In my opinion, the lawful execution of a murderous dictator after having his day (30 mos.) in court, is a positive attribute of a nascent democracy that’s slowly showing the signs that it is indeed serious about developing its democratic institutions. The rule of law is the bulwark of any democracy, and Iraq (in spite of all of its difficulties in fighting a murderous insurgency over these past few years) has made remarkable progress in building up that important institution.
Regardless of its successes, the nay sayers would rather labor over “its failures” (the inability to lessen the violence) as the “measuring stick” for which Iraq should be evaluated and judged. That type of thinking is as wrong as it is unfair, and places Iraq at an extreme disadvantage by expecting/demanding immediate democratic results that other democratic states (during a post WWII Europe) never expected from the nascent democracies of Germany and Japan, and whose governments by the way, didn’t have to defend themselves from a murderous insurgency.
An editorial in today’s edition of the central newspaper of Finland (Keskisuomalainen) editorializes the differencing viewpoints from world leaders over Saddam Hussein’s execution. GWBush: “Saddam received justice that he denied Iraqis”, Finland’s FM, Erkki Tuomioja: “The EU rejects the death penalty, even in the case of Saddam Hussein.”
The editorial goes on to trivialize the fact that the overwhelming majority of Iraqis’ are glad that Saddam is truly dead;
“A portion of Iraqis rejoiced over the departing of the murderous president, but to a significant portion of Iraqis Saddam was the head man of an independent state, who the US swept from power by an illegitimate occupying force. “Hardly anyone seriously believes in the democratization of Iraq any more.”
The cynics.
This is one paper the overwhelming percentage of Iraqis would rather wrap their fish in than read….(if they could). Their type of cynical nay saying lacks balance as it does logic. I also find it typical of the EU moral relativist mindset, like Finland’s Foreign Minister, Erkki Tuomioja, who actually believes that political mass murder, even on a grand scale, is never deserving of capital punishment, which would of course include Uncle Joe and Adolph.
These are the types of leaders we’re stuck with here in Europe. Out of touch and out to lunch nincompoops!
Webster’s Online dictionary of the word Justice: 1 a :
“the maintenance or administration of what is just especially by the impartial adjustment of conflicting claims or the assignment of merited rewards or punishments.”
I can’t help but think back to year of 1989 when the Iron Curtain fell, and Romania exacted its own version of “justice” on the murderous tyrant, Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife. Both were summarily shot after a quick trial. Saddam at least received a 30 month trial while the Ceausescus’ got the Readers Digest version, and then a firing squad. In the case of Saddam, he was tried before a court of his peers and sentenced justly, while Slobodan Milošević milked the European Courts for over four years than died of natural causes.
I find it ironic that Romania, an indisputable nascent democracy, (which has risen from the ashes of its Communist tyrannical past) was once thought of as being immune to democratic traditions, will soon be joining the EU. (2007 is here, Romania and Bulgaria are now EU members)
I recommend this article in the NYT’s, it gives insight as to why some leaders do in fact deserve the ultimate penalty, as did Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. *L* KGS
