July 24, 2003

GET IN TOUCH WITH YOUR FEELINGS

The phrase “mixed feelings” always seems to appear in stories about the reaction of expats to events in Iraq. Here’s an example from the ABC after Saddam’s statue was brought down:

For many, those images were a powerful symbol of the end of a regime that had driven them from their homeland.

Yet their joy at the prospect of a new freedom in Iraq is tempered by apprehension for friends and family lost in the chaos.

You get the idea. Saddam is bad, but so is war bad too! A story in today’s Sydney Morning Herald also refers to mixed feelings, but these feelings are a mixture of delight that Uboy and Quasar are dead and bitter regret that the pair of death-dealing Saddam spawn aren’t alive so they can be tortured like common lab rabbits and then killed:

Death came too quickly to Saddam Hussein's sons - Ameen Kherasani wanted to see them punished first.

"They were lucky," he said. "I wanted them alive. I wanted to tie them in a square in Baghdad for everyone to come along in a line and beat them. All Iraqis suffered because of these dictators."

Mr Kherasani, 33, working in the Dijlah corner shop on Auburn Road, Auburn, battled mixed feelings yesterday. Four of his brothers were killed during Saddam's reign. He was happy that Uday and Qusay Hussein were dead but felt cheated that their end came in a shoot-out with United States soldiers.

Down the road in the Sinbad Restaurant, Hani Hadedi, 32, was disappointed that Saddam's sons were not captured and tried. "I wanted to see them in court so they could be punished before they die. It is very, very easy to die like this," he said.

Other Iraqis in Sydney were delighted at the news. Razak Ruda, the secretary of the Iraqi Australian Cultural Association, heard reports of the deaths on television late on Tuesday night. "I was jumping and dancing and I woke up all my family. Then I started to laugh and cry at the same time," he said.

Everybody’s happy! Killing them Hussein boys has brought multicultural Australia together. When Saddam eventually gets it in the neck, the Sinbad Restaurant will be the place to be; in fact, customers would like to see him on the menu:

At the Sinbad restaurant in Auburn Road, Saddam Hussein had few friends. "I want to eat him," said Ali Albuswelim who has had no news of his father and brother, jailed since 1991.

Posted by Tim Blair at July 24, 2003 02:58 AM
Comments

I had mixed drinks when I heard the news.....does this count?

Posted by: The Referee at July 24, 2003 at 03:12 AM

What a pleasure it is to see terrorists and tyrants blasted with machinegun bullets or torn apart by anti-tank missiles lobbed at them by predator drones opperated by bored american teenagers fifty kilometers away.

I mean it just really is a joy.

I believe Saddam is dead, killed in the first minutes of the war. The reason is simple, there is no way that grandstanding arab megalomainiac would have missed his moment of glory leading the heroic arab resistance to the infidel west if he had one ounce of strength left in him. No way. He was on TV 24-7 duing GW1, loving it.

Instead, his bunker was bombed and Saddam dropped off the face of the earth, co-incidence? We got 'pre-recorded' messages and a previously unknown clown caliming to be the information minister handling questions from the press. And Saddam's alive? No way.

Saddam was killed early, and it's a real shame, I'd have liked him to be alive, to know his animalistic offspring had been shot down like rabid dogs and dragged out into the street for the cameras.

Oh well. Still a great day :)

Posted by: Amos at July 24, 2003 at 03:20 AM

Havent we all had the urges to eat our former dictators at one time or another?

Posted by: Tom at July 24, 2003 at 03:27 AM

Pol Pot Luck
Macaroni and Mao
Fidel Fries
Saddam-alami
Leninwurst

and due to recent events

fresh Swiss Cheese Uday


Where is the Pepto-Bismal?

Posted by: derf at July 24, 2003 at 04:11 AM

Or should it be

Kung Pao Mao?

A nice Chianti and some fava beans.

Posted by: derf at July 24, 2003 at 04:13 AM

Lautréamont recommends giving your feelings a pilot. ``I was only feeling.'' Oh hell I'll look it up..

``Youth intends sentimental lucubrations. Maturity begins to reason without confusion. He was only feeling, he thinks. He used to let his sensations wander: now he gives them a pilot.''

That's so 19th century.

Posted by: Ron Hardin at July 24, 2003 at 04:14 AM

Mu Goo Gabe
Mobutu Sesame Seko

Posted by: scott h. at July 24, 2003 at 04:54 AM

Hi, off the subject, - my blog has hacked and is now mirroring a radical lefty blog. Needless to say Blogspot havent responded to my emails - so does anyone out there know how to correct the code or where I might find out how to?

Posted by: Giles at July 24, 2003 at 05:25 AM

When I read typical Leftist drivel, I'm simultaneously amused and disgusted. Does that count?

Posted by: Jerry at July 24, 2003 at 08:47 AM

Talk about managing to turn a positive into a negative: on this morning's AM program, Linda Mottram(aka Sister Sneer)managed to suggest that most Iraqis were sceptical that Uday and Quesay were in fact dead. That's everyone's ABC -we wouldn't want unconfined joy now would we?

Posted by: Rob at July 24, 2003 at 10:50 AM

What about Uday Satay? It may make you Quesay if it is too greasay.

Posted by: Habib Bickford at July 24, 2003 at 01:02 PM

I wonder if their joy is tempered by the fact that their TPV's might not be renewed now that Saddam is gone.

Posted by: Gilly at July 24, 2003 at 07:00 PM

This sounds like the outtakes from a Monty Pythin script. I'm expecting a big cartoon foot to drop any moment now.

Posted by: Bill Peschel at July 25, 2003 at 02:13 PM