June 25, 2004

SAD

I read this today in the comments section on another blog. It's part of a longer rant I won't bother with.

The first iraq war was a mistake. Iraq (former babylon) used to be one of the richest most prosperous countries in the world and was the center for trade in the middle-east. The british during there imperialism invaded and took over kuwait which later gained sovereinty. This left Iraq with no access to water and they lost all there trade and the country went to shit. To add salt in the wounds oil was discovered in 1978. So to the Iraqi people a piece of their land that had had owned for 1000's of years was taken from them causing their economy to colapse.
Now I am in no way saying Sadam was right in his methods but you must understand the culture. Sadam came into power by killing the former leader as did he and so on. When you rule a country like this you must rule it with fear. At any moment he could be overthrown. We can't contemplait this because we haven't lived that way for thousands of years.

Wow. I can't help but think of the wonderful Onion parody a few years back. Point (college student): Nigeria is a land filled with culture. Counterpoint (Nigerian): Get me out of this hellhole. We have to accept a violent dictatorship and the invasion of Kuwait because it's their culture. That's appallingly depressing; I think it's the worst thing I've read in a comments section in a long time.

This person describes himself as "well educated and professional", but I have to wonder about that, considering the wealth of spelling and grammar mistakes throughout.

Unfortunatly people regard US people in that malice. Its your government that people hate. They rule by econimic oppression. Who dares to stand up to them. The UN can't who can. So its no wonder 9/11 happened. Unfortunatly it envolved thousands of innocent people.

Posted by Sarah at June 25, 2004 04:02 PM
Comments

As Neal Boortz always says, it displays the power of a government school education!

Posted by: Mike at June 25, 2004 06:41 PM

That must be it...Saddam invaded Kuwait in the 90's to take all that water back.

Can the fool who wrote that ignorant drivel read a map?

It bothers me in a distant way that well meaning idiots armed with half-facts are allowed to vote.

Posted by: Jason at June 25, 2004 06:44 PM

people can be well educated and professional, yet still not speak English as a first language, you know. English speaking people aren't the only ones who have running water and university.

(the reason I point this out is that given the second piece you provide, he quite obviously is not American. I didn't know they even had computers in other places!)

just sayin'.

Posted by: friend of anon at June 26, 2004 02:09 AM

Sadam was an ass clown, I think we can all agree on that. If Bush had said, "I think Sadam is an ass clown and I want to bomb his country," maybe I could have respected that. But still, it's the kind of pet project that takes away from more important issues like fighting terrorism.

Posted by: Crake at June 26, 2004 04:09 AM

This person made it clear he is Australian. I assume English is his first language.

Posted by: Sarah at June 26, 2004 06:49 AM

There are plenty of Australians (and Americans, too) who don't speak English as their first language.

Posted by: Kolo at June 26, 2004 07:41 AM

Every dictator wishes for a country full of people just like this guy.

Posted by: Matt at June 26, 2004 08:26 PM

Not that I agree with this person, but it seems to me you don't have much more knowledge of Iraqi history than him/her. And that's part of the problem in today's discourse. You can't make a tangentially important point without being called a fool.

What that person (link, Sarah?) meant by 'losing access to water' is losing access to all harbors (to the British) except Basra, making trade over sea increasingly difficult.
Iraq never really accepted Kuwaiti sovereignty and regarded it as China regards Taiwan. The invasion of Kuwait however was an oil field dispute. The Iraqi government complained to OPEC, but its cries were not heeded (who was right in the dispute still remains unclear to me, so if anyone wants to enlighten me, please do) consulted with the US ambassador April Glaspie before invading Kuwait and her response was "We have no opinion on your Arab - Arab conflicts, such as your dispute with Kuwait." (link)

Now, this doesn't really affect the debate on the last invasion, since the first was solidly legitimized by the UN, but please don't question someone's education so quickly if you're knowledge is lacking too.

On the other hand, since I haven't seen the rest of the rant, my opinion on him/her could change.

Posted by: Sander at June 28, 2004 04:19 PM