“Danielle, please write a blog.” I get scolded by Russell whenever I run into him. I decided today, out of all days, deserve some attention. Today marks the anniversary of the Iraq war. Seven years later and we are no more ‘safer’ today then we were then. Thinking back on Bush’s Mission Accomplished sign, I get infuriated. What mission? The mission was weapons of Mass Destruction. There were no WMD’s.
We went to war under false pretenses and they couldn’t even bother faking to find the one thing we went in there for. These fucking morons have the audacity to lie to the world about their accusations but couldn’t even bother to dig up a hole and throw some evidence in there. And even worse, the disservice the U.S. media did to its fellow citizens and the country by compromising the journalism code of ethics and standards. I think back to the days of credible unbiased reporting, when personal opinion or corporate interest was never injected in real news. The day the most trusted man in news, Walter Cronkite told America that Vietnam was a lost war and could not be won. President Johnson was reported to have said “If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost middle America.” And he had. That was the turning point when a nation woke up, stood together in protest, stopped believing the lies of political authority, and demanded to end Vietnam.
More than 4,300 American lives. 30,000+ severely wounded. Almost a million Iraqi civilian deaths based on the poll done by Lancet, the oldest medical journal (though a poll of ORB in London places that number over a million and some U.S. made polls are way under both those numbers). $750 billion spent so far. And for what? The least we could have gotten out of that situation is cheap oil, and these incompetent douche-bags couldn’t even do that. Prices are higher than before the invasion. It has also, very presently enhanced and not reduced American security.
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