A reminder why lying to start a war is wrong...

[FormerRepublican]

As I watch all the angst in the media while we wait for indictments in the Plame leak, and wonder if the investigation might uncover the lying that led to our invasion of Iraq, I am reminded of all the many reasons why military aggression and expansionism is so horribly wrong.

To be specific, I've been thinking about the dead from World War II. 68 Million people dead, to be exact.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties

Think about that. 68 Million people dead because Hitler decided to use his military to expand German power as a solution to domestic problems. 68 Million is a BIG number. Every time I look at that number I realize how horrifying the conflict of World War II really was. As we grieve over 2000 American military dead in Iraq, imagine Bush wars escalating to the scale of World War II, where 405,000 of our military died!

As we watch Bush and his criminal gang squirm in the calm before the indictment storm, we should remember that war should only be fought in the most dire circumstances directly relevant to our national security. Not for profits. Not to expand US power. Not as private payback to a tin plated dictator by the son of a former President. If World Wars are started and people die, WE should not be the ones who started it.

We the people NEED someone calm and slow to anger with their hand on the war button. The risks are simply too high when the option of last resort becomes a hair trigger to full military intervention. 68 Million dead is simply too high a cost for any but the most dire reasons to wage war. And can we ever know in the very beginning how a little war will evolve? Can we predict how our military aggression today might fuel military aggression against us tomorrow?

Every time we contemplate war, we must ask ourselves if the conflict in question is worth 68 Million dead. Only with this gravity in our contemplation can we avoid another incident of government betrayal lying us into senseless war that endangers, rather than protects, our national security.

And when I contemplate what the Bush Administration did when they manipulated us into war, I am reminded of an equivalent. An equivalent would be if Roosevelt had used the attack on Pearl Harbor as a means to persuade Americans to support his declaration of war on South America. The Bush Administration redirected the legitimate response after September 11 (assuming they didn't manufacture 9/11 too, which is a whole new level of treason) to an uninvolved country for shady reasons. If that's not treason - to misdirect the military away from the identified enemy of Al Qaeda for shady reasons - then treason doesn't mean betrayal of your country! They diverted our military AWAY from the legitimate target toward a decoy in a time of war!

Perhaps the Saudis placed a short call to the Oval Office to cash in a favor and keep the American military away from the bin Ladens...? After what I've seen in this White House, it wouldn't surprise me. And that, perhaps, is even scarier than 68 Million dead. We might have a President, and a White House, who is willing to betray our nation and our national security - if not for the Saudis, then for PNAC and the Israelis who dreamed of using American military power and American dead to destroy their enemies. We live in a country where the highest officials of the land no longer love, protect, and serve their own country and their own people. Is it any wonder why they're quick to pull the trigger and involve the US in potential World War?

[Old and In the Way]

1. I do see the House of Saud and the Israeli's having a convergence

of mutual interests, particularly with respect to Iraq and Iran. Lawd knows how much the House of Bush owes the Saudi's or what blackmail potential Israel or SA has over them. Whatever, invading the ME has not made us safer, it's not addressed our strategic weakness in our energy policy (weve seen an $800BB drain in the Treasury and oil supply is more tentative then ever). But it has deflected ME focus from Israel and the House of Saud, to us in Iraq.

When the history is written on Bush the Lesser's pResidency, I don't think it'll be too kind. I'm thinking of appropriate titles for the chapter-

"Evening in America"
"Mission Demolished"
"The Stolen Presidency"
"The End"
"1984: 16 Years Later"