2 posts on Kos in as many days, that's a record for me. I thought it was worth mentioning how Bush distorted the truth to make Iraq sound as noble as WW2. I don't know if it's Bush or his handlers that constantly state things falsely and rely on America's ignorance to cover their tracks.
The most recent example is Bush's speech in San Diego promoting the war in Iraq, being ignorant of how things actually happened in the past he compared the Iraq situation with the Japan/America conflict during WW2. Parallels abound but with the Bush's US in the place of 1941 Japan.
Bush repeatedly likened his vision of spreading democracy in the Middle East to Franklin D. Roosevelt's support for freedom in troubled areas across the globe.
"President Roosevelt believed that free nations are peaceful nations that would not threaten America," he said. "He knew that it was the lack of democracy in Japan that allowed an unelected group of militarists to take control of the state, threaten our neighbors, attack America and plunge an entire region into war.
"And he knew that the best way to bring peace and stability to the region was by bringing freedom to Japan."
We'll start with, "it was the lack of democracy in Japan that allowed an unelected group of militarists to take control of the state."
First Japan was a democracy from about 1918 onward (or as far back as the latter part of the 19th century if you count when the House of Representatives was formed). The form of government was very similar to Britain's Parliamentary system and the period was actually known as the Taisho Democracy. While it was a little dissimilar from our 3 branch, representative democracy it was still a democracy.
Then a group of militarists did take control of the state, but not in a military coup, it was really a bunch of soldiers controlling popular and government opinion to guide the country in a militant direction. The democratic government still existed but was expected to follow the guide of the military leaders as a "national consensus"; sound a little familiar? Let me add a hint that they then went on to invade nearby foreign countries in the name of expanding their strength and fighting wars overseas so they didn't end up on their home soil. One of their attacks was on a country (the US) that they had been allied as recently as 20 years before.
Sound familiar? How about you Mr. Rumsfeld? Do you rememeber meeting with people in the 80's you later decided to attack?
It's ironic how history repeats itself so much, and it's even more ironic that when it's repeated Bush can twist it so that it sounds like we're once again fighting a noble war when in reality we're more similar to the people who attacked us in the past.
Lt. Commander Joe Ring also made this idiotic remark.
"I thought it was very, very relevant, how he tied it together with the war in the Pacific," Ring said.
"It's the same threat," he said. "Fortunately, it's not as large, in a conventional sense, as it was in World War II. But for the citizens and for the innocent people, I think it's even worse now. The Japanese bombed our fleet, but the terrorists bombed our businessmen and women at work."
EXCEPT IRAQ AND THE TERRORISTS IN 9/11 ARE NOT THE SAME ENTITY!!! So no, it's not relevant. It's a lie, it's spinning history to make Bush's previous lies look like truth.
I can't believe how many people buy into this crap. Iraq was not the terorrists of 9/11, Saddam isn't Osama, Iraq didn't have any terrorists until after we invaded. We created our menace there, we made the bed and now we're dying in it. So it's in no way similar to the war against Japan.
That is unless you count the pre-emptive strike lacking any provocation and you switch the US with Japan at Pearl Harbor.