If They Were We

This was written by Mike Taylor.

This evening after listening to the news, which was harder to take than usual, I starting running a parallel scenario through my head. Americans would never accept what the Iraqis are being expected to tolerate if the same thing had happened here. There would be plenty of unhappy "insurgents" and a great many of them would have absolutely no connection to the "Bush regime."

Imagine that China decided that the US posed a threat to it. It would be more than easy to prove that the US had weapons of mass destruction and the capability to strike China. It could also be proven that the US had ignored sanctions imposed against it by the UN. Suppose China then preemptively struck at Washington DC and New York City, massing an enormous invasion force with an ally such as Russia.

Suppose then that, when DC and New York were being patrolled and fired upon and beaten into submission, Los Angeles was identified as an "insurgent stronghold." Suppose that all residents of Los Angeles were ordered to leave the city and remain outside its boundaries for an indefinite period of time. Suppose hospitals were bombed and the Red Cross were not allowed in to tend to the wounded.

Suppose next, as I heard on the news this evening, that Los Angelinos were to be allowed to return, but not before each person was fingerprinted, received a retina scan, and was issued an ID card which did not allow them to leave their neighborhoods or go anywhere but a local clinic for necessary services.

Suppose finally that China told the rest of the world that all would be well as soon as elections could be held and a Communist government put in place.

Would we sit still for this? Hell, no. The wonder of it all is that the rest of the world sits still as we do the same thing to Iraq, a country that never threatened us in any serious way, never struck out at us, and never killed any Americans until we attacked it.

It's a crazy world, isn't it?