PrintJuly 21, 2008
Let Me Count the Ways
"How do I love thee, Barack Obama?" his media maids and man-servants coo: "Let me count the ways."
- 1. In your toasted anti-Iraq speech of 2002, you proclaimed that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction - but has any of us reminded you of that?
- 2. In declaring Saddam armed but not dangerous, have we asked you how that could be?
- 3. You preach that "Iran's President Ahmadinejad's regime is a threat to all of us" - but did we probe into how Ahmadinejad unarmed was a threat while Saddam armed was not?
- 4. When Bill Clinton stated that Saddam "presents a clear and present danger to the stability of the Persian Gulf and the safety of people everywhere," did we ask what you knew that he didn't?
- 5. When Hillary Clinton stated that Saddam "has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members," did we inquire how he was therefore not a threat?
- 6. When you proclaimed that "Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors," did we point out that Israel was among those neighbors and that Saddam was paying $25,000 to suicide-bombers families so their sons would kill Jews?
- 7. Did we ask how Saddam was no threat to the US when he was firing on American pilots?
- 8. When you said "What I am opposed to is a rash war," did we inquire how it was "rash" to act more than four years after Congress passed the Iraq Liberation Act declaring that "it should be the policy of the United States to seek to remove the Saddam Hussein regime from power in Iraq"?
- 9. When you waxed about Saddam "that in concert with the international community he can be contained," did we ask how that could be when that same community bribed and conspired and kicked-back to keep Saddam in power and strip all sanctions?
- 10. When you perorated that "even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences," did we ask if that wasn't also true of any new venture - or did Edison, Bell, Carrier, Ford, and Harley and Davidson know exact times, costs, and consequences before they began?
- 11. When you articulated that war in Iraq "will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world," have we asked why then Arab nations are sending ambassadors back to Iraq and forgiving Saddam-era debt?
- 12. When you contended that Iraq would "strengthen the recruitment arm of Al Qaeda," have we pointed out that Al Qaeda is being destroyed in Iraq and will be in Afghanistan now that US troops have built a solid ally in Iraq?
- 13. When you argued "Let's fight to make sure that the UN inspectors can do their work," have we asked how they could when inspectors testified that Iraqis repeatedly lied and that none of Iraq's Full, Final, and Complete Declarations to the UN was ever full, final, or complete?
Ah, but then love does indeed blind, and so media maids and man-servants would never ask:
- 1. What Obama would do with a Saddam long freed from sanctions and by now chemically, biologically, and nuclear rearmed as he had long ago pledged?
- 2. How dramatically he would have rebuilt his military flush with $140-a-barrel cash?
- 3. Or would oil be even higher with Saddam reigning, Uday and Qusay squabbling to succeed, and Ahmadinejad racing to have nuclear weapons first?
- 4. How many more Kurds and Shias, along with troublesome Sunnis, now would be dead?
- 5. With Afghanistan alone attacked, would Osama Bin Laden have accepted Saddam's safe haven offer and allied his forces with Saddam now free from sanctions?
- 6. Would Israel survive or would Saddam unleash WMD, solve the Palestinian problem, and rally Arabs behind the new Nebuchadnezzar, emperor of the Middle East?
- 7. How brisk would Saddam's arms export business be - especially to counter nuclear-armed Libya and still hustling A.Q. Kahn?
Countless indeed are the ways the press loves Barack, and why not? Saddam was no threat. And neither is Obama.
