HARD TIMES

Defenders of our Iraq policy are having a hard time. They used to say that those of us opposed to the war from the git-go "hate America." Now that 62% of us oppose the war, that's a hard
accusation to make stick: do the majority of us hate the country? Or do we hate what our government is doing over there?

Justifying what we are doing in Iraq gets harder and harder. Wars are killing orgies. The worst thing about killing orgies, besides the killing, is the danger that the killing can't be stopped. How
can this killing be stopped? It has snowballed way out of control! There are at least three wars raging now in Iraq.

As the defenders of the war find less and less justification for continuing fighting it, they like to
attack the war's critics, for lack of anything constructive to offer. Debra Saunders, for instance,
has long been a vocal supporter of this administration, and its Iraq fiasco. No longer able to
reasonably defend the failed policy, she instead falsely accuses Noam Chomsky of hypocracy
and inconsistency. To do so, she quotes a Muslim convert who unconverted after discovering
that some of the radical Muslims endorse hatred and violence. She cites him to prove that these are bad people we are dealing with, cutthroats, murderers and thieves. As if Chomsky didn't
know this! She goes on to quote the convert regarding 9/11: "Chomsky made no real effort to enter the minds of the perpetrators" (after advocating such an effort).

Clearly, neither Saunders nor the person she quotes has read Chomsky's book, 9/11. Much of that best-seller is devoted to Chomsky doing exactly what they are accusing him of not doing.
Why doesn't Saunders reference Chomsky himself, rather than a second-hand source who is
badly misinformed? The New York Times has referred to Chomsky as, arguably, America's leading intellectual. I will second that motion. To prove him in error, and that is certainly
possible, facts are required, not fiction.

Reply, if you wish, to jgoodwin004@centurytel.net