[SOC] Iraq

[Ian C. Purdie]

"Heaton, Timothy H." wrote:

> I rather doubt that anything was lost on Paul. There are a lot of ironies in
> the current situation, and they can contradict each other. Consider the irony
> that Saddam will likely consider himself the victor if he survives and all his
>
> people die.

I have no idea what he thinks but, I don't particularly regard him as being any
better or worse that many other despots around the world except this one sits on
large oil reserves.

> This is clearly so because he's used his mastery of military and ecological
> terrorism to wipe out large sectors of his own population in northern and
> southeastern
> Iraq.

Well if you look at the modern history of Iraq [1921] you will see it is
substantially a "nation" created out of three disparate peoples - Kurds, Shi'a
Muslim and Sunni Muslim [from memory]. I believe irrespective of who is in
charge at any point in time from any of those three main groupings, they would
still be attacking the other two.

[QUOTE]

"And, for all that Saddam Hussein is criticised and reviled, his opponents have
not been able to nominate anyone else who might hold Iraq together - with its
Kurds in the north, Sunni Muslims in the centre and Shi'ia in the south. What
the outside world calls terror, Saddam calls expediency"

- from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1100529.stm.


> I happen to agree with the statements you've expressed about the war. I'm
> very concerned about the motives of the president I didn't vote for. But
> you've
> said little to defend your position, and you've used the kind statements of a
> fair-minded man as a sounding board for your politically-charged statements.

I've actually said quite a lot:

see - http://my.integritynet.com.au/purdic/sydney-protests.htm [well over 2,000+
words]

> If you want us to know your position, why don't you just state it up front
> and tell us why you think this irony applies in this situation. Then we could
> have a
> meaningful discussion. As it is, you seem to assume that anyone who doesn't
> see things
> exactly like you do is dumb or deluded.

Not at all, I find it very ironic that many people honestly believe the whole
exercise is to remove "unproved" weapons and; to save the people of Iraq, we
have to bomb the hell out of it and kill countless innocents to "save" them. Not
once have I heard or seen folks from the pro war lobby speculate upon the
potential consequences. I sincerely believe such a war will not be an "ending"
but merely a "beginning" of far worse horror.

I begin to become very, very suspicious when the mass media flog a constant
mantra and, selectively quote things to put an entirely different spin on it...

[EXAMPLE]

On our Channel 10 News today [11:30 a.m. AEST 25th February, 2003] the headline
voice-over was -

"Callous Malayan Prime Minister describes our Bali victims as 'collateral
damage'".

Now I don't particularly have any time for the Malaysian Prime Minister,
Mahathir Mohamad, he is very undemocratic, but watching the report of him
addressing the 115 other members at the "XIII Conference of Heads of State or
Government of the Non-Aligned Movement {20-25 February,2003)" meeting in Malaya,
I found most of what he said [limited by the 30 second TV report] as fairly
reasonable to a reasonable minded person.

What Dr Mahathir's speech, at the summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in Kuala
Lumpur yesterday, said was [as opposed to the above headline]:

"If Iraq is linked to al-Qa'ida, is it not more logical to link the
expropriation of Palestinian land, and the persecution and oppression of
Palestinians, with September 11? If the innocent people who died in the attack
on Afghanistan, and those who have been dying from lack of food and medical care
in Iraq, are considered collaterals, are not the 3000 who died in New York and
the 200 in Bali also just collaterals?".

He was speaking at length about the "double standards" of the west, the report
on mass media news quoted part of a sentence totally out of context, to convey a
wholly different meaning. Three people have so far today told me about it, I
asked "did you read or actually listen to what he said?", the replies? "No we
just heard it on the news".

The usual 10 second or less attention getter.

> I happen to think Paul is rather wise.

So do I, we just don't agree on some things at times. He acknowledges his
conservative leanings and I'm an active member of the Labor Party in Australia.

I believe Paul and I have great personal respect and admiration for one another
garnered over a rather long period of time, longer than the life of this list in
fact. We regularly privately communicate and have spoken on the phone, exchange
personal information and so on...


72/73's

Ian C. Purdie
Budgewoi N.S.W. Australia - Co-ords S33�14', E151�34'
VK2TIP "I'll give ya the TIP mate" QRP-L #1978. SOC #171 FP#91
http://www.electronics-tutorials.com/