Time to Take Sides With the Libyan People Against Gaddafi

Photo by: Forrest R. Whitesides

A memorial at Dachau Concentration Camp

What do the words on the memorial at Dachau—NEVER AGAIN—mean if they don't apply to Libya?

Al Jazeera reports that the massive damage done to the bodies of the dead in Libya—bodies torn limb from limb—supports the allegation that "the military haven't only been using gunfire, but artillery as well."

In response to the chaos on the ground in his nation, Muammar Gaddafi delivered a 'rambling' address today — in which he blames colonial influence, hallucinogenic drugs, and satellite television for the uprising.

In the same address Gaddafi vows to die a martyr.

Earlier in the day, Libya's ambassador to the United States, Ali Suleiman Aujali, demanded Gaddafi's resignation. Aujali cites reports of artillery fire directed against civilians, as well as well-established reports of jet pilots defecting to a neighboring country, rather than obeying orders to bomb their own citizens.

Multiple accounts of attacks against civilians using artillery, missiles, andairstrikes seem remarkably consistent, given the unstable conditions in the country.

And yet the absence of a decisive response from the White House continues.

Now is the time for President Obama to address the world — to forcefully assert that the United States sides with the Libyan people in their struggle for freedom.

Gaddafi has devolved into a deranged real-world analog of Heath Ledger's Joker in Dark Knight: A mad murderous clown.

The world—led by the United States — must speak in a clear voice to oppose the horrors visited on the people of Libya—to demand the immediate removal of Muammar Gaddafi from power.

________________________________________

Questions? Comments? Email us [e-mail]

Follow NetNet on Twitter @ twitter.com/CNBCnetnet

Facebook us @ www.facebook.com/NetNetCNBC