11/01/2006: "Gordy Is Right ...Sort of?"

Gordy is right, up to a point. It is distressing that "tabloid" politics is the norm. But he is wrong to say that we have to renounce that attitude and support our current leader in whatever he does, or risk the downfall of civilization as we know it. (The column the letter is addressing)

The current leadership has done everything possible to increase the threat of terrorism, not defeat it. There's much flapping of lips and moaning and groaning in the blog-sphere right now (and obviously Gordy has read it all) saying the same thing…..We must stay in Iraq to fend off Islamic Jihad/Muslim Fundamentalism (thee must be an election coming!). The only problem with that excuse is that there was no Islamic Fundamentalism in Iraq under Saddam. Its existence was a threat to his stranglehold on power, and he did not tolerate it. Yes, he hated the Kurds and the Shiites, but he also understood the threat religious fundamentalism poses.

No….to carry on with the current ill-conceived, un-thought out, non-plan is the worst possible course of action.

Now that "Stay the Course" has been abandoned, the proper course of action, or attitude, towards Iraq should be the one Colin Powell voiced long ago…."You break it, you fix it" (or words to that effect). Our only goal in Iraq should be to put the country back together so that what was once was a hotbed of Muslim moderation and liberalism (YES YES, Saddam was a hedonistic mass-murdering dictator, but he was, to his core, opposed to Islamic Jihad and the Muslim fundamentalists) can get on its feet again. If you're the Leader of the Free World, and you want to build a fence, build it around Iraq. Keep the outside fundamentalists out, and the home grown ones in, so you can wipe them out. Then you can start, maybe, to deal with the real problem in Iraq…religious intolerance between the Sunnis and the Shiites.

But, is that a job for the Leader of the Free World? I don't think so. Religious intolerance is ubiquitous throughout the world. Our job should be to root out and destroy Islamic Fundamentalism, nothing more. There was not a drop of it in Iraq before we moved in. Saddam made sure of that.

Now that I think about it, the fence as a metaphor for a military plan of action is a good one. I will support whichever Leader of the Free World, present or future, decides to alter our course in that direction.

Bob Querry
San Juan Island