There is some revisionism tales going about - that say that Shias were not oppressed under Saddam (similar to the garbage being floated that the "shah" was OK after all...) the storyline goes like this: Baathists and Saddam (and the "Shah") were secular - therefore in his regime he had Sunnis Shias and Christians - therefore he was better than having some sort of a possible Islam based govt. in Iraq - that would, of-course, be majority Shi'a --- since they are the majority there... But majority rule - is of-course very problematic, because that would mean the minority, that the US could manipulate, would never remain in power for very long (if ever)... Lebanon is an example where the colonialists institute a system where the majority could not rule... and it is kept artificially divided... Altaf On May 27, 2006, at 7:52 PM, L. Mirza wrote: > > > I don't recall hearing you had ever been to Iraq. I > have and the Shias were completely oppressed, the only > slums in Baghdad were where the Shias lived, and while > all of the Central and Northern Iraq were well > developed, had good water supplies and very good > roads, that changes drastically once you drive south > in Iraq. You could tell exactly where the southern > Iraqi dividing line was by the way the super four lane > each way highway, suddenly turned into a one lane > dusty, pot-holed road. In the south all the cities > were crumbling, streets were in poor shape and > services such as water and electricity were minimal. > Unlike central Iraq where everything was rebuilt from > the Gulf war, just 9 months earlier, nothing in the > south had been rebuilt since 1988 when the Iran Iraq > war ended, let alone the the 1991 Gulf war. > > Are you saying Richard, that an oppressed majority can > not now be allowed to rule as a majority in their own > country? ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Protect your PC from spy ware with award winning anti spy technology. It's free. http://us.click.yahoo.com/97bhrC/LGxNAA/yQLSAA/xYTolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> New Pacifica Working Group http://www.egroups.com/group/NewPacifica 'Save Our Stations!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NewPacifica/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: NewPacifica-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/