Career not Conscience
The Lancet medical journal has published figures today estimating that over 650,000 Iraqis have died since the illegal invasion in 2003
The absolutely shocking scale of casualties which the Lancet has now revealed demonstrates the disastrous decision of the Cabinet to back Bush's decision to invade Iraq.
David Blunkett's revelations in his diary today show that ministers in the Cabinet, including Gordon Brown, knew that following George Bush into this war would be a disaster but did nothing for fear of losing their jobs.
Putting one's Ministerial position before your conscience calls into question both your judgement and your integrity. If more people had stood up and been counted in the way that Robin Cook did and had resigned their Cabinet posts, we may well have prevented this war, its terrible consequences for the region and the world, and the appalling loss of an estimated 650,000 lives.
The absolutely shocking scale of casualties which the Lancet has now revealed demonstrates the disastrous decision of the Cabinet to back Bush's decision to invade Iraq.
David Blunkett's revelations in his diary today show that ministers in the Cabinet, including Gordon Brown, knew that following George Bush into this war would be a disaster but did nothing for fear of losing their jobs.
Putting one's Ministerial position before your conscience calls into question both your judgement and your integrity. If more people had stood up and been counted in the way that Robin Cook did and had resigned their Cabinet posts, we may well have prevented this war, its terrible consequences for the region and the world, and the appalling loss of an estimated 650,000 lives.
posted by John at 1:45 PM
5 Comments:
Well said John
I just heard what you've said above mentioned on Radio 4 I was only listening with half an ear but it was a political discussion between various editors that weren't the sort to even mention you as a leadership[ candidate normally I could tell but they did becasue of what you've just said (it was a discussion about Brown's prospects as leader), so maybe we are breaking through the media blackout at last although I still can't bear the way they can hardly bring themselves to mention you because you are a left winger, what kind of democracy do we live in?! I hadn't read about the Blunkett diaries just yet as I was waiting till I could get up the strength quite honestly what with the Islamaphobia and now they've admitted to the NHS cuts by using that terminology thrown to them by the Tories, we should all now blow the whistle on this New Laboour elite that have taken over the party and let the decent real Labour MPs have a chance.
Well said John
I just heard what you've said above mentioned on Radio 4 I was only listening with half an ear but it was a political discussion between various editors that weren't the sort to even mention you as a leadership[ candidate normally I could tell but they did becasue of what you've just said (it was a discussion about Brown's prospects as leader), so maybe we are breaking through the media blackout at last although I still can't bear the way they can hardly bring themselves to mention you because you are a left winger, what kind of democracy do we live in?! I hadn't read about the Blunkett diaries just yet as I was waiting till I could get up the strength quite honestly what with the Islamaphobia and now they've admitted to the NHS cuts by using that terminology thrown to them by the Tories, we should all now blow the whistle on this New Laboour elite that have taken over the party and let the decent real Labour MPs have a chance.
John, how do you think those politicians that voted for this mass slaughter rationalise what they have done? Surely no right-thinking person can see that anything but a hideous crime has taken place with the unjustified and illegal invasion of Iraq. I can't quite get my head around how the MPs that voted to go to war are not so completely consumed with guilt at all the bloodshed they have caused. I can understand it of Blair because I think he is a particularly scary and unhinged character - but what about those who supported the war because of genuine concern for Iraqis (like Anne Clwyd for instance claims to). If she was genuinely concerned for Iraqis where is her long overdue apology? Why is she not down on her knees begging for the Iraqi people's forgiveness? Is parliament really just full up of mostly souless, power-hungry careerists or are these politicians for the most part in some sort of deep denial about what they've done to the people of Iraq? All those men, women and children who were bombed from the air by the most powerful nations on earth and crushed to death beneath the rubble of their houses, the torture at Abu Ghraib, trigger-happy soldiers patrolling their streets, the massacres at Fallujah and Haditha, the complete transition from a secular society to a fundamentalist one, no electricity or clean water, cluster bombs, mercenaries and big US corporations making a killing (literally) out of the chaos brought to Iraq. I would not have been able to live with myself at all if I had been in any way responsible for that. This is without a doubt one of the biggest crimes against humanity of our times. I pray that there will come a day when all those responsible will pay dearly for what they have done. John - thank you for being a rare politician of principle.
Too many MPs are seeing politics as a career to make a fortune from.
Blair/Brown and Cameron (BBC) are all the same, if their principles are not accepted by the electorate, do not fight for them just change them to a set that will be acceptable, so hanging, immigration control and many of the far right policies seem set to be accepted in order to hang on to power at any cost or price.
Socialism is founded on priciples that remain unchanged, only the process applied to put these principles in place are changed.
Representitive democracy in the Party is not a principle that nOW LABOUR ADHERES TO.
I believe that it can return with a grass-roots shift away from the idolitary od leaders and return to the policy becoming more important that the individuals within the Party.
here here.
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