It's the WAR, stupid!

We're coming up on the Fifth Anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. What a difference Five Years makes! Five years ago, a majority of Americans were in favor of invading Iraq, based on the lies of the Bush administration that Saddam possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction and the false insinuations that he had ties to Al Qaida. Apart from these two overt justifications, there was the fact that he was thumbing his nose at America and also a general sense that someone, anyone, had to be made to pay for 9/11. This was to be a cakewalk war that likely wouldn't last six months, with low casualties; a war that would pay for itself.

Now, a majority of Americans want the war over with. They want our troops brought home. Around four thousand of those soldiers will never come home. Between 30,000 and 100,000 of them will come home broken in some way or another, whether broken physically or scarred mentally or emotionally, the casualties can by no means be considered "light". As for the cost of the war, the White House has claimed the cost to be a mere 420 billion or so, while experts in calculating costs say more likely 3 trillion dollars or so. It certainly has not paid for itself, and in fact the flow of oil that was supposed to make this a profitable war has slowed to a trickle, with an instability booster and a concomitant doubling in gasoline prices for all of us.

Our economy is in recession, teetering on depression, and yet we continue this war. But we're getting smarter. 71% of people polled by CNN recently are starting to connect the dots between spending on this war and our looming financial collapse. Many have already connected the overarching theme of a "War on Terror" with a real war against our civil liberties and personal freedoms.

So for a moment imagine there had been no war. Would we still have a Patriot Act? Would we have done away with Habeus Corpus and Posse Comitatus? Would we still be taking off our shoes to get on a plane? Certainly 600 thousand Iraqis plus or minus would still be breathing.

I only mention this because at times it seems the anti-war fervor around here has been quenched by other passions, and I certainly have been caught up in this myself. But when you look at a friend losing a job, or your stocks fall 10% in a month, or when you have your carry on searched for the 3rd time by airport Gestapo, or you hear ONE MORE EFFING TIME about 'terriers' and 9-11 offered as a justification for any absurd thing a politician offers up, keep in mind that this misbegotten foolish and illegal war lies in back of it.

And let's pray that we don't have another five years of such madness, in Iraq or Iran or anywhere else.