The Liberals’ Creed

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-05-2004
The Liberals’ Creed
457
Thu, 05-27-2004 - 9:47pm
Kirkuk, Iraq—For all the talk about a widening religiosity gap between the right and the left, sentiment from the left indicates a certain religious fervor about the war in Iraq. A string of recent letters and articles from those of a more liberal persuasion suggest that they choose to ignore or simply do not believe information which is inconsistent with their basic tenets. Theirs is a policy of faith, and here is their creed.

We believe in the United Nations, and Kofi Annan, the maker of international legitimacy.

We believe that the UN inspections worked.

We believe that SCUD missiles fired at U.S. troops minutes after the war began don’t change anything;

We believe that 3 liters of sarin gas used against U.S. troops doesn’t change anything;

We believe that finding evidence of mustard gas doesn’t change anything.

We believe that the war in Iraq conducted by a Republican president was unjustified because it lacked UN approval;

We believe that the "military action" in Kosovo conducted by a Democratic president was justified without UN approval.

We believe that the Iraq war was unilateral.

We believe that the participation of Albania, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Estonia, Georgia, Honduras, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Thailand, United Kingdom, and Ukraine does not change the fact that the war was unilateral;

We believe that multilateralism can only be achieved with the participation of France and Germany;

We believe in multilateralism.

We believe that this war was motivated by greed and oil;

We believe that when France, Germany, and Russia opposed the war, they were motivated by principle, and not by sweetheart oil deals or Oil-For-Food kickbacks;

We believe that US oil prices are too high, and that the administration failed in its responsibility to do something about it.

We believe that the U.S. may only legitimately use force for humanitarian ends in one place if it does so in all places where aid might be needed;

We believe that the U.S. may not quell threats in places where the cost is relatively low unless it is willing to use force in places like North Korea, where the cost in lives would likely be very high;

We believe that a humanitarian action is only truly humanitarian if there are no strategic interests to muddle the altruism.

We believe that President Bush lied.

We believe that Prime Minister Blair lied.

We believe that when Hillary Clinton and Dick Gephardt voted for the war based on the same intelligence relied upon by Bush and Blair, they made reasonable decisions based on the intelligence available at the time.

We believe that the administration did not make the case for war;

We believe that the administration offered many different reasons but could not offer a coherent message explaining the need to go to war;

We believe that the administration made perfectly clear that the only reason we were going to war was because of the threat from WMDs.

We believe that there were no WMDs.

We believe that finding sarin gas is 14th page news;

We believe that if the sarin gas is old, then it really isn’t a WMD we were looking for;

We believe that it wasn’t really sarin gas;

We believe that sarin gas isn’t necessarily a WMD.

We believe that there was no terrorist connection to, or threat from, Iraq.

We believe that members of Abu Nidal in Iraq would not have committed terrorist acts if we had not invaded;

We believe that al Qaeda operative Abu Musab al-Zarqawi would not have committed terrorist acts if we had not invaded;

We believe that Saddam’s terrorist training camp at Salman Pak—complete with a Boeing 707 plane used for hijacking drills—did not exist or posed no real threat;

We believe that it was merely a coincidence that the pharmaceutical factory bombed by President Clinton in Sudan was using al Qaeda funds and a uniquely Iraqi formula to produce VX gas;

We believe that we are responsible for bringing terror on ourselves.

We believe that the prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib is widespread and is probably the tip of the iceberg;

We believe that Abu Ghraib proves that the America’s occupation is no different than Saddam’s tyranny;

We believe that any attempt to suggest that there is a moral difference between a regime which systematically killed 300,000 people and tortured countless others and a regime which punished the acts of Abu Ghraib is illegitimate.

We believe that soldiers deliberately target women and children;

We believe that the soldiers abuse and kill Iraqis because they are racists;

We support our troops.

We believe that no one should question our statement that we "support our troops;"

We believe that the best thing that could happen for this country would be for Bush to lose in November;

We believe that the best way for Bush to lose in November is for the Iraq effort to go poorly, even if that means that more Iraqis and troops will die;

We believe that most of the troops are minorities and the poor;

We believe that when the word "heroes" is used to describe our troops, it should always be enclosed in scare quotes.

We believe in quagmire.

We believe that when fringe Iraqi groups attack hard targets and are soundly defeated with relatively low Coalition casualties, that this is inescapable evidence of crisis;

We believe that Iraq is Bush’s Vietnam.

We believe that Vietnam is the lens through which all wars should be viewed.

We believe that soldiers in Vietnam were baby killers;

We believe that John Kerry is a hero for his service in Vietnam.

We believe that because John Kerry is a hero, he necessarily has the national security expertise necessary to be commander-in-chief.

We believe that any attempt to question his national security expertise based on his voting record, including his decision to vote against a supplemental bill used to buy the soldiers body armor, is an unfair attack on the patriotism of a hero, who by virtue of this honorific has the expertise to be commander-in-chief.

We believe in the trinity: NPR, CNN, and the New York Times. We believe in Ted Kennedy, Tom Harkin, John Kerry, and all the DNC, and we look for President Clinton yet to come. Amen.


by: Robert Alt



Pages

Avatar for baileyhouse
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:34am
>>>I don't recall conservatives hating Clinton with the same intensity as liberals hating the current president.<<<< Maybe not on this board because it was too new, but PLUUULEEEASE, the HATE for Clinton WAS EVERYWHERE in the pious, rightous republican community....Your comment is just toooo funny....

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-05-2004
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:34am
No, their followers WERE acting on the call to arms! And should the right wing religious newpaper be shut down if the religious readers of the paper followed the instructions to a tee? Or do you think their freedom of speech should be honored. Somehow I don't think so.
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-05-2004
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:35am
Please research this. I hope that once you do, you can make an intelligent argument.
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-05-2004
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:36am
This doesn't surprise me.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2003
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:38am
Interesting article, and in fact hope that is how it will all play out.
iVillage Member
Registered: 05-21-2003
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:39am
From one of your sources:


Bin Laden's "al Qaeda" organization functioned both on its own and through other terrorist organizations, including the Al Jihad group based in Egypt, the Islamic Group also known as el Gamaa Islamia led at one time by Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, and a number of other jihad groups in countries such as Sudan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Somalia.

If I am correct in assuming your stance on the issue's, then are we going to war with the above metioned countries? They are harboring terrorists. Does your reasoning include these countries? Does this adminstrations reasoning include these countries?

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2003
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:40am
"Oh, so you can read their minds and know that they are lying when they say that they must "kill the infidels"? They have made it quite clear that they are at war with us because we do not worship in the same way that they do. If we converted, and followed their religion to the tee they would stop trying to kill us. This is the only way to negotiate our way out of this."

Sorry, but that isn't the case, else they would be attacking all Christian countries. Fighting them over religion is a mistake. We fight because they attacked us, and we have to simultaneously work to defuse the root cause.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2004
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:41am


How do you figure when the U.S. said they would not account for Iraqi civilian deaths?

"The precise number of Iraqi civilians killed by U.S. soldiers since the end of major military operations is unknown, and the U.S. military told Human Rights Watch that it keeps no statistics on civilian deaths. “It’s a tragedy that U.S. soldiers have killed so many civilians in Baghdad,” said Joe Stork, acting executive director of the Middle East and North Africa division at Human Rights Watch. “But it’s really incredible that the U.S. military does not even count these deaths. Any time U.S. forces kill an Iraqi civilian in questionable circumstances, they should investigate the incident."

http://www.hrw.org/press/2003/10/iraq102103.htm

"The Pentagon said yesterday that it has no plans to determine how many Iraqi civilians may have been killed or injured or suffered property damage as a result of U.S. military operations in Iraq."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A26305-2003Apr14?language=printer


http://www.iraqbodycount.net/press.htm

IRAQ BODY COUNT Press Releases

PR7 - Thursday March 19th 2004

700 named in Iraq's death toll after a year of slaughter

As the anniversary of the Iraq invasion approaches, Iraq Body Count has been able to establish the names of almost 700 civilians killed in Iraq between March 19th 2003 and February 29th 2004 as a direct consequence of the US/UK invasion and subsequent occupation.

The list, periodically updated and permanently available on the Iraq Body Count website http://www.iraqbodycount.net/names.htm , details (where known) name, age, gender, place of death, cause of death, and the media sources from which they were obtained.

Although this list provides details for less than 7% of the 10,000 civilians reported killed during the same period (see http://www.iraqbodycount.net/bodycount.htm ), it is the closest so far to a truly comprehensive accounting and memorial for the civilian dead in Iraq. Among the 692 deaths listed there are 106 females, 421 males and 94 known to be under 18 years of age.

As world opinion increasingly turns against the US-led coalition for the lies that forced war on a powerless country, and for the chaos into which Iraq has now sunk, the human details pieced together in the Iraq Body Count list paint in graphic and poignant form the terrible, true cost of this war: the pointless loss of husbands, wives, sons and daughters of a proud but suffering people.

John Sloboda, co-founder of Iraq Body Count said "We hope that many organisations, agencies, and web-sites will wish to refer to this list and carry a link to it. Now, in this anniversary week, it has never been more important for us to offer the respect to those victims of war and civil disorder that has been denied them by the US and UK governments, as well as by the officials in Baghdad that they control."

For further information please email press@iraqbodycount.org

Avatar for baileyhouse
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:42am
I guess if we can't laugh at a ignorance we would lose our sense of humor.
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-05-2004
Fri, 06-04-2004 - 10:42am
Do you know what a Jihad is? It is a holy war.


"Kamil stressed that Islamists must resort to terrorism as the sole viable and effective means of meeting such challenges as 'the enslavement of mankind, the unfair killings of the oppressed on earth, the corruption of man and land, and the proliferation of destructive weapons that are used only by tyrants.".. (pg 403)

They have made this quite clear. This is a religous war, a jihad. If we changed all of our policies in accordance to their fanatical beliefs, there would be no more need for them to kill us. Simple as that.

Pages