Friday, January 27, 2012

Death and Democracy

Yesterday, 32 people were killed at a Shia funeral, the day before 17 killed in a bombing in a predominately Sunni neighborhood. Iraq remains on the brink, the brink we led them to.

On Jan 26th, 2012 Hilary Clinton answered a question regarding Iraq. She schooled the Iraqi's on democracy, compromise, and the inappropriate use of power at a Town Hall Meeting on the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review.

"The United States, led by our very able, experienced Ambassador Jim Jeffrey – I don’t know if the man has slept more than an hour or two, because he is constantly, along with his able team, reaching out, meeting with, cajoling, pushing the players, starting with Prime Minister Maliki, not to blow this opportunity. Let me just be very clear: This is an opportunity for the Iraqi people of all areas of Iraq, of all religious affiliation, of all backgrounds – this is an opportunity to have a unified Iraq, and the only way to do that is by compromising.

And one of the challenges in new democracies is that compromise is not in the vocabulary, especially in countries where people were oppressed, brutalized over many years. They believe that democracy gives them the opportunity to exercise power...

But at the end of the day, Iraq is now a democracy, but they need to act like one, and that requires compromise.

And so I’m hoping that there will be a recognition of that, and such a tremendous potential to be realized. Iraq can be such a rich country – it’s already showing that with the oil revenues starting to flow again – but problems have to be resolved. They cannot be ignored or mandated by authoritarianism; they have to be worked through the political process. (Applause.)" http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/01/182613.htm

Clinton's equating richness with oil revenue rather then equating it with the ability to live lives of dignity, respect, and peace with your neighbors makes me wonder if she has any concept of peace whatsoever. It is obvious she is utterly clueless as to what richness is.