[Peace] very nice

[Dlind49 at aol.com]

America, Meet Your Leaders
By Harry Browne © 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
9-20-2

Poor President Bush. 
  
He apparently wants to invade Iraq more than anything else in the world. And 
just when he thought he had sufficient support to do so, foreign leaders 
started backing out. 
  
So he went to the U.N. and gave a stirring speech - saying Saddam Hussein 
must allow weapons inspections or the U.S. will invade - only to have Hussein 
agree to allow the inspectors in. 
  
What is the point? 
  
In his quest to go to war, the president is supported by writers and 
commentators who never saw a war they didn't like. That may be because they 
never have to go to war themselves - they just send others to their deaths. 
  
To these people, the object isn't a democratic Iraq or U.S. security. The 
object is war. 
  
The goal isn't peace in the Middle East or removing dangerous weapons. The 
goal is war. 
  
The warmongers demonstrate that war is the purpose of it all by the way they 
promote it. 
  
If you try to deal with any of their claims, they change the subject. 
  
If you point out that Pakistan (a military dictatorship), India, Russia, 
China, France, Britain, Israel and the United States all have "weapons of 
mass destruction" (including chemical and biological weapons), the 
war-mongers say, "But Hussein gassed his own people." 
  
If you point out that Bill Clinton gassed the Branch Davidians at Waco, the 
warmongers say, "But Hussein invaded Kuwait." 
  
If you point out that the U.S. invaded Panama and Grenada - and has bombed 
numerous countries that didn't attack the U.S. - the war-mongers say, "But 
Hussein operates a brutal dictatorship." 
  
If you ask if this means we must invade several dozen other countries in the 
world who are suffering under brutal dictatorships, the war-mongers say, "But 
Hussein has violated a dozen U.N. resolutions" (this is usually claimed by 
someone who doesn't think the U.N. should even exist). 
  
If you point out that the U.S. also violates U.N. resolutions - and didn't 
even pay its dues for many years - the war-mongers say, "But Hussein has 
weapons of mass destruction," and we've come full circle and can start all 
over again. 
  
If any of these claims were a truly serious concern, the war-mongers wouldn't 
be jumping around from one contention to another. 
  
Lies and damned lies 
  
After every war, the historians dig through the archives and discover that a 
great deal of what our government claimed as the reason for going to war was 
untrue. 
  
After World War II, we found out that the Pearl Harbor attack was neither 
"unprovoked" nor a "surprise." 
  
After the Vietnam War, we discovered that the Vietnamese didn't really fire 
on American ships in the Gulf of Tonkin, and so the Senate resolution 
escalating the war was based on a fraud. 
  
After the Gulf War, it turned out that the Kuwaiti woman who told Congress 
that she witnessed Iraqi atrocities in Kuwait - and thereby incited several 
senators to vote for war - wasn't even in Kuwait at the time she "saw" the 
atrocities. 
  
And so it goes. The politicians get us all whipped up, and only later do we 
discover that what we knew about the war and the enemy was a lie. 
  
These are our leaders 
  
But, of course, it isn't just war that politicians lie about. They lie about 
their loyalty to the Constitution, they lie about their voting records, they 
lie about the contents of the bills they pass, they lie about the 
non-existent "budget surpluses." 
  
And as though that weren't enough, they vote for bills they haven't read and 
don't understand. They browbeat committee witnesses on subjects the 
politicians know nothing about. They seize on any imaginable event as an 
excuse to arrogate more power to themselves and to take more liberty away 
from us. 
  
And they expect us to go to war on their say-so. 
  
You believe what you want. But as for me, until George Bush lays out 
specific, credible, verifiable, understandable evidence that Saddam Hussein 
poses an immediate threat to the security of the United States of America 
(not just to the "interests" of the U.S., as defined by power-hungry 
politicians), I prefer to keep my self-respect and oppose any thought of 
going to war. 
  
I love America, not its government. 
  
I am loyal to the Constitution, not to the politicians. 
  
I love the traditional American way of life, not the 1984 version we're 
living today. 
  
And I don't understand why it is so great to live in a country that's 
constantly at war with someone somewhere in the world. ___ 
  
Harry Browne is the director of public policy at the American Liberty 
Foundation. You can read more of his articles and find out about his network 
radio show at HarryBrowne.org.