Juan Cole nails it; Iraq and American Fantasy

[LynnTheDem]

"For American observers concerned with Iraq not to realize how truly awful the situation is, and to fail to understand that the US faces a grave crisis if key policies are not changed, makes them poor Americans.

The United States is a democracy and a democracy only works if the citizens are informed and exercise their faculties of critical reason. Looking for token pro-American Iraqis to say nice things while ignoring all the evidence of US failure is pitiful.

I sometimes get messages from readers who are excited by all the rebuilding work the US has done in Iraq and think it is unfair for it to be overlooked. This way of thinking is just wrong. The British in India built railroads and lots of infrastructure. By the 1940s, no Indians were grateful, and they just wanted the British out so that they could have their independent country. The railroads, they said, were after all mainly built to transport British troops and merchandise.

When you mess with a people's independence, they stop being grateful for infrastructure. Ask King George III."

http://www.juancole.com/

[Cocoa]

1. Joe Scarborough was doing the "token Iraqi" thing last night

and Cole is right, it was pitiful.

[Ganja Ninja]

2. Same goes for Vietnam.

They weren't interested in Democracy, they wanted independence.

[jdj]

3. It's more about that fact that Saddam was a "brutal dictator"

and the Americans have been brutal invaders. People felt they could try and keep their heads down and maybe live a normal life unaffected by Saddam Hussein. Now they don't even have that option, their countrymen are being slaughtered, their country is being sold and bankrupted, and Shari'a law and all it's adjoining insanity is looming over what was once a decently progressive country in the area of women's rights.

So how is this a better deal for them?

[LynnTheDem]

4. Let's not forget WHO DESTROYED their infrastructure in the first place.

I burn down YOUR house.

Then I take YOUR money and pay my own company huge profits to rebuild YOUR house to how I decide you deserve.

And YOU should be grateful to me.

YEAH RIGHT!

[Karenina]

5. Payback is a bitch.

.