Iraqi Judges Stunned By American Democracy In Action
Imagine if you will, a group of Iraqi judges sent to this country to experience the democracy as practiced in these United States. Would you be surprised if I tell you they got sick to their stomachs at what they saw and heard, cut their visit short and hurried back to the sanity of their homeland? That's exactly what happened. These are remarks made before they caught the red-eye back to Iraq. Lead Iraqi delegate Muhamad Mithaqi, noted secular Sunni judge had this to say:
I was stunned when I heard President Bush telling Republicans that one reason they should support Harriet Miers for the U.S. Supreme Court was because of "her religion." This after two years of being lectured to by U.S. diplomats in Baghdad about the need to separate "mosque from state" in the new Iraq.
Another Iraqi judge mentioned:
I read that the former Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth Starr said on a radio show of the conservative James Dobson that Miers deserved support because she was "a very, very strong Christian who should be a source of great comfort and assistance to the people in the households of faith around the country."
To which Mithaqi replied:
They lecture us about keeping religion out of politics, and then their own president and conservative legal scholars go and tell their public to endorse Miers as a Supreme Court justice because she is an evangelical Christian. What would they say if they picked up their newspapers next week and read that the president of Iraq justified the appointment of an Iraqi Supreme Court justice by telling Iraqis, "Don't pay attention to his lack of legal expertise. Pay attention to the fact that he is a Muslim fundamentalist and prays at a Saudi-funded Wahhabi mosque." Is that the kind of Iraq they sent their sons to die for? I don't think so.
Judge Abdul Wahab al-Unifi stated:
I do not want to spend another day in Washington after listening to the Bush team defend its right to use torture in Iraq and Afghanistan. I was heartened by the fact that the Senate voted 90-9 to ban U.S. torture of military prisoners. But I am depressed by reports that the White House might veto the bill because of that amendment, which would ban "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment of POWs. I survived eight years of torture under Saddam. Virtually every extended family in Iraq has someone who was tortured or killed in a Baathist prison. Yet already, more than 100 prisoners of war have died in U.S. Custody. How is that possible from the greatest democracy in the world? There must be no place for torture in the future Iraq.
Another delegation member, Sahaf al-Sahafi, a newspaper editor, said:
I decided to go home after watching the televised videoconference last Thursday between soldiers in Iraq and Bush. The soldiers, 10 Americans and an Iraqi were coached by a Pentagon aide on how to respond to Bush. I had nightmares watching this. It was right from the Saddam playbook. I was particularly upset to hear the Iraqi sergeant major, Akeel Shakir Nasser, tell Mr. Bush: "Thank you very much for everything. I like you." It was exactly the kind of staged encounter that Saddam used to have with his troops.
None of this actually took place. My thanks to Thomas L Friedman of the New York Times for the above. But it is no stretch of the imagination to think that it could have. If you have doubts, compare the words of Tom "It's a political witch-hunt" DeLay to those of Saddam Hussein about the trials they face. Both claim they are victims of political oppression. Both claim they can't get a fair trial because of political circumstances. Both claim their judge is out to get them for political reasons.
Yet many Americans don't seem to realize the danger this country faces in the hands of a President who is ready to unleash military action against Syria to try to distract the population from the news of the day. Too many still see President Bush as does Jonathan Keyser of Phoenix who wrote the following to the Arizona Republic:
I am sick of all of the liberals who do nothing but gripe and complain no matter what the president does. George Bush is the best president the United States has ever had. We are fortunate to have a man like him who stands up for what is right, doesn't waver from his beliefs, delivers what he promises, cares about people across the country, mourns with the families of the dead and wounded, and isn't afraid to go to war to protect our lives and livelihood.
Don't you liberals understand that it is your left-wing policies, economics and philosophies that have caused our country so many problems? Stop bashing morality and conservative values, and do your part to make this world a nicer, more caring place.
As I read this, I kept waiting for the punchline. But it wasn't a joke. Mr. Keyser obviously doesn't read the newspaper he writes to. We can laugh at his comments, but I fear there are many more out there with similar views that have blinded themselves to the truth about this administration. In a very few days, over 2,000 American men and women will have died in Iraq over WMDs that never existed. And they will continue dying as long as the Keysers among us choose to ignore the facts concerning the Bush Republicans.
