This morning my computer collapsed and I lost many files I was working with. Anyhow, the social and political events of last week have been quite depressing.

I watched Bush’s news conference[1] and he was unapologetic about his no fault administration and he was bumbling as he couldn’t find the words to answer simple questions from his prepared list of journalists.

President Bush is really the supreme mouthpiece of the corporate and military industrial complex which has taken over the government of the United States and which is threatening the stability and peace of the entire planet. President Bush is peddling further tax cuts today and bad fiscal policies are going to get worse.

In the year 2000 an estimated 94 percent of U.S. corporations and 89 percent of foreign corporations paid less than 5 percent of their total incomes in taxes[2]. In the year 2003, federal individual income taxes equaled 7.4 percent of GDP while corporate income taxes were just 1.2 percent of GDP[3].

This is Bush’s America: he reduces taxes for the top 1% of Americans, he mortgages the future of next generations with his military and tax cuts deficit spending. The effects of these policies are wars against Osama bin Laden, then Saddam Hussein and now against Islamic cleric Al Sadr. In the meantime, the social and economic predicament of the United States, Iraq and the world is degrading one big step at a time.

People are dying in Iraq and in the Middle East. In the background of continuous killing in the region now called Israel and the occupied territory of Palestine, we have the new killings of hundreds of American troops, thousands of Iraqi civilians, including children and babies, dozens of private soldiers, a score of journalists and others[4].

Yesterday we learnt of the execution of Italian private soldier Fabrizio Quattrocchi by Iraqi insurgents. Just now I learn that Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini has stated that Quattrocchi died as a hero[5]. Frattini confirms that as the gunman's pistol was pointing at Quattrocchi the hostage tried to take off his hood and shouted "now I'll show you how an Italian dies." Let me say that there is no hero in unneeded wars and that there are the pains for the family and friends of the dead.

President Bush says he has provided freedom and democracy in Iraq. Bush also says that the United States will hand over sovereignty to an independent Iraq on June 30. Sovereignty belongs to the people and Bush doesn’t know yet to which party to give this sovereignty. Bush’s understanding of sovereignty is just like any business transaction where there are two parties with the difference that in this case the other party doesn’t exist, yet the supposed negotiated sovereignty is to change hands exactly on June 30. A reality is that this supposed Iraqi sovereignty must coexist with the establishment of an American 3,000-man embassy in Baghdad along with the permanence of thousands of American troops[6].

This is how CEO Bush securitizes Iraq. The next thing we know is that Iraq’s shares will be traded in the New York Stock Exchange. Social and economic policies have nothing to do with financial business, and to watch Jack Welsh, former CEO of General Electric, being interviewed on CNN in regard to president Bush’s misstatements is a blatant misunderstanding of what public policies are.

I question how the American people can believe that ignorance is power, or that George Bush is the president of the United States.

Quattrocchi went to Iraq to make some money so that he could return to Italy, marry his girl friend and raise his family. It is very sad. Quattrocchi didn’t have to die because there was no social need for a war in Iraq in the first place.

Imagine the economic waste of this Iraq war. There are between 10,000 to 20,000 private soldiers (a better common name is mercenaries) in Iraq and they are paid up to US$1,000 per day[7]. They all work for the reconstruction of Iraq. Now we must imagine the inflated cost of this reconstruction on behalf of American contractors and at the expense of Iraqi people.

The Bush administration is the real evil in the world. American generals have been complaining that the new Iraqi soldiers and police refused to fight against their own people and these generals have been blaming the poor Iraqi leadership for this[8]. Let us understand that the new Iraqi soldiers and police have been trained by foreign mercenaries and that these Iraqi soldiers and police make only a fraction of the salary earned by the mercenaries.

The Iraq war is not right, people die in vain, and Bush is the real evil.

References

1. The New York Times Text of President Bush's Press Conference (PDF) April 13, 2004 http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/13/politics/13CND-BTEX.html?pagewanted=print&position=

2. Chicago Tribune Corporations escape taxes (PDF) April 4, 2004 http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0404040417apr04,1,2117793.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

3. Shapiro, Isaac FEDERAL INCOME TAXES, AS A SHARE OF GDP, DROP TO LOWEST LEVEL SINCE 1942, ACCORDING TO FINAL BUDGET DATA October 23, 2003 Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, http://www.cbpp.org/10-21-03tax.htm

4. Ewens, Mike Casualties in Iraq: The Human Cost of Occupation Antiwar, http://www.antiwar.com/casualties

5. BBC News Italian hostage 'defied killers' April 15, 2004 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3628977.stm

6. Rennie, David Americans plan giant, 3,000-staff embassy for Baghdad (PDF) March 1, 2004 Telegraph, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/01/03/wirq103.xml

7. Callahan, Nathan My United States of Whatever: Politics in the New Age of Hired Guns. An Interview with P.W. Singer, author of Corporate Warriors http://www.nathancallahan.com/whatever.html

8. Schmitt, Eric and Thom Shanker Training Skills of U.S. General Sought After Poor Performance by Some Iraqi Forces (PDF) April 15, 2004 The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/15/international/middleeast/15TRAI.html