Not to let the facts get in the way of a good story...

Reuters is reporting that Saddam Hussein accepted a deal to go into exile in order to prevent the war. His offer was rejected, however, by a war-mongering cabal intent on death and destruction. But its not who you think. In fact, Saddam Hussein and the U.S. both tried to avoid war, it was the 22 member Arab League who scuttled the arrangement. This is a new story, and there are more details to come, but it should at least put a new perspective on the idea that the U.S. was intent on war "no matter what"...

- Dane

Hitchens Burning

Hitch indulges in some justified crowing at the possible impending conviction of his old nemesis, George Galloway. Galloway, of course, is the former British MP who lectured the U.S. Senate during the hearings on the Iraq War (it appears he indulged in some fabrications during his self-righteous scolding); he is also a hero to the anti-war campaign and friend of Syria's Assad regime.

What is most interesting is the list of people who are slowly being exposed for their participation in the Oil-For-Food scandal (I once heard it described as the largest money laundering scheme in history); so far high-ranking officials from the U.N., Britain, France, and Russia have all been implicated or indicted, and this is sure to be only a fraction of the people who were actually involved.

Could all of that opposition to the Iraq War emanating from various countries and the U.N. have possibly been predicated on something other than principle? One would have to be naive indeed to think the millions of dollars dignitaries around the world were receiving as kickbacks from the Oil-For-Food program didn't at least in part inspire their righteous indignation over the Iraq invasion.

--Josh

Yes, it Really is Like That

Those of you who have had the good fortune of viewing Fernando Meirelles's magnificent The Constant Gardener may have found yourselves wondering, as the final credits rolled, whether the horrific events depicted in the film have any basis in reality. In short, the answer is yes.

• Beware--if you haven't seen the movie yet, don't read the review. It doesn't even know the meaning of the word "spoiler," and sums up the movie's plot in its second paragraph. If you're especially sensative to the give away, stop reading right now.

Central to the movie's plot is the nefarious practices of a fictional British pharmaceutical company (KDH), that tests its drugs on unsuspecting Africans. When some of the subjects of the study die, their deaths are covered up. The main action of the film concerns the efforts of Justin Quayle (Ralph Fiennes) to uncover the nasty plot behind his wife Tessa's (Rachel Weisz) death. In short, the problem is this: Tessa has information about the drug companies' nasty practices, and she wants to go public with her report. So she is killed, and Justin (of course) goes after the truth.

Writing about the film in the New York Review of Books, Marcia Angell concludes that it is largely unrealistic--but not in the way you would intially think:

On the basis of the research I did for my book I believe that most of the background facts about drug company behavior in The Constant Gardener, however hard to believe, are correct.

Yet the story is based on the premise that a pharmaceutical company would be so threatened by disclosures of its activities that it would have someone killed. That is what is fantasy. In fact, many of the practices that so horrified [the] heroine are fairly standard and generally well known and accepted. They seldom provoke outrage, let alone murder. A company like KDH would not kill someone like Tessa even if it were willing to do so; it wouldn't have to. Her concerns would have seemed isolated and futile, and the companies would hardly have taken notice of them.

The rest of the article goes on to document a few of the more tame crimes commited by drug companies, and explain why Western pharmaceuticals so often test their drugs in Africa.

This is great reading: well-researched, well-timed, and devastatingly revealing.

--Ted