Thursday, March 29, 2007
Hear ye, Hear ye, Wingnuts!
Yesterday, we learn that Pres. Bush's walk-in-the-park-to-liberate-Iraqis have resulted in 655,000 deaths. Now to put this horrendous figure in perspective, Firedoglake has a post and chart to illustrate what exactly this figure means.
For the folks mathematically challenged, the poop on the war against terrorism and freedom on the march in the Middle East means that "one out of every forty (sic) Iraqis who were alive at the beginning of this monstrosity" are now dead!
Not too worry, though. Bush had to rid the world of the tyrant and liberate Iraqis, right?!?
Hmmm....the Washington Post this morning reports about a recent meeting between the White House (and yes, that would be El Presidente) and a Russian general with a long history of butchering dissenters.
Bush welcomed Gen. Vladimir Shamanov (the same Russian general who directed "some of the most notorious atrocities against civilians during the brutal second war in Chechnya") to the White House and sat around smiling for pictures.
Of course, in the case of Shamanov, it's an entirely different matter. He was simply shutting down an rebellion that threatened a NATION.Russian troops under Shamanov rampaged through the village of Alkhan-Yurt in December 1999, killing 17 civilians, according to human rights investigations. The soldiers looted homes and shot those who got in the way, including a woman over 100 years old. Shamanov threatened to shoot villagers who pleaded with him to halt the "cleansing operation," investigators found. Rather than prosecute, the Kremlin gave Shamanov a medal -- a medal he appeared to wear to the Oval Office.
The European Court of Human Rights also has found Shamanov's troops responsible for the "massive use of indiscriminate weapons" that killed civilians in another village, and human rights investigators concluded that detainees at a base under his command were beaten, subjected to electric shocks and held in pits.
Well, Howling Latina supposes that Bushie got the idea of awarding his biggest toadies and henchmen the Presidential Medal of Freedom-- right out of the Kremlin propaganda manual--just like a lot of the White House great ideas about democracy in the homeland.
