Author Topic: Liberal Math  (Read 2031 times)

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Offline DixieBelle

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Liberal Math
« on: January 11, 2008, 11:27:11 AM »
I don't often go after individual bloggers, but statements made yesterday by "dday" at Hullabaloo warrant direct comment.

Discussing a new report that places the number of Iraqi's killed since the start of the war until June of 2006 at roughly 151,000, "dday" wrote:

Quote
NPR was trying to spin this as somehow a LOW number of Iraqi civilian casualties in the last three and a half years, because it comes in lower than the Lancet study. But it remains 150,000 human lives, dead, senselessly, for an unnecessary war of choice. And that only goes up to June 2006, and the authors of the study admitted they were unable to reach certain areas that were "too violent."

Not to mention the 3,900-plus soldiers, including 9 in the last two days. And the numbers of wounded are incalculable.

All to remove a dictator who wasn't nearly as efficient at killing Iraqis.

Saddam Hussein "wasn't nearly as efficient at killing Iraqis"? Only in his community-based reality.

Between 70-125 Iraqi civilians were killed per day during Saddam Hussein's reign.

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Along with other human rights organizations, The Documental Centre for Human Rights in Iraq has compiled documentation on over 600,000 civilian executions in Iraq. Human Rights Watch reports that in one operation alone, the Anfal, Saddam killed 100,000 Kurdish Iraqis. Another 500,000 are estimated to have died in Saddam's needless war with Iran. Coldly taken as a daily average for the 24 years of Saddam's reign, these numbers give us a horrifying picture of between 70 and 125 civilian deaths per day for every one of Saddam's 8,000-odd days in power.

That gives us a range of 600,000-1,000,000 civilians killed during Saddam's stewardship, with a median average of 97.5 Iraqi civilians killed per day during his reign, or 780,000. Over 24 years, that is a median average of 32,500 Iraqi civilians per year...

But this isn't a true "apples to apples" comparison, is it?

This does not include military deaths that occurred during Saddam's "unnecessary war of choice" with Iran from 1980-88, which which accounts for roughly one million more lives on both sides, nor casualties sustained as a result of his other "unnecessary war of choice" that resulted from his invasion of Kuwait, where an estimated 100,000+ died during the first Gulf War in 1990-91.

Combining the number of civilians killed by Saddam and number of soldiers killed on all sides during his two "unnecessary wars of choice," and we find a median estimate of 1.88 million killed during his 24-year reign, or 235 people a day.

The Iraq War started on March 20, 2003, and this study ran through June of 2006. In that time, 151,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed, or 126.04 per day.

Add in 10,000 estimated terrorist/insurgent/militia dead and roughly 2762 through that time period Coalition military deaths, and you arrive at a rough total of 163762 total violent deaths, or 136.7 total violent deaths per day through June 2006.

235 violent deaths per day over Saddam's reign including his wars.

137 violent deaths per day in Iraq over the first three years of the present war.

You do the math, and try to paint Saddam's continued reign as a preferable state of affairs.

http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/archives/251594.php

I just thought this was a great tool in the arsenal when schooling the 'tards. Especially in light of the promo for "Baghdad Hospital" I just saw on TV. They show an injured lady screaming, "Bring back Saddam! It wasn't like this under him!"

 Links are at the article.
« Last Edit: January 11, 2008, 11:29:32 AM by DixieBelle »
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