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BrentA
Gym climber
estes park
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I kinda thought we were the bullies, and the world is just standing up to us with "terrorism".
Privatizing public utilities is much less menacing to them.
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Ouch!
climber
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LEB, it seems you have bought the Bush line that Iraq blew up the twin towers. Further discussion is rather pointless since anything that begins with a false premise is about as useful as tits on a boar hog.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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LEB; Ouch's "My country, always evil" is only an indication of his own sad pathology, and not indicitive of the climbing community in general.
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nailbomb
climber
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my country, always clockin' mad dollars...
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Saddam was well known for particularly oppressing the Islamist extremists that we are also fighting. No terrorist from Iraq ever hurt anybody in the United States. Now that Saddam and his oppressive security establishment are gone, the terrorists have moved into Iraq and have killed thousands. Saddam, bastard that he was, wasn't threatening anybody, Colin Powell said so himself in Egypt just before 9-11.
In mean time, we pulled most the troops our of Afghanistan and let Bin Laden go. You have to ask yourself, if terrorism is the reason for all this war, are we fighting in the right places?
Unfortunately, US foreign policy is far from innocent. We have supported dictators like Saddam during the periods of his worst crimes, and continue to support kings and dictators like in Saudi Arabia (remember where the hijackers came from?) Egypt (in the top 3 for US aid) and so on.
Terrorism is wrong, but if somebody put a king in charge of the US, I'd fight em.
Think about if I walked over to you and casually stepped on your fingers. You'd make a big noise and if I didn't get off, you'd start beating at my legs, acting hysterical, or even use a weapon on me if you had one. I could act indignant and say, look this woman is a terrorist. I'm just standing my ground here. See, she's trying to infiltrate my shoes!
Giving in to the terrorists? Bush gave Bin Laden the things he wanted most.
1. Bin Laden wanted the US bases out of Saudi Soil. Bush removed them.
2. Bin Laden wanted infidel Saddam removed from Iraq. They were sworn enemies.Now Iraq will be an Islamic state sooner or later. It was secular under Saddam.
The war on terrorism is just an excuse to secure oil (and more importantly, the dollar standard for world oil sales) and foster security for Israel. All the money is going into overseas wars that stir up the terrorists more, very little goes to securing our borders, railways and ports. They don't mind if a terrorist sneaks through once in awhile and blows something up because it shores up support for the fearless leader and his violent actions. We need fear to continue to give up our money and freedom for unjustified wars. If the administration wasn't willing to sacrifice lives to get what they want, we wouldn't still be in Iraq.
And an unjustified war is a big deal. That's why we invaded Iraq in 1991 remember. We needed to stop their unjustified invasion of Kuwait. They had almost 400 billion in claims on them for that action and the courts recently decided that Iraq needed to pay something like 54 billion in reparations.
We feel cocky because we know we're too powerful to be stuck with our own reparations. We're sure we won't suffer because we invaded the wrong country.
or will we? Karma is a bitch, it just takes time to work it's way around.
Personally, I think we'd be better off cleaning up our act and joined the UN in cracking down on bullies, rather than doing it ourselves.
from a lefty site, but the truth is the truth:
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0708-27.htm
"Mr Bush has undermined global security by legitimizing a doctrine of ‘preemptive war. “ What nation cannot use Mr Bush’s rationale — “to counter a sufficient threat to our national security...to forestall or prevent such hostile acts by our adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act pre-emptively” — in its own interest to attack a neighboring state”? The threshold which prevents nations from legitimately making war on other nations has been dramatically lowered by the Bush administration.
Even worse, as I have argued previously on this page, the American president’s “National Security Strategy” justifying preemptive war provided economic reasons as examples of a casus belli: a disrespect for private property, policies which do not “support business activity,” and a refusal to commit to “tax policies — particularly lower marginal tax rates — that improve incentives for work and investment.” If one parses that last statement, it says that if another nation that taxes the wealthy to provide services for the poor, the United States may consider it has a sufficient cause for preemptive war."
That worries me. That's just wrong.
But hey, I'm outnumbered and the wheels of our nation's politics are in motion. Wonder where we're going?
Peace
Karl
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WBraun
climber
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Nice post Karl.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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Karl, Talk to some of the jar heads that were involved in the initial invasion of Iraq.
Why did all the dead Iraqi tank crews have Syrian passports and pockets full of Franklins?
Why was the ONLY pitched battle, when they stumbled into a terrorist training camp?
Why were the Fedaheen Sadam almost always Syrian (Hizbulah) or Saudi (Al Queda) with passports stamped "reason for entry, Jihad"?
You are talkin out your ass man!
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Ouch!
climber
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Actually, in declaring A "War on Terrorism" instead of pursuing a bunch of renegades to punish for criminal acts against the US, gave the bastards a perverted status of legitimacy in the eyes of many around the world. Sort of creating an adversarial conflict between two warring nations. Bush's subsequent monumental blunders enhanced their standing and allowed them to grow disproportionally to what might have been expected. Bush's exposure as deceitful has hurt our cause with former friends.
Civilized warfare does not exist. It is a non-sequitur. The Islamic extremists are engaged in total war, without regard for any human life, including their own. This was apparent in the suicide attacks on the twin towers.
They probably could have been stopped, should have been contained, and not let loose on the world with stupid remarks like, "Bring it on".
I don't know how it could have been f*#ked up any worse. Now there is the devil to pay and all the stiffupperlipmanship won't matter at all.
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WBraun
climber
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What's this mean TGT? I'm ignorant of most of this stuff and find all this very interesting.
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cactus
Trad climber
okanagan
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Why do some americans wear Canadian flags when they travel internationally? Because they are ashamed of being a$$hole yanks.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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Read several of the first hand accounts of the Iraq invasion. The speed of media now means that the kinds of personal histories that were published say 20 years after WWII were in print months after this time.
Try these
The March Up. Written by a retired USMC Maj Gen and M Sgt.
Generation Kill. The same events viewed by a Rolling Stone reporter stuck in the point Humvee with a recon platoon.
Thunder Run Zumwalt's book on the 3rd ID's taking of Baghdad.
I had a conversation with a young Lt. at Tahquitz last year that confirmed the same stories. It turns out that the only ones that would fight for Sadam were criminal gangs and Jihadis.
My kid is in and out of the sandbox several times a month and is in a position that allows a good overview of the reality. The unspoken (for both military effectiveness and geopolitical reasons) truth is that Iraq is being used as a jihadi magnet. It's easier to kill them there than Europe or N Africa.
The long term goal is the transformation of that region to a democratic form and from what I've heard it's probably going to work. But, if the idle Saudi and other assorted Wahabists are willing to present themselves for collecting their 47 virgins, our kids are more than willing to oblige them.
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Ouch!
climber
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Werner, TGT has been watching Faux News and listening to Rush Lumballs. If that had been fact, Bush would have screamed it to the world. Jeez! What utter bullshit these chickenhawk neocons come up with to try to hang on to a lost argument.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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No! Iv'e been talking to them that's been there, done that and have the green shirt. That includes my own son.
How's that, you self loathing pice of pond slime.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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So, TGT, at the time of the first Iraqi war, what had the Islamic world done to the United States? If we had to list what the US had done to them, we could start the list with.
1. One sided support for Israel
2. Putting Saddam in Power and supporting him
3. Engineering the overthrow of the democratically elected leader of Iran and replacing him with the despotic shah.
4. Supporting the tyrannical and undemocratic kings of Saudi Arabia.
5. I could go on and on
So what if there were Syrians in Iraq in 1991. If Iraq invaded the US, would we have some Canadians and Mexicans on our side too?
It's the golden rule man. If you switch shoes with the guy who's supposed to be the enemy, if it still looks just and fair, then I'm behind it 100%
It's true that we now have a big problem. We've pissed off the Muslim world. That's undeniable. Many of those Muslim countries are going to be filthy rich and powerful due to increasing oil profits. That's undeniable too. How are we going to prevent them from "getting even?" Easy, the same way as ever before, by making sure we control the governments through more kings, dictators, and bogus governments. Seems like the plan anyway.
If it was up to me, and it obviously isn't. I'd publically express regret any wrongs done to the Muslim world, and convene a conference of all our enemies and naysayers, with extensive moderators and mediation, and show respect, and willingness to work out any differences that it might be possible to address. We might still have to agree to disagree about some things, but even respect and dialog have a way of taking off enough edge that folks don't want to shoot anymore.
Sure, there would still be some extremists but they need the common folk to support them or they're just a fringe element like Timmy McVeigh.
I know it sounds too simple, but it's worked for me
Peace
karl
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Ouch!
climber
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TGT, yours is the common failing of the zealot. You are not smart or reasonable enough to see the difference in critizing the war and not the warriors. Soldiers have no voice in the matter and will fight and die for their buddies, even when they are sorely used by crooked politicians and inept leaders. When people make up bullshit stories to reinforce stupid arguments, they are not doing the warriors any favors and they just sound silly.
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Ouch!
climber
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LEB, There is a forest somewhere among all those trees. Keep looking.
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Ouch!
climber
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The jihad magnet is and has always has been bullsh#t. When Bush did not get the loving greeting he expected in Iraq and the fighting intensified after he declared it over, The Jihad magnet became a fallback position to justify the blunders.
How incredibly stupid is a concept to bring democracy to Iraq by inviting outsiders to come in and kill countless thousands and lay waste to the country. Only in the mind of a Bush. Brilliant.
The truth is, the thing is out of control and Bush hasn't a clue how to get out except more deceit and death. Afghanistan is threatening to become another situation like Iraq. What will he do if it blows up in his face.
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