(for thinly veiled disappointment at the capture of Saddam): “I can’t believe this. I’m crying here. I feel that we now don’t have a chance in this election.” – poster Carrie B. on Howard Dean’s campaign blog. Way to get your priorities straight, Carrie.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE II: “The same men who are going to carry on attacking the Americans will, of course, be making a secret holiday in their heart over the capture of Saddam. Why, they will argue, should they not rejoice at the end of their greatest oppressor while planning the humiliation of the occupying army which seized him?” – Robert Fisk, on form, in the Independent.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE III: “The thought of a 21-year-old losing his life while chasing what is, in the end, a complete stumblebum, is shattering. A soldier was killed in Iraq yesterday, so he certainly wasn’t looking for Saddam. The president, all his people and generals look around for something to grasp and hold high, look what we have done! and yesterday was their greatest day, they had captured a name known all over the world. By nightfall, they were finally silent, and the rain beat down on the new graves of the young.” – Jimmy Breslin, New York Newsday.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE IV: “I look forward to the day when sanctions mass murderer Clinton is pulled from a hole all burly faced and brought to justice – when Colin Powell is yanked from his hideaway for his role in the ‘highway of death’ massacre of 50,000 Iraqi soldiers as they exited from Kuwait or even for incinerating Panamanians in their shanty towns – and what about Bush, Cheney, Bremer and their democratic party accomplices who have been saying ‘me too!’ every step of the way? One thing good about the capture is that now it will end US and media speculation about whether capturing him will dampen the spirits of the Iraqi resistance fighters. It indeed could prove to be a double edged sword where now the recruitment into their ranks can go forward without the taint of being ‘Saddam loyalists.'” – Bob Witanek, Committee To End The Occupation of Iraq.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE V: “My wife, Shahin Cole, suggested to me an ironic possibility with regard to the Shiites. She said that many Shiites in East Baghdad, Basra, and elsewhere may have been timid about opposing the US presence, because they feared the return of Saddam. Saddam was in their nightmares, and the reprisals of the Fedayee Saddam are still a factor in Iraqi politics. Now that it is perfectly clear that he is finished, she suggested, the Shiites may be emboldened. Those who dislike US policies or who are opposed to the idea of occupation no longer need be apprehensive that the US will suddenly leave and allow Saddam to come back to power. They may therefore now gradually throw off their political timidity, and come out more forcefully into the streets when they disagree with the US. As with many of her insights, this one seems to me likely correct.” – blogger Juan Cole, history professor at the University of Michigan, looking on the bright side.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE VI: “Funny how Saddam Hussein appears in the news just when both the American and British Governments are struggling to gather support for their respective ‘Presidential’ campaigns. This fantastic piece of detective work has the same smell as the reason the war was ‘inaugurated’.” – David, Rome, Italy, another BBC listener.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE VII: “Saddam might call on Donald Rumsfeld and say I met him in 1983 and he sold me chemical weapons to use against the Kurds and of course the Americans don’t want that. I think they may be very embarrassed. The Americans ordered his assassination before they caught him so clearly there’s not much chance of him getting a fair trial,” – British anti-war deputy, Tony Benn.
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE VIII: A classic interview from a clueless anti-war interviewer on Australian television:
Sharon Ghidella: What about Australians troops though, we’ve still got 850 Australian troops over there in Iraq, surely now that we’ve got Saddam Hussein, they’re on the road to recovery as such, or towards democracy, isn’t it time to pull the Australian troops out of Iraq? Prime Minister John Howard: No I don’t believe so. Ghidella: Why not? Howard: Because the job is not yet done, it’s not completed, we have caught Saddam but that doesn’t mean that overnight…
Another classic question from Ghidella: ” The world may rejoice, but globally though it’s not going to have that much of an impact is it, the fact that Saddam Hussein has now been captured, he hasn’t been in power for seven months.”
GALLOWAY AWARD NOMINEE IX: This one is really ingenious. Indymedia – one of the major anti-war sites – simply (as of 10.30 pm last night) doesn’t mention the capture of Saddam at all. Its more pressing headlines? “Majority of the population of Uruguay votes against privatisation.” “Activists Gather in DC to Oppose CAFTA.” Eloquence itself.
GALLOWAY AWARD NONINEE X: “Wipe away the celebration spittle. The capture of Saddam Hussein, like so much surrounding this fantasy war, will produce more questions than it answers. Just as the U.S. administration worked the PR machine when the war ‘officially ended’ now the capture of Hussein will also prove to be just another plastic Turkey moment. Another moment that does not really matter.” – Adam Porter, GuerrillaNews.com.
VON HOFFMAN AWARD NOMINEE: “The task force’s search for Saddam was, from the beginning, daunting. According to Scott Ritter, a former United Nations weapons inspector, it may have been fatally flawed as well. From 1994 to 1998, Ritter directed a special U.N. unit that eavesdropped on many of Saddam Hussein’s private telephone communications. ‘The high-profile guys around Saddam were the murafaqin, his most loyal companions, who could stand next to him carrying a gun,’ Ritter told me. ‘But now he’s gone to a different tier-the tribes. He has released the men from his most sensitive units and let them go back to their tribes, and we don’t know where they are.’ … The task force, in any event, has shifted its focus from the hunt for Saddam as it is increasingly distracted by the spreading guerrilla war.” – anti-war journalist, Seymour Hersh, in last week’s New Yorker.
The Dish 