invasion. Secular governments are important in Arab lands in which
there is division between Sunni and Shi'ite. Secular governments keep
the divided population from murdering one another.
When the american invasion, a war crime under the Nuremberg standard set
by the US after WWII, overthrew the Saddam Hussein secular government,
the Iraqi Sunnis and Shi'ites went to war against one another. The civil
war between Iraqis saved the american invasion. Nevertheless, enough
Sunnis found time to fight the american occupiers of Iraq that the US
was never able to occupy Bagdad, much less Iraq, no matter how violent
and indiscriminate the US was in the application of force.
The consequence of the US invasion was not democracy and women's rights
in Iraq, much less the destruction of weapons of mass destruction which
did not exist as the weapons inspectors had made perfectly clear
beforehand. The consequence was to transfer political power from Sunnis
to Shi'ites. The Shi'ite version of Islam is the Iranian version. Thus,
Washington's invasion transferred power in Iraq from a secular
government to Shi'ites allied with Iran.
Now Washington intends to repeat its folly in Syria. According to the
american secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, Washington is even
prepared to ally with al-Qaeda in order to overthrow Assad's government.
Now that Washington itself has al-Qaeda connections, will the
government in Washington be arrested under the anti-terrorism laws?
Washington's hostility toward Assad is hypocritical. On February 26, the
Syrian government held a referendum on a new constitution for Syria
that set term limits on future presidents and removed the political
monopoly that the Ba'ath Party has enjoyed.
The Syrian voter turnout was 57.4%, matching the voter turnout for Obama
in 2008. It was a higher voter turnout (despite the armed,
western-supported rebellion in Syria) than in the nine US presidential
elections from 1972 through 2004. The new Syrian constitution was
approved by a vote of 89.4%.
But Washington denounced the democratic referendum and claims that the
Syrian government must be overthrown in order to bring democracy to
Syria.
Washington's allies in the region, unelected oil monarchies such as
Saudi Arabia and Qatar, have issued statements that they are willing to
supply weapons to the Islamist rebels in order to bring
democracy -- something they do not tolerate at home -- to Syria.
For Washington "democracy" is a weapon of mass destruction. When
Washington brings "democracy" to a country, it means the country's
destruction, as in Libya and Iraq. It doesn't mean democracy. Libya is
in chaos, a human rights nightmare without an effective government.
Washington installed Nouri al-Maliki as president of Iraq. He lost an
election, but remained in power. He has declared his vice president to
be a terrorist and ordered his arrest and is using the state police to
arrest Sunni politicians. Syria's Assad is more democratic than Iraq's
Maliki.
For a decade Washington has misrepresented its wars of naked aggression
as "bringing democracy and human rights to the Middle East." While
Washington was bringing democracy to the Middle East, Washington was
destroying democracy in the US. Washington has resurrected medieval
torture dungeons and self-incrimination. Washington has destroyed due
process and habeas corpus. At Obama's request, Congress passed
overwhelmingly a law that permits american subjects to be imprisoned
indefinitely without a trial or presentation of evidence. Warrantless
searches and spying, illegal and unconstitutional at the turn of the
21st century, are now routine.
Obama has even asserted the right, for which there is no law on the
books, to murder any american anywhere if the executive branch decides,
without presenting any evidence, that the person is a threat to the US
government. Any american anywhere can be murdered on the basis of
subjective opinion in the executive branch, which increasingly is the
only branch of the US government. The other two "co-equal" branches have
shriveled away under the "war on terror."
Why is Washington so determined to bring democracy to the Middle East
(with the exception of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and the Emirates),
Africa, Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, and China, but is hostile to
constitutional rights in america?
The rights that americans gained from successful revolution against King
George III in the 18th century have all been taken away by Bush/Obama
in the 21st century. One might think that this would be a news story,
but it isn't.
Don't expect the Ministry of Truth to say anything about it.
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