Tim Blair

So if one ever suggests that a political institution and its attached bureaucracy have become outmoded and new institutions and allaiances are needed, one is a terrorist?

I love the "wrecking [Iraq's] infrastructure" line, too. Do you realize that not ONE new palace has been built since the US invaded? An entire industry, devastated like that.

I don't think anyone can say "Hussain was bad, but" and have a leg to stand on, if morality or basic human suffering (as a bad thing) are the basis of their arguments.

Isn't that something basic they teach you in speech and debate class in high school? The word "but" isn't allowed in debating? C'mon, secondary ed., can't have forgotten EVERYTHING we've learned...

Iraqis can't buy gas? I read a story yesterday saying traffic jams are terrible in Baghdad; it said Iraqis buy gasoline for a nickel a gallon.

Charles Krauthammer recently used the phrase "unhinged" to describe a growing portion of the Democratic Party's reaction to things Bushian and Iraqian. Mr. Adams diatribe fits that description nicely. "Unhinged" is a very apt phrase to describe pampered Westerners who gibber endlessly about "international law" and other such twaddle while enabling the extermination of whole ethnic classes for what...to spite Amerikkka?

Just say it -- "unhinged". Doesn't that sound good rolling off your tongue? Definitely a word to be incorporated into the vocabulary of any sane person.

to fix up the supply of electricity

I recently read that the electric grid capability in Iraq now surpases what was available "pre-war".

I think I read the same piece Joanne read--basically Iraqis are paying pennies a gallon to fuel pretty high end rides (e.g. Mercedes, Audis, etc) that they can buy cheaply as there are no import duties. (No government=no tariffs.)

CNN is reporting today that the head of the US Army Corp of Engineers said Sunday night was the first evening that the entire nation of Iraq had electricity including prior to the war when Saddam could capriciously and malevolently black out an entire city like Basra or Kirkuk.

Sounds like Wanker Adams should keep up with the news better.

Despite rhetoric from both camps pro and con the war in Iraq, Adams simply states the facts of the matter. Pandoras box and Iraq post war are very much the same.

Niall

Adams has never stated a fact in his life. He is a lying toe-rag who, like lefties everywhere, thinks the truth doesn';t matter if it gets in the way of his ideology.

But that's OK, we need people like Adams. They serve to demonstrate to us the banality and stupidity of the left-wing world weltanschaung.

Niall: Do go on! Tell us more about your in-depth fact-finding mission to Iraq!

Which cities did you visit? Did you take the free tour with the Corps of Engineers through the sewage, water, and electrical infrastructure?

How many people did you interview?

Do you feel lucky to have escaped with your life? Surely you must, to have returned from the Lovecraftian horror that is post-war Iraq!

Tell us more, oh, wise Niall!

/sarcasm on

WOW. What a fact filled, intelligent, well crafted article. Should be used in journalism classes as an example of brilliant reporting.

The time and effort he put in as he trudged the highways and biways of Iraq really shows. He must have interviewed thousands of Iraqis. A lesser journalist would have determined the effort to be too great and would not have undertaken it.

It's obvious he didn't just stick with the other journalists at the hotel in Baghdad. He interviewed Iraqis from all over the country and it really shows.

I wonder how he managed to evaluate all that raw data about the country's infrastructure? Must have been an enormous amount.

It's journalists like Mr. Adams who are responsible for the opinion the public has of journalists. He's an example of going after facts and not just presenting recycled opinion. He should be very proud.

/sarcasm off

"So was killing thousands of Iraqis and wrecking the nation's infrastructure necessary?"

The simple answer Phillip is, yes it was neccessary -

Bob Cotgrove from the University of Tasmania has pointed out that the poverty Saddam enforced on his nation created a massive death toll, Mr Cotgrove estimates that, in the late 1990s, 66,900 more people died a year in Iraq than would have been the case had the death rate been the same as in neighbouring nations. Of this number, 41,300 were children.

Keep in mind this figure ignores murders by the regime, ignores torture and rape by the regime, and ignores the simple fact that the people had no freedom at all under the regime.

So, on balance I think we can say, Phillip, that not only was it neccessary, but it was one of the modern worlds major humanitarian operations, and also that anyone who actually needs to ask if freeing 20 million people from Saddam, his family and associates is neccessary, is so morally corrupt as to be unfit to participate in human society.

"All in all, it seems reasonable to observe that Hussein was on the skids"

I don't think I have heard anyone say this. Yet, it is quite a pertinent observation.

Is it possible that the US believed NOT that Iraq was about to launch WMD's but the COMPLETE OPPOSITE.....that is, that Saddam was about to fall?

Therefore the US decided that they needed to get in there and keep control of the impending availability of oil.

Tim,

There are people in Australia who actually believe Adams' load of crapola?

Nice of him to condescend and admit Sadaam was monster.

What a sport!

Joe,

Yes there are people who believe the Philcher's litereary diarhea; in fact many people think he just tells it like it is. The usual suspects - arts grads, teachers, caviar socialists and other gullible twits. Fans of Mike moore and Noam chomsky also tend to be Adms supporters.

Regarding all these claims about the oil, how long would it take and how much oil would have to be stolen to reimburse the U.S for the $100+ billion they have spent and will be spending in Iraq? 10 years? 20 years? 50 years? Does anyone seriously think the U.S. could spend the next few decades sucking out all of Iraqs oil? Given that there would be major strife caused by an angry population and that the U.S. would have spend billions more just to protect their pipelines and troops, could they ever conceivably make a profit from the oil? I don't think so.
I asked some of my anti-war friends and they had never even thought about that. They just bought the line about the whole war being to steal all the oil because it sounded like what they'd been brought up to expect from the U.S.

THHC,

Got it. Sounds like the garden variety lefty we have here in the States.

Not sure what I like better though--literary diarreha or gullible twit.

It's a toss up.

The Telegraph reports electricity is now at pre-war levels. That's not good enough, however. They're trying to double power output by next summer.

If the grid is so bad in Iraq how come they are selling so many tv's, dishes, ac's and fridges over there now? And if there is no gas how come so many cars are being sold. The free market so depresses the left, especially because it has that word 'free' in it; it reminds them too much of the word liberty.

Maybe Phil always gets snotty when he's hungry.

Face it, fatty Adams is getting on in years, the voice of the calling grave is becoming discernable.Adam's hope of seeing Australia converted into a Soviet-Casto-Maoist-PolPotian gulag will soon be nothing.So, of course he's getting desperate.

"Do you realize that not ONE new palace has been built since the US invaded?"

Lazy American Imperialists!

I tried to follow that last sentence but couldn't with all those words separating "UN" and "ineptitude".

Adams falls into the same trap, of his own making, that many other leftist extremist, Bush-hating commentators have fallen into. The "wrecking the nation's infrastructure " accusation is usually accompanied by (as is the case of Adams' column) by a claim that the Americans have failed to re-build and restore Iraq's infrastructure to a pre-war level (something along the lines of Saddam was evil, but he kept the lights on......)

These same dishonest fanatics were screaming indictments of mass murder against the U.S. for enforcing U.N. sanctions throughout the 90's, and into the early years of the new millenium. Virtually every one of these malevolvent, hate-driven screeds included charges that these sanctions had " wrecked " or " completely destroyed " Iraq's infrastructure. The Fisks and Pilgers of the world would give us detailed accounts of a nation in shambles, no hydro, no water, etc, etc.....

It's long past time to dig out their old columns, and ask these liars how Iraq's infrastructure came to be magically rebuilt and rehabilitated on the eve of war. If it was "destroyed " by sanctions, how could the Americans " destroy " it during the war? Adams and his fellow leftist hatemongers are now telling us Iraq's infrastructure was pretty darn good under Saddam, in a pathetic attempt to discredit the Americans post-regime change.

Talk about hypocrisy. Use sanctions before the war, for years, to claim the U.S. destroyed the country. Then, post-conflict, when sanctions are no longer available as a club to beat the Americans with, declare that the Americans destroyed Iraq's infrastructure DURING the war.

Why aren't the columnists who stand for truth all over this ????

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the thrust of this thread is as follows:

Remove a brutal dictator ---> replace him with... uh... like... some retired army dude!

I dunno, conserva-kidz -- maybe come up with some IDEAS for a VIABLE next option before you go howling down critics of the Iraqi invasion!

The idea that Saddam was about to fall and the US had to get in first is absolute garbage. There is no evidence for this. Saddam was in no way weakened throughout the course of the 90s, except in his ability to build WMDs, which was somewhat contained. I'd love to see some documented evidence of a serious threat to his rule, but naturally it won't be forthcoming.

"Remove a brutal dictator ---> replace him with... uh... like... some retired army dude!"

I see, so in your opinion as soon as the last shot was fired and well before any infrastructure has been fixed, before any of the guilty rounded up , before a functioning economy was put in place and before the existing systems of Saddams regime were dismantled - elections should have been held?

I see you don't understand the meaning of the term 'interim administration'.

Well, lefty-loon -- maybe if you come up with some IDEAS for a VIABLE next option before you go howling down the Iraqi invasion!

There is a recurring leitmotif in the moral equivalence sermons from the loony left.
The pattern is: "Yes, Saddam was a monster, BUT etc...".
Just send the old windbag to Kurdistan.

Yes, Hussein was a monster, but

Trent Lott stood down (and he deserved to be forced to be stood down) for saying that certain problems wouldn't exist if some Dixiecrat became president. Yet saying that certain problems wouldn't exist if Saddam were in power in Iraq is regarded as progressive and anti-imperialist.

Tim, far be it from me to give advice, but I hope you ran this past a lawyer first.

lawyer? naww...funniest line i've seen at this site so far has been "phillip adams who, like martin bryant comes from australia"... 'ken classic!!

Miranda,

In NSW we don't actually have "lawyers". A member of the legal profession is either a barrister or solicitor. As for this post and the subsequent comments, I think they would all come under the heading of "fair commentary". Mr Adams has been caught out fabricating truth and his opinion is thus absolutely worthless, like that of most knee-jerk, envy spewing anti-americans.

Ran it past a lawyer? Well, you sound qualified, MD. You tell me wherein the lawsuit lurks. Come on. Point it out.

James wrote:
Remove a brutal dictator ---> replace him with... uh... like... some retired army dude!

A retired army dude is going to take over in Iraq? What a news splash, James! So Paul Bremer is out and Wesley Clark is in? Gonna be awful hard for "Clark the Shark" to campaign from over there, now that all the embeddeds have left...or maybe you mean some other retired army dude...please name names, enquiring newsjunkies want to know...

What's the difference between Wesley Clark and Bill Clinton?

The General keeps his privates in order.

(Thanks, Jay)

Sure, James. We all know what a disaster putting General McArthur in charge of the Japanese occupation was. Right?

I swear, they get more inane every day.