Maybe if we could run a script to search Nexis for bloody and violent events NOT mentioned in the NYT for the last five years we could accurately predict the location of our future trauma in, say, 10 years. And then like any good prediction machine, we'd use it to change the future by getting those places *into* the NYT, thereby breaking the curse.

Disobeys orders? His invasion of Kuwait was hardly disobeying orders, since the US ambassador gave him, at least arguably, a green light a few days earlier. I guess he disobeyed orders by staying in Kuwait once Bush 41 decided he was worse than Hitler, and by not dismantling all of his WMD programs immediately (what was it, a year or two?). I guess he denied W's orders to bring his non-existent WMD's for show and tell in a parking lot, and he refused to leave the country on 72 hours notice. I also suspect he didn't do everything Reagan asked back in the 80's.

But I don't think the '91 war, the sanctions, the bombings, the inspections, the current war, or his being on trial had much to do with him disobeying orders. He was convenient to our "leaders" as an ally for a while, after which he became more useful as an enemy.

I wonder if Bushareff is taking notes.

A perfect example of the REVERSE MEMORYHOLE except the fact we were paying Saddam to do our dirty work over there. Sometimes it's not cheaper to do it yourself. Let's through MORE MONEY at the situation, maybe it'll all go away. For sure the money will.

paging 'victor' davis hanson.

HAHAHAAHAHAHHAHA kneel before my brain-numbing jokes pewny hoomanz!

This is a great blog. First-time reader. Please excuse me for not having a response to the subject piece that is as funny and clever as comment #1 is. Maybe next time.
The comments are great. Wow. Just when I thought that I might have to go back to reading cable-tv crawls. I'll be coming back. And I don't understand how there ever was a time when permission had to be obtained to change the price of a burger. Is there still a Price Commission? Does it control gasoline?

This isnt a new pattern. Other examples are as numberous as they are similar. In the end, being a stable buisness friendly state is more important to privalaged elites than actually respecting human rights or chemical weapons bans, and the media has what seems to be an on/off switch in these instances.

If any foriegn leaders happen to be reading this blog, take that to heart.

Fantastic excerpt from Yergin/Stanislaw's book: I'm ashamed that I didn't remember Nixon's wage-and-price control experiment. I was right in the thick of it, running out of money to pay tuition at Cal.... Wouldn't cross the picket line at Ray Kroc's franchise for a job, and couldn't even afford to eat one of those pricey burgers. The experiment was over in Berkeley, anyway, so we left Berkeley for more affordable communal living in the high desert above Palm Springs until we could save enough money, picking tomatoes at $1.25/hr, to go to the cheaper state university in San Luis Obispo. We didn't have access to television or radio, or computers, of course, so I missed out on both Bonanza and the Bonanza preemption. I need to read more history and less blogs!

Okay, I’m a Canadian. So none of you have to listen to any of this. Not being an American, I’m not likely to believe that my opinion matters.

(Insert additional facetious comments here)

Saddam Hussein was certainly a soldier in the employ of the United States military establishment. And as I understand it, soldiers who disobey orders are given a court martial and shot. The fact that it took an adventure to find the guy and bring him to trial in order to shoot him is incidental.

What exactly is the problem? Is it that you, America, hired a murderer and then later you’re put in the inconvenient position of having to execute him? Is it that you would like to stop hiring foreign murderers to do your dirty work? Is it that the foreign murderers should just stay on their leashes and not put you into these difficult positions? I’m sorry, I’m baffled.

It is American policy to hire, use, then discard foreign bastards…it has been for something like 160 years, since America’s first clumsy efforts in Mexico. Need I remind you of the Philippines, or Cuba, or the banana states, or Cambodia, etc., etc., etc. Please stop acting like these events with Hussein are SO amazingly profound and unexpected.

The reverse memory hole is so complete that it is conveniently forgotten that every administration since Pierce has had its collection of Noriegas, Husseins and Diems. What, the system isn’t working for you? Getting a little squeamish in your old age?

Considering the history of your country, exactly what moral high ground are you standing on?

alexis S, there are not a lot of people in spaces like this claiming any moral high ground. in fact, kawika and the proprieter of this here establishment have both mentioned in this thread that it's a 230-year pattern of making the world safe for business interests. while other first-world beneficiaries (such as canada) of these policies have a little more high ground than we americans do, it's not much of a high ground unless you're really into relativism. the system is working for canada, isn't it? or have your government and people refused to partake in the spoils of slaughter?

Hey Joe,

Don't forget to mention how you won the war for us.

I don't pretend to any high ground. I am sickened. I love Jon because he says the sooth. Not of lot of it out there.

And yes, sometimes I comment from the hip before I read all the comments.

Man, Americans are assholes.

Good job with Stephen Harper, by the way.

Compatriots! Please, settle down. In my capacity as sooth-teller, I hereby stipulate that (1) some proportion of Americans are power mad assholes, yet (2) this proportion is no higher than it would be in any other group of humans who found themselves in similar circumstances.

I realize #2 is not much consolation to those at the wrong end of the fist, however.

In any case, Alexis' question -- Considering the history of your country, exactly what moral high ground are you standing on? -- is the right one. The problem is not that America is worse than every other country. We're not. The problem is our ignorance and preening self-delusion that we're better than everyone else. A little moderation and self-knowledge would be extremely helpful.

We can look for these qualities being adopted by America just as soon as China cuts our line of credit.

What Jon says is good. He wants to cut off a futile dispute. But I'm still going to travel with a Canadian flag on my backpack and act like a self-satisfied jerk wherever I go. I'm sorry about that. I can't help it. I got started doing that back in the eighties and it's been a damn fine wheeze ever since. Opprobrium and the opportunity for a broken nose should be shared selflessly, even if it afflicts some people who don't deserve it.

My nose bleeds easily, please don't break it. Opproprium, on the other hand, I can handle. Usually.

Jonathan, if you hadn't been so cheap when they were selling vowels this blog could have been about bubblebaths and chocolate and hot stone massages. Instead you had to get in on the Ides of March action.