bt’s Weblog

In December 2000 after the Supreme Court effectively made ‘Dubya’ president, his right wing supporters began calling Gore supporters “sore losers.” If was very adolescent but hurtful nonetheless to those who saw their assumed right to vote taken away as (paid) Republican hoodlums attacked polling offices in Florida screaming “Shut it (the recount) down.”

A hallmark of Karl Rove’s low-life methods is to denigrate his opponents by accusing them of having a fault which his candidate has. Recall the “Gore is a liar” campaign. We know now that Shrub lies like a rug (as my father used to say). Recall the hired Swiftboat assassins who attacked Kerry’s Vietnam service. We know now that while Kerry was being shot at Shrub walked away from his cushy Texas Air National Guard post with two years left in his ‘commitment.’

The “sore loser” taunt reminded me of something I read during the 2000 campaign about Shrub. It was an anecdote about his hating to lose so much that he would change the rules or keep upping the points needed to win until he either won or the game was called. This is not unusual with some teenagers who have yet to develop enough confidence in themselves to be able to admit defeat without fear or rancor.

It seems that once more Rove labeled the opposition with his patron’s weakness and that Shrub has never gotten beyond that adolescent flaw. It wouldn’t be so bad if he weren’t also commander-in-chief of the armed forces who are currently engaged in the Iraq killing fields. Shrub continues to talk about ‘winning’ and ‘victory’ and ‘not quitting’ as if he were playing a game of one-on-one and losing. Now as in his youth he keeps the ‘game’ going until either time runs out or he scores the winning point. Apparently thousands of needless deaths and their attendant pain and suffering mean nothing to this stunted individual for whom (his) winning is everything.

Think about it because it isn’t so far fetched as it seems at first reading.

I am grateful to Lisa Adams whose article “Is Bush a Sore Loser or Merely Simple?” convinced me I wasn’t alone in my belief about Shrub, Sore Loser-in-Chief.

So goes a line from the Monty Python movie, The Holy Grail.

After writing the previous comment (below) I recalled seeing the number of Iraqi soldiers and police who were killed in the past two months (May and June 2007). So I searched the NY Times and Washington Post and found (in the Post) the article I was looking for. The July 1st article was headed, “Iraq: Civilian Deaths Down 36 Percent” and among other numbers it reported that 190 policemen and 31 soldiers were killed in June as compared to 127 policemen and 47 soldiers the month before.

The number of U.S. military killed was 101 in June and 126 in May. A chart will help you see the implication of those numbers; Civilian numbers include both “official” sets of numbers.

Note that it didn’t go well for the police (50% increase in fatalities). The other groups decreased by percents in the low thirties. BUT compare U.S. and Iraqi army deaths and then answer the question, “How well are we doing with training Iraqis to take over from us?” Not very well, you say? I agree. When the occupying army suffers three times the casualties of the home army there is something really, really rotten going on.

Aside from that the numbers are horrible no matter how you look at them.

In June, at best, 1,500 people were snuffed out in Iraq. The high official figure is 2,400 people. And what for? Shrub says we’re fighting ‘terrarists over there’ so we don’t have to do it here. What a crock of shit that is. He created the insurgent, terrorist, al-Qaeda murder-fest and instead of crawling away in shame he tells a friendly group in West Virginia that this horrible situation, “will require more patience, more courage and more sacrifice.” Who the fuck is doing the patiently courageous sacrificing Junior? Most certainly it is not you or any of your war-monger support group. You, Mister President, are dragging out this needless slaughter until you can skip out of the White House and go back to your Texas ranch and get stone drunk or clear brush or both. Then you will blame the next president, who you assume will be a Democrat, for losing your war. Talk about lowlife.

Might as well join the millions of bloggers and such who are getting their two cents worth in on this auspicious (or not) date.

Over the past week I’ve noticed a couple of articles with headlines that say tensions are easing and killing is down in Baghdad. Reading the articles shows that the headlines aren’t completely accurate. It depends on who is talking and what constraints they put on their statistics.

On July 1 the headline was, “Officials Say Civilian Casualties in Iraq Declined” and the statistic given by the government was a 36% decline from May to June. “Only” 1,200 civilians were (estimated) killed in Iraq in June. Or according to the Iraqi Health Ministry the number was actually 2,097 down from 3,190 in May. Less than 100% difference in the two “official” estimates (he said sarcastically).

A rather downbeat article appeared on July 5 in the NY Times with the headline “Body Count In Baghdad Up in June.” Those bodies were the ones found dumped in the street or where ever and that number was up 41% since January.

Today the banner was “Tensions easing in some Baghdad neighborhoods.” The article gave a number of (anecdotal) comments from Iraqis about the improving situation. The statistics given were that from June 30 until July 5th, 472 civilians had died in attacks in Baghdad,” a dip of 2% from the previous 16 day period. Deaths from bombings fell 17% to 96 and bodies found dumped in the streets decreased 11% to 279 over the same period.”

Few read the statistics and fewer calculate what the percentages indicate. For example if 96 deaths from bombings is 17% less over a two week period that is a drop of 20 people dead. Wow! An 11% decline in dumped bodies to 279 comes out to 34 fewer dead. That’s absolutely better than the bombing deaths although the fact is in one city that has half as many people as New York City 279 bodies of tortured and sometimes beheaded bodies were dumped in the streets over a two week period.

In other words, you can find “good” news that O’Reilly of Faux News tells us is being covered up by the fucking liberal press. But how good is it when on average you are going to find 19 dead bodies a day somewhere in the streets of Baghdad. That’s the ones that are found. Now WTF is so good about that?

Technorati has this to say about my blog.

• Rank: 1,677,885 (No blogs link here)
• URL: http://btsawyer.com/btblog
• Updated: 27 days ago

Hey mom I’m special. Out of over one and a half million blogs not one links to this one!