Crusader

I found an interesting artical in the toronto star. Here it is. I was quite shocked and dissapointed in the canadian government's behavior. The US also did not help the issue either. ______________________________________________ Published on Sunday, November 9, 2003 by the Toronto Star We Used to Feel Protected by the Law by Linda McQuaig Of all the horrifying things about the Maher Arar case — the beatings, the rat-infested, coffin-like cell — the most horrifying may be Ottawa's refusal to hold a public inquiry. Here we were, thinking we live in a country based on the rule of law, with our freedoms carefully set out in our much-celebrated Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and then we discover that a Canadian was imprisoned and tortured in Syria for 10 months — and it all apparently happened because of action taken by Canada's own security officials. If this isn't enough to warrant a public inquiry, what on earth is? It's hard to imagine anything more basic to our rights as Canadians than the right to be free from our own government setting us up for torture abroad. But that's what appears to have happened in this case. Of course, it was U.S. officials who diverted the computer consultant to Syria after he passed through JFK airport on his way home to Canada in September, 2002. And it was Syrian officials who repeatedly beat him with an electric cable. So Canada's involvement seems at least lower down the torture chain of responsibility. But from what we know — and this is precisely why we need an inquiry — Canada's role was crucial; without the actions of Canadian security officials, the whole excruciating nightmare probably wouldn't have happened. Arar had been travelling to the United States without problem prior to his arrest; Washington had even extended his work permit several months earlier. Canadian security officials apparently brought Arar to U.S. attention by forwarding to their American counterparts information that Arar was acquainted with another Ottawa man, Abdullah Almalki, whom Canada had been investigating as a possible terror suspect. (Almalki had witnessed Arar's signature on Arar's Ottawa rental lease.) In forwarding this rather tenuous piece of information to U.S. officials, Canadian security officials should have known — since it had been reported in the newspapers — that the U.S. had adopted the practice of transferring some detainees to brutal countries like Syria to increase pressure on them to talk. Now, it's true that we can't stop countries around the world from torturing people, nor can we stop the U.S. from sending detainees to such places. But we do have control over what goes on in this country, including — theoretically, at least — control over our own security agencies. Yet someone inside these agencies apparently made the decision to toss a Canadian citizen to the wolves. And this may not be the only such case, nor the worst. Almalki, who witnessed Arar's signature on his lease, is also in a Syrian jail on apparently tenuous evidence and undergoing worse torture, according to Arar, who saw him there recently. Did Canadian security agents play a role in his detention, too? We urgently need a public inquiry to put the hot, heavy glare of the public spotlight on the actions of our agents as they, apparently recklessly and overzealously, co-operate in the U.S. war against terror. What information about Canadian citizens is being handed over to U.S. authorities? What agreements have our agencies entered into with the U.S. in the post-9/11 world? Did the U.S. violate an agreement with Canada in transferring a Canadian citizen to a torture country, or is there no agreement to prevent such a transfer? A public inquiry would also send a strong message to Canadian security officials — who seem to operate largely without surveillance; not even Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham appears to know what happened here — that they don't have carte blanche to trample our freedoms, that this is a rules-based country, that we have legal rights. A generation of Canadians has grown up thinking their rights are protected by the Charter, which has, among other things, been a useful tool for corporations to defend their tobacco advertising rights under the banner of free speech. Yet our government refuses to hold a public inquiry despite compelling evidence that its security agencies may be setting up Canadian citizens for torture abroad. So what's the message — that torture is less serious than restraints on advertising? If there's not going to be an inquiry, then I hope Ottawa will at least advise us whether it's dangerous to do things like have our rental agreements witnessed by someone with an Arab name, who might just be under investigation by Canadian authorities. If we do such provocative things, should we avoid U.S. airports? I just want to know what's considered acceptable behaviour in my country. I used to feel that I knew, but I'm not so sure any more. Linda McQuaig is a Toronto-based author and political commentator. Copyright 1996-2003. Toronto Star Newspapers Limited ###

An interesting artical appeared on Common Dreams just today which sums up dean's statement very well. ______________________________________________ Published on Friday, November 7, 2003 by the Boston Globe Dean's Appeal to South Cuts Across Race by Derrick Z. Jackson NO ONE ACCUSED Howard Dean of whistling Dixie in February when he tried to appeal to Southern white men or to Southern black people about Southern white men. "You know all those white guys riding around with Confederate flags in the back of their pickup trucks? Well, their kids don't have health insurance either." Dean said this before a group of African-Americans at a hamburger joint in Spartanburg, S.C. A Newsday story said, "This blunt appeal to a commonality of racial interests won the moment and a burst of applause." That same month in Washington at the Democratic National Committee winter meeting, Dean said, "I intend to talk about race during this election in the South because the Republicans have been talking about it since 1968 in order to divide us. . . . White folks in the South who drive pickup trucks with Confederate flag decals in the back ought to be voting with us and not them, because their kids don't have health insurance either and their kids need better schools, too." That brought a standing ovation. That makes very curious the catcalls nine months later from Dean's rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination. Last Saturday, Dean said in the Des Moines Register, "I still want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks. We can't beat George Bush unless we appeal to a broad cross-section of Democrats." As if this was the first time they heard it, the other candidates drew crossbows. John Kerry said it was "craven." Joseph Lieberman said it was "reckless." Dick Gephardt said "I will be the candidate for guys with American flags." At this week's Rock the Vote forum in Boston, John Edwards told Dean, "The last thing we need in the South is somebody like you coming down and telling us what we need to do." Al Sharpton said Dean sounded "more like Stonewall Jackson than Jesse Jackson." Sharpton also said, "Maynard Jackson said that the Confederate flag is America's swastika. . . . I don't think you're a bigot, but I think that is insensitive." That last dig showed how fast Sharpton and the Democratic candidates get lost without a compass. Maynard Jackson, Atlanta's first African-American mayor who died this summer, gave Dean some of the loudest applause at the DNC meeting. "Dean blew the roof off today," Jackson said. "There was no mealy-mouth wishy-washiness about it. It was very gutsy." Donna Brazile, the campaign manager for the 2000 presidential campaign of Al Gore and Lieberman, and no mealy-mouth herself, said Dean's words were "the medicine to cure my depression." Referring to the Democrats' fear of squarely taking on Bush's policies, Brazile, despite her neutrality, said, "Anybody who gets us off the floor and out of the fetal position, I'm for." The Democrats should stop trying to mop the floor with Dean's Confederate flag and grab their opportunity before it is lost. There is a health care crisis that cuts across race. There is a public education crisis that cuts across race. There is a jobless economic "recovery" that cuts across race. The Republicans have successfully distracted huge swaths of white males from those problems, exploiting various codes that blame everyone except straight white men for America's problems. In the Deep South, ties to the Confederacy remain a powerful political code. In 2001, white voters in Mississippi voted overwhelmingly to retain the current flag, which includes the Confederate symbol, over the wishes of African-American voters who wanted a new flag. This week, former Republican National Committee chairman Haley Barbour won the Mississippi governor's race after defiantly refusing to disavow the use of his photo by the Council of Conservative Citizens, a group tied to the old segregationist white citizens councils. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney came to Mississippi to campaign for Barbour. While Barbour played to the code, Dean was trying to crack it. Some political analysts talk as if the white South is locked up forever for the Republicans. Had the Democrats won just one other state in 2000, Bush would not be in the White House. Clinton had the economic message to win several Southern states in both 1992 and 1996. Dean has since apologized for invoking Confederate imagery. He should drop the Confederate line because it risks its own distraction, narrowly stereotyping Southern white males when too many white men all across America, broadly stereotyped as "NASCAR dads," have been persuaded to vote for codes against their best economic interests. Dean should not drop the cause. The real apology should come from the other Democratic candidates for not joining it. Dean was the first to get off the floor to say the Democrats cannot win unless they tell white men how code politics is killing them in the pocketbook. Back in February, Maynard Jackson said Dean's bluntness "stole the show." The other candidates are merely jealous that Dean stole the issue of white men while they are still talking their way out of the fetal position. © Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company. ### ______________________________________________ As you can see, Dean didn't go into damage control. It brought him MORE popularity than before and I think it will bring him even more votes.

Hey! it's not like the Bible contridicts itself! If the ten comandments say, "Thou shalt not kill" then way was there a great flood? I think Golaith got more than a headache from that stone!!!! What about the walls of Jericho when they came tumbling down?? The Bible abdocates violence.

Howard dean all the way!!!! he's aleady leading in the key swing state of Iowa. I think he has what it takes to go all the way.

The French have the same right to voice there opinion as we do. Both the US and France have permanent seats of the security council and veto power. Obviously, the global community and the UN charter written by FDR and Churchhill think that France has equal say.

If you want proof of halliburton profiting off the war in there various ways, heres an artical on Commondreams published by the new York Times. ______________________________________________ Published on Saturday, July 13, 2002 in the New York Times In Tough Times, a Company Finds Profits in Terror War by Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta Jr WASHINGTON — The Halliburton Company, the Dallas oil services company bedeviled lately by an array of accounting and business issues, is benefiting very directly from the United States efforts to combat terrorism. From building cells for detainees at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba to feeding American troops in Uzbekistan, the Pentagon is increasingly relying on a unit of Halliburton called KBR, sometimes referred to as Kellogg Brown & Root. Although the unit has been building projects all over the world for the federal government for decades, the attacks of Sept. 11 have led to significant additional business. KBR is the exclusive logistics supplier for both the Navy and the Army, providing services like cooking, construction, power generation and fuel transportation. The contract recently won from the Army is for 10 years and has no lid on costs, the only logistical arrangement by the Army without an estimated cost. The government business has been well timed for Halliburton, whose stock price has tumbled almost two-thirds in the last year because of concerns about its asbestos liabilities, sagging profits in its energy business and an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission into its accounting practices back when Vice President Dick Cheney ran the company. The government contracts, which the company said Mr. Cheney played no role in helping Halliburton win, either while he led the company or after he left, offer the prospect of a long and steady cash flow that impresses financial analysts. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Congress has appropriated $30 billion in emergency money to support the campaign against terrorism. About half has gone to the Pentagon, much of it to buy weapons, supplies, and services. Although KBR is probably not the largest recipient of all the government contracts related to terror efforts, few companies have longer or deeper ties to the Pentagon. And no company is better positioned to capitalize on this trend. The value of the contracts to Halliburton is hard to quantify, but the company said government work generated less than 10 percent of its $13 billion in revenue last year. The government business is "very good, a relatively stable source of cash flow," said Alexandra S. Parker, senior vice president of Moody's Investors Service. "We view it positively." By hiring an outside company to handle much of its logistics, the Pentagon may wind up spending more taxpayer money than if it did the work itself. Under the new Army contract, KBR's work in Central Asia, at least for the next year, will cost 10 percent to 20 percent more than if military personnel were used, according to Army contract managers. In Uzbekistan, the Army failed to ascertain, as regulations require, whether its own units, which handled logistics there for the first six months, were available to work when it brought in the contractor, according to Army spokesmen. The costs for KBR's current work in Central Asia could "dramatically escalate" without proper monitoring, but adequate cost control measures are in place, according to Lt. Col. Clay Cole, who oversees the contract. The Army contract is a cost-plus arrangement and shrouded in secrecy. The contractor is reimbursed for its allowable costs and gets a bonus based on performance. In the past, KBR has usually received the maximum performance bonus, according to Pentagon officials. Though modest now, the Army contract could produce hundreds of millions of dollars for the company. In the Balkans, for instance, its contract with the Army started at less than $4 million and turned into a multibillion-dollar agreement. Mr. Cheney played no role, either as vice president or as chief executive at Halliburton, in helping KBR win government contracts, company officials said. In a written statement, the company said that Mr. Cheney "steadfastly refused" to market KBR's services to the United States government in the five years he served as chief executive. Mr. Cheney concentrated on the company's energy business, company officials said, though he was regularly briefed on the company's Pentagon contracts. Mr. Cheney sold Halliburton stock, worth more than $20 million, before he became vice president. After he took office, he donated his remaining stock options to charity. Like other military contractors, KBR has numerous former Pentagon officials who know the government contracts system in its management ranks, including a former military aide to Mr. Cheney when he was defense secretary. The senior vice president responsible for KBR's Pentagon contracts is a retired four-star admiral, Joe Lopez, who was Mr. Cheney's military aide at the Pentagon in the early 1990's. Halliburton said Mr. Lopez was hired in 1999 after a suggestion from Mr. Cheney. "Brown & Root had the upper hand with the Pentagon because they knew the process like the back of their hand," said T. C. McIntosh, a Pentagon criminal investigator who last year examined some of the company's Army contracts in the 1990's. He said he found that a contractor "gets away with what they can get away with." For example, KBR got the Army to agree to pay about $750,000 for electrical repairs at a base in California that cost only about $125,000, according to Mr. McIntosh, an agent with the Defense Criminal Investigative Service. KBR officials did not dispute the electrical cost figures, which were part of an $18 million contract. But they said government investigators tried to suggest wrongdoing when there was not any. "The company happened to negotiate a couple of projects we made more money on than others," said one company lawyer, who insisted on anonymity. He added, "On some projects the contractor may make a large or small profit, while on others it may lose money, as KBR sometimes did on this contract." Mr. McIntosh said he and an assistant United States attorney in Sacramento were inclined to indict the company last year after they developed evidence that a few KBR employees had "lied to the government" in pricing proposals for electrical repair work at Fort Ord. Mr. McIntosh said the Sacramento prosecutor said to him, "Let's go for this, it's a winnable criminal case." A KBR lawyer said that the government's theory "was novel and unfairly tried to criminalize what was only a preliminary proposal." The United States attorney's office in Sacramento declined to discuss its internal deliberations in the cast. But it dropped the criminal inquiry and reached a civil settlement in February, in part because of weak contract monitoring by the Army, according to Mr. McIntosh and a lawyer involved in the case. As part of the settlement, KBR paid $2 million but denied any liability. Last December the Army's Operations Support Command, unaware of the criminal investigation, found KBR's past contracting experiences to be exemplary as it awarded the company the 10-year logistical support contract, according to a command spokeswoman, Gale Smith. The Army command's lengthy review of bidders did not discover that KBR was the target of a criminal investigation though it was disclosed in Halliburton's annual report submitted with the bid, according to Ms. Smith. She said that if the support command's managers had known of the criminal inquiry, they would have looked further at the matter but not changed the award. KBR's ability to earn the Pentagon's trust dates back decades. "It's standard operating procedure for the Department of Defense to haul in Brown & Root," said Gordon Adams, who helped oversee the military budget for President Bill Clinton. The company's first military contract was in 1940, to build a Naval air station in Corpus Christi, Tex. In the 1960's, it built bases in Vietnam. By the 1990's, KBR was providing logistical support in Haiti, Somalia and the Balkans. KBR's military logistics business began to escalate rapidly with its selection for a $3.9 million contract in 1992, Mr. Cheney's last year at the Pentagon. Over the last 10 years, the revenues have totaled $2.5 billion, mostly a result of widening American involvement in the Balkans after 1995. "We did great things to support the U.S. military overseas — we did better than they could support themselves," said Charles J. Fiala, a former operations officer for KBR. "I was in the Department of Defense for 35 years. We knew what the government was like." Robert E. Ayers, another former KBR executive who still consults for the company, said Mr. Cheney "stayed fairly well informed" on the Balkans contract. Stan Solloway, a former top Pentagon procurement official who now heads an association of contractors, said the company "understood the military mind-set" and "did a very good job in the Balkans." But reports in 1997 and 2000 by the General Accounting Office, the audit arm of Congress, found weak contract monitoring by the Army contributed to cost increases in the Balkan contract that benefited KBR. The audit agency's 1997 report concluded that the Army allowed KBR to fly in plywood from the United States, at a cost of $85.98 a sheet, because it did not have time to procure it in Europe, where sheets cost $14.06. Mr. Ayers, the former KBR executive, had worked on the Balkans contract. "If the rules weren't stiff and specific," he said, "the contractor could make money off of overspending by the government." The contract awarded last December by the Army's Operations Support Command, is "open ended" with "no estimated value," said Ms. Smith, the command's spokeswoman. She said that was mainly "because the various contingencies are beginning to unfold." KBR won this and most of its other Pentagon contracts in a competition with other contractors, but KBR is the sole source for the many tasks that fall under the umbrella contract. Pentagon officials said the company had recently taken over a wide range of tasks at Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan, from running the dining operation to handling fuel and generating power for the airfield. The company employs Uzbeks, paying them in accordance with "local laws and customs" but operating under United States health and safety guidelines, according to Halliburton's statement. For the first six months that American troops were at Khanabad, the logistical support was provided by the Army's First Corps Support Command. Mr. Cole, the contract manager for the joint command in Kuwait, said the contract would initially cost 10 to 20 percent more than if the Army had done the work itself. He said that he and his staff recommended using the contractor because "they do a better job of maintaining the infrastructure." In addition, he said, the contractor should provide long-term flexibility, an asset in a war with many unknowns, and cost savings by avoiding Army troop transfers. Ms. Smith said that the criticisms by the G.A.O. had led the Army to build additional controls into the contract. At its base in Cuba, the Navy has followed the same pattern as the Army: use the military first and augment it with KBR. The Navy's construction brigade, the Seabees, built the first detention facility for battlefield detainees at Guantánamo Bay. Then the Navy activated a recently awarded $300 million, five-year logistic support contract with KBR to construct more permanent facilities, some 600 units, built mostly by workers from the Philippines and India, at a cost of $23 million. John Peters, the Navy Facilities Engineering Command spokesman, said the permanent camp was "bigger, more sophisticated than what Seabees do." But the Seabees built the facilities for the troops guarding the detainees, and in the 1990's the Seabees built two tent cities capable of housing 20,000 refugees in Guantánamo Bay. "Seabees typically can perform the work at about half the cost of contractors, because labor costs are already sunk and paid for," said Daryl Smith, a Seabees spokesman. Zelma Branch, a KBR spokeswoman, said the company relied on its excellent record rather than personal relationships to win its contracts. But hiring former military officers can help the company understand and anticipate the Pentagon's needs. "The key to the company's success is good client relations and having somebody who could anticipate what the client's needs are going to be," Mr. Ayers, the former company executive, said. ©Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company ###

I agree with the above. A lot of the world is concerned with the US's recent troubling actions, but a lot of that concern has turned to downright hate. There's no excuse. It's just an imaginary line between us and Canada.

Every religion has it's fanaticals. The Koran specifically says, "Never kill a soldiar without a shield or spear." Just because a selected few are violent dosen't mean that every one is. There are christain fanaticals blow up abortion clinics dosen't mean that there all fanatics.

I'm in the Modle Un in school, (I made a supernation and conquered it) but besides that, the UN is too restrained to deal with this. Only one organ of the Un can implement military force and thats the security council. That organ is even screwed up because the 5 permanet members France, UK, US, China, and Russia have veto power and can veto each other.

This is pure conservitive propaganda at it's worst. Yeah, you've heard about it like 200,000 times because the media isn't reporting the whole story. For every 1 heroic rescue story like this, theres about 500 tradegetys. We need to leave Iraq now.

While Haliburton and Bechtel profit off of the Iraqi people's oil, many troops are dieing. the White House is prohibiting the media from reporting the whole story. Things are very much worse than what Fox news will let you belive. They only care about filling there wallets with black gold.

Just because the EU will be bigger economically than us is no reason to feel threatened. Americans, (Conservitives in general) are just cocky. The US hasn't been the biggest power always and will not continue to be in the future at the rate we are plumiting. I'm not surprised that you shoved the past conviently aside considering conservitives tend to ignore the past. You fail to realize that everything relates bck to the past. Even us.

Speaking of the Conservitist biased media, this recent artical at commondreams about how the Bush adminisrtation itself is not releasing the "whole" story to the media. Thank you Boston Globe. ______________________________________________ Published on Wednesday, November 5, 2003 by the Boston Globe How the White House Deletes the Truth by Derrick Z. Jackson PRESIDENT BUSH blames the media for filtering out good news on Iraq. He says he does not even read newspapers. "The best way to get the news is from objective sources," Bush said in a Fox News interview. "And the most objective sources I have are people on my staff who tell me what's happening in the world." This is the same president who erases history itself. Bush's desire for us to become ostriches over the deaths and wounding of American soldiers in Iraq -- 379 dead and 2,155 hurt at last count -- is but one more pathological act in sticking all of America into the sand. Bush severely limited access to the presidential papers of his father. Vice President Dick Cheney erected an iron curtain around his energy task force. Hundreds of Muslim immigrants were detained without due process and with no evidence they were involved in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The administration wiped out parts of an Environmental Protection Agency report that specifically tied human activities to global warming. Bush has his eraser out again. The Justice Department recently released a commissioned report on diversity among its attorneys. Half of its 186 pages were blacked out. The Bush administration made sure to filter in the good news in the report. The federal government, regardless of which party is in power, has long been more inviting to people of color at the entry level than the private sector. The Justice Department is no different. Its attorney work force is 15 percent of color and 38 percent women, compared to 12 percent and 30 percent, respectively, in the national legal labor pool. The blacked-out pages betray a Justice Department that does not want America to know what happens after people are hired. The full report is available on a Web site called the Memory Hole, which electronically lifted the blacked-out sections. Among the conclusions of the full report were: "When controlling for component, grade, and salary, we found that the average minority is currently residing approximately one-third step lower than the average white and the average woman is currently residing approximately one-half step lower than the average man. These effects are statistically significant." "Race and gender combine for a particularly strong negative effect of identity for minority women." "Section chiefs are an extremely critical element of the department's diversity climate. They have significant authority in recruitment, hiring, promotion, performance appraisal, case assignment, and career development. The section chief work force is not diverse, and turnover is low. This pattern, combined with the generally low attention that these managers pay to staff career development, leads minorities to perceive a lack of advancement opportunities." The sections on "stereotyping," "racial and gender tension," "harassment behavior," and "mentoring," were completely blacked out. Asked if employees felt free to "express differences that may be due to different cultural backgrounds," 83 percent of white men and 73 percent of white women said yes. Only 56 percent of men of color and 42 percent of women of color said yes. Deleted was this statement: "More than 40 percent of racial minorities participating in the study believe that stereotyping of minorities having limited abilities is a problem. Further analysis shows that an actual majority (51 percent) of nonwhite women hold this belief. Although we do not know the extent to which this belief is based on actual differential treatment of people, it clearly represents a barrier to the goal of creating an environment where all members feel equally valued and able to contribute." An further analysis provides an even more deeper divide. While only 13 percent of white attorneys at the Justice Department say people of color are stereotyped, 60 percent of African-American lawyers say attorneys of color "are often stereotyped here." Deleted was a paragraph that showed that about 20 percent of lawyers of color say they have personally experienced racial harassment at the department. Deleted was the fact that only 53 percent of attorneys of color felt that the promotion process was fair with respect to color compared with 87 percent of white attorneys. Deleted was the fact that 60 percent of women felt that the promotion process was fair with regards to gender, compared with 81 percent of men. Deleted was the fact that only 45 percent of attorneys of color, compared with 74 percent of white lawyers, "feel that assignments I receive, and management decisions about my career development, have been made without regard to my race/gender/ ethnic origin." With all these deletions, it was no surprise that all nine pages of "Recommendations" were blacked out. Hear no problem, see no problem, solve no problem. Bush blames the media when he is bringing back memories of Nixon erasing tapes. The administration deleted the data on global warming. It blacked out diversity reports. It disappears immigrants. With a war built on falsehoods failing with fatal consequences, Bush now wants to disappear the media. It is all part of Bush erasing you. © Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company. ###

Well, I don't know too much about yopu, but I'm still in school. If you like Bush cutting Education by 1.7 billion so you can get a nice 400 dollar check in the mail (Which FYI, 1 in 4 people did not qualify for) thats your buisness, but I myself would like to go to collage. The 'American Dream' that the conservitives thought of is simply a lie. There dangling a carrot in front of our face so we think we could someday "make it big." In reality, none of us will be rich so get used to the idea. UIt's a lie thought up by corporate CEO's so the working class will work harder for no extra money. You'll never be rich so get used to the idea. Finally, there are vast inequilities in America. There is an 8.6% unemployment rate. There are more people living below the established poverty line than ever before under the Bush administration. There is no compassionate in your converitism when you get a 400 dollar tax cut and a homeless man gets nothing.

Quite on the contrary this is not the liberal view. Nobody on our side liked Al Gore, he was just the best we had at the time. You see, he's an idiot but unfortunately the lesser of two evils at the time. When people are faced with a hoorible travesty ( Like 9/11) they naturally rally behind there leader. The support Bush is due to 9/11 not any feelings of him doing a "great super job!!!!" Iraq was the biggest mistake of our time. Iraq is in the heart of the middle east. The western views will not be welcome there, nor will they accept democracy. The "democracy" we have in place at this time is no more than a shame. A handful of officals the US choose to represent the Iraqi people. Why has there been no election? Because the US knows that the Iraqi people would "elect" another dictator. 70% of all Iraqi people would rather have Saddam still in power rather than the US. Wow, we are worse than Saddam!!!!! I also think your living in the past about the whole "liberal Media" biased thing. The media is clearly conservitist biased. Donahue was cancelled and during the entire "iraq cat and mouse game" between the US and Iraq, you were 80% more likely to watch pro war topics. Fox is also clearly biased, giving us the ever watched and loved, "Sites and sounds of iraq" when they show us videos of bombs expoding and people running to the music of twangy "American" country music. War is a last resort and shouldn't be portrayed in a positive way. The American people need to fear war instead of using it every time it's convienent for them to snatch some oil. Speaking of which, Haliburton and Bectel need to go and give Iraq there natural resources back.