The war in Iraq is not keeping Americans free

Published 11:17 am Tuesday, May 20, 2008

As a former resident of Albert Lea, I couldn’t help but respond to one letter writer’s disagreement with Mary Hinnenkamp winning the Teacher of the Year award.

Essentially it was argued that we should continue with this war in order to restore democracy and stabilize the country of Iraq. It was also argued that if we weren’t dropping bombs and raiding houses in Iraq, our citizens would not be free.

The only part I do not understand is the part about how we as U.S. citizens would not be free. Isn’t it the Iraqis who are not free? Aren’t they suffering through a out-of-control civil war? Isn’t this chaotic and violent war partly due to the ill advised and immoral war planned by the Bush administration? Don’t they deserve the credit, since they started the darn thing?

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Let’s put it in plain English. Was Iraq a part of the 9/11 attacks? No. Was Iraq planning to attack the United States? No. Well, at least we found those weapons of mass destruction. Not exactly. At least we were showered with flowers as freedom fighters. No. In fact, the only democracy that exists in Iraq is enforced on the population with the trigger of a gun. For some reason I don’t think Webster was thinking of this when he defined democracy.

Thousands of U.S. lives lost, tens of thousands of American troops injured (virtually ignored by the conservative and liberal press), tens of thousands of Iraqi deaths, trillions of dollars in tax payer money that could currently be used to help us out of this current recession… are only some of the costs of this idiotic war.

Mrs. Hinnenkamp spends one day a week standing for her principles — not because she is progressive or conservative. But rather because she stands for common sense.

I only wish others would do the same.