Bobert's spelling problems are due to dyslexia, I believe, not stupidity...

What he is saying is: when you have a country that is patched together out of several mutually hostile religious/ethnic groups (Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis)....rather like Yugoslavia was (Serbs, Croatians, Bosnians, and Kosovars)...and that country is in a fairly primitive level of social development, where violence can happen easily between such groups...then the only way to keep the lid on the pot is with a strongman as leader.

In Yugoslavia it was Tito. He kept things peaceful and rather prosperous for decades in that country. After he died, it fell apart. In Iraq, Saddam managed to keep things running in an orderly fashion too, but it all started to unravel after he went off and fought a proxy war for the USA against Iran in the 80's, then invaded Kuwait, and then got attacked twice by the USA. Iraq was once the most modern, prosperous and liberal society in the Arab world (prior to the war with Iran). It is now an utter disaster.

To say that is in no way to excuse Saddam for his many crimes, it is simply to point out that in this case...the America-offered cure for Saddam has proven worse for most ordinary Iraqis than the disease was. That was Bobert's point.

There's an interesting book out about the war. It's called "The War Against Truth". Written by a Canadian journalist who was there during the war, and saw close up what was happening. You oughta check it out. You think Saddam was hated? Oh, he was. But take another think and imagine just how much America is hated there now. You'd have to be there to realize just how much. I'm glad I'm not there, and I feel sorry for any young American soldiers who are. It was not their decision, and they were lied to by their government.