HobbsOnline

Steaming hot commentary on journalism, Tennessee, politics, economics, the war and more...

Name:
Location: Nashville, Tennessee, United States

9/17/2002

The President and the Iraqis in Nashville
I had the distinct pleasure of being in the audience at a luncheon fundraiser for Senate candidate Lamar Alexander today in Nashville and hearing President Bush speak. Unfortunately, I couldn't blog the event - as news coverage is published online I'll add links to it - but some things stand out.

The president appeared to speak without notes, and delivered a strong and coherent speech that pulled no punches. He harshly criticized the Democratic-led Senate for failing to pass a defense appropriations bill needed to fight the war against terrorism, and criticized them for not treating the war as what it is: a war that will "define civilization." He also re-affirmed the Bush Doctrine and re-affirmed his committment to oust Saddam Hussein.

Outside the Nashville Convention Center, meanwhile, about 100 anti-war protestors chanted and waved signs. It was the usual left-wing fruit salad protest staged by a ragtag band of people who mostly looked like they badly needed a bath. Organized and advertised as an "anti-war" protest, it featured an incoherent mishmash of messages from the Liturgy of the American Left. Along with anti-war signs and signs calling Bush, Vice President Cheney and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld "the real terrorists," there were signs critical of Bush's environmental policies, and signs for assorted other left-wing causes unrelated to war and terrorism.

Meanwhile, nearby, stood a dozen young Iraqi men, holding signs in support of a war against Saddam, and chanting pro-Bush slogans with a smile. One sign read "Saddam Hussein is the Virus, Bush is the Cure."

I spoke to a couple of these Iraqis. One told me his story. He moved to the U.S. from Baghdad, and now lives in Nashville. He has family in Baghdad. He told me he is willing to risk losing them in a U.S. attack because Saddam must go, and the Iraqi people "are just waiting for the first shot" by U.S. forces as the trigger signal to revolt against Saddam.

"We're with George Bush to the end," he said.

Will Saddam's army fight against the U.S.? I asked. Not a chance, he assured me. Saddam's Iraq "will collapse in an hour" if we go in, he said.

Will the people of Iraq be happy to see American troops? "Yes," he said, a big smile on his face. What did he think of the anti-war protestors? "They don't know what they're talking about," he said.

In an era when Arabs in America are alleged to be afraid to show their face for fear of harassment and "profiling," these Iraqi immigrants stood proudly on a street corner to speak their mind on the imminent war with their home country. They were not intimidated by the incoherent rantings of the anti-war protestors nearby because they spoke from personal knowledge of life under Saddam and why he must be driven from power. It was a sublimely American moment - and one that neatly exposed the moral bankruptcy of the message of the anti-war protestors who shared the sidewalk.

For these young men from Iraq, America means freedom and the right to protest and speak their mind. In Iraq, they and their families would be being killed right about know. On the other hand, those anti-war protestors would probably be invited to a banquet with Saddam.

UPDATE 9/18: The Tennessean today claims there were 300 anti-war protestors. But the crowd looked smaller than a recent anti-income tax rally that the same paper claimed numbered only around 100 or so. Perhaps the political leanings of either the crowd or the paper affect the counting ability of The Tennessean?

But at least the paper noticed the presence of Iraqi protestors in favor of the U.S. going to war against Iraq.

"Those people over there are supporting Osama (bin Laden) but they are so naive they don't know it. Whoever looks for peace and an end to terrorism should support the president, said one pro-war Iraqi, Ali Alebdy, who came to Nashville as a refugee five years ago, neatly explaining the moral incoherence of the anti-war Left.

Weirdly, The Tennessean calls Alebdy "an Iraqi-American." But an Iraqi-American is a person of Iraqi ancestry born in America. Perhaps the oh-so PC Tennessean needs a refresher course in ethnic hyphenation. The people on the sidewalk yesterday voicing support for the war are not "Iraqi-Americans" who theorize about Saddam without personal knowledge. They are Iraqis and, unlike the anti-war protesters, they know what is wrong in Iraq and what it will take to fix it. Because they've been there. Because they still have family and friends there.