Reaction to Saddam's demise

First, some personal thoughts.

Anyone familiar with the writing on this site knows I've long considered Saddam as more of an integral cog in the Global War on Terror than conventional wisdom would suggest. During the past year we've seen his barbarity on trial while the man himself attempted to shape the battle from jail, offering various self-serving missives designed to help his cause. In the end he was like a guilty sailor flashing the moon to his mates as he was forced to walk the plank--bitter and deluded right up until the hatch opened. No contrition, no remorse, the picture of a man heading for Hell.

It's clear the Bush administration tried to devalue his contributions to the chaos, choosing instead to prop up Zarqawi and AQ in Iraq rather than the Ba'athists. This became clear when Maliki's Shiite government came to power and prominently included Saddamists in their list of 41 most-wanted. Feel free to argue why this was done, but I don't believe there was malice intended. Whatever the case, all the cards are now on the table and we'll see the result.

To those who believed Saddam had some sort of self-protection option--some kind of final deterrent to stave off execution, it appears unlikely. If the US government had any intelligence towards that end the execution would never have proceeded. We'll see, of course, but apparently the threat was like so many other assumptions made about the man--more BS than reality. I'm happy to be wrong about that.

But enough about me. Reaction is from the web is predictable so I'll just throw out a couple out for posterity:

> Josh Marshall's site-- the hooded executioners brought back memories of Nick Berg.

> At HuffPo, an editorial makes a comparison to Christ, then proceeds to list all the reasons Saddam was no threat. Sorry, but this man is an idiot.

> Jeralyn Merritt, as usual, has a roundup of mainly negative reaction but with less moonbattery.

> Glenn Greenwald is still clueless that we're involved in a war.

And the message boards are sizzling as usual. Here's one example:

Saddams gone. Big deal

Others suggested it wasn't worth the loss of one troop.

But that screams for context. Let's go back to 1998 when bin Laden issued his famous death to all Americans Fatwa and offered support to Iraq. Clinton made several speeches, like this one and this one:

The United States favors an Iraq that offers its people freedom at home. I categorically reject arguments that this is unattainable due to Iraq's history or its ethnic or sectarian make-up. Iraqis deserve and desire freedom like everyone else. The United States looks forward to a democratically supported regime that would permit us to enter into a dialogue leading to the reintegration of Iraq into normal international life.

Yeah, Clinton's gone. However, his talk (and we could include similar rhetoric from other dems) exemplifies the modern Bush-bashing leftist. Ask yourself who better fits the oft-used put down--"all hat, no cattle"? After 9/11 Bush took it seriously, which doesn't compute on some port sider CPUs.

Nobody believes Saddam's death will stop the violence, but if the Middle East is ever going to emerge as anything but a cesspool of terrorism then terrorist-supporting thugs like Hussein need to be shown the door. The little one.