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12/17/2005 Archived Entry: "More graves for the democide count"

PROFESSOR RJ RUMMEL COUNTS 262 MILLION VICTIMS OF DEMOCIDE but there are many graves of innocents yet uncounted. Prof. Rummel's definition of democide is The murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder. His definition excludes "the death of noncombatants killed during attacks on military targets so long as the primary target is military" aka "collateral damage." Democide therefore does not count many of the civilian victims of total war, such as those killed in the bombings of London, Dresden, Hiroshima and many other cities. Democide apparently ignores the 30,000 (Bushimo's estimate) to 100,000 (study published in The Lancet, free registration required) civilian victims of our invasion and occupation of Iraq.

It is sad but true that 100,000 is just a rounding error in 262 million victims. But what about the 30 to 90 million deaths that can be attributed to the US fedgov's highly politicized decision to outlaw DDT and actively discourage its use, despite an overwhelming lack of scientific evidence of serious hazard, and a record of preventing 500 million deaths? Read DDT vs. Death by Malaria by Dr. Robert J. Cihak, M.D., past president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, and 100 things you should know about DDT for a good introduction.

I don't question Prof. Rummel's fine work, which is thoughtful and useful even if the results are horrible and frightening. But death by government is an even bigger problem than his grim statistics indicate.

Silver

Posted by Silver @ 10:37 AM CST
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