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Tuesday, February 18, 2003

What is Real? 

The guy who delivered the pastries this morning said, "We're not going to do anything in Iraq."
"Oh yea, right," I said. Lately, I've been in no mood to beat around the bush (no pun intended). "We're only going to go in there and kill thousands of innocent civilians", I said.
He continued to insist, "We're not going to do anything there. We're just going to go in and...", I think he said something about we are going to stir them up against their own leader, or some such nonsense. At that point, without my first cup of coffee, I had had enough.
"Look, I don't know what planet you're living on, but please just, go away; just go away," and I shooed him off.
Yesterday, my boss, the owner, said the Iraqi civilians are all going to come out to greet us when we invade, waving American flags. I told him I thought we would kill thousands of their civilians.
"Maybe one thousand", my boss said.
"It's going to de-stabalize that area", I said.
"No, its going to stabalize it," he said.
"Well, a lot of people are frightened of triggering World War 3 out of all of this," I said.
"Who is saying that?", he wanted to know. "Nobody I know is saying that," he said.
"Everyone I know is saying it", I said.
"Yea, all you left-leaning, liberal types," and he laughed, but he did seem a little stunned that we were considering this could be the beginning of the end. These two encounters leads me to believe that the Americans justifying the war have become adept at rationalizing. Perhaps there is also the naive belief that America has the best of intentions for the rest of the world. I am afraid most are in for a very "real" education.