My LTTE: Will Bush Be Brought To Justice For Crimes?

[Larkspur]

In today's The New London Day...

Will Bush Be Brought To Justice For Crimes?

George W. Bush “is the president of my country and deserves to be treated with respect and dignity …,” says the writer of a letter headlined “Bush deserves dignity, not thrown footwear,” published Dec. 26.

Has the letter writer seen the new movie “Valkyrie”? Adolf Hitler was the legally elected leader of Germany, but that didn't stop some German military leaders from trying to kill the most evil man in modern history.

George W. Bush deserves a fate worse than a pair of shoes being thrown at him. While he's not as evil as Adolf Hitler, President Bush is by every definition in the Article of the Nuremberg Trials a war criminal. Like Adolf Hitler in 1939, Bush started a war in 2003 under false pretenses. By initiating this war of choice, President Bush inspired Vincent Bugliosi, the man who successfully prosecuted Charles Manson to write a detailed how-to legal case titled “The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder,” which became a New York Times best-seller. For information: www.prosecutionofbush.com.

I pray that someday justice be served to President Bush and his minions for the crimes they've committed. Only then will peace and reconciliation begin.

I just got called from some guy saying he was a vet in Iraq and Afghanistan and he said that he was angry that I compared Bush to Hitler. I told him that Bush and Hitler committed the same war crime -- starting a war of choice. I didn't get a chance to add that Bush also condoned torture, another war crime.

I also didn't get the chance to tell him that my mother served in the US Army during World War II. I had an uncle who served in the Navy in the Pacific as a pilot in WW II. And my eldest brother served in the Air Force during the end of the Vietnam War era. My brother fortunately did not get sent to Vietnam during his enlistment. I also don't agree with using ones status as a vet to silence dissent.

[NewJeffCT]

1. excellent letter

and, I hope he is brought to justice some day.

[Larkspur]

3. Thanks for the compliment

I hope Cindy Sheehan and Vince Bugliosi will find a way to go after Bush & Co. after Jan. 20, 2009. I don't expect Obama to.

[NewJeffCT]

4. I'm not even hopeful a special prosecutor will be appointed

to look into Cheney's admitted torture authorization. It will have to come from a private person like Sheehan or Bugliosi.

[Larkspur]

2. Here's the full text of the LTTE I was responding to...

Bush Deserves Dignity, Not Thrown Footwear

Published on 12/26/2008

It has taken me a while to write because I didn't want my anger to color my words. I am writing about the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at President George W. Bush. We've all seen the video, over and over again.

I am not, and never have been a supporter of President Bush's foreign policies. But he is the president of my country and deserves to be treated with respect and dignity, especially in a nation that has been the beneficiary of so much sacrificed American blood. If the Iraqi people and their elected representatives are so ungrateful for the removal of Saddam Hussein, then I am sad for them.

The shoe-throwing display was reprehensible. Based on news coverage, the Iraqi people absolutely loved it, and that makes it much worse. What a high price we have paid for their freedom and this is how they show their appreciation.

If it were within my power, I would give them back Saddam Hussein, leave Iraq behind and leave them all in the sand to stew. They don't deserve what we have given them, and have no appreciation of the price we have paid to provide it.

[gratuitous]

7. Ah, Iraq is a "beneficiary"!

Those ingrates, and after all we've done to for them! A country of some 30 million people, and we've made refugees out of 4 million of them, and killed Allah only knows how many. A hundred thousand? A million?

For comparison's sake, let's look at Iraq's 30 million and the United States' 300 million. We lost less than 3,000 on September 11 and went batshit crazy. We'd have had to had a September 11 massacre every day for a month to equal the low end of the estimated number of Iraqis we've dispatched. We'd need a year of September 11s to reach the high end of a million.

And this letter-writer finds it "reprehensible" and "ungrateful" of one Iraqi to register his objection to being the "beneficiary" of so much attention from the Bush administration. The guy's a fuckwit.

[NewJeffCT]

9. Didn't you know

the surge was such a smashing success that Iraq is now a modern day paradise?

[fudge stripe cookays]

8. We need to throw this shit back at them every day.

When we hear them bitching about Obama for whatever reason, give them the standard "Well, he's our president and we need to respect him" line. Drives them batshit.

[Veritas_et_Aequitas]

5. My father's a vet from Vietnam, and he commends your statements.

[Shardik]

6. Great letter. Great to see it got published, n/t

[Larkspur]

10. Got a response to my LTTE today in The Day

Sad That That President Is Called A War Criminal

I read with dismay the letter from the chairwoman of the Killingly Democratic Town Committee about bringing the president of the United States to trial for war crimes committed while liberating Iraq. (”Will Bush be brought to justice for crimes?,” Dec. 31.)

While reading her letter, it dawned on me that it is not her first letter to The Day. The Democratic Party officials in Killingly seem to have a lot of time on their hands. Googling Killingly reveals statistics such as: an almost 9 percent unemployment rate, a significant crime rate, departing businesses and plunging home values.

My two sons are in the military - voluntarily, by the way - and my youngest is headed to Iraq. I'm glad my politicians in Griswold don't refer to my sons' commander in chief as a war criminal.

Good luck to my veteran brethren in Killingly. I don't think they have much support from the chairwoman of their town's Democratic Party.

As usual with these right wingers, they get the facts wrong. I'm not the chairwoman of Killingly's DTC, and there are vets who agree with what I wrote. Also he's ignorant about how the Nuremburg Trials were run. Regular German soldiers were not prosecuted. The Trials were specifically geared to prosecute the leaders, but regular soldiers, who committed crimes against humanity themselves, such as abusing or torturing civilians or POW's or directly aided and abetted the Nazis in their atrocities were prosecuted. The Nuremburg Trials also set the standard that "I was just following orders" was not a valid excuse to escape punishment for helping commit war crimes and crimes against humanity.

And in regards to my extensive LTTEs, LTTE’s are not novels. Writers have approximately 200-250 words to make their point. If mine get published, maybe it’s because I’m a good writer? And yes, I've had many LTTE's published, though not as many in 2008 as I had in 2006-2007. I've been writing and getting LTTE's published since 1994.

[gratuitous]

12. It's an old dodge, designed to fool the gullible

Watch the "trial" scene from Animal House. As the Deltas are accused of breaking all sorts of college rules, one of the guys jumps up to speak and turns the trial around, from a discussion of what the Deltas did to an attack on . . . the United States of America! And against free speech! And we're not going to sit around and listen to you bad-mouth the U S of A.

So, instead of rebutting your letter on the merits, the writer turns it into an attack on the military and our star-spangled, freckle-faced men and women volunteering in uniform! Including (choked sob) his (quavering voice) very own two sons. How dare you besmirch their honor that way?! (Begin humming "The Battle Hymn of the Republic")

Which doesn't touch the fact that President Bush is clearly implicated in crimes against humanity and war crimes, and a civilized nation would try him for those crimes.

[Javaman]

11. Was your mom a nurse during WWII or a flight trainer?

I'm curious. My aunt was a nurse in europe.

[Larkspur]

13. My mom was a clerk in the meteorology department for the US Army

She was stationed stateside and was the clerk who took the weather measurements for the Army air bases she was stationed at. It was a new field for women at that time. She was not a Meteorologist, just the clerk who did the grunt work to get the weather measurements.

My mom joked how she took the Army test and was asked if she could be a mechanic. She knew all the tools listed on the test, but my mom was not mechanically inclined. She was more a English lit type but was fairly good at math. She did really well on her math test and because of that the Meteorology department was open to her.

[Javaman]

14. Wow, that's actually pretty interesting. Never knew that. :)

My aunt is gone now, but thank your mom for her service to the nation for me.

[Larkspur]

15. My mom passed away in 1998. Your aunt and her are probably having a long chat

My mother liked to converse a lot.

[Larkspur]

16. Found another response to my LTTE

The right wingers in Southeast CT are out now.

Shall We Try Democrats For Their War Crimes?

Many people cannot get over the fact that George W. Bush is the U.S. president. He won twice. The Democrats tried to steal the election not once, but twice. That would be in Florida and Ohio. Now they want President Bush charged for war crimes.
Bringing up Adolf Hitler to compare to President Bush is very troubling. (”Will Bush be brought to justice for crimes?,” Dec. 31.) Sounds like the Michael Moore wing of the party.

Going to Iraq was approved by 77 senators. The Senate and House of Representatives approved a bill for regime change in Iraq. It is the Liberation Act, H.R.4655. The national security advisor urged the president to end Iraq's weapons-of-mass destruction programs. The secretary of state said we must stop Iraq's use of nuclear and chemical weapons. A senator said we knew for years that Saddam Hussein was developing weapons of mass destruction.

Who said these things? The secretary of state was Democrat Madeline Albright, the security advisor was Democrat Sandy Burger and the senator was Democrat Ted Kennedy. President Clinton signed the bill.

Should these people be charged with war crimes as some want to charge President Bush?

Love how they spin that the Dems, not Bush, tried to steal the 2000 and 2004 elections. A definite right winger.

Joe Lieberman would definitely be charged with war crimes. He wrote the Iraq War Resolution and was Bush's biggest cheerleader for war. Nearly 2/3's of Dems in the House voted against the IWR and over half the Dems in the Senate voted for it too, so most Dems in Congress opposed it. It was the Republican controlled Congress that passed it with little debate.

The Dems who could be charged with war crimes are Nancy Pelosi, Jane Harmon and Jay Rockefeller. They did nothing to stop Bush's torture program and one of them wanted Bush to be more aggressive using it.

As far as Albright and the other Dems mention, sure try them. I have no loyalty to them. Lyndon Johnson was also technically a war criminal because of the Gulf of Tonkin lie, but at least the Dems made it so that Johnson declined to run for re-election.