Any Man’s Death?
Josh Marshall tells it like it is.
Convention dictates that we precede any discussion of this execution with the obligatory nod to Saddam’s treachery, bloodthirsty rule and tyranny. But enough of the cowardly chatter. This thing is a sham, of a piece with the whole corrupt, disastrous sham that the war and occupation have been. Bush administration officials are the ones who leak the news about the time of the execution. One key reason we know Saddam’s about to be executed is that he’s about to be transferred from US to Iraqi custody, which tells you a lot. And, of course, the verdict in his trial gets timed to coincide with the US elections.
This whole endeavor, from the very start, has been about taking tawdry, cheap acts and dressing them up in a papier-mache grandeur — phony victory celebrations, ersatz democratization, reconstruction headed up by toadies, con artists and grifters . . .
The Iraq War has been many things, but for its prime promoters and cheerleaders and now-dwindling body of defenders, the war and all its ideological and literary trappings have always been an exercise in moral-historical dress-up for a crew of folks whose times aren’t grand enough to live up to their own self-regard and whose imaginations are great enough to make up the difference. This is just more play-acting.These jokers are being dragged kicking and screaming to the realization that the whole thing’s a mess and that they’re going to be remembered for it — defined by it — for decades and centuries. But before we go, we can hang Saddam. Quite a bit of this was about the president’s issues with his dad and the hang-ups he had about finishing Saddam off — so before we go, we can hang the guy as some big cosmic ‘So There!’
Marx might say that this was not tragedy but farce. But I think we need to get way beyond options one and two even to get close to this one — claptrap justice meted out to the former dictator in some puffed-up act of self-justification as the country itself collapses in the hands of the occupying army.
That’s true enough. And it’s also true that the US and its Iraqi allies chose to try Saddam on one of his relatively minor crimes because if they did so they could get him safely hung before they had to try him for the major ones, the gas attacks and massacres that happened during The Years of Playing Footsie with the United States. The Dujail reprisals were a war crime, no doubt about it, a bigger sham of justice than Saddam’s own trial, by two orders of magnitude. They were also the sort of war crime that people like Ralph Peters and a hundred other pundits and parapundits think the United States should be committing. Every time you read a complaint about “politically correct rules of engagement” you are reading someone who would applaud a Dujail-level slaughter if only we were to perpetrate it. Those are the people who are happiest of all about tonight’s execution. Smells like – victory! It’s the pomander they don against the stench.
Trackback by Making Light —
December 30, 2006 @ 12:10 am
Jim Henley speaks into the night…
Here: [T]he US and its Iraqi allies chose to try Saddam on one of his relatively minor crimes because if……
Comment by Alex from Inactivist —
December 30, 2006 @ 12:47 am
Every time you read a complaint about “politically correct rules of engagement†you are reading someone who would applaud a Dujail-level slaughter if only we were to perpetrate it.
Exactly.
Comment by Jon H —
December 30, 2006 @ 1:17 am
I’d have to say I have a bad feeling that there’ll be a new joke going around Shiite circles:
Q: What do you call the executions of Saddam and his brother?
A: A good start.
And this will turn into action, in the form of a more energetic pogrom against the Sunnis.
Comment by Jon H —
December 30, 2006 @ 1:24 am
Especially if there were an assassination attempt on the President or VP in a predominantly Arab or Muslim area in the US (maybe in Michigan? is there an Irantown in Los Angeles?).
You just know the John Gibsons would be calling for city blocks to be gassed and napalmed.
Comment by Lisa Hirsch —
December 30, 2006 @ 1:24 am
Superb. Thank you.
Comment by Jon H —
December 30, 2006 @ 1:31 am
I’m still surprised that Saddam’s defense didn’t try using the Addington/Yoo arguments of unlimited executive power. Surely Yoo would think Bush could legally order a Dujail-like slaughter of citizens.
At the very least, they should have made a public attempt to hire Yoo, based on the suitability of Yoo’s past work in justifying the unjustifiable.
I’ll quit monopolizing your comments now.
Anyone wanna carpool from Cambridge, MA to the jan 27th March? My car has 83,000 miles on it and some cosmetic damage, so I can supply the wheelses.
Comment by Kevin Hayden —
December 30, 2006 @ 2:13 am
And when it was protested that they couldn’t do it on Saturday, the beginning of the Sunni Eid, the Shia judge dismissed that, saying that the official Eid was Sunday. Which it is… for the Shias.
That was a direct insult to Sunnis, unnecessary since Saddam was a secularist who only happened to be born Sunni.
Now we return you to our regularly scheduled genocide on the OIL Network…
Comment by Jesurgislac —
December 30, 2006 @ 6:18 am
I was trying to say something like that on my journal, but you say it better: I’m linking to this.
Trackback by Outside The Beltway | OTB —
December 30, 2006 @ 8:01 am
Saddam Hussein Executed in Baghdad (Video)…
Saddam Hussein is dead.
Some Arab media, including state-run Iraqiya television, Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya and the U.S.-financed Al-Hurra, reported about an hour before daylight Saturday (about 10 p.m. EST Friday) that Saddam had been executed. There was …
Comment by Wild Pegasus —
December 30, 2006 @ 10:49 am
Actually, there is a Little Persia in Los Angeles.
- Josh
Comment by Bumbler —
December 30, 2006 @ 10:52 am
Your a joke.
Comment by Hesiod —
December 30, 2006 @ 11:21 am
Your a joke
At least get it grammatically correct, doofus.
Comment by ran —
December 30, 2006 @ 11:23 am
This war itself is one massive war crime, which in a just world would see the war criminals who lied us into it – I’m looking at you Bush,Cheney,Rumsfeld,Rice, Powell,Feith, Wolfowitz – right there in the gallows with Saddam.
Comment by Mr.Obscura —
December 30, 2006 @ 11:42 am
I will weep no tears for Saddam. But he got frontier justice, as Rooster Cogburn said, “a fair trial and a fine hanging”. This wasn’t Nuremburg. It was a kangaroo court, and I’m ashamed of our country for participating in it.
Comment by Timw —
December 30, 2006 @ 11:46 am
“one of his relatively minor crimes”
I love this one; only on the left, could one justify mass murder as a relatively minor crime.
Oh, and I love Marshall’s obligatory reference to Marx. That was rich.
Let’s see, I think one of his star pupils was a guy named Stalin. I think he and Hussein were birds of a feather.
Comment by Patriot —
December 30, 2006 @ 12:02 pm
Timw,
Die painfully in a fire you monster.
Comment by Jim Henley —
December 30, 2006 @ 12:08 pm
Whoah, Patriot! That’s a little much, don’t you think?
Comment by Jonathan Goff —
December 30, 2006 @ 12:32 pm
Patriot,
Yeah, that response was a bit over the top. I would’ve merely pointed out that numeracy doesn’t appear to be one of Timw’s strong points. I mean, in all the math classes I’ve sat through 180,000 is much greater than 180, which would by definition seem to imply that a mass murder of 180 was a lesser crime than a mass murder of 180,000.
But what would I know. I’m just an engineer.
~Jon
Comment by Jennifer —
December 30, 2006 @ 1:16 pm
I love this one; only on the left, could one justify mass murder as a relatively minor crime.
And presumably, only on the far-right could one overlook the meaning of the word “relatively” and imply that the statement means something completely different than it did.
Tim, are you ever bothered by the knowledge that you cannot defend your position honestly, but only by deliberately misrepresenting what your opponents say?
Comment by Michigan J. Frog —
December 30, 2006 @ 1:53 pm
Congratulations, Jim. Apparently you are now an insane American leftist, mourning Saddam’s death!
Linky: Here there be wingnuts
Comment by Jim Henley —
December 30, 2006 @ 2:06 pm
Mich: I saw that! Post coming, though it will boil down to, “You, Sir, have confused ‘America’ with yourself.”
Jennifer: I suspect timw’s answer would, at bottom, be “No. It doesn’t bother me.” The thing to understand about the jingos, particularly the ones who are still left, the hardcore, is that they see themselves as soldiers in a propaganda war. Since they really believe Green Lantern Theory, they really believe that Will is all, and therefore that maximizing “will” overrides all other values. It becomes an affirmative duty to believe official lies and deprecate critics of present policy by whatever rhetorical means. Cheering state agents and jeering state critics is, to them, “fighting the war on terror.” Finicky concerns like what an opponent actually says and means by it are peripheral concerns to them. They view it as their patriotic duty not to get wrapped up in such niceties.
Trackback by The Heretik —
December 30, 2006 @ 2:47 pm
The Personal…
The personal is political, more for George Bush than most. We won’t know how George Bush personally feels about Saddam Hussein’s demise for now. The man who took Saddam’s pistols as trophies will take no personal shots in public. …
Comment by traderrob —
December 30, 2006 @ 3:56 pm
Marshall’s comments are most definately the most monumnental load of steaming crap I have read in a very long time.
Comment by Barry —
December 30, 2006 @ 4:11 pm
Then I congratulate you, sir, on your luck in avoiding any and all statements by either the administration, or that crew known collectively as the ‘warbloggers’. Would that I had that luck.
Comment by Allahu Akbar —
December 30, 2006 @ 4:38 pm
The execution of Saddam is just another example of the evil empire trying to make a peaceful Islamic people subservient to your greedy government and multi-national conglomerates.
The American people will feel the wrath of the righteous.
Comment by Jim Henley —
December 30, 2006 @ 4:43 pm
Ah, trolls. Way to go, Jimmy, aka “Allahu.” Your e-mail shows underneath, you know.
Comment by Daniel DiRito —
December 30, 2006 @ 5:04 pm
To view a cynical and satirical visual of George Bush playing a round of “Hangman”…link here:
http://www.thoughttheater.com
Comment by Nat Echols —
December 30, 2006 @ 5:22 pm
I’m still surprised that Saddam’s defense didn’t try using the Addington/Yoo arguments of unlimited executive power. Surely Yoo would think Bush could legally order a Dujail-like slaughter of citizens.
I’m pretty sure Ramsey Clark tried something very much like this. Clark, however, has been totally batshit insane for years now.
Comment by Barry —
December 30, 2006 @ 6:32 pm
Despite the best efforts of the Bush administration to make him look like a rational judge of reality, of course.
I fear that Yoo will be one of those names which will haunt the USA for decades. The Nixon White House produced spectres good for 35 years of evil; the Bush White House will sink to that challenge, I’m sure.
Comment by diana —
December 30, 2006 @ 6:38 pm
Jim, never mind the bollocks-producers, here’s a question: what’s the biggest lesson you learned from this war? For myself, it’s: you can never be too cynical with respect to those* in power. Never, ever ever.
(Before this I would have said, “men in power.”)
Comment by Jennifer —
December 30, 2006 @ 7:31 pm
I suspect timw’s answer would, at bottom, be “No. It doesn’t bother me.â€
Jim, I’m not saying I disagree with you. I’m just saying that attitude is completely insane.
I’m sure there are issues on which we have different opinions. And the reason my opinion differs from yours is that (obviously) I feel that I am right and you are wrong. Since you are wrong, I don’t need to misquote you or take your words out of context to prove that I am right; the inherent wrongness of your words should do that for me.
The only reason I’d have to take you out of context is if I suspect that maybe, you might be right. Which would make me wrong for disagreeing with you. So why the hell would I continue to defend a position I feel or suspect is wrong?
There are many possible answers to that, but all imply I’m either dishonest or insane. Or both.
Comment by Walt —
December 30, 2006 @ 8:27 pm
Let me guess: Just a couple of weeks ago Timw was eager to defend Pinochet for killing less people than Castro.
Comment by buck smith —
December 30, 2006 @ 10:30 pm
The Iraqis did a better job trying Saddam than the internationals did in trying Milosevitch.
But the reactions of Iraqis to the hanging of Saddam – bitterness by Arab Sunnis, elation by Shias and Kurds, the Eid holiday connection tying it all back to ancient religious grievances, shows that Iraq needs to separate into three countries. The problems in the Middle East have nothing to do with the US and Bush and everything to do with Middle Easterners’ literal belief in ancient religious texts full of murderous gibberish.
Comment by Barry —
December 31, 2006 @ 12:15 am
buck smith, read Juan Cole’s blog (’Informed Consent’). He’s somebody who actually knows something about the Middle East. In short, the splitting of Iraq would involve the ‘ethnic cleansing’ of millions of people. And that’s above and beyond the factor that many families are mixed Sunni/Shia.
Comment by Bruce Baugh —
December 31, 2006 @ 12:21 am
Jennifer, it’s not so much insane as it is (I think) amoral. What the Bush-Cheney administration and their followers have done is give up on being moral entities – they have only appetites. I keep thinking of a marvelous line in Alan Moore and John Totleben’s comic book Miracleman, as the narrator reflects on the condition of people with super-powers before stumbling into the trans-human universe: “We had no creed save ballistics.” That’s them, trying to live as though nothing in the mental room actually matters as long as they get what they want.
Now if you want to call that insane, I’m not going to argue a whole lot. I mean, I think that the potential for morality is a crucial part of being human, and this might add up to a difference that is no difference, really. I wouldn’t want to take it further than “so far the distinction seems meaningful to me”.
Comment by Watergate —
December 31, 2006 @ 2:17 am
Can’t we just all agree that Saddam was a horrible person that deserved to be executed? Does it matter how it happened or who did it or how Bush was or wasn’t involved? Can’t we just be quietly satisfied that a murderer and torturer of hundreds of thousands of people has finally received justice?
Comment by Avram —
December 31, 2006 @ 2:21 am
Buck, plenty of Americans (about one in four) have “literal belief in ancient religious texts full of murderous gibberish”. Yet they mostly manage to behave themselves.
The US and various European powers have been undermining democracy in the middle eat for well over a century. It’s not just religion, it’s also oil, and us wanting pliable puppet states instead of democracies that might want what’s best for their own citizens instead of our oil companies.
Comment by Watergate —
December 31, 2006 @ 2:28 am
Utter crap from Avram. Islam is squarely against democracy. No evidence of “oil” undermining democracy. Look at the Palestinians. No oil, and they just kill each other in an orgy of Jew-hatred. No one makes them do that but themselves.
Comment by Jesurgislac —
December 31, 2006 @ 5:12 am
Watergate: Can’t we just be quietly satisfied that a murderer and torturer of hundreds of thousands of people has finally received justice?
But he hasn’t. He has received justice as the man who ordered the reprisal killings and torture of several hundred people. He has not received justice – and, to the point, the Iraqi people have not received justice – for the murder of hundreds of thousands of people, nor for the torture he has committed. His rapid execution for a lesser crime means he escapes justice for the greater crimes.
Comment by ran —
December 31, 2006 @ 9:24 am
Just look at Israel. No oil, but yet they run an illegal, immoral and murderous occupation of Palestinian territories while systematically stealing their land and resources in an orgy of of greed and Arab-hatred. No one makes them do that but themselves.
Comment by Barry —
December 31, 2006 @ 9:32 am
Thanks, ran. You saved me a couple of minutes replying to Mr. scandal, there.
Comment by Leonard —
December 31, 2006 @ 9:46 am
Bullshit. Go look at a list of the largest oil exporters in the world. I’ll save you trouble: wikipedia!
Notice anything in particular about that list?
Comment by Neel Krishnaswami —
December 31, 2006 @ 12:01 pm
Kevin, re #7: Saddam was only a secularist until the first Gulf War, after which he latched onto Islamism as a convenient way of shoring up his hold on power. Dictators have no creed they truly believe in but the maintenance of their power.
Watergate, re #36:
Can’t we just all agree that Saddam was a horrible person that deserved to be executed?
Yes.
Does it matter how it happened or who did it or how Bush was or wasn’t involved?
Yes.
Can’t we just be quietly satisfied that a murderer and torturer of hundreds of thousands of people has finally received justice?
No. The dictator may fully deserve nothing more than a bullet in the head and the bill for the cartridge, too, but the people of his country deserve better. Part of the reason that dictators are terrible people is because they exercise authority in arbitrary ways, and whoever gets rid of one has a moral obligation to start pushing the country towards a government of law. If you kill the dictator after a show trial, then you have thrown away a chance to demonstrate, in the most public possible way, that the rules are different now — and you don’t get many chances to change the norms like that. That’s why so many people are disgusted with the botched job the Bush administration has inflicted upon the Iraqi people with this trial.
Comment by Rob —
December 31, 2006 @ 12:59 pm
Yes I’m sure Saddam’s death will change a whole lot of things. The next dictator will think twice now that he knows that after 30 years of absolute power that as a man in his 70s after living the life of luxury and having every desire satiated that he could possibly be killed a few years before his life naturally ends.
Comment by Mona —
December 31, 2006 @ 1:15 pm
Well Jim, I’d congratulate you for an outstanding post, but I just learned that you are an America-hating lefty. That has been said of me as well after I came to be deeply alarmed by George W. Bush and the 109th GOP-controlled Congress.
Therefore, I must not commend your post, as doing so would reinforce notions that I hate my country and am a Marxist.
I will, however, risk the opprobrium by noting that this comment:
was also outstanding.
Trackback by Where Worlds Collide —
December 31, 2006 @ 2:46 pm
That Hanging…
So Saddam is dead. I don’t agree with the death penalty, regardless of how horrible his crimes might have been…….
Comment by Sam Haldi —
December 31, 2006 @ 8:58 pm
My goodness; the left in this country certainly is composed of hysterical and useless idiots. Congratulations! What a bunch of losers you, apparently, all are!
Best regards,
Sam Haldi
Atlanta, GA
Comment by Jim Henley —
December 31, 2006 @ 9:01 pm
Sam, rest assured that the 87% of the country that doesn’t think like you is properly abashed at your rebuke.
Comment by diana —
December 31, 2006 @ 11:16 pm
One more thought: I think his death *is* a turning point, but not one in our favor. Earthquakes create tsunamis. We should not be surprised if his final words, “Down with the traitors, the Americans, the spies and the Persians” are not taken very seriously by more than a few insurgents. Meanwhile, I’m sure that the Powers That Be are watching Mogadishu & drawing all the wrong lessons.
Happy New Year.
Comment by David Saia —
January 1, 2007 @ 1:57 am
“parapundits”? If a pundit is “a learned person,” and “para” means “near, abnormal, or resembling,” then those who are “parapundits” would be… nearly-learned, abnormally learned, or resembling someone who is learned.
…have I got that right?
Comment by David Saia —
January 1, 2007 @ 1:58 am
I think I look a lot like Bob Saget, so… that would make me a…
Parabob
Happy Ought-Seven!
Comment by Avram —
January 1, 2007 @ 4:43 am
Watergate, I didn’t say that oil undermined democracy, I said that we undermined it.
Comment by Jim Henley —
January 1, 2007 @ 10:24 am
David, dude, how delightful that you visit. If a pundit really were a learned person, yeah, you’d have it right.
Trackback by Radio Left —
June 13, 2007 @ 1:00 pm
Robert Farley (Tapped): More Rubble, Less Trouble…
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