HISTORY LESSON….Reader Jeff S. points out an interesting excerpt from George Bush’s recent speech at the UNITY conference:
One of the biggest fears many Iraqi citizens have is that we’re not a country of our word. People don’t want to take risks. They understand that at this point in time, if a vacuum were created, anarchy would reign and there would be mayhem and bloodshed. And they’re fearful that the United States will once again say something and not mean it.
I say “once again” because you might remember, at different times during Iraqi history, they believed they heard something, in terms of U.S. support, and it didn’t happen, and then there was, you know, a lot of death as a result of unfulfilled expectations.
Bush is referring, of course, to his father’s call for Iraqis to rebel against Saddam Hussein during the first Gulf War. But when they did, he declined to support them and they were brutally crushed by Saddam’s forces. The death toll among those who heeded Bush Sr.’s call was about 100,000.
For some reason, the famously plain spoken Bush Jr. was a little vague on these details. But I guess we can at least be thankful that he didn’t directly try to blame it on Clinton.
