Remember March 28, 2003?

I started this blog February 28, 2003, filled with rage at the seemingly inevitable Iraq War that Bush thrust upon us. Not long before, my darling cat of 13 years had died. I was also fourteen days into the fertilization of egg and sperm that would become the Cutie Nubbin (now the Unreliable Narrator), though I wouldn’t have confirmation of this for several weeks.

So here’s a post from my first two months of blogging: “It’s Not Right,” dated March 28, 2003. Nine days into the first troop deployment to Iraq. Five years later and I still blame Bush for every death connected to this disaster, as well as blame aplenty for Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, and others who helped shove this misbegotten war down the public’s throats.

I don’t know if you were paying attention, but in the months immediately after September 11, 2001, few people dared say what a bad idea a military strike of any kind was. There seemed to be a taste for vengeance in the air. There was approval for sending troops into Afghanistan (which as I seem to recall, I was against). It amounted to a new McCarthyism, with dissent, if any, whispered and skepticism demonized as “unpatriotic.”

After that, getting approval for the UNILATERAL, PRE-EMPTIVE strike against Iraq was easy–just as I feared. And just as I feared, mass demonstrations voicing vociferous public disapproval for this plan were ignored or played down by the NYT, the Washington Post, and other mainstream media outlets.

I’ve always maintained that MSM acted shamefully and with extreme cowardice in not vetting the need for–and the evidence for–this war. And I’ve made merciless fun of every gaffe and lily-livered, belated mea culpa in the NYT since.

One legacy of this war for me personally has been caution in selecting sources of information and a reality check by reading a few overseas newspapers in English. Another legacy has been the resolve to document these times for my son, because he’s certain to live in a world radically different–possibly much more bleak, if we don’t remedy our situation wisely–than the carefree one I knew.