I was thinking the other day, and one of the issues that I kept chewing on was that what the Iraqi people really need right now are some help forming labor unions and keeping an eye on Halliburton and the Becthel Corporation. Actually, I am just kidding. But that is what these deranged peaceniks think the Iraqi people really need:
Some of the same peace activists who protested the U.S. invasion of Iraq have now set up camp in Baghdad, determined to scrutinize a military operation they couldn’t prevent.
Their new International Occupation Watch Center, which opened last week in Iraq’s chaotic capital, will keep a skeptical eye on the activities of U.S. troops and officials.
Its four-member staff will shadow U.S. companies Bechtel Corp. and Halliburton, whose role in Iraq’s reconstruction provoked protests at home.
More to the point, the center will actively oppose the occupation itself and call for its swift end. Its views, to be published in newsletters printed in English and Arabic, will probe the occupiers’ tolerance for dissent.
“This is a test of our rights — of freedom of speech, freedom of the press,
freedom of assembly — and we’ll press those rights to the full extent,” said San Francisco activist Medea Benjamin in an interview from Baghdad.
It is a shame these guys got scared and fled Baghdad before the War and didn’t get to live up to their lifelong dreams of being Human Shields for a brutal dictator. Then there would have been fewer of them to hassle the newly liberated Iraqi public. Maybe if they are lucky, they can hook up with some misogynistic anti-American mullahs and really foment some good old-fashioned Viet Nam era civil disobedience. That will help matters- and if we are lucky, the soldiers who have to put up with them might be able to shoot them in the ass with rubber bullets. Fair trade, I guess.
C’mon lefties. Someone come defend these losers. And if you guys ever wanted to know who right wingers were talking about when they mention the “Blame America First Crowd,” here is your answer. I am filing this under General Stupidity because these people are probably Nader supporters- but I am sure they have their sympathizers and supporters at the DU and among the Atriettes and the fringe that reads the Daily Kos.
Barney Gumble
Just like the Isralies don’t want any outside scrutiny of what happens in the occupied territories, the right doesn’t want any outside scrutiny of what happens in Iraq.
What are you afraid of?
John Cole
I knew Barney would defend these losers.
Umm- the outside scrutiny could be the MEDIA, and not a bunch of loser twerps like these 60’s leftovers.
Emperor Misha I
I wasn’t aware that their civil liberties even EXISTED in a war/occupied/martial law zone. They might find out the hard way and boy, what a sad day that’ll be… I hope I have enough champagne by then.
Andrew Lazarus
Medea Benjamin was the Green candidate for Senator in the ’00 election.
I’ve heard her called “Where are the Media” Benjamin. It seems to me, frankly, as if concerns about the occupation (or about Halliburton and friends) would be easier to investigate from the USA. I don’t support any of what they’re doing in Iraq.
Incidentally, I’ll even take issue with my buddy Mr. Gumble. Israelis are quite used to other (left-wing) Israelis reporting on conditions in the territories, although many of them would rather stick their heads in the sand, because some of it is shameful. (Gideon Levy and Amira Hass come to mind, but there are others.) The *Americans* pretending to participate in the political process there are generally acting out either jejune teen rebellion or anti-Semitism, not that this is to excuse the stupid blundering that caused the death of Rachel Corrie. I wasn’t greatly surprised to hear others in her group had naively and unwittingly aided two suicide bombers.
A very good picture of diverse psychopathologies in Israel, written when tensions were high after the *first* intifada, is Robert Stone’s novel “Damascus Gate”.
Also, FWIW, my views on the Occupied Territories are probably as far left as anyone’s, including Mr Gumble, reading here.
M. Scott Eiland
*snicker* I wonder if these antiwar types are being too vocal around the population around how some of them were volunteering as human shields for Saddam before the war started–if one of the little twits got himself lynched, it would be a justifiable reason for clearing them out of there. The US Army has better things to do than preventing left-wing idiots from winning themselves Darwin Awards.
intelligent man
Reasons for attacking Iraq:
WMD–oops, there weren’t any.
Saddam’s connection to 9/11–oops, there wasn’t any.