They have executed Saddam Hussein

[mummydear]

He's dead

here

Now lets see what happens .

And of course, as Chomksy says, the US economy was in a pretty parlous state, and Bush needed an overseas adventure to distract attention and win votes for the mid-term elections? So how to choose the victim? Chomsky says:

"Why Iraq? The experimental subject must have several important qualities. It must be defenseless, and it must be important"

Rumsfeld decided on Iraq on about the 12th of September

[hat agrees with others - good to see you back]

have just seen the fottage on the news. Very disturbing. I am against the death penalty anyway but too see it carried out by a bunch of guys in balaclavas and bomber jackets - rule of law my arse.

the footage was very bad, i thought at one point the bbc were going to go too far but sort of cut it off at the crucial point. v. disturbing stuff.

i hold a different view to all of you,im personally very happy that the murderous monster was put to the gallows.
have any of you lived in iraq under the evilness of this creature? and seen first hand what a murderous bastard he was?

as I understand it Iraqi tv cut it, not the BBC, iyswim. I think it's a very important piece of footage. compulsory viewing for anyone pro-death penalty. the very fact that we can't stomach seeing the whole thing surely says it all.

Watching someone get executed should not be for public consumption that's not to say some people don't deserve to be executed in the same way that (imho), war is sickening to watch but sometimes justifiable.

How bizarre that they put a scarf around his neck first?

smeeinit, I have not lived under SH but I have travelled to Iraq and interviewed many people about his regime. I went to Kurdistan and it's no exageration to say that every single person I met had a horrific story to tell. why do we think these things horrific? because killing is wrong. always wrong. I have no sympathy for him. not one dot. but I will not degreade my own beliefs by making any exceptions to them.

It is to my discredit that Saddam's death doesn't grieve me overmuch. He's a human being (yes, despite being a very evil man).

The use of the death penalty does grieve me. For anyone. Killing people is wrong. Whoever does it.

And it was a bloody stupid thing to do, in any case.

I do not agree with the death penalty, in any situation. Ever. It is wrong.

I am not sad that Saddam is now dead, but not happy either. Indifferent probably best description.

Someone said he deserved to die because of all the atrocities he ordered etc... what about Robert Mugabe? He has killed and is killing innocent Zimbabweans every day - but nothing is being done about him!! I'm not saying he should be murdered, because as I said, I don't agree with the death penalty - but he should be stopped. Why isn't he? Because Zimbabwe isn't in a prime location!!

George Bush might be more of a civilised (!?) leader, but his hands still have plenty of blood on them!!

i'm afraid i think those that feel that bush is not in the same ballpark as saddam are naive. Agree with all of aloha's posts in this respect. blair not far behind, but i would agree that he is 'not as bad'. he has done nothing to stop or even protest against the state sactioned torture at guantanamo though. and certainly has waged an illegal war in which what is it, 600.000 civilians have so far died? he is therefore a war criminal.

I find state sactioned killing odious wherever I find it and therefore feel that saddam's death is not only absolutely and totally counterproductive (if peace in the region is the aim) but also immoral.

This execution is a disgrace to the civilised world. The way it has been played out and sensationalised in the world's media is shaming to all of us. It brings home the terrible savagery and indignity of the death penalty. IMHO.

agreed greensleeves.

Well put Greensleeves!

Saddam obit in the Guardian

As far as anybody can be described as evil, he was an evil man, and actually enjoyed killing and torturing; Bush and Blair are misguided but not evil.

Hanging him was wrong, but life imprisonment would also have made him a martyr to his own supporters.

I agree with this:

LIAQUAT BALUCH, MMA RELIGIOUS ALLIANCE, PAKISTAN

"We have no sympathy with Saddam Hussein, but we will also say that he did not get justice."

"The execution of Saddam Hussein will further destabilize Iraq. There will be more sectarian violence in Iraq, and we believe that the execution of Saddam Hussein is part of the American plan to disintegrate Iraq."

Edmund Burke says: All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing.

The "fact" that Bush and Blair are "not as bad" as Sadaam is no answer I'm afraid!

so i don;t have to embarass myself, trying to articulate how i feel about this..

agree with greeny, aloha,mb & sophable....

MarsLady - that is so concise. I like it. It's turning out to be a very intellectual Saturday for me!!

Thanks Ready. I'm too tired to do more than concise, but to be honest I remember Martin Luther King making a similar statement (but couldn't remember the exact wording). Burke sums it up really. It all just goes back to the "we were only following orders" argument.

This article talks about the Hussein excution and destablisation - Saddam Execution Set To Destabilise Iraq Further

Written by this guy - never heard of him before - anyone read his articles before?
this

But Bush/Blair clearly are "as bad as Saddam" in any quantifiable way. They are the same animal. The same ideology and system created and elevated them. They have been directly responsible for countless human rights atrocities in many areas of the world besides Iraq, and British and American governments have funded, controlled and supported dictators and totalitarian regimes.

In response to Janh's point about Saddam being "more evil" because he enjoyed violence - I doubt any of us know for sure who has derived more enjoyment from the murders, rapes, torture and systematic oppression they have inflicted. But personally as far as the range of damage inflicted on innocent people, Bush and his cohorts put Saddam firmly in the shade.