Another story of Syria

[dexeron.livejournal.com]

Jon Stewart returned last night, and the talk of the day was, of course, Syria (and he, of course, tried to inject a little humor into the situation.) However, the interview segment with which he closed out the show was anything but humorous, bringing in Andrew Harper, the head of the United Nations Refugee Agency in Jordan. This is the important story, in my opinion: the story of millions of people displaced from their homes, many of them women and children. It's also the story of nations such as Jordan who are doing what they can to provide a safe haven for some of these people, and the incredible work being done by the UN, an organization that is so often derided by folks here in the U.S., but which does certain things very well; this is one of them.

Any discussion of our response to the situation in Syria should involve the discussion of how we can help these people. While we're talking about what message we should send to the Assad regime, or whether or not we should act militarily, and in which way, here is an obvious human crisis where we could all put our money where our mouths are. I'd prefer to see this story given the lion's share of airtime on our cable news stations, over constant redundant talking heads debating back and forth on questions of chemical weapons and factions and military responses and political calculus.

Here's the interview, in two parts:

If the embedding doesn't work for some reason, here are direct links:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-september-3-2013/exclusive---andrew-harper-extended-interview-pt--1

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-september-3-2013/exclusive---andrew-harper-extended-interview-pt--2

Comments

[cheezyfish.livejournal.com]

LOL.

Okay, admittedly pepper spray and teargas are sorta, technically, chemical weapons. Much more so than white phosphorus. I certainly wouldn't go around telling people how many people I know who were attacked by chemical weapons though. It would likely confuse people. The rest on your list are not chemical weapons. Agent Orange's health effects were not known, and were not meant to kill humans. It was not considered harmful during the time it was used. Same goes for Zinc Cadmium Sulfide. Saying depleted uranium is a chemical weapon is a bit like saying lead paint is, or the arsenic laden ground water where I grew up is a chemical weapon. It simply isn't. You should be embarrassed and feel dumb for saying such things. Essentially, you have such a weak definition of "chemical weapon" that everything used in modern warfare qualifies. The grenade uses a chemical reaction to explode, gun powder burns and propels a bullet, etc.

And seriously, if you want to go around and spout off about how terrible it is that the US uses chemical weapons like pepper spray and tear gas, go ahead. I don't really care how much people laugh at you.