Thursday, October 07, 2004
(9:15 PM) | Anonymous:
Should We Lynch the French? Or, All Governments Are Failures.
I'm sure we've all heard the findings of the Duelfer Report and how evil the French are. Did you know they were willing to take oil for reduced prices if they could get the sanctions lifted?!?! How evil is that?!?! I've even read a Washington Post article that suggested part of these bribes was money given to the Socialist Party of France in 1988. This is just stupid because at that time America was still an ally of Iraq and was helping fund and supply their war with Iran (where we were helping Iran too) under President Reagan. Iraq was reaching out to all the major powers, a political move considered intelligent by most of those who hold to realist views of politics.While I disagree strongly with the idea that economics should come before ethics it would be a double standard to hold companies and officials of other countries accountable while giving our own free reign. Obviously it is sickening to think that people would work with brutal dictators but sovereign nations allow their leaders to do so, including our own. Countries are very complex things and we all know that aspects of America enthusiastically support human rights in the world and also support oppressive, brutal regimes.
Some of those who joined the so-called "Coalition of the Willing" are actually on the Iraqi bribed list. Turkish, British, Saudis, Italians, and Spanish; not to mention two Americans are all implicated. To suggest that the nations of these citizens resisted the lure of those bribes and joined up regardless while France feel victim to the allure of money is guess-work at best and complete stupidity at worst. To understand why the French government refused to support the war you have to understand that the political climate of France is different than America. If a French President and the National Assembly tried to take the nation to war though a vast majority of the population opposed it the country would be shut down. It was completely impossible for France, as a representative Democracy, to support the war because of the principles of the society, regardless of any corrupt aspects of government.
