"Barbara O’Brien’s wide-ranging account of Zen history is conveyed with a master storyteller’s ability to keep the forest from getting lost in a myriad of trees. Wearing her scholarship lightly, she blends just the right amount of skepticism about her hagiographic sources with a deep appreciation for the Dharma." — Barry Magid, author of
Nothing Is Hidden and
Ending the Pursuit of Happiness Order here!
I agree up to the comments by Josh Marshall. After that, I don’t agree with any of the arguments and I think they’re stupid arguments, not very well thought out and I basically agree with the right-wing that this was final chapter on closing the Saddam Hussein book. I don’t think the trial was a sham and I don’t care one iota if the Sunni’s are going to be even more up in arms over this. I don’t care for any of the coverage though and think its being hyped more than what it should be. I disagree that the “liberal” media is basically treating this like any other news story. Come on, Larry King had a show devoted to it last night with the trailer “Suddam Hussein execution”. To cover it properly, it should be ignored except to report “Saddam Hussein was executed at such and such a time” and that’s it.
this was final chapter on closing the Saddam Hussein book
So we’re leaving Iraq now? Not that I’d heard.
Who is the next demon going to be now that Saddam has left the stage? al Sadr..? Quick, George, we need an Iraqi villian!
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article2112555.ece
Robert Fisk said it well.
I remember hearing many years ago, that in a troop of baboons, when a young male challenger defeats the alpha male, the vanquished is severely beaten and subjected to anal rape–in public.
I see no value in executing Saddam or anyone else, life in the slammer is far worse than death, an execution pleases the sadists.
Killing Saddam will make NOTHING better.
I wanted him to watch his own slide into insignificance. To experience utter powerlessness for a decade or so in contrast to his absolute power.
Yep, hanging is too good for him, and too bad for any civilized govornment.
There are times when killing the captured dictator is neccessary in order to bring an end to a conflict. The Ceaucescus had to go, for example. But this is not such a case. Saddam was already a footnote, and his death changes nothing.
Bush has lost his bete noire, and now he’s got nothing. Big mistake on the administration’s part.
Still, I see it as a mistake in acquiescing, not in acting. As far as I can see, Saddam’s execution was ordered and carried out by Iraqis (albeit one faction of Iraqis) and not Americans. I think even that faction would take offense at accusations that they were merely American puppets.
The execution-by-one-faction will only increase the factional bloodshed, of course. And provide yet another excuse for escalation of our presence in Iraq.
To view a cynical and satirical visual of George Bush playing a round of “Hangman”…link here:
http://www.thoughttheater.com/2006/12/george_plays_hangman.php
Q. How does the undertaker in Baghdad know which bodies are Sunni and which ones are Shia?
A. The Sunnis are the ones with the drill holes.
marijam – “closing the book” on someone (Saddam) who knows too much.
The book will really be closed, and justice served, when Bush and Olmert are punished for the same crime that lead to Saddam’s hanging: Disproportionate use of Violence.
http://gdaeman.blogspot.com/2006/12/justice-in-executing-saddam-hussein.html
… and for those who want to see, literally, what Stirling Newberry refers to as Bush’s giant middle finger: Bush’s One Finger Victory Salute
http://www.bushflash.com/thanks.html A history Lesson.
Agree with your comments and Josh Marshall’s. The whole Iraq rollout, featuring its evil WMDs and threats of Imminent Danger ™ needed a villain, and Saddam filled that role quite well. But as we all found out, the Iraq War was deliberately based on fiction. Sure, Saddam was evil, but so are a dozen other dictators on this planet right now, some with real, as opposed to imaginary WMDs.
Getting rid of Saddam was in no way worth the enormous cost: the killing and maiming of thousands of Americans and many more Iraqis, the destruction of their country, the entrapment and isolation of our own, and finally the emboldening of our real enemies. It’s like using an atomic bomb to kill a fly – it flattened the whole neighborhood – the cure was far worse than the problem. Osama is laughing his a** off at our monumental blunder. His baiting us via 9/11 worked like a charm.
The real tragedy is that without a Saddam-like figure, the country will splinter, and Iran will be the big winner. Like so many things that the right destroys because they cannot understand, Saddam, however evil, served a useful function. He was contained and relatively harmless to the outside world. There was no real reason to displace him, especially when there are other dictators out there who really are a threat to world peace.
There’s also the pathetic need for one crime boss to put down an upstart, to show the rest of the world who’s in charge. I am certain that Bush is doing high fives as he thinks he’s showing the world who’s in charge. I am certain Bush thinks this execution is signifcant and redemptive.
And so, in keeping with the official fiction, we killed a patsy, to reaffirm the story line and shore up Bush’s fraud. How I wish one of our elected officials had the guts to call this sham for what it is. And then I hear Elizabeth Vargas on ABC News parrotting the government’s line. You’ve got to be kidding me.
I was kinda hoping they would have the execution on pay-per-view. It would be the cherry on the top of a commercial war, waged for oil and for the companies getting filthy rich on no-bid contracts.
Now we know why Bush delayed that ‘big speech’ that he was supposed to give a few weeks before Christmas, you know the one in response to the Baker Report. When they realized they had nothing, they manipulated the timing of the Hussein execution. Like it really makes a difference. He’s so predictable.
tsk, tsk, Swami.
How can you tell a neocon at a glance? Easy, no amount of surge will release the perpetual hard-on.
3,000
3,000.Just great…. How many more before we say enough? This morning’s paper listed 3 soldiers KIA. Their ages were 20,20, and 21.