My father, Lynn, had suffered a stroke and heart attack and wasn’t expected to live. I had been visiting my father in the hospital for the two weekends prior driving the six hours to Illinois from Tennessee and six hours back on Sunday evening. My Brother called early Friday morning and said our dad wasn’t expected to last the night so we'd better come quickly. My wife Margaret, me and the kids loaded our car, chose clothing to wear to my dad’s funeral, and headed for Illinois with dread in our hearts.
When we arrived at the hospital the doctors attending him said he would die shortly if we didn’t put him back on a respirator. After coming off the respirator only a week before he made me promise that he wouldn’t be put back on it for any reason. My mother and brothers were holding off making any decisions until I arrived.
When I arrived early that afternoon the doctors pressured us to agree to put him back on life support but we fought back. His blood pressure and oxygen levels were dangerously low, and he was worsening. They said it would be on our heads because he would surely die without life support. We refused to acquiesce. We honored my dad’s request and waited at his bedside for him to pass.
On the other hand, my father-in-law, who was suffering from liver disease, had improved dramatically over the previous two days and was to be released the next morning. He was laughing and cheerful that evening, cheered by a surge in energy and spirit and anxious to be released. My wife went home with her mother that night and my mother and I spent the night with my dad in the critical care unit, awaiting his demise, my mother in a recliner and me on the floor.
The next morning I left my father’s bedside to visit Ernie and was shocked to see him lying in bed, pale and ashen-faced, hooked up to a bag of fluid and medicines. “What happened”, I asked, not believing what I was seeing. “I don’t know”, he moaned back at me with a look of despair on his face.
In short, my father-in-law Ernie died early that afternoon and my father left the hospital the following week, regained his health and lived almost four more years. He died of a heart attack while on his feet attending an auction. He died instantly the way most of us would like our lives to end.
The clothes we brought to wear to my father's funeral were worn to Margaret's father's funeral instead. How ironic is that?
I tell this story to make a point.
Medical history fully acknowledges that more often than not there is a notable surge of energy and of spirit that precedes a person’s death by minutes, hours or perhaps days. Astronomers know the same is true of stars. Right before a star dies it expands and blazes with a surge of energy. Also, volcanoes, storms, and many life forms surge just before they die, a last great effort to fight off death and become immortal.
Likewise, George W Bush, his delusional advisors, John MCain, William Kristol, and all those who think that a surge of troop levels in Iraq is all that is needed to “win” the war, are unwittingly participating in and aiding that natural phenomenon that will result in the failure of Bush’s plan to take over the region. Just like the surge of flame before a candle flickers and dies, this surge of troops, more soldiers, more fire-power, more military suppression, etc., will only fail to revive this ill-fated effort. It’s a last ditch effort to keep Bush’s fantasy alive but it’s just pissing in the wind.
Specifically, this act heralds the death of the effort by Bush and the neocon’s to take over Iraq, to protect the Saudi Royal family and Israel, to face down the people of Lebanon, Syria and Iran and take complete control the Middle East’s oil reserves. Bush was trying to write history. He planned to be known as a great president but like Nixon or much worse he will go down as an embarrassment and a failure.
How can an outside, invading force “win” a civil war? Only the Iraqi’s can solve their differences. You cannot erase the hatred that comes from religious differences from people’s hearts by threats and use of violence. Military force can only contain it with violence and murder as Saddam did.
Bush and the absolutely insane, greedy and power obsessed neocons have foolishly unleashed a storm that will not die easily. Bush will get his legacy – but it won’t be the one he imagined. He will spend the remainder of his life being criticized, hated and reviled and will go down in history and as the madman who once tried to rule the world but instead stirred it to violence and bloodshed.
Go here to read more: Old guard back on Iraq policy
BY PETER SPIEGEL
WASHINGTON-An influential faction of neoconservatives is behind Bush's expected call for more troops.
