<This is just so screwed up I don't even know where to start. And Iraq cheerfully exploits them to their faces, and they still don't get it.

Several activists said even if they fail to sway the White House, they hope their efforts will complicate the Pentagon's war plans and lead European nations to sit out the action, spoiling the Bush administration's hope for an international coalition against President Saddam Hussein. In most Western European nations, including Britain, France and Germany, a majority of people consulted in opinion surveys oppose participation in a military attack against Iraq.



That is also the logic behind the Iraqi government's decision to welcome the activists. "It helps us to strengthen public opinion in Europe," said Abdelrazak Hashimi, director of the Organization for Friendship, Peace and Solidarity, a quasi-governmental [!!] group that coordinates visiting delegations. "It proves we are not alone . . . and it has an effect."

Although the Iraqi government has offered to pay for hotels, food and, in some cases, airline tickets, the leaders of each of the large peace groups here during the past week said they financed their trips independently. But unlike journalists and many others who want to visit Iraq, the activists had no problems getting visas, sometimes receiving them in just a day or two.

Hashimi said his government also will eagerly admit people who want to serve as human shields. "If we can prevent the war any way we can, we have the privilege and the right to do it," he said.

...During the Gulf War, the Iraqi government placed Westerners captured in Kuwait next to sensitive installations in an effort to protect the structures from American bombs.



..."We're here out of no love for the current regime," Watenpaugh said. "But we're also opposed to the arrogant American position that we know what's best for the Iraqi people."

This last sentence pretty much sums up their capacity for intellectual judgment in a nutshell. Sure, Iraqis are murdered and oppressed by their own leaders, but who are we to decide that this is a bad thing?