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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jlallen who wrote (147441)	10/8/2004 11:38:23 PM
From: Michael Watkins	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Yes...it will take some time for others to adjust to a post 9/11 frame of mind, especailly those who were not attacked as we were....like Canada.. Hogwash. You won't find any thinking Canadians believing themselves immune from international terrorism. The majority of the country reacted "We are all Americans" after 9/11. Fighting terrorism is a goal Canadians will line up to support. But you will find quite a few wondering why Bush made an issue out of Iraq instead of continuing to cheaply contain him. You will find most Canadians wondering why the Whitehouse used deception to justify an enormously costly war against a mad - literally insane, inept and impotent dictator like Saddam Hussein, when the real focus should have been on international terrorism. You'll find that many thinking people the world over - both in America and elsewhere, wondering aloud "why didn't the US administration simply redouble efforts to contain Hussein, and focus all additional avaialble resources on hunting down terrorists wherever they are. In the Middle East. In Russia. In Canada. In the United States. You see, a thinking person realizes that the President of the United States (and I am not talking about Bush here) could easily get the world to support a real war against terrorism, rather than a deception designed to embroil countries in a fight against a crazy lunatic who had no teeth, Saddam Hussein. When Bush argues that sanctions would not work, he is completely mistating reality - what he says doesn't make simple common sense. In a post 9/11 world, countries everywhere had a post 9/11 frame of mind - your words - and would readily sign up to doing what ever it took to contain Saddam Hussein. And Libya. And Iran. And North Korea. And Sudan. And Saudi Arabia. And Syria. And dictatorships and failed states wherever they are. But Bush blew it. Bush had a real opportunity to bring the world together, an opportunity which has not existed since Hitler declared war on the world. He had the opportunity to use the tremendous outpouring of sympathy and support from the entire world to really set to work to fight terrorism and tyranny the world over. Instead, he wasted that goodwill. Instead, he trashed the trust of the world, and also the trust of many Americans. There was a time, in the post 9/11 world, most countries would have followed a real US leader, a real president. Bush is not that man. And he will never be that sort of leader. Is Kerry? We won't know unless he is given an opportunity to try. Due to the method in which American elections are conducted, you have only one alternative choice. In this case, the "devil you know" has demonstrated just how badly he can fail. There is no sane alternative but to accept that its time for a change,