Those darned ungrateful Iraqis. Don’t they know that the brutal sanctions that U.S. officials employed against them for more than a decade was for their benefit? So what if they lost hundreds of thousands of their children? Can’t they see that those deaths were “worth it” because U.S. officials were trying to oust their brutal dictator, Saddam Hussein, from office?

Ingrates!

Don’t those people know that we even supported their ruler, Saddam Hussein, in his war against the Iranian people? Don’t they know that the United States delivered to him the infamous WMDs that were later used to scare the American people, so that he could kill Iranians with them?

Don’t they know that U.S. officials inspired Iraqi dissidents to revolt against Saddam during the Persian Gulf War? Yes, it’s true that U.S. officials then watched quietly as Saddam massacred the rebels and filled mass graves with them. But what does that have to do with anything?

Ingrates!

Don’t they know that the U.S. invasion and occupation of their country has killed and maimed only tens of thousands of people? Why, many more people died in World War II. What’s the loss of arms and legs or a few lives in comparison to a U.S.-sponsored national elections?

Ingrates!

Don’t they know that the torture and sex abuse of Iraqis at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere were for the benefit of the Iraqi people? Why, those detainees could have had information about other Iraqis who were resisting the U.S. invasion of their country. So what if some of them were innocent? Everyone knows that you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet.

Ingrates!

So what if Iraq is degenerating daily into chaos, mayhem, violence, and even civil war and that countless Iraqis are losing their lives and limbs every week? Don’t those people know we meant well? Don’t good intentions matter in the Muslim world, as they do in the United States?

Ingrates!

Don’t Iraqis know that the purpose of our unconditional military and financial foreign aid to the Israeli government is to bring peace and freedom to the Middle East? Sure, it hasn’t worked for decades but don’t we have to keep doing the same thing if we’re going to expect a different result?

Ingrates!

Don’t they know that U.S. officials partnered with Osama bin Laden and Islamo-fascists to oust the Soviet Union from Afghanistan? Why do they hate us? We’re not occupiers of Iraq, like the Soviets were in Afghanistan; we’re liberators!

Ingrates!

Why, they just hate us because we have a Bill of Rights. It couldn’t have anything to do with U.S. foreign policy, because everyone knows that the United States has been so kind and generous to the Iraqi people.

Ingrates! Protestors! Terrorists! Islamo-fascists! Hitlers!

Poor President Bush. His despondency brings to mind that of another Texas president — Lyndon Baines Johnson, who just couldn’t understand why the North Vietnamese wouldn’t accept U.S.-taxpayer money in return for letting the United States continue ruling South Vietnam.

Ingrates!

Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation. Send him email.