. Ya know, that's just a damned good point

Not only that, it's PRECISELY what the Mujahadeen were doing in Afghanistan not so many years ago: using shoulder-mounted light SAMs to shoot down helicopters of the occupying power. Then, they were "freedom fighters", of course. Obviously, this isn't too shocking, but the concept of being "terrorists" when shooting at combat troops in a war zone is ridiculous. Yes, they're guerillas, irregulars, partisans and all sorts of other things, but terrorists?

Every so often you'll catch a reference to "innocent soldiers" (like in the Saudi Arabian bombing a few years back) that's just galling.

We shouldn't be there; it's as simple as that. I'm sorry that my countrymen and women who've elected to serve us all for our protection are now in a war of conquest that really isn't their fault, but a spade's a spade.

[nostamj]

6. it should be

one interesting thing I picked up today.

the CBC is reporting a "WEEK of Resistance" while the US media talked only about a DAY of Resistance"

if the deaths today were the START of something, then this week could certainly be a tipping point for BushCo and their sick 'war'

i don't think we'll ever know how many died on the chopper today. but if we have sustained double-digit deaths (along with the ongoing double-digit wounded) he's GOT to be in trouble.

the deaths are bad enough, but the story of the wounded needs to get out. esp. following the stories about the warehousing of the wounded and lack of care, decent facilities, etc.

we need to know how many have died of their wounds. that number is (AFAIK) still a mystery.

[Gloria]

9. Yes, the BBC Talking Points also recapped the terrible WEEK in

Iraq...They had a British colonel (I think he was a colonel) on delivering the "but things are better, the Iraqi people were abused for a long time....." etc. etc....
But then came the phone calls from the Iraqis...as well as an American living somewhere in SE Asia who said she felt less safe because of Bush's policies than she had even just after 911....

[nostamj]

11. CBC reported that this weekend

was the START of the Week of Resistance

that's why I fear the news for the rest of the week...

[DUreader]

7. I suspect not, see if it gets much coverage tommorrow or if

as I guess it gets called a crash and is not talked about much

casualties get listed under 'accidental' status and we never hear how

many of the injured subsequently die and how many are paralysed, braindamaged and/or amputees.

[grasswire]

8. please

Let's not talk about this in terms of political benefits. Please.

Let the facts speak for themselves.

[jumptheshadow]

13. Grasswire, I agree with you

eom

[Deja Q]

19. In a moral and just society, I'd agree with you. Unfortunately,

Sadly, America's been anything BUT that. I'd dare even ask if it was EVER moral or just.

Look how the repukes twisted the Wellstone memorial for their own gain. Norm Coleman even thanked God for winning at the time, which equates thanking God for having Wellstone killed. He even spoke negatively of Wellstone long after his death.

This MUST be maneuvered into a political cause, if not more.

Politics is the only way we can get the idiot* out of power and a semblence of morality created, which would then lead to a solution worth living for. Sorry, but I will not take a break under any circumstance. Bush is maladjusted, if not just plain evil - he ustn't remain in any power of any sort.

[Rose Siding]

10. Maybe in a horrible way-

Fox is running the footage of the jubilant Iraqis over and over. If there is a turning point, it may only make it more likely that the "public" here will see the broader Iraqi public as enemies. To do otherwise would be to admit responsibility for being an aggressive, invading occupying army.

I mourn the loss of lives but how can anyone be surprised that this would happen?

[wuushew]

12. That would not follow the Vietnam effect...

however this is not 1968's media either.

[stopbush]

23. Lott floated the "mow 'em down" balloon

for the bushies this week. That was no accident. Next will come the Cheney pronouncement to "go large," which will mean an escalation of the war.

I fear that we may see horrors from the US side that have made our massacre to date seem insignificant. I can see bush ordering that Tikrit (SH hometown) be levelled with tactical nukes. I can see bush getting support from Israel on this to keep Congress at bay.

In a sense, the worse it gets for the US and the grunts on the ground, the better it gets for the BFEE. The American populace is by and large a cowardly lot of couch potatoes. They'll follow bush to their graves - even send their children to die - as long as they can do it from the comfort of their homes bouyed by the false assurances of their government and the solace they draw from the imaginery sky-being.

I fear the worst is yet to come.

[9215]

24. No matter what Bush does it will fail

Remember somebody said about Vietnam: "We will bomb them back to the stone age".

If this fucking baboon king doesn't learn from this most recent history then fuck him and the assholes who back him.

70% of the American public falsely believe that Saddam was behind 9/11. They see this war in Iraq as a do or die struggle against a mortal enemy. This is one way it differs from Vietnam and Kissinger recently saying that if we leave Iraq the enemy will follow us is fomenting fear out of this ignorance.

[submerged99]

14. Only the draft will change opinions

I think we are at a point where all of Bush's supporters will support him, no matter how many casualties the U.S army takes. I think the 46-50% of people polled will stay there even if Bush was to drop a bomb on the iraqis or the U.S military was to take another Beirut type blow.

The only way I feel they would change their opinion is if Bush was to reconstitute the draft because then that would mean they could be personally affected. Just my opinion.

[RapidCreek]

22. Your absolutely correct

RC

[AlinPA]

25. I agree.

His support is solid with republicans. God, guns and flags.

[jody]

15. Not a turning point. AWOL and his cabal have risked everything on

victory in Iraq and then to bully and intimidate the other ME countries.

They and their colleagues from the Sharon/Likud-Zionist group have nothing to lose. If they don't succeed this time, they can try again in a few years because they control enough votes to pass bipartisan legislation moving them inexorably toward a New World Order.

There will always be a battle between good and evil to control the world. Right now, evil has the high ground.

[leftofthedial]

17. no turning point

just a milestone in the timeline of another escalating Repuke foreign policy disaster.

[Kamika]

18. no, they are experts at making ppl forget stuff

Anyone remember that cia leak? anyone?

[Don_G]

21. Nope

The stuff Dimbo pulls outrages us, but dosen't make a whit's bit of difference to the average person out there.

It's going to take a spark to set the Country off and much more than the non-news that Dimbo and his Cabinet finds fund-raising to be much more interesting than attending the funerals for the Military that died for Exxon, Texaco and Halliburton.

[kalazh]

26. it mght be

I don't know

[jmowreader]

27. No...

It should be, but it won't be.

Bush must but can't pull out. If he doesn't, thousands of our soldiers will eventually die; if he does, his chickenhawk supporters will desert him. How will it look to a guy with a "These Colors Don't Run" bumper sticker on his Hummer to have the guy he supported pull troops out of Iraq? And he needs all of those people if he wants to be reinstalled.

I wouldn't be surprised if he pulls a Reagan and starts another war to take our minds off this one.

[benburch]

28. Yes, it is a turning point!

Here is how I think it will turn; By the end of this week we will be starting up the draft system, and kicking the war into high gear. I hope I am wrong.

-Ben

[nostamj]

31. bush cannot campaign on a DRAFT

not with this QUAGMIRE going on.

there (sadly) will more attacks and (very sadly) this will not be the worst...

a turning point? enough bushies with dead children, no jobs and no future...