Bated Breath

Minutes from now, former Iraq dictator Saddam Hussein is to be executed by hanging, ending an era in memory of brutality, delusion and unfortunately, great American colusion. To paraphrase FDR, Hussein was "our S.O.B." in the early 1980s after Saddam got the wild hair to attack Iran. He suddenly became the world's bogeyman when the world's oil supply came under attack. He became the West's biggest thorn in its public relations side when he continually thumbed his nose at U.N. weapons inspectors, continued to build up WMD and then suddenly halt all productions and attempts to amass these weapons all the while feigning that he was to be the Middle East's most heavily-armed superpower next to Israel. Only with the March 2003 U.S. invasion did the world see that this psychopathic ruler was a deranged criminal with military backing and control over a nation due to the fear of terror. What truly was a weak and instable nation was only made worse with his overthrow, regardless of those who claim that a man that evil deserved to be deposed. While that argument was not only moot (justification on ground of merit?), it was continually thrown in the face of those, including yours truly, who opposed Bush's manipulation of "intelligence" (remember, there's always a problem whenever the words "Bush" and "intelligence" are used in the same sentence) into taking over a nation with the goal of ultimately toppling all Middle Eastern anti-U.S. governments in order to control the region's oil supply. Three years and hundreds of thousands of deaths later, only with years of fighting a burgeoning self-inflicted terrorist front, not to mention a midterm election that served as the president's only wake-up call that Americans had had it with his Iraq policy, has the president seen that he probably wishes Saddam to be back in power. I will never justify Hussein's maniacal rule of that country and oppose all forms of human oppression everywhere but when actions based on national interests (including the toppling of any leader who serves as a threat to them), including Middle East stability, are carried out so poorly without any sort of realization that they may or already have failed, then U.S. actions fail to serve the greater good of the nation and the world. Here we are now, in a week of weeks to be quoting the foreign policy expert Gerald R. Ford, that the Bush War was stupid. So, let's see, here are George Walker Bush's predecessors on his war of choice:

Clinton: "notice I didn't invade even though he had claimed to have a nuke in the 90s? How right was I"?

Bush I: "don't invade Baghdad". "Jim, go clean up my kid's mess. No, not Katrina, I've got that."

Reagan: "Attack? Here, have some of our chemical weapons and anything you need to hit the Iranians. Just be careful because I'm giving them the same stuff on the downlow."

Carter: "Check out my Nobel Peace Prize for making peace in the Middle East."

Ford: "Mistake". "Cheney's hell-bent on invading." (paraphrased)

Nixon: (paraphrased), "whatever you do, don't make Donald Rumsfeld Secretary of Defense."

Johnson: "do I need to quote Santayana, you dolt?"

JFK: "the GOP impeached Clinton on blowjobs. You got lucky, chump. Shoulda cheated; check out our approval ratings."