Dear Editor,
There has been a great deal of debate on the issue of why the United States went to war with Iraq. I’ve read a lot of partisan bickering in the East Tennessean about the president and the war in Iraq. I’d now like to discuss some of these views and offer my own view on things.
Many of my Democratic friends have said the Bush administration wanted to gain control of Iraq’s vast oil resources.
My Republican friends and the Bush administration, on the other hand, have given several other reasons to justify the war -Iraq’s massive stockpile of weapons of mass destruction and links to al-Qaeda.
For starters, the whole al-Qaeda thing was false.
Saddam Hussein ran a secular dictatorial regime that did not support Islamic fundamentalism or al-Qaeda. Sometimes, I’m just not sure where the administration comes up with this stuff.
This brings us to the WMDs. I don’t see them, you don’t see them and the administration can’t find them. Either Iraq did not have WMDs, or that tricky David Copperfield was hired by Hussein to make them magically disappear.
Finally, as a Democrat, I’d like to say that I could agree with the assessment of my fellow party members that the United States went to war with Iraq for the sake of securing oil. But, I cannot.
I simply do not believe that our president would send us to Iraq for mere oil. Certainly, there must have been some impending crisis or real threat to our security that forced us to go into Iraq – something much more important than oil.
And, I think I know what it is.
Why are we in Iraq? Sand. That’s right, sand.
Iraq has lots and lots of sand. And, we urgently need more sand. Every year more and more sand is being washed away from our beaches by ocean waves. Our beaches must be replenished before they are gone forever.
After all, beaches are a vital part of the economy and the American way of life. Hotels, stores and restaurants have all been built around these beaches and depend on them to bring in business.
More importantly, we depend on these places for Spring Break, summer vacation, and the filming of Girls Gone Wild videos. I’m sure that a drop in the sale of those videos alone is enough to cause great harm to our economy.
The Bush administration saw this threat to our economic security and acted. We now have an abundant source of sand to breathe new life into our beaches and, ultimately, our economy.
So there really was a good reason to go to war with Iraq.
How ’bout that? I would just like to thank the administration at this time for saving my Spring Break 2005.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but George W. Bush certainly has my vote in November!
Matt Gross

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