First, this is markedly offensive:

Do they get a little skip in their step everytime the US death toll goes up because it means that Bush looks bad? I swear, some people posting here sound as if they are wishing for our troops to get slaughtered and Iraqi homes to get bombed just so that they can jump around and say "I told you so!"

I hate it when anyone dies, including the probably thousands (my bogus estimate) of Iraqis, military and civilian, that died at the US's hands, as well as the US soldiers and international journalists that died. Yes, yes. I know that Saddam was likely to kill that many people on his own, and I'm glad that he's gone.

But this whole dog and pony show about humanitarian aid is just a smokescreen. If that's the reason that we were going in there, then that should and would have been the first words out of our administration's mouth. But it was not. It all centered around how Iraq was somehow complicit in the deaths of thousands of people in New York and Washington several years ago, despite the fact that those attacks were demonstrably committed by Saudis, who we support, and supported by Afghanistan, or that they might somehow be complicit in some crime in the future.

Again, I'm very happy for the Iraqis who are happy. But I've seen any number of reports of Iraqi civilians who are not happy. It may be that all of these people are friends and family of killed civilians, but even that seems unlikely.

Also, the reports of Iraqis in Dearborn who are overjoyed is not surprising. Those people are no longer in Iraq for a reason. They are likely the ones who were oppressed under Saddam. Of course they're glad he's gone. They have a personal interest in it that overshadows any potential international ramifications. So that's certainly a biased sample.

Again, I'm glad for the Iraqis. I'm glad that Saddam is, likely, gone. But I'm scared for us. I'm saddened for those that lost loved ones, whether they be Iraqi, US, or anything else. And this is not a wound that will close cleanly. It will leave a scar so big that it may have been better to leave the cancer. And it's all due to an incompetent doctor who wouldn't listen to the rest of the medical community.

I hope that I'm wrong. I hope that this isn't the start of more selective ``regime change'' in the Middle East. We'll have to wait and see. But I don't think that we should assume that the ends justify the means or the intent. The ends now exist, and I'm glad of them in and of themselves, but that doesn't excuse the rest.