Let us for once be clear about those reasons: if Iraq didn’t have oil, we wouldn’t have invaded them. If their main export was strawberries, we wouldn’t be there. So whatever else anyone might say – WMD, 9/11, terrorists, Al Qaeda, Israeli lobby, Saddam was a bad guy – the basic subterranean reason for us being in Iraq is this: there’s a lot of unexploited oil under that desert sand, and there are US companies who are very good at getting that oil out, and there’s an oil law in front of the Iraqi parliament now that gives these companies the right to get that oil out, and the President and the Vice-President of the US are oil men.
Enough said.
You can tell me till you’re blue in the face about bad Saddam and bad WMD and good spreading of freedom and dire necessity of us having permanent military bases in the Middle East, and you may be right, but to me the most obvious dots to connect spell O-I-L.
Anyway: to get back to the odious Nazi analogy. Let’s see where it takes us.
Hitler had the Germans behind him because they were real sore at having lost WWI and all those reparations they had to pay. Plus he told them they’d been stabbed in the back by the Jews.
Now isn’t it a fact that a good part of the US is still sore at having lost the war in Vietnam? You know those Americans. You’re probably one of them: we would’ve won the war in Vietnam, but we were stabbed in the back by war-protesting hippies and the liberal media who made us pull out when we were winning.
We didn’t cause our humiliation: no, it’s the fault of those draft-dodging hippies. They’re the ones who made America lose to a bunch of peasants in black pajamas.
Why do we make all these excuses? Here’s why: our pride suffered. We’re America, the great America, users of 25% of the world’s resources, supremo oil-guzzlers of the planet, and we’re entitled to our lifestyle, it’s our oil, dammit, and we don’t take kindly to having our pride hurt, because we’re entitled to our pride, because God is on our side and we’re the best country that ever was bar none in the history of the world.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Matthew T. Sussman
You underestimate the strawberry, O scary-headed jewel case.
2 - STM
Adam would likely know a fair about nazism, or as close as you could get to it in apartheid South Africa.
He should also know from his experiences there that America is a long way from being a nazi state, or indeed anything approaching it.
Shame on you Adam. We all know America's a long way from being perfect, and today may not be as "free" compared to other countries as it likes to think with the surreptitious erosion of too many rights, but the truth is it's the democracy that is still America that lets you get away with writing this kind of bollocks.
Try something similar in, let's say, Burma, for instance, and see what happens.
3 - Lumpy
I think adam is on target when comparing himself to the 'good germans' he's just got the context wrong. it's not the Iraq war he's complacently accepting but the theft of our rights by the globalist elites he worships.
as for his callousness towrds the iraqis who he thinks are just subhumans deserving of no compassion, that's typical of the bean counting internatuonals. i'm glad that the US cares about people and trying to protect them.
but I guess this is all par for the course from someone who still believes the no wmds lie.
4 - DEE
Nice writing... I agree, I see similarities to Germany during that time and the US currently... wait until the value of the currency drops further and we approach another similarity... I for one, when thinking of all the Americans dieing IN IRAQ for what? I can't figure out, I also have always thought about what we have done to the Iraqis and all of them who have died because of our actions... I remember Iraq did not attack us on September 11th... A death is a death whether its an American death or Iraqi death... It is terrible no matter what nation the person belongs to... I agree we are like the Germans not doing enough to stop the course we are on, but we have to realize that our political system needs to change in order to change our foreign policy decisions... unfortunately unless we are willing to sacrafice and force this change, it will not happen, the politicians stand to lose if that change happens and they will push back and fight that change with all their might, just like the German ruling class fought against changing the Monarchial system... at that time they banked on the liberals not fighting when it came down to it, and they were right, and I don't see enough of the American liberals willing to stand and fight either... get ready for destruction kiddies
5 - zingzing
there ARE thousands of people dying because of the actions we have taken.
before: iraq is no nice place to live, with an evil dictator and a keep-your-mouth-shut-or-we-kill-you kind of nastiness to it.
now: iraq is a complete warzone.
when we leave (and we will, come january 09,) it's going to be worse. those who have no way to leave will pay the price. sectarian genocide will occur. we've made the place worse. whatever intentions we had, the place is a mass grave just waiting to happen, and it is our fault. hussein wasn't good by any means, but at least he isn't religious warfare. so there.
i don't think adam is saying we are as bad as the nazi germans. i think he is saying we are just as self-deluding as the nazi germans. we (as individuals) don't think all that much about what our country does.
even as i am writing this, am i formulating some plan to help? no. i'm just sitting back, letting things unfold. there's no way for me to stop it, and that's the way it is. or so the nazi said. i.e.--me.
see? many people will die today because of what my govt does. what will i do? go to sleep. get up. go to work. go out. drink. come home. go to sleep. life goes on.
6 - Clavos
"when we leave (and we will, come january 09,)"
Don't be so sure of that, zingzing. In tonight's Democratic debate, not one of the major contenders, when asked a direct question by Tim Russert, would confirm that they would have all the troops back by the end of their first term, in 2013.
Not one.
7 - dee
Clovis obviously did not watch the debate... I will give you one.. Bill Richardson said he would, f*ck it, I will give you two, Dennis Kucinich said so also... go back and watch the tape... stop spreading lies
8 - Lumpy
Bush hinted very clearly recently that once the next president got briefed by the CIA all claims they would pull out would be over no matter what they said in the campaign and I find it very believable.
9 - Clavos
"Bill Richardson said he would, f*ck it, I will give you two, Dennis Kucinich said so also... go back and watch the tape... stop spreading lies"
You don't read very well, deedum.
I said: "...not one of the major contenders..."
Neither Richardson nor Kucinich is a major contender.
You can stop calling me a liar now.
10 - STM
I can't believe any American would even compare the US system to the Nazi state, or Americans to the Germans who simply allowed Hitler to happen. It's drawing a very long bow indeed. Actually, it's just bollocks.
You are not heading in that direction. Last time I looked, you still had rule of law.
Most Germans were happy about Hitler, too. Can't say most Americans are happy with Bush, can you?
Also, he's not likely to ban elections any time soon.
Get over it, and get real.
11 - Dave Nalle
Dang, was there ANOTHER democratic debate? I seem to have missed it. Where was it broadcast this time, on public access in New Mexico or something?
dave
12 - Clavos
MSNBC. From Dartmouth.
13 - troll
...another bitch fest
Adam - once again I agree with most all of the sentiment expressed in your work (excluding your claimed lack of empathy) but am left unsatisfied... where's the positive end of the critique - ?
is there really nothing to be done in the face of Mammon - ?
in any case your analogy does point to an often neglected bit of German history - here's Wiki's gateway to the subject of anti-nazi resistance at 'home'
14 - lumpy
don't worry. if hillary takes power we'll see a resistence movement arise here in the US.
15 - troll
red neck noise dude - with all due respect for my brother red necks
16 - moonraven
Clavos is now deciding who is a Major contender and who is a MINOR contender in a party that he doesn't belong to.
The fucking redneck nerve!
Adam,
Good piece. The connections with Nazi Germany have been made many times--especially since the Reichstag Fire--er, 9/11.
The Bush Gang and its apologists on this and other reactionary websites have taken as their motto the Goebbels Rule: Tell a lie a hundred times and it becomes true.
You made one grave error in your piece--well, two, but one is factual: 1.2 million Iraquis dead and counting.
The second one is that you have adopted the typical Ugly American commitment to not learning about other cultures. Spend some time in the Middle East like I do and you WILL begin to feel for those Iraquis. The brightest graduate students I had at NYIT Jordan were Iraquis--and their families had been destroyed.
17 - handyguy
Adam, the article is well written, but I have to agree with you that the Nazi comparison is odious...to the point where you should not have used it.
But it is a valid point that relatively few in the US shed any tears for the dead Vietnamese or the dead Iraqis. We have caused a truly wretched amount of useless destruction and suffering.
If a Dem president leaves troops in Iraq very far into 2009, they had better be moved out of direct combat - "redeployed" - or there will be some very ugly demonstrations reminiscent of the LBJ/Nixon era. And I'll be right there.
18 - moonraven
You damn well better be there!
I would be willing to bet that more than 90% of the folks posting here are obese--because they never get off their ass and do ANYTHING!
19 - Clavos
"If a Dem president leaves troops in Iraq very far into 2009"
ALL the Dem frontrunners in the debate at Dartmouth said they would leave troops there until at least 2013.
20 - The Obnoxious American
Echoing the comments of handyman and STM, you are way off base making such a comparison. Yes, tens, make that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died, and it is unfortunate, and in general American's don't think about this terrible fact.
But to compare that to the attempted genocide of non-aryans by Hitler is beyond the pale and you should be ashamed.
I'd advise you to visit the holocaust museum, and read up on the details of the concentration camps and the tactics employed. Take a gander at some of the piles of shoes and eyeglasses and then tell me if there is some relativism between the US and Nazi Germany.
For shame!
21 - Dan
Obnoxious, Don't buy in to that phony 100's of thousands dead bullshit.
Take Adams figure of "over half a million Iraqi's".
Do the math: 500,000/4.5 years = 111,111. 111,111/52 weeks = 2,137. 2,137/7 days a week = 305 per day.
Even when Alquida blows up 50 or 60 innocents with a car bomb, it's a big story that seems to happen maybe once every couple of weeks at most.
Liberals can't do simple math. I guess they think we can't either.
Of course if they're counting terrorists, then the figure does trend upward. We're doing well in that area. [Personal attack deleted by Comments Editor]
22 - alessandro
To people who read about history but fail to understand it, drawing analogies to the past to explain a contemporary issue is easy. It makes perfect sense.
Critical they are to the intellectual process, context and perspective are elusive.
Think of it this way. Ever been on a highway and hit black ice? That's how easy you can lose control of history.
23 - Baronius
Scratch a liberal, and you'll often find a racist underneath. This article doesn't make much of an effort to distinguish between Germans and Nazis, does it?
24 - JustOneMan
Based upon the left wing view of jewish lead neocons and israels control of congress maybe adam should have used this title for his post..
"The Israelification Of America Or: We Are All Good Jews Now"
JOM
25 - Baronius
JOM, does every article seem to be about Jews and Israel? What about cereal boxes? When you read the ingredients in breakfast cereal, does it make you think about the Jews?
Do Jew sometimes in the middle of Jew? Or sentences that are Jew for Jew suddenly?