From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Sun May 22 2005 - 13:54:39 BST
Hi Ant,
Well, if you want to argue about the decision to liberate Iraq from a
monstrous tyranny, we can do that by rehashing all the arguments, pro and
con. I too can play the game of "I'm sick to death of . . ." But, what's
the point? But, if you want to discuss it from an MOQ perspective, I'm all
ears. So far as I can discern, war isn't intrinsically immoral by MOQ
standards.
Best,
Platt
> Platt,
>
> Thanks again for providing some alternative viewpoints to the Galloway
> hearing at the Senate. It was very telling in your last post that, after
> initialling pointing to the Senate’s documents as damning evidence against
> Galloway, there was a lack of reference to them in your subsequent post.
> Now you might want to start thinking about why the Senate have forged
> documents in this context and who made them. As regards your other
> comments, they came as little surprize and, as usual, I have responded to
> the most misleading ones.
>
> Platt stated May 19th 2005:
>
> > >Free speech doesn’t require a megaphone be given to every crackpot who
> > >wants to destroy what we fight to preserve and promote around the world.
>
> Ant McWatt replied:
>
> >Well, that’s a bit of a harsh indictment on Norm Coleman. ;-) And,
> >anyway, don’t you think people in a democracy should be allowed to make
> >their own minds up about who is talking like a crackpot and who isn’t?
> >What gives a big mouth reporter on Fox News the right to censor parts of
> >an important Senate hearing? Hasn’t it crossed your mind that Fox News
> >were possibly trying to hide something? Wake up and smell the coffee!
>
> Missing the point, Platt responded May 20th 2005:
>
> As far as I can determine, the editors at Fox news gave Galloway more
> exposure than any other network including the leftist editors at CBS, NBC
> and ABC. No doubt the reason for this "censorship" was the judgment by
> editors (who are also "people in a democracy") that his testimony lacked
> news value.
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> What I was particularly objecting to with Fox’s coverage was that the
> voice-overs of their newscasters obscured what Galloway was saying. That
> policy is straight out of Orwell’s 1984. As a democrat and believer in
> free-speech, it was very disturbing to watch.
>
> Platt stated May 20th 2005:
>
> After all, Americans have heard it all before, ad nauseam.
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> As have the British public, ad nauseam. Personally, I’m sick to death of
> hearing about the children and young parents killed by the occupation. I’m
> sick to death of hearing about young soldiers (hardly more than children
> themselves) being killed in a situation created by middle-aged politicians
> who ensure their own children don’t fight in Iraq. I am sick to death
> about hearing about the taxpayer’s money being squandered by such a dubious
> escapade. I am sick to death of hearing about the massive profits that
> corporations such as Halliburton are continuing to make from this
> occupation and I am sick to death thinking about the long-term damage this
> occupation will cause for world peace and security.
>
> Platt stated May 20th 2005:
>
> Galloway is the British version of Michael Moore.
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> As there are so many people (in the US and UK) against the Iraq occupation
> this seems a rather sweeping statement.
>
> Platt stated May 20th 2005:
>
> However, I give Galloway high marks for demonstrating what a bunch of wimps
> Republican senators are, even though their lack of cohonies hardly requires
> additional evidence.
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> Yes, Michael Hamilton illustrated this very well in his comments about
> Galloway. I am keeping an open mind about Galloway’s exact involvement in
> Iraq (though it appears that those documents of the Senate are forgeries)
> but his independently-minded straight talking in relation to the political
> sheep (whether in the Senate or British parliament) has made for a
> refreshing change. And, yes, I wish more politicians would reject the
> corporate party lines and, like Ten Bears (the Comanche chief whose speech
> to Washington politicians is quoted in chapter 3 of LILA) speak their real
> minds clearly. Even Dr Hans Blix (the Chief UN Weapons Inspector in Iraq)
> has spoken of the culture of spin and hype surrounding Bush Junior and
> Blair and famously compared their governments’ attempts to make the case
> for war with an advertiser trying to sell a fridge.
>
> > >Apparently Galloway is not in favor of establishing democracy over
> >tyranny
> > >in Iraq or anywhere else.
> >
> >I think he is. However, I think – like any reasonable person – he’s
> >against illegal wars and the imposition of puppet governments such as the
> >one presently installed in Iraq.
>
> Platt replied May 20th 2005:
>
> I guess you missed the free elections in Iraq. Not even Jimmy Carter could
> claim they were bogus.
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> Yes, I missed the free elections in Iraq because they haven’t happened yet.
> And, no doubt, President Carter would agree with me as indicated by the
> sentiments of David Carroll of the Carter Center (the human rights
> organization founded by Carter) in the article from the “Washington Post”
> pasted below.
>
> =================================
>
> “No Foreign Observers to Monitor Iraq Vote: Only One Outsider from
> International Mission May Assess Elections on Site”
>
> By Robin Wright
> Washington Post Staff Writer
> Saturday, January 22, 2005; Page A12
>
> When 1 million Palestinians voted for a successor to Yasser Arafat, 800
> international observers poured into the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to
> monitor the polling. Former president Jimmy Carter and former Swedish prime
> minister Carl Bildt led one team. A former French prime minister led
> another, and there were two U.S. congressional delegations.
>
> When 8 million Afghans voted in October, at least 122 international
> observers from across Europe and Asia monitored the presidential election
> -- and declared it an "orderly and transparent process."
>
> But in Iraq, where 14 million people are eligible to vote, the elections
> next week may have only one outsider from the hastily organized
> International Mission for Iraqi Elections to evaluate the balloting. If
> reluctant governments change their minds at the last minute about letting
> their officials go to Iraq, a handful of others may show up. But, even
> then, none is likely to tour polling stations or to be publicly identified,
> mission and U.S. officials said.
>
> The violence in Iraq means that its elections will be the first among
> dozens of transitional elections over the past two decades -- since
> democracy began to sweep through eastern Europe, the old Soviet Union,
> Latin America and Africa -- that will not have an international observer
> force touring polling stations to assess the vote’s credibility, election
> experts say….
>
> "That means you don’t have an independent voice that can really report
> credibly on the quality of the election -- in a context where there are
> already extremely difficult circumstances and doubts about the process,"
> said David Carroll of the Carter Center, who was an observer in the
> Palestinian elections. Among those doubts are whether the insurgents will
> succeed in keeping people away from polling places with threats of violence
> and whether the minority Sunnis will participate in sufficient numbers for
> the balloting to be called successful.
>
> (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28599-2005Jan22.html)
>
> ===============================
>
> And, because genuine free elections haven’t happened yet in Iraq, the
> political situation there is deteriorating as indicated by the following
> extract from a recent article by Hannah Allam:
>
> ========================
>
> “Iraq Elections May Have Made Things Worse”
> By Hannah Allam
>
> Saturday 14 May 2005
>
> Baghdad, Iraq - Two weeks of intense insurgent violence have made it
> crystal clear that Iraq’s parliamentary elections, hailed in late January
> as a triumph for democracy, haven’t helped to heal the country’s deep
> divisions. They may have made them worse.
>
> The historic election sheared off a thin facade of wartime national unity
> and reinforced ethnic and sectarian tensions that have plagued Iraq for
> centuries. Iraqis immediately began playing the roles the election results
> delivered to them: victorious Shiite Muslim, assertive Kurd, disaffected
> Sunni Arab. Within those groups lies a mosaic of other splits, especially
> between secularists and Islamists vying for Iraq’s soul.
>
> With little social cohesion, violence has soared, fuelled by anger over
> foreign occupation and religious differences, while a semi-sovereign,
> disjointed government has taken over with little ability to control or
> appeal to groups behind the killings. At least 400 Iraqis have died in two
> weeks. U.S. casualties are also up. According to Icasualties.org, a Web
> site that tracks Iraq coalition casualties, 46 American service members
> died under fire in April, and 28 have died so far in May.
>
> (http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/051405F.shtml)
>
> =======================================
>
> Back to Platt May 19th:
>
> > >Good thing [Galloway] wasn’t in charge at the beginning of Word War II.
> >Like
> > >Chamberlain, he would have capitulated to Hitler in a Munich minute.
>
> Ant McWatt replied May 19th:
>
> >Hitler was a real threat to world democracy. Though Hussein was a despot
> >and a dictator he was no real threat to us in the West. Galloway was
> >concerned primarily with the children in Iraq who were first starved to
> >death by international sanctions and then killed by the US-UK invasion and
> >occupation.
>
> Platt stated May 20th 2005:
>
> Two-faced Galloway shows no concern for the children killed by Saddam.
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> Again, from what I’ve seen of Galloway I think this is an ungrounded
> accusation (though I still don’t forget that he’s a politician). However,
> I think it more likely that the two-faced people in this respect are Blair,
> Bush and all those who supported them in the Iraq invasion.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Anthony.
>
>
> =============================
>
>
> In 2005, Scot Bear spoke to the assembled tribes and specifically to the
> representatives of Washington, saying:
>
> “There are things which you have said to me which I do not like. They were
> not sweet like sugar, but bitter like gourds. I was born in the rain,
> where the wind blew free, and there were clouds to break the light of the
> sun. When I was at Washington, the Great Father told me that all the Iraqi
> land was theirs, and that no one should hinder them in living upon it. So
> why do you ask them to leave the oil? The young men have heard talk of
> this and it has made them sad and angry. Do not speak of it any more. If
> the Texan had kept out of Iraq, there might have been peace. The white man
> has the country which they loved. I want no blood upon Iraq to stain the
> sand. I want it all clear and pure, and I wish it so, that all who go
> through among those people may find peace when they come in, and leave it
> when they go out."
>
> As the Doctor read it again this time he saw that it wasn’t quite as close
> to political speech as he’d remembered - it was a damn sight better than
> political speech. Here were the straight, head-on, declarative sentences
> without stylistic ornamentation or spin of any kind, but with a poetic
> force that must have put the sophisticated bureaucratic speech of Scot
> Bear’s antagonists to shame. This was no imitation of the involuted
> double-speak of 2005.
>
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