Shoe Throwing a Metaphor for Iraqi Anger and Frustration
Bush behind a lectern dodging a shoe throwing journalist appeared to effectively punctuate the failure of the Bushite regime's criminal preventive invasion and occupation of Iraq based on lies.
Shrub made his last visit to Iraq in an official capacity still packaged in secrecy for security more than five years after his administration initiated the Invasion of that country. It's ironic and hubristic that he can still utter the word, success, when talking about the destruction of Iraq by the US.
Just before the shoes went flying, Shrub had read his delusional bragging speech about the SOFA agreement which he claimed was a success, even though it is the antithesis of what the Bush administration stubbornly demanded and dictated and was rejected by the Iraqis.
In no way is it a success for Iraq or the US after five years of devastation by the US invasion and occupation, that has cost more than 4,200 American lives and tens of thousands wounded; hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqi men, women and children. It was a needless invasion that has been called a crime by international legal experts.
It can only be considered a bittersweet victory in that Iraq is showing the US the door marked exit.
Bush's heinous invasion and occupation of Iraq also resulted in Bushite policies of torture,
extraordinary rendition, defiance of habeas corpus, kangaroo military trials, igonoring the Geneva Conventions, abrogation of Americans' civil rights and many other anti-Constitution, anti-rule of law violations.
The agreement calls for the withdrawal of all US troops by December, 2011 (Bushites have fought against a "timeline" for many moons), no remaining military bases (which the Bushites euphemistically termed "enduring" and "contingency operating bases" rather than permanent).and seemed a fitting end to Bush's final visit to Iraq in the waning days of his failed presidency.
As reported in AsiaTimes: "Before hurling his leather-soled missiles, al-Zaidi certainly had Bush's true legacy in Iraq in mind, which includes hundreds of thousands of dead and "disappeared", over 4 million internally and externally displaced, 70% unemployment, a lack of electricity, a lack of drinking water, a cholera epidemic, the balkanization of Baghdad - a shabby, dangerous collection of Sunni and Shi'ite ghettos separated by high blast walls - and the horrendously incompetent kleptocracy that calls itself the Iraqi parliament.
"These shoes also metaphorically hit the huge Bush administration army of advisers, analysts, sycophants, politicians, diplomats, generals, UN bureaucrats, businessmen, "human-rights" wags, media hacks and assorted profiteers that made the Iraqi tragedy possible. These shoes put to immense shame US public opinion, which overwhelmingly condoned the 2003 invasion and occupation and only turned against it when facts on the ground and horrific non-stop carnage spelled out that this was an "unwinnable" war.
"Only a few days before al-Zaidi's act, in an interview published in the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times, president-elect Barack Obama promised, 'We've got a unique opportunity to reboot America's image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular ... So we need to take advantage of that.'
"If Obama really wants to seize the "opportunity" and "reboot" America's image, he must convince the Muslim world that the US will renounce pre-emptive wars against Muslim countries....
"Till then, this is what the US gets - a flicker of poetic justice still shining in the post-everything era: a little emperor cowering behind a lectern dodging a flying shoe."
Shrub made his last visit to Iraq in an official capacity still packaged in secrecy for security more than five years after his administration initiated the Invasion of that country. It's ironic and hubristic that he can still utter the word, success, when talking about the destruction of Iraq by the US.
Just before the shoes went flying, Shrub had read his delusional bragging speech about the SOFA agreement which he claimed was a success, even though it is the antithesis of what the Bush administration stubbornly demanded and dictated and was rejected by the Iraqis.
In no way is it a success for Iraq or the US after five years of devastation by the US invasion and occupation, that has cost more than 4,200 American lives and tens of thousands wounded; hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqi men, women and children. It was a needless invasion that has been called a crime by international legal experts.
It can only be considered a bittersweet victory in that Iraq is showing the US the door marked exit.
Bush's heinous invasion and occupation of Iraq also resulted in Bushite policies of torture,
extraordinary rendition, defiance of habeas corpus, kangaroo military trials, igonoring the Geneva Conventions, abrogation of Americans' civil rights and many other anti-Constitution, anti-rule of law violations.
The agreement calls for the withdrawal of all US troops by December, 2011 (Bushites have fought against a "timeline" for many moons), no remaining military bases (which the Bushites euphemistically termed "enduring" and "contingency operating bases" rather than permanent).and seemed a fitting end to Bush's final visit to Iraq in the waning days of his failed presidency.
As reported in AsiaTimes: "Before hurling his leather-soled missiles, al-Zaidi certainly had Bush's true legacy in Iraq in mind, which includes hundreds of thousands of dead and "disappeared", over 4 million internally and externally displaced, 70% unemployment, a lack of electricity, a lack of drinking water, a cholera epidemic, the balkanization of Baghdad - a shabby, dangerous collection of Sunni and Shi'ite ghettos separated by high blast walls - and the horrendously incompetent kleptocracy that calls itself the Iraqi parliament.
"These shoes also metaphorically hit the huge Bush administration army of advisers, analysts, sycophants, politicians, diplomats, generals, UN bureaucrats, businessmen, "human-rights" wags, media hacks and assorted profiteers that made the Iraqi tragedy possible. These shoes put to immense shame US public opinion, which overwhelmingly condoned the 2003 invasion and occupation and only turned against it when facts on the ground and horrific non-stop carnage spelled out that this was an "unwinnable" war.
"Only a few days before al-Zaidi's act, in an interview published in the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times, president-elect Barack Obama promised, 'We've got a unique opportunity to reboot America's image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular ... So we need to take advantage of that.'
"If Obama really wants to seize the "opportunity" and "reboot" America's image, he must convince the Muslim world that the US will renounce pre-emptive wars against Muslim countries....
"Till then, this is what the US gets - a flicker of poetic justice still shining in the post-everything era: a little emperor cowering behind a lectern dodging a flying shoe."
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