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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Friday, December 29, 2006

So, Saddam's dead and it still goes on.

As I said earlier, Saddam is irrelevant to today's Iraq.

In today's Iraq,
Three more Marines were killed in battle in Iraq, the military said Friday, making December the year's deadliest month for U.S. troops with the toll reaching 106.....

Already, December was shaping up to be one of the worst months for Iraqi civilian deaths since The Associated Press began keeping track in May 2005.

And there's no reason to think that Saddam alive or Saddam dead will make a bit of difference to the trendline.

posted by mikevotes at 10:09 PM

5 Comments:

  • Saddam bear the burden of his own guilt, but we too bear the burden of our own guilt. The guilt of acting as ringmaster for a kangaroo court and a judicial joke. The guilt of turning over a prisoner of war to his enemies. The guilt of being the champions of the death penalty at a time when the civilized world has moved beyond such barbarity.

    Generations to come will remember the Saddam Hussein trial not for the crimes of the accused, but for the pervesion of justice it was. And the world will hang this example around the neck of a country that knew better: the United States.

    By Blogger -epm, at 10:53 PM  

  • I'm right: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6218597.stm

    With the exception of Australia, who's government increasingly makes the Bush Administration look down right progressive, the focus of international comment is the trial and the death penalty, not the crimes of Saddam.

    By Blogger -epm, at 7:39 AM  

  • Yeah, the trial has been roundly criticized as unjust. It was the replacement of the judge in the middle that struck me.

    Iraq would have been better served by a fair trial both for itself and for its worldwide legitimacy. The US would have been better off with a fair trial as it would have damped perception that this was a US political show.

    It would have been far better if the trial had been just for all concerned, but in a broader sense, I have no question of his guilt. Saddam's regime was guilty of crimes, even if it was only the torture and execution of a single dissident.

    Ya know?

    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 8:11 AM  

  • Saddam's regime was guilty of crimes, even if it was only the torture and execution of a single dissident.


    By that measure there would be many more whose fate lie in the gallows. Many in suits and ties who's delicate hands were not stained by blood, but who's words and actions have caused much blood to flow.

    I think we're in agreement: Saddam was a guilty man, but a guilty man to whom vengeance was done, not upon whom justice was served.

    The world knew Saddam was guilty; they didn't expect him to be found otherwise. They did, however, expect the United States and her proxy, Iraq, to act in the noble traditions set by the example and practice of greater and wiser generations that preceded us. What is news is not that Saddam is guilty, but that Justice was raped in the process of adjudicating that guilt. The news is that the US polluted it's moral credibility, not that Saddam had none to begin with.

    By Blogger -epm, at 10:49 AM  

  • I agree wholeheartedly that it's largely vengeance, not justice. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough earlier. The trial was a set up, but because of his known guilt, I wasn't going to get all that excited about it.

    BUT, you make a very good point that the story is the trial and its relection on the US and the "new Iraq."

    Point conceded.

    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 1:55 PM  

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