Iraq

From today New York Times:

In the real Iraq, armed Shiite and Kurdish parties have divided up the eastern two-thirds of the country, leaving Sunni insurgents and American marines to fight over the rest. Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki and his “national unity cabinet” stretch out their arms to like-thinking allies like Iran and Hezbollah, but barely lift a finger to rein in the sectarian militias and death squads spreading terror across Baghdad and the Shiite south.

The civilian death toll is now running at roughly 100 a day, with many of the victims gruesomely tortured with power tools or acid. Over the summer, more Iraqi civilians died violent deaths each month than the number of Americans lost to terrorism on Sept. 11. Meanwhile, the electricity remains off, oil production depressed, unemployment pervasive and basic services hard to find.

Iraq is today a broken, war-torn country. Outside the relatively stable Kurdish northeast, virtually every family — Sunni or Shiite, rich or poor, powerful or powerless — must cope with fear and physical insecurity on an almost daily basis. The courts, when they function at all, are subject to political interference; street-corner justice is filling the vacuum. Religious courts are asserting their power over family life. Women’s rights are in retreat.

I know there are a lot of deluded people out there who think Dubya & his regime are doing a bang up job of bringing democracy to the Middle East. Little somethings like facts aren't going to get in their way of their worship of their hero. This never was about bringing democracy to the poor huddled masses (hint: you can't force a democracy at gunpoint on anybody, it's kinda counter to what democracy is all about). It's always been about oil. For that oil, the United States of America has willingly abrogated its own Constitution and its place as the moral leader of the world. A person like me has no representation whatsoever, despite those fancy words put to parchment by brave men a long time ago. In their stead have come other men (& Condi), who are neither brave nor honorable but who are instead venal and morally repugnant: people who, if there were any justice in this world, would be sitting in dock at the Hague. The destruction of an entire sovereign nation, the forced and dangerous instability of an entire region, the death of God knows how many people, most of them innocent of anything except being in the wrong place at the wrong time. All for the oil. And now we're getting ready to place the cherry on top of this noxious dessert & make torture legal.

All for the oil.

Is it really worth it?