Qaddafi has been in our gun-sights since 1980, based on the same kinds of lies Bush told us about Iraq.

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Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, when speaking recently at West Point, America's premier military academy, said, "If someone mentions going to war again soon, he should have his head examined."

Gates has learned what many of us experts on the Middle East and Islam said at the beginning of the George W. Bush debacle -- before Bush attacked Iraq based on lies -- you cannot win a war against a concept called "terrorism." Such a concept  is unending, and "Islam" is a religion that will never be wiped out by armies; the more Muslims are attacked, the more they will retaliate against their attackers   (in this case, America and its handmaiden, NATO, and other NATO countries in Europe).

Now one of the old chicken-hawks, the pro-Israeli minister of lobbying for Israel in the U.S. Senate -- Joe Lieberman -- has said we should get involved in Libya. Lieberman is advocating that we support the rebels, including furnishing them with weapons and possibly our military. He and the old warmonger, and perhaps not a hero after all as the stories by fellow prisoners come out -- John McCain -- are advocating this sort of intervention, in what is a nationalist matter.

Just what would America do if Mexico came across the border into Arizona to "protect" its citizens? We'd raise holy hell;  go mad, and tell Mexico it's none of their business to come into America.

Then why is it that some of our ignorant congressional people say it is okay to go into Libya? I'll tell you why:

1. We want that cheap "sweet crude" for our sakes and the for sake of the EU. If we get rid of Muammar Qaddafi, an ardent nationalist, the EU and America will be sure to install a puppet and we'll get the oil cheap, or even free (as was the case of Iraq, and still is, because our oil companies steal Iraqi assets every day).

2. The EU and America do not want Qaddafi to continue financially supporting the African Union. Without Qaddafi's money, the African Union will die and Africa will once again be at the mercy of the colonialists, headed this time by America and the EU.

3. Lieberman, a dual US-Israeli citizen who often votes and pushes for Israel first and the United States second, wants another Arab/Muslim country to go into further chaos so that any hope of unity is destroyed with the puppets we would put in. And we'd put one in who was favorable to Israel, just as we helped Anwar Sadat and Hosni Mubarak, and others. Speaking of Joe Lieberman, it was interesting to note that the Huffington Post ran an article by an old leader of AIPAC, David Harris, attacking Qaddafi and asking leaders from around the world who had received awards and help from Qaddafi (who supports nationalism against colonialism) to give their awards back.

I thought about David, whom I've known since the first Intifada -- I met him at a speech by the late PM of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin -- and if we follow his logic, which I'm sure he wouldn't want us to do, then Shimon Peres of Israel, a hawk, should give back his Nobel Prize for Peace, as should Barack Obama (the warmonger) and Menachem Begin as well.

Of course there are more reasons, but it is clear that, whether Qaddafi is right or wrong -- and I am not one to judge because I'm neither Libyan nor on the ground in Libya -- America, by positioning itself as it has at the UN, and by sending warships off the coast of Libya, has probably had its hand in this from the beginning. We have funded anti-Qaddafi groups since the Reagan era -- when Reagan falsely accused Qaddafi of sending "hit squads" to kill him. However, in 1986, when speaking to a joint committee of Congress, Secretary of State George Schultz said, "It was all pure disinformation; Qaddafi had never made any threats or hired any hit squads to kill President Reagan."  

Clearly, Qaddafi has been in our gun-sights since 1980. So, after 31 years, it appears as if America will finally get its way. I know that the Libyan people are enchanted with the words "democracy" and "freedom." They think these words mean "paradise," but after an American or EU puppet rules Libya for a while, they'll see that "freedom" is when the strong eat the weak, and the weak either knuckle under or get beaten, shot or imprisoned.

One has but to look at the history of protest movements and the arrests and beatings that even the most polite protests have garnered. For example, the recent case of Ray McGovern who simply stood with his back to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton when she was speaking of freedom and democracy. McGovern was beaten and arrested for that protest and Clinton didn't do a thing to stop the police thugs from beating and arresting him!

This is not a piece supporting or attacking Qaddafi, but it is a piece that calls for Americans to wake up and see who we really are -- one of the world's great terrorist nations, and a neo-colonial power. We have the world in our gun-sights, and corporations that will stop at nothing to keep us in continuous war against anyone who doesn't knuckle down to being used.

If Qaddafi is overthrown, then the Libyans will experience what the Iraqis, Afghans, and Somalis have experienced -- rape by the puppet regimes that kiss the feet of the colonialists -- America and the Europeans.

Authors Bio:
Sam Hamod, Ph.D. is a graduate professor; he has taught courses in creative writing, politics, religion, mass media and intercultural relations. He has one of the very few PhDs awarded by The Writers Workshop of The Univ. of Iowa, has published 12 books of poems, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and has 3 more books under contract, including his memoirs, "At the Broadway Lounge: A Muslim Life in America." His M.A. and B.A. are from Northwestern University, and he went to Law School at The Univ. of Chicago. He is the former Director of The Islamic Center in Washington, DC; he founded and edited THIRD WORLD NEWS in Wash, DC; has taught at Princeton, Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin, Howard and Valparaiso. He also served as an advisor to the State Department and worked on the "peace process" between Palestine and Israel in Wash, DC. He founded www.todaysalternativenews.com in 2000. He has lectured and read his work all over America, the Middle East, Europe and Africa.