I'd just like to thank all of the brave men and women in our military who proudly protect our rights and freedoms.

God bless you

As well as those in Iraq, which never threatened our rights and freedoms. And has safer farmers markets than Indiana.

Tragedy for millions, profits for a few. An oil rich country with little or no water, electricity, or gasoline (its imported from Kuwait). Unemplyment exceeds 50%. But NeoCon greedfuckers tell the media the surge is a success and fools believe it. Their bullshit story is critical to fall elections. Just like Abramoff and subprime banking fraud, coverup is the path.

This is a tragic and totally futile war. No winners only sad losers and broken families. For what? weapons of mass-destructions?. Wake up USA and stop the nightmare.

Hey, but let's investigate the CEOs of companies here in the US rather than those who profit from the profligate waste and destruction in Iraq. They're serving "FREEDOM," not greed, right?

Amanda Jordan, whose Marine husband was killed three days into the war, says she doesn't know what bothers her more -- the days that go by when no one speaks of the war, or the punditry. At a local diner she frequents with her 11-year-old son near their home in Enfield, Conn., she's contemplated standing up and leaving so he doesn't hear when people say Iraq was unnecessarily invaded.

"This is like my life. You're saying my spouse, my child's father, is dead for no reason," says Jordan, a 39-year-old former paralegal who is studying to be a therapist specializing in grief. "That's a pretty harsh thing to hear all the time."

Sorry Amanda, but it's true. As it is for every other person, Iraqi or American or otherwise, who will continue to die in a war for OIL. I guess that's a reason.

John McBush said way way back in 2003 that the war had succeeded beyond expectations. I'm guessing he expected the viet cong to come and torture him again.

At a local diner she frequents with her 11-year-old son



With her attitude, I'll bet her kid grows up with an irrational all-American hatred for Muslims or foreigners in general (not knowing that we all come from different countries and are all different) so he can make sense of why his daddy died.

He'll probably get killed looking for "WMDs" too.

and he came to feel that his months in Iraq were a time of growth.



Wow. Killing women and kids was a "time of growth"?

Good of the Iraqis to help with his "growth".

You're saying my spouse, my child's father, is dead for no reason,

Not for no reason.

He died so that multinationals could increase their profit margins by significant amounts. He died so that Bush's corporate cronies could win no bid contracts to build stuff in Iraq that never got built. He died so that the Military Industrial Complex could make a few bucks. He died in order to make the US a pariah on the world stage. He died so that the US could bankrupt itself. He died to make the world a less safe place. He died in order to create millions of suffering refugees. He died so that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis could die. He died so that the US could be turned into a stinking torture state.

Look, Spud didn't say they were good reasons.

Be Well.

He died for OIL and that is a fact. I know it must suck to come to terms with that fact but thems dare breaks unfortunately. I wonder how the Bushites sleep at night. I really do.

Larry Mohr

I was on board the Bush bandwagon until November 0f 2002, even though I was worried the day he was elected about Cheney and the morons he'd bring into the Bush cabinet. I remember the day after 9-11 getting up and shaving and thinking about the real possibility of going into Afghanistan and I remember saying, "keep it straight" as in "focus only on this, get it done, and then get the fuck out of Dodge".

In November 2002 I started to read more and more things about Iraq and suddenly I knew there'd be an invasion so I started to do my own research.

I wrote on a piece of paper which politicians were in agreement of what we all now deem the "neoconservative" movement and I noticed a trend between them and the democrats. Suddenly I realized that the Republican party was no longer the party of fiscal responsibility and non-interventionism. It was about extending global empire by means of continuous interventionism. i was 40 years old and felt like a kid all over again.

I got into a big argument with some family members during that thanksgiving (2002) about the "war on terror' and suddenly I knew things had changed for me-- why?

Well, my family ALWAYS has spirited policial discussions at the thanksgiving table, however I was fighting with those who always were "on my side".

Ever since then I have been convinced that Iraq was a totally needless war that would eventually serve to bring down America and anyone who had a hand in it-- those who could be investigated and found to have agendas that could be deemed anti-American in nature, be they businesspeople, oil barons, former leftists, zionists, or just plain greedy power-hungry assholes-- all were guilty and deserving of the Nathan Hale treatment.

Now i soon relaized that's the majority of our government, and sometimes one wonders that if the government is simply the mirror of the will of the people, then what the hell have Americans become?

Its quite amazing that one can have civil arguments with the majority of Americans when you are facing them, in person, but when it comes down to dealing with them through the media-- be they bloggers or pundits or even the odd message board troll, things become quite different-- it is a point where everyone tastes the power of the viral word and willingly exposes their eccentricities and radical natures-- where they can become faceless armchair quarterbacks pronouncing fatwas from the saftety and anonimity of their own keyboards-- anonymous cybersoldiers perfoming tactical retreats and advances under new handles, one google search away from sounding like they know what the hell they are talking about.


The Iraq war in summary is a mirror of our own country-- we are under occupation, but it isn't from some group of muslims-- it is an insurgency of domestic demagoguery. One, in my opinion that is the synthesis of old-time far-right Republican scare tactics, conservative christian religion, and racial prejudices and the leftist idealogy that leads us to intervene ad nauseum into the affairs of other countries under the guise of "making the world safe for democracy" or "championing the cause of freedom".

Its this synthesis, that reaches across parties from left to the right, that is the greatest threat to this country, and the Iraq invasion was "the hook" (as con artists used to say) in the whole great swindle.

I just can't believe the military death toll.

Military losses, 1980 through 2006
(ttp://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/
natsec/RL32492.pdf)

As tragic as the loss of any member of the US Armed Forces is, consider the
following statistics:

The annual fatalities of military members while actively serving in the armed forces from 1980 through 2006:

1980 .......... 2,392 (Carter Year)

1981 .......... 2,380 (Reagan Year)
1984 .......... 1,999 (Reagan Year)
1988 .......... 1,819 (Reagan Year)

1989 .......... 1,636 (George H W Year)
1990 .......... 1,508 (George H W Year)
1991 .......... 1,787 (George H W Year)
1992 .......... 1,293 (George H W Year)

1993 .......... 1,213 (Clinton Year)
1994 .......... 1,075 (Clinton Year)
1995 .......... 2,465 (Clinton Year)
1996 .......... 2,318 (Clinton Year)
1997 ............. 817 (Clinton Year)
1998 .......... 2,252 (Clinton Year)
1999 .......... 1,984 (Clinton Year)
2000 ...........1,983 (Clinton Year)

2001 ............. 890 (George W Year)
2002 .......... 1,007 (George W Year)
2003 .......... 1,410 (George W Year)
2004 .......... 1,887 (George W Year)
2005 ............. 919 (George W Year)
2006.............. 920 (George W Year)
2007...............899 (George W Year)

Clinton years (1993-2000): 14,000 deaths

George W years (2001-2006): 7,932 deaths

That damn Bush is horrible.

Sniper, I pulled up your link. I don't see the numbers you're using. For instance, total military deaths in 2000 (Clinton) was 758, not 1,983. Also, the numbers are for 8 years under Clinton, 6 under Bush.

In fact, the only place 1,983 military deaths shows up is in 1987. You also aren't differentiating between hostile action deaths, accidents, self inflicted, illness, etc. which your link clarifies.

Your totals appear to seriously overstate military deaths under Clinton and understate those under Bush. I've already imported the data into Excel and did the totals.

Perhaps you linked to a different source than what you're quoting?

From the link Sniper supplied:

Table 6. Comparison of Death, Wounded and Amputation
Statistics in American Conflicts

Operation Iraqi Freedom (Bush 43)
Deaths: 3,091 (today's number is 3975 US only)
Wounded: 23,417 (classification of "wounded" is interesting)
Amputations: 472

Operation Enduring Freedom (Bush 43)
Deaths: 352
Wounded:1,110
Amputations: 37

Persian Gulf War (Bush 41)
Deaths: 382
Wounded:467
Amputations: N/A

No listings for any conflicts when Clinton was President - and you can figure out why, I'd think.

Sniper shot the others to make up the numbers

Gee. In looking at the data, Sniper, it turns out:

1983: 2,465
1985: 2,252
1986: 1,984
1987: 1,983

Those numbers attributed to Clinton were from Bush 41's term.

Nicely restated to cover only the Iraq war, Crispee. Also, I don't care much for links to nysun or murdoc. Use the Pentagon's numbers if you want to make a case. I don't agree with the Pentagon's numbers, but at least no one on the "right" should disagree with them.

That's 4,417 deaths in peacetime but, of course, who's counting?

Yes, there's a "run rate" of deaths for any organization. The question is what is that rate?

Under Clinton it was .05%. Under Bush 43 it's .11% - more than twice. If you want to use raw numbers, that's fine - but don't expect the meaning to be what you'd like it to be. Some of us will look at the total military personnel and divide the deaths (accidents, self inflicted, homicides, etc.) and see the normalized rate for what it is.

This discussion is disingenuous. It's sad that the point was even raised. Worst of all, if the numbers used were deliberately misstated, and that's a big "if" it's despicable.

Nicely restated to cover only the Iraq war, Crispee. Also, I don't care much for links to nysun or murdoc. Use the Pentagon's numbers if you want to make a case. I don't agree with the Pentagon's numbers, but at least no one on the "right" should disagree with them.

Posted by YAV at 2008-03-09 01:05 PM

Use the Pentagons numbers if you want to make a case? I don't agree with the Pentagons numbers? You kind of cover yourself both ways Yav. Not sure how the 'rate' changes the raw numbers. The argument sniper was conveying was obvious.

Not sure how the 'rate' changes the raw numbers.

Of course you don't.

The argument sniper was conveying was obvious.

Yes it was. He either intentionally lied or he accidentally transposed the military deaths, under Bush 41 no less, to Clinton to make a point.

As to using the Pentagon's numbers, that is what I am using. I am using Sniper's link since he chose to use that as his source. I chose to play the game with the data he provided. That choice undercuts any claim to my own bias.

Lying prick chicken-hawk. Nice one, douchebag.

KG,

thanks for the post. though from afar, I followed pretty much the same evolution. watched gore tank during the debates, he seemed like a shrill prom queen not getting the recognition he thought he deserved. bush seemed ok, though i was worried about his fundamentalist and corporate support bases and how they would affect policy. guess a prom queen would have been better than a puppet armchair general that doesn't know his ass from his elbow.

Sniper is a victim of a Liberal History teacher who taught him that the Clinton Presidency was

1994,1983,1982,1997,1985,1986, 1987.

Clinton used a time machine from area 51 to make it so.

"I followed pretty much the same evolution. watched gore tank during the debates, he seemed like a shrill prom queen not getting the recognition he thought he deserved. bush seemed ok, though i was worried about his fundamentalist and corporate support bases and how they would affect policy. guess a prom queen would have been better than a puppet armchair general that doesn't know his ass from his elbow"

I was a dyed-in-the-wool Republican so naturally Gore and Loserman winning the election would have led me quite naturally to some sort of violent spree, LOL! Bush was a fairly blank slate when he first burst on the scene-- I gave him the benefit of the doubt like any loyal Republican would at the time. I didn't like Bush initially because he beat out my boy McCain. Then on 9/11 and 9/12 I thought we had the right guy in office-- then a few days later I realized we didn't have the right guy in office! From the get-go the damn administration was looking past Afghanistan and trying to hype the whole "war on terror" ideological bullshit-- that's the neoconservative influence and I will never forgive those Republicans who sold out to it in the run-up to the invasion. For a while i foolishly thought McCain would be able to resist those trumpeting for war against Iraq. I soon saw the folly of my ways and for the first time in my life in November of 2004 I voted Libertarian.

I voted Libertarian in 92, 96, 00 -Harry Brown and in 04 Mike Badnarik

But the Dems still call me a faggot