by Adrian Hamilton, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

A British columnist decries the exploitation of Iraqis' desire for self-determination:
http://tompaine.com/opinion/#003623

Britain implicated in oil-for-food scandal, damning report says
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=607603

by Robert Kuttner

The American Prospect

02/03/05

The United States has spent nearly $200 billion dollars and lost more than 1,400 American lives so that Iraqis could attempt representative government. If, by some miracle, the result is a democratic and pro-western Iraq, President Bush can claim Mission Accomplished, for real. But a great deal must still break right before that banner can be unfolded. One risk is endless insurgency and prolonged occupation. Another is that Iraqis will indeed elect a popular government, but not one that we like, or that likes us. A recent New Yorker magazine profile of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi referred to him as Saddam Lite. This would not be the first time that the United States installed a friendly strongman with democratic trappings, only to have the enterprise backfire utterly...

http://www.prospect.org/web/view-web.ww?id=9142


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

http://chronicle.com/temp/email.php?id=5olxgmpu8go2b4u9vpdfqg10v0x186aa


Informant: William K. Dobbs

From ufpj-news

http://www.veteransforcommonsense.org/index.cfm?Page=Article&ID=2765


Informant: Shanti Renfrew

by Mark Morford

San Francisco Chronicle

02/02/05

Ah, the violent march of democracy. Beautiful thing, really, seeing repressed and weary Iraqis vote for the first time, and dance in the bloody bombed-out streets, and avoid the suicide bombers and of course not be able to travel between provinces or drive anywhere in their locked-down nation and by the way watch out for the snipers on the roofs. It really is amazing, watching the deeply flawed system of democracy take hold in a raw and decimated nation like a thorny weed cracking through shattered concrete. All people deserve to be free and now Iraqis have a tiny bloody taste of it and this is always, always a good thing. I am not kidding. So, should we be proud? Is Bush's thuggish and illegal pre-emptive attack strategy justified? Are Iraq's first-ever elections a defining moment in American political history?

http://tinyurl.com/3jofo


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

by David Corn

Tom Paine

02/02/05

The historic election that occurred in Iraq has made it easier for George W. Bush to distance himself from the phony case he presented for war in Iraq. This latest State of the Union address is the president's first since his weapons hunters declared there had been no WMDs and no WMD programs in Iraq before the war. Bush might -- only might -- feel obligated to reference the matter and offer what has become his final and disingenuous fallback position on those (nonexistent) WMDs. But the election has shoved the WMD controversy (or non-controversy) even further to the side. When the CIA issued a classified report this week concluding that Iraq had abandoned its chemical weapons program in 1991, it was not front-page news. So whether the MIA WMDs are State of the Union material or not, allow me to puncture Bush's final WMD myth. He has, of course, promoted a series of WMD fables...

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/dreaming_of_wmds.php


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

by Carl F. Worden

Sierra Times

02/02/05

For those of you who think the Iraqi Election on January 30, 2005 was a turning point in the Iraq War, it wasn't. We tried the same thing during the Vietnam War. ... [quotation cited from 1967] ... I will once again repeat that this war in Iraq is unwinnable. ... The huge difference between the Vietnam War and the Iraq War is that Vietnam was a tactical war, whereas the war in Iraq has developed into a strategic one -- and there's a nasty difference between the two. We could declare false victory in Vietnam and walk away without repercussions. Where Iraq is concerned, when we walk out of there in defeat, as we most assuredly will, we will have created a united enemy of many peoples and nations, and we will be left without the future support of most of our most trusted former allies...

http://www.sierratimes.com/05/02/02/worden01022005.htm


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

by Jarret Wollstein

International Society for Individual Liberty

02/03/05

In the wake of this unending bloodshed, destruction and death, some soldiers are beginning to question the wisdom of this 'war of liberation' in which entire cities like Fallujah (home to 300,000 people, just a few months ago) are being obliterated. It should therefore come as no surprise that more and more soldiers are returning to the U.S. very angry with the authorities who lied to them about nearly everything, when they sent them to Iraq. Nineteen-year-old Marine Lance Cpl. Andres 'Andy' Raya was one of them...

http://www.isil.org/towards-liberty/rambo-comes-home.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp