I don't think they deserve your time. Glad they're gone but you can do more good by writing about something meaningful. I'm not trying to say that I don't enjoy your writing regardless of the subject, but would prefer that you ignore these slime for the slime they are. Elevate...

cheers,

Dick

Let me know where they are buried. It's the only reason I'd ever go back to Iraq...

To take a leak on their graves.

(Never said I was a High Minded Sapper. Whole concept is oxymoronic. Moronic Sapper, maybe).

Sapper Mike

Are there no depths to which these people will NOT sink?

There may be, Sir, but we as intelligent Americans are already ashamed of their loathsome quailings and bleatings, so I daresay we'd be none too eager to learn the depths to which these Liberals can slide...

KDean

"I am angry. And when I get angry I want to write an essay. And I will."

At least that's one GOOD thing we'll get as a result of those miserable slugs...a new must-read Bill Whittle essay. (By "miserable slugs," I mean the left-wing whackos who view everything in terms of taking potshots at the President; Uday and Qusay would seem to deserve an epithet more like "demons incarnate.")

When I broke the news on Electric Minds earlier today, one of our conference hosts replied, "I hope Uday spends his eternity going through a heavenly plastic shredder. That bastard." My comment was, "An M-16 beats four aces." (referring, of course, to the "Iraq's Most Wanted card deck," of which the Terrible Twosome were two of the aces)

You know, this afternoon I thought to myself, "I bet that right now some people are hatching conspiracy theories." You know--aha, Bush was just about to be impeached for telling those lying lies in the State of the Union, so he arranges to have Saddam's kids killed!

And, of course, no sooner did I email those thoughts to a friend, then good old Hesiod Thingummy came through.

I can't help it, I always come up with the conspiracy theories. Bad habit of mine. Before Wellstone's body was cold, I was thinking, boy, the aluminum-foil-helmet crowd is gonna go crazy over this one.

(Turns out Lileks has the same bad habit, for what that's worth.)

Erbo says, 'Uday and Qusay would seem to deserve an epithet more like "demons incarnate."'

Not "incarnate" any more. And I think they're learning a thing or two about old-school demons.

Kyrie eleison.

It's time to throw a party to celebrate the deaths of these two piglets. Just two days ago I saw a show on the History (or was it the Learning?) Channel about these two monsters. Far from not deserving our time, we need to expose them. Their evils must be exposed and disseminated for all the world to see by someone like Our Captain. Go ahead Bill, give these former dictators-in-training and their liberal supporters a good reaming. They deserve it.

As for Wellstone conspiracies: I live in Minnesota. The wreckage was still smoldering in that frozen swamp when some fool at the U of M Minneapolis campus put up a banner screaming "WHO KILLED WELLSTONE?" There's even a former professor out there with a website claiming that some nebulous agency of the federal government used a top-top-top-top secret electromagnetic pulse weapon to disable Wellstone's plane.

Let's think that one through for a minute. To the best of our known physics, the only way to create an EMP is with a nuclear explosion in the upper atmosphere. (Ever see "Goldeneye"?) I recently drove through the area where the crash occured. Lots of birds, lots of critters, thick green foliage, no leftover radiation to interfere with my vehicle's onboard computer system. Maybe the FAA's theory is more plausable. A 20+ year old plane flying dangerously close to stall speed in bad weather (October in Northern Minnesota is roughly equivalent to Siberia) with at least one pilot who had "sexed up" his flying record. Not a good combo. But don't let facts get in the way of a good conspiracy theory.

I wrote a celebratory haiku for the occasion. It's on my blog, but here it is again:

Hussein boys kick back
rockets strike their jacuzzi
four testicles boil

Also wanted to say thanks to the people who, with true class, expressed levelheaded disagreement with certain aspects of my point of view in the "Trinity" thread.

Hapjang,

Kevin

Amen. I was getting all frustrated and all I needed to get a little Whittle fix.
When I first heard they bagged those two little punks I was glad, but the icing on the cake is that unlike getting vaporized by a daisy cutter landing on on their respective heads, they had plenty of time to see it coming. Kudos to the 101st Airborne and whoever the future multimillionaire is that ratted out those pricks. Here's hoping when they finally tag Saddam they hang all three of them upside down in the middle of Baghdad Mussolini-style.
Hm. Such hostility on my part. And I didn't even live under those bastards.

As early as last night Rep Charles Rangle (D-NY) had grabbed a reporter and was bloviating that it's illegal to assassinate foreign leaders and that Mr. Bush should be prosecuted. As if a gunfight during an arrest is an assassination.
Unless there's been a law passed that I hadn't heard about, even if we HAD snuck a sniper, say, into range and blown them away without a chance to surrender, it would not be a violation of Law. It would be a violation of a previous President's executive order, I believe it was Jerry Ford. Mr. Bush is no more required to obey Jerry Ford's orders than I am King George's orders.
Lies, from the Left, how shocking.

As Jay Leno said last night:

"What a great day, Jessica Lynch came home and Uday and Qusay didn’t."

Amen.

Bill - Well said and nice work (as usual). Get going on that essay. We are going to need it and need it soon. The drums are beating...

Sapper Mike - Been there once, too, and don't want to return, but I'll take that trip with you, drink a few gallons of water before and...

Blackfive

Can't wait for the next essay. How's this for a title...JUSTICE!.

Bill -

I'm afraid I went a step further in my wishes for the details of their end. I hope the 14 year old son went first, so whichever one was 'daddy' had a chance to feel some of the pain he inflicted on the countless other families he destroyed. It's a shame that pain was to last only a few minutes - thousands of others will live with it for the rest of their lives.

Amen, Bill!
I've had my concerns about the Iraqi campaign - not whether we needed to deal with Saddam, but how and when...
Still, whatever else happens, we freed the people of Iraq from a truly monstrous tyranny, and whether or that alone is a sufficient cause for war, it suits me just fine.

BTW, how will I be able to get a copy of your book?

Thanks for your good work - you've done some of the best writing I've seen on the net!

"What the hell has happened to those people?"
I say nothing, except that now more of them are showing their true colors. The movie "Clockwork Orange"
Charles Manson's diatribe in court, and the Unibomber's manifesto tell and age old story about "Liberal"
thinking.

TO: Bill Whittle
RE: Shame Anyone?

"Is there no shame, none whatsoever, for someone who would take the side of these murderers and torturer..." -- Bill Whittle

None whatsoever, compadre.

Shame requires a standard of measure against which good conduct is differentiated from ungood. And, last time I looked, the people you are referring to don't have a standard, at least not one that is generally recognized. They are a classic example of 'situational ethics'...it all depends on what suits their purposes. And as a result, yesterday's truth is tomorrow's lie.

Regards,

Chuck(le)

Thanks for the announcement, Bill. Why is it, do you suppose, that all of a sudden Pavlov's dog comes to mind?

I'm NOT a Southerner, DEFINITELY NOT a supporter of the Confederate cause. However, these words are far more appropriate today that when they were said by a maniac in a theater almost 140 years ago:

Sic Semper Tyrannis

It’s funny that Erbo would call the lefties slugs. I just blogged about that.

"A while ago, Noam Chomsky declared that no one should criticize an opponent of the US government, no matter what they’ve done - because telling the truth about the evils of an enemy distracts the reader from the despicable deeds supposedly committed by the ultimate evil, the democratic government of the United States. Any enemy of democracy is Noam and the hardcore left’s best friend. They’ve defended al Qaeda, Saddam - and now they are doing their best to defend his sadistic sons.

I’m now convinced that if flesh eating slugs from the planet Zod descended upon the earth with plans to eat our President first, then the rest of the human race, and if a lefty had a salt shaker in his hand, he wouldn't use the salt. He'd put it down, welcome the slugs and take them to the President. He'd agree to be eaten - to him, anything would be better than living under Bush’s proto-fascist government."

- I was angry too. I couldn’t believe they’d go so far, to defend those two. Now I see that they don’t think, they react – just like slugs. To them, U.S.=bad. Enemy of the U.S.=good.

Can’t wait for the essay.

Hey Bill,

Kudos on the reminder, and can't wait for the essay. I agree with the reader above about the hard Left having no morality compass whatsoever anymore...and I am not talking about a morality compass in the normal Judeo-Christian sense of the word. I am talking about having the freaking human decency and intestinal fortitude to say, "Hey, you know what? Saddam and his murdering thug sons were menaces to the entire free world, but even worse yet, to the people they purported to 'represent'. I am glad they are gone, that no more children will be executed or imprisoned, no more women raped, and no more people beaten, tortured, or put into shredders." Is that so much to ask? Apparrently it is, especially when there is a potential potshot to be taken at President Bush. As many disagreements as I may have had with him on other issues, I think he stands in the top 3 all time of Presidents on foreign policy boldness and initiative. I don't want any of the nine dwarves or Hillary "Soialized Medicine" Clinton fighting the terrorists, and I don't think anyone else does either. Until the hard Left realizes this, and has an articulable and strong foreign policy, as well as some other non-Bush bashing leg to stand on in domestic matters (rasing taxes won't do it), it will always be National Security, Stupids! I will leave you Bill with one of your own quotes..."I would like to think that some of these murdering terrorist scumbags had as their last thought on Earth that maybe 9?11 wasn't such a hot idea after all." Amen brother, take care and God Bless.

I just blundered into this site, and - guys and gals - you are terrific. Put me down for the future as a regular visitor. I do want to post some good news about the death of those murderers - I just read that three days ago they ran out of virgins in Paradise. As for Rep. Rangel's interview on FOX, I'm still waiting for a direct answer to one question. Someone should call him the Artful Dodger, but then Charles Dickens might object. It's amazing how the liberals can not find one good thing about what George the Younger has done. The game is still being played, but at the end, his vision and fortitude will make this a much safer place - for America and the world. Despite being in the midst of a war, he should be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Wonder what the liberals would think about that nomination. When all is said and done, who will have done more for world peace - George W. Bush or Jummy Carter?

Duly elected leader? Hah, hah!
In a true democracy the candidate getting the most votes wins. Dubya was appointed by the judiciary. Remember that.

Vote for in 2004!

Stu

Chris W. writes, 'I don't want any of the nine dwarves or Hillary "Socialized Medicine" Clinton fighting the terrorists, and I don't think anyone else does either.'

I'm about as right-wing as they come, and let me tell you this--I'm damned glad to have Tony "Socialized Medicine" Blair fighting the terrorists with us.

Stu Savory writes, 'Vote for in 2004!'

Whoa. Deep, man. Verb sap--gotta watch out for those <>s.

So tell me--did the electoral college bother you in October 2000? (Had you even heard of it?)

Stu Savory, perhaps unwittingly, captures the argument in a nutshell. In his world, the Dems are out of power over an illegal, legal ruling. (Never mind that by definition, that is impossible at the Supreme Court) The reacquisition of power is the number one objective and that outcome justifies any means. Liberals, you see, only have everyone's best interests at heart.

Thanks for the laugh Stu!

I love it when Europeans attempt to make observations about The United States. Their sheer ignorance can be breathtaking.

Stu, please read more and post less, it will save you embarrassment in the future.

Just a minor point for Stu Savory's edification: The United States is not a 'true democracy' - it is a federal republic.

Anyone have some cites or links for the leftists who are failing to rejoice at the deaths of Uday and Qusay and/or are pissed at the lack of due process for them? I think I've seen *one* link in the comments and none in the essay.

Meanwhile, I rather wish an arrest had been possible, though it probably wasn't tactically
feasible. (Could the soldiers have surrounded the building and waited?)

I don't care much whether the brothers had gotten a trial (though perhaps interesting information would have come out), but two extra people got killed. One of them may have been guilty on his own (dictator's bodyguards could be doing some murdering or torturing), but I haven't heard about any evidence or even a solid identification in the matter.

The other non-Uday/Qusay corpse was a 14-year-old boy, "probably the son of Qusay". Again, *if* it's the son, then he may have done major crimes himself, but I haven't seen any evidence. Hogarth is pleased at the thought that maybe the kid died first and Qusay suffered some extra as a result. On the other hand, maybe the kid died last and most painfully. Maybe he was the local equivalent of a pizza delivery guy or he was a house-cleaner or someone else's kid being held as a hostage.

Military action is noisy and direct and it's satisfying when it works, but actually thinking about the collateral damage might take some of the fun out.

Well, a few Iraqis wanted them taken alive, too, just so *they* could put them to death after a lengthy trial.... maybe Saddam can be taken alive and put in a court like that guy Milosovich (sp?) or Norgegia or whomever.... but I doubt it. Saddam will either fight to the death or kill himself and won't give anyone the satisfaction of a trial in an air conditioned court room.

What ever happened to the wife of Saddam? Maybe she can take the bodies of the sons for burial... but I can't remember where she is, I think she no longer lives in Iraq, but I am not certain. I also read today that the Iraqi Council has viewed the bodies of the sons and is helping to determine what should be done with them now. I know it seems barbaric to put out grisly death photos, but it seems people in Iraq want some proof.... and even the photos won't be proof enough, so they have dental records, x rays, dna and finger prints. But even *that* won't be enough for some people.

So, I am sure it was discussed by all the military minds.... what to do.... but you would think taking them alive would have been the best thing... martyr's get lots of mileage over there.

Nancy L. writes, 'Anyone have some cites or links for the leftists who are failing to rejoice at the deaths of Uday and Qusay and/or are pissed at the lack of due process for them?'

Steve Den Beste rounded up a few.

'Meanwhile, I rather wish an arrest had been possible, though it probably wasn't tactically feasible. (Could the soldiers have surrounded the building and waited?)'

I think the fear was, what if there were escape tunnels or somesuch? They've gotten away too many times before, we didn't want to risk that happening now.

'The other non-Uday/Qusay corpse was a 14-year-old boy, "probably the son of Qusay". Again, *if* it's the son, then he may have done major crimes himself, but I haven't seen any evidence.'

He may not have committed any crimes, but he was on the wrong side of a firefight in a war. (There were several hours of fighting--the kid could've surrendered, but he didn't.)

Damned shame that U&Q let a kid fight for them. But, after all, they were evil bastards, so it isn't that surprising.

And if he was a hostage--well, then, wouldn't the moral culpability attach to the hostage-takers, and not to us?

Dang it! *sniff* I love you guys!

It is so good to hear so many reasoned voices rising out of all the clamor and tumult. And it's so great to hear from the likes of Stu in a forum like this. It's kinda' like the famous birthday episode from the old Steve Allen show (at least I THINK it was a birthday episode), in which he got pelted, by his crew and production staff, with pie after pie after pie after pie. Hilarious.

Thank-you, Stu, for the comic relief.

I must go dab away a tear now.

Keep up the good work, all.

GHS

Andrew, some of the reports coming out about the attacks on the troops is that they are being done by kids.... here is a link, sorry I don't know how to format it nicely in HTML:

http://www.nydailynews.com/04-03-2003/news/wn_report/v-pfriendly/story/72391p-67079c.html

Yes, I know, it's the daily news, but there are other places to find the same info, search for:
Saddam's Lion Cubs

... so anyway, it is not surprising they got their 14 yr old son to pick up arms, at least not to me.

The Guardian, UK, reports the kid was the last to go:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1004750,00.html

And here is a recent article on how the attacks on our troops are carried out:

http://www.statesman.com/nationworld/content/news/072003/0720insurgents.html

Like Den Beste mentions in his excellent essay, it has to become unfashionable to use the USA as a scapegoat for the failure of prosperity in that region, and put the blame squarely where it belongs.... on the religious teachings that perpetuate militant hatred.

Note:
The bounty for the 2 sons together, 30 mil, is higher than for Saddam alone, 25 mil. So, I would raise the bounty to twice that, for Saddam alive. And make it 30 for Saddam dead. Or some kind of scale like that.

An Iraqi blogger describes unfolding events as he sees them:

http://dear_raed.blogspot.com/

Dubya was appointed by the judiciary.

I know I shouldn't feed the troll, but it's fun...

Stu, The US Supreme Court merely told the Florida Supreme Court to stop changing the rules of the game to suit their whims. If you know anything about law (I'm betting money you don't) and history (again, I'll take odds on this) and all the facts of the case (not one chance in a thousand that you do), then you'd understand that the US Supreme Court's ruling was absolutely correct.

Now, go back under the bridge where you belong.

As I recall, the age of adulthood is set at puberty in Islamic beliefs. To address some concerns voiced regarding the young man's presence and subsequent death, it is likely logical to conclude that he chose to be present, as an adult combatant. Postulations of "delivery boy", or "hostage" don't hold water in my book. First, men on the run like Q&U don't tend to advertise their presence by calling for delivery of any sort. Especially with the "heat" so close by. Second, the young man could have surrendered, as Andrew S pointed out.

But I am not here to debate the "rightness" of the young man's--Mustafa's(?)--passing.

Bill asked a question. He asked, "Is there no shame, none whatsoever, for someone who would take the side of these murderers and torturers just to take a shot at their own country and its duly elected leader? Is there no depths to which these people can sink?

None?"

Well, as far as political depravity--that answers itself. Are you familiar with the term, "monkey trick", Bill? In writing, it refers to certain little quirks in style the author can use to manipulate their audience. In the interest of brevity, I won't get into the list of literary monkey tricks, here. But blustering, obfuscation of facts, mud-slinging, and spin-doctoring are examples of political monkey tricks. The opposition will use it as a tool to manipulate the audience, in a bald attempt to turn their sympathies toward the person making the declamations.

Monkey tricks are also used in journalism. They can be recognized by little verbal twists used to evoke an emotional response. You've seen many examples. In "Magic", you illustrated the point by using the example of redirection. (I thought your exemplification was brilliantly handled, by the way.)

It is interesting to note that the Society of Professional Journalists, while purporting to call for honesty and sensitivity in journalism, does not stress the importance of keeping one's personal politics out of journalism. (Although it's mentioned. Briefly. In passing.) Most of the thrust of the code, when a critical reader looks between the lines, seems to communicate, "Get the story at any cost." View the Code of Ethics here.

This is a long, rambling way of saying that no, there is no shame, Bill. And more's the pity, for it would show a modicum of maturity which I believe is glaringly absent in news agencies and general politics today.

But maybe there's some comfort? Just by cruising through the comments sections of this, and other articulate bloggers' sites, there seem to be an awful lot of critical thinkers out there who can recognize bullshit from the accompanying reek.

Regards,
Linda

A warning from Scots Historian Professor Alexander Tyler, circa 1787,
Re: The Fall of the Athenian Republic.

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse (generous gifts) from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the world's greatest civilization has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence. From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance, from abundance to complacency; from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back into bondage."


Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University of Law, St. Paul, MN passed on that gem & provides the following 2000 election facts for consideration.

Population of counties won by Gore 127 million, won by Bush 143 million

Sq. miles of country won by Gore 580,000, won by Bush 2,427,000

States won by Gore 19, by Bush 29

Murder per 100,000 residents in counties won by Gore 13.2 by Bush 2.1 (not a typo)

Professor Olson adds, "And may I add that the map of the territory Bush won was (mostly) the land owned by the people of this great country. Not the citizens living in cities owned by the government and living off the government....

Taking the path of least resistance is what makes rivers run crooked!

....................

Should we find ourselves in a state of apathy, think about the quote from Edmund Burke, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

VRWCman -

Minor point, EMP is not created solely by nuclear explosion. Rather we discovered it as a side-effect of nuclear testing. Over the last few years a great deal of effort has been put forth in developing non-nuclear EMP bombs.

More generally, in the short term, I am more than willing to see the asshatted fuckwits who are less than ecstatic about the death of Q&U, continue to hoist themselves on their own petard. In the long term, however, I am beginning to wonder if these folks aren't so seriously bent in their world view that trying to bring them back into the fold will be like the Catholic trying to reunite with the Protestants during the Wars of Reformation.

I hope that this virulent strain of idiocy is a short-term plague and not something that's here to stay.

AR

Thursdays usually kind of suck- not as bad as Monday but not as good as Friday...I ( and I think this is OK by the Big Guy's standards ) did a little jump for joy when I found out these 2 pricks were dead. There is so much more to add as to what they did but let's let it rest at 'they ain't gonna be pullin' their shit no mo' "
There IS justice in the world...takes time but it's there...

Nancy, reports from the scene indicate that the 14-year old continued to fire atour troops after the other 3 people, if you can cll them that, in the house were down. He CHOSE to keep shooting at our troops. He CHOSE to get killed. I see no reason to mourn his end.

'[the 14-year-old] CHOSE to keep shooting at our troops. He CHOSE to get killed. I see no reason to mourn his end.'

He died like a warrior. I can respect a warrior who dies in honorable combat, even on the other side, even on an evil side. And I can mourn for him. He deserved a better father and a better general.

Still, if the last two hundred years teaches us anything, it's that shooting at Americans is a good way to get yourself killed. (That's why the death toll in the Civil War was so high--everyone was shooting at Americans, which is a damned dangerous thing to do.)

Sucks for the kid. But it's the thought that counts- the kid presumably wasn't fully cognizant of just what wonderful company he was in, so say a prayer if you're of that persuasion. And hey, if you have to die fighting for the most vile sentient creatures in decades, wouldn't you want to do it before you were old enough to be fully brainwashed?

Anyway, the reaction astounds me. It's like clearing the benches every time an opposing batter gets a hit. Hey, those were the two fairest political points ever scored. The ball almost hit the 2nd baseman in the nads on its way into center field, what can you possibly protest here?

The left is by far the scummiest of the scum on this earth. I'd be quicker to make friends with a schizophrenic than a raging liberal wacko. Visit my site @ http://think-about-it.us

-Jarred

Without meaning to detract from any of the other fine comments, I would like to particularly thank Ron Bowen for his two-part post.

Uh, I may be behind the info curve here, but the last reports I saw said that the kid was only wounded, he was the single survivor.

Is there any confirmation, one way or the other, on this?

For the record, I wish that the Twin Spawn could have been captured. Qusai, in particular, was for many years his father's Minister of Hiding WMD, so it might have been illuminating to chat with him. It also would have been a great opening case for a new Iraqi judiciary.

But that's in a perfect world. Given a choice between killing them and letting them escape, well, that's no choice at all, is it?

C3PO (in that high pitched british droid voice): Lord Vader, by order of the Rebel Alliance, you are hereby placed under arrest. Please follow me into this little round escape pod where we will be jettisoned to the planet Tatooine below..

Darth Vader (paying no mind to the droid): Tatooine is now within range of our weapons. Commence destruction procedure.

10 seconds later: KAAA BOOM!

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/04/14/iraq/main549376.shtml

^^^^^ Story about Saddam Hussein's wife from back in April, 2003... she was thought to be in Syria. The USA military are keeping the bodies until they are claimed by a family member.

(And Krupke, there were no survivors, Uday, Qusay, his 14 yr old son and a body guard's bodies were all removed from the house in Mosul.)

I would hope the bodies are not turned over to family. We don't need any burial place to become a site of pilgrimage for other wackos and nutjobs. They should be dumped in an unmarked, undisclosed location somewhere like we do with other trash.

I met Ron Bowen at McCarren Airport in Las Vegas a few years ago. He and I share a very good friend, although we had not met previously. It was the mutual friend's bachelor party, and you must believe me when I say that MUCH hilarity ensued.

Ron is a goddam brilliant guy; funny, too. Ron is also the kind of guy who will deck someone in a bar if they insult his friends. How can you not love someone like that?

I am building up a healthy head of steam these days, but I find myself being forced to deal with two seperate issues. One is STRENGTH...I think that will be next (formerly known as POWER).

The other subject I am hot to touch on is very much along the lines of Ron's post, and, coincidentally, much about the electoral college and other anti-democratic mechanisms that preserve democracy from mob rule. So REPUBLIC is on the near horizon, as soon as I can get some free time. Sometime during next week, I hope.

I NEED AN EVAC HERE!!!!

TO: Tom the Barbarian
RE: Wishful Thinking

"I would hope the bodies are not turned over to family." -- Tom the Barbarian

According to Jame "Best of the Web Today" Taranto, the remains are being held in refrigerated facilities at the Baghdad Airport.

A request has been publicized that a member of the immediate family should come to claim them. [Note: Sounds like a 'trap'.]

Regards,

Chuck(le)

My recollection is that at least amoung Saudi Arabs the tradition is burial in unmarked graves, though this does not necessarily mean their locations would be secret.

Some folk of a vengeful bent might say, find out what are the ancient sacred ways of handling the revered corpse among Saddam's people, then VIOLATE EVERY LAST ONE OF 'EM!

Heavens forfend!

Well, hey! Seems to me that's a method of wrecking your enemies chances of a trouble-free afterlife in Many cultures... despoil the body, mutilate, dis-honor, besmirch, degrade, yuckify, and generally stomp on it, then cast the innards to the dogs.

Seems to me a civilization that abandons its cultural rituals has lost its heart!

DM >:D

The reaction of the leftist weenies to the killing of these two dogs is beyond belief. These two were snarling, biting, rabid puppies, and the proper response to that is a bullet to the head. To refer to them, or consider them, as human beings is an insult to virtually every other human on the planet.

To Chuck(le):
Yes, it would be interesting if a family memeber showed up for the bodies, especially when we stop to consider that in Islamic tradition, the washing of a man's body is performed by other men.

I'm very sure our people would like to ask that male relative a few "innocent" questions regarding the health and livelihood of certain other family members. laughs

'A request has been publicized that a member of the immediate family should come to claim them.'

I think you're referring to this article:

Saddam to Offer Eulogy at Sons' Funeral

Thanks for the kind words Bill! I am about to go off-line for a bit. I pick up a U-Haul in the morning and move 7 miles north to Moore, Oklahoma. Being 7 miles away from the tornado capitol of the planet was just not good enough, so I'm moving there. You're comment regarding some fool insulting my friends in a bar is totally accurate. What I find so funny, about myself, is that you could pretty much go about TRYING to punch my buttons (on a personal level) and I'd probably buy you a drink. But try some provokation towards a friend...God help you. The only thing worse would be some kind of insult to my 18-month-old daughter. Holy shite...it would take one altogether too large dose of thujone (the primary psychoactive in absinthe) for me to even begin to imagine!

Anyway, like I said...I'm moving tomorrow. The builder was "funded" today so today is the first day I actually own the house (mortgage not withstanding). I had already bought an American flag and a bracket, but needed a pole. I bought a pole, but it did not fit the bracket. I returned the pole b/c I could not get a flag and bracket at the store the pole came from. I tried and failed and achieving the "flag, pole, bracket" trifecta on another errand trip and decided to have a friend bring me a set I saw this morning (all 3 elements included). He did it, but the bracket was too large to fit in the place (other than my privacy fence, which I considered on a temporary contingency) that has wood available to install it (the place is ALL brick). Well, we can cut off the top of the bracket and still preserve the screw holes...so we will do it tomorrow. It pains me that it did not go up today, but I tried my damndest considering the closing of the house "craziness" and my preparation for the move (commencing in 10 hours). Give me a little time and I 'shall' return'
Ron

It is exactly for these reasons that many bleeding heart liberals have supported wars such as these... like they did during the Clinton administration. Meanwhile, those who are willing to put our own country first, and abide by the "national interest" position, which forms a basis for the true conservative view on foreign policy (and is embodied in the Sharon Statement, which forms the basis for the modern conservative movement) - it is those American patriots who oppose liberal wars. Governor George W. Bush, when campaigning for President, made clear his opposition to that type of promiscious intervention overseas. In making the case for this war, the issue has always been the self-defense of our people and our nation. As Kate O'Beirne of National Review stated, the liberation of the Iraqi people was known to be a result of this war, but not a rationale for it. The rationale for this war is the threat that Saddam is claimed to present to our people. Even President Bush, and many of his spokesmen, have seemingly been abiding by this.

Wow a Troll coming in an posting fake comments under another person's handle. Who would have thunk it? Hey Bill, can you edit the Trolls' comments? Then at least they might be funny

"Is there no shame, none whatsoever, for someone who would take the side of these murderers and torturers just to take a shot at their own country and its duly elected leader? Is there no depths to which these people can sink?"

You have awakened to the truth of the "lies of liberalism; what they are,who they are, what their agenda is; a deep pit indeed.

Well, someone with a LOT of class decided to post a comment under my friend Ron Bowen's name.

It was a troll trifecta, this one:

1. No return address -- COWARD
2. Used someone else's name -- TOTAL LACK OF INTEGRITY
3. Made comment about my friend being diagnosed with AIDS. What CLASS.

If we are judged by our enemies, then we are most definitely doing something right, because THIS was one rare piece of filth.

I may order an EJECT! EJECT! EJECT! T-shirt. It will have the logo on the front, and the words BANNED AND DELETED! on the back.

Bye now. Back to the muck under the rock. Chickenshit.

I must have missed something here. Did someone actually post a comment falsely claiming to be RON BOWEN, and that post has then been deleted? 'Cause I sure can't find any post that fits the description in Bill Whittle's post of July 27, 2003 11:16 AM.

Am I hallucinating?

Did I just say that?

David March

What happened to the label "liberal"? According to the concept that "institutions are opposed by radical ideas, which become institutions opposed by radical ideas", it was institutionalized. The word was once applied to an emerging group. Now emerging humans apply themselves to favorite parts of the accumulated dogma associated with the word.

To David March...

Yep.

To every question you asked.

GHS

Heh! I *love* this blog and (mostly) the kind of people who post comments here.

It just seems a pity to see all this intelligence and talent being wasted railing against the blinkered, unprincipled idiots of the Left.
There are far more interesting subjects.Why dignify the bastards with any more than a passing guffaw?
Any members of the VRWC visiting the Northern Territory, Australia, call in and I'll open a 30 pack of cold beer. (no wimpy six-packs up here)

Saddam's snots got snuffed, ha! ha! ha! As for the Supreme Court's controversial decisions, I support them. Bush is Constitutionally the President. The United States is not a democracy (mob rule) but a Constitutional republic with checks and balances, including an Electoral College, a Senate apportioned by states rather than by population, and, above all, an independent judiciary which can overrule the tyranny of the majority. Thanks to the Supreme Court (and those two brave men John Geddes Lawrence and Tyron Garner) we now, all of us, heterosexual _and_ homosexual, enjoy the right to privacy in our homes. Thank all the Gods and the Goddesses! THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA now, at long last, ATTAINETH ITS CAUSE: FREEDOM!

Always fun to come by and see what the wingnuts are up to!

Still the same old bloodlust!

Why didn't the Pentagon capture the Hussein boys alive and put them on trial instead of puttying them up and putting them on display?

Tell the Pentagon to look for Saddam at the summer home of his old pal and business partner Donald Rumsfeld.

As to selection 2000: read Palast's book.

(Though I know you won't)

OK: Back to the RNC talking point exchange.

Thanks for listening.

Ah...yes a drive by "attack" by a Lefty. Calls us names (wingnuts), claims we like killing people (bloodlust), states that we support terrorists (Rumsfeld and Saddam....), and then runs away without presenting any facts. How typically Left wing.

What is it about Bill's eloquence and intelligence that attracts the stupidest Trolls on the Net?

I'm curious, "Mr. Tullio"...

What do you think actually happened in that shoot-out over there? (and yes, it really was a shoot-out) Do you think Saddam's little baby cobras and their cohorts just came a-strollin' on out with their hands up, and we just riddled them to shreds for target practice? Do you think we barged in on a peaceful dinner scene, and then, as they were looking up in surprise at all the guns, we just started mowing them down for the sheer joy of it?

Does the fact that they were firing on US even enter into your thinking? Does the fact that they made no attempt to surrender, nor even STOP SHOOTING, even when three out of the four of them were already dead, have any bearing in your rationale at all? And just what exactly do you think happens when armed people exchange fire with other armed people and nobody surrenders?

Well, allow me to educate you... one side wins by killing, or at least incapacitating, everybody on the other side. It's that simple.

If they'd have surrendered, they would BE in custody right now, awaiting trial. If they would have just stopped shooting after receiving their first non-fatal wounds, they most likely would have been overrun and captured by force, but they'd still be alive. But they chose... THEY chose... to do neither. And they died in the very hail of bullets they wanted.

And that's the part that sucks for me... that they got to go the way THEY wanted to go, in their own little "blaze of glory." I would rather that they had been dragged out of their flattened house, half-crushed from the collapse of the building's walls that had been pushed in by bulldozers, but alive.

So don't be thinking that "we" got what "we" wanted out of this. Those bastards didn't suffer anywhere near enough.

But then, who am I talking to here? Probably just myself, since you've probably already vanished back into your self-deluding little Happy Theories treehouse club again.

And by the way; if it leans any farther left, that treehouse is gonna' slide right off that branch altogether. And then I'm sure it'll be all "our" fault for not getting you out before you rode it over the edge.

Dang.

GHS

Thanks for playing.

So---let me get this straight: The Marine unit had no alternative but to bring in the howitzer or whatever it was and blow the place to smithereens after receiving gunfire from the Hussein Boys and Saddam's 14 year old nephew and whoever the other person was?

I guess Janet Reno was right on Waco after all.

The obvious conspiracy, which none of you mentioned because you must be part of it, is that Uday and Qusay died in the bathroom and Elvis died in the bathroom. The US goverment killed the Husseins so they must have killed Elvis. There I said it. Now I'll just wait for the black helicopters to blow up my house.

'The obvious conspiracy, which none of you mentioned because you must be part of it, is that Uday and Qusay died in the bathroom and Elvis died in the bathroom.'

So did Vince Vega in Pulp Fiction. Coincidence? Suuure. Just keep telling yourself that.

Yes, they had an alternative. They could have sent in Marines to take their chances on capturing heavily-armed men in a structure they controlled alive. I'm really quite pleased that our military doesn't waste the lives of its men on suicide missions to capture alive butchers that don't want to be caught alive so they can be tried in court in a country that wasn't even involved and sent to tennis prison for the rest of their worthless lives.

I honestly want to know: what would YOU have done?

See, that's the part I missed during my 12 years in the military... the part where they teach you what the difference is between being shot at by a 14-year-old and a 40-year-old. Apparently you caught that part of the lecture, Mr. Tullio. Excellent!

So tell me. What did I miss? Is it that the bullets hurt less when they come out of a 14-year-old's gun, or that it's less dangerous to charge across an open space when a 14-year-old's spraying that area with an AK-47 on full auto? Or maybe it's the unlikelihood of being hit by anything that's being fired by a 14-year-old in the confines of a 4-foot-wide hallway or as you're storming through a 3-foot-wide doorway. Is that it? Perhaps it's the high likelihood of all your highly valued men coming out unscathed from an assault on a building defended by four people intent on martyrdom?

See, before you came along with all the obvious answers, I had just foolishly presumed that our troops, highly trained and equipped for urban warfare as they were, and also (unlike you and me), having actually BEEN THERE at the time, might have actually had a REASON for making the choices they did based on the conditions and the situation of the moment. Of course, had I known that the action taken was actually a sign of the widespread trigger-happiness of our military (as evidenced by the absolute bloodbath we've inflicted on them so far), or perhaps a result of the Great Bush-Rumsfeld-Powell-Hussein Conspiracy, then I would never have succumbed to such an obvious subterfuge. What a fool am I.

No... wait a minute. I'm pretty sure I heard SOMETHING about shooting back at bad guys that are shooting at me. Yeh, yeh. Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure about that one.

Maybe that's the lesson YOU slept through.

Just glad I could help out.

GHS

Oh, and by the way... I believe it was a TOW missile that finally breached the walls, not a Howitzer.

Must not have been any tanks available.

GHS

Touche! (Though I cringe at using a word from such a cowardly language). Well put GHS!

JK Saggese

Thanks. Right. A TOW missile.

Can you "overkill?"

Maybe they could have tried teargas first. Cut off utilities.....etc.

Bottom line: The cowboy at the top wanted them dead. No muss. No fuss. High-fiving all around.

Good show.

Are you telling me the decision to kill them was made in the field? I doubt it.

Where did the buck stop? Certainly not with the AWOL fratboy coward besmirching the White House.

The whole incident was badly handled and did nothing to quell the neverending jihad in the making.

Face it: the neocons in power have blown it and the botched encounter with the evil Hussein brothers underlines it.

In your heart of hearts, you know I'm right.

Holy Koresh!

"Can you SAY overkill?"

I know you'll ridicule me for that omission if I don't correct it!

My bad!

Carry on.

Now I know I'm on the right side of things, as well as the "right" side. Anyone who would mourn the deaths of these two monsters is either insane or a terrorist sympathizer. There is no other way to put it. The "Little Husseins" were (in)famous throughout Iraq as torturers, rapists, kidnappers and murderers. You want to question our methodology? If we really WERE so bloodthirsty, we would have killed all of the thirty-some "cards" instead of capturing most of them.

Mister Tullio, you have demonstrated quite eloquently what we mean by "idiotarian". By all means, keep posting your drivel. We love a good laugh. (Oh, and by they way, the AWOL coward has been gone from the White House since January 2001. In your heart of hearts, you know I'm right.)

The Clenis was never IN the military. He did just what all the chickenhawks in this administration did: he got a college deferment.

Bush was AWOL from his Champagne Unit in the Texas Air National Guard. Look it up. At least he got some good pictures of himself in uniform before he disappeared.

I don't "mourn" the deaths of the Hussein Brothers nor can I defend their alleged heinous acts. I do, though, mourn a missed opportunity to demonstrate the rule of law. But when has the Bush Cabal ever worried about that?

Oh well. Mission Accomplished, right?

Your Fellow Citizen,

Lou_Tullio

I gave up flying small aircraft when I became pregnant with my first child. I know that aircraft are unforgiving and impervious to charm.

George W. Bush flew airplanes in the National Guard. He soloed. He flew. This is a profoundly dangerous thing to do and he survived. He did not go to Viet Nam, but there are lots of brave pilots who died in their planes right here in the USA. George W. wasn't one of them.

When you're in the air, nothing matters but your skill. Money, parents, fame -- nothing counts but ability and nerve. Just ask John F. Kennedy, Jr. Er, well, perhaps not.

I knew Geoge W. Bush was a brave man when he threw the first ball at the World Series in New York in 2001. In a stadium of people with the WTC still smoking in the sky, he walked out alone under the lights. The man positively clanks.

He is responsible for ending the lives of many (much more than two) mass murdering raping psychopaths. I'm a tiny bit responsible too, because I voted for him. That makes me sincerely, deeply grateful.

God Bless, everyone. I love reading the comments here (except for trolls, o' course.) I'm eagerly awaiting Mr. Whittle's next essay.

Nice slag at JFK, Jr. What's next, a good Wellstone joke?

It cracks me up to read the reverent tone of your remarks about the Coward in Chief, Bonnie. (Where was he while Rudy Gulianni led the country after 911? Cowering in bunkers all over the country. Read up on it.) Very Hallmark.

I understand that you want to believe Bush is a great guy and that your denial of his incompetance and outright criminality allows you to deify him but c'mon! I can almost hear the symphonic score as he walks out onto the mound, surrounded by the most intense security musterable (is that a word?)

Brave would have been Bush* donning a white robe and walking alone from Bagdhad to Damascus.

BTW: what proof do you have that Bush* EVER soloed? And if he isn't a coward, why didn't he show up for the last year of his Tour of Duty?

Of course for anyone of you to admit that Bush* is taking us to hell in a handbasket would cause your fragile world to crumble.

Can't you see you're being manipulated? These neocons and their Boy King care nothing about you.

Don Quixotely Yours,

Lou_Tullio

Ahhhh yes, the President is told by the Secret Service that he needs to stay away from potenial target sites, and he is a Coward. Rrrriiiiggghhhttt. Oh and Tullio, if there are no services in Iraq, a perennial Lefty claim now, then how could we cut the utilities? And how would that tactic have helped? As for the Tear Gas plan, have you every tried to shoot tear gas into a window from which a man was shooting at you with a fully automatic weapon? And if this 14 year old if a poor victim, why was he still shooting after the adults were dead or unconcious?

As foir our world crumbling, Tullio, that started when the WTC was attacked. In 1993. Followed by Khobar Towers, the Embassy Bombings, and the USS Cole attack. So Bush was somehow responsible for the inaction of BJ KLintoon? That is rich.

As for the "neocon" crack, why don't you come and say what all Lefties mean by that phrase: "the Jooos are running the Government".

I need to learn to ignore the spewage from Trolls. Sorry everybody.

Last comment was mine.

Gee, Eric, methinks thou dost protest too much er somethin'.

Face it: Bush OK'd those murders. Are you trying to tell me that we couldn't have waited those guys out?

Why are you so Janet Reno?

As far as Clinton and 911 goes: all the material was given to Condi. She was told by Sandy Berger that something big was in the offing.

What did Bush* do? He went to his "ranch." And when the towers fell, what did he do? He listened to his handlers and ran like a little bunny.

Bush* makes my skin crawl. What a phony creep he is.

911 happened on Bush's watch. Aren't Republicans the Party of Personal Responsibility? Stop blaming this PNAC sh*tstorm on The Clenis.

And what's with playing the Jew card? It seems to me you are projecting your own prejudice.

Whatever, Eric.

FYI Cheney, Bush and plenty of other wacked out neocons signed onto The Project for a New American Century document. Clinton rejected the mad plan. Have you read it? Can you defend it? Is this the America you want?

Your beloved "heroes" are not true Conservatives. They are radicals and they have made the world a darker place with their quest for oligharchic empire with terrorism as their catalyst and excuse for aggression.

Wake up and smell the napalm. You've aligned yourselves with psychopathic dissemblers. Beware the military/industrial complex, i.e. The Carlyle Group (which partnered with the Bin Laden family). Ike warned us.

It's not too late to look at the details, wake up and help change this shameful chain of events.

Respectfully Yours,

Lou_Tullio

http://costofwar.com

Wow! Where to begin. Where to begin. So much comedy in such a short program.

Let's see... "can you overkill?" Well, whether you slip in a bathtub and break your neck, or stand at ground zero of a nuclear blast, you're pretty much dead either way. So your degree of "deadness" appears to be irrelevant either way. But as it applies to your specific point here, sorry, but breaching one corner of a building with a hand-launched missile (in lieu of sending men across a free-fire zone to PLACE a satchel-charge at the base of the wall) hardly counts as overkill. I've seen the pictures, and all they did was "breach" one corner of the house. They didn't level it. And that's not what killed "the boys" anyway.

"Maybe they could have tried teargas first. Cut off utilities.....etc."

Maybe they did. Then again, maybe I just missed the parts of all the related news articles that specifically said they didn't. But even if they didn't, let's not compare military operations to the tactics of your local home S.W.A.T. team, who, when beseiging a crack house, have a civil mandate to ensure that NO "fellow citizens," on either side of the lines, become casualties of the moment. "Waiting them out" is an essential part of their modus operandi... unless, of course, the guys holed up in the crack house not only refuse to surrender, but insist on firing on the surrounding officers, with every intent to kill as many as they can before going out in a hail of fire themselves. THEN even the S.W.A.T. team will start playing with explosive breaching tactics and answering fire for fire.

"Are you telling me the decision to kill them was made in the field? I doubt it."

Well, as long as YOU doubt it, enough said! If, after all, in your unbiased non-conspiracy-based opinion, and with all your obvious military background, YOU think the President specifically ordered such notably worthy prize pigeons "murdered," then it must be so. But, to answer your question: YES, I'm telling you the decision was made in the field. That's what field commanders do.

"I do, though, mourn a missed opportunity to demonstrate the rule of law."

Well, I'll grant you that one. That would have been quite the coup. Even better than all those other guys in that card deck that we DID manage to take alive. But then, AGAIN, it was the martyrs-to-be that made that choice, not us.

I'm just curious: when (not if) we finally find ourselves surrounding Saddam's latest hiding place, do you think HE'LL be more reasonable than his sons, and simply allow himself to be taken into custody, and brought, in chains, before the world court? Who knows. Personally, I'd be willing to bet he'll do his sons one better, and off himself before the assaulting troops can reach him. And that would REALLY be a shame. Of course, it'll be "all our fault" if he does, right? All part of some evil (and truly brilliant) plan to eliminate all the potential political gold mines at the high end of the Iraqi food chain.

Oh, but THIS is the one I REALLY liked: "... Brave would have been Bush donning a white robe and walking alone from Bagdhad to Damascus."

Hee, hee, hee! That's a good one. Say it again.

I think I want to put that one on my refrigerator, just in case I'm ever unsure about the kind of thinking we're up against here. But let's keep the comedy ball rolling here.

"What did Bush do? He went to his "ranch." And when the towers fell, what did he do? He listened to his handlers and ran like a little bunny."

No, he did what he HAD to do. By LAW. What EVERY President is obligated to do in a time of imminent, direct, and personal threat... he got the hell out of the reach of the terrorists. They were, after all, actively attempting to rain aircraft down on certain key buildings in certain key cities. And since "his handlers" are equally obligated to protect him, I think we can presume that they were fairly insistent at the time. But, brilliant, unbiased reasoning on your part anyway.

And speaking of unbiased reasoning, let me put a couple of quotes of yours together here and see how they shake out...

"Bush makes my skin crawl. What a phony creep he is." And then, "It seems to me you are projecting your own prejudice."

Hee, hee! Stop it! You're killing me!

*whew!* Well, how to wrap this up... ummm... how about THIS dazzling quote of yours:

"BTW: what proof do you have that Bush EVER soloed?"

My! Such a grasp of the facts you have. How about the fact that he graduated basic flight school? I'm pretty sure (after a great deal of time in the military aviation field) that soloing is a prerequisite to actually receiving pilot's wings. But why let facts get in the way when baseless, biased, hot-headed drivel is so much funnier?

Thanks for the laughs.

And please, don't stop now.

GHS

Coming into this little exchange late but had to respond to something from Lou's 2nd (I believe) post.

"The Marine unit had no alternative but to bring in a howitzer or whatever it was.."

How hard is it to know that it was an Army unit from the 101st Airborne that was involved in the firefight? As well as a TOW missile not a howitzer. I don't even think the Marines are in Iraq anymore (please correct me if I'm wrong here).

My first thought when I read this was: "does the sight of a military unit and it's equipment so scare this man that his bowels turn to water and he quickly turns away before his sensibilities are offended?" His ignorance of the basic facts in the whole Uday and Qusay firefight are astounding. I guess if the facts don't fit into his "It's all Bush's fault" square peg he'll pound the round peg until he either tires out or the round peg turns square and it does fit.

Poor, poor, Lou. You have my pity.

Just a few more points of interest here, until we all get to jump to a Saddam-is-dead conversation...or we all settle down to read the next Bill Whittle essay. Ahhh, such pleasures to look forward to.

When the Secret Service understands the President is under attack, they take over. In fact, if Bush & Family couldn't run fast enough then they would have been carried. Lou, honey, you've watched too many made-for-tv movies about the Prez. He doesn't have any say until the situation is cleared. Remember when Reagan got shot? Watch the tape. The Secret Service threw him into the car with all the courtesy of a cop handcuffing a mugger. He isn't the President then, he's POTUS. An object. And that object has no say until it is safe.

Logically this makes perfect sense. The President is a politician and will make judgements based on politics. This can get him killed.

When the situation was cleared on 9-11 (all commercial aircraft landed or crashed) then Bush insisted on returning to Washington. This gave the Secret Service many Maalox moments but they had to obey him, which they did -- once the imminent threat was gone. A coward would have cowered, Lou. That's why they call it cowering.

Understanding politics means that you have to read a lot, from many different sources, and understand math and logic. Spewing conspiracy theory, while lots of fun, simply labels a person as a not-too-bright regurgitator of other's propaganda.

So, I wonder how the wounded soldiers are doing? Three soldiers were shot in the raid that killed the Hussein brothers. Remember that? Have you ever been shot, Lou? I haven't, but I have had surgery and it hurts. It hurts worse at 3 a.m. for some reason. There are men right now who are recovering from bullet wounds while Lou pontificates about what a bad job they did.

My prayers and thoughts are with the brave soldiers. They did an outstanding job.

I have been reading the posts here, and Lou, I have to do a little educating for one and all.

In the military, we have something called "After Action Reviews," from which we identify

1. What happened
   
2. What went right
   
3. What went wrong
   
4. How to do it better next time.
   

From that process, we publish "Lessons Learned" to all soldiers, so that we don't re-invent the wheel every couple years. So turn your mind back to 1989, and review the actions that occurred in a small country also (then) run by a tyrant: Panama.

You may have seen some video footage coming from the reporters at Ft. Amador, which was the Headquarters of the Southern Command. One of Noriega's supporters was holed up on the second floor of one building, taking shots at targets of opportunity, e.g. anything moving. US forces are trying to get him with small arms (rifles and machineguns) but are unsuccessful. They then bring in Howitzers, shooting from across the parade field. Yeah, they're 105mm popguns, but they are in fact howitzers. Goblin residing on the second floor continues to shoot. The video cameras are rolling, and the talk is all about how they can't clear this guy out.

Well, one of the men (a Sapper) who later began to work for me grabbed a section of Bangalore Torpedo, ran to a side door, taped it to the door, and detonated the Torpedo. Blew the heavy steel door up a flight of stairs.

Goblin's next action? White surrender flag.

The Lesson Learned? Use explosive ordnance to extract snipers in heavy buildings.

Let's see...TOW Missile???

Explosive Ordnance.

Anytime after explosives are used, the targets against whom the explosives are used are disoriented and mostly deafened. That youngster was pretty tough, being able to shake off an attack like that and keep firing. Didn't do him much good, though.

Lesson learned, objective siezed. Loss to US forces - 0%. Loss to enemy forces - 100%.

/History and tactics lesson.

Sapper Mike

Dear Mr. Tullio,

People like you have in the past reluctantly forced me to close my comments section. Let me tell you why.

I get a fair amount of readers after an essay, and I do value alternative inputs. Every now and then, someone will make a contrary comment that is based on fact and well-reasoned argument. It is a genuine pleasure, not to mention an education, to rationally debate with those people like that.

You are not one of those people.

I think, by now, we have gotten the full extent of your argument. BUSH = BAD. I don't know that it required seven posts and zero facts to do so, but I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.

I am not willing to let this become your weblog, Lou. If you were making arguments, with facts, logic and persuasion, I would be intrigued. But the banality of what you are shrieking is getting a little old.

First of all, your very first sentence sets your tone, and like so many of you on the left, it is an ugly, desperate, smug and pointless one. Good for you Lou. Good to know that no parody of the left can be too far out there and still not include real-life people like you.

There are many words to describe people like you, and the most polite one I can think of right now is "impossiblist." The Confederacy had an entire wing of people like you, and that is the main reason there is no longer a Confederacy.

Impossiblists are ideologues so seeped in their fantasy world that any measure of progress that has to conform to reality is intolerably tainted for them. This is crystal clear in your attitude, and it the sign of an infantile intellect, one incapable of seeing that perfection is the enemy of action and success.

Impossiblists are idiots who say we should have surrounded the building, used tear gas, or "starved them out." Yes, that's a very proundly wise strategy. Lets just set up a ring, keep them there for four or five weeks, hope they have no escape tunnels, count on no harassinging fire from other torturers, murderers and rapists, and then, when the media circus is in full swing and after the requisite four weeks are up (during which people like you, who now argue for "starving them out" would be howling like hysterical children over the 'standoff' and the 'quagmire') then after all that time we can watch as they kill themselves and we get NOTHING but another chance to look weak and ineffective and for people like you to bitch, moan and whine.

After the thousands upon thousands of people those two bastards murdered, are you really so dense as to believe they would come out with their hands up? Again, history shows us what happens with regimes like this. Moussolini surrendered; he was shot and hung upside down in front of a gas station. Hitler heard the news. He didn't surrender Lou. He killed himself. It's all there in black and white in your local library. It might avail you to do a little reading every now and then; I can tell you from bitter experience that it does wonders for your worldview.

I DO pity you, Lou -- I really do. It must be perennially AWFUL to be you. How do you face each day, with nothing but more defeat and envy and rage and isolation facing you? How does it feel to be mocked and scorned and downright pitied by the vast middle of America who see people like you not as Champions of Morality but as poor, terrified little spoiled babies desperate for the attention they so obviously didn't get when they were children? Why else run into a dinner party and fling your own feces on the wall, stamping your feet and then running off to your bedroom?

You have made a great number of baseless allegations. I will deal with only one because I have to go to work.

George Bush flew F-106 Delta Darts. The F-106 is a delta-wing, supersonic interceptor. It is notoriously difficult to fly, and now we are in MY area of expertise, so pay attention.

Lou, you couldn't find a way to open the canopy on an F-106. I'm sorry you don't like GWB; that is, of course, your right in theis free country. If you had said about Saddam in Iraq what you said here about Bush, you would not be facing some hostile comments in a weblog -- you would be dead, Lou. Very likely, your family would have been tortured to death before your eyes first. Do you have a wife or daughter, perhaps a young son? Saddam had several people whose job description was STATE RAPIST -- look it up. Their job was to make your eventual death a little more miserable for you and a little more fun for Uday and Qusay.

GWB is a fighter pilot, Yale graduate, Harvard graduate, two-term Governor of Texas and President of the United States. What the hell are YOU, Lou?

You've had enough of my bandwith in this particular thread. You might look at the very top of the comments section, and see my policy regarding "serial loathesomeness." You are welcome to continue to visit, and to make comments in the future, but I warn you right now: Those comments will have to be based on facts and contain more argument than insult, and any additional comments in this thread will mark you as a serial temper-tantrum problem child and it will be deleted and you will be banned. You know what sold me on that idea? One little sentence fragment regarding the Hussien brothers and "their alleged heinous acts."

Anybody who is so blinded by hatred and ideology that they have to qualify untold volumes and reams of evidence against these two monsters and their "alleged heinous acts" is not someone who can be taken seriously, and neither can the entire left for the exact same reason.

Thanks for visiting. It's always nice to run up the hit counter.

Thanks for playing, guys. I appreciate the bloviating. And the pity. Oh well.

I'll admit my grasp of the facts of the incident is at least as faulty at The Boy King's: sketchy.

I defer to the expertise in evidence here as far as military and tactical detail. I'm not a vet or a cop. I probably couldn't even get a job as a security guard. (Thanks to all here for your service, BTW)

The question remains: Why the Janet Reno?

You truly believe that calls were not made to higher ups to request permission for the Janet Reno-ing? No quick satellite phone call? I think you're fooling yourselves. Doesn't the buck stop with the Commander-in-Chief? Are you admitting that our forces didn't have the ingenuity to take them alive?

The Hussein Brothers were not just anonymous nutcases with automatic weapons. US Forces are not just a SWAT team. I understand that adrenelin levels are high in a situation like that and I wish I could give our forces the benefit of the doubt. The whole incident doesn't pass the smell test. But then what do I know?

Look at the attempts to blast Saddam. Bush* is doing his best to kill him rather than take him alive. After all, "dead men tell no tales."

The Bush Cabal is as wrapped up with the Saudis and Saddam as Prescott Bush was with the National Socialist Party. Why the redacted 28 pages in the 911 report? Even the Saudis want them released.

I'll be surprised if Saddam makes it to court. If he doesn't kill himself Hitler style as you seem to hope, fellow citizen, I'll bet there are standing orders to kill him in the field.

Why no response to my other (OT a bit admittedly) concerns?

So, what about the PNAC?

What about the Carlyle Group/Halliburton feeding frenzy? What about the apparent conflicts of interest? What's your reaction to http://costofwar.com? Who benfits from those Billions?

Don't dismiss it as Conspiracy Theory.

Why is the White House stonewalling Waxman on the Cheney energy documents?

Why is the White House hiding Nixon-style behind "National Security?" Why all the secrecy?

And, please-- answer the AWOL issue. Doesn't that matter to you? Is that OK? Maybe he got his wings but why did he disappear instead of enjoying his new skill with the rest of the Champagne Unit? The documents and testimony exist: Bush* was AWOL.

Scared little bunny? Alcoholic, coked-up little bunny?

Move along. Nothing to see here. Karl Rove is handling it. No biggie.

Anyway.

I appreciate that you think my "white robe" scenario is funny. I think you missed my point, though: What if Bush* had followed the dictums of his philosophical hero Jesus Christ rather than the impulses of Prescott Bush's client?

Believe me, "they" don't hate us because of our "Freedom."

No justice? No peace.

Enjoy the final days of Jeffersonian Democracy while you can. The Totalitarian Oligarchy is here.

Only we can stop them, fellow citizens.

Thanks for responding respectfully to my point of view. I'll make every effort to do the same.

Fire away. I appreciate the feedback.

Sincerely Yours,

Lou_Tullio

Haven't had time to read the comments posted while I was writing the above. I will post a response if comments haven't been shut down or I find myself banned.

Thank you for the dialogue.

Very Truly Yours,

Lou_Tullio

Where was President Bush during the months in question?

Have a look here.

The information is garnered from actual Air National Guard records, interviews with officers, and public records.

A remarkably dispassionate report, and so one that refuses to fall sway to attempting to manipulate the audience's comprehension of the facts with any editorial bias. I'm sure there are those who will be disappointed by this.

Regards,
Linda

Lou, your tone, and the quality of your argument, is improving. I have no intention or desire of banning people who want a serious and respectful argument. That is what a free republic is all about.

I am stealing from the company to write this, so I cannot answer your charges at this time. If you keep them factual and on topic, I suspect the rest of the Hive Mind can give you, if not answers that will satisfy you, then at least something to think about.

One last thing:

They do indeed hate us because of our "freedom," and in any reading of Islamicist literature it is immediately apparent that freedom is anathema to them. "Islam" does not mean "peace," it means "submission" -- submission to the will of Allah. They also hate us because we are wildly successful in everything we do, while faithfully breaking all the commandments they hold themselves to. They hate us because we are calling Allah a liar. They hate us because we respect and value women and homosexuals, instead of stoning them to death. They HATE us, Lou, because we embrace all the things that liberals like yourself defend -- as do we. So why are you so damn quick to rally to the defense of people dead set to kill and destroy the things we all hold dear in this country? Is your loathing of GWB so strong that you will do anything to sabotage his actions, even if they are demonstrably effective in making this free and tolerant nation safer from out enemies?

I'm sure we'd all like to know how you guys think on this issue, because truth to tell, most of us -- and most of us are in the middle, not in the right wing lunatic fringe -- think you on the left have left 'morally bankrupt' far behind and are rushing headlong into 'clinically insane.'

You know, Mr. Tullio, I think, I THINK I'm beginning to detect a theme here... something about this guy named Bush, and how every single last thing about him (his past, his present, his qualifications, his intentions... his voice, his eyes, his haircut, the way he walks) is nothing but the purest incarnation of evil.

Got it. Okay... what else ya' got?

YOU: "You truly believe that calls were not made to higher ups to request permission for the Janet Reno-ing? No quick satellite phone call? I think you're fooling yourselves. Doesn't the buck stop with the Commander-in-Chief? Are you admitting that our forces didn't have the ingenuity to take them alive?"

ME: (a) There are many levels of higher-ups between a typical field commander and the President. And all of them have the authority to make just such a tactical decision. (b) Yes, the buck stops at the President. He sets policy, he sets the grand strategic objectives, then he sits back and accepts full responsibility for the outcomes. He does NOT direct individual operations, and he is not even in the loop when it comes to tactics. They tried that during the Vietnam conflict, with crippling results to our own forces, and, as Sapper Mike so ably explained, we learned from that. George SR. set a proud new standard in the first Gulf War when he set things in motion, then got the hell out of the way of the people he'd tasked with carrying it out. His son, regardless of his personal flaws, has done an excellent job of learning from that too. And (c), regardless of the ingenuity of our forces, when someone doesn't want to be taken alive, they've got a lot more ways at their disposal for accomplishing that than we do of stopping them. They got what THEY wanted, not us.

YOU: "The whole incident doesn't pass the smell test. But then what do I know?"

ME: I think you summed it up very nicely.

YOU: "Don't dismiss it as Conspiracy Theory."

ME: Yes, why would I want to dismiss an unsubstantiated theory about a conspiracy as Conspiracy Theory? Good point.

YOU: "Why is the White House stonewalling Waxman on the Cheney energy documents?"

ME: What has this got to do with anything we've been talking about here? I think the magicians call this "redirection."

YOU: "Why is the White House hiding Nixon-style behind "National Security?" Why all the secrecy?"

ME: Oo, I bet you're one of those folks who think the press should have unlimited access to our military planning as well. After all, restricting sensitive information is just another form of "secrecy." Forget the importance of actually succeeding with those plans, or minimizing the casualties to friendly forces. What's most important is the abolition of all secrets.

YOU: "Why the redacted 28 pages in the 911 report? Even the Saudis want them released."

ME: I don't know... YET. I've got my own theories, based on the same precepts as the paragraph above, but I don't want to make this any longer than it's already gonna' be. But I'll bet YOU'RE presuming the worst.

YOU: "I'll be surprised if Saddam makes it to court. If he doesn't kill himself Hitler style as you seem to hope, fellow citizen, I'll bet there are standing orders to kill him in the field."

ME: (a) I agree that he almost certainly won't make it to court. (b) I DON'T hope that he makes the Grand Hitler Gesture. I WANT his ass in court. But I'll bet HE'S got other plans. (c) The last line shows once again just how little you understand about the military... or America, for that matter.

YOU: "And, please-- answer the AWOL issue. Doesn't that matter to you? Is that OK? Maybe he got his wings but why did he disappear instead of enjoying his new skill with the rest of the Champagne Unit? The documents and testimony exist: Bush* was AWOL."

ME: First of all, I've never heard this claim from anyone else (and as inflammatory as it is, I find it hard to believe that SOMEONE outside the extreme leftist camp hasn't made mention of it at least once in the last four years). But I'll accept that maybe I just missed it. And I will check into it. In answer to your specific question though... no, I don't care about it. It's in the past... just like Clinton's "non-inhaling" experimental days, Bush Senior's sinister cloak-and-dagger background with the CIA, Reagan's "lack of qualifications" as a former Hollywood actor, the embarrassments of Jimmy Carter's hard-partying brother, Gerald Ford's clumsiness coming down the plane's stairs... should I go back through every former President's foibles and youthful mistakes, or should I stop with, say, Kennedy's infidelities WHILE IN OFFICE? And I LIKED Kennedy. I also don't care that Bush is a recovered (recoverING) alcoholic either. Actually, it bothers me more that he's a born again Christian.

YOU: "Scared little bunny? Alcoholic, coked-up little bunny?"

ME: See, THAT'S the crap that's probably going to get you banned from this blog... not the ill-informed, conspiracy-nut, hateful, baseless, cliched rhetoric, but the childish, petty, feces-flinging and procession-mooning. But at least it lends your "argument" shitloads of credibility.

YOU: "What if Bush had followed the dictums of his philosophical hero Jesus Christ rather than the impulses of Prescott Bush's client?"

ME: He'd be dead. Just like YOU would be if YOU walked alone between Baghdad and Damascus. Except that in his case (as with ANY President in history), HE'D be dead if he just walked unprotected between Washington DC and Baltimore... or anywhere, for that matter, unprotected. The bullseye doesn't get any bigger or more tempting than the one on the back of the President of the United States.

YOU: "Enjoy the final days of Jeffersonian Democracy while you can. The Totalitarian Oligarchy is here."

ME: Wow! Just as original as when I heard that same sentiment expressed following Reagan's inauguration, and then again after Bush Senior's. And just as valid too.

Enough.

Now we're both just regurgitating.

Sorry folks. I'm through now.

GHS

Lou,
Although the buck does stop at the President's desk, I firmly belive the decision about Tweedledum and Tweedledummer was made on the ground. I think CENTCOM learned that flattening a building results in weeks of speculation. They used that technique because they did not have combat troops in Baghdad yet.

The decision probably went no higher than a Battalion or Brigade Commander. The rest of the chain of command knew what was going on, but let it play out with those that were there making the call. Guidance of some sort was sent back down, maybe even by the Pentagon, what that was I can only speculate. It wouldn't surprise me that is was "take alive if possible - but end it as quickly as possible". No commander in his right mind wants to stay engaged for a prolonged period of time. It invites to much risk.

Waiting for decisions from Washington on tactical battles was how Viet Nam was fought. I know for a fact that no one called the President to see what should be done. It's a silly notion that you do.

As for the rest of the "Black Helicopter, Corporations are running the war" drivel. I reject it outright. Without looking into it, because the same crap was said back in Viet Nam about all the corporations that produced something that the military needed. It's just bullsh*t.

BTW, I think there are only 3 companies in the world that are big enough to handle a problem the size of Iraq's oil fields. Two are U.S. firms, Haliburton is one (I can't recall the other U.S. one) and the other is French.

Since the French don't deserve it. Who should be over there fixing Iraq's oil industry?? Hmmm?

Tullio, do you realize that most of Saddam's palaces had tunnels? That several large houses in Tikrit, Saddam's home town, and Mosul, a Ba'athist stronghold, have been found to have escape tunnels under them? So how is waiting them out going to work? They could simply wait until nightfall and scoot out of a tunnel. Then the Left here would be bitching about how we let two mass murderer/rapists get away.
The fact of the matter is that you have clearly shown your blinding bias against Bush, and nothing that he, or the people under him, does will be the proper decision. So why do come here and waste people's time?

I've been following this with interest.And a great deal of respect for the restraint of those replying to Tullio. Bill's the courteous host, as ever..
I'm not American by birth or citizenship ceremony, but I trust the judgement of the U.S. military.Maybe it's not perfect but it's sure as hell a long way ahead of second-best.
If that's what it took to conduct a little pest-eradication, fine by me.

Okay, Tullio, you've got me. I'm willing to admit publicly, for the record, that Bush was AWOL, because being Absent Without Official Leave is serious, a crime.

I don't want to ever support someone in the presidency who has been part of AWOL. And I'll publicly admit Bush was AWOL when YOU post a link or links to his punishments FOR said AWOL. You know? Punishment under Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice? Or punishment under any OTHER Article of the UCMJ? Fine with me.

But no punishment = NO AWOL. You can't have Bush being AWOL without it being noted and him being called for it.

When you become familiar with Copernic, Google and Ixquick, you'll enjoy the delightful FACTual stuff which pops up on your computer screen, Lou.

"Wake up, Little Suzy, wake up!"

A suggestion. I realize that letting someone like Lou take up space on this comment board is not something that you or I may enjoy, but, anything that will help others understand how monumentally stupid a closed mind can be will only help others to make a concious decision to think before casting their vote in 2004. If the comments in response to people like this can help others to at least use their a small portion of their brain and think, then you will have made a difference.

We'll have to get up a fund to pay for tools to be installed on this website just to NAVIGATE our way through all the comments. A SEARCH engine might be nice. I don't mean something we could use to delete anything, just to be able to LOCATE a given post...
Jeez. We're turning into a nation of editors.

David March

By the way, Steven den Beste (USS Clueless) has some astounding articles about the conflict between the Western industiral "democracies" and the arab muslim states.

Even if you don't LIKE'em they are thought-provoking. You can't just dismiss the ideas.

David March

hmmm...yet another tribute to willful ignorance. Does no-one look at the big picture anymore? Lots of self-justification and hubris in Whittle's little essay, & it comes to mind that gloating over the death of these two cretins, though satisfying, diminishes us all. Keep in mind that a large proportion of the Iraqi population feels much the same way when seeing U.S.troops get capped.
The perception is the reality, peoples, and truth be buggered. There's a moountain of information availble that spells out why so many criticize U.S. occupation in Iraq. As Bush well knows, there ain't none so blind as those who will not see.

"it comes to mind that gloating over the death of these two cretins, though satisfying, diminishes us all"

Well, Bob, I for one don't feel the least bit diminished by the deaths of those two collections of now re-distributed DNA.
Following your rationale,celebrating the death of any psychopathic rapist/killer diminishes us.

How?

I just want to add this little tidbit for Lou and a few others about the military operations going on over there. The U.S. military has conducted over 500 (actual number will not be known for some time) 'assaults' on places that were suspected hiding places of the Iraqi leadership.
Many of these were on suspected hiding places of Saddam, Uday and Qusay. The military didn't know for sure on any of these assaults if anyone would be found but they had to conduct each as if a group of die hard, will not surrender types were on the other side of the door waiting to fight their way to martyrdom.
Each time this happened, U.S. soldiers and Marines risked their lives without knowing for sure that they would be dying that day or not.

Do you think that the President was consulted each and every time one of these assaults was made ???

No sorry, the only one who gave the orders was the battalion commander with the assistance of his intelligence section.

Sorry to ruin the Conspiracy Theory about GWB being like a Mafia Don, calmly ordering the 'hit'.

The men of the 101st were probably expecting just another routine 'rumored hiding place' assault when they found themselves in a serious fight with people who refused to surrender.

Do I rejoice that they are dead?

No .... I will not bring myself to the level of barbarity that can cheer ANY human beings death.

Do I believe that Justice was served?

Oh yes .... and I believe that Gods Final Judgement will be swift.

Just my 2 cents.

Sorry to ruin the Conspiracy Theory about GWB being like a Mafia Don, calmly ordering the 'hit'.

No, but you should be sorry for putting that image of GWB in my head. (Argh... now I've got an image of GWB as the leader of SPECTRE from the Bond movies. Could be worse: could be Dr. Evil... AIGH!!)

O_o;;

Dear Ben-

Please post info backing up your statements? It is hard to get your idea of big picture with zero information (supposedly there is a mountain of it and you give us zero information?).

Usually, I just absorb the comments and don't post. This is an amazing group of people who have much more profound and intelligent things to say than I do; however, your comments are insulting and sad and I want to address a point here...

There is a big difference between taking down two of the sickest bastards the world has seen in a long time and killing American soldiers.

Bill Whittle pointed out just a few of the atrocities that the extra crispy Hussein boys committed.

Now, see this about an American soldier who was killed leading a supply convoy - http://www.blackfive.blogspot.com/#MatSchram .

Do you seriously think anyone will write similar tributes about the Hussein boys?

I'd tell you to take a look in the mirror, but I think that you're the one who's blind.

'Sorry to ruin the Conspiracy Theory about GWB being like a Mafia Don, calmly ordering the 'hit'.'

"Mr. Hussein, Mr. Hussein... what have I ever done to make you treat me so disrespectfully?"

There is a distinctive barnyard aroma given off by some of the recent posts here.

I wonder if it’s possible to devise a test that would be useful in “qualifying” readers. Just as is done, for instance, to determine which students will matriculate at a given college. Anyone may read and learn from the posts, but to be allowed to post, regardless of viewpoint, they must pass a short quiz.
But, you could have several levels--- the most conspicuously thoughtful and learned would have full access to post, lesser lights might have their posts identified by different color, Trolls to their own window, and so on. I propose some questions here, but I leave it to others to decide the criteria. God knows, I might not qualify MYSELF!

1) When confronted with an armed suspect whom they recognize as a violent offender, police should be required to:
a) draw their weapons and order the suspect to lay down his weapon and surrender or they will shoot.
b) keep their weapons holstered and politely ask the suspect to surrender.
c) draw their weapons, lay them on the ground, and surrender to the suspect.
d) draw their weapons, and commit suicide out of the shame that they chose to pursue a life of fascist bullying authoritarianism.

2) When a police officer fires on a suspect, the goal should be to:
a) aim for the main body mass to maximize the probability of disabling the suspect.
b) shoot the weapon OUT of the suspect’s hand.
c) carefully shoot an innocent person standing NEAR the suspect, to convince the suspect that the officer is serious.
d) kill everyone.

3) You believe:
a) things often are not as simple as they first appear.
b) all Democrats are nice; all Republicans are mean.
c) if a tooth comes loose from your gums and you place it under your pillow, a sweet faerie will come while you sleep and trade you a shiny quarter for it.
d) the voices keep telling you to kill your parents.

4) The last time you participated in an election:
a) you ran your campaign on the issues, and lost because you refused to stoop to false attacks on your opponent
b) you meant to study the issues confronting your community, and vote for the candidate who seemed to have solutions, but things got busy and you ended up voting for the one name that seemed familiar.
c) you were apprehended because someone recognized you from the flyers at the post office
d) the other inmates chose you to represent their cell block in the hostage negotiations.

5) The last time you got a medical exam it was:
a) part of your enlistment into the armed forces of your country.
b) to check out a change in your bowel habits.
c) after dating a woman of questionable virtue.
d) as a result of your victim’s police report.

6) People who rape, murder, and torture their fellow humans:
a) need to be eliminated---captured and incarcerated, or killed if they cannot be subdued.
b) need to be given a fair trial, with the best defense possible regardless of the cost to society, to ensure that every citizen’s theoretical rights are honored, no matter how many victims may have suffered. Better to set a thousand murderers free, than to wrongly convict an innocent man.
c) have simply made a lifestyle choice that is different from, not better or worse than, yours and mine.
d) are your secret heroes.

As you see, it should be possible to devise a test that cleverly reveals whether a person is rational, confused, ignorant, irresponsible, delusional, or psychotic.

Of course, even psychotic people can be entertaining sometimes.

David March

George Will is fond of relating an anecdote from his days as a flunky for William F. Buckley. Will wanted to know how Buckley was able to churn out 2 to 3 essays every week. Buckley responded “Because I find that I am annoyed two to three times weekly.”

You’re in good company, Mr. Whittle.

Lou Tullio:

One statement of yours stands out for me: "Enjoy the final days of Jeffersonian Democracy while you can. The Totalitarian Oligarchy is here."

Lou, it strikes me that you have either one of two things wrong with you: 1) You have absolutely no conception of what the words you wrote actually mean. Both my grandparents had actual experience of everyday life under actual dictatorship and ACTUAL Oligarchic Totalitarianism
(Nazi Germany's occupation of Greece, in their case) I had first hand reports while I was growing up, and to this day, of night curfews, slave labour, billeting of foreign troops in private homes, mass hostage executions, drawing up lists of genocide targets, the thousand everyday casual brutalities and indignities undergone by a subject population, etc. I'd suggest reading George Orwell's piece "Politics and the English Language" to aid in rectifying your ignorance.

2) you are maliciously and cynically using words denoting the actual procedure and effects of an actually existing historical ideology, emotionally charged with memory of actual pain and suffering, in order to drive your own partisan political agenda. I find this not only untruthful and dishonourable but repulsive in the extreme. If a Totalitarian Oligarchy ever has you under its control, Lou, there will be no need to contend that it exists. You will know it, right down to your bones.

*knee jerks painfully into desk*

Hey, Ben- here's a hint: it's much easier to get respect for your position if you actually, you know, PRESENT it, instead of stopping by for a quick session of condescension. I'm sure it makes life much easier for you if you assume we're all idiots picking bits of gravel out of our knuckles that haven't the faintest clue about American foreign policy or history, but the fact of the matter is most of us do not live in a self-contained Whittlebubble. "OH MY GOD! SOMEONE ELSE'S POINT OF VIEW! IT BURNS!"

I have read the opposition. At great length. And yet, despite my actively seeking out that which to see, I still disagree. There are none so complacently arrogant as those who assume that being intelligent and well-informed equates automatically to agreement with their position.

And GHS: get on top of your e-mail, knuckle-dragger.

Hello all.... here is a bit of diversion from the political discussion (which I have been enjoying):

Birdman flys the English Channel, no plane:
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=429447

Bush was AWOL......what??

http://unsolvedmysteries.com/usm329229.html

Ben Newhouse graces us with another example of the kind of thinking that will soon be availaible for viewing in museums.

Ben, here's some late-breaking news for you. The Perception is NOT the reality. REALITY is the reality, and perceptions are spun off of it.

On September 10th, 2001, we were perceived as rich, spoiled, corrupt, cowardly blowhards without the stomach for a fight, fat ripe fruit ready for the picking, a paper tiget that only needed a sturdy poke to collapse in the dismay and defeatism and cowardice and pathetic hand-wringing that you so eloquently display in such few words.

There is a new perception now, because we have ACTED to CHANGE THE REALITY. People like you told us how The Arab Street was going to rise like Godzilla after Afghanistan, and Irag, and storm across the ocean and bring us to our knees.

Wrong. Wrong, as always, infinitely, pervasively, perennially, TOTALLY wrong -- but hey, why let that get in the way of a cozy philosphy where you can moralize to your hearts content while people better and smarter and braver than you or I are out there fighting to preserve your right to be a sancimonious, stupifyingly evidence-resistent gasbag?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10956-2003Jul31.html

Charles Krauthammer's most recent column (dated 01 August, actually) about the killing of the sons of Hussein and the subsequent display of their bodies.

Puts things nicely in perspective, particularly reminding us that this is the rule in Muslim countries--- to display and desecrate the bodies of deposed tyrants. It also seems to have a long and respectable tradition in other parts of the world.

His main point is that so far we have captured most of the people in the celebrated deck of evil cards, but very few of those captures have actually been televised. If we were to have taken the sons prisoner, we could expect many decades of intrigue and scheming and terrorist acts simply to attempt to FREE them.

What a God-awful mess that would be.

David March

Bill,

Yes this stinks - to high heaven. The "Classic Liberals" have all become Republicans and conservatives.The neo-liberals are all self/human race/decency loathing nihilists. Keep writing, it's not a waste of time because as we all know, all that's needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

Here's a little something to cheer you up. A letter from a young Marine in Iraq to his Dad. I pulled this from Grunt.com, a Marine bulletin board I subscribe to. This might not go over to well with some of the intellectual giants inhabiting this comment section but what the hell, screw'em.

---Quote---
Dad,

The bottom line is this: Things are not as bad as they appear on the news. I
can't believe how bad the press is, even Fox news which I don't think is
that much better than the Communist News Network (CNN). Why do they only
report on the one or two soldiers killed daily? They don't report on the
millions of great things we do on a daily basis to make this country better.
These people love us for the most part. It is only a very small amount of
unorganized Ba'ath left-behinds who are giving us trouble. We have turned Al
Hillah into one of the richest, safest cities in Iraq. The only people who
probably know this are the Marines and the people of Al Hillah.

I get very frustrated with the media. I have little respect for them and I
don't think I'll ever again be the voracious news consumer I was before.
Their agenda is all too obvious to the men over here who are actually living