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12/25 |
2003/7/3 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:28908 Activity:nil |
7/2 LURD Performs Ritual To Hold Ganta -Buries Alive Girl, Cow http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/939538/posts \_ you read free republic. \_ we all know that it's ecchang posting all the free republic links. \_ wrong -op \_ wow, you are pathetic. you delete my freeper post and replace your own. |
2003/7/1 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28881 Activity:high |
7/1 A Real Conservative take on the Bush War: http://amconmag.com/06_30_03/buchanan.html \_ Yet more evidence that the world is ending: I agree with Pat. Repent, sinners! \_ yes, the world is ending. The worlds top golfer is black, and the worlds top rapper is white. |
2003/7/1 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:28876 Activity:high |
6/30 It's only war crime when someone else is doing it... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3035296.stm \_ Perhaps because it is not in our nation's best interest to defer to vague international bodies on this or any other matters? Also, while you're chewing over that consider that the US has a real court system, a culture that creates citizens opposed to any sort of war crime (in fact, the US invented the concept), and given that any body that lacks the power to enforce it's edicts is useless so is the ICC. The US is the only thing that gives the UN or any other similar entity any authority. If we withdrew and ignored all of these pesky little socialist clubs they'd all collapse. I'm not sure if you were trolling or you actually believe in all these silly little multinational oddities but they do not and in fact can not work as you might wish. There is no such thing as 'international law' outside the fantasies of certain anti-American Europeans (France, Belgium, Germany) and the Blame America First crowd in the US. -xyz \_ Of course it's not in the purity temple's interest to submit to foreign oversight. They're all terrorists. Probably have weapons of mass detruction too. Let's nuke them, because any nation that threatens another... \_ If you had a real response instead of knee jerking I'd be happy to discuss it with you. -xyz \_ bye bye "isolationism" -- being sold with the same rationale1 bravo doublespeak miracles from the new reich! \_ I'm not in favor of isolationism. Submitting to the will of Eurocrats and the third world is not the only way to participate in the world. -xyz \_ Most countries' citizens are opposed to war crimes, except that they tend to overlook the crimes when it's committed by their own country. It is the same for US. That's why we need UN. - fgh \_ It is in our nation's best interest to work through international bodies rather than act like a gung-ho cowboy. US is suffering from classic overextension, and its strength is overrated. Our military rules but it is resulting in huge budget deficit, and putting a huge drag on our tired economy. States are close to bankrupt, trade deficit is soaring, fed has no more room to cut interest rate. US economy is supported by asian nations buying US treasuries, stocks and US dollars. That should not be something we should count on forever. - abc |
2003/6/21-22 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28800 Activity:moderate |
6/21 http://csua.org/u/3bi "BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. troops psyched up on a bizarre musical reprise from Vietnam war film "Apocalypse Now" before crashing into Iraqi homes to hunt gunmen on Saturday, as Shi'ite Muslims rallied against the U.S. occupation of Iraq." \_ Damn, I love the smell of napalm in the morning. \_ it's the smell of victory. \_ Reuters? It's like reading a Blair NYT article. \_ ??? On what basis this comparison? \_ Years of reading Reuters and applying critical thinking skills instead of passively accepting what they say. It's like reading Pravda with an occasional true story in it. \_ Your skepticism foo is much greater than mine, then. |
2003/6/21-23 [Reference/RealEstate, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28796 Activity:high |
6/21 I will need to find a place to rent starting near the end of this year, 1 bed room or even a studio. Almost anywhere in the bay area is OK. It must have broadband, not be in a slum/war zone, and not be run-down, otherwise just want the rent to be as low as possible. Where should I look into/avoid? When should I start looking? Any url? http://craigslist.org _/ Ok tnx. -- away from BA for many years. \_ Adams Point area of Oakland (north side of the lake between harrison and lakeshore. There are a ton of buildings around me with signs up. A 1 bd goes for just under $800 most places. And there are a number of very nice buildings, nice restaurants, decent bars. BART and freeway accessible. --scotsman \_ can prob find an in-law cheaply in SF in the sunset/parkside district. Office-- their have some good, not-too-expensive places listed. \_ YMCA? \_ Your entire running-dog-pound of a country is a war zone. Love, -Chemical Ali \_ Didn't this guy get scrubbed in a missile attack or something? \_ http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=25679 \_ If you're an alum, pay your dues and take advantage of the Housing Office-- they have some good, not-too-expensive places listed. |
2003/6/17 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/China, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28752 Activity:nil 73%like:28746 |
6/18 http://csua.org/u/39y Yet another american soldier raping the local population. If our soldiers are raping allied civilians, what do you think they're doing to Iraqi women? \_ Buying them cheap. The starving and hopeless give the best bang for the buck. \_ the main issue is that US Military is pretty much immued to the local jurisdiction. And that USA tend to be very protective of her own subjects. This is nothing new. A century ago, British nationals could pretty much get away with anything in China for the same reason. \_ Damn! I wish I could be immued to the local jurisdiction! \_ Nonsense. You seriously want our soldiers to be subject to the concept of 'justice' that exists in the many places we send our troops? That's so naive and childish a concept it borders on the infantile. If you want to avoid US Soldier/Local Civilian problems, the only way is to not have our soldiers in other countries. The end results of that could be far far worse than the once per 4 years rape that happens. If you were truly concerned about the locals around the world, you'd be screaming everyday about the UN boys from other countries that are actively and openly engaged in the sex slave trade buying, selling, and raping the same women they're sent there to protect. \_ US troops are hugely involved in the local sex trade, too. Have you ever been to a military base overseas, or even in the US? The nearest town is almost always full of prostitution. It is hypocritical to condemn the UN soldiers of doing this while ignoring the fact that the US does the same thing. -veteran \_ There is also a problem with sexual assault/rape within the armed forces, and fraternization, too. -veteran#2 \_ It would be better if the US soldiers weren't customers but our officers are not actively engaged in buying, selling, and moving women around the world. You're trying to make some sort of moral equivalency which doesn't exist. Example: a pot smoker in Berkeley is *not* the same level of criminal as the grower moving a few tons of pot every year. Both are criminals but one would get a small fine at worst while the other would get big time at the big house. (insert your drug of choice in that) \_ And the US tends to cover up those nasty rumors about permitting military contractors to have child sex slaves. http://www.insightmag.com/main.cfm/include/detail/storyid/163052.html \_ True enough. While visiting prostitues certainly creates the demand for the sex trade, it is not the same kind of crime as actually running it. -veteran \_ Flapdoodle. There's no need to make this an either-or proposition. Improve the process by which these cases are reviewed by military tribunal, and hand over suspects in non-frivolous, evidence-supported cases. This will protect the troops from malicious and baseless accusations and still address real problems. \_ Ok, let's say a US soldier is involved in an evidence supported case in Pakistan. You're going to turn that guy over to the mullahs running the northwest province under shariah islamic laws? Why don't you just do him a favor and put him in front of a firing squad instead? \_ Hey, if you do the crime in a foreign country, you get to face the consequences of your actions. That said, we could even modify the process to weed out crimes for which we have no analog here in the US and (like Mexico) refuse to extradite criminals if we believe the expected punishment will be cruel and unusual by our standards. There's a lot of room to work with here. \_ The difference is that a soldier doesn't have any choice about going to some third world shit hole with brutal laws and no justice. As a civilian I can choose to not be subjected to that by simply not booking the flight. Soldiers go where they're told to go. They should be subject to the US code of military justice. That's why it exists. I'm not in any way saying rape is ok or that our guys shouldn't get punished for it. I'm saying they should be consistently subject to the same code no matter where they might be assigned. \_ We have a draft again? Oh whoops, it's all volunteers. And last I checked, I was able to contain my hormones enough to not rape anyone. Bring 'em all home, stop wasting my dough. -John \_ My country Singapore is the smartest. We let US have small base in Singapore in case commie China turn into big bad wolf. US has no better choice since getting kicked out of Pilipines. Also, we tell US to follow local jurisdiction just like Michael Fay. Small little red light district in Geylang for horny US GIs, but no mischief or arse gets cane. Neighborhood bullies like Malaysia and Indonesia also don't dare to cause mischief with US base in Spore. By the way, we detained like 10 terrorists without trial over the years. US beat us by detaining 762 in Guatanamo Bay. Poor GIs in boring Geyland with ugly spore girls must miss Olongapo bad. \_ LAH! \_ Guatmo.. A lovely place. Females staying there are advised upon arriving to lock their doors and keep a loaded firearm nearby because the US marines and navy boys tend to get a little wild. I've had female friends talk about being woken up in the middle of the night as drunken sailors and marines attempted to knock down their door for a little unrequested R&R. \_ I'm sure they're willing to pay after. What's the problem? \_ Yermom keeps wanting more than the $5 she's worth. |
2003/6/17 [Politics/Domestic, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28746 Activity:high 73%like:28752 |
6/18 http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030616/ap_on_re_as/japan_us_military_10 Yet another american soldier raping the local population. If our soldiers are raping allied civilians, what do you think they're doing to Iraqi women? \_ Buying them cheap. The starving and hopeless give the best bang for the buck. \_ the main issue is that US Military is pretty much immued to the local jurisdiction. And that USA tend to be very protective of her own subjects. This is nothing new. A century ago, British nationals could pretty much get away with anything in China for the same reason. |
12/25 |
2003/6/12 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28709 Activity:nil |
6/11 Ex-Saddam Media Man Says Iraq Had No Banned Arms http://csua.org/u/383 |
2003/6/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28687 Activity:nil |
6/9 Democracy: that was what the war is all about: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2978186.stm |
2003/6/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28680 Activity:kinda low |
6/9 V is coming back: http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/TV/06/09/television.visitors.reut/index.html \_ Was a sci-fi allegory of the nazi take over of germany in the 30s? Say what? More like what happened when the Europeans took over the world and used/abused natives everywhere. I see my girl Diana is coming back. Too bad she won't be anything like her younger self. \_ No, it's more like Republicans that lie and cheat their way into office, and invade nations claiming to protect the world from WMD's when they were after oil all along. \_ Waaah! The republicans really want to eat Iraqi flesh! \_ Mmmmmm... Iraqi fleeesh... <garrrgh> \_ Wow dude, you really need to take a break from the leftist propaganda machine and chill out for a bit. |
2003/6/5-6 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28644 Activity:very high |
6/5 Does anyone have a copy of the Guardian article saying that Wolfowitz said that Iraq was about oil? They removed the article and apologized. \_ Try google's cached pages. \_ Does google cache news? I can't figure it out. I did find: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0604-10.htm http://www.khilafah.com/home/category.php?DocumentID=7345&TagID=2 \_ Except it's not what he said, troll. \_ Dude, read the page. The explanation of the retraction is on the right hand side (of the commondreams link, anyway) \_ Read it. Not impressed. It's the Guardian for God's sake. \_ http://www.chronwatch.com/editorial/contentDisplay.asp?aid=2971 \_ Here is the retraction: http://www.guardian.co.uk/corrections/story/0,3604,971436,00.html \_ some more thorough quotes from the wolfowitz interview, albeit from the ever-obnoxious conservative "weekly standard": http://csua.org/u/34v \_ what's "ever-obnoxious" about the weekly standard? is it that you find the writing poor, the research is poor or you simply disagree with their political views so it must be automatically 'obnoxious'? |
2003/5/31 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28590 Activity:nil |
5/30 http://www.detnews.com/2003/entertainment/0305/30/c01-178421.htm Right wing nut head takes over and destroys another radio station with the help of Michael Powell and his endless efforts at eliminating small time radio and killing all neutral voices on radio. We want our air waves back! |
2003/5/31 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28588 Activity:moderate |
5/30 Anybody know what happened to the dear_raed blog? I've heard it's back up, but where? \_ It's back up at the same old place: http://dear_raed.blogspot.com |
2003/5/30 [Computer/SW/WWW/Browsers, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28583 Activity:nil |
5/29 sigh... AOL/TimeWarner surrendered the browser war... \_ You just noticed? That happened years ago, genius. \_ I think he's referring to the $750M settlement with MS today http://money.cnn.com/2003/05/29/technology/microsoft \_ yup, that is what I am refering to. While the outcome of the war is clear years ago, AOL didn't wave the white flag until now. Notice the word "surrender" I refered earlier.. - OP, not as genius as you think \_ They waved the flag years ago. Netscape was never serious competition after the sale. AOL could have put real resources into it, used it for their own services, etc, and never did. This $750m thing doesn't make it official. It was already official in 97/98. \_ Only if your definition of "winning a war" is synonymous to "winning a war through DoJ punitive actions" |
2003/5/30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28578 Activity:insanely high |
5/30 "US choice of disarmament to justify Iraq was political: Wolfowitz" http://csua.org/u/32e \_ *HELLO* you just figure that out? Look at the obvious: 1. we impose sanction against Iraq in name of WMD. 2. we topple the government there by force. 3. we lift the sanction without proving that Iraq doesn't have WMD from reliable sources. We are in a catch-22 situation. If Iraq has WMD, then the lift of sanction won't be justified. If we can't find WMD in Iraq, then, the most persuasive arguement to go to war at first place won't be justified. \_ Why would you maintain sanctions if there is no government there to build or launch WMD? \_ Why? We're good at whup-assing people we don't like. We just happen to a bit too selective about it for my liking. -John \_ You're right, we knew that all along. There is no need to remind us about it. However, what's peculiar about this article is that it's being published in mainstream press and it quotes a high-ranking government official (and not say, some anonymous motd poster). -op \_ Dear OP Scum, you're more likely to get the truth from me than you are to get it from any government official in any administration. --some anonymous motd poster \_ Hint: there was no second war in the gulf. The first one was never finished. We were just finally finishing what was started in '91. \_ you then should finish off the revolution war and war of 1812 and topple the crown in Britian \_ We should finish the Korean ware too. If nothing else will will make the world safe for H07 K0R3AN CH1X, LCDs and cheap DRAM. \_ We already have all those. \_ If NK attacks, we would lose all of them so we should preempt them and protect our investment in free access to H07 K0R3AN CH1X, high quality LCDs and cheap DRAM. \_ Idiot. The shooting never stopped in Iraq. We continued to bomb them since the "end" of the "first" gulf war and they continued to shoot at our planes. But you knew that and were just being intentionally stupid when you wrote your drivel. \_ In his quote above, Wolfowitz is saying that those in the Bush administration wanted war in Iraq for different reasons: . To free the Iraqi people from a tyrannical dictator \_ Why, in 12 years of discussing it, did they never use this as a talking point in the press? This is a bullshit afterthought that they threw out because focus groups pounced on it. We have never used our military soley for "freeing people from tyrrany." In fact, more often, we've been the ones installing the tyrranies. \_ The current administration hasn't been in office 12 years. . To depose a government which may sponsor terrorism \_ Against us? That's a BIG "may" \_ Terrorists are terrorists. You think they're choosey who they target? . To enforce UN resolutions \_ HAHHAHHAHHHAHAAAHAHH! wow. You really swallow this stuff whole? Our selective choices of which UN resolutions deserve enforcing should give anyone pause. \_ We should've let the UN sink years ago anyway. . To facilitate movement of U.S. military out of Saudi Arabia \_ And into Iraq? Yeah, that'll win us points with the imams.. \_ Actually, yes. It will. . To create a democratic secular Arab government \_ Wouldn't it be nice. \_ You had a better plan for this or you think Arabs are genetically inferior and incapable of secular democracy? . To prevent the distribution of WMDs to terrorists \_ Find the stash first... We claimed, very publicly that we had solid proof of when and where development was happening. We have a little trouble with the truth. The only reason the Bush administration could agree on was the last. Disarmament was the reason selected to be emphasized to the American people and the world at large; hence, this was a "political" decision. |
2003/5/24 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:28540 Activity:very high |
5/25 More on US racist imperialism 20TH CENTURY DEMOCIDE http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM \_ this is a good site in terms of murder by government statistics, but like (it often seems) everyone, they just aren't too bright. I'm sick of hearing this drivel about how "democracies" don't fight one another. \_ what's the most destructive war you can think of in which both sides were democracies? \- how many democracies were there in the world between 1648 and 1945? --psb 1648 and 1945? how many democracies were there in the year 1812? --psb \_ world war II, Hitler was democratically elected as was mussolini. Finland was a democracy at the time they were fighting on the side of Germany et. al. The whole idea is just stupid. It is more true and slightly less meaningless to say "countries with mcdonald's in them don't go to war against each other." That is to say that countries with stong economic interdependencies and countries with similar cultures, are less likely to \- the interdependence theory [sic] is pretty iffy. in fact it isnt really a theory. does it apply to france and england since 1066? were the alliances of the peloponessian was explained by "cultural and econ ties"? how about the post 1945 relations between the US, Su and China? and of course the war of 1812 again. the main problem is like that with freudian theory ... it's hard to test because it is so vague. it's not so much right or wrong but either meaningless or more charitably an assertion not a theory. (see APSR Dec97,pp913-917) the %GDP in exports in 1900 was quite high ... that level wasnt equalled for almost 50yrs after ww2. remember states (should) seek security. interdependence (often) means vulnurability. do you think germany and japan liked being "interdependent" on other countries for oil in the 1930s? there is a huge lit on this since kohane and nye book. e.g. http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/copeland.htm --psb go to war; but the idea of being a democracy somehow magically keeping you from making war on other democracies is just stupid. \_ They were elected but then took over and made them into 100% dictatorships. They were not democracies in any sense of the word by the time any shooting started. I'm so tired of know nothing smart asses like you spouting off like you know something. This isn't a dorm lounge chat at 3am about whether or not God exists. It's the motd and you can't get away with making up shit like that here. \_ dear moron, i notice you didn't address Finland. Also I can name a number of other examples of democracies \_ Finland was a semi-autocratic nation under Field Marshal Mannerheim at the time. Likewise, it was not a case of 'two democratic nations', as their alliance with the Germans was a logical continuation of being invaded by the USSR in 1939 and losing >10% of their territory. Your point about nukes is wrong, and your historical points are shaky. Likewise, your list of criteria about nations with residual totalitarianism below will find few applications in modern Europe. Plus, 'dear moron' is not a way to win arguments. Just some free advice. -John fighting one another, but you will just explain all of them away until you are left making some stupid statement which boils down to "Europe hasn't had any warfare since world war II". (btw, the reason for this is simple: NUKES). I was asked for the "most destructive" example and i gave it. It is not the best. It was the most destructive though. Asking to specify "the most destructive" is practically an admission of defeat already. If you don't accept democratically elected govenments that turn dict. then you prob. don't accept countries with nominal/residual monarchy or countries with slavery/without universal suffrage with makes the NUMBER of democracy/years in existence pretty damn small with which to be making sweeping generalizations like this. Of course, a complete lack of data points (or intelligence) has never been enough to stop Poly Sci folks from spouting nonsese. \_ aristotle hated democracies cos he felt it ruined athens. caused them the wwar. \-how is this relevant? i'm tempted to say this is wrong, but it is really more correct to say this is meaningless. --psb \_ Very well stated. who is this? -scotsman \_ Exactly. There may be some anecdotal evidence that \- it's not "anecdotal evidence". it's an issue of is it a "mere corrletation" or is there a causal explanation. and then is the data fudged on the correlation at all. --psb democracies don't go to war with one another, but if you consider why countries go to war, there is no reason a democracy wouldn't go to war with another democracy. \_ Ooo Yea baby! I've been waiting to hear this for some time. \_ And you're incapable of typing it yourself? \_ Too hard for me. \-Hello, YMWTS: ~psb/DemoWar.commentarii. --psb \_ How about adding another counfounding variable: the deep fear of war European nations (where a large number of the world's democracies are) had after WWI and WWII, which broke down the barriers for greater efforts at integration such as the EU. Or is that weak? \- What are you trying to explain? yes weak. "fear went down" is not an explanation; it is an assertion. why didnt the EC happen after the "fear went down" after napoleon was defeated? the concert of europe was a very different answer than the EC. how about "the frenchies stopped fearing someone capturing paris again aftger developing their "force de frappe". on the period between ww1/2 see EHCarr 20 yrs crisis. that is a damn good book and Keynes: Econ Conseq Peace. On the point of everything being warm and fuzzy among the euro-allies: what do you think is more likely: --brit/france turn over their nuke arsenals to a "EC joint nuke command" --"team player germany" builds its own nukes. now it is possible neither will happen in the next 20yrs, but if you were a betting man, which would you bet on? --psb \_ But but but, isn't it true that the nationalism and naitional rivalry among European nations as seen in the earlier half of the 20th century very much went away? Isn't that part of the reaction to the horrors of WWI and WWII? Or do you there a better theory for it? \_ To add to it, another coun |
2003/5/17-18 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28468 Activity:kinda low |
5/17 All the Iraqi people I've heard interviewed says this Ahmad Chalabi guy is a crook, yet US still want him to be part of, if not the leader of, the future Iraqi government. This guy has good relationships with several US congressmen. \_ Al Jazeeri interviews? \_ it is one of the most neutral press on the face of the earth. \_ Nah, CNN, NBC, etc. \_ All the Iraqi people? Okey dokey, which Iraqi people is that, exactly and what role do they want in the future government and what role did they have in the previous government and what do they stand to lose if this guy gets any power? Thanks. \_ Try doing a search on "Ahmad Chalabi", and follow that up with a mental exercise counting all the crook leaders US supported starting with Saddam Hussein. \_ Pffft. Show me the urls. I'm not doing your work for you. \_ one has to be non-white to really notice this. Anybody else bothered by the fact that Chalabi is a white guy? Iraqis don't look like that. Why is this white guy trying to rule over a nation of dark skin people? \_ just like Jesus. \_ with his blond hair and blue eyes just like the movies! \_ I don't know man. I used to have this classmate whom I thought was russian, he being really fit, with short blonde hair and blue-green eyes. Turns out he was Kuwaiti. Maybe they are descendants of the Mamelukes? hair and blue-grey eyes, like one of those russian gymnast. Turns out he was Kuwaiti. Maybe they are descendants of the Mamelukes? |
2003/5/16-17 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28463 Activity:insanely high |
5/15 I highly suggest everyone read this... a compelling, eloquent talk by Arundhati Roy that I was lucky enough to witness: http://www.cesr.org/roy/royspeech.htm [reposted... if someone wants to repost any of the responses that also got deleted, feel free] \_ Holy shit! She had to travel to Iraqi to find out that wars not only kill civilians but destroy civil infrastructure, too! What a shocker! I'll sell all my stock in General Dynamics at the opening bell! Who would've thunk war kills people and blows shit up? This is highly compelling!!! \_ Compelling my eye. Bitch bitch bitch. Where was she when Hussein was producing those mass graves of his? Or is it only fashionable to bitch at the United States because someone with a large wallet and a guilty conscience might be knocked for some mula there? \_ You miss the point. Mass graves were not a reason to go to war. Internal injustice has never been a reason. Anyway the problem with her speech is what the person below says: it doesn't matter what we think, it matters what the dumb bastards in Texas et al think. \_ So if you saw millions of people getting killed in death camps in another country, you'd write it off as an internal political debate and it's not your problem, eh? You're one sick bastard. And I mean that as a statement of fact not a childish motd insult. \_ Reasons are not important, effects are. \_ You seem to imply that the war has had good effects. If we were in Iraq to right the wrongs of a half-century of bad foreign policy, excellent. But so far all I see is a lot of angry proto-terrorists who are getting getting some good practice with looting and lawlessness. \_ You mean the war had no good effects? Are you insane or trolling? Don't let the western coverage fool you, Iraqis are happy as can be that Hussein is gone, and that is what's important. Interestingly enough, this looting of which you speak was greatly exaggerated by the western press, and turns out was often perpetrated by baath party members. \_ Nah, Iraq is currently an anarchic mess. Hopefully US troops would impose some order soon. \_the truth is, most people in iraq were probably deeply ambivalent about the US's intervention. check out that "where is raed" weblog as a good (and fascinating) anecdotal example of this. Also true is that the costs of this war (and by that I include the years of sanctions since they are all part of essentially the same western aggression) are quite real and severe (loss of life, diminished quality of life for nearly all but the iraqi elites) while the benefits are only questionable. \_ Ah yes, sanctions, the same sanctions people like you said would get Iraq out of Kuwait in '90 and now are a tool of "western aggression". Make up your mind. \_ This is where a lot of (us) liberals tend to get confused: we want to believe, ultimately, that any war is wrong. The sad truth, however, is that sometimes military action is required to effect meaningful change. Military action prevented the ultimate genocide of the Kosovars and caused the topple of Saddam Hussein. These are good things. The difference between the two (and where most Cons get mixed up) is that the first was a necessary action carried out when all other alternatives had been tried and the danger was imminent, while the second involved a brash decision to brazenly and callously disregard the alternatives despite a lack of evidence of a need for urgency. We're all happy that Saddam Hussein is no longer in power. What we (liberals) are unhappy about is the way it was done. And despite what you may think you learned in high school civics, the ends does not always justify the means. In this case, the means have compromised the security of the ends. --erikred \_ I suppose you get easily flustered. Regardless of why you may think Bush went to war, it seems pretty clear that ousting Saddam was a good thing. How can this be confusing? The man gassed hundreds of thousands. If you want to question motives fine, we can have an argument about that, but questioning whether the outcome of the war was a good thing makes people not take you seriously. \_ I suggest you read my post again and then consider erasing your response. I'm not arguing that getting rid of Saddam Hussein was wrong. I'm saying that the way it was done was wrong. --erikred \_ Why was the way wrong? The diplomatic way would have taken longer, (perhaps infinitely long). Meanwhile Hussein would have had free license to continue his butchery. How is a faster way not more humane? Do you really hate Bush this much? \_ hundreds of thousands? why don't you just say millions. the most he gassed are the iranians during the iran/iraq war, during which the us actively supported iraq. \_ because he didn't gas millions. however he is responsible for more arab deaths than any other individual, group, .org, or entity throughout *ALL* of history. think about that for a second. \_ most of those deaths occurred when the US was *actively* (with money and weapons) supporting Iraq and Saddam. and US leaders at the time knew about it. Hence Arundhati's point that ousting Sadam is in some sense a good thing to do, but if we hold him responsible for those deaths we should likewise consider those that enabled him war criminals. \_ yea, I supported war against the taliban but not iraq. taliban is hopeless and anything is better than taliban. \_ but the baath party wasn't hopeless? it just needed a slight diplomatic push to reform? \- AR for someone who comes across as a nice person is sort of a rhetorical terrorist. --psb \_ Good god, partha. What does that make you? At least she's easy to look at. \- i think jhumpa lahiri is more attractive. --psb \_ that lahiri is more attractive doesn't mean roy is altogether unattractive. and both are certainly more pleasing to the eye than you, partha. \_ Dis not the Everlasting And Infinite Beauty of The PSB! --psb #1 Fan \- was she smoking [tobacco] when you saw her? ask her wht she think about giving money to tobacco companies. --psb \_ Really, is that the best you can do? \_ Infidel! The psb shall crush you like the tiny insect you are and devour your soul! --psb #1 Fan \_ If DanS were here, he should observe the correct use of brackets in a sentence. \_ AR speaks from a place of outrage, and it's a justifiable outrage. Unfortunately, the only people who want to hear what she has to say are the people who already know all of this. If the outraged want their message heard by the rest, they'd better learn how to soundbite it, give it punch, and market it. Only when it appears as a matter of course on The View will it actually have any chance of waking people up. \_ Outraged about being civilised and not lingering in, or returning to, some third world feudal shithole? \_ Where was this wench and all the other libs during Clinton taking out Slobo? All this rhetoric is thinly veiled proganda (by communists) aimed one side of the political spectrum- Iraq simply provides a rallying point. Also, if not for Western imperialism in her native land she would be burned to death in her husbands pyre. \_ Communists? Who the fuck are you, J. Edgar Hoover? Nobody bothers blaming the communists anymore. Just chalk it up to the ineffectual intellectual left and be done with it, you rabid left-baiting twink. \_ "Nobody bothers blaming the communists anymore". That's a silly statement. When the Soviets were around, you leftists claimed they weren't "Real Communists" so they didn't count as such. Now that they're working on making a real western style capitalist democracy you make some silly noise about the commies being dead and completely duck his question about Slobodon and Kosovo. Your rhetorical fu is weak! You are busted! Thank you for playing, please review chapters 1 and 2 in your Rhetoric 1A book for the quiz on Monday. \_ Please say something intelligent / factual if you want me to reply, and not prate trite epithets. \_ I'd like to see a response to the Slobo question. \_ She probably was not supporting that US intervention either... although many were. A genocidal dictator was taken out of power and tried in international court. This is very different from the Iraq case where the US provided a dictator with money and weapons for years, and then when he stopped obeying orders took the country by force. \_ imperialism does not go hand-in-hand with modernization/ globalization. You are probably one of those fools who shouts about how great women in Afghanistan have it now that Bush has intervened. \_ 1) statement of opinion, not fact. you can't possibly back up your imperalism/modernization comment. 2) modernization is *not* globalization. 3) who the hell wants globalization anyway? \_ Case in point: Cuba. A modernized country that is not part of the US international trade empire. |
2003/5/8-9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28380 Activity:high |
5/8 Pat Buchanan on the War on Iraq: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=32433 \_ GO PAT! GO! (link unread, any reference to Pat always has his campaign slogan as the right response) \_ strange. I am a left-wing liberal, but i find myself agree with a lot of what he said. |
2003/5/8-9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28375 Activity:moderate |
5/8 kngharv, can you post a url (or two) supporting what you were saying about the looting of various ministries in iraq? thanks \_ If you tell us wtf you're looking for I'm sure any of us could find it. If you spent 30 seconds on google I'm sure you could find it. Why don't you just email kngharv instead of posting your oddball mystery missed connections style crap on the motd? \_ whoa, take a deep breath homey. If you so desperately want to answer my query, I think there's enough info up there to do some google'ing; I tried myself and while I was able to find something on http://wsws.org I was hoping kngharv might have an article from a more reliable source. This is hardly "missed connections style crap". In fact, it is specifically regarding something that he posted on this here motd yesterday. Maybe if jwang wasn't deleting the damn thing every hour you would have had a chance to read it. |
2003/5/8-9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28371 Activity:very high |
5/7 I've never seen a convincing explanation of why exactly G.H.W Bush didn't go all the way to Baghdad in '91. Can anyone provide such an explanation? \_ he had a 100hrs victory with less than 200 casualties, a figure that he didn't expect to hold in taking the country. Then again, what were the final tallies on this ass kicking? \_ ghwbush said the world coalition he had gathered then had given him authority to kick iraq out of kuwait, not overthrow the iraqi government. that doesn't seem too incredibly far fetched to me. - danhr \_ The objective of the 1991 Gulf war was free Kuwait from Iraq and prevent Iraq from controlling 40% of Arab's oil reserve. The objective was achieved without invading and occupies Iraq. It was a big miscalculation on Iraq's part. Iraq had invaded Iran in the past with USA's blessing, Hussin didn't expect USA would turn against him second time around. \_ Um, Iraq informed the US of the plan to invade Kuwait. The US did not object, so Iraq took that to be implicit approval. Then Bush and fellows feigned shock when the the invasion took place. \_ Iraq also claimed our forces were NOT at the airport, or within 100km of Bagdad. Their credibility of facts sucks. \_ More proof that Israel is in control of US foreign policy. \_ Nyet, comrade! They only talked to some low level official in country and got an ambiguous reponse. They heard what they wanted to hear. Please try to avoid mass rewrite of key elements of history. \_ Ambassador April Glaspie was a low level official? \_ Yes. Ambassador to >insert 3rd world BFE country here< is never a serious position. \_ Except in times of crisis and in hot-spots, I tend to agree with you. \_ She told them effectively the US would not accept Iraq invading Kuwait, regardless of what the media tries to portray. In fact, she has maintained and repeated this position many times., \_ In fact, she has maintained all along that she did not give "the green light" and that she was the target of a "deliberate deception," but she acknowledges that the majority of what was reported about her meeting was true. In other words, she neither objected nor gave express approval. Saddam then read into that what he wanted. Let's not pretend however that the US expressly told him not to do it. \_ Is it our job to play red light/green light with thugs? I don't recall seeing that written anywhere. Maybe it's in one of the Federalist Papers I missed. \_ We armed them, we trained them, and we supported them when they were at war with Iran. They were in effect our client state, and as such, yes, we had an obligation to red light the invasion if we were truly opposed to it. We weren't, so we didn't. \_ US didn't arm Iraq. The Soviets and French did. The Chinese sold more arms to Iraq than the US. http://projects.sipri.se/armstrade/Trnd_Ind_IRQ_Imps_73-02.pdf \_ US bad, UN good, EU good, Israel bad, PLO good, Arafat good, Sharon bad, Bush bad, Chirac good, France good, China good, Britain bad, Russia good. Clear now? \_ Yawn. \_ Exactly, Iraq arms came almost entirely from China, France, and Russia. After all it was an exocet missile launched from a Mirage that hit the US naval vessel in 87. During the Iran / Iraq war we should have provided more military support to crush militant islam in Iran. So the complaint should be we did not do enough, as opposed to too much. [MOTD reformatd] \_ But we did tell them not to do it. So what's the problem? And no they weren't a client state. It was a business arrangement. \_ They are/were however a client state of France. And frankly, our assistance during the Iran / Iraq was completely justified, given the threat of militant Islam which has manifested current events. \_ And here's the crux: When did we tell them that? I'd love to see that url. \_ You're aware this pre-dated the current concept of 'the web' and urls, right? So the odds of getting an accurate and direct quote from that time is near zero. When you find the url that proves it either way, please come back and let us know. In the mean time, those of us old enough to recall the events will just have to get by with our aged and withering memories. \_ Graduated in '92. Are my memories not fresh enough for you? 'Cause I do not recall Bush telling Saddam not to do it when Iraq massed troops on the border. \_ 92? Sorry. You were still under the thumb of the Berkeley PC establishment. Maybe next time. By comparison, even now many still don't understand the logic behind the 2nd Gulf War. \_ It wasn't a second war. It was the completion of the first which should've come years before GWB2 got into office. \_ http://www.thememoryhole.org/mil/bushsr-iraq.htm Basically Bush Sr didn't want to get us into the situation that we are in now: having to occupy and rule an Arab nation against international opinion. \_ Couldn't say it better than GWB himself: link:tinyurl.com/amxh (RealPlayer file) |
2003/5/8 [Science/GlobalWarming, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28369 Activity:high |
5/7 Day 47. Still no wmds. \_ But I bet the jews are pleased at getting america to do their dirty work. \_ Are you really an anti-semite or do you just play one on the motd? \_ KILL THE JEWS! KILL THE JEWS! http://www.masada2000.org for details. \_ Haven't you heard already? The bar has been lowered. All we're looking for now is evidence that they used to have WMDs several years ago. \_ Frankly, I never cared if there were or weren't. The WMD was just for the consumption of the great masses. I believe what we were really doing was cleaning up the mess we left behind in 91 and the only disappointment is that it took 12 years to get around to it. \_ I disagree... I'm not against the war per se (incidentally I am against the war, but that's a seperate discussion) but what I am against is anyone who believes that the reason we are there had anything to do with "wmd's" or terrorism. We are there to satisfy the needs of american business... anyone who doesnt realize that this country is run by corporate america is deluding themselves. \_ What business is in the Iraq? WTF are you talking about? It took two years to find Saddams nuclear program after GWI. \_ OIL! stupid. Iraq has the 2nd largest oil reserve in Arab world. and Bush just issued a plan to "privatize" much of Iraqi economy. Take a wild guess which company will end up buying the assets of formal Oil Ministry of Iraq? By the way, if you notice, virtually all of the government building were looted, except the Oil Ministry. Hostipal, water treatment plants, Universities were all allowed to be looted, (by some account, even encouraged by US soldiers) but Oil field, and its refinary infrastructure were well protected by US arm and forces. 70 years ago, US forces were doing the same thing inside China protecting the interest of then Standard Oil company. So, this is not something new. Just please believe that we are doing all these for the goodness of the mainkind. \_ OIL OIL OIL! OILITY OIL OIL OIL! OILITY OIL! |
2003/5/5 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28329 Activity:nil |
5/4 "We went to war just to boost the white male ego" http://csua.org/u/e42 |
2003/5/4 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Asia/Korea] UID:28327 Activity:high |
5/4 The UN solves a critical hunger crisis with skill and diplomacy without resorting to military force in this link. If it was the Bushies, you know the military would've been called in and we'd be bombing the whole place "in order to save it and feed the hungry": http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,449436,00.html \_ Kinda how they solved that Cultural Revolution, Khmer Rouge Korean crisis, Idi Amin, Rwanda... Sorry to say it, but you are a moron, and Im putting it nicely. \_ Sorry to say it, but you got trolled, and I'm putting it nicely. \_ As did you... \_ That's pretty pathetic. |
2003/5/3 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28312 Activity:nil |
5/2 So we still haven't found WMD in Iraq yet. Assuming we never do, and it turns out the intelligence was all wrong, do you think we should apologise, leave and help Saddam get his country back? In not, why not since we went in under false pretenses if we find nothing. Iraq was innocent. \_ The WMD were indeed just a pretense (as the War on Terrorism was already funded, this kept them from needing to secure funding specifically for ousting that really bad guy who just happens to sit on humongous oil reserves. go go gadget congress). But there were many reasons why we went to war. However, the administration has to answer the people on this point (snicker snicker). I'm interested to see how they handle this question come election time. |
2003/4/30 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/India, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Israel] UID:28274 Activity:high |
4/30 Initially when we went into Somalia, the people loved the US troops. We brought them food and they were fed. After the situation stabilized the Somalis turned against us. And culminated by dragging a dead US soldiers through the streets. Beware that history might repeat itself. \_ Tell that to George W. "I look to history, but only selectively" Bush. \_ Wow, that's a really cool rewrite of history. I like how you saw a hollywood movie made from a book and then decided how the world works from there and can be applied to all other cases the same way. I'm glad you don't work in foreign affairs. Keeping hacking java. Stick with what you know, you'll do better. \_ Yea, like I said, this looks like another Palestine, except a few times larger. \_ Somalia was never stablized. Warlords ruled most of the country. The US went in to cover food aid and then got mixed up in nation building. Right now, Afghanistan is a closer match but without constant media showing Somalia's millions of starving. Iraq will be MUCH different from both. I agree with the Palestine analogy. \_ Only difference is that unlike Israel, US civilians are not at the scene, and hence not as exposed. Hopefully US military personnel fend for themselves better. Otherwise, it can get ugly. |
2003/4/30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe, Politics/Foreign/Asia/India] UID:28270 Activity:kinda low |
4/30 http://nypress.com/16/18/news&columns/cage.cfm \_ Nice. In all fairness, description as follows: Scathing Op/Ed piece on NYTimes' lack of journalistic integrity. |
2003/4/29-30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28261 Activity:moderate |
4/28 http://csua.org/u/df5 US Pulls out of Saudi Arabia. \_ All trolling and meta trolling deleted. And on the US isn't pulling out. Sheesh. What sort of imperialist hegemon would pull up and leave the most oil rich country in the region? \_ The hegemon with a new, more mobile armed forces transformed to respond to a nonconventional, often hidden enemy. \_ And a new country to play with that has lots of room, it's own oil, and borders on RILO (Regimes I'd Like to Overthrow). \_ you know the acronym is only clever if you don't have to spell it out you fucking moron. \_ If we pull out of Saudi Arabia then the terrorists have already won. \_ Don't worry. We're not pulling out. \_ Yermom is now happier. |
2003/4/26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28234 Activity:high |
4/25 Repton soldier dies According to her account, Jenkins was working in crowd control in Baghdad when an Iraqi child playing with unexploded ordnance approached a group of soldiers, tossing it toward them. Jenkins recognized the danger and threw himself on the explosive as it detonated... http://tinyurl.com/ad1e \_ Another victim of the imperialist hegemon. They want a war? Let's give them a revolution! Regime change in Washington! \_ ANOTHUR VICTIM UV THE 1MPURIALIST HEGUMON! THEY WANT A WAR?!?1?!? LETZ G1VE THUM A REVOLUSHUN! REGIME CHANGE IN WASH1NGTON! |
2003/4/26-27 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28233 Activity:very high |
4/25 Can foreigners file lawsuits against US citizens, corporations, or other entities in the US? \_ Unfortunately, yes in most circumstances. \_ of course! What you think if you break a contract with a foreigner they can't sue you for breach of contract or something? \_ ok. Then why can't the Iraqi people file a class action lawsuit for wrongfully death of their family members as a result of the bombing? \_ They can, and they should. Unfortunately, US courts have a tendency to dismiss cases against the military in times of "war." The only way they're likely to see any results (and this is a long shot) is if they take it up with the World Court at the Hague. \_ which US does not recognize. USA has a tendency to disregard international law of any sort when they found it inconvenient. \_ there's no such thing as international law. all countries ignore this silly internation law fantasy when they find it inconvenient and why shouldn't they? do you *really* want some 3rd world dictators deciding how you can live your life in this country? do you want the EU making the same decisions? there aint no democracy in the UN, kids. i never understood why *any* American citizen would want the UN to have any power or control over our government. maybe it is just a case of simple ignorance about the UN and the world in general. or maybe you're just trolling? either way, it's a silly concept. \_ Don't be stupid. UN has served us well for years. It's a good tool for controlling the world. Only the current president is incompetent in using the UN to achieve US goals. \_ Please cite a war or genocide it has prevented. The UN was founded by Communists, prevented. Provide evidence for all this success you cite. Could it be you are historically ignorant? The UN was founded by Communists, and continues to be run by Communists, look it up. \_ A big chunk of the world really don't give a fuck about your commie liberal right wing facist war. If US is so great, why did it kill Indians, invade Filipines, oppressed blacks, experiment on its own people? Why should anyone trust your benevolence? Why don't you just fuck off and stop bothering other countries. \_ Good plan. Anyone who has ever done anything bad in the past is not permitted to attempt to do anything good forever after. I like it. I predict world-wide chaos and complete collapse within about 5 minutes of the enforcement of that policy. Can I vote for you for public office? \_ Well, the person is saying abolish the UN and just trust US benevolence. US has shown again and again that it mostly only cares about its own self- interest. Why did it give all the chemical weapons to Saddam? Sorry, we'll pass. Fuck off. \_ Idiot. All countries only care about their own self interest. Any country that doesn't won't be around for too long. Can you be anymore naive? I think not. \_ Oh, so you believe in law of the jungle. I see. \_ I believe in reality. Please name the country that has ever acted in anything other than self interest in foreign affairs and policy. \_ At no point did anyone say to just trust the US. If you want to create your own straw man to knock down and it somehow makes you feel smart to do so then be my guest. Just do it somewhere else. I'm sure there are plenty of mindless forums out there that would welcome your sort of anti-intellectualism. \_ It's called using a strawman against a strawman. If you can't take it, go away. \_ No. It's called making shit up and putting words in other people's mouths. Your debate fu is weak. \_ If UN did not sanction Iraq for 10 years, Saddam would have been able to acquire all kinds of new and replacement parts for its army. \_ If the UN hadn't sabotaged sanctions, they might have worked. \_ Sanctions haven't ever worked anywhere. The victim country ends up with hungry civilians while the leaders and military continue to shit on gold toilets and fill their Swiss bank accounts. \_ *sigh* ok, i'll bite. Run by communists now? what? do you mean people who used to be communists? people who are just as bad as communists? or do you actually believe that the whole UN is controlled by the Chinese? \_ I'm not the previous person, and he's wrong about the communist thing but he was close. It's really run by a bunch of socialists which is just as bad. \_ just as bad? socialists? so northern european countries that have socialized healthcare and more welfare than you agree with are as evil as the Soviet Union or the Kmer Rouge? Do you seriously believe that? This is exactly how communists sound when they talk about the evil capitalist imperialist oppressors. and they're full of shit, too. \_ Evil right winger nutter imperialist hegemon fascist! How *dare* you raise a challenge to the New World Order and Internation Law as embodied by the corrupt beaurocrats at the UN? Next, you'll be coming up with links about how UN 'peace keepers' have engaged in the sex slave trade almost everywhere they're sent. How could you think such a thing of people who only have your best interests at heart? From each according to their ability, to each according to his need (or ability to manipulate the leftist press in the EU and USA). \_ Nah, US is the New World Order. \_ Uhm, no. That's not what was ever meant at all. Start a new top level thread if you want to discuss this in detail. \_ Actually, no, they can't. Anyone can file anything they'd like but it's going to be instantly dimissed. Anyway, there weren't any wrongful deaths. \_ they *should*? Who are you, some kind of anti-war fanatic? -gw bush #1 fan \- in general you can only sue the govt, when the govt decides to let you sue "him" ... so in some cases the govt may reserve the standing issue to citizens. the jurisdictional issue is more complicated. you may wish to learn about "conflict of laws" also read something like C. Rembar: The Law of the Land on the development of the right to sue the king. --psb \_ we all knew this. you're taking it too seriously. (and anyoen who didn't know this can go back to where ever they came from!) |
2003/4/25-26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28231 Activity:moderate |
4/25 War is just a racket: http://www.fas.org/man/smedley.htm \_ And doesn't work with cable modem? \_ Full text: http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm \_ Nice little communist rant from before everyone understood how poorly communism works in the real world. This guy dropped dead in 1940 for those not interested in reading pre-WWII communism++ garbage. \_ The man's points are valid even if you don't agree with his politics. |
2003/4/19-20 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28174 Activity:high |
4/19 Question for you video nerds. If you have a giant pile of videos of Saddam Hussein, how hard is it to make a convincing piece of "new" footage? Could any yahoo with some artistic skill and a good computer do this? If so, what's all the fuss about these bits of footage of Hussein? \_ Synthesizing novel convincing human motion from data is an interesting open problem in computer vision. -- ilyas \_ There is a new video clip showing Hussein with Laci Peterson! \_ It's not Laci Peterson, it's Laci Rocha. \_ All you need is a PM and FCP. Seeing is not believing. |
2003/4/19 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28171 Activity:high |
4/19 The impending battle to lift UN sanctions on Iraq Russia in New Push to Lift Iraq UN Sanctions (FLASHBACK 2000) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/896221/posts \_ Oh, those rascally Russians. I mean, it's not as if the U.S. has changed its mind and dropped all pretence of Iraq actually having WMD. |
2003/4/17 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28150 Activity:high |
4/16 Blix will save us and lend us credibility! And oh yeah, let's make the Middle East nuclear free so it's safe for Arabs to attack Israel again! Gotta love those ultra leftist Europeans for their transparency http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A44572-2003Apr17.html \_ 1. The Bushies have yet to show us the proof that either Iraq or Syria have WMD. \_ I'm sure the childish little ding on their name lends much credibility in the circles you walk in. I don't care if there isn't a single WMD in the entire country. There's 24+ million people now free of brutal oppression. Does that mean *nothing* to you? \_ It does. And if things turn out well that will be great. But if you remember the whole reason for the war in the first place was SADDAM HAD WMDS AND WE HAD TO GET THEM BEFORE HE GAVE THEM TO TERRORISTS. \_ Saddam is gone. Things have already turned out well. And there were many reasons to go into Iraq. I don't care which of the 15-20 announced reasons you'd like to latch on to. I'm happy that Saddam is out of power and maybe dead, that the Baath party in Iraq is dead, that the Kurds are free, that the Shi'ites are free, that there's one less country supporting terrorists, and that finally the US is properly feared and respected as the super power it is and not a paper tiger willing to be bound by the dictates of the jealous and bitter weaklings who dominate the UN who would love to take advantage of our generally good nature to fuck us over, keep us down, and then spit on our graves once we bowed to "the international community", whatever *that* is. \_ Wow. Can we meet so I can do a psych profile on on you and the roots of your aggression against the world? \_ Did our "generally good nature" also led us to support such lovely rulers like Pinochet, Marcos, Suharto, ... , and yes, Mr. Hussein himself? Not to mention Mr. Bin Laden too. \_ Things have not turned out yet. Things are still in motion. The war continues. 2. Israel does not need nukes to deter an attack from its neighbors-- its military forces and its superior battlefield technology do that. \_ So the Israelis wasted their time and money on the nukes? Maybe you should write a letter to their embassy explaining. While you're at it you might explain how their conventional forces will help deter anything when (not if) some nuthead gets nukes in the region. Which military college or school of international affairs did you get your PhD from, btw? \_ It is not as easy to build/acquire nuclear weapons as you imply. Do some research before you spread panic. Next, as things stand now (as opposed to your pre- Armaggedon fantasy), the Israeli military and its level of tech are sufficiently superior to their neighbors to deter a conventional attack. The nukes are a nice piece of insurance, admittedly, but they are not the end-all of military preparedness or deterrence. \_ And you would know because you've previously ruled a place the size of California and know that it's hard to hide stuff in a place so small? \_ well they swore they had proof of WMDs, so you would think that me[a]nt(sp) they had some idea WHERE THEY WERE. \_ I wouldn't think that at all. Why would you think that? \_ And, not that it really seems to matter to the current administration, but our credibility is short on this point. Blix was correct in saying 'internationally backed inspections would have "considerably more credibility."' \_ Credibility? With who? I'd rather know that Americans were there and come up with whatever is or isn't there then go along with the spy infested anti-American UN inspections team who now has even less incentive to prove Iraq had WMD. \_ The world outside of the US and Britain does matter, no matter how much the Bush apoligists try to deny it. It is amusing to see how Bush's rhetoric has changed entirely from talking about WMD to "freedom." "The Iraqi's are liberated!" conquest==liberation in Bushspeak |
2003/4/17 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28145 Activity:nil |
4/16 About the Private Lynch thing, yeah the article is silly when you look at it as a "this was a special forces rescue, of course they handcuffed everyone, pointed guns at them, etc." However it also is obvious that if YOU had been the person handcuffed, threatened, etc. you'd probably not be too happy either. This is why many Iraqis aren't so happy with the us occupying the country. They don't love having foreign invaders who can't even speak their language come in and point guns at them. Oh and I wonder how many of you thought the whole Elian retrival thing was done perfectly ok. \_ Dr. Harith's reaction sounded pretty effete and out of touch |
2003/4/16-17 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28141 Activity:high |
4/16 The Truth about the Private Lynch rescue http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,5944-648517,00.html \_ frankly, Dr. Harith sounds pretty effete and out of touch \_ How so? \_ he said his colleagues weren't treated courteously during the POW rescue \_ How dreadful! They used standard swat team tactics to go into a place with unknown dangers and actually dared to do as trained and not assume that just because some clown is wearing a stethoscope that he's a nice friendly happy smiley doctor. It would've been better if they didn't cuff him and he pulled a gun and shot a few I guess. \_ It would have been better if they'd secured the area and then let the doctors get on with their work. \_ WTF do you think they mean by "securing the area"?? Everyone who isn't on the team goes into cuffs and gets a boot on their back. That's what it means. The ignorance around here is shocking. \_ They walk in, raise their arms and show their naked palms in the international sign of nonbelligerence, and say, "Ok, people, now please don't do anything." What do *you* think "securing an area" means? \_ lol \_ True, can't really argue with you on that one. But keep in mind some of these doctors are still a little touchy from Gulf War I when we were bombing their hospitals. \_ I wonder if Lynch will ever be able to tell her own story. \_ Probably after she leaves the Army, but not until then. \_ If an Iraqi told you guys the US Flag originally had 100 stars, but Bush had the CIA secretly remove 1/2 of them using the FBI and special forces, you'd probably start checking the ashes of the last flag you burned to look for the missing 50 stars. -ax \_ I didn't read the link. Why would I care? Is there a conspiracy about her rescue? Was she really not rescued? Did the evil Bush admin send out special ops to change the road sign so she could be ambushed and then rescued for PR purposes later? Don't you have something better to worry your little head about? \_ I didn't read your post. You suck. \_ Yes. You did read my post. Anyway, I got a few minutes and read the link. It was even more stupid than I imagined. \_ What makes it stupid? It sounds like a pretty likely scenario for what happened. What is stupid is the US insistence on stonewalling the whole thing. We did nothing to be ashamed of. \_ It's stupid because it's the standard droning anti-US noise told entirely from a single perspective without the slightest shred of critical thought or research into the hows or whys of the way a swat team style action works. "I look like a doctor so I should be left alone to wander about in a combat zone doing my doctoring!" Ridiculous. So anyone who can find a white coat and a tie shouldn't be secured in a combat zone? Need I go on? \_ What's stupid is the US media repeatedly calling it a "daring" rescue attempt. Now we know how "daring" it was. \_ Silly rabbit, the whole rescue took place in Sound Stage 9. There was no war. There was no ambush. There were no POWs. And there certainly was no rescue. Lynch is actually a bit actress who did soft porn on the side. \_ They probably used the same stage as the moon landing. \_ Naw, they use computer graphics nowadays. The same team that did Shrek, I think. \_ I thought she looked a little like the village girl from Wag The Dog. \_ Lynch is not as busty. |
2003/4/15 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28126 Activity:very high |
4/15 First the national museum, now, the national library. And believe me, history will blame USA for this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2948021.stm \_ It wasn't the library at alexandria. I agree it's a loss but it is hardly an earthshaking one. History may blame anyone they want for anything but I know of ~30m Iraqi's who are happier free sans old books than enslaved with old books right now. Perhaps it would be better to not help anyone who lives near a library because, hey, books are more important than people, eh? \_ That was a really weak attempt at justifying the American forces do nothing while morons burn the Iraq's national library, please try again. - danh \_ I don't know. Life in Iraqi still sucks more than pre-sanction Iraq. It may improve, but it's a big hole to climb out of. \_ In fact, a good number of those interviewed are saying that the same bullies are back in power (Baghdad police), and that only Saddam has changed. \_ Yes, but they're OUR bullies now. Go Democracy! |
2003/4/14 [Reference/Military, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28111 Activity:nil |
4/13 The US is at war with Syria. The US has always been at war with Syria. |
2003/4/13 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28103 Activity:high |
4/12 motd conservatives, when we don't find WMD, will you vote for impeachment? http://www.sundayherald.com/33080 \_ no. why do you say "when we don't"? \_ RTFL. Looking more likely day by day. \_ You do realize this doesn't even make sense don't you? Impeach- ment is not for getting rid of someone you don't like. It's for getting rid of a TREASONOUS president. Nothing Bush has done can be construed as treason. Remember, Clinton was not impeached for sex, he was impeached for lying to a Grand Jury. \_ invading Iraq, endangering citizen of USA for nothing... i think it's a treasonous act. \_ Iraqi Information minister also states, "We have completely defeated the American Dogs, and driven them from Bagdad! Isreal is next!" \_ Why dignify such stupidity with a reply. The depravity of the op is self-evident. |
2003/4/11 [Politics/Domestic/Election, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28086 Activity:high |
4/11 http://desmoinesregister.com/news/stories/c2229999/20980532.html Truly amazing. If we'd gotten butchered they would've said to bring the troops home to avoid Vietnam quagmire. We roll over them and they say that proves we didn't need to be there. Some people will twist anything to suit their agenda. \_ how many different ways do you listen to bill o'reilly? tv? radio? car radio? mp3 player? his stupid "oh I'm being oppressed!" newspaper column? fan fiction? truly amazing. \_ WTF are you talking about? I don't listen to BO'R and if I did so what? Ad hominen is not an effective debate tactic. \_ Where are those weapons of mass destruction? \_ Since there are over 1000 sites and the US/Brit forces don't yet have safe control of the country and they've only checked out 20 sites and it can take more than a week to test a sample and then double check it because in this case they *must* be certain, the WMD are either in labs all over the country or in some cases being tested right now. You expected what? Big glowing neon signs that say, "WMD HERE!"? |
2003/4/11 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28079 Activity:insanely high |
4/10 NOOSE TIGHTENS ON IRAQ-SEPT. 11 CONNECTION link:www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/5599583.htm \_ Just curious for those who believe there's no connection between Iraq and terrorism against the US: if the US comes up with either documents or people in post-Saddam Iraq that say otherwise will you believe it? Is there anything that would change your mind? |
2003/4/11 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28075 Activity:nil |
4/10 The News We (CNN) Kept To Ourselves http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/11/opinion/11JORD.html \_ So this idiot didn't tell these stories because it would've gotten people killed or tortured yet his stories are all about people getting killed and tortured. I see appeasement has once again worked well to keep people safe from oppression and suffering. |
2003/4/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28074 Activity:nil |
4/10 Saddam's Yacht drifting. According to maritime law, it's yours for the taking if you can salvage it. http://csua.org/u/cdb sell it on ebay for millions of dollars and then brag about it on the motd. |
2003/4/10 [Politics/Domestic/California, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28073 Activity:nil |
4/11 Do you really think Democracy will work in Iraq? What if everyone votes to have another form of government? |
2003/4/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28068 Activity:high |
4/10 One of my "liberal" coworkers was against the war, and now that we've "liberated" the Iraqis, she's arguing about how great it is that they no longer have this oppressive regime that would torture its people and so forth. So do most supporters of the war think that it is about a) Regime change for the Iraqis: b) Nat'l Security: c) Financial Gain for Americans as a whole: \_ Few people doubted that US would win militarily without too much trouble. I personally predicted 2 weeks when asked. I was a little too optimistic. I have always found the WMD and Al Queda link accusations weak in evidence and the response disproportionate. Regime change for the benefit of Iraqis is the only possibly legitimate justification for killing tens of thousands of Iraqis. However, regime change as justification is illegal under international laws and may become a dangerous precedent, so the WMD excuse. I hope things work out well. \_ Really? It was just a couple weeks ago when pundits were muttering about fedayeen, too few troops, and I thought I even heard talk of quagmire. For example (abstract only), http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FA0D1EFD35540C748EDDAA0894DB404482 \_ That's relatively speaking, like arguing whether Cal's football team would lose 52-6 or 42-10, and the opposing side's coach telling his players not to take Cal lightly. \_ did you even read the link? to quote: "It is not likely to change the outcome of the war, but it will prolong the fighting, make it more costly for his adversaries and profoundly affect the way it is seen in other Arab countries and around the world." now in light of this quote, is your Cal analogy fair? \_ How about this? http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A34229-2003Mar26 \_ What about it? Army guys playing down expectations and painting a more formidable enemy to cover themselves in case things don't go as well as planned? What do you expect them to say? "This is a turkey shoot." ? \_ Again, did you even bother to read the link? \_ Err ... yes. Did you? Also, try using http://csua.org, at least for the long nytimes link above. \_ It is about A and B. C is a long term side effect but in the short term wars cost money. \_ U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A!!! |
2003/4/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28066 Activity:very high |
4/9 Ignorant Arab Americans don't understand Al Jazeera was always on their side and just trying to tell the truth. http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/Midwest/04/09/sprj.irq.dearborn.rally/index.html \_ Weapons grade plutonium found in huge underground area beneath Iraqi nuclear complex. Fox News Channel was always on our side and just trying to tell the truth. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,83821,00.html \_ Unfortunately Fox is trigger happy with reporting, so we'll have to wait and see.c \_ U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A!!! |
2003/4/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28064 Activity:insanely high |
4/9 It is sickening that the Iraqi people who welcome the imperialist hegemon instead of rising up to fight to protect the Leader of the Arab nation and throw off the yoke of their Western oppressors who will only enslave them, exploit their resources, and place them under the control of a military dictator. Don't they understand they were much better as a free Arab nation. I shed tears for the Iraqi people who lived in a free republic only days ago and are now slaves. [this is what you extreme leftists sound like to other people] \_ Nice try Trollboy. Go back under the bridge. -gwbush \_ Silly troll, the knee-jerk liberal reaction you seek is to be found out on Sproul Plaza. Go thither with your mocking scree, that they may jackboot you in the head. -gwbush \_ He shoots! He scores! The crowds go wild! Troll leads 1:0! -gwbush \_ nope, just to you \_ as an extreme leftist how would you know how you look to other people? \_ Why should I care how one extremist views another, trollbot? \_ Sorry, you're knocking on the wrong door. I voted for Clinton twice. |
2003/4/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28061 Activity:nil |
4/9 to that guy who is so upset the media keeps covering the deaths of journalists, here's a BBC guy who thinks the Iraqis did it: http://csua.org/u/cce - danh \_ It's not hard to find out if US really didn't do it and want to clear its name. I mean, they have the control of the hotel and can easily to find the fragment of the explosive shell. By the way, Al Jazeera's office was hit by a missile. Considered Al Jazeera's office was on US target list in the past, considered that US has overwhelming control of its proximity, it is unlikely that it was the works of Iraqi. \_ Idiot. We also dropped 3 missiles into Iran and at least 1 in Turkey. Must be we're at war with Iran and Turkey, too, huh? It's a *war*. Shit happens in war. It isn't a nice near clean little ps/2 shoot em up. People die. Even people no one was aiming at. I've got sympathy for the civilians too stupid or unable to leave the city beforehand. The journalists? Fuck 'em. They're vultures. We didn't kill nearly enough of them. There were Iraqis all over the city at the time. It *very* easily could have been Iraqis. Your "considering" is armchair bullshit. I don't know who it was but it doesn't take a brain the size of a planet to figure out it could have been either side. Your attempt to look like an intellectual while really just showing your "hate America" bias is transparent. \_ just a guess, 4 years ago you were probably pretty rabidly anti-the government in charge and made all sorts of wild accusations about abuses. So why was that not hating america? \_ We'll be at war with Iran soon enough. \_ yet *more* journalist death coverage? enough already! will this journalistic narcissism ever stop? \_ ok now you're just being dumb and you're no longer funny. please start spouting off about ride bike/use gnu-linux, thanks. |
2003/4/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28052 Activity:very high |
4/9 I'm supporting the efforts in Iraq. However, do you think the U.S. media is underemphasizing civilian casualties and underemphasizing the grieving families of the casualties? \_ Underemphasizing civilian casualties and INSTEAD showing grieving families? That's a strange dichotmy, because I've seen both in the news. \_ I meant underemphasizing both civilian casualties AND showing the grieving families. -op \_ your clarification is suck. You need to use underemphasizing twice so it is clearer. \_ No. \_ Yes, unquestionably. \_ I don't know about underemphasizing civilian casualties, but they sure as heck are over emphasizing the press casualties. \_ are you the guy from earlier? what's your deal? you get raped by a paperboy in junior high? - danh \_ Yes, yes, It's all true! Why me? WHY?!?! \_ Yeah but those are brown people. There's lots of them... \_ there are lots of "brown" people in America and in the U.S. military. \_ Yeah, but they're *our* brown people. \_ Do you think the media underemphasized the grieving families of those killed in 9/11 at the towers and the pentagon? I think the media has done just fine making Iraqis into real human beings while making dead American civilians and military into body count. \_ are you trying to draw a link between iraq and 9/11? Troll boy. \_ No, I'm showing you how the media treats Americans as body count but people from other countries become real human beings for some reason. This is a knock on the American hating media, not a trollish link. \_ U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A!!! |
2003/4/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28049 Activity:nil |
4/9 I am getting annoyed at the coverage of the 3 reporters killed at the Palestine Hotel and the Al Jazeera office. 100+ US and British soldiers were killed. Hundreds of Iraqi civilians dead. Thousands of Iraqi soldiers gone. And the press obsesses over 3 reporters? Get a grip and get some perspective. \_ Everyone knows the Palestine Hotel is full from top to to bottom with journalists, the balconies are brimming with cameras covering the war, Al-Jazeera told US Central Command months ago where their offices are, and the US armed forces can't get it together enough to refrain from shelling the hotel? It says in in the Geneva Convention somewhere "Thou shall not fire tank shells at journalists, not even Arab ones, sayeth the Lord." \_ It's still 3 dead out of thousands. How many apartments and markets were bombed? How many innocents killed? Let's have more coverage of that. Or is the life of a reporter worth more? \_ hey we're all on the same side here. a big issue is the us army claims it heard or saw gunfire coming from the palestine hotel and felt the need to shell it, forgetting that the remaining, alive reporters in the building heard no gunfire at all for hours before they got hit with a tank round. \_ I applaud your overuse of linefeeds. \_ Hello? Reporters are human beings, not newsbots. Their #1 concern at all times is themselves. Why do you think they *still* talk about Herb Caen in the Chron? \_ There is a difference between knowing *why* a story is there and accepting that the story *should* be there. Perhaps the difference is too subtle for you. -OP \_ oh! what a zinger! perhaps you should re-read the OP and see that, unlike you, I was actually on topic. thanks! \_ Adding "-OP" to your post after I reply doesn't help you any. Go re-read what you said and try not to do any more post-reply editing. It's cheap and makes you look stupid. \_ Note my original post's use of the term "perspective". It takes no great genius or empathy to appreciate why a story about the death of journalists would be of interest to other journalists. It requires perspective to place those deaths in the context of the thousands other innocents killed in the war, and to understand over-coverage of the 3 dead at best shows a lack of impartiality and fairness, and at worst diminishes the loss of those thousands other dead. The question was never why the coverage was there. The question has always been whether the coverage was appropriate. The other participants in this thread have grasped that distinction. It is a shame that you have not. -OP \_ Death rate of reporters in current war: 1% Death rate of coalition forces: 0.1% \_ Yeah, but "full from top to bottom with journalists" doesn't mean that people with guns can't be in it too. Also, I bet that a camera-man "shooting" you looks similar to a dude pointing a rocket-launcher at you. \_ there were no guys with RPGs in the palestine hotel. I concede that a bunch of cameras sticking out of windows on balconies might look like weapons. It doesn't excuse theq us army from lying about hearing weapons fire from the hotel. plus they're still lying around it, publically, but privately saying "yeah we might have made a mistake and thought those cameras looked like iraqi republican guard." \_ And of course it isn't at all possible that it was a round from an Iraqi shooting at the Americans? Nope, can't be that. Not at all possible for stray rounds to kill reporters IN THE MIDDLE OF A FUCKING WAR ZONE, GENIUS!!! sheesh. \_ It was Geraldo. He snuck back into Iraq and was shooting wildly with his six gun like a drunken cowboy. |
2003/4/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28048 Activity:nil |
4/9 And here comes the lies and illusions of the imperialist hegemon, claiming that the victims somehow killed themselves! media.guardian.co.uk/iraqandthemedia/story/0,12823,932481,00.html Of course, since we've heard from people in Jordan and the motd that the people celebrating in the streets is all just lies and there's no chance anyone could be happy to see the red white and blue roll into town crushing tha Baathist butchers directly responsible for the deaths of more than a million people, this journalist thing must not have happened either. The Americans aren't even in Baghdad. They're in a quagmire, shooting at everything that moves, unable to tell friend from foe on the ground. The Iraqi people shall rise up and destroy the evil imperialist hegemon invader in the name of Allah and the great Arab nation!!! Long live Saddam! Death to Bush! \_ Aren't these lyrics from the latest Toby Keith album? \_ U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A U-S-A! |
2003/4/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28047 Activity:nil |
4/9 How could we have a war without Jane Fonda getting in her two cents? http://www.startribune.com/stories/389/3814120.html ``What it's going to mean for (America's) stability as a nation, for terrorism, for the economy - I can't imagine,'' Fonda said Tuesday. I'm sure she can't. Jane, Jane, Jane, what are we going to do with you? Still trying to revive her proud moral position from Vietnam. \_ you make a good point--she was right, despite the derision lumped on her by pea-brained yahoos. \_ she was right? about what? I like the line about how they put on some silly staged play for her when she was in Vietnam and she was stupid enough to believe it was for real. \_ She was hot in Barbarella. |
2003/4/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28042 Activity:insanely high |
4/8 Fighting censorship here at motd. Restored FNS: Majority of foreign journalist in Iraq considered US' attack on Palestein Hotel and Al Jazeera Office an deliberate act. Contrary to what US DoD have stated, there were no fire fight anywhere near neither Palestein Hotel nor Al Jazeera office during the attack. Al Jazeera, which lost a journalist as result, pointed out that its office in Kabul during the war against Afghanistan was on US military's Target list and was destroyed. Aside from Al Jazeera, Office of journalist from Saudi Arabia and UAE were also destroyed by US military. \_ Dude. It's a fucking WAR. People are shooting all over the place. Mistakes happen. There is no conspiracy to slaughter journalists, there is no shadow directive to wipe out critical voices, there is no dark plot to silence opponents. Some yahoo was driving a tank down the street, thought he got shot at, and "shot back". These are nervous 19 year old kids with HS educations having grenades thrown at them, not smug know-it-all college brat armchair admirals. Furthermore, the guys reporting on this knew the risks when they put themselves in harm's way--war journalists get killed. Even good ones sometimes--Ernie Pyle and Robert Capa are just two examples. It doesn't excuse that it happened, but maybe you might consider wiping away your paranoid fog and _thinking_ before shooting off your gob. And PLEASE learn some basic English grammar before marking an ass of yourself--this is supposed to be a University. You're embarrassing. -John \_ Bzzt. Even the German press is disputing this claim. \_ Can you put up a link? Provide any proof at all aside from your vague accusations and unsubstantiated engrish conspiracy theories? Or are you really just the whiny-assed, just-got-to-college-and -am-still-full-of-antiestablishmentarianism bitch that you sound like? \_ I'm skeptical that the US would intentionally fire on journalists (what purpose would that serve), but every article I have seen on this incident has stated that witnesses in the area claimed that there was no fire coming from the Palestine Hotel: http://csua.org/u/cb7 (NYT) http://csua.org/u/cb8 (Guardian) http://csua.org/u/cb9 (Wash. Post) -!op \_ censorship in its worse form. US military desperately want to silence those who leak out information which they don't want people to know. By staging such superfical accident, you would be suprise how effective it can get. Then again, this is my personal opinion. I was refraining myself dumping personal bias when I posted the information earlier. The information sources are Television footages from various nations. It may sound overly negative because I have skipped all the American one. You guys can see that in the US yourself. -op \_ Thanks for the links. \_ You have no concept of what censorship means during war. The military is not there to gratify every civilians whim for full disclosure. The military must kill the enemy and, unfortunately, anyone else who gets in the way. Period. \_ You're preaching to the choir, man. I think you have me confused with another poster. \_ BS, I saw TV footage of weapons fire coming from the building. Maybe that was a hoax too? And frankly, you are in the middle of a battle field - what do you expect. \_ the TV footage is presumably provided by embedded American journalist. We don't know rather that particular footage is the Palestein Hotel or not. And, FYI, these are not accusation just from journalist of Arab origin, I know that Italians were saying the same thing. \_ The embedded journalists aren't all americans. Why do you dispute his claims based on the reports of some reporter who wasn't even there? \_ "pizza" is now called "freedom pie" \_ so's yermom |
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 [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 [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 [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/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 |
2003/4/7 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28017 Activity:nil |
4/7 Yeah Arnett... you were fired for telling the truth. Why don't you ask the interviewer to look out his windows now and see Stars and Stripes. \_ This is all an illusion. The Americans are in a quagmire in all parts of the country. They aren't 100km from Baghdad. They are stuck in the Baghdad airport. They have been beaten at the airport and send running. Hundreds of Americans were killed. They commit suicide against the walls of Baghdad and we encourage them to do so. There are no WMD in Iraq. Chemical Ali is still alive. Saddam is still in complete control. We have used only one third of our might. This shall be the mother of all battles! Peter Arnett is a quality journalist who reports the truth, not an American hating ultra leftist. And now you know the rest of the story! (I always wanted to say that... heh) \_ In all fairness, Arnett was once a quality journalist whose reporting won a pulitzer. These days he seems to be suffering the journalistic equivalent of stockholm syndrome. |
2003/4/6 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28008 Activity:high |
4/5 How come the US hasn't planted any "Made in IRAQ" WMD in Iraq yet? \_ Why would it have to? What difference would it make at this point? \_ You are right, the Bush adminstration has no credibility in any case. All their excuses for war have turned out to be lies. \_ Hmm. I was more implying that at this point, we're committed to the war, and whether we find WMD or not, US public opinion will remain largely unchanged. Now that we're actually in Iraq, I doubt finding WMD will sway international opinions much either. *shrug* \_ WMD was just an excuse. Iraq used chemical weapon roughly at the same time as USA used it against Vietnam. \_ Is this another reference to sarin? Or are you talking about agent orange? Including agent orange in the set of WMD is kind of semantic. \_ I believe he's referring to the discredited Peter Arnett stuff about using sarin in Vietnam on our own guys and local friendlies. Some people just can't but help believe anything bad said about America. |
2003/4/6-7 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe, Politics/Foreign/Asia/Others] UID:28007 Activity:insanely high |
4/5 What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is brought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy? - Gandhi \_ Gandhi was a British subject, disgruntled because he could not become an officer, who slept with preteen girls in the nude, was fixated on his own feces, gave tacit approval of the wholesale slaughter of Muslims after independence, advised the Jews of the Holocaust to go quietly, and was a supporter of the caste system. \_ Interesting; could you cite a few sources? \_ So what? Look up ad hominem. \- i imagine this is a troll, but in case it leaves some of with mistaken impressions: 1. he was a british subject as a consequence of birth. g. washington was also a british subject. 2. "couldnt not become an officer" ... "yes, g. washington also was disgruntled because he couldnt become archbishop of canterbury" 3. girls and feces ... feces not quite right. something possibly to the girl stuff. i dont think there was any accusation of molestation. YMWT(see) the play "gandhi vs. the mahatma". 4. muslim: the main reason i replied. that is 100% opposite to the actual state of affiars. 5. jews: dunno the answer there 6. caste system: more complicated than that People in india have much more complicated and diverse reactions and mpression of Gandhi in india. I dont think much of this particular quites but he has some others that much of this particular quote but he has some others that arent to be believed slavishly but worth thinking about. \_ You want a real answer? The answer is that it doesn't matter to the dead, but for millions of others who didn't get dead it matters a lot. It's a naive and childish but catchy little quote. \_ It matters to me, if I get a good paying job because the economy improves because market and consumer confience recovers because of a decisive military victory for whatever reason and because, in time, we will have virtually unlimited supply of fuel. \_ In time we will have a virtually unlimited supply of fuel, but not because of Iraq or the war. Rather the source will be our own waste coverted to fuel via a fast depolymerization process (see this month's discover for more info). \_ moron... in time, we will only be running out of fossil fuel. \_ The world has 2000-4000 years worth of coal, much of which is in the U.S. Probably a good 200 years of oil, also. I'm not advocating relying on fossil fuels, which is a bad idea for alot of reasons, but we're not running out any time soon. \_ on the contrary, estimates of oil reserves can vary widely. there are those who think oil will run out by the 2050's. I.e. well within your projected lifetime. \_ 2000+ years coal and 200 years oil!? Are you serious? URL for sources please? \_ I got those numbers from a UN report, which is available on the web, but I can't find it right now. if you're patient, I'll post it tomorrow, when I can ask the guy who showed it to me(I'll post it anyway.) |
2003/4/5 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:29936 Activity:nil |
4/4 Yesterday I noted a pre-invasion UN study that estimated 500k civilian injuries and wondered what the current estimate was. To partially answer that question, Iraq claims that 500 civilians have been killed in the conflict. A bit premature to say, but the UN estimate seems a bit high. \_ The UN estimate included deaths from starvation and disease. Plus we haven't reached Bagdhad yet, where the mass of civilian casualites can be expected. \_ Certainly more injuries and deaths is expected. Note that I qualified my point with "A bit premature to say". How many casualties from Basra? -OP \_ url please. \_ http://csua.org/u/c5f (sfgate.com) \_ Unlike the movies, being injured does not equate to being killed. That said, the current number of casualties is closer to 10K than 500k. But it's early and the UN assumed chem weapons would be used. Still time.... \_ I am certainly aware of the difference between injury and death. Note that I said "To partially answer that question". However, it seemed unlike that the ratio between injury and death is even 100 to 1. -OP \_ Generally it's between 2:1 and 5:1 depending on the cause. \_ How can the UN assume chemical weaponry would be used if the UN position is that there is no proof that Iraq possessed chemical weapons? Or did the UN assume the US would use chemical weapons? \_ The US is the villain here. We used sarin gas on our own guys in Vietnam (says P. Arnett). Why wouldn't we gas the Iraqi civilians, too? \_ Is it me, or does it seem that a lot of Sodans are rooting for more casualties? \_ It's not you. The extreme left wants a million Mogadishus and isn't happy that it's gone relative well thus far. It's like my HS english teacher who wanted to see 50,000 US casualties in whatever war we were in at the time so we'd come home and stop fighting. \_ I voted for Ralph Nader, and am a member of the extreme left. I was opposed to the starting of this war for many many reasons, but now that we are in it, I'm hoping we crush the Iraqi forces as fast as possible, with as few casualties as possible. Not all people who don't agree with you are just like your highschool english teacher. \_ Ralph isn't the extreme left. Sorry to tell you but you're a lot more mainstream than you seem to think. \_ Ralph is not mainstream (except maybe in SF). He got what, 3% of the vote??? \_ Bullshit. Nobody wants dead soldiers. We would however, prefer to see Bush cronies held responsible for the soldiers that have died, and the civilians, and the rampant bald-face lying, and the criminally inept diplomacy. Clinton was strung up on a rack for getting a little nookie. Bush has ruined the economy, destabilized the entire middle east, and given cushy contracts to his corrupt friends-- but if someone questions his peroxide-white reputation he's labeled an anti-American. \_ I'd normally respond to this point by point but it screams "troll" and I've been trolled enough lately. \_ How come people often ignore the fact that the economy had already started going downhill before Clinton's term ended? \_ everyone knew Gore would lose \_ Note that I did not say "more *US* casualties". In fact, given the rest of the thread, it should be obvious that I was talking about Iraqi (and specifically Iraqi civilian) casualty. I posted something that implied the civilian casualty situation isn't as dire as predicted, and a couple of posts jumped in within 5 minutes to try to imply that 1) I am grossly incompetent (to not even know the difference between injury and death), 2) there are many more casualties (URL please, btw), and 3) more is forthcoming. Hence my observation that some Sodans seem to want the casualty number to be (much?) greater. -OP \_ want and convinced it will be are two different things. I want a government that never lies to us, I know full well that wont ever be the case. |
2003/4/5 [Politics/Domestic/Crime, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28001 Activity:moderate |
4/4 http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/05/sprj.irq.sahaf/index.html Here's the best line from the article. I wonder how he plans to keep this promise and I wonder what the highly independent Al Jazeera has is reporting is going on at the airport: "Sahaf said he would take reporters to the airport later in the day, after it was cleaned up." \_ think poker bluff? |
2003/4/5 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:28000 Activity:high |
4/4 http://csua.org/u/c61 (http://www.cnn.com US troops introduce profiling to Iraq. Where will it stop?? \- Profiling is fine, racial profiling is not. -Smart Liberal oboxymoron \_ Oh yeah? You think they're looking at anyone who isn't of Middle Eastern origin like that? \_ moron , everyone in iraq is middle eastern, so they are not profiling race, but characteristics of paramilitary \_ Ah, the ignorant speak. So you don't know about all the people from African and South Asia that work in Iraq and thus live there and etc? You think the only people who might want to shoot an American soldier are Middle Eastern? This is clasic racial profiling. You should be ashamed of yourself for supporting this gross violation of human rights and heaping shame and humiliation on the Iraqi people in their own country! \_ Looking for tattoos indicating Fedayeen Saddam membership is gross violation of human rights? \_ Are they checking tatoos on the non-Arabs? If not, then yes, it is racial profiling. \_ you are the one that is racists, human beings can't be profiled as terrorists or paramilitary because of their race means that you are the racists , sack of shit \_ If this parsed into some form of English, I'd respond. \_ Yes -- normally I'm pretty decent at deciphering other people's egyptian, but I'm struggling with this one. -mice \_ That's why I chose to let this one go. Maybe the poster would like to come back and try again in modern English. \_ I think it's something like "you are the ones who are the ball-lickers." |
2003/4/5 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27999 Activity:low |
4/4 So is that the real slim saddam? \_ Will the real slim saddam please stand up? |
2003/4/4-5 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Others] UID:27994 Activity:high |
4/4 Associated Press article on Yahoo news: http://csua.org/u/c59 "Al-Jazeera is based in the Persian Gulf state of Qatar. It has received funding by Qatar's government but is an unusually independent voice in the Arab world." Does this give Al-Jazeera more credibility? \_ do you have a point? \_ I meant people have been saying that Al Jazeera is biased towards Iraq. Now that AP calls it independent, maybe it is not as biased as we think? the Iraq side. Now that AP calls it independent, maybe it is not as biased as we think? \_ No. It doesn't say what you think it says. It says it is an 'unusually independent voice in the Arab world' which means it doesn't necessary spout off the noise from the government that funds it, but isn't necessarily unbiased. So, no, it doesn't come across any more neutral than it did before you mis-read your own posting. \_ Of course they're biased. Al-Jazeera is based in an Arab country and their primary audience are Arabs. \_ So our US media are all biased too? \_ All media is biased. Some is more biased than others. \_ More than what? NPR? Fox News? \_ Than the motd. \_ The motd is the final authority on all things. \_ No it isn't. (hah! now you go into a Kirkian Logic Loop!) \_ But it is, but it says it isn't and if it says it isn't i\ t must not be because it is but if it is then it can't be because it says it isn\ 't but .. But it is, but it says it isn't and if it says it isn't it must not b\ e because it is but if it is then it can't be because it says it isn't but .. B\ ut it is, but it says it isn't and if it says it isn't it must not be because it\ is but if it is then it can't be because it says it isn't but .. But it is, bu\ t it says it isn't and if it says it isn't it must not be because it is but if i\ t is then it can't be because it says it isn't but .. But it is, but it says it\ isn't and if it says it isn't it must not be because it is but if it is then it\ can't be because it says it isn't but .. But it is, but it says it isn't and i\ f it says it isn't it must not be because it is but if it is then it can't be be\ cause it says it isn't but .. But it is, but it says it isn't and if it says it\ isn't it must not be because it is but if it is then it can't be beca |
2003/4/3 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27974 Activity:high |
4/2 'We didn't fly to Baghdad to drink coffee' (Former Russian Generals help Iraq prepare for war) http://www.gazeta.ru/2003/04/02/Wedidntflyto.shtml \_ They didn't do so well. |
2003/4/3 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27972 Activity:high |
4/2 Those who supported DOS attack on Al Jazeera and think Al Jazeera is pro Iraqi, think again: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2911935.stm \_ I'm a conservative, I don't think. \_ This is a perfect example. I, a conservative, originally posted the reply 'I'm a liberal, I don't think'. So, instead of an original witty reparte what does some moron do, but transpose the word 'liberal' for conservative. \_ Are you seriously bragging that you are the one who posted 'I'm a liberal, I don't think'!? \_ Thats a little better. \_ bad troll. no cookie. \_ all blatant trolling crap deleted. everything else left alone. \_ How can you distinguish this from two evil stepsisters fighting? \_ From that article: "The US and UK have accused the station of bias and criticised it for airing pictures of dead Western troops." Who is right? \_ Right? In what sense? |
2003/4/3 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Israel] UID:27968 Activity:high |
4/3 That Jessica Lynch is tough. I heard she shot several Iraqis and she didn't want to be taken alive. Two broken legs, broken arm, and at least one gunshot wound. \_ She's a Palestinian. \_ Uh, no, she's not. She's from Palestine, West Virginia. She's as white and American as a girl can get. \_ the guy above was joking... \_ What do you call someone from Philadelphia? She's a Palestinian. This is a useless but correct fact. \_ Do you have a URL you can post? This is interesting. \_ turn on cnn/msnbc/foxnews/cbs/whatever for 30 seconds. \_ like saving private ryan \_ no, nothing like saving private ryan. \_ Don't forget that she was also stabbed. \_ How'd she get the broken legs and broken arm? \_ I'm only guessing here, but from bullets? \_ Good assumption. \_ or maybe a little retrobution after she ran outta bullets and \_ or maybe a little retribution after she ran outta bullets and got captured. \_ I wonder why the Iraqi soldiers didn't execute her or sexually assault her. I thought extreme Muslims treat women with little respect. \_ Well, they said she was crying all the time. Maybe they just couldn't do it. \_ you dont know what they did to her. \_ We're pretty sure they didn't execute her, though. \_ Clones! |
2003/4/3 [Reference/Religion, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27964 Activity:high |
4/2 http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2003-04-02-freedman_x.htm Don't blame Jews for this war \_ I blame the Jews in West Palm Beach who voted for Pat Buchanan. \_ blame canada \_ Shut your fucking face, unclefucker \_ So I keep hearing how the Jews own the media and the banks and the government. Someone forgot to tell me where to sign up to get my share! --jewboy |
2003/4/3-4 [Reference/Military, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27963 Activity:very high |
4/2 All these discussion regards to weapon of mass destruction. Did we use Sarin gas during the Vietnam War? \_ no, we used agent orange. Fucked up the jungle good. And our own soldiers. \_ all signs point to maybe \_ No. Peter Arnett got busted and fired for saying so in 1998 with zero proof and CNN retracted the whole story. The guy has quite a journalistic record of excellence. \_ "Zero proof"? How about the testimony of multiple sources, including two military officers? The only reason CNN retracted the story was political pressure. \_ bullshit. URL. 2 military officers? The ones he was quoting that he hadn't even met? Or maybe it was the American officer he claimed got gassed and was dead yet was there in studio 25+ years later to confront him with his own lies? You're fucking nuts or intentionally ignorant. Or maybe I just got trolled... damn. Trolled again. \_ http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/tailwind_army.html We certainly used some kind of gas stronger than CS. Perhpas not Sarin, but the Army will not admit to what exactly it was. \_ exactly. the point is, we used weapon of mass destruction, and we are not particularly proud of it (remember NY Metro Museum wanted to do a exibition on 50 annualversiry of Hiroshima, but dropped the idea because political pressure?). Japan used chemical / biological weapon at a scale which makes Iraq looks like a child play, and we forgive them. If we take out this issue of WMD, what else you can think of to support US's war against Iraq? \_ exactly not. we didn't use nerve gas in vietnam and you have zero proof of it anywhere. \_ Governments in Japan and Germany are not the same as those in power during WW2. We did not forgive those war-time goverments; we hanged them. \_ go back to your history book. We forgave Japan. \_ Give me one source. _/ (reformatted to fit) \_ Emperor Shoowa stayed in throne until 1989. \_ General Hideki Tojo danced at the end of a rope in 1948 after an extensive trial that laid all blame at his feet. \_ On a powerless throne because it was easier than losing a half million more people on both sides doing an ugly mainland invasion. \_ Unit 731 of Japan: http://csua.org/u/c3e \_ "JAPAN ADMITS DISSECTING WW-II POWs" <DEAD>www.ipsystems.com/powmia/unit-731.html<DEAD> "The prisoners were eight American airmen ...... torn apart organ by organ while they were still alive." \_ And? Never doubted the claim, just the forgiveness. \_ Don't forget they also ate their POWs, including Aussies and Americans. \_ They were hungry. Have you no compassion?? We forgave them after we hanged a bunch of them. -John \_ We placed blame on certain people and hanged those people. This does not imply forgiveness; it implies assigning singular blame and punishment for crimes committed on behalf of a nation. \_ And after we demilitarized them and after we dismantled their government and after we sort occupied their country and after we nuked two of their cities.... \_ Yup. You want a job done right the first time around. In the case of the Germans, we didn't. What's all this about nukes anyway? We haven't nuked anyone in years. Nor have the Israelis or the Brits or the French or even the Rooskies. Nukes all around! \_ not if some giant fuckheads in the Pentagon and Congress have their way with implementing small scale nukes. I hate everyone right now. \_ Because he's there. Reason enough. \_ Who let the Jews get nukes?! \_ Clinton, who else?! What do you think that Monica Lewinsky was really looking for in Billy's pants? \_ Biological and chemical warfare covers more than what most people think (ie. death by disease or exposure to toxin). In Vietnam, Agent Orange was used, but mostly as a biological warfare tool. The chem part was "accidental" or unintended. The bio part was to remove jungle and destroy crops. Starvation is bio-warfare. The attacks GWI and GWII vs. water delivery and treatment sites, while \_ ageng 0 was a weed killer for jungles to remove enemy cover called infrastructure attacks, are biological in nature. It can be argued that while not using a WMD, the US is using biowarfare. \_ Then can I also say shooting an enemy with a gun is biowarfare, since it stops his biological function? \_ Hell, is feeding someone Mexican food biological warfare? How about milk if you're lactose intolerant? \_ Agent O was not to destroy crops. Sheesh. It's easier and cheaper to kill peasants if you want to stave out the country. \_ agent 0 was a weed killer for jungles to remove enemy cover |
2003/4/2 [Reference/Military, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27958 Activity:high |
4/2 Total number of US military deaths in Vietnam: 58,135 Present total US deaths in current gulf conflict(*): 44 The current conflict has been running for about 1 week. Extrapolating in a completely ridiculous fashion, we can conclude that the current conflict may continue for another 1321 weeks (25 years) before we see Vietnam's level of casualties. (*) Let's be honest here, Vietnam wasn't a war, it was a police action, so we'd be hard pressed to call the current conflict a 'war' \_ You could really not run a war worse than Vietnam. The civilians in charge at the time were complete morons. \_ Agree with the first part, but you seem to imply that our current civilians in charge are not, in fact, morons. \_ Maybe they're not morons, but morAns. http://sf.indymedia.org/uploads/morans.jpgmf3937.jpg \_ Notice that his T-shirt says "Cardinals"? That explains why. \_ What do you have against people from St. Louis? \_ It could always be the Arizona Cardinals... \_ St. Louis? Arizona? I was referring to Stanfurd. \_ And that would be Cardinal, sans 's' \_ So are we Cal Bears or Cal Bear? \_ Vietnam was a war. You degrade the men who served and the people who died by mincing words like that. Police action is when a cop pulls you over. Soldiers, platoons, mines, ambushes... that's war. \_ I meant no slight to the fine men and women who served and gave their boides and lives in Vietnam. I was, however taking a shot at the gub'mint of de good ole US of A. Vietnam was not a war. No decleration of war ratified by Congress was ever made. -op \_ That's hardly a worthy definition. Wasn't the war powers clause (prez can wage war for 90 days etc...) passed in 1974 in response to the war? It does not take congressional action to wage war, just generals and soldiers. \_ Actually, the war powers act was written to LIMIT the powers of the president. It didn't give him more power to wage war, it said that instead of being able to do whatever he wanted, he had to consult congress after at most 90 days. \_ Agreed, I meant that it was the result of Congress not liking the fact that a president can wage war without any official support. The relevant part was the fact that they considered what the executive branch had done was a war. \_ Depending on how one looks at it, Congress did give permission to make war with Vietnam with the passing of the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. Similarily GWII has been argued as a continuation of GWI (ie. the war never ended) or as an extension of the War Against Terrorism resolution (it made Afghanistan possible too). \_ But the Tonkin incident never happened. Still, you can only call Vietnam a war. \_ Yep and yep. Saddam wasn't part of Al-Queda and you see how well that worked out for Iraq. \_ Except the War Powers Act is clearly unconstitutional to begin with. \_ True, but then you have to get the courts to kill it. \_ Good god, it wasn't mean to be a discussion of the fucking war powers act you morons. It was meant to be a moderately interesting, albeit wholly unscientific factoid. -op \_ you're the moron who said it wasn't a war. |
2003/4/2 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27952 Activity:very high |
4/1 Is it possible that Iraqi RELEASE Jessica Lynch instead of what US said that she was being rescued? It doesn't make any sense that she was the only one who was rescued. \_ no, this is ridiculous. are you the founder of the local chapter of the "hate america first society"? much better to trust in the goodness of saddam and his militia fanatics than the us military rescuing one of their own? nuts. where do you get this crap from? \_ and it makes sense that Iraq released her? \_ Sure it does. First of all, she was wounded badly, possibly necessitating treatment that lightly wounded or uninjured POW's wouldn't need. Second of all, the Iraqi's are under no obligation to handle all of their POW's identically. I think if you'll look into this, you'll find that it's actually quite common for POW's to be split up upon capture -- I can think of a variety of reasons why -- morale, safety, secuity, secrecy, etc. -mice \- What do you think about the US releasing a list of targets in Baghdad 12 hrs before it bombs them? Then civilians can get the hell out of the neighborhood. If SADDAM uses this info to put hostages in the bldg, ostensibly this will be detected and the US can skip bombing those on that day and then go back to not announcing and say "see, saddam->bad". Is there any downside to this? ok tnx. \_ i assume this is hypothetical and we're not really releasing target lists. i think it's a terrible idea. you don't win wars playing patty cake. this isn't a playground scuffle. \- yes but there is a PR war too. Dropping leaflets doesnt win the war, but it might help on the margin. --psb the harder and faster and heavier they're hit now, the more lives will get saved in the long run by having it end sooner. \_ Well, I'd think that it would be pretty difficult to reliably identify POW's. If we could, then yeah, we'd very likely eschew bombing the building(s) housing them -- but you can make a pretty safe bet that there would be Special Operations guys moving in with little delay: Special Forces/ Delta, SEALs, etc. Of course, I'm a little more cynical. I suspect that motives of the 12 hour notice are less to do with humanitarian reasons and more to do with strategic/ political thinking. The targets that we're likely giving warning on aren't 'targets of opportunity', so they're not likely to move in 12 hours -- so in that respect the warning makes little difference. If there's civillians there, and US munitions kill them -- we can safely blame Saddam and his regime; if there aren't any then we still win the moral high ground with our humanitarianism. Of course, I wasn't aware of the 12 hours notice thing, so I'm basically talking out my ass, and likely completely wrong. -mice \_ do you find Jessica Lynch cute? \_ Actually...yes. -mice \_ what's a nice lady like that doing in the military? \_ how do you know she's nice? why can't nice girls join the military? btw, she happens to be the daughter of a coworker of mine. \_ heh Likely meeting many fine, healthy, -available- young men. \_ Why would a fine young woman like this want to do that when she could go to Cal and join CSUA instead? \_ Yeah and then she could learn about the latest distro and all the kewlest bike rides and we could show her all the kewl stuff she can do in pine! sweet! \_ You must have missed the 'fine' and 'healthy' words in that sentence. \_ you think fine and healthy young women would prefer to be abused and raped in service \_ But where is Navajo Lori, Jessica's roommate, and my friend's cousin? acadamies? \_ gee i hope so. i hate doing the ugly sick ones. \_ Was she sexually assaulted by the Iraqi soldiers in any way? \_ But where is Navajo Lori, Jessica's roommate? Still MIA. |
2003/4/1-2 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:27944 Activity:high |
4/1 Anyone have an english URL for Leslie Cheung today? \_ First result in Yahoo search: http://www.lesliecheung.com \_ http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=2487595 (4/2) Yesterday I didn't realize why someone was asking for this until I watched the news last night. Sigh. \_ http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=2487595 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/2906999.stm others found by searching on http://news.google.com \_ It's on <DEAD>sjmercury.com<DEAD> \_ And http://www.sfgate.com |
2003/4/1 [Reference/Military, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27941 Activity:nil |
4/1 It's raining Land Rovers in Iraq. I guess this is what happens once you run out of ammo: http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-12278226,00.html \_ I can't seem to get "<DEAD>www.sky.com"<DEAD> from ANYWHERE. |
2003/4/1 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Israel] UID:27935 Activity:nil |
3/31 Sharon is preparing the new Palestinian homeland: http://www.iht.com/articles/91651.html \_ Ok, I have read the entire article and couldn't find either "Palestinian" or "homeland" mentioned even once in it. \_ You have to read between the lines. Sharon is maneuvering a Syrian war so that he can transfer the Palestinians there, which the current peace treaty prevents. |
2003/3/31 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27924 Activity:high |
3/31 Why Iraqis are never going to see the Americans as liberators http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2479.htm \_ the most disturbing news I heard over the weekend was some middle eastern professor here in the US saying that Iraqis won't fight for Saddam. They hate him. But they will fight for Iraq. Don't underestimate Iraqi nationalism. \_ hell it looks like even the iranians are willing to fight for iraq. \_ They realize they could be next. "Axis of Evil" --dim \_ Relax, Iran. There's still Syria. --erikred \_ that's why some higher public officials wanted a small force -- a force big enough to win, but small enough not to look like invaders. They wanted to emulate the latest war in afghanistan. |
2003/3/31 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27922 Activity:high |
3/31 Anybody think that the republican guards are sitting around in their tanks waiting to be bombed from the air? You don't have to be a military genius to figure out that this war will be fought in the streets of bagdad. Saddam probably sent the troops home wearing civilian clothes and stashing weapons in houses. Preparing for door to door combat. \_ Duh, of course they're not. You, Sir, are a military genius! Was there a point you were trying to make? Did you have a suggestion for our military leadership to better conduct the war? \_ actually, it would be nice if they would listen to this sort of thing, b/c it really appears they are not. http://slate.msn.com/id/2080814 \_ Actually, I think the US military has been afraid of exactly this since the war was first contemplated. It's not the US military that wanted to go to Iraq. Not AT ALL. \_ The point is, when this turns into door-to-door combat, it'll be another somalia. Soldiers dressed up as civilians dragging a dead body around the streets in front of live TV broadcasted around the world. What do you think that'll do to the morale? \_ Hmm, I actually find that REALLY unlikely. Though there are some surface similarities, the situations are radically different, both politically and strategically. different, both politically and strategically. -mice \_ I agree. Somalia was a very limited mission with the incident in Mogadishu due to a bad operation plan without Hui in Vietnam during the Tet offensive, except with decent heavy support. A more accurate parallel would be Hue in Vietnam during the Tet offensive, except with greener American troops, tighter rules of engagement, and higher US concentration of logistics and heavy support. I wonder if the US will stop doing the chem-alert dance within city limits and under fire. \_ many republican guards are surrounding baghdad. There is a special republican guard unit inside of baghdad, maybe 15000 troops? \_ So far Saddam's battle plan has been working a lot better than the American's battle plan. "So far"? And the sky is green, right? \_ You call losing 75% or more of the country in a week a really great plan? Sending out suicide bombers at the point of a gun? That's a plan? Please send some email to Saddam with more great military advice. It'll only make the job that much easier. You haven't studied a whole lot of military history, if any. This war is going fantastically well for a weeks' worth of fighting. If you can call a week and a total route a war. \_ true. But beware -- the hardest part is still to come. The Siege of Baghdad continues. If only we can create some sort of Trojan Horse. \_ Touched a nerve, eh? First take some prozac. Second, yes I have studied military tactics. He is doing what he set out to do in the only way he could. He still has the bulk of his infantry *intact* and is using every possible unconventional guerilla tactic to sting the so-called coalition's ass. Considering the overwhelming conventional force against him, yes, his battle plan is working to a "T". He will bloody the coalition badly if they are drawn into city fighting. He was smart to not leave his forces out in the open where they would have been shot to pieces. Don't take this the wrong way, I am for US/Britain victory, but covering what has happened so far with blind rhetoric won't hide the truth. Capisch? Roger-and-out. \_ not-op: I am the gamemaster. I give you a choice. Which side would you like to be on? Saddam? or Coalition? \_ not-op: Err ... how 'bout God's side. |
2003/3/31 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27916 Activity:high |
3/30 Anyone else see/hear/read Peter Arnett's "interview" and "reporting" from Baghdad? Why is this clown still in the air? He's already been bumped down to Nat'l Geo and he still somehow gets airtime. It's like Heraldo except Heraldo knows he isn't a real reporter but Arnett lacks this critical bit of self knowledge. \_ update: turns out NBC fired his ass and he's apologized as well. -op \_ Yeah... but mentioned that what he said is 'something we all know about the war.' \_ Only if http://arabnews.com and al jazeera is your idea of a source of truth. Arnett drank the Iraqi PR lemonade. Afterall, we know from the Iraqi Ministry of Truth that the coalition is losing on all fronts and the brave Iraqi peoples have risen up and killed thousands of Americans and destroyed hundreds of tanks and are pushing the evil USians into the sea! |
2003/3/30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27914 Activity:very high 50%like:27659 |
3/28 Just another day at a peaceful anti-war rally: http://csua.org/u/bfa \_ And the pro-war side is blameless. http://csua.org/u/bfb I'm not disagreeing with you; the world is pretty fucked up. \_ Are you seriously stating a moral equivalency between civilian casualties of war and someone whose "anti-war" stance is to push the Jews into the sea? \_ Are you saying that all war protesters are violently antisemitic? Of course not. I'm just saying there are a hell of a lot of reasons to be against this war. \_ blame the local iraqis solders who forced civilians into the crossfire \_ Or the inept diplomacy of a simple-minded President. \_ Okey dokey, it's easy to spout off about someone else's failures, how about you tell us the non-violent yet effective actions you'd take as US Pres. that would have made certain Iraq was disarmed? Inspections? There were no inspections from '98 and they only went back in under tremendous pressure due to the US military buildup and even then they weren't doing anything useful since a) they didn't want to and b) the whole .org was filled with so many spies the Iraqis knew what was going to be inspected before the UN guys on the ground in Iraq did. I've yet to hear a single response from anyone in the government, the media, the public, or private about how to disarm Iraq/Hussein without fighting if he doesn't want to do it voluntarily. Just lots of noise about, "bush is stupid!". Maybe he is stupid but you're not doing any better. \_ How about not pissing off a collection of nations that were squarely in our pocket because of September 11th? How about putting a real effort into Afghanistan? How about prioritizing this effort with respect to North Korea? How about just keeping your goddamn story straight, and not lying to the public? Are we there for disarming him, are we there because he's a war criminal, or are we there because my misguided domestic policy and tax refunds has turned a budget surplus into a recession and I need a quick shot in the arm for the next election? Or maybe it's just a cover to get the flag-waving jingoes out in force and allow me to push some of the worst civil rights legislation through congress in 40 years? How about not claiming some stupid forgeries as "evidence" of nuclear arms dealing? Sure, rattle sabres, let people know you're serious. But don't treat war as the foregone conclusion. |
2003/3/30-31 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27911 Activity:high |
3/29 A little late but I had a busy day: http://www.efreedomnews.com/News%20Archive/Iraq/SpecialReportWaronIraq/SR2RisetoPower.htm http://www.indianaobserver.com/2002/12/I69Iraq.html http://www.arationaladvocate.com/dejavuonthebrink.htm Some of this is fact. Some is opinion. These and other links you can easily find yourself show the Baathist/Nazi link in action, attitude, goals, etc. If you want to dig deeper go look up Michel Aflaq, the founder of the whole Baathist insanity. Here's a starter on Aflaq: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/837uvzrs.asp http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/political_wrap/jan-june03/sb_1-24.html \_ nice links, thanks \_ Good stuff. Refresh my memory: You're posting these to prove what, exactly? Or you're posting them as informational links? \_ This was the Saddam is a Nazi vs. the Saddam is a Stalinist thread from over the last few days. Having read these and a few other links I confirmed my previous understanding that the Baathists are Arab Nazis but was unaware they were also fans of some of the earlier Russian communists to some extent. \_ It's an idiotic argument. \_ There are people who will argue whether the flames are blue or green when the point is that your arse is on fire. \_ Yeah, it would be better to discuss something deeply intellectual like which linux distro is better or car vs. bike, or whether the war is about oil or just pure meanness on the part of dick cheney. You've totally nailed it with your deep and incisive commentary and editorial. How can I learn to be as smart as you? \_ Um, go back in time and prevent your past self from getting that lobotomy? \_ oh! ouch! it's like 1st grade all over again! *laugh* It's too funny that the motd can sink even this low. I thought most of the grade schoolers left when the motd got a little harsh on that sort of infantile stupidity. \_ Apparently not: we're both still here. \_ 1) Another common thread of 20th century genocidal dictators is where many developed their political philosophies - the cafes of Paris. \_ That's because Paris used to be where you went to be educated. Things have changed now and the U.S. is where you go to get an education. Hence all the terrorists who are educated in the U.S. 2) Hitler was a socialist. \_ the cafe's of Austria then? \_ 'many' \_ Hilter was more fascist than socialist, but then again lots of of people had similar POVs. And the key to Soviet socialism, German nationalist socialism, and Italian facsisism is the emergence and misinterpretation of Darwinism. That is, thinking survival of the fittest rather than understanding evolution. Which leads us to the roots of pure capitalism and the American sense of superiority.... \_ It does? How so? This hasn't been a pure capitalist society in your great grand daddy's lifetime. The American sense of superiority comes from having a robust economy, an effective military, and a flexible and adaptable culture that rolls with the punches. That 'sense' is because it's true. \_ I agree in part, but the greatest contribution America has made is put forth in the Bill of Rights and Constitution. No amount of wealth or power can overshadow rights and government ordained by God. \_ "Bill of Rights" & Constitution establish religions via "ordained by God" therefore are unconstitutional \_ So you wrote them? \_ Uh... what? They establish no such thing. Are you one of the left wing nutters that thinks the Pledge is a violation of your rights too? |
2003/3/29-30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27909 Activity:high |
3/29 How did this Iraqi farmer manage to shoot down an Apache helicopter a few days ago with his ancient-looking rifle? Is this even possible? \_ No. \_ It's possible if you listen to Iraqi state owned/run 'media' and think it's real. In the real world, no. Anyway, the apache is an attack helicopter. It's built to dish out damage and get the hell out. It is not built to survive heavy attack so I'm very pleased to hear we only lost 1 or 2 in a direct close up attack like that. \_ Given what I am reading in non-US news sources, it seems like coalition helicopters are lost in nearly every attack/search/rescue operation. Some of those loses are non-combat-related but Iraqis did shut down a number of them. This is not surprising since they do have the weapons capable of that but farmers' rifles certainly don't qualify as such. |
2003/3/29-30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27908 Activity:high |
3/29 I don't like this suicide car bomber killing at all. Would Iraq become a Palestine, but 5 times the size? \_ The scary thing about this war is that there have been already many reports that the population of the Southern Iraq is not as welcoming towards the US troops as expected. For example, one of Iraq's Ayatollas has already issued a fatwa to fight the coalition troops. Yesterday, there was a report on ABC news about how those trucks with humanitarian aid in the Southern Iraq were being sacked by a mob before reaching their destination. I was shocked to hear a guy from the crowd yell "We hate Americans!" to a reporter's question about what he thinks about Americans. The answer was yelled back so odiously that I think he really meant it. And we thought that they (specially Shiites in the South) can't wait to be liberated from Saddam's regime. However, I changed slightly my pessimistic outlook after this was followed by a tragic story where a bunch of Iraqi civilians who were traveling in a car were killed by the US soldiers who mistook them for terrorists. After the burial, their relatives told that they forgive the soldiers (who by the way, offered apologies and also helped to bury the dead) since they understand the difficult times they're living in. I thought that was very touching. \_ If you were some pro-saddam fedayeen you'd take the American food and then scream into the camera how you hated Americans, too. Why do you take that stuff so seriously? Once it's all over and the thugs are wiped out and powerless you'll see what the Iraqi people think for real, good and bad. |
2003/3/29-30 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27902 Activity:very high |
3/28 Alternative to Al Jazeera: http://english.daralhayat.com \_ What is wrong with Al Jazeera? \_ what isn't? \_ well, it haas been down for the last few days and though back up, it is slow and presently link:english.aljazeera.net is NOT in english (sat 1:20 am) That being said the above site is pretty weak. http://www.arabnews.com seems a lot better. \_ http://arabnews.com is better at what? \_ Americans cannot reach http://aljazeera.net, for whatever reason. I hear that you can still reach it from overseas, though. |
2003/3/28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27893 Activity:high |
3/28 Can you think of any realistic scenario of peace? (Iraq) Assassination of Hussein maybe? (not necessarily by Coalition forces) \_ Yeah, after American forces get finished killing off all resistance in Iraq, Syria, Iran and Saudia Arabia. \_ not a moment too soon. oil propping too many tyrants. \_ no, we're there to genocide innocents. get real, fascist! \_ You forgot Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, the Sudan, Pakistan, and I'm sure a few others I've forgotten, too. |
2003/3/28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:27891 Activity:insanely high |
3/28 News of Foreign Sources: * Morale of US troops start to budge. Troops start to avoid certain color of candies as believed they bring bad luck * Some units of US troops' rations are reduced due to supply issue * 8 civilian death 33 injured in latest US bomb raid \_ Rather than posting from "Foreign Sources", how about you state where you got each bit of news, with a URL if it was from the web? Anyone can make shit up and post it on the motd. Also, I know anti-American propaganda and American defeatism isn't the only thing "Foreign Sources" are publishing yet I note that's the only thing you are posting. Sources would increase credibility. \_ Keep this up. Some (but by no means all) of this I haven't heard about, particularly after Al-Jazeera got shut down. Even the Guardian has been curiously monotonous about its coverage. -- ulysses \_ they will bring the 70,000 sunni kurds from the north. \_ Those damn green M&Ms. Gonna get laid? In this desert? Lying sacks of sugar. \_ That's funny. The army here ride these 40 year old 3-gear monsters that weigh a ton. Says something about how well they built them that they're still in use. -John \_ Did they report about those 40,000 gorillas from Brazil that Hitler is training to storm the Maginot Line, or the Gulf War Virus? \_ I hope the military equipped the soldiers with Linux. \_ I think you're joking but all of that equipment will need some sort of rudimentary operating system. Most of it is probably Wind River stuff but just imagine an army powered by M$ equipment....wait some recent news is starting to make sense... \_ "Windows: Famous for stranding billion-dollar battleships at sea." http://csua.org/u/bdc \_ They will all ride bike. \_ http://www.militarybikes.com/military.html \_ That's funny. The army here ride these 40 year old 3-gear monsters that weigh a ton. Says something about how well they built them that they're still in use. -John \_ Maybe they just can't afford new ones? Example, "It says something about the T-55 that it's still in use". \_ The paratroopers aren't as good as the old American and British bikes (I used to have a 35 yr old Raleigh) but they are still better than what passes for a "rugged" mtb these days. \_ Yes, keep posting. We want to know. |
2003/3/28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27887 Activity:very high |
3/27 "The UK says the discovery of chemical weapons protection suits at a deserted Iraqi command post in the south could indicate that Iraq intended to use chemical weapons in the war" -- bbc So far, this is the basis for US "proof of WMD". Never mind that the "command post" was a hospital. \_ Are you the guy that insisted US involvement in Iraq was just sabre-rattling? \_ No, that's me! -not op |
2003/3/28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27886 Activity:nil |
3/27 I figured out the Iraq problem. Saddam is rolling an above average number of sixes and fives on his two dice. Maybe they're loaded. \_ No, the problem is that we're only rolling 1 or 2 dice on the attack. That heavily favors the defender. \_ That fits. Trying to minimalize casulties and the number of armies that you need to move to the Middle East. \_ Or we're so hung up on using Power Attack that we're stuck with a crappy attack bonus. |
2003/3/27-28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27883 Activity:very high |
3/27 Why does it seem to take such a big effort to fight this war against Iraq? Iraq is not a dominant country to begin with. Supposedly the US today has many more smart weapons than in the first Gulf War, while the Iraqi military has worse equipment and lower morale than 12 years ago. Yet, it took us several long months just to get our troops and supplies ready to start the war. And with Britain helping and massive Iraqi troops surrendering or leaving their posts, we are still not reaching Baghdad swiftly and Saddam is still standing. If the US can even win this war easily, what do we expect if another dominant country similar to the USSR, Nazi Germany, or Imperial Japan launches a war against us in the future? \_ Since you bring up WW2: DDay cost the allies roughly 5000 dead and I don't know how many more wounded. At DDay+8 the allies had gained about 10 miles in some places and suffered a few thousand more dead. Iraq+8 we've lost roughly 100 dead, unknown (to me) wounded, and gone about 250-300 miles. In WW2, the bombing policy over Germany was known as de-population. The idea being that since they had a hard time knocking out factories, they'd instead kill the civilians who worked in the war factories since neighborhoods make better targets and you don't care which house you hit, just more is better. In Iraq we're trying very hard not to kill civilians. Iraqi official government media claims 92 civilians which even if true makes this the lowest civilian casualty war in modern history and maybe ever. Go read what happened on the German/Russian front. Go read about Dresden. We could Dresden the whole place in minutes but we don't. You know why? Because we really actually are honest to god, the "good guys" here. \_ Stop. Iraq isn't WW2 Germany, an overland invasion isn't establishing a beachhead, the middle east isn't northern France, and it isn't US vs. Iraq. It's US vs. Osama^H^H^H^H^HSaddam. See? "Operation Iraqi Freedom." \_ Nothing is exactly the same. Ever. So let's not ever look at anything that ever happened in history before because it isn't exactly the same. Good plan. Buds? \_ Dude, they're bad analogies and distort history. Iraq doesn't have the firepower that Germany did vs. the Allies at that point in WW2. D-Day in France forced the Allies to ship in all supplies as opposed to trucking them over from Kuwait. Hedgerow'ed and hilly Northern France isn't desert and the US claims not to be fighting the Iraqi people as opposed to defeating "the Hun." \_ I suggest that you gather a little more information about military campaigns. There are many numerous examples in our history. Also, Iraq had a failry large standing military -- quite a large one, iirc. Check your 'facts'. \_ Iraq had the second largest standing army before Gulf War I. And why don't you think the US is performing a swift job? It has only been less than 8 days. Were you expecting a 6-day war? \_ With supposedly far superior weapons and air power and satellites, and months of preparation, I was expecting them to have already defeated all the major Iraqi divisions and already in Baghdad going house to house hunting for remaining oppositions. \_ Really? I thought Turkey had the biggest army in that region. \_ What a stupid data point. Hey idiot, before GWI thousands of Iraqis soldiers were still living. Before the tech bubble popped, WebVan stock was real valuble, so now it should still be worth a lot right? \_ Iraq is fighting a defensive war which is easier than in Kuwait (where they really didn't have much time to dig in, and the local population didn't want them around). Iraq is much larger than Kuwait. The US forces are using untried tactics trying to reley on airpower and special forces to take land. Oh and most important, war is a slow thing. You don't just get everyone into a 747, Kuwait. drop em off and say "Do Your Thing!" Plus I almost forgot, the number of surrendering Iraqis is much less this time around. \_ Iraq: area 168,927 sq. mi. Kuwait: area 6,880 sq. mi. \_ Caveat: I'm not for the war, but... The war is going slow because the troops are under orders not to fire on targets until they have clear shots on hostiles. The Pentagon is being extra careful to avoid civilian casualties and any appearance of improper behavior on the battlefield. Given the amount of scrutiny this war is under, that's a smart thing to do. --erikred \_ is it really? i'm not sure. the whole world ouside of the u.s. is against this war already. we can go through the whole thing with less than 100 civilian causalities, and the rest of the world will cry bloody murder. the american public, meanwhile, will continue to do what the corporate media tells them and support the war right up until the number of US dead rises to unnacceptable levels. it seems to me that the biggest factor in what the world and the US thinks of this war a year form now is whether we win fast and decisively, which will be bloody. \_ If the Bush Admin is to adhere to the new doctrine of US superiority, then you're absolutely right, the smart thing to do is to end this quickly, no matter what the cost in civilian life/property; that's the only way to secure American dominance. If they had the slightest doubt, however, that they could blitz the Iraqis into submission, the current policy of reducing civilian casualties makes sense: you don't want a long, drawn-out AND bloody conflict. --erikred, and you are? \_ as some people have mentioned: 1. military forces are trying to reduce civilian casualties 2. kuwait has smaller land area. 3. Turkey didn't allow land forces to launch attack from their country 4. in 1991, Republican guard were centered around Kuwait. the coalition outflanked and crushed them in the open desert. \_ Wrong. They were based between Bhagdad and Kuwait and not hurt badly during GWI. \_ I define "around" to be the area between Baghdad and Kuwait. There were Republican Guard units in Iraq ready to sweep into Kuwait. \_ I define that as Southern Iraq. Admittedly, the RG ran back to Baghdad with their tails between their legs, but they weren't "crushed." 5. Now, we are going to do urban warfare -- more difficult to do if you want to reduce civilian casualties. \_ We still haven't gotten to the hardcore urban warfare yet. The US has gone around most urban areas. \_ yes. It will be a tough fight in Baghdad. 6. Not enough coalition forces at the present time? 7. Longer supply lines are vulnerable to guerrilla attacks. 8. Iraqis have tow missiles and new tactics? \_ 9. That darn sandstorm. 10. Iraqis don't like us. \_ 11. Iraqi loyalists are preventing Iraqis from surrendering \_ The problem is the US set expectations for swift victory. A big show of power, "shock and awe," smash up a division or two, and *poof* lots of Iraqis would surrender. To do this quickly, the US put "light" divisions on the front (emphasis on speed, easily transported to Middle East, a "furstest with the mostest" POV), not the heavy tank divisions which suck gas, need lots of infrastructure to maintain, take a while to setup and are bad at urban warfare. Even if Turkey agreed to letting the US in, there weren't enough blue water port facilities to offload a heavy cav division in such a short time. The tanks on the front now are the reserve maintained by the US after GWI. Running an invasion based on airpower, swift light troops, low civilian casulties, and hopes for a demoralized enemy is kinda... well.. stupid. \_ bring back Schwarzkopf? \_ I heard that Tommy Franks wanted lots of armor/tanks, but Rumsfeld overturned him? In any case, the coalition can still bring in armor to Iraq. The plan doesn't have to be static. \_ The problem is getting the tanks to Kuwait, getting the troops to the tanks, setting up logistic support, and the worst part, manuvering the heavies in while pulling the lights out. Even worse, by the time this all happens it may be an urban warfare situation so the heavies are no good. Did I forget to mention how much extra putting in the heavy divs is going to cost? Big ole bucks... \_ http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/03/27/sprj.irq.war.main/index.html 120,000 more troops are being deployed, many are heavy mechanized. |
2003/3/27-28 [Consumer/CellPhone, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27881 Activity:kinda low |
3/27 CDMA or GSM in Reconstructed Iraq? http://siliconvalley.internet.com/news/article.php/2171271 Thoughts: It's noble that the US plans to use US funds to install a wireless telephone system in Iraq. It galls the hell out of me that we're now about to wrangle about whether we get licensing fees for either the makers of CDMA or GSM. Proposal: Howzabout the makers of whichever system they do install waive all licensing fees for the next ten years as a token of appreciation for the damage this war (and I mean from both sides) is inflicting on the Iraqi people? --erikred \_ Huh? Why should Qualcomm carry the burden? Or would they get money from US taxpayers to make up for the licensing fees? Make it phones from Motorola, infrastructure from Lucent, and licensing fees for Qualcomm. Nothing for Siemens or Alcatel or those Hans Blix type viking countries. Oh, nothing for Nortel either. \_ I wanna see Yahoo/SBC convince Iraqi citizens to "upgrade" \_ It gets harder and harder to believe this war is about humanitarian reasons when the profit-vultures are already trying to divide up the spoils. \_ are you kidding me??? you actually thought this had anything to do with "humanitarian reasons"??? \_ Do we really want to install wireless phone network there? In Somalia, it was the wireless phone by which the warloads got wind of our special forces' strike. Else they wouldn't be prepared and there would've been fewer US casualties. |
2003/3/27-28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27874 Activity:moderate |
3/26 The Onion captures the motd: http://www.theonion.com/onion3911/pt_the_war_on_iraq.html \_ History indicates you are wrong. \_ Touche'. --op \_ I'm glad you found a popular humor site that supports your position. Does this give you warm fuzzies and reaffirm your beliefs? I know I always go to the onion to find out what's really going on and to get a fair and balanced perspective on the world. \_ You don't think it's a fair characterization? We've gotten nothing but stonewall rhetoric for *months*: "The Iraqis have WMD-- look, satellite pictures of trucks!" "Iraq's been angling for nuclear weapons from Nigeria." "We have more support than we did during Gulf War I (and 3 countries are actually helping)". The administration is lying, holding scripted "press conferences" and hoping that if they keep repeating themselves the Iraqi dictatorship will just keel over in fear. Things will not be alright. \_ Look, you've been proven wrong, so stop talking. You've had your say already. \_ That's the spirit! |
2003/3/27 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/India, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Asia/Others] UID:27872 Activity:nil |
3/26 What the Slimes were saying about Afghanistan after 3 weeks - NY Times article entitled: Quagmire Recalled: Afghanistan as Vietnam http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/876504/posts \_ What part of that article doesn't still hold true? The Vietnam comparison was weak, but it basically says that * the war is going more slowly than hoped * real ground troops are required * air power / special ops are not enough * setting up a new government will be difficult All of this has been borne out. The country is still controlled by warlords in nearly every area; there are still many terrorist hideouts that can't be searched by a small force, and the special ops teams are spread too thin. \_ No one said it would turn into the flower of central asian democracy in a week. I see no problems there that time won't cure. \_ time and support, yes. I'm not saying the situation is horrible. But the article was right. We did need regular troops, and those troops were sent. Not enough, because of Iraq. \_ They were wrong on every account. The Afghan national army was being trained, and is now making progress. |
2003/3/26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:27864 Activity:nil |
3/26 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/23/fashion/23DIXI.html "... the backlash against [The Dixie Chicks] was not a spontaneous, widespread outburst, but instead was led by a small group of activists, beginning with http://Freerepublic.com. ... the phenomenon even has a name getting 'freeped,' slang for being deluged with angry e-mail messages from users of the site." \_ FR gets more traffic than Salon. \_ DC were pretty stupid to make such statements given where their fan base is. Freedom of speech extends both ways, and those fans are exercising it well. \_ yeah, they should just release a punk album. i'd buy it. \_ boo hoo, it sucks when activism goes the other way huh? like a very small number of morons shutting down the financial district for the ego boost, the $500k police overtime cost, and to hurt the hourly employees who sat in traffic for an extra 2-3 hours instead of earning money to feed their kids. i've got zero sympathy for people who mouth off and then whine like babies when they take an economic hit for it. you've got the right to mouth off in this country and others have the right to not buy your product, not listen to what you say, and do their organised best to shut you down. the left has been doing this for years. sucks now that it goes the other way now, huh? head/pig/insert. |
2003/3/26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27856 Activity:nil |
3/26 I was a naive fool to be a human shield for Saddam: http://csua.org/u/b78 \_ a line that sums it all up formt the link, "Jake was so shocked at how naive he had been. We all were. It hadn't occurred to anyone that the Iraqis might actually be pro-war." Here we see the inner workings of the young leftist: knows better than the poor dumb third world 'native peoples' he's trying to "help" because he's a smart and powerful Westerner and only he knows what's best for them, so he got on a bus to stroke his ego and save the world. There's a reason people grow more conservative as they age. It's called "growing up". Some grow up earlier than others. Getting on a bus to hell and talking to the victims of a Baathist Nazi bastard like Hussein can mature some folks a little sooner than normal. \_ Huh? I thought the claim has always been that the Iraqis would be pro-war and would rush out in droves to welcome the American liberators. |
2003/3/26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27849 Activity:nil |
3/25 Petition Ready: Request Moore go on Hunger Strike http://www.petitiononline.com/moore131/petition.html |
2003/3/26 [Reference/Religion, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27848 Activity:nil |
3/25 These are the true inheritors of the Babylonian Empire and they are responsible for all of the technological advances made in the Muslim world since 700 AD. Its interesting because some consider Hammurabi's Code of Laws a progenitor of Magna Carta. Persecuted for centuries, Iraq's Assyrian Christians once again wary of their future http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?eo20030227a2.htm |
2003/3/25-26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27840 Activity:insanely high |
3/25 Civilian deaths from U.S. airstrikes fuel rising anger in Iraq - http://latimes.com, you probably need to register, but take a look at the photo gallery link on the right. http://csua.org/u/b8b#latimes \_ oh the horror! plez! people have no stomache these days. get real this is war - GW1 was a fluke - most wars thousands of peep die. \_ an excellent reason to avoid wars, you're right. \_ A stitch in time saves nine. \_ Let's be consistent and disband the police department. \_ huh? \_ LAtimes is username:password \_ csuamotd:csuamotd \_ What other csuamotd accounts are there? \_ huh? why do you need more than 1? |
2003/3/25 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27836 Activity:very high |
3/24 After we defeated Germany and Japan in WWII, we occupied the countries and we helped them rebuild. We're still there today. Is Afghanistan and Iraq going to be any different? After we bomb the hell out of them we're going to foot the bill and rebuild their country. And stay there for the next 50 years? Is this the so-called "Bush Doctrine"? \_ The Bush Doctrine is preemptive strike on countries we fear may give WMD to extremist groups. \_ When do we staring bombing North Korea? \_ As soon as we're done with Iraq and Bush gets tired of diplomatic avenues. \_ You scare the hell out of me, and it's because I'm afraid you're right. \_ You'd prefer what? We let them build a few nukes each year until they've tested a missile that can hit California and then what? Because of a lot of small minded people we won't even have a realistic anti-ICBM defense in place by then. It'll come about 2 years later which is 2 years too late for SD/LA/SF. Poof! \_ Disagree. I think Bush will hit Iran first, since we are there already. It's cheaper to just knock Iran out THEN hit N. Korea later. I don't think UPS gave US government enough of bulk discount for ferrying 250k troops and equipments \_ I'd prefer to see Syria get smushed but I think you're right about Iran. We build up some big air bases and bring in a few hundred thousand more troops then the Iranian nutters get the axe. \_ There is no counterbalancing Soviet power so no, it won't take 50 years. \_ True. The US will probably stop helping them out in a few years or until the spice flows again. The spice must flow! \_ Arrakis --> iraq Shaddam IV --> Saddam Feydaykin --> Feydayin CHOAM --> OPEC spice --> oil \_ that's idiotic. put down the lame scifi and read some history. \_ boy that's clever. \_ Ah, the geek, and geekier-than-thou. \_ dammit, there must be some reason i read all six of those books half a dozen times. just let me have my moment. \_ What about the 4 new ones? |
2003/3/25 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27834 Activity:moderate |
3/25 We actually blame Iraq for this: http://csua.org/u/b81 \_ I blame Clinton. \_ Bill O'Reilly will probably blame San Francisco \_why can't we blow up bridges, schools and cemeteries from 30k ft? \_ it was hit by a guided missile. \_ it was hit by a guided missile. any incidents like this would make US' occupation a bit more difficult. Trust me |
2003/3/24 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:27826 Activity:very high |
3/24 THE WAR THAT WILL CHANGE THE WORLD http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/71309.htm \_ The New York Post is a tabloid with about as much credability as as the weekly world news. Please don't post NYP articles, it just makes you look like a moron. \_ oh, as opposed to freerepublic \_ is there a list of 'motd acceptable' news sources? I should we should only allow NPR quotes and Salon. \_ This is a serious question. What makes you think that our attempts to create a democracy by force in Iraq will be any more successful than our attempts in Afghanistan, Panama, Haiti, etc? \_ We never attempted in Afghanistan, it seem to be going as well as expected thus far. It worked in Japan, South Korea, Europe, Taiwan, Chile, and was working in Iran. What is the alternative? I propose there are only two: 1) kill the Arabs ala colonial Europe or Rome. 2) make it more attractive economically to lay down arms and live and prosper with a non-belligerent society. \_ Taiwan? South Korea? Europe? What the heck are you talking about? \_ history? \_ History? US invaded Taiwan to bring about democracy while it is under dictator CKS? \_ You do not build weak, nascent democracies to counterbalance the Soviets. You align with stable dictatorships with capitalistic tendencies in order to transition to liberal styles of government. This was the essence of US Cold War policy, I'm actually expected to explain this? \_ Sure, but how is this relevant? We are talking about the feasibility of a direct US invasion and regime change here. This is not analogous to any of the countries you mentioned except Japan and Germany. Vietnam, for example, blew up in our face because while we were thinking of fighting against communists and the soviets, we miscalculated vietnamese nationalism. \_ "except Japan and Germany" is the point. thanks. \_ I would grant you that, but I would also point out that Japan and Germany were actually occupying nations they invaded when we decided to topple their regimes. Perhaps there are better ways to change / mellow out the regime in Iraq under scenarios similar to what happened in places like Taiwan and South Korea, given that there is limited evidence that we would be successful in building a democracy in Iraq. How much effort and resources are we willing to devote to this enterprise, or would we just get another puppet dictator, someone like Ferdinand Marcos or the Saudi sheiks, who constantly steal from their people? |
2003/3/24 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27819 Activity:nil |
3/23 What motivation is there for anyone to follow the Geneva Convention in terms of POW treatment? Everyone's up in arms about how the Iraqis are treating those captured, but why should they care about so-called international law? |
2003/3/23 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27814 Activity:high |
3/23 TrollP. My dentist was arguing that the UN has become obsolete, along the lines of the League of Nations. Now... I'm not going to argue with a man who has a drill in my mouth. I was just wondering if those right of center agree with that thought or if it is just pure ignorance. I don't care what those left of center think. \_ UN obsolecense rests on the premise that the US is the single hyper/uber-power, and that no one can oppose us. This is premature, as we still do not have the means of neutralizing unstable regimes armed with nuclear weapons, and we've yet to prove that we can smoothly execute a military campaign against a vastly inferior target. The credibility of the Bush Admin's claim of UN obsolecense hinges on an unqualified victory over Iraq. If they cannot deliver such, the UN will emerge more popular (and relevant) than before. \_ Okay, look at it this way. The UN is a body of 'leaders' that aren't elected, have no system of accountability, and yet still dictate what constitutes 'proper' action for sovereign nations. It just doesn't make very much sense to me to give any credence to UN's 'authority'. \_ The Bush admin just invaded Iraq without UN Security Council creidbility by actually enforcing the 17 UN security council approval, the whole time saying they didn't need a yes vote to invade... but just in case kept trying to get one. looks like the bush admin thinks the UN is pretty irrelevant now. Thanks guys! see you in hell. \_ Ha, this happened to a friend of mine when he was a kid. He said his mom was arguing with the dentist and his dad was horrified. His dad was like "just agree with the man! Our son is in his hands!" \_ If anything Bush has actually preserved any semblance of credibility by enforcing the 17 UN security council resolutions. That said, the US should never have joined the United Nations. It was organized by Communists and has been a complete failure at preventing conflict, instead tacitly approving a number of genocides. \_ So Bush has preserved the principles of the UN by ignoring the principles of the UN? Put head back in sand. \_ Better to pass endless resolutions forever. If *those* are UN principles then we can do with out it. No one needs an international debate club comprised mostly of third world despots. |
2003/3/23 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27813 Activity:high |
3/23 Assume that Saddam actually has POWs and he's torturing them. What is the next step for the US/Britain? \_ It's not that *WE* aren't torturing those suspected terrorist. \_ Yeah, so it's good to go. Grab a few repair techs and shoot them in the head going for that Mogadishu effect. It's a good plan that only a sick fuck like you would think was ok. \_ Seems unlikely. The average soldier right now is probably more worried about fratricide and accidents. \_ If this war ends soon, this will probably go down as the only war in history where one side had more casualties due to accidents and traitorous fucks than from enemy fire. \_ obviously you don't know much about history. \_ enlighten us. provide counter example. \_ He's not torturing them as it appears they were executed. \_ As far as your question goes: the plan continues. If we think they might be alive and there's a possibility of some dramtic hollywood style rescue, we might try, but I doubt it. The tanks and APCs will continue forward and the Baathist-Nazi bastards will be crushed. |
2003/3/23 [Politics/Foreign/Asia, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27807 Activity:very high |
3/22 What are you all you Bush defenders going to do when it turns out that he lied to us all to drag into an unjust war? http://csua.org/u/b66 \_ I don't care what reason we gave in '03. It should've gone like this in '91. His father is the one who committed the crime. The son is fixing it 12 years later. Works for me. \_ Oh wow, so now any country can invade any other country based on a crime committed sometime in its history. \_ No. Any country can and always has been able to invade another country based solely on the ability to do so. What planet have you been living on where someone else's permission was required? \_ Removing Saddam is justified by any measure. However, if Bush lied to do so, then fuck him, I say. Fuck him right out of office. \_ Gee, who do you think is a more likely liar, Bush or Hussein? \_ Probably both. \_ whether it's justified or not, the more important concerns are of sovereignty and international law \_ LOSERS of wars don't have sovereignty, dumbass. \_ Oh, I see, law of the jungle eh? \_ On *this* planet, between nations, yes. If I go into your house and shoot your ass there are police and the rest of the legal system to apprehend and punish me in some way. If my country invades your country and yours is too weak to stop it, then your country is a footnote in history. There are more dead countries, kingdoms, empires, etc in the history books than currently exist on the planet. When this changes you can let us know. \_ the bush administration has decided abiding by international law and the UN is for SUCKAH PUNKS. this may lead to a few misunderstandings with a few other countries in the very near future. \_ What is international law? People keep using that word without really thinking about what it might mean. Is it backed by some principle, or is it just arrived at by consensus of participating countries? I, for one, wouldn't want a consensus of mostly nasty countries determining what my country could or could not do. \_ I really love when the lefties get upset that the US is in violation of Kyoto, the land mine ban and a few other treaties we never ratified or even signed in some cases and then pretend we're in violation of some mythical "international law". \_ Most ppl get upset that the US failed to ratify treaties that seem to be in the interest of humanity at large for short-sighted business reasons. Find me a reasonable rationale for failing to ratify Kyoto, landmine, and chemical weapons treaties. \_ Kyoto: it's based on junk science and doesn't put real limits on China, India and other 3rd world nations that can easily out pollute us in a few short years. Landmines: they'd want us to pull up the mines in the DMZ between N/S Korea. Chemical weapons: we've got a shitload of the stuff and destroy it as fast as the plants will run. What's your problem with that? Most "ppl" run at the mouth based on ignorance and don't have a clue what they're talking about beyond what NPR told them to think. \_ You usually do not invade a sovereign nation under international law. The legal basis for invading Iraq depends on UN resolutions after the war in 1991 started by Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. Here is an Economist article about its legality: http://www.economist.com/agenda/displayStory.cfm?story_id=1648347 \_ Why not? What if the country is nasty? Are you willing to let people under a nasty regime suffer because of the principle of sovereign immunity? I think people's lives and happiness are more important. \_ If every country felt this way, there would be no end to the wars. Think about it for a second: the Christian countries would all want to invade everyone else to "save" them. The Muslim countries the same. All in the name of "happiness." [formatd. again for you.] \_ No end to wars? There will always be wars so long as there are limited resources, people disagree with each other, or religion still exists. I think it's cute that you believe wars will somehow magically end if every country was just happily isolationist. Are you a GO PAT! GO! follower? \_ watch out! more imaginary missles incoming! \_ laugh as he continues to keep FERC from stopping his energy company buddies from raping California. \_ Oh really? Daniel Weintraub: New energy lessons from the last crisis in California http://www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/story/5932213p-6893078c.html |
2003/3/22-23 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27805 Activity:very high |
3/22 American kid/human shield 'shocked back to reality'. http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030321-023627-5923r A group of American anti-war demonstrators who came to Iraq with Japanese human shield volunteers made it across the border today with 14 hours of uncensored video, all shot without Iraqi government minders present. Kenneth Joseph, a young American pastor with the Assyrian Church of the East, told UPI the trip "had shocked me back to reality." Some of the Iraqis he interviewed on camera "told me they would commit suicide if American bombing didn't start. They were willing to see their homes demolished to gain their freedom from Saddam's bloody tyranny. They convinced me that Saddam was a monster the likes of which the world had not seen since Stalin and Hitler. He and his sons are sick sadists. Their tales of slow torture and killing made me ill, such as people put in a huge shredder for plastic products, feet first so they could hear their screams as bodies got chewed up from foot to head." A few of you might also like to check out the history of the Baathists in Iraq. They're not just "Nazi-like" but are actually Arab Nazis. The truth is out there for those who are interested in knowing it. \_ I've posted this before, only to be deleted. People didn't seem to like the source. "It is Michel Aflaq who created the party and not I," Saddam told an interviewer in 1980. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/837uvzrs.asp \_ Saddam was a bloody tyrant right from the start, yet we supported him all those years, giving him weapons and technical help when he used his nerve gas against Kurds and Iranians. him all those years, giving him weapons and technical help while he was using nerve gas against Kurds and Iranians. Note that Iran- Iraq War was started by Saddam when he invaded Iran. \_ Just because we've done evil in the past doesn't mean we're not allowed to correct it later. If the standard for who is allowed to fight evil is only people who have never done anything evil then no one would be left to do so. \_ Except that it calls into question as to whether our stated reason for the war is the real reason for it. \_ Why is this any more believable than the stories about babies being pulled from incubators in the last war? Don't be so quick to swallow the propaganda. \_ ie, believe the news stories that support your stance on war. \_ babies? incubators? What are you talking about? Ok, ok, you're right. Anything that supports a point of view different from yours must be lies. Afterall the UPI has such a long history of supporting right wing conservative christian anti-arab, pro- israel, anti-minority racist lies. Did I miss anything in my list? Do we still hate rich white people too? Why don't you just post a list of the things we're allowed to believe and the ultra left wing 'media' resources you use to 'learn' of those events? \_ Your historical memory is weak, child. Bush I sold the war against Iraq with such a story: http://www.counterpunch.org/cohen1228.html \_ Why do you think his arab neighbors aren't jumping to support him? |
2003/3/22 [Science/Space, Recreation/Food, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27804 Activity:high |
3/21 Let's say we dig through the rubble and find Saddam's body. How can we tell it's him and not one of his dozen body doubles? It's not like we have his DNA. \_ meanwhile the real saddam is doing what? shaves off his moustache and goes to work as a waiter in a paris bistro ... who spits in the food of americans? if he has no public face or power, in a sense it is still mission accomplished. --psb \_ it'd still be fairly easy to recognize him then, too. \_ We get Mossad on his ass. hunt him to the end of the earth. \_ Except that we DO have his DNA. \_ From where? \_ From examining his relatives |
2003/3/22 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:27802 Activity:nil |
3/21 http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110003234 "Jacques Chirac says France will not authorize a U.N. resolution allowing the United States and Britain to administer postwar Iraq." \_ France also threatned to veto a resolution that authorized the use of force against Iraq. \_ "Authorize" a UN resolution? How arrogant. \_ The U.S. has to come back showing respect to the UN after having defied it. \_ Too late. Another international institution ruined by Bush. \_ Let's return the Statue of Liberty. She's an ugly biotch anyways. |
2003/3/22 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27800 Activity:nil |
3/21 Regarding Saddam's TV appearances of late, a rhetorical question: why would Saddam bother looking like Saddam? If I were in his place I'd use the same body double for every public appearance and have surgery to look like just another Tom, Dick, or Abdul. \_ Then the body double would have you executed and just be you maybe? \_ Presense. Looking like someone doesn't give that person the same sort of charisma. And it feeds into the dictator ego. |
2003/3/21 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27790 Activity:high |
3/21 My favorite quote from the wall in the last few days, "low estimates are for 250,000 dead iraqi civilians. wonder how they'd vote." \_ Two or three times, if I know Chicago politics. \_ 3500 died during the first Gulf War, 35,000 died in the months after as Saddam suppressed uprising. This from Human Rights Watch. \_ You should do some research. US forces were there while Saddam put down the uprising in the south of Iraq. In fact, some of it happened in the view of US forces, but they had orders not to interfere. \_ And if they did you'd be pissed off they went beyond their mandate. Whatever. Some people are never happy. \_ good point. \_ Do you have a URL for that? The estimate i've seen agrees with the around 30,000 from Hussein putting down a rebellion. But i've seen around 80,000 for deaths from US action: http://csua.org/u/b4f (business week) \_ The conservative estimate is >= half a million Iraqi soldiers got toasted in the first gulf war. I did not make up the number nor am I saying it is too many or too few. Supposedly they died for a good cause because we learned a lot about the efficacy of our weapon, and hence it does help protect American life indirectly. War kills, and God blesses us to be the winning side. \_ People die in wars. The Iraqis had a choice. They didn't have to invade their neighbor. Ask the Kuwaitis about how fun it was to live under the Iraqis for a short period of time. \_ I checked. It's from Tom. What did you expect? |
2003/3/21 [Science/GlobalWarming, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27789 Activity:high |
3/21 Is this war about terrorists, or WMDs, or regime change, or oil, or dollar vs euro, or Bush personal vendetta, or American hegemonism, or a combination of all of the above? What do you guys think? \_ I had a "well, duh" moment yesterday. The only reason it's all been couched in the "protecting us from terrorists" context is because that context is already funded. It's about oil. period. --scotsman \_ You need another moment. It's about oil, in the sense that oil is what makes Saddam rich, which gives him the capability \_ Nothig wrong. It's just greed. to sponsor terrorists. Dubya has said, "After all, this is the guy who tried to kill my dad" in a speech, and he figures Saddam's going to get his revenge one way or another. The Bush view is "get them while they're small" -- preemptive strike -- and make them an example. \_ And what's wrong with controlling the 2nd largest source of energy on the planet? \_ what's the first largest source of energy? or do you mean second largest source of oil? \_ currently its the same thing. \_ It's going against the will of the people, squandering resources in order to recoup the losses of some of our largest corporations. And what's wrong with it? That innocents are less important than those companies' bottom lines. \_ the will of which people? you want to see the latest polls on support for the war and support for bush? the last bit is just your opinion of the root cause. \_ The Congress of these United States. The funding for this war is misappropriated from the struggle against "terrorism". Are you one of those who compares the state of affairs in Iraq to the Cuban missile crisis? \_ So you think Congress doesn't want this to happen? You're aware they voted October/02 for military action? You're aware they could vote anytime to do all sorts of things both real and symbolic? The last I knew they were going to vote on a resolution to say they support the troops. And WTF does the Cuban Missile Crisis have to do with this? Can you please try to stay in the same century with us? \_ Nothing wrong. It's just greed. \_ adults would call it control of strategic assets. ya know, important things you need to keep your culture alive. \_ Next thing we know, you will be calling it 'lebensraum'. \_ Haven't you figured it out yet? The war is about the Jew Sharon and Zionsim. \_ Kill the Jews! Push them into the sea! \_ War on the nexus of militant Islam, rogue states, and terrorism - they are all intertwined. Reestablish negotiating position of the US to one of power. Transition of US foreign policy from Cold War - first major transition since the 1940's. Proxy war on the Saudis. \_ What is your definition of a "rogue state"? \_ Iran, N. Korea, France, Germany, China, Russia. -Dubya \_ nah, thoes are our reluctant allies!-dubya \_ hi trollboy! love ya, kid! |
2003/3/21 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27780 Activity:very high |
3/20 First American casualties: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A687-2003Mar20.html "Earlier two other U.S. military helicopters made crash landings during operations along the Kuwait-Iraq border. One was later destroyed by American warplanes to prevent it from falling into Iraqi hands, Defense Department officials said." Wtf are we doing? \_ Fighting the jew's war for them with our blood and money. \_ Are you Palestinian, French, or German? Why do you hate jews so much? \_ Why not? Doesn't everyone hate Jews? It's so chic! \_ NYTimes just had a full page ad by some Jewish organziation calling on Jews in US to be against the war. \_ No surprise. Jews are mostly leftist. \_ Not possible. Anyone who disagrees with Sharon is an anti-semitic pro-Hitler Jewkiller. See above. \_ What in hell does a Jewish .org being against the war have to do with Sharon? You've lost it or I just got trolled. Either way, this makes no sense. \_ We'll probably kill more of our people than they will. \_ Sounds like the kind of incident that happens even in training exercises. Sad, but so? \_ Sad, and what the poster above you wrote. \_ More of the men will die of throat/mouth cancer from tobacco chew than will die during their entire time in the Middle East. We should invade Virginia to force them to stop spreading this deadly plague which is killing our troops and humiliating our peoples and driving them to terrorism. \_ they'd just get executed. you can harass the government in \_ Or, alternatively, we could send all of our states' attourney generals to Iraq to harass the government there with lawsuits until they go bankrupt. \_ they'd just get executed. you cant harass the government in a dictatorship. you can only kill and replace them. \_ That doesn't sound so bad either. \_ I thought that was standard procedure. From what I saw in the movie "Black Hawk Down", the US troops did the same thing in Somalia. |
2003/3/21 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27776 Activity:nil |
3/20 http://www.rosbaltnews.com/2003/03/21/61827.html If true this is interesting. Not much info yet. The headline is: "Saddam Hussein's Son Hurt in Fight with Father's Body Guard" |
2003/3/21 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27774 Activity:high |
3/20 Iraqi blog (can't verify authenticity): http://dear_raed.blogspot.com \_ http://www.msnbc.com/news/809307.asp |
2003/3/20-21 [Politics/Domestic/Immigration, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27764 Activity:high 54%like:27762 |
3/20 Autobots Roll Out! http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_fullstory.asp?id=3828 \_ I hope he's not indicative of the type of ppl in our military \_ oh trust me, he is \_ why should anyone trust you? |
2003/3/20 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27762 Activity:nil 54%like:27764 |
3/20 Look out Saddam here comes Optimus Prime: http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_fullstory.asp?id=3828 |
2003/3/19-20 [Reference/BayArea, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27758 Activity:high |
3/19 Any war protestor in Berkeley? -alumni \_ "alumni" is plural, dumbass. I doubt you are multiple people. -aaron \_ Well, specifically it means a group of male graduates if you want to nitpick. If you ever used the terms data and media as singular then you're being hypocritical. In modern usage alumni to refer to singular or plural in conversation is fine. I assume you're one of those anal people who insist on accenting the e in resume. \_ you're just wrong. \_ Resume is probably too pedestrian for them. I'm sure they favor Curriculum Vitae instead. \_ no, we're all for the war here in Berkeley - danh \_ there is a protest at 5pm at powell and market in SF - danh \_ where you there, danh? I passed by the protest on my way back from the IETF meeting at the Hilton. \_ Forget the protest. When does the looting start? I need a new pair of sunglasses. \_ why wait for looting? if there's a real riot, and someone sees you looting, you might actually be shot. if you go steal a pair of sunglasses now, before the riot, the potential for getting shot is zero. just don't steal from Fred's. \_ Sir, I admire your honesty and realism. \_ So here on Wilshire, the street was shutdown and the cops were beating up protestors. Whatever happened to the hippie movements, it migrated to LA? -happy UCLA CS student |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27755 Activity:high |
3/19 The rest of the world can see that we are marching to Sharon's orders, even if we cannot: http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EC20Ak07.html \_ Yeah! Kill the Jews! Push em into the sea! Round em up and slap a yellow star on em then gas em! YAAAAAAA! Wow, I feel so much better having gotten that bit of mindless hatred off my chest. \_ I see you cannot debate the points raised by the story so you resort to race baiting. \_ Let's see: Likkud fuels the AEI, which fuels the PNAC, which sets the agenda for the Bush Administration. The only thing the article lacks is a reference to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. I'm not a Bush- supporter, but this article is insulting. \_ I can't believe I am dignifying this with a response, but any article that must cleanse itself by stating that it is not a conspiracy theory, thus obviously thinks it may be perceived as one, is starting on shakey ground already. \_ Fine, read this one then, that says much of the same thing, but in much less detail: http://csua.org/u/b1f But I suppose Rueters and the NYT are part of the vast anti-Semitic conspiracy in your worldview. |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27753 Activity:high |
3/19 Forget WMD, Terrorism and Liberating the people of Iraq. Its all about the Euro: http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/RRiraqWar.html \_ More and more people are beginning to believe this. |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27750 Activity:high |
3/19 "the death of the man in his 30s was the first related to the latest protests over the U.S.-led war against Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein" http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54702-2003Mar19.html Bush's first victim in Gulf War II. \_ obcookie |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27749 Activity:nil |
3/19 Ok do you believe the war has started now? http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1084275,00.html Or now? http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/til/jsp/modules/Article/print.jsp?itemId=3895393 Or maybe now? http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2863065.stm It's probably just cowboy rhetoric and bluster.... Nevermind, this is not the war you're looking for. \_ Sure! The war's started! |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Domestic/California, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27745 Activity:nil |
3/18 Just curious. The person who claimed the US would be backing off the war noise over the next several weeks and how you "told us so!!!!": do you still believe your earlier statements? I'm the one who said about a week ago that this coming weekend would be the start. \_ When the bombs drop, I'll admit I was wrong. I wasn't trying to troll either. \_ is your point simply that behaving irrationally, or bluffing, are effective means of diplomacy? \_ Whoever said it was effective? Anyways, I still think the U.S. won't do anything until it gets support from Russia, France, and China. I wouldn't be surprised if the troops sit there for a month waiting for Iraq to surrender (which it won't). \_ You are living in the past. Many people fail to understand Bush. He is not a complex man, what you see is what you get. Unlike Clinton, he means what he says. \_ at least I had a job when Clinton was in office. \_ As an intern? \_ I miss the intern days. The WH was so much more fun when we took government seriously and we smoked out and nailed all the interns and stroke of the pen, law of the land... sigh. Oh for the dotcom days when we all had bubble jobs based on VC money with no business plans. \_ What I see is a moron. Is that what I get? He could have gotten much more support for the war, and made it much easier for American troops and tax payers if he and his underlings just learn some basic diplomatic skills. \_ Could he have? France has been obstructing US efforts to control Iraq the whole time. \_ So you figure he could've gotten the votes in from France/Russia/China how exactly? Do you understand how diplomacy works? To get their vote in a useless body (the UN), we'd have to buy them off with something that has real value. You're so smart, how about I give you my vote at the next CSUA meeting and in exchange you give me 50 bucks. That sounds good to me and you'd show good diplomacy. I'd not veto your resolution to oppose the war or something. \_ I am not referring to getting votes, but generating bad vibes all over. Even in terms of getting votes, if the Bush administration has done it smarter instead of like a gung-ho cowboy, he may very well have gotten enough votes to force a French veto rather than having to withdraw the resolution. Even magazines like the Economist which openly supported the war thought Bush and his underlings screwed up the diplomacy big time. \_ Ok, I'll buy that. Yes, there are some bad vibes. Maybe it could've been better, maybe not. Either way I believe the French were hell bound to veto anything that would had a trigger clause in it. I believe that because they said so so many times. The WH reaction to that was too flustered but in the end most countries either already liked/hated us and will continue to do so as before. The long term effect on how much any other country likes/hates us is about zero because this isn't a play ground. \_ we got UN support in Afghanistan, and in Iraq last time, so the assertion that France was going to veto stuff just because they "don't like us" is not only absurd, it's contradicted by history. -tom |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27744 Activity:nil |
3/18 Just curious, what is the consensus on how long the war with iraq is going to take? live outside of US \_ There is no consensus, of course. That's what makes living in the US fun. I'm sure there's consensus in France. \_ My guess is the troops will move in at the same time the bombs start falling on military c&c behind the lines so it'll take about 4 days to get to Baghdad and then God only knows what'll happen in the city. The military may surrender. They may go house to house which could take weeks. They will probably lose most of the city right away and then there'll be hard mop up in a few sections for a week or maybe two if they're really suicidal. \_ It could all be over in a day if they would just use one or two of the neutron bombs we've got. None of our troops would get hurt and all of the oil wells and buildings would be intact. |
2003/3/19 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27743 Activity:nil |
3/19 I'm really worried about the economic impact of the war. Bush still hasn't given us concrete numbers of how much this all costs. I've heard $100 billion tossed around. Where the hell is that going to come from? social security? Medicare? Cutting foreign aid? Printing more money? After the last gulf war there was a brief rally in the stock market and we plunged deeper into recession after that. I think the same will happen again. \_ Not to mention that Kuwait and Saudi Arabia ended footing much of the bill for the last Persian Gulf excursion. In other words, we never actually saw the whole cost last time. We're on our own this time, monetarily. \_ What do you mean "saw the whole cost". We made money last time. \_ I've already bought a few blocks of halliburton and others. \_ After all this time I can't believe that you are still in the dark on this. Its all about the OIL! He's going to take all of Iraq's oil and sell it and use the money to pay off the national debt and give all his zionist-fat-cat-worker rich cronies a huge tax break so that they can all buy new Escalades and drive over the poor workers-of-the-world who are trying to unite in order to form a more perfect commune. |
2003/3/18 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27737 Activity:nil |
3/18 To make the motd less boring, take a part in the following informal survey. Saddam Hussein will.. Flee Iraq within 48 hours: Take the Bribe and flee quietly: \_ Whatever happened to noriega? Declare and offer to surrender all of his WMDs to avoid the war: Order a preemptive strike on Israel and US troops in the region: Flee Iraq within a few days after the war starts: Try to flee Iraq once Bagdad is surrounded by US troops: Be toppled and possibly assassinated in a coup attempt: Surrender himself to US troops: Commit a ritual suicide: Threaten to cover all of the Gulf's baby seals with oil and other chemicals if the US proceeds with the war: Announce that Osama Bin Laden has been hiding in his presidential palace all the time: Admit that the real Saddam Hussain died during 1991 bombing of Bagdad and he's only his genetic clone: Admit that one of his grandfathers was Jewish and ask Israel for a political asylum: Rally on Sproul against the war and the Zionist expansion in the middle east: Wait out Bush's bluff and embarrass the U.S.: . \_ It is not a bluff. \_ Of course it's a bluff. I heard it on NPR. Keep on downloading warez and mp3s until the net connection dies: . Play hide and seek with the US--to make his point: . |
2003/3/17 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Israel] UID:27725 Activity:nil |
3/17 'For whose benefit these endless wars in a region that holds nothing vital to America save oil, which the Arabs must sell us to survive? Who would benefit from a war of civilizations between the West and Islam? Answer: one nation, one leader, one party. Israel, Sharon, Likud.' -Pat Buchanan \_ Someone besides me quotes Pat? Cool!!! -ax \_ No, lots of isolationists and racists quote Pat. GO PAT! GO! |
2003/3/15-16 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27706 Activity:low |
3/15 Very interesting program from http://Marketplace.org It explains why USA is sure Iraq has the know-how to build Atomic weapons link:csua.org/u/ad5 \_ "They fucking looked at the receipts, duh." - B. Hicks. (valid then, valid quote now). \_ Virus warning. The uninfected original is at http://marketplace.org, but it uses real player, which will try to put advert loaders in your startup. \_ what is the name of the virus? how do i know i got infected or not? (norton antivirus already running) \_ Iraq has blood agents and nerve gas, but isn't close to nukes. \_ Dead is dead, thanks. And how do *you* know they aren't close to nukes? And even if true, you know why? Because the damned jews killed their french built nuke plant. that's why. \_ Arthur Kent, AKA the Skud Stud from GW1, has a History Channel special on this coming up soon. \_ Any relation to Clark Kent, AKA the Man of Steel? Quest for Peace anyone? Maybe a quality respirator instead? |
2003/3/14-15 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27699 Activity:insanely high |
3/13 Turns out that the "evidence" that Bush presented of Iraqi attempts to build a bomb are crude forgeries. Two guesses as to who passed them to British Intelligence: http://edition.cnn.com/2003/US/03/14/sprj.irq.documents \_ "Incompetence I have not seen in those agencies. I've seen plenty of malice, but I've never seen incompetence." \_ "Incompetence I have not seen in those agencies. I've seen plenty of malice, but I've never seen incompetence." What a ridiculous statement. \_ he's talking about the technical services division \_ You peaceniks could very likely set the stage for use of a nuclear weapon in this country. Ask yourself this, Russians). You believe Saddam will allow Iran to go nuclear and not Iraq? Had the 1st Gulf War not occurred Saddam would have been nuclear by 92 /93. He had 20,000 + personnel working on his program. Exactly where do you think all that expertise went? This is not a time to play self- righteous isolationist. Iran is 1 / 2 years tops away for a nuclear weapon - if they don't have one already (thanks to the Germans, French, and Russians). You believe Saddam will allow Iran to go nuclear and not Iraq? Had the 1st Gulf War not occurred Saddam would have been nuclear by 92 /93. He had 20,000 + personnel working on his program. Exactly where do you think all that expertise went? This is not a time to play selfrighteous isolationist. \_ Ask yourself this warmonger: France, Britain, Russia, China, Pakistan and India all have nukes, yet none of them have been used against the US. Why is that? How would Iraq be any different? \_ Understand this. I am for enforcing the 17 resolutions against Iraq, no more no less. Terms of the cease \- hello, do you think the us should stop enforcing the no-fly zone over the northern kurd area? that was a us+brit idea ... not un sanctioned --psb \ Take an educated guess. fire dictated full disarmement. If the distinction between the countries you mentioned and Iraq is not clear to you, I don't think anything would be gained by explaining it. And BTW, I seem to remember about 50 years of war between the US, China and Soviets, a little something called the Cold War. Which, incidentally we did not win by protesting for peace and groups hugs. \_ In spite of Reaganite crowing, the Cold War was won primarily with a policy of containment. A good argument can be made that detente, or a policy of "peace and group hugs" reassured the USSR enough to allow more moderate influences to take power. \_ Right, this was a foregone conclusion after the US left Vietnam, Vietnam invaded Cambodia, and the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. Take ~20 % interest rates, double digit inflation, definitely a foregone conclusion. \_ The Cold War was won by the US on 12 Oct 1986. Not because of any peacenik group hug, but because the President was able to make it clear to the Soviets what we wanted, a world in which the dread threat of nuclear destruction did not hang over Europe, Asia or America. The only way the Soviets were going to have have any part in this world was if they agreed to Zero Option. On all accounts detente was a failed policy. Every "accord" signed under detente limited the rate of production and deployment, not the total number of deployed weapons. Detente didn't make the world safe for anyone, it just kept making more and more dangerous in smaller and smaller increments. |
2003/3/14-15 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27694 Activity:high |
3/13 Been getting a lot more telemarketer calls in the past few weeks than before, what's going on? \_ Have you been protesting the war in Iraq? Could be the FBI. \_ you got on a list. every time you get a call insist that they take you off the list. within a few weeks the calls will stop. amazing how legislation to stop telemarketers actually works. \_ you should ask them to put you on their do not call list, not to be taken off their list \_ I've been doing this for like a year. Still get lots of telemarketer calls. The National DO NOT CALL ME YOU PUNKS list should help. \_ my experience has been that requesting to be put on a do not call list works...with one glaring exception. AT&T. i've told those fucks more than four times now to put me on their do not call list, and they say they've done it, then they just call again. i can only take solace in the fact that as a former fone phreak i've cost them almost enough to compensate me for my time. \_ Note the date/time, name, and address of callers. You can ask for $500 as a fine... I've written down how this process works but don't have it handy. You basically mail them and ask. \_ we're all in this together... |
2003/3/13-14 [Politics/Domestic, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27690 Activity:low |
3/13 In all these pictures of military guys lately, the soldiers have have a backwards American flag patch on their arm. What's that all about? Symbolize anything? \_ http://www.ushistory.org/betsy/flagetiq.html#3 The last question. \_ Someone ought to tell Old Navy that it has been violating Section 8d for the last 5 or so years. \_ It's so the Iraqi's can see it facing the right way in their rear view mirrors as they flee. \_ omg! you're right! someone notify the pentagon. \_ It's a secret message from the skull and bones crowd to the novus ordo seculorum people. \_ you got it. this is why the bank of England flys their flag backwards also. \_ especially when the wind is in the wrong direction. |
2003/3/12 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27666 Activity:nil |
3/11 RUSSIAN THREATS TO UNITED STATES SECURITY IN THE POST-COLD WAR ERA http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/862609/posts |
2003/3/11 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27659 Activity:nil 50%like:27914 |
3/10 An Open Letter to Anti-War Protestors http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6578 \_ I might as well write "Hello You Warmongering Fools" \_ Did you even *read* the link? No. You didn't. You're not even remotely close to the link topic. You might as well learn to read before you try writing anything. |
2003/3/11 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27651 Activity:very high |
3/11 Told you it was all one big bluff. GW's people just ain't that crazy, and Powell was on board, so you knew we weren't attacking: (until later that is) "The goal is to not have a war. The goal is to have the pressure be so great that Saddam Hussein cooperates," said Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. "Short of that, an unwillingness to cooperate, the goal is to have the capabilities of the coalition so clear and so obvious that there is an enormous disincentive for the Iraqi military to fight against the coalition and there is an enormous incentive for Saddam Hussein to leave and spare the world a conflict." \_ when did you tell us this? the war is going to happen. \_ search ~mehlhaff/tmp/motd,v for "You heard it here first" \_ gee, anonymous motd poster, you're smart! \_ If we don't go to war I will vote for Bush \_ If we don't go to war I will vote for Bush \_ Ah know! :D \_ so how come the rest of the world doesn't get what the US is doing and/or go along with it? \_ The U.S. is backing down. You'll see more signs over the next few weeks. \_ We may be backing down politically but we're stepping-up the military actions. \_ Apparently because the world is full of idiots who are more interested in looking good and making useless symbolic statements than actually getting anything done. \_ Thanks for joining us! Have a seat. \_ Can't we all just get along? \_ Depends. Are we French, German, and Russian and making or hoping to make huge bucks off Iraq? German equipment to develope nuclear and chemical weaponry is grossly exaggerated. \_ The importance of Iraq as a customer for French and German equipment to nuclear and chemical weaponry is grossly exaggerated. \_ And all it cost was the goodwill and trust of Old Europe, the Muslim population, and most of the UN. Plus maybe $10 billion for military costs. \_ And don't forget NATO! \_ Good riddance on all of that, except the $10B. \_ France? Don't want it, never had it. (I was actually in Paris post 9/11, and there was *no* goodwill. If anything, there was a snickering you-deserved-it attitude.) Muslim? Never had it, never will. UN? Let's talk about things that matter, should we? But I forgot, we're talking about France, so obvious we are not into relevance. $10b? That's welfare for engineers and defense corps. \_ The UN? It's mostly third world dictators. They understood that when they created it thus the security council exists. \_ CA would veto the war resolution too. What they didn't deal with was the fact that certain nations with permanent seats had no business having such a gift. If France and GB can have seats, I think CA and Texas should too |
2003/3/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27640 Activity:insanely high |
3/9 Does anybody here really support going to war? I saw Blix giving his report on Friday and it seemed like he was making progress. If you do support the war, why? \_ You don't seem to understand that the inspectors are there only to confirm that voluntary disarming has taken place. They are not detectives. They do not have the capability of finding anything that the Iraqis might be trying to hide. Once you understand and accept that fact you'll understand why the anti-Saddam folks want to see this happen and get his ass dead or in prison along with the rest of the bastards in the Baath party. but sometimes it is less bad that "containment". Also Sadaam is \_ you don't seem to understand that the OP was asking a question, not making a statement. \_ The real issue for anti-war has nothing to do with Saddam, at least for me personally. United Nation was founded on the base of national soverignty. Whatever we think we are doing the right thing, fundamentally, what we are doing is no differ from Japan's invasion of Manchuria / Soviet invasion of Czech, and yes, Nazi's invasion of Poland. War, idealogically, should be last resort. If there are more than one country who adopted preemptive strike policy, then the world will be in a much \_ terrible place to live. \_ So you believe that anything going on inside the borders of another nation is a-ok and no one on the outside should do anything about it because of national soverignty? You think if we knew for real what was going on in the concentration camps we should have left the Nazis be so long as they didn't stomp on their neighbors? Would you agree that Milosevic was ok with all the ethnic cleansing going on? It was inside his country, after all. What if Israel forced all the Arabs out of policy transformation the likes of which has not seen since the 1940s. This was expected at the end of the Cold War, but was delayed pre-1967 Israel by force? Or executed them all just because they policy. That aside I think his domestic agenda has been a disaster, namely spending like a liberal. can because it's their country, right? \_ Well we are supporting Pakistan. Angola seems to always be below the "killing our own citizens" limit as is Indonesia and North Korea. The US still refuses to sign many international treaties against things like bioweapons, chemical weapson, land mines, war crimes, etc. Too bad about all of that. have had to argue against the hawk's strident remarks. \_ Too many people on Earth. War = death. Death = good, as long as it's not my death. \_ Ah, techno-libertarian-geek politics in a nutshell. \_ then, US should unleash all its nukes on China and India first. Take out those 2 countries will elimate almost 1/3 of world's population. \_ Yes, because the people in Iraq deserve to be freed from a tyrant dicator and get a try at "democracy". Tyrants like Saddam only respond to force and violence. The only reason Blix is in Iraq is because of the threat of war. I do not like violence, but sometimes it is less bad than "containment". Also Sadaam is but sometimes it is less bad that "containment". Also Sadaam is aparently manufacturing more al Samoud 2 missles to replace the ones he's had to destroy. If you lived in Iraq, what would \_ I say we overthrown Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait and Jordan government first. Saddam may be a dictator, at least its a republic. I would think absolute Monarch should go first. \_ A republic? It's a dictatorship. You can't have both. Sheesh. Anyway the other Arab states you mention are mostly heading in the right direction, albeit slowly or at least have a chance of doing so. The Baath party in Iraq will never give up power. Force is a last resort. Saddam is beyond that point. The others are no where near it. you want, freedom or more inspections? \_ You're in the minority on this one. Pretty much everyone cares one way or the other. Go back to hacking Java. We'll wake you when it's over. \_ A better question might be does anyone here really care? \_ "Those who are good at getting rid of trouble are those who take care of it before it arises" - Master Sun \_ unfortunately the Supreme Court kept that from happening. \_ That gosh darned electoral college - what were the founding fathers thinking. Oh thats right, you have absolutely no idea. \_ "If your forces [votes] are not equal to those of the enemy, avoid their edge for the time being, waiting for a gap; then make a determined bid for victory." - Master Sun \_ Unless you're Al Gore. \_ "When you know neither the arts of defense nor the arts of offense, you will \_ You're way off topic, trollboy. Move on, nut head. lose the battle" \_ Yes, I think Bush has handled the war on terror impeccably, policy transformation the likes of which has not seen since the 1940s. This was expected at the end of the Cold War, but was delayed above reproach. We are in the midst of an overarching foreign policy. Nato is dead (has been dead), so is the U.N. The geopolitical alignment is shifting, regardless of the who the US president is. That aside I think his domestic agenda has been a disaster, namely spending like a liberal. \_ Hey! Clinton didn't do-nothing, know-nothing! He did a lot! He started the current shitfest in Israel/Palestine. He blew up an aspirin factory. He blew up some camels. He chicken shitted out when the going got tough in Somalia. He did a lot! \_ The New Pax Americana? The world's policemen? I thought the Republicans were against that. policy transformation the likes of which has not seen since the 1940s. This was expected at the end of the Cold War, but was delayed for eight years by Clinton's do nothing know nothing foreign policy. That aside I think his domestic agenda has been a disaster, namely spending like a liberal. \_ You can't beat the locals at their own game in their own country. Stronger or more inspectors won't work. Inspectors are meant to \_ The Soviets never honored the ABM or SALT treaties either, they were a joke. \_ Neither did we. What's your point? So they spent their country into the ground and are now quite happy to dump their nukes. Sounds like Reagan's Soviet policy worked pretty damned well. "The bombs will drop in 5 minutes". \_ The Soviets did honor the ABM treaty. They were allowed to build a test facility (which they tricked the US into thinking was real) near Moscow. It was covered. The US never signed SALT or SALT II. \_ To paraphrase Harry Belafonte, Powell's a house servant. You know that the smartest and scariest guy in the fray is Rumsfeld. \_ Riiight... I suppose Condi is too. Modern liberal philosophy is implicitly racist, and you are a disgusting wretch. \_ If you're going to base your political philosophy on what an aged song writer/singer of little ditties has to say, you have no business having an opinion. Perhaps you should see what Streisand or Garafalo or a number of other hollywood knuckleheads are saying? At least they were born in the last century so senility isn't an issue yet. \_ Here's the end deal with me. The reason for war can be stated for humanitarian reasons. But not getting our traditional allies to join us is just plain stupid. There is no rush for war. Iraq has been slowly toturing and killing it's own people for decades, in no small part thanks to the US and it's allies. Hussain will make an error and then war can be had. The US needs to PROVE to the world that it is right. And it really hasn't. verify when a state truly wants to disarm (like former Soviet states). Saddam will only be disarmed by force, and disarming by force de facto equals "regime change". We'll end up where we would have ended up anyway, but Rummy and Wolfy should have watched their words and followed Powell's advice. Then France, et al. may not have had to argue against our dig in, for whatever reasons. |
2003/3/10 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27638 Activity:high |
3/9 Look at these desperate losers trying to call a crop duster a 'smoking gun'. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-605557,00.html \_ A remote-controlled crop duster with a 25-ft wingspan? In combination with the anthrax that Iraq has? Note also that it wasn't declared by Iraq. \_ You don't have to declare farm equipment! And they don't have any anthrax. The inspectors haven't found any because there isn't any. \_ I didn't know Iraq was remotely dusting their crops, why don't we do that here in the U.S.? Thanks for the insight. \_ Well, I guess we haven't wanted to dust israel with aerosolized anthrax or botulin toxin lately. |
2003/3/9 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27634 Activity:nil |
3/8 When Will Americans Come http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110003156 |
2003/3/6-8 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Domestic/California] UID:27609 Activity:very high |
3/6 Mall t-shirt part II: http://csua.org/u/a48 Now the mall wants to drop the charges because they know they screwed up bigtime. \_ dropping charges doesn't mean anything. They want to apprehend the person who is in their view politically incorrect. By arrest him first, file charges later, then release him, The mall has achieved this goal. Same tactics is oftened used in mainland China. Most people gets the message and become silent afterwards. \_ Um, okay. Most people would consider this a victory for the demonstrators and the guy who was arrested. He's probably not planning on being silent since he's considering a lawsuit. I think a reasonable person would say the mall failed miserably and that this will send a message to malls across the country that they shouldn't try the same thing. \_ call me a greedy bastard. What I really want to see is a civil lawsuit against the mall. As previous motd stated, there is no law (hence protection) governing this kind of issue in New York State. Consider that New York is the 2nd largest State in the Union. Such law is long overdue. \_ What you don't seem to understand is businesses don't want such a law, neither do a probable majority of the public. So in the sense anything is overdue, it would be annuling California's law. \_ California isn't the only state with limited \_ California's law does not provides that you may exercise your 1st amd. right to free speech in a quasi-public forum (privately owned, but operated with the intention that any member of the public can attend) at any time you chose. What it provides is that you may exercise your 1st amd. right at a reasonable time and place within the forum and that such a time and place may be determined by the owners of the forum. \_ the CA state supreme court said the following in Robins v. Pruneyard Shopping Center, 23 Cal.3d 899 (1979), aff''d, 447 U.S. 74 (1980): The free-speech guarantees of the California Constitution "protect speech and petitioning, reasonably exercised, in shopping centers even when the centers are privately owned." - danh free speech protections in quasi-public forums. Colorado, Oregon and New Jersey among others protect free speech in quasi-public forums. As far as what the majority of the public want, that is irrelevant since the purpose of the first amd. is to protect the freedoms of the minority from the will of the majority. \_ You are a greedy bastard. \_ This doesn't work as well in the States because we're not that subtle, we haven't internalized our protests to avoid persecution, and we love to sue to make our voices heard. In real terms, sure, the mall achieved its goal by expelling the t-shirt protesters, but in perceived terms, they've lost by having to make the retraction. \_ Will all of you with anti-war desires please form a PAC, stop being so cheap, and pay for your results like every other special interest? I had to live through the hippie movements in the 70's, 80's, and 90's, and I'd really like to keep the new millennium hippie free. Thanks. -ax \_ 1. anti-war not necessarily equal to hippie \_ Would people mind dressing up a little for protests then? They get international press and everyone outside the US thinks we are slobs. -ax \_ Most people outside the US agree with the protestors. \_ And you know this how? You've polled the world and the world is qualified to make this judgement and makes it from a neutral point of view and not an anti-American or selfish perspective? Uh huh. 2. this whole thread is not about war/anti-war. it's about freedom of expression and consistutional right in semi-public areas \_ Malls are private areas. \_ not true... in most of America (ie, suburbia) there are no general shopping districts, per se, and few public places for people to congregate. Malls spring up to fill this gap, and therefore act as de facto public places. \_ You are wrong, except in California. If you read the USSC opinion posted here yesterday the mall was completely legal in its behavoir - as it should be. \_ You fail to understand why people move to suburbia. They move there precisely to avoid having to deal with the unwashed masses, crazies, and generally anyone who deviates from their beliefs and values. \_ it has nothing to do with anyone else's political in a store at the mall. Sure, I care about freedom of speech and all that good stuff, but aren't we missing the more important issue here? The guy BUYS a shirt in a store within the mall, which I'm sure the mall doesn't mind one bit. But then as soon as he WEARS it, they get pissy. That's probably his best bet at winning a lawsuit (although it probably wouldn't be as nice of a case for 1st amendment rights then). beliefs. thats such an idiotic and silly smear. it is entirely and 100% because it is cleaner, safer, easier to live, more convenient and mostly free from crazies and criminals. you're not as clever as you feel. the only reason to live in a crowded city such as SF is you're young and \_ you think black people should still be forced to attend different high schools? besides, the point was to disprove that protest "doesn't produce anything" like the endless party, you're old and have near zero rent due to draconian rent control laws. or you're a criminal and there's a higher victim density there. --happy in the burbs \_ Hahaha thanks for making my point. \_ I weep for you poor soulless bastards. \_ Which is why the t-shirtters are getting support both from the Right and the Left: they may disagree vehemently, but they both want the right to do so loudly and publicly. \_ Protest, by its very nature, doesn't produce anything. It only prevents things from happening. \_ bzzt. sorry. wrong. cite: most progressive change w/in the last 30 years \_ 'progressive change'? is that a good thing? If all those protestors would pick up trash, or join the Peace Corp, or actually DO SOMETHING USEFUL other than complain, that would make the world a lot better place than chanting "No War For Oil". -ax \_ gee, ax, are you joining the Peace Corps? Or are you for the war and joining the Army? -tom \_ I'm just tired of seeing the same unhappy faces protesting every issue that comes up: compaining doesn't accomplish anything. How many bodybuilders or athletes do you see running around protesting? There are do'ers and complainers. Those who can't do, complain. -ax \_ While our elected officials (and one appointed one) don't seem to realize this, we are living in a democractic society, and protest is vital to its workings. "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has. [Margaret Mead]" As for bodybuilders and athletes, I don't think being more concerned with your shoe contract than with world politics really qualifies as "doing". -tom \_ Republicans are that small group, and they are changing the world. Protest by voting or PAC's, don't clog the streets with sloppily dressed people followed by a celebratory riot. -ax \_ I used to give you more credit than this. -tom \_ I didn't say they were changing it for the better! -ax \_ that's not what I mean. voting is important, but it's not the primary agent of social change. Look at the civil rights reforms of the 60's--do you think they were driven by the election of Ronald Reagan as governor and Richard Nixon as president? No, they were driven by protests and the work of activists. As for PAC's, government-for-hire is the *problem*, not the solution. -tom <- \_ I think the protestors would be more effective saying that they have mobilized >51% of the voters and Bush won't get re-elected if he goes to war with Iraq. Protests, as they stand now, are a very vocal minority trying to bully more than their fair share of representation out of the government. It's one vote per person, not more votes for those who yell the loudest. Which is why I too hate PAC's, although at least lobbiests are well dressed and don't turn over newspaper stands and throw rocks. -ax \_ More to the point, the protesters need to protest _and_ mobilize the vote. Protest gets the message out there; votes are what gets the politicos to listen to your protests. \_ not really. its still about money. \_ The funny part about this argument is, ax is complaining about how protestors aren't "doing" anything, in a case where the protestors actually *did* something. Do you think the mall would have dropped the charges without the protests? -tom \_ Wearing T shirts and putting on bumper stickers isn't doing anything. How do you get peace? You crush all your enemies. Peace is just the lack of war. Sitting on your ass in a tied died shirt smoking a doob isn't peace. Your peace is provided by the men and women who wear the US flag on their shoulder and actually go out and do something to prevent terrorists from dropping anthrax in your bong. -ax \_ How about the strategy of, "Don't make enemies?" \_ counterexample: al qaeda would not be attacking the US if we were not an ever-present aggressive military presence in the middle east. -tom \_ The same people who run Al Qaeda also plan to turn the entire world into a Taliban-ish muslim state. That includes your pampered ass. \_ Al qaeda says that they wouldn't be attacking the US if we weren't in Saudi Arabia, but how can you believe the words of a bunch of criminals? \_ What do Gordon Liddy and Pat Robertson have to do with this conversation? \_ what possible *reason* would they have to attack the US if we weren't in the middle east? Bush has already warned us that a war in Iraq is likely to *increase* terrorist attacks in the US. -tom \_ Duh, read a history book. We're the infidels and they believe it is the word of God that they should convert the entire world, at the edge of a sword if necessary. Wake up. Read their own websites if you're feeling nerdy. \_ rhetoric for minions and motivating factors for the leaders are two entirely separate things. the former just needs something to believe in. the latter needs something to show for it (money, power, increased followings). You need the history book, not to mention philosophy, civics, etc. \_ If you knew anything about how islamic politics works, then you would be aware of the fact that most of the leaders are in it for the simple purpose of eliminating the unbelievers from the face of this world. \_ This is a convenient reading of history. Who has fought more wars in the last 100 years, the Arabs or the Europeans? How about the last 1000? \_ OK, so Bernard Lewis is wrong and you are right. \_ Actually this is fairly normal. The mall got the person off of their property with a minimum of costs and doesn't wish to alienate anyone, so they drop tresspassing charges. Besides, a trial would cost the mall money and bad publicity. \_ What makes this interesting for me is that the guy bought the shirt in a store at the mall. Sure, I care about freedom of speech and all that good stuff, but aren't we missing the more important issue here? The guy BUYS a shirt in a store within the mall, which I'm sure the mall doesn't mind one bit. But then as soon as he WEARS it, they get pissy. That's probably his best bet at winning a lawsuit (although it probably wouldn't be as nice of a case for 1st amendment rights then). \_ I think it was a "Make your own T-shirt" booth, not a stock one at Anchor Blue. It's sorta like that Nike guy wanting "Sweatshop" on his sneakers. (I think both are fine, btw). \_ Just because you bought something at the mall doesn't mean you can use it at the mall. Think cigarettes, music CDs, "massagers," nude photography, etc. It's still private property. \_People who keep insisting that "the mall is private property so they can do whatever they want" need to learn about the legal concept called "public accommodation." \_ Didn't you read the legal opinions presented here yesterday? The mall was perfectly legal in its behavoir - as it should be. The only reason they are backing down is because its politically incorrect and they are a business, ie. they want to make money. \_ Public accomodation doesn't imply public forum. They can still say no to the tshirt if they felt it was disruptive. \_ Can they say no to blacks if they feel that they too are disruptive? \_ if they wear shirts saying 'kill whitey' \_ hi red herring troll boy! missed you, you race baiter, you! on the count of 3, lets all hate all white people in the name of advancing equality! \_ I wasn't bringing up a race issue. I was using race to point out how the flaws in the "they can still say no" argument. But you missed that point entirely. \_ You failed to deliver it. Your failure is not my fault. So you're not only a race baiter and a poor debated but you can't take responsibility for your own failings. Typical race baiter drivel. \_ Ah, good example. If the mall can prove that somebody is being disruptive, they can refuse them service or access. If they can't, then it's a question of discrimination, unless they are a private club. So excluding blacks to a publically accessible area (the mall) for no reason is discrimination, UNLESS they can prove that their presence will present a danger to public safety. Very tough to do. |
2003/3/2-3 [Politics/Foreign/Asia/China, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27579 Activity:very high |
3/2 http://www.observer.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12239,905936,00.html Not surprising that we've been spying on the other members of the security council, but it still sucks. \_ you do remember what happened to that plane that crashed while spying on China, right? \_ or China spying on the U.S. stealing our nuclear and other technological secrets. \_ wait a second... please tell me you're not talking about that one Chinese scientist guy who got arrested for "stealing secrets" \_ Champion of human right. That scientist was shackled from waste down, in a solitary confinement 23 hours a day for 9 month before he was released on the ground of lack of evidence. \_ Get it right. Only some of the charges were dropped. He is still guilty of some serious offenses. For someone who betrayed America he was treated very very well. \_ SOMEHOW China got schematics for one of our nuclear warhead designs. It might not have been Wen Ho Lee, but someone, somewhere either was very stupid or sold us out. --PeterM \_ still, it's not an excuse for lock up people based upon his nation of origins... despite that it is part of American's tradition and the cornerstone which this nation is build upon. \_ Yeah, just like the design of gunpowder, years ago. \_ Gun powder chemistry and nuclear chemistry are vastly different. Gun power can be made at home using stuff that occurs naturally in most parts of the earth. \_ technology is technology. it may look simple in the hindsight. \_ You are either funny or humorous, but not both, both of you. \_ Every country with the resources spies on every other country they can afford to spy on. To think otherwise is naive and childish. This isn't the playground where little bobbie looked inside little jennies lunchbag and stole her cookie. \_ That's filthy! \_ No, this is worse. It's bad enough that we're spying on members of the Security Council, but it's unforgiveable that we're incompetent enough to get caught at it. We're supposed to be the sole remaining World Power, and we can't even bug phones without a leak? \_ Did you even read the article? The NSA wasn't caught \_ What part of "without a leak" didn't you get? in the act. Rather some traitorous coward leaked a classified memo to the press. BTW, why shouldn't we be spying on the countries that make up the sec. council or any other country? Most of these nations wouldn't hesitate to stick it to America given the chance. \_ get out of American and travel around the world. you will then learn America is not as popular as you would think. \_ I have traveled in Europe and Asia. So what if a bunch of people living in conditions barely fit to be called civilized don't like America. Who fricking cares?!? Just because they've got a flag, a parliment and a bunch of bureaucrats grown fat on bribes isn't any reason for the finest nation in the history of this world to yeild to their worthless opinions. \_ This is kind of attitude along with what US's action which reflect such attitude, are the reason why other nations hates America. And remember, there was point in time we don't care about Pakistein and Afghanistein. You will be suprised sometimes how much these people, who barely consistutes as civilization as you described, can be either helpful or debilitatingly harmful. \_ And that makes it right to listen in on their phone conversations and email to determine which way they're going to vote on a resolution the Pres. says isn't necessary anyway? Look up the word "ethics." \_ Can you be so naive to think that we can trust the other members of the security council? Except for the UK, none of the other permanent or temporary members can be considered trustworthy. It is in the best interest of this nation to know what the hell those fools are upto at all times. When you swim with sharks... \_ We're the most powerful nation on earth, and we have the most extensive intelligence network in the world, and we're using that to figure out whether six fence- sitters are going to back a war we pretend we can wage w/o their support are going to vote with us or not? Pshaw on your shark analogy. \_ You sound like Jimmy Cartah, aka mr. ethics, and CIA Director Stansfield Turner. Based on their sucess in North Korea, Iran and Nicaragua, maybe you should reconsider your position. \_ whoever deleted my post... fuck *YOU* next time, be a man and try to some up with something to counter my arguement instead of being a fucking chicken \_ Nicaragua? You mean the country that fairly and freely elected a socialist government over our objections? I'd consider Nicaragua a victory despite our best intentions. |
2003/3/1-2 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27575 Activity:very high |
3/1 GIMME SHELTER Baghdad's Hilarious Human Shields http://www.iconoclast.ca/MainPage.asp?page=/NewPage10.asp \_ These people are idiots, and are giving principled opposition to this war a bad name. \_ Exactly which principles are those? They seem to characterize the pacifist position perfectly. \_ Sane foreign policy. The rule of law. A stable world. The fragile global economy. Pacifism is quite distinct from a reasonable opposition to this war, which I'm sure you're aware of Mr. Troll. \_ Then what is your middle east solution. The region will only to continue to destablize. Wanting to remove an oppresive dictator and remake the geopolitical dynamic in the middle east is now considered an insane foreign policy? An exactly which law are you conveniently referring too? Certainly not the Constitution. \_ Kyoto! We're in violation of Kyoto! And the international law against land mines! And the international law that says we have to obey the whims and wishes of every 3rd world crack pot dictator. And the one that says 'stability' is more important than 'freedom'. Yeah! Take that! \_ Um... Didn't _we_ write the law that stability is more important than freedom? \_ I was just gonna point out the irony of having a bunch of pacifists support a dictator who (literally) has human meat grinders in his prisons for people he doesn't like. Who wants to bet on these people being captured and used as hostages by Hussien if things get hairy? \_ not anymore, he released the entire prison population several weeks ago. kind of weird. \_ Not really. Able-bodied men can help defend the country. \_ But he'll still have those useless idiots available as hostages. \_ The sad thing is that these people do not realize that US military will not hesitate to bomb into oblivion any strategic Iraqi targets regardless of whether there are any human shields from Western countries present there. Fools. \_ and "strategic Iraqi targets" includes "anywhere there are people wearing turbans" \_ Of course it does. Why wouldn't it? Geeze.... |
2003/2/28-3/1 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27566 Activity:moderate |
2/28 link:forbes.com/forbes/2003/0317/134.html on the richest but least deserving people on the planet. A few of your heros are on list this. \_ Saddam Hussein is worth at least $2B? Wow! \_ I wonder why the great hero of the people's collective movement has $110 million. Could it be that he is a *gasp* evil oppressor capitalist swine pig-dog at heart who hasn't tried pure berkeley sytle communism?!? \_ are you for real? actually wait you are all the same guy, why do i even bother. \_ yeah there's only 1 conservative on the entire motd for all these years. I'm sure thinking that makes you feel better about being in the minority. \_ Castro is taking all the money himself to save his people from corruption, much like a loving parent shielding his children from harm with his own body. I assure you that Castro himself receives no benefit or joy from the money. Quite the contrary. \_ Come on, this is Forbes. Like they don't have an agenda... \_ Yeah, but as long as those numbers aren't fake we can use them. \_ Did you read how they arrived at those numbers? Estimating Castro's wealth as a stipulated fraction of a guess at Cuba's GNP? I was suprised. Forbes usually does better than that. \_ So what is the difference between the inherited wealth of a King or Queen and the inherited wealth of say, the Walton's or any of the other on the top 500 who acheived their wealth from inheritance? \_ You can't tell the difference between wealth stolen from the people though force of arms and wealth earned by a relative and passed on? Okey dokey! Mars or Venus? \_ Which is which? Most fortunes are acquired through the violence and treachery of one's ancestors. \_ care to back this up with a real reference? \_ Someone please tell me how Oprah is worth $1 bil. At least Jailbird Stewart sold something tangible. Oprah spouts feminazi drabble \_ years ago oprah gained seveal hundred million in cbs stock when cbs bought king world, maybe she diversified? producing and owning the syndication rights to a popular television show is tangible. |
2003/2/28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq, Politics/Foreign/Europe] UID:27559 Activity:high |
2/27 Editorial defending Washinton Post's pro-war stance: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8531-2003Feb26.html \_ The huge problem with this editorial is "[Saddam] unquestionably possessing and pursuing biological and chemical weapons". It's still a question. If a group of smart people can't get this right, what can you say? \_ What smart people? The French? Or the Germans who sold them all of it between '91 and now? \_ The Washington Post editorial staff, of course. If you can do a good job convincing people of your assertions please contact Colin Powell. \_ hmm... theory of evolution... |
2003/2/27-28 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27554 Activity:insanely high |
2/27 Do muslim countries allow birth control? Turkey most likely does, but what about Saudi Arabia or Kuwait? \_ what, you on drugs? They need all the population they can get to fight the evil god-less capitalistic pigs. Go alalalalalalah! \_ Wow. I laughed out loud when I read this. Thanks. \_ I read that just over 50% of Palestinians are under 15 yrs old. \_ I read that just over 90% of Palestinians are under 15 yrs old. \_ birthrates in the middle east are really really high, i think it's closer to 48 percent of all Palestinians clear: 50% of Palestinians are under 15 yrs old. are under 15. \_ and what percentage of Americans? The rest of the world? Statics like that are meaningless without some reference. \_ It's not meaningless at all, the meaning is perfectly clear: 90% of Palestinians are under 15 yrs old. \_ It has no context and therefore has no value and thus no meaning. Did you know that in Sweden roughly 50% of all people who are the children of two natives are female? Pretty shocking about those Swedes, huh? \_ just think of all that bombfodder. \_ Not even close: link:csua.org/u/a1c Where did you read this? The same place you read that 90% of all reporters are Democrats? \_ Except the latter is true. Go find it yourself or come up with a counter number. The motd is not the place to seek an education. You have to provide that yourself. \_ Oh, how clever! Someone switched it from 50% to 90%... |
2003/2/26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27539 Activity:high |
2/26 Voice of Iraqis- Why dont antiwar types want to hear them? http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-taheri022603.asp \_ do you think the iraqi people think the US will invade, knock over hussein, and leave? or do they think the US will install a military led government that will exist until the end of time? \_ What do *you* think the Iraqi think? That is clearly more important than what they really think. \_ You know it's all about the oil! As if the Iraqis wouldn't love to sell us all the cheap oil as fast as they could pump it. \_ You know I bet if you went to an anti-abortion rally and tried to get the microphone to speak against them you would get a far less polite response. \_ The Iraqis are misled and misinformed brown people. We white people know what's best for them better than they do. \_ You didn't read the article, did you? \_ Actually I did. You had to retake Subject A, didn't you? \_ I guess meant "we white people" as the anti-war crowd. He thought "we white people" was the pro-war crowd. Is that your meaning? \_ Given the context, I meant the former. However, you can just as well say the latter. What does the fabled Arab street want? Ref Melian Dialogue. \_ Many Iraqi-Americans are opposed to the war. They almost all hate Hussein but many (most?) do not support a US dominated effort to overthrow him. Such complexities are probably too much for your binary brain to handle, though. \_ There are lies, damned lies, and equivocations. \_ OBTW, learn how to indent correctly. \_ The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity. |
2003/2/26 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27533 Activity:very high |
2/25 What day do you think we officially begin the attack on Iraq (not counting the constant low level bombing of radar and SA that's been going on since 91)? I put 5 bucks on march 16th, Iraqi time. I don't understand why this was deleted. Restored. \_ Beware the Ides of March. \_ Bad choice. Two days before the full moon? A lot depends on what level of intensity the US wants to start with. Probably a week or two of airstrikes to be followed up by invasion, airborne to get the airport with full assault through Turkey and Kuwait. Still need a couple of weeks to get the troops set in Turkey. Push it to bombing around March 21 and invasion a week later. \_ Pave. -John \_ We already have Special Forces on the ground in Iraq. How does this not count as officially beginning the attack? \_ They are spying. They have not actively disrupted Iraqi operations. Guiding missles and bombs to targets doesn't qualify. \_ Because by that standard, the 1991 war never ended. If you want to go by your definition, there's no need for any new resolutions, congress, the UN or anything. \_ APRIL NEVER ENDED! \_ So if Iraq sent infiltrators into the United States to blow up selected military targets, that would not be considered warfare by you? Just making sure you are willing to consistent here. \_ It is warfare. It isn't a mass invasion. That would be Mexico, currently. |
2003/2/25 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27520 Activity:nil |
2/25 Thank god! Rosie has spoken and says war is wrong and we're doing bad and that she just wants saddam and osama "to go away". I rest can more easily at night knowing great minds like this are getting quoted on world affairs and influencing the public. \_ Sounds like she's arguing for the side of war. You can do that effectively by reducing the opposition's side of things to an absurdity, or making their essential position look really dumb. Which she's done very well, according to your quote. \_ This is called "straw man argument" and is considered weak debating technique. \_ Not really. It may fall under the description, but it's not a particularly good example. \_ Except in this case you *know* Rosie isn't in favor of war. She's just your typical hollywood leftist loud mouth idiot. Although I do admit that I too would like saddam and osama to "go away". It's got a deceptively simple and childishly joyous quality. |
2003/2/24 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27508 Activity:high |
2/24 Iraq War Humor: US secretary of state Colin Powell was recently approached by an Iraqi newspaper reporter and was accusingly asked, "Isn't it true that only 13 percent of young American citizens can locate Iraq on a map?" Secretary Powell stopped, turned, and stated "Yes, this fact cannot be denied....but, unfortunately for you, all 13 percent are United States Marines. \_ not sure if the following is a joke or not, from the New Yorker: The other day, Secretary of State Colin Powell was reminded that his boss [the President] is in bed by ten and sleeps like a baby. Powell reportedly replied, "I sleep like a baby, too -- every two hours I wake up screaming." \_ Not sure if the following is a joke or not, From the New Yorker: The other day, Secretary of State Colin Powell was reminded that his boss [the President] is in bed by ten and sleeps like a baby. Powell reportedly replied, "I sleep like a baby, too -- every two hours I wake up screaming." |
2003/2/22 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27491 Activity:nil |
2/22 http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030221-050222-6573r I think Suhr can eyeball it a hell of a lot better than some faked commission bullshit. It's a fact. |
2003/2/21-22 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27489 Activity:very high |
2/21 Whether you are for or against an Iraq War: What do you think is going to happen militarily? Lots of Iraqi casualties, very little for the Americans? A cakewalk for the Americans? A political victory for the Iraqis? \_ If we go in with a UN mandate, everyone will surrender. \_ war in iraq will mean the end of america. the jihad is already primed after the unjust war in afghanistan, and a war in iraq will just unleash the rage of muslims everywhere. it will mean military defeat in iraq without, and uprising and reprisals in america within. american streets will run red with blood as we once and for all cleanse the world of these infidels. this is the will of allah. \_ I've seen the Will of Allah. All I get the Original Star Trek Commemorative plate and a free wings coupon from Hooters. \_ Hey, where's the nearest Hooters? I feel like a road trip. \_ Militarily, Iraq will be defeated. They can't defend themselves effectively in the desert environment against the well trained, well equiped coalition ground forces that are supported by the unchallenged air forces dropping precision munitions on the Iraqis. Remember the "Desert Storm". Iraqis' only hope of slightly changing the odds in their favor is to entrench themselves in the large sites. Baghdad is a large city with a population of over 4 mln people. It will sure be somewhat hard to take it and the US troops might suffer heavier than usual casualties there. But, IMHO, if it gets to the point that Baghdad is under a siege, surrounded by a couple of hundred thousand coalition troops, I am sure the US won't stop there and try to take over it at any cost (be it time or human lives). Eventually, the game will be over. Saddam knows that. I suspect that his strategy of moving the warfare into the cities is nothing more but a PR move to persuade the US and UK that this war will be longer and bloodier than they expect. If the war really gets to that stage, either Saddam will likely try to flee to a third country or he'll be removed from power by an internal coup/unrest. \_ I agree that there won't be some big final street to bloody street battle. SH isn't going to stick around to get his ass shot off. If he does, it's over. If he doesn't there'll be mass surrender in the first 48 hours and the rest will surrender within a week to ten days. \_ I think the US will crush Iraq with less than 1000 casualties. Then we will have to occupy the country for the next 10 years with 2 divisions of troops. Whether this is a good thing or not depends on your feelings about empire. \_ Saddam can drag the diplomatic game on and on until warm weather comes. Then the US soldiers will faint of the intense heat inside their anti-chemical-biological protective suits. Also, if the battle goes into the cities, is it going to be another Somalia? |
2003/2/21 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27476 Activity:high |
2/21 You heard it here first: The U.S. will not invade Iraq unless it has shown convincing evidence (what it's presented so far, isn't). We will not get the votes for a serious resolution next week. Crazy people do want to detonate a nuke in Los Angeles / New York / D.C. \_ Haha.. Stupid commie beatnicks will not alter the course of history And just as well, cuz either way, the religious war will continue \_ Jewish ppl were very stout protesters of vietnam. Funny how they're conspiciously quiet when it comes tho iraq. \_ Hope that wasn't a serious thought. The vietnamese wanted Whitey out. Iraq wants the Jews dead. Big difference. \_ Maybe they figure Sharon and Bush make a good team. Hey, Genocides' good as long it happens to the right ppl, oi vey? \_ If you're going to get Yiddish on us at least use the words properly. "oi vey" does not even come close to fitting in this context. Maybe Sharon and Bush are hip to any old genocide, maybe not, but for certain you're an idiot. \_ URL? Anyway, doesn't matter. I know President Sheen will lead us to the promised land of pure utopain liberal secular pacifist (unless the left feels a need to bomb) humanism! Thank you for saving us President Sheen! \_ You know, Martin Sheen is a very strong Roman Catholic as is the character he plays on WW. \_ So what? I'm a very strong atheist. I work out all the time and keep very fit. What of it? \_ Pick up a history book. \_ I'm waiting for Pres Stupid Fuck to declare war on germany/france. \_ President Sheen would never do that! They're our key allies! \_ Seems to me this is more of a war of Texas vs. Iraq. Why not just send the texans to fight it? \_ Yeah! No blood for big oil! Excuse me while I change the oil based tires on my imported bike! \_ don't tell people that there are petroleum products that you don't pay for by the gallon |
2003/2/20 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27469 Activity:nil |
2/20 I saw President Sheen on tv last night saying how invading Iraq is bad. I hope Congress listens and doesn't declare war. Think of the children! |
2003/2/20 [Politics/Domestic/California, Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:27465 Activity:kinda low |
2/19 Peace Movements: Then and Now http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=6228 \_ wow, fear the commies! Commies everywhere! Damn reds! \_ Completely unfounded drivel! Congratulations and welcome to the motd! \_ that was particularly content free, thanks! \_ Oh so THIS is what David Horowitz's fearsome magazine and foundation are about. God, I can't tell you how relieved I am. |
12/25 |