friedman (WAS: internet & social control)

[Kevin Troy]

>From: Malignd <malignd at yahoo.com>
>Subject: Re: Internet & social control
>
<<... (first among US journalists to suggest
tht lying to the US public about WMDs in Iraq was
excusable, for example)>>
>
>He wrote that "lying to the US public about WMDs in
>Iraq was excusable"?
>
>Is that a quote?  Might you cite it?


I think Doug was referring to the column that is abstracted below.  If
anyone wants more than the first two paragraphs, the full text is
available from the Times archive for a small fee.

MalignD, if you disagree with Doug's interpretation, I'm sure he'd be
happy to take it up with you off-list.

Cheers,
Kevin T.


Editorial Desk | April 27, 2003, Sunday
The Meaning Of a Skull

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN (NYT) 886 words
Late Edition - Final , Section 4 , Page 13 , Column 1
LEAD PARAGRAPH - Friday's Times carried a front-page picture of a skull,
with a group of Iraqis gathered around it. The skull was of a political
prisoner from Saddam Hussein's regime, and the grieving Iraqis were
relatives who had exhumed it from a graveyard filled with other victims of
Saddam's torture. Just under the picture was an article about President
Bush vowing that weapons of mass destruction will be found in Iraq, as he
promised.

As far as I'm concerned, we do not need to find any weapons of mass
destruction to justify this war. That skull, and the thousands more that
will be unearthed, are enough for me. Mr. Bush doesn't owe the world any
explanation for missing chemical weapons (even if it turns out that the
White House hyped this issue). It is clear that in ending Saddam's
tyranny, a huge human engine for mass destruction has been broken. The
thing about Saddam's reign is that when you look at that skull, you don't
even know what period it came from -- his suppression of the Kurds or the
Shiites, his insane wars with Iran and Kuwait, or just his daily
brutality.