-Caveat Lector-
Excellent post. Thank you flw. Gavin.
<< The Bill and Saddam Show
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On the eve of impeachment, and holy seasons in the east and west, the
curtain once again rises on the Bill and Saddam Show, starring the usual
cast of characters and with the same bloody and predictable ending. They
both retain power, and their people continue to suffer under their lies and
duplicity. Call it statecraft or a devil's ploy, but don't call it "national
defense."
It's the oldest trick in the political book. Distract the public from a
political crisis at home with a phony one abroad. Even after "Wag the Dog,"
the popular movie ridiculing the White House penchant for drumming up
foreign bogeymen, the Clinton administration has pulled the caper again. The
peacenik generation again uses war to try to save its skin.
It makes no sense for Congress to trust Clinton on war and peace as it
prepares to impeach him for pathological lying. Tragically and stupidly,
some Republicans are ready to believe every word. Of course, the White House
might have calculated that some of its opponents are suckers for killing
foreigners. No one said the Clinton administration lacks a survival
instinct.
Two days before the administration settled on Iraq, the usual suspects --
identified only as "U.S. intelligence sources" in the media -- floated
another trial balloon. We were told that terrorists allied with the shadowy
Osama Bin Laden were planning to bomb a U.S. city. Recall that this was the
same trump card Clinton used to justify a hit on a Sudanese pharmaceutical
factory, an action that violated the Constitution but took Monica off the
front pages for a few days.
Perhaps this time, the administration found the Bin Laden excuse too lame,
too spent, too uninteresting. Or perhaps their internal polling showed more
public fear of the demon Saddam Hussein. In any case, the Bin threat was
quickly dropped for the more tried-and-true excuse that Saddam was not
cooperating with the friendly U.N. inspectors crawling all over that
once-sovereign country.
Even amidst the killing, isn't it time we ask why Iraq wouldn't cooperate
with U.N. inspectors? Might there be another reason besides its desire to
hide chemical and biological weapons?
Iraq has been subject to U.S.-U.N. sanctions since 1991. More than 90,000
Iraqi children die every year due to disease and malnutrition because of
these sanctions, an instrument of war deemed unjust since the time of St.
Augustine. Meanwhile, Clinton spends his time in Palestine worrying about
children whose fathers have been casualties in a conflict he can do nothing
about.
Clinton could have ended these murderous sanctions long ago. Instead, he has
presided over that country's further demolition and impoverishment. But that
hasn't been enough. The U.S. has called for the overthrow of Saddam and made
clear its intention to keep sanctions in place until the end of time, not a
policy Big Oil has seen fit to oppose. After all, Iraq could be selling vast
quantities of the sweetest crude on earth, to the great benefit of American
consumers.
Meanwhile, after seven years of searching, not one "weapon of mass
destruction" -- or any evidence of one -- has been found. Most recently, the
U.S.-U.N. inspection squad sought to search, and to make copies of documents
from, the ruling party's political headquarters. And we know that the U.S.
is funding various front groups to overthrow the government, even as
Clinton's lackeys complain about an attempted coup d'etat against him at
home.
Would the CIA and its front groups find internal political information from
Iraq useful? Certainly. And is the Iraqi government likely -- even at the
cost of bombings -- to turn such information over to its sworn enemies?
Doubtful. This fact remains: there are no chemical weapons in the file
drawers of the downtown, two-story headquarters of the Ba'ath Party. The
demand to inspect this building was a provocation, and Saddam responded
predictably.
So, allegedly because the Iraqis refuse to allow an office building to be
searched -- and actually because it will derail the impeachment process and
generally advance the warfare state -- Clinton is sacrificing the lives of
foreigners who have never done anything to us, and risking U.S. troops. It's
important, after all, not to go down in history as William the Impeached.
It should be clear that Saddam and Bill need each other. Saddam needs a
foreign enemy on which to blame all his domestic troubles. And the U.S.
embargo and periodic bombings allow him to keep a tighter grip over his own
people. Bill needs a foreign enemy too, particularly one who heads a
far-away country few Americans care a whit about. Can Clinton count on the
patriotism reflex to cover up for his misrule? Surely Americans have not
been drained of all power of political discernment.
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Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. is president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in
Auburn, Alabama >>
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