Friday, August 20, 2004
Bring Me The Head Of Saddam!
A bust of Saddam Hussein is on display at the Kentucky State Fair.
How tacky is this? It's as bad as President Bush keeping the gun Saddam was holding when he was captured. Too bad Saddam isn't dead, we could have displayed his corpse like we did with Uday and Qusay. Hell, we could have put him in a glass case with dry ice and paraded him around the country for all to see. Let everybody see how tough we are.
Now maybe some kindly reader will correct me, but I don't recall reading about the Hitler bust tour after WWII. And I don't recall reading about the Robert E. Lee or Jefferson Davis bust tour after the Civil War. To me, this all seems rather childish. Kind of a spoils of war dick measuring if you will. George wants to show everyone how tough he is and how great a military leader he is. Truth be told, most armies could have overthrown Saddam's undermanned, underfunded, underequipped troops. I'd be more impressed if we could put something on tour that showed evidence of a stable, peaceful Iraq; maybe something that didn't represent 950 dead Americans.
Imagine if after 9/11 al Qaeda were to have attacked the Lincoln Memorial and then put the bust of Abraham Lincoln on display for all radical Muslims to fawn over. We would have launched a nuclear strike on the entire region within the hour. There's no way we would have stood for this. This is how the insurgents and anti-American forces in Iraq are feeling right now.
If we're trying to encourage the opposition, I think we're doing a damn fine job of it. So much for trying to bring peace to the Middle East.
- The head from a damaged statue of Saddam Hussein is on display at the Kentucky State Fair, piquing the curiosity of many tourists but angering some who say it's in poor taste.
The bust, about a foot and a half high, is from a statue that was damaged last year by U.S. forces. It's not from the statue that was toppled by jubilant Iraqis in one of the defining images of the war.
Kelly Barron, a tourism director, said the "quiet, simple display" has attracted many people eager to snap pictures of the deposed Iraqi dictator. Alongside the glass-encased bust is a small Iraqi flag and description of how soldiers captured the statue. The display also includes photographs of the intact statue and tank fire striking it.
How tacky is this? It's as bad as President Bush keeping the gun Saddam was holding when he was captured. Too bad Saddam isn't dead, we could have displayed his corpse like we did with Uday and Qusay. Hell, we could have put him in a glass case with dry ice and paraded him around the country for all to see. Let everybody see how tough we are.
Now maybe some kindly reader will correct me, but I don't recall reading about the Hitler bust tour after WWII. And I don't recall reading about the Robert E. Lee or Jefferson Davis bust tour after the Civil War. To me, this all seems rather childish. Kind of a spoils of war dick measuring if you will. George wants to show everyone how tough he is and how great a military leader he is. Truth be told, most armies could have overthrown Saddam's undermanned, underfunded, underequipped troops. I'd be more impressed if we could put something on tour that showed evidence of a stable, peaceful Iraq; maybe something that didn't represent 950 dead Americans.
Imagine if after 9/11 al Qaeda were to have attacked the Lincoln Memorial and then put the bust of Abraham Lincoln on display for all radical Muslims to fawn over. We would have launched a nuclear strike on the entire region within the hour. There's no way we would have stood for this. This is how the insurgents and anti-American forces in Iraq are feeling right now.
If we're trying to encourage the opposition, I think we're doing a damn fine job of it. So much for trying to bring peace to the Middle East.
