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By David Caputo (about the author) Page 2 of 4 page(s)
A few people had other plans in mind...
During the Iran-Iraq War, the Kuwaitis had occupied some extremely oil-rich land that Iraq claimed vigorously was its own.
Soon the Kuwaitis started aggressively expanding on their practice of "slant drilling" even further into Iraq oilfields from platforms based on Kuwaiti soil.
Saddam emphatically protested this to the Kuwaitis, OPEC, and the US State Department, but to no avail.
April Glaspie, US Ambassador to Iraq, visited Saddam in August of 1989 and said that the US considered the border dispute an "internal matter" between the two countries, one in which the US would not intervene or choose a side.
Ha Ha... Fooled Ya!!!
Hussein took the bait and invaded Kuwait, and to have heard George Bush 41's outcry, you'd have thought he'd converted the entire population under age 12 into party-sized sausage links.
The massive propaganda machine sprung into action and before you could say "Open Sesame" we'd mustered half a million troops and a coalition of the fellow faux-indignant and the term "Peace Dividend" was officially dropped from polite conversation.
We HAD to invade, right? They were "killing babies", weren't they?
Well... maybe not.
Don't forget, fellow Americans, that you live in a country where Public Relations, Advertising, and Spin is the one thing that we do, and will probably always do, so far much better than the rest of the world that it's not even funny. That gun is actually pointed though, most of the time, at you. You're sold a fraudulent bill of goods so often that it's truly almost impossible to make clear sense of anything.
But try we must, so onward through this meandering eulogy (or should I say, obituary) we slog...
Compared to most rulers in the Middle East, Saddam Hussein was kind of a liberal.
Don't misunderstand what I mean. It's pretty clear that he was a paid CIA asset, much like Noriega of Panama, and a bloodthirsty and ruthless sonovabitch of the first order for pretty much all of his adult life. This clearly makes him someone you don't want sitting on your local school board. I also most assuredly wouldn't have wanted to be an administration-ripping sarcastic political journalist in Baghdad circa 1987 (or 1998), because I'm rather attached to my fingernails, and I only like my private parts touched with love, not electrodes.
But women in Baghdad could wear skirts. And pants. And walk around without headscarves. Women assumed prominent roles throughout layers of society that were unthinkable in most "conservative" Muslim countries. They also made up a significant percentage of university students on all levels and had successful careers in almost every profession.
Take action -- click here to contact your local newspaper or congress people:
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