I was going to write a blog entry about feeling awful today (I still have the cold), but events in the news have given me an excuse to write an opinionated blog entry for the first time in ages.
I was quietly watching the news last night when it was announced that a team of researchers in Iraq have made the first serious attempt at calculating the death toll following the invasion and toppling of Saddam Hussain. After interviewing thousands of families, and tracing thousands of death certificates and other official records, the team of hundreds of researchers put the figure at about half a million people. The “official” estimate is 650,000 - with the vast majority killed by gunfire. It could be as low as 400,000 - it could be as high as 900,000.
This estimate took a lot of effort, risk, time, and resources to work out. It’s based on the methods that have always been used to estimate casualties on a similar scale. The teams of researchers worked in most of the major cities of Iraq.
As soon as George Bush got hold of the figures, he publically discredited them.
I was so angry. I couldn’t believe it - a politician, who has not read the report, or talked to anybody who might re-inforce the validity of it, goes straight to the television cameras and attempts to discredit it - and you know why? Because it’s “inconvenient”.
In the American military’s perfect little world they would have imposed their version of democracy on Iraq and been cheered by the world. In reality they have forced democracy onto a country which cannot support it, and caused a civil war. HALF A MILLION PEOPLE HAVE BEEN KILLED.
Can you believe the US politicians are claiming only 30,000 people have been killed? The next question is if middle america believes what they are being told by their own politicians, or if they believe hundreds of academics and sociologists who spent months risking their lives in Iraq to compile the data… I know who I believe.