A few days ago I wrote that in a just world, everyone who saw “Fahrenheit 9/11” would also see “Team America: World Police” and “Osama.”
After watching the DVD of an amazing documentary called “Voices of Iraq,” I’d like to add that to the list. The film was shot in 2004 by Iraqis themselves with video cameras distributed throughout the country to men, women and children. (At one point, a boy points a camera at his mother and asks, “What do you think of democracy, mom?”)
As depressing as the daily reports coming from Iraq sometimes are, it’s impossible for me to despair for the country’s future after seeing the relief and hope expressed by so many of the people. And yes, I know there are angry and desperate Iraqis (some of them appear in the documentary), but don’t the hopeful ones deserve a voice too?
After listening to the Iraqis’ horror stories of life under Saddam Hussein, and after seeing the videos made by his thugs of prisoners having their hands and tongues cut off, being beheaded, thrown off buildings and blown to pieces by explosives, my thoughts turned to one smiling and fawning visitor to Baghdad.
And those thoughts were: The greatest service he could have performed for the cause of human freedom– of which he speaks so piously– would have been to rise from his seat, still smiling, and strangle Saddam with his bare hands.