The Dynamic Duo

I just saw Lou Dobbs on CNN complaining that with the Iraqi people there is no sense of gratitude, rather almost a sense of entitlement towards the Americans who have come in and liberated their country.

I think I have come up with an analogy that may make this a little bit easier to understand. If you have driven a car in a large city in the United States, you may have had the experience of someone washing the windshield of your car, and then requesting money for the service he provided. I have seen people get fairly offended by this. Imagine yourself in that situation, and I’m sure you can understand why. Afterall, you never asked to have their windshield washed, and the guy may not have done a very good job of it anyway. In some cases, you may not even agree that their windshield needed cleaning.

I think you probably see the parallels that I am making with the situation in Iraq, but it really doesn’t explain the (often violent) unhappiness of many Iraqis with the “service” the U.S. has provided them. This is in large part because my analogy needs to be taken slightly further to truly express the situation.

Now imagine the person in question reaching into your car, and washing the inside of your windshield. I think the person who would not be upset and offended by a stranger reaching into their car without invitation or request is a rare breed. Even if your child was getting sticky fingerprints all over the inside of the windshield you would not want some stranger reaching in uninvited, it is an intrusion: uninvited, rude, and scary.

The U.S. didn’t go into Iraq at the request of the poor Iraqi people who were being terrorized by Saddam Hussein. Admittedly Saddam was an evil man, and many of the Iraqi people may be better off without him. If he was the unruly child in my example, he probably would have been smearing chocolate on the windshield. That still doesn’t change the fact that Iraq was a sovereign nation that we invaded of our own accord, for our own interests (or those of the administration currently occupying the white house). This was not done in response to the request of the Iraqi people, and was not done in their interest.

I think expecting them to be grateful for this is ridiculous, naive, and insulting; and I think Lou Dobbs owes the people of Iraq an apology.