Another MSNBC Night-Another Night Of NO Hillary Talk

March 24, 2002

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The neo-cons casually compare Iraq to the Third Reich, Israel to forsaken Czechoslovakia and skeptics to Neville Chamberlain, but their evidence for attacking Iraq doesn't hold up. The anthrax letters came from a source far nearer to our shores than Baghdad. And CIA chief George Tenet testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that the "jury's still out" on whether Hussein had anything to do with Sept. 11.

Oil is a much more powerful motive for an Iraq attack.

Iraq is the Mideast's No. 2 supplier of oil, behind Saudi Arabia. The United States, swallowing a quarter of the world's production, is the world's No. 1 consumer. This country is led by a pair of oil-patch veterans who share a sense of entitlement about the world's oil reserves regardless of what flag flies above them. Bush and Cheney see Hussein's chief weapon of mass destruction as his threatened grip on the Persian Gulf oil tap.

This confluence of interest between ideology and oil has put us on the road to Baghdad. It's time for us to realize that American principles have precious little to do with this costly prospective military campaign.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2002/03/24/IN164155.DTL

September 1, 2002

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But this is my last column. The wisdom of middle age has taught me I can't have -- or do -- it all.

I remember Sen. Ed Muskie the night he won his last election back in 1976. He'd had some vodka, which I sensed he'd drunk fast -- like a Russian against the winter. He said:

"The only reason to be in politics is to be out there all alone and then be proven right."

That goes for good columnists, too.

So I'll say it: I hate this war that's coming in Iraq. I don't think we'll be proud of it. Oppose this war because it will create a millennium of hatred and the suicidal terrorism that comes with it. You talk about Bush trying to avenge his father. What about the tens of millions of Arab sons who will want to finish a fight we start next spring in Baghdad?

Well, that's it for now. You know where I stand.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi%3Ff=/c/a/2002/09/01/IN133269.DTL