Hypocrisy Rules The West

Shame has vanished from Western "civilization."
Hypocrisy has taken its place. 

On September 28, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
could be heard on National Public Radio decrying the use
of violence against democratic protesters by the
government in Burma.  Brown declared the British
people`s revulsion over the violence inflicted by the
Burmese government on its people. 

But Brown said nothing about the violence the British
government was inflicting on Iraqis and Afghans.  

George W. Bush also struck the blameless pose when he
declared: "The world is watching the people of Burma
take to the streets to demand their freedom, and the
American people stand in solidarity with these brave
individuals." [Junta
Restricts Protesters, Communications in Burma,
By Edward Cody, Washington Post September 29,
2007]

Bush and Brown do not have the same sympathy for the
peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan. Neither Bush nor Brown
stands in solidarity with those who are demanding their
freedom from foreign occupation by American and British
troops.  Indeed, Bush and Brown, as commanders in chief,
are on a killing spree that makes the government in
Burma look extremely restrained by comparison.

Why were British soldiers sent to kill Iraqis and
Afghans?  September 11 had nothing whatsoever to do with
the UK.  No doubt but that the corrupt Tony Blair was
paid off to drag the British people into Bush`s Middle
East war for American/Israeli hegemony, but Brown has
done nothing to terminate Bush`s use of the British
military as mercenaries. 

The NPR announcers also supported the Burmese people,
but they, too, show little disturbance over Bush`s
five-year old wars that we now know were based entirely
on lies. Al Qaeda is not the Taliban, and Iraq had no
WMD. Neither country was a threat to the US.  Now that
we know this, why does the media still give Bush and
Brown a free pass to use violence against Iraqis and
Afghans?

To cut to the chase, what is the difference between Bush
and Brown on one hand and the murderous Burmese
government on the other?  Bush and Brown are actually
worse. They pretend to be democrats concerned with what
people actually want.  The Burmese government doesn`t
pretend to be anything but a military dictatorship. 
Moreover, the Burmese government is clean by comparison
as it hasn`t committed acts of naked aggression—war
crimes under the Nuremberg standard—by invading other
countries and attempting to occupy them.

Despite all the killing Bush has accomplished, he
thirsts for yet more blood.  Iran is in his and Israel`s
sights. 

All indications are that Bush is going to attack Iran. 
Propaganda, demonizations, and crass lies are pouring
out of the Bush regime and its media and academic
propagandists such as

Columbia University president Lee Bollinger.  Both
parties in Congress have lined up behind the coming
attack on Iran.  The despicable senator Joe Lieberman
even snuck language into a bill to give Bush the go
ahead.

Who is going to stop Bush from a third war crime?  Not
his vice president, Not his national security adviser,
not his secretary of defense. Not his secretary of
state. Not Congress. Not the US military.  Not the
corporate fat cats. Not the Israel Lobby. Not the bought
and paid for "allies." Not the anti-war
movement.  Not the American people.  Certainly

not the media. 

Americans are content with whatever crimes their
government commits as long as the justification is
Americans` safety. 

Americans` willingness to murder others out of fear for
their own safety is a result of September 11.  The
antiwar movement is impotent, because it has accepted
the government`s 9/11 story. To oppose a war when you
accept the government`s reason for the war is an
indefensible position. 

The Bush regime knows that if people will believe its
9/11 story, they will believe anything. Propaganda
silences facts, and Americans fall for one set of
falsehoods after another. The alleged 9/11 hijackers all
came from countries allied with the US, principally
Saudi Arabia, but Americans believe the government`s
lies that Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and Syria are
responsible.  Americans have been convinced that without
"regime change" in these countries, the American
superpower will remain helpless in face of stateless
Muslims armed with box cutters.   

Americans have been brainwashed to believe that Muslims
hate us for our "freedom and democracy," whereas
in fact the problem is the US government`s immoral
foreign policy and interference in the internal affairs
of Muslim countries.  Bush`s message to the Middle East
is clear: Be a puppet state or be destroyed.

In the meantime, to prevent democracy and civil
liberties from getting in the way of making Americans
safe, Bush has set aside habeas corpus, due
process, right to legal representation, privacy, and the
separation of powers mandated by the US Constitution.
Otherwise, Bush says, we will lose the "war on
terror."

Bush says he has made Americans safe by ridding them of
these constitutional impediments to their safety. And
once American bombs fall on Iran and Syria, those
countries will be free and democratic, too, like Iraq
and Afghanistan.

In leading Americans to this conclusion, Bush has sunk
the United States to a new low in human intelligence and
morality.

COPYRIGHT

CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

Paul Craig Roberts
[email
him] was Assistant
Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan Administration.
He is the author of

Supply-Side Revolution : An Insider`s Account of
Policymaking in Washington;
 Alienation
and the Soviet Economy and

Meltdown: Inside the Soviet Economy,
and is the co-author with Lawrence M. Stratton of


The Tyranny of Good Intentions : How Prosecutors and
Bureaucrats Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name
of Justice. Click

here for Peter
Brimelow`s Forbes Magazine interview with Roberts
about the recent epidemic of prosecutorial misconduct.