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2003/4/8 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28025 Activity:high |
4/7 Here is a completely absurd question (I know this will never happen but..) Imagine that Saddam Hussein and his cabinet of ministers are all captured alive. Suppose, that six months later the we still fail to find a credible proof that Iraq was producing WMDs. What other excuse will our government use then for not reinstating Saddam as the president again since he represents the legitimate government of Iraq? \_ You don't consider finding evidence of biological weapons and chemical weapons enough proof of WMD? \_ All planted by the US government. \_ What evidence? So far everything that has been announced to be a "Smoking Gun" eventually turned out to be missilies with conventional warheads, or pesticides, or some other non-WMD related chemicals. (e.g. http://csua.org/u/c9d \_ He was killed while trying to escape, of course. Or we could just release a video of him being some Bubba's bitch in prison. That should fix his political future. \_ How about a major blockbuster hit movie in which he is Satan's gay lover? Thank you Trey Parker and Matt Stone. \_ Excuse? So you consider WMD's an excuse (from your use of "other")? How about 12 years of UN resolution violations? \_ Never proven. And it would be upto UN to prosecute these. \_ I used -excuse- word because the WMD argument was used merely as an excuse to start the war. They didn't show us a credible proof so far that these weapons exist and if they do whether they posess any treat to USA. \_ And how long has Israel been violating UN resolutions? \_ Oh no! Israel has been brought to the table. Now someone surely will -have- to delete this thread. \_ irrelevant since he will be tried for War Crimes ie: Kurds \_ American propaganda. The Kurdish accusation is absurd on its face. There is no proof that chemical weapons were used. Even if there were, the proof was manufactured by the US and Kurdish traitors. Besides, the decision to use chemical weapons were made at a local level. And Saddam actually thought he was authorizing the spraying of fertilizers anyway, and it was an honest mistake that chemical weaponry were loaded into the missiles instead. Besides, Iraq did not possess chemical weaponry, so it was impossible it was used against the Kurds. qed. \_ The truth is that the much touted "Saddam uses gas on his own people" myth is almost assuredly a lie: http://truthout.org/docs_02/020303C.htm Saddam used mustard gas many times on the Iranians, but that is not really the same thing. \_ And of course, Iraq's actions during that war were done with a full US support and approval. \_ You mean our boy Jimmy who told Saddam he'd have our full support if he invaded Iran? That support and approval? \_ The US did not approve of Hussein's use of gas. \_ Yep. Guy citing top secret hush hush US intelligence you-can't-read-them-just-trust-me-what-they-say documents. Got me convinced. \_ How about these Marine Corp assessments, that say also that it was Iranian, not Iraqi gas? http://fas.org/man/dod-101/ops/war/docs/3203/appb.pdf \_ On the other hand, here's something more recent: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/iraq_wmd/Iraq_Oct_2002.htm Whether recent means more likely to be slanted by current politics or based on more recent information is of course based on your own prejudices. \_ Here is a very long, well documented, though sometimes overstated summary of the evidence: http://www.mediamonitors.net/robinmiller10.html The Army War College assessment does not disagree with the CIA document above, except in omission. Both say there was a battle, both say Iraq used mustard, but the Army and Marines decided that Iran used blood agent, which caused most of the casualties observed by the foreign press. In any case, the evidence is weak, not the slam dunk it was portrayed in the US press. \_ The US government lies all the time to get us to agree to dubious wars. GWB is hardly the first: http://goatee.net/2003/deadly-deceit.html |
2003/4/8 [Uncategorized] UID:28026 Activity:nil |
4/7 Is Legolas (in Lord of the Rings) gay? |
2003/4/8 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28027 Activity:nil |
4/7 What is the official Israeli stance on the war? \_ Preemptive war and targeted killings without support of a world body (in fact, scorn from a substantial number of nations) are fine to insure domestic security, especially if the other side is associated with suicide bombers. |
2003/4/8 [Politics/Domestic/Crime, Politics/Domestic/President] UID:28028 Activity:high |
4/7 Isn't it funny that someone is perfectly ok with being denied entrance to a college in favor of people with lower scores, so long as that person with lower scores was white? http://csua.org/u/c9e (washington post column, free registration, blah blah) \_ As much as I hate to take the same of the issue as the knee-jerk pseduoconservative facists, this author missed the point. No one got points for being white. People *did* get points for being part of a recognized minority group. The other bonuses had to do with things like participation in athletics, student government and social service organizations. None of these, which the single exception of the child-of-alumni credit, has a disctinct racial correlation slanted towards white people. Assuming that the comfort or discomfort of this applicant had to do with the race of the benefactors is both unfair and unwarranted by anything I have heard from her. -liberal lawyer \_ Just curious, are you saying motd conservatives are really faux conservatives, faux fascists, or both? And if so, how can we be real conservatives, fascists, or both in your liberal lawyer view? --wannabe pseudoconservative fascist \_ I imagine you will get far with this insightful pithy legal rhetoric. Please post your name / affiliation so others might avoid your services. \_ White? I thought it's usually black or Hispanic. \_ No, you fail to understand. See, she didn't sue when she found out that she had lost out to a person with lower scores. That didn't bother her when she thought it was due to some other sort of desire the college had (for people with diverse socioeconomic he did not mention any of the other criterion for getting "points". backgrounds, athletes, etc.). No, she only sued when she found out that she had lost out to people who were black. \_ Perhaps she was comfortable with a policy that gave extra points to applicants' accomplishments and talents as opposed to their ancestry. \_ Yeah, as long as they were white! \_ Current case law: You can't use quotas, but you can use race as a "factor". 20 points for being black out of 150 points is a "factor" but not a quota, so it's legal. \_ I love people who can't distinguish between a moral discussion and a legal one. (this includes almost all lawyers). Do you plan on becoming a lawyer. 'Cause you already have the mind-set. \_ obcookie \_ No, it's not funny, or even interesting, at all. I would wager that the majority of people who are against race-based affirmative action are in favor of socio-economic affirmative action (at the very least as a "reasonable compromise"). Socio-economic AA is not racist, whereas race-based AA, ipso facto, is. What *Is* "funny" is that he did not mention any of the other criteria for getting "points". I can only assume that this is because if he had people would have noticed a difference between judging based on those items and judging based on race. As the individual bringing suit may have as well. \_ I disagree with your "ipso-facto." This is opinion, rather than \_ I'm not the original author, but I'll defend the use of the term "ipso-facto". The immediate clause indicates that race based AA is a racist practice. This is true, whether you find is morally repugnant or morally just. Perhaps it the difference is that the latter term has a negative connotation whereas the former may not for some. Be wary when reframing a statement changes your opinion of it. This typically means you are holding conflicting beliefs and could use a little introspection. \_ Sigh... you're bringing harsh facts into this. Please, stop now before someone learns something and becomes a better person! Think of the children! fact. Why is it ok for a school to place importance on elements of diversity such a culture, heritage, and socio-economic background, but not on ethnicity? Ethnicity in America is the very essence of culture. To say that race "doesn't matter" and "has no bearing" when it clearly DOES have a bearing is willfully ignorant of life in America. But that's just my opinion. By the way, the motd conservatives are way too easy to troll. \_ The problem is you can't just become black to earn these bonus points. There are lots of poor people irrespective of what color they are, so it's okay to earn points because you're poor. \_ Do it for the children! Please stop now! \_ Got your point smashed to the sharpness of a dull crayon so you decide to claim you were just trolling all along? Uh huh. Like anyone believes that. Back to rhetoric 1a for you! |
2003/4/8-9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28029 Activity:high |
4/8 This is what you get for tell people what US of A doesn't want you to tell: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2928153.stm Call me a cynic, but I think US destroyed Al Jazeera office deliberately. \_ Ok you're a cynic \_ and you're naive. \_ Great way to gain credibility for your opinions. Go around belittling the competence of your opponents by name-calling and questioning their knowledge. Anyone who disagrees with me is obviously an idiot. -John \_ cynic sounds right, but naive is mightily persuasive! \_ John, the first was a joke and the second was just an idiot the rest of us chose to ignore. Why couldn't you? \_ And a few French embassies. And so what? It isn't for telling people what we don't want them to tell. It's for being lying sacks of shit and enemies of our nation. We bomb our enemies. Why is that a big surprise? Anyway, if they weren't hanging out with Iraqi snipers trying to get a good photo or story, they wouldn't be getting killed or bombed as often. \_ You know, freedom of the press is one of the things that foreign oppressed people particularly admire about the United States. This tarnishes our reputation a bit, don't you think? \_ Our press is quite free. What are you talking about? If you're concerned about freedom of the press, look at the rest of the non-Western world. \_ What am I talking about? I am saying that deliberately killing journalists makes our comittment to free press look less than sterling. What are you talking about? \_ Who said we deliberately killed journalists? If we wanted to deliverately murder journalists I think the U.S. marines have proven quite capable of killing anyone they're pointed at. One or two dead here and there *in a war zone!!!!* is no big surprise. How many journalists do you think we killed in Dresden? sheesh. \_ freedom of press only applies to people of US Citizenship and people who have no threat to the big brother. Look at MLK, he was assasinated by the big brother. \_ For the people! Kill whitey! Death to the Man! Blame America First! Yeah! Down with big brother! \_ Um, since when was being a war correspondent a safe and cushy job? \_ Worked for Wolf Blitzer and they promised to not target any civilian areas and we know that being in a war zone as a civvy is really safe so it must have been intentional murder. |
2003/4/8-9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28030 Activity:high |
4/8 Godmother of Baghdad http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=7145 \_ this is from David "American liberals are responsible for Stalin murdering millions" Horowitz's website, who cares besides that one guy who's always posting frontpagemag urls? - danh \_ But they are, can't you see? Plus, Hitler was really a liberal. \_ No. Hitler was a socialist. BTW, since you mention Hitler first, you automatically lose. You lose extra points for not even bothering to accuse someone else of being Hitler. \_ No, I was just trying to get someone to delete this whole idiotic thread. But I think this whole thing is proof that deliberate trolls don't get deleted. \_ RACIST! HITLERITE! \_ from the same site: "MOMENT OF TRUTH (For the Anti-American Left) Every movement has its moment of truth. At an "anti-war" teach-in at Columbia last week, Anthropology professor Nicholas De Genova told 3,000 students and faculty, "Peace is not patriotic" In other words, bad troll, no cookie. \_ This whole thread is a troll. Censorbot, ACTIVATE! |
2003/4/8-9 [Finance/Investment] UID:28031 Activity:high |
4/7 What's a good pointer to sell your time-share? ok thx \_ There are time-shares that aren't scams? First I've heard of it. As far as i can tell time shares are always sold at the same kinds of seminars where "breakthrough marketing opportunities on the internet" are sold. \_ There was an article in Smartmoney Magazine (WSJ affliated) that tried to make a case that time shares do not totally deserve all the bad publicity. It did mention that it is best to buy it second hand rather than directly from one of those slippery snake oil salesperson. \_ No one buys a timeshare as an investment. \_ I would have thought the same, but I know a couple people who claim to love having their timeshare. They swap with other timeshares in various places. I suppose this is cheaper than just booking hotels or whatever in these places. \_ Trading credits for other destinations has a fee attached as high as $500/week, or as much as I spend in many places. TSs work if you like a place a lot, and keeping coming back. I prefer to change it up myself. \_ are they really timeshares, or did they just go in with a bunch of friends or aquaintances to buy a shared vacation home? I've known several people who've been happy with the later, but only suckers who've fallen for the former. \_ There is always eBay. If the site is fairly desirable, you can also try the rental method. I hear okay things about that. \_ Timeshares are like the market in the late 90's. It's a game of selling to the greater fool, except in timeshares, most people are smart enough to not buy one in the first place so everyone except the original builder loses money. A good pointer? Get good fire insurance and burn the fucker. |
2003/4/8-9 [Computer/SW/OS/FreeBSD] UID:28032 Activity:low |
4/8 What is a good program in FreeBSD to draw flow charts? Thanks. \_ xfig? |
2003/4/8-9 [Transportation] UID:28033 Activity:high |
4/8 I might buy a used vehicle. What's the best way to exchange money? Cash is too dangerous. Check takes days to clear. What's a good alternative? \_ money order/cashier's check. Duh. \_ money order/cashier's check. Duh. \_ money order/cashier's check. Duh. \_ money order/cashier's check. Duh. \_ money order/cashier's check. Duh. \_ I think what he's trying to say is money order or cashier's check \_ Just as dangerous as cash. \_ depends on how secure you want to be. A money order is less secure than a cashier's check, but a cashier's check is at least if not more secure than a regular check, and clears instantly. \_ some hearsay for your: a friend of a friend allegedly said they got a cashier's check through ebay, cashed it at the bank sent the product, and then the bank came back and said "woops it was a forged check, we are taking the money out of your account. \_ maybe they should try using escrow next time? \_ crack. bring enough crack for the vehicle value. and a shotgun. |
2003/4/8-9 [Uncategorized] UID:28034 Activity:moderate |
4/8 Anyone heard of a peer2peer program called Phynd? Know anyone currently running or who once ran a Phynd server at Berkeley? Please drop me an email if you do. -dans \_ Yeah I read in the news that the RIAA was suing some guys who used Phynd $1.5 Trillion dollars. \_ not $93T? \_ that would be ridiculous |
2003/4/8-9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28035 Activity:very high |
4/8 If Saddam has a network of underground tunnels, why aren't special ops going through the tunnel system already? (they captured palaces) \_ Who says they aren't? Just because Geraldo and Arnett and Al Jazeera are walking around the war zone doesn't mean our special ops guys takes them on every mission. sheesh. this isn't a movie! \_ true that there are special ops possibly going down there. |
2003/4/8-9 [Science/GlobalWarming, Recreation/Food] UID:28036 Activity:nil |
4/8 geek fiction: http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/4/3/19455/41933 \_ a kur5hin story/bad geek fiction is not more interesting than the motd you destroyed. |
2003/4/8-9 [Academia/Berkeley/CSUA/Motd] UID:28037 Activity:nil |
4/8 Motd restored. If you're going to remove it, you have a moral obligation to replace it with something more interesting. Your comments on how boring the current one is are not more interesting. Thank you for playing the Motd Restoration Game! Play Again(y/N)?__ |
3/15 |