Tim Blair notices this Waleed Aly cornucopia of nonsense, complete with a refreshingly honest graphical admission the media can’t wait for a Tea Party member to finally do something violent. 
It’s a target-rich environment, but this bit jumped out at me:
It’s not just that we don’t value Iraqi lives as much as American ones (although this is true, given our ability to rationalise away the mammoth loss of civilian life during the Iraq war).
Given that the average monthly violent death rate under Saddam was actually higher than the worst death tolls of the occupation, this is like complaining the Normandy invasion proves we don’t value European lives — ask the Kurds how they feel about it. Also, nearly all of the Iraqi civilians killed were killed not by or because of the allied troops, but rather by terrorists and former regime elements, despite the best efforts of allied troops — it’s certainly the highest standard any invader has ever been held to. And it would appear we value Iraqi lives more than our own, since we sent our soldiers over to guard their polling places while they struggled to assemble something resembling a representative democracy.
UPDATE: As far as I know, there is no truth to the scurrilous rumor Columbia University has requested Dzokhar Tsarnaev’s transcripts and curriculum vitae.
Comments
5 responses to “Violence and Value”
They SO badly wanted the April 15 bombing to be Tea Party Terrorism that the president uncharacteristically used the word “terrorism” to characterize what happened in his first press conference on the subject. What a disappointment it must have been when it turned out to be radical jihad.
Thank you. Just because the Iraq war was a mistake and/or poorly executed does not mean everything about it was an example of America’s awfulness.
They SO badly wanted the April 15 bombing to be Tea Party Terrorism that the president uncharacteristically used the word “terrorism” to characterize what happened in his first press conference on the subject. What a disappointment it must have been when it turned out to be radical jihad.
Why would it matter? We’ve already experienced a number of right-wing attacks that have been ignored. George Tiller, the Holocaust Museum, The Sikh Temple, Pittsburgh, Spokane, etc. There’s nothing to wait for.
Thank you. Just because the Iraq war was a mistake and/or poorly executed does not mean everything about it was an example of America’s awfulness.
Um, no. You don’t get to scream about BENGHAZI!! for six months and then write all of the Iraq war as a “mistake.” It was a massive failure of a war and everyone knows that the war was sold to the public under false pretenses.
(http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2013/02/iraq-war-started-under-false-pretenses/)
Now, I believe that even if it was sold under the truthful pretenses, the US would have still most likely gone to war, but still, it makes the audit more difficult.
Remember, this war will cost at least two trillion after you include the care we will provide for disabled veterans. The no-bid contracts, subsidies and fraud dwarf the Soylendra “scandal.”
Personally, in retrospect, I would have preferred to just give Saddam $25B to go into exile rather than the $1.7 Trillion we’ve spent so far. Just remember that figure the next time you go around blaming the debt on the unemployed , the food stamp parasites, students and the rest of them.
Take a little a responsibility for once.
TheAJ,
Iraq accomplished all of our goals at a historically low cost and was based on the best intel available at the time, left-wing hallucinations, histrionics, and haranguing notwithstanding.
The rest of your comment is equally ridiculous but my time is limited so I won’t bother with further off-topic troll-rebuttal.
“As far as I know, there is no truth to the scurrilous rumor Columbia University has requested Dzokhar Tsarnaev’s transcripts and curriculum vitae.”
Umm. Thanks for the laugh, despite my having to clean up the keyboard AND monitor.