Dictatorship Software Rebooted

Just to rub it in - I am writing this post while watching the sun set over the Pacific and - do you believe it - there is a wi-fi link on the beach!

The title comes from Stirling Newbury's (of Bop News) prediction of what will happen in Iraq. And he was right - this is what we are seeing now. My last post was on how even the sanest person can succumb to the madness of dictatorship. I am just amazed how quickly the current Iraqi government has fallen into this pattern. Take the current president of Iraq. Jaafari was by all accounts a mild-mannered physician before becoming president. Now, under his rule, his interior ministry sanction El-Salvador style death squads and the crudest of torture chambers. Look at these two reports:

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Juan Cole published a tranlation of an online debate on the [Sunni] IslamOnline website with Dr. Ali al-Adad, a prominent member of the [Shiite] Central Council of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), to a live exchange with its readers of Islam Online. In an answer to a question on the Iraqi Interior Ministry torture chamber uncovered by US Soldiers al-Adad said...

The recent incident in al-Jaderiya [the intervention by US troops in a location under Ministry of Interior control, where tortured prisoners were held] is a pretext used to question the legitimacy of the noblest and most honorable regime freely and democratically chosen by the Iraqis. The truth on what is said about al-Jaderiyya will be revealed after the investigation.

What is important is that all should know that there are daily operations of extermination and mass murder using bomb cars perpetrated by criminal Ba'athists and Takfeeris [Sunni Islamic fanatics] in Iraq, and we have not heard a condemnation of these acts from some Arab brothers abroad who know quite well what Saddam's regime used to do and what criminals belonging to Saddam's bunch are doing today.

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Robert Dreyfuss after meeting Iraq's deputy president, Adil Abdul Mahdi, wrote..

When I asked him about reports that Iraqi police and interior ministry squads were carrying out assassinations and other illegal acts, he didn't deny it--but, he said, such acts were merely a reaction to the terrorism of the resistance. "There is terrorism on only one side,:" he said. "Inappropiatem acts by the other side, by the police--this is something else. This is a reaction." As far as civilian casualties in Sunni towns, he had this to say: "You can't fight terrorism without attacking some popular areas."
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Abdul Mahdi had this to say about Fallujah, the city that was obliterated by the the U.S. armed forces a year ago. "It is one of the most peaceful areas in Iraq. I don't know whether the people are happy or not. But it is one of the most peaceful cities."

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What is chilling is that when both people were questioned about the torture, they didn't see it as a bad thing that they should not be associated with but simply excused it because of the terrorism. So a whole section of society is singled out for torture and random killings because of the actions of a few gangs. These are not the words of a government that looks to make peace with the Sunni population but the words of a dictatorship conslidating its power.