This was just sent in by Allen Forkum:
In “Confession of an Anti-Sanctions Activist,” Charles M. Brown exposes one leftist, anti-American “peace” group for what it really was: a tool for Iraqi Baathist propaganda.
“Our uncritical treatment of the Iraqi regime was not a case of ignorance. It was the result of a deliberate choice we made among our priorities. We had to decide which moral challenge we wanted to make. We chose to limit that moral challenge to the U.S. policy of maintaining sanctions against Iraq. We were never particularly interested in or suited to challenging Saddam and his regime over their invasion of two neighboring states, the systematic genocide against the Kurds, or Saddam’s consolidation of one of the most violent internal security systems in the world.”
This article is a good study in the massive evasion necessary to support leftist causes. The author even traces the roots of the group (Voices in the Wilderness) back a Catholic radical group from the ’70s. Ultimately, however, the author fails to see the altruist/socialist connections between the group and Saddam’s regime:
“It was tragically ironic: Voices and the regime did not share a single value. Voices [in the Wilderness] was an attempt by Catholic radicals and their disciples to promote their vision of world peace; Saddam Hussein’s only apparent desire was to maintain his iron grip over Iraq. Voices and the regime agreed only that the sanctions crisis was rooted in U.S. policy. Yet that single point of agreement became the fulcrum of Voices’ venture in Iraq. This was yet another case of politics making for the strangest possible bedfellows.”
Also of interest from the archives:
- “I Was Wrong.” by Ken Joseph, Jr. (April 1, 2003)
I had been demonstrating against the war thinking I had been doing it for the very people I was here with now and yet I had not ever bothered to ask them what they wanted…Over and over I questioned them ‘Why could you want war? Why could any human being desire war?’ They’re answer was quiet and measured. ‘Look at our lives! We are living like animals. No food, no car, no telephone, no job and most of all no hope.’
- Smashing Windows for Peace by Robert Garmong (March 28, 2003)
- Peaceniks: Warmongers for America’s Enemies by Alex Epstein (December 10, 2002)
- Debunking the Clichés of Pacifism by Kevin Delaney (October 13, 2001)