I Wonder Why Many Don't Love Us

In his op-ed in today's Washington Post, "The Smart Way out of a Foolish War," Zbigniew Brzezinski asks what price the American public would have been willing to accept if honestly informed about the Iraq invasion's "costs":

"Nonetheless, if the American people had been asked more than five years ago whether Bush's obsession with the removal of Saddam Hussein was worth 4,000 American lives, almost 30,000 wounded Americans and several trillion dollars -- not to mention the less precisely measurable damage to the United States' world-wide credibility, legitimacy and moral standing -- the answer almost certainly would have been an unequivocal "no."

Is there a prominent omission here in the list of what would provoke a "no" from the American people?

Or is it my imagination?

What about the concept, "Scores if not hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed, untold wounded, and millions driven into being refugees"-- wouldn't this have also provoked a "no" from the famous "American people"?

Why is this omitted in the calculations by an ostensibly wise man like Mr. Brzezinski?

Can you wonder why non-Americans get a little put-off when they hear this stuff from even supposedly enlightened American powers that be?

[Appreciations to Uber.com, where this appears on my Brain Flakes blog.]