The Rational Radical's Weblog

Saturday, February 01, 2003

A War Crime or an Act of War?   Very interesting piece, seeming to establish that whatever other atrocities Saddam Hussein is guilty of, targeting the civilian villagers of Halabja for genocidal poison gas extermination is not one of them. Brings to mind the "throwing the babies out of the Kuwaiti incubators" story that was widely reported during the 1991 Gulf War, only to turn out to have been a total fabrication, fostered on the media by a Washington, D.C. public relations firm in collaboration with W's father, then President. I don't doubt that Saddam Hussein has committed untold atrocities against his opponents. And that's what makes the spreading of false stories like Halabja and the incubators more disturbing -- the seemingly congenital inability of the Bushians, both pere and fils, to tell the truth, even when lies are unnecessary to establish the point, here the point being Saddam Hussein's reprehensible human rights record. But come to think of it, I shouldn't limit that accusation to the the Bushians. It afflicts most all governments, not least our own, even when Bushians don't infest it.

Jack Clark 9:29 PM [+]   
Post #88409235

Clinton Behind Mandela's Bush Bashing?  Of course. Clinton is behind every single thing that the wacky-right disapproves of!

Jack Clark 10:40 PM [+]   
Post #88367321

Funniest stuff I've read in a while, from the daily changing headline section of Newsmax.com:

Exclusive Interview: Outspoken radio star Michael Savage, author of the new No. 1 best-seller "The Savage Nation," tells NewsMax his candid views on "treasonous" U.S. senators such as Barbara Boxer, Saddam-abetting media leftists such as Wolf Blitzer, war with Iraq, how to protect our borders, and the revolt of young people against Clintonism. Free Offer: Get "The Savage Nation" by subscribing to our magazine.

This Savage guy is quite the comedian, since he couldn't be serious, could he? I especially like the "revolt of young people against Clintonism"!

Jack Clark 10:33 PM [+]   
Post #88367079

Tolerance and Hypocrisy on Gay-Straight Clubs More O'Reilly demagoguery exposed. Compare a real journalist's reporting of the story with O'Reilly's. I watched the segment, and the excerpts accurately reflect the whole:

Dr. Capehart was recently interviewed by Bill O'Reilly, Fox's conservative television news superstar. "I would have turned them down," Mr. O'Reilly said, "because I say once you open the door to a club based on sexuality, then you got to have the S&M club, the bigamy club, you know any club." Dr. Capehart said, "That's exactly my point." Mr. O'Reilly blamed the A.C.L.U. for the whole mess. "I call them a fascist organization," he said, "because what they're doing is using terror to further their agenda. Am I right?" Dr. Capehart added, "You are exactly right."

Jack Clark 9:56 PM [+]   
Post #88312122

Kazakhstan: Government Critic Sentenced  Yet more democracy-fostering by the Bushians.

Jack Clark 9:54 PM [+]   
Post #88312029

All Bush Wants is Iraqi Oil, Says Mandela  At least there's one international leader who's not afraid to speak bluntly.

Jack Clark 9:42 PM [+]   
Post #88311550

Weight Is Focus of Plane Safety We're so damn fat that planes crash trying to haul our lard-asses in the air!

Jack Clark 9:50 PM [+]   
Post #88252539

I like these two letters to the editor:

Killed in Afghanistan

Re "General Says 2 Pilots in Errant Bombing Broke the Most Basic Rules of Combat" (news article, Jan. 22): It is both curious and distressing that the only time that American service personnel have been called to account for the war in Afghanistan is when four Canadian soldiers are killed.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of Afghan civilians have also been killed. What, if anything, do the United States government and the international community propose to do about achieving justice in these other cases?

Assisting the Poor

Your Jan. 22 editorial "Then There Are the Poor" was more than a little upsetting. As a Republican, I am ashamed that the Bush administration would revive a plan to require an additional 10 hours of work each week from women with small children who manage to hold a job under the welfare reform program. In addition, financing for child care and transportation to these jobs would be frozen.

The poor who are striving to help themselves should be given more relief, not less, in these economic hard times. I realize that the money has to come from somewhere. If that means forgoing tax cuts, I for one would be glad to do so. We who are fortunate enough to be able to fend for ourselves without government assistance should remember the less fortunate among us.

Those damn poor people, stirring up trouble again! They made bad choices in life, and should just live with the consequences. And most of them don't want to work hard anyway, so to hell with them!

Jack Clark 10:19 PM [+]   
Post #88202209

Show Trials Like Stalin's in Turkmenistan More of our democracy-fostering.

Jack Clark 10:18 PM [+]   
Post #88202174

Serving Notice of a New U.S., Poised to Hit First and Alone   Only in the horse-blinders reading of history of mainstream media is this U.S. policy "new." Since WWII especially, we've gone all over the world and through overt or covert violence had our blooody way with the people of dozens of nations. That history is never mentioned in mainstream media.

Jack Clark 10:16 PM [+]   
Post #88202065

Powell Adopts Hawkish Tone Has anyone with an IQ above an aardvark been fooled by the good cop-bad cop routine of Colin Powell and George Bush? Oh, Colin Powell is a dove, he wants a peaceful solution, he's against a rush to war. C'mon. Has Colin Powell ever had an opportunity to kill impoverished Third World people he hasn't jumped at? Ask thousands of dead men, women and children in Vietnam, Nicaragua and Iraq. Powell has been on board the Bushian Iraqi War Machine since Day 1, and his part in the dog-and-pony show that is administration p.r. shouldn't fool anyone.

Jack Clark 10:10 PM [+]   
Post #88201823

Iraq Faces Massive U.S. Missile Barrage   If we're going to destroy Baghdad's water and power systems -- as the article claims -- that is terrorism plain and simple directed against a civilian population of millions. If Al Qaeda destroyed a U.S. city's water and power systems, and claimed that those life-and-death infrastructure elements were legitimate military targets, Al Qaeda would be met with outrage and condemned as brutal terrorists. Justifiably so! But if the U.S.commits precisely the same atrocity against someone else -- well, that's okay, because then it's a legitimate military target. The transparency of our hypocristy and brutality is evident for all the world to see.

Jack Clark 12:04 AM [+]   
Post #88086442

Many observers have pointed out the disparity between the right wing's expressed concern for the well-being of what it calls "unborn children," as opposed to its immoral lack of concern for the well-being of children once they are born. The thought just struck me, and maybe it's a common analysis, but I'll just put it down: the right wing really doesn't care about the "unborn children" at all, just like they don't care about the born children. They are consistent. Their anti-abortion stance is really about controlling women. Period. Just like they want to control everything: what you can read, what you can say, what kind of sex you can have. Repressed control freaks is all they are.

Jack Clark 11:56 PM [+]   
Post #88086230