How Many More Will Die For Bush’s Ego?

By Paul Craig Roberts

12/09/06 "Information Clearing House" -- -- Last July in response to Bush-the-Evil’s enabling of Israel’s gratuitous slaughter of thousands of Lebanese civilians and destruction of the country’s infrastructure, I wrote about “the shame of being an American.” With the ongoing slaughter of our troops and Iraqi civilians in Bush’s war in Iraq, it is time to revisit that theme.

As the Iraqi civil war (euphemistically termed “sectarian violence”) intensifies, both US and Iraqi casualties have sharply increased. Thirty-five US troops have been killed in the first week of December. Iraqis are dying at each other’s hands at about 100 per day, with many more wounded by bombs.

Iraqi civilians continue to suffer at the hands of the US military, with the latest news being a US air strike that wiped out two families totaling 32 people.

The report from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group has made it plain as day that the US is accomplishing nothing in Iraq except the destabilization of the entire Middle East. As Middle East expert Anthony Sullivan writes in The National Interest, the ISG report “constitutes a massive repudiation of the policy of the Bush Administration.” The war is lost and cannot be retrieved militarily. “Staying the course” is the path of total folly.

Yet, the White House Moron says that it is better for 100 US troops and 3,000 Iraqi civilians to die every month than for him to admit that he is wrong.

To date the cost of Bush being wrong is 25,000 US casualties (dead and wounded) and approximately 650,000 dead Iraqis. No one knows how many have been wounded. How many more will die before America drowns in the shame of the blood that is being shed for no other reason than the American people were so stupid as to elect a president who cannot admit that he made a mistake? The same stupid American people elected a Congress that is too corrupt to impeach a president who is a liar, a war criminal, and a tyrant. Instead, they are prepared to let Bush off with a mere “mistake,” a courtesy denied to President Clinton. Lying about sex is an impeachable offense. Lying about war is a mere mistake.

Are the American people, Congress, and the American Establishment going to let the death toll continue to mount day by day for the two more years it takes for Bush to become history?

How do America’s military families feel about the loss of loved ones for no reason except President Bush cannot admit a mistake?

How do the troops themselves feel about it? On December 8, a US Marine who has spent 7 months fighting insurgents in Anbar province answered this question on lewrockwell.com as follows: “I’m sick and tired of this patriotic, nationalistic and fascist crap. . . . How do you justify ‘sacrificing’ your life for a war which is not only illegal, but is being prosecuted to the extent where the only thing keeping us there is one man’s power, and his ego.” US Marine Philip Martin says he joined the Marines to protect the US Constitution, not to serve as an imperialist storm trooper.

I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard talking heads worrying about Bush’s “comfort level” with the Iraqi Study Group’s unanimous report. Bush’s comfort level? What about the comfort level of the Iraqis and Americans who are losing family members while idiot talking heads worry about Bush’s comfort level with the facts!

Try to imagine the impression the US gives to the rest of the world: The US cannot stop a war that is a catastrophe becoming a calamity because it would interfere with Bush’s comfort level.

This disastrous war is a testament to the irresponsibility of the American people and their elected representatives. There were, of course, many dissenters. But the majority were too lazy and irresponsible to take the trouble to be informed. Most Americans allowed themselves to be deceived and emotionally manipulated. The consequence of this failure of the American people has been brutal for countless people and their families in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon and for the thousands of American families who have suffered because Bush sent US troops on a fool’s mission. The American people are stained with the blood of innocents. Are they still not sufficiently angry with the president who used them for his crimes to demand his impeachment?

As long as Bush remains in office, the neoconservatives will demand more wars. In the current issue of “Foreign Policy,” neocon Joshua Muravchik stridently insists that Bush bomb Iran before he leaves office. Muracvchik urges his fellow neocon warmongers to “pave the way” for the bombing of Iran and to “be prepared to defend the action when it comes.”

As Middle East expert Anthony Sullivan writes, the neoconservatives are “fifth columnists” whose “real concern is not the United States but Israel.” Sullivan writes that “it is past time that neoconservatives and their movement be left to drown in the deepest reaches of the ocean.”

Amen! And send Bush and Cheney and Rice with them.