Quotes of the Morning: American Freedom (tm) in Action

“Iraq is more free every day. The lives of the citizens are improving every day. And one thing is for certain; there won't be any more mass graves and torture rooms and rape rooms.”
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, January 12, 2004

“No more mass graves and torture. Whoo hoo!”
-Skippy

“Daylight Tuesday brought the discovery of at least 86 shot or strangled men across the city, most of them with hands tied and many of them tortured, according to police. They included 27 corpses in one of the first mass graves to be found in the capital since the U.S. invasion three years ago..”
-Washington Post, March 12, 2006

“Well that is a mass grave, sure, and there is some mention of torture, but I think that what Dubya REALLY meant is that the GOVERNMENT would no longer have mass graves and torture rooms. You are all just misinterpreting him. You want America to fail and hate our troops. You must, because otherwise Fearless Leader would have been lying, and he is infallible, so that can’t be the case. The US is still trying to show these people how a civilized country behaves, so a small amount of backsliding is expected.”
-Skippy

“As the Iraqi insurgency intensified in early 2004, an elite Special Operations forces unit converted one of Saddam Hussein's former military bases near Baghdad into a top-secret detention center. There, American soldiers made one of the former Iraqi government's torture chambers into their own interrogation cell. They named it the Black Room.”
-New York Times, March 19, 2006

“Ok, that was us. All part of spreading American Freedom ™. Hey, if Iraq is so free, and if our troops are just there to keep the peace, how come we’re using bombing runs? I don’t think I ever recall ‘keeping the peace’ using military air strikes before.”
-Skippy

“U.S. forces, joined by Iraqi troops, on Thursday launched the largest air assault since the U.S.-led invasion, targeting insurgent strongholds north of the capital, the military said.
‘More than 1,500 Iraqi and Coalition troops, over 200 tactical vehicles, and more than 50 aircraft participated in the operation,’ the military statement said of the attack designed to ‘clear a suspected insurgent operating area northeast of Samarra,’ 60 miles north of Baghdad.”
-Associated Press, March 17, 2006

“American forces have dramatically increased airstrikes in Iraq during the past five months, a change of tactics that may foreshadow how the United States plans to battle a still-strong insurgency while reducing the number of U.S. ground troops serving here.
A review of military data shows that daily bombing runs and jet-missile launches have increased by more than 50 percent in the past five months, compared with the same period last year. Knight Ridder's statistical findings were reviewed and confirmed by American Air Force officials in the region.
The numbers also show that U.S. forces dropped bombs on more cities during the last five months than they did during the same period a year ago. Airstrikes hit at least 11 cities between Oct. 1, 2004, and Feb. 28, 2005, but were mostly concentrated in and around the western city of Fallujah. A year later, U.S. warplanes struck at least 22 cities during the same months.
The spike in bombings comes at a crucial time for American diplomatic efforts in Iraq. Officials in Washington have said that the situation in Iraq is improving, creating expectations that at least some American troops might be able to withdraw over the next year.”
-Knight-Ridder, March 14, 2006

“Still not doing that whole ‘Keeping the Peace’ thing that well though..”
-Skippy

“A U.S. airstrike north of the capital Wednesday killed 11 people most of them women and children, said police and relatives of the victims. The U.S. military said it captured the target of the raid, a man suspected of supporting al-Qaida fighters.
But the military said only four people were killed a man, two women and a child.
Iraqi police, meanwhile, found 25 bodies discarded in various parts of Baghdad, the Interior Ministry said Thursday, part of a wave of apparent sectarian killing.”
-AP, March 16, 2006

“At least we got our man. Arrested during an airstrike. Someday I’ll figure out how that works. The bombs were apparently discerning enough to blow up only the women and children, while somehow slapping handcuffs on the target. The target who was not an al-Qaida fighter, but was SUSPECTED of SUPPORTING them. Iraq, where suspicion of supporting the enemy is punishable by the slaughter of your family. By the way, the 25 bodies in the article above are not part of the 86 bodies from the second item.. In four days they have found over 100 bodies of people who were executed in the capital city alone. And that doesn’t count those who have died of bombings, starvation, etc. With all of that American Freedom ™ now being enjoyed daily by the people of Iraq is it any wonder that we are looking to continue to spread the joy to others? American Freedom ™ is on the march!”
-Skippy

"Each passing day could be the one on which the Iraqi regime gives anthrax or VX nerve gas or someday a nuclear weapon to a terrorist group."
-George ‘Dubya’ Bush, September 28, 2002

“Oops.. That was back when we were preparing to attack Iraq. I meant to post this one..”
-Skippy

“The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, Wednesday compared the threat from Iran’s nuclear programs to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States.
‘Just like Sept. 11, only with nuclear weapons this time, that’s the threat. I think that is the threat,’ Bolton told ABC News’ Nightline. ‘I think it’s just facing reality. It’s not a happy reality, but it’s reality and if you don’t deal with it, it will become even more unpleasant.’”
-MSNBC, March 15, 2006