Seriously. The Mac OS is much more "fun" to use. I have a Windows XP and a Mac OS X machine next to each other. I find myself using the Mac one more. Not cause it's faster, it's not (933 machine compared to a 2.5 machine), but the experience is more enjoyable.
Not that this matters. But it's also good to know its safe. But how many people actually direct connect to the internet? Doesn't it make sense to have some sort of cheap firewall/router box to protect you?
What you think the French are going to come in on a white horse and offer their help with anything? No. Or the Germans? Ha!
No, I think the problem is that we were trying to be "sensitive" to the religious institutions there, and trying to let them mediate problems. That seems to be a rough road. That Cleric over the summer who would agree to something, then break the agreement. Stuff like that.
Iran and North Korea are not a serious threat yet.
North Korea is openly hostile, and actually HAS missiles that can hit the US. Why didn't we invade North Korea first?
I believe its because the US and other countries are still in talks with them. This is called diplomacy. I know people think Americans don't do this, but we do. It's a dirty little secret.
And... there is no evidence that Iraq ever funded terrorist attacks on US soil or interests. If you want to go after a country that is training terrorists try Paksitan, as that is what the Madrasas near the Afghan border are doing. And, where do you think Osama Bin Laden is holed up right now, and Musharaf won't let us go in and get him. Not that Bush is making that a priority.
You are right. Pakistan is a problem. I don't think Osama is there though. I think he's in either Iran or Syria.
Ummm... We didn't make him play. He no longer holds power and is a prisoner. That sounds like making him pay.
Yes. He is paying. And when he goes on trial, he will have to pay more.
Excellent question. I always thought this was incredibly stupid. I am guessing two possible reasons: 1) His scientists actually were lying to him that they had real weapons programs and potential weapons, therefore he was trying to keep the UN from finding imaginary WMDs. 2) He knew there were no WMDs, but stupidly thought that if the US thought he had them, we would not invade.
Well, there is evidence to suggest that his scientists were lying to him, and using some of the money for other things (personal gain). A lot of people suggest it's a "face" thing. That he had to make himself look "powerful" to keep away other countries. I don't buy this though.....I think he had something, and probably shuttled it off to Syria. Time will tell. Perhaps it will have something to do with those missing explosives.....
Iraq was not a real threat, nor was he going to become a real threat anytime soon. Shoot the ease of invasion proved that Iraq was not a threat now, and the investigation after showed the were not an imminent threat either. So, who cares, maintain the stranglehold on him from the last 11 years. If we find any actual progress towards becoming a threat, then invade. He will probably be dead before Iraq becomes a credible threat.
Hindsight is 20/20. Yes, we know now he didn't have what we thought. But everyone thought he had the stuff. John Kerry, Bush, Edwards, etc, etc. Could you imagine Saddams radical sons running Iraq? Yikes!
The real problem is Hussein wasn't deposed afer the 1991 invasion. While there were good reasons for not marching on Baghdad, they are just as relevant when applied to the current invasion. The mistake was allowing Saddam to fly helicopter gunships after that, and put down the Shiite uprising with the helicopters after encouraging the Shiites to rise up was pretty stupid. His military was in disarray after Kuwait, without the air support Saddam would have been deposed.
Totally agree with you. We should have deposed him in 1991. Failing that, allowing him to surpress the Shiites was something we should have allowed either...
Oh, right. Those are some really "unbaised" places there Jethro. Is the Area 51 report in there too? Oh, how about the interstellar space travel plan? We still getting visits from Planet 9?
Ah. This is true, but the kind of explosives he in storage there, and which was such a BIG issue last week, aren't something you can get easily in the US. A couple of ounces of them are more deadly and effective than pounds and pounds of regular TNT.
Um, hate to break it to you, but he funded terror outside of Palestine. Here is an example. I'm sure I can find you some more news articles if you'd like.
I know, it's tough to be wrong. I'm sure Dan Rather feels the same way......
Oh please. If the US wanted to assasinate him, they would have no problem.
Bush didn't want to do anything about Saddam before 9/11. Go look at what he did. Nothing. He didn't give a shit about him. It was a UN problem. Yeah, the UN wasn't doing much about it.
After 9/11, Saddam's antics were not tolerable. He was a threat. A smart Saddam would have stopped the gaming and allowed the UN to do it's job. He'd still be in power perhaps. But Saddam did not.
Debt is something US citizens know about. Hell, 70% of us are in debt......why not add a little more.
You have a good point, but the flaw is that when he lost the 1991 Gulf War, he agreed to disarm and allow UN inspectors in to ensure he remained so. He failed to do that.
That is different than just having the UN decide to inspect our weapons. It was part of the agreement/arrangement to allow Saddam to remain in power.
UN Approve was never going to happen. Go read up on this "Oil for Food" scam.
I find it amusing that while in the process of holding an election, there is no movement to set up a democracy that will let the rest of the world have a say with what happens in the US. Its like someone saying "I don't like the current government, so I am not bound by the laws of this country".
What? You think we should allow Europeans and other countries in on our elections????
Saddam had a track record. Missle attacks, invasions, disregarding the UN. We thought he was up to something, and he was put on notice. He continued to play his game, and we put a stop to it. It's that simple. When you are the power in the world, you can do that. And when we are pissed off, we can do that and not care about the flacid UN.
'I still believe it was the wrong thing to go in and force the people in Iraq to create a government not of their own choice. We in the USA hear about the good things, but there is a lot of bad being done in the count
Listen guy, I have friends over there. Serving in Iraq. Potentially protecting lard-asses like you. They frequently mail and email with good things that they have done in the country. And how the people there support them. They are NOT in the handfull of trouble spots.
Believe what you want, but my accounts are first hand asshole.
Saddam had no missiles capable of hitting the U.S. When the invasion started, he was able to whip out what, three or four of his next-to-useless-even-fifteen-years-ago SCUD missiles? He had nothing. No WMDs. No delivery system.
So you'd back this up with your first hand knowledge? I don't think anyone truely knew what he had before we went in.
Yes, it was insane of Saddam to think he could keep gaming the U.N. the way he did. But it was insane of Bush to throw together a plan based on wishful thinking, and storm into Iraq with a coalition based on us, a handful of Great Britain's finest, and fifty-seven other countries who showed their support by sending canned hams.
Well, isn't this always the case? The US ends up with the majority of the force. Can you name one thing that we haven't been a major part of?
We forced a confrontation even as other options were begging to be pursued. For that decision, thousands died, and if there is the smallest measure of justice in this world, that decision will be the end of George W. Bush's political career
No, I think all the other options were not "in play". Even all these puntants were saying so back at the time. Kerry, Kennedy, Edwards, etc, etc. If they had reservations, they sure didn't say anything when they voted to authorize the President to use force. What, did they really think he'd bluff? After having planes crash into buildings?
That is another problem I have with Kerry. How can you seriously think that the President would never use force? I couldn't think of how I'd have done it differently. He went though the UN, and it was more of the same old same old. Then what? Wait until another attack? No. History will decide if it was right or wrong, but I believe President Bush did the right thing.
I was pissed off at some one who cannot see the inconsistency of a stated policy. If the policy should lead to a different set of action than the one performed, then there must be a different reason for performing that action. Every policy stated by the administration to justify invading Iraq, should have put other coutnries higher on the list. Therefore, the policies statements for invading Iraq were not the real reason.
Hogwash. We invaded Iraq for our own security. We gave Saddam yet another chance to work with the UN. He failed. Would you propose to keep a openly hositle country with a track recorded of launching Missles at Israel, and invading other countries, to continue to operate? I suppose you'd want to do something AFTER Saddam launched a couple of missles at the US?
Someone had to do what the UN FAILED TO DO for 11 plus years. It only took a handful of terrorists to kill thousands of US citizens. If you have a whole country, with the backing of it's government, doing that.....
What other options were there? Another round of UN resolutions? In the mean time Saddam could be funneling funds and explosives to groups to do more harm in the US. Are you saying we invaded because we didn't think he was doing the things he told the UN he would do? Is that really the United States job to enforce UN resolutions against the wishes of the UN. American soldiers, Iraqi Soldiers, and Iraqi civilians deserved to die because of Saddam wasn't obeying UN resolutions, and we decided it was our job to make him pay?
We were not out to "make him pay". We were out to make him play. Play by the rules which the UN set up. How freaking simple was it to allow inspectors to go around and look for weapons? And this guys didn't let them do it. Insane.
He kicked the UN out for a number of years. I mean, where do you draw the line guy? You have a guy, with a history of missle attacks, invasions, gassing his people, not following UN resolutions, and being allowed to continue basically giving the bird to the UN.
True enough, but I think you are overlooking that everyone thought Saddam had weapons. He funded suicide bombers. Would a President allow a country that openly encouraged killing Americans to continue? No. The President went through the UN. Passed yet another resolution. Nothing. Then went in. I suppose all those hundreds of thousands of Tons of explosives aren't dangerous. Oh, probably used for "construction". Yeah.......forgot about that.
They believed in LESS government. Look up the word LESS. What we have now is a government that people want to have do everything, and it can't do that.
Bush and his party voted in an unfunded Medicare prescription drug benefit. What's the difference?
So you'd like free handouts for Drugs as well? Like I said before, Government doing Medicare is a BAD idea.
It is a crappy idea. Social Security has a huge funding gap that will only be fixed by reducing benefits and raising taxes. Individual Accounts can only work if the money removed form the Social Security revenue stream by these accounts is either accounted for by reducing benefits, or raising taxes.
So throwing more money at it will fix it huh? Yeah. Ok. NOT.
You and Bush are hypocrits. If freeing people form tyranny through force is a good foreign policy, we need to invade Pakistan where a military dictator is in charge who overthru the democratically elected government. Oh, and China, and North Korea, much of Africa, and most of the rest of the Middle East.
Ah, but they have not invaded another country, lost, and agreed to things to end the hostility. Saddam didn't do what he said. So, when do you say "enough is enough"??
It is not the right thing to do because by the justification for war in Iraq the United States must be invading a lot more contries. If you agree that the US should invade the countries I described above, plus more I cannot think of now, then maybe your opinion is internally consistent. As is you are probably insane.
Another reason why I don't like Democrats. You pander being the party that is inclusive, yet look at your statements. You probably a card carrying member of the Ku Klux Klan.
So what is the "primary reason" you think? Surely you don't think we are there for Haliburten (or however it's spelled)? Seriously, there are like 3 companies in the world that can do what Haliburten does, and it happens to be the biggest.
I believe we went there because, as everyone did at the time, Saddam had weapons. And he had a shit load of weapons. Not the Nuclear or Biological ones we thought. Though that seems funny because Libya had a Nuclear program.....anyhow. Yeah, so it turns out there were none. But then why did Saddam keep acting like he had them? Not letting UN Inspectors access. Thumbing his nose at the whole process.
I still believe it was the right thing to go in and allow the people in Iraq to create their own government. We in the USA hear about the bad things, but there is a lot of good being done in the country.
Ok, MINUS the slavery and women voting thing. Government is too big. I don't want State Health Care, nor do I want to have it provide for my retirement. Both are bad ideas I think.
Yeah, and notice how many people will mod-down any other opinions than the Kool-Aid ones (ie: Democrat).
Look, Kerry scares me. He can't answer a question directly. He's now even wearing one of those Lance Armstrong bracelets. Great. This guy will sell his soul to be President.
I don't think government should be involved in all it does, and Kerry wants to expand it. Government Health Care? Are any of you who use Slashdot going to use it? But you are going to get taxed to pay for it. Bush's plan about individual Social Security accounts is a great idea. But what that basically is is a sort of "retirement plan", which everyone should do anyways. Why do we all think we are "entitled" to all these things?
If I had a time machine and could bring back a Jefferson, or Franklin, or Adams, they would be shocked.
But back to Kerry and Bush. I don't agree on Bush on everything, but I think giving the Iraq people the chance of freedom is priceless. I know people serving in Iraq, and they believe they are doing good work and are proud to help there. That right there is my reason to vote for another 4 years. With everyone's "TV" mentality, where you want something done 5 minutes ago, War in Iraq is not fast nor easy. But it is the right thing to do. And in light of the United Nations possibly being corrupt, why would I want Kerry to go and work with them?
Slashdot Mirror
Not that this matters. But it's also good to know its safe. But how many people actually direct connect to the internet? Doesn't it make sense to have some sort of cheap firewall/router box to protect you?
I think what we are faced with is throwing more money at it. Which is sad. I liked a lot, no, all of your ideas......
No, I think the problem is that we were trying to be "sensitive" to the religious institutions there, and trying to let them mediate problems. That seems to be a rough road. That Cleric over the summer who would agree to something, then break the agreement. Stuff like that.
Iran and North Korea are not a serious threat yet.
Which report did you read? The Dan Rather version? The Democratic National Committee version?
I believe its because the US and other countries are still in talks with them. This is called diplomacy. I know people think Americans don't do this, but we do. It's a dirty little secret.
And... there is no evidence that Iraq ever funded terrorist attacks on US soil or interests. If you want to go after a country that is training terrorists try Paksitan, as that is what the Madrasas near the Afghan border are doing. And, where do you think Osama Bin Laden is holed up right now, and Musharaf won't let us go in and get him. Not that Bush is making that a priority.
You are right. Pakistan is a problem. I don't think Osama is there though. I think he's in either Iran or Syria.
Ummm... We didn't make him play. He no longer holds power and is a prisoner. That sounds like making him pay.
Yes. He is paying. And when he goes on trial, he will have to pay more.
Excellent question. I always thought this was incredibly stupid. I am guessing two possible reasons: 1) His scientists actually were lying to him that they had real weapons programs and potential weapons, therefore he was trying to keep the UN from finding imaginary WMDs. 2) He knew there were no WMDs, but stupidly thought that if the US thought he had them, we would not invade.
Well, there is evidence to suggest that his scientists were lying to him, and using some of the money for other things (personal gain). A lot of people suggest it's a "face" thing. That he had to make himself look "powerful" to keep away other countries. I don't buy this though.....I think he had something, and probably shuttled it off to Syria. Time will tell. Perhaps it will have something to do with those missing explosives.....
Iraq was not a real threat, nor was he going to become a real threat anytime soon. Shoot the ease of invasion proved that Iraq was not a threat now, and the investigation after showed the were not an imminent threat either. So, who cares, maintain the stranglehold on him from the last 11 years. If we find any actual progress towards becoming a threat, then invade. He will probably be dead before Iraq becomes a credible threat.
Hindsight is 20/20. Yes, we know now he didn't have what we thought. But everyone thought he had the stuff. John Kerry, Bush, Edwards, etc, etc. Could you imagine Saddams radical sons running Iraq? Yikes!
The real problem is Hussein wasn't deposed afer the 1991 invasion. While there were good reasons for not marching on Baghdad, they are just as relevant when applied to the current invasion. The mistake was allowing Saddam to fly helicopter gunships after that, and put down the Shiite uprising with the helicopters after encouraging the Shiites to rise up was pretty stupid. His military was in disarray after Kuwait, without the air support Saddam would have been deposed.
Totally agree with you. We should have deposed him in 1991. Failing that, allowing him to surpress the Shiites was something we should have allowed either...
Indeed. Some of the political campaigns back then make the current ones pale in comparison.
Go see your doctor. You are drooling again.....
Ah. This is true, but the kind of explosives he in storage there, and which was such a BIG issue last week, aren't something you can get easily in the US. A couple of ounces of them are more deadly and effective than pounds and pounds of regular TNT.
I know, it's tough to be wrong. I'm sure Dan Rather feels the same way......
Bush didn't want to do anything about Saddam before 9/11. Go look at what he did. Nothing. He didn't give a shit about him. It was a UN problem. Yeah, the UN wasn't doing much about it.
After 9/11, Saddam's antics were not tolerable. He was a threat. A smart Saddam would have stopped the gaming and allowed the UN to do it's job. He'd still be in power perhaps. But Saddam did not.
Debt is something US citizens know about. Hell, 70% of us are in debt......why not add a little more.
That is different than just having the UN decide to inspect our weapons. It was part of the agreement/arrangement to allow Saddam to remain in power.
I find it amusing that while in the process of holding an election, there is no movement to set up a democracy that will let the rest of the world have a say with what happens in the US. Its like someone saying "I don't like the current government, so I am not bound by the laws of this country".
What? You think we should allow Europeans and other countries in on our elections????
Saddam had a track record. Missle attacks, invasions, disregarding the UN. We thought he was up to something, and he was put on notice. He continued to play his game, and we put a stop to it. It's that simple. When you are the power in the world, you can do that. And when we are pissed off, we can do that and not care about the flacid UN.
'I still believe it was the wrong thing to go in and force the people in Iraq to create a government not of their own choice. We in the USA hear about the good things, but there is a lot of bad being done in the count
Listen guy, I have friends over there. Serving in Iraq. Potentially protecting lard-asses like you. They frequently mail and email with good things that they have done in the country. And how the people there support them. They are NOT in the handfull of trouble spots.
Believe what you want, but my accounts are first hand asshole.
So you'd back this up with your first hand knowledge? I don't think anyone truely knew what he had before we went in.
Yes, it was insane of Saddam to think he could keep gaming the U.N. the way he did. But it was insane of Bush to throw together a plan based on wishful thinking, and storm into Iraq with a coalition based on us, a handful of Great Britain's finest, and fifty-seven other countries who showed their support by sending canned hams.
Well, isn't this always the case? The US ends up with the majority of the force. Can you name one thing that we haven't been a major part of?
We forced a confrontation even as other options were begging to be pursued. For that decision, thousands died, and if there is the smallest measure of justice in this world, that decision will be the end of George W. Bush's political career
No, I think all the other options were not "in play". Even all these puntants were saying so back at the time. Kerry, Kennedy, Edwards, etc, etc. If they had reservations, they sure didn't say anything when they voted to authorize the President to use force. What, did they really think he'd bluff? After having planes crash into buildings?
That is another problem I have with Kerry. How can you seriously think that the President would never use force? I couldn't think of how I'd have done it differently. He went though the UN, and it was more of the same old same old. Then what? Wait until another attack? No. History will decide if it was right or wrong, but I believe President Bush did the right thing.
Yeah, I agree with you. Idealy, "Iraq" should be split up into 3 separate countries I think. But I don't see that happening....
Hogwash. We invaded Iraq for our own security. We gave Saddam yet another chance to work with the UN. He failed. Would you propose to keep a openly hositle country with a track recorded of launching Missles at Israel, and invading other countries, to continue to operate? I suppose you'd want to do something AFTER Saddam launched a couple of missles at the US?
Someone had to do what the UN FAILED TO DO for 11 plus years. It only took a handful of terrorists to kill thousands of US citizens. If you have a whole country, with the backing of it's government, doing that.....
What other options were there? Another round of UN resolutions? In the mean time Saddam could be funneling funds and explosives to groups to do more harm in the US.
Are you saying we invaded because we didn't think he was doing the things he told the UN he would do? Is that really the United States job to enforce UN resolutions against the wishes of the UN. American soldiers, Iraqi Soldiers, and Iraqi civilians deserved to die because of Saddam wasn't obeying UN resolutions, and we decided it was our job to make him pay?
We were not out to "make him pay". We were out to make him play. Play by the rules which the UN set up. How freaking simple was it to allow inspectors to go around and look for weapons? And this guys didn't let them do it. Insane.
He kicked the UN out for a number of years. I mean, where do you draw the line guy? You have a guy, with a history of missle attacks, invasions, gassing his people, not following UN resolutions, and being allowed to continue basically giving the bird to the UN.
This "pretend to be so powerful" idea is stupid.
True enough, but I think you are overlooking that everyone thought Saddam had weapons. He funded suicide bombers. Would a President allow a country that openly encouraged killing Americans to continue? No. The President went through the UN. Passed yet another resolution. Nothing. Then went in. I suppose all those hundreds of thousands of Tons of explosives aren't dangerous. Oh, probably used for "construction". Yeah.......forgot about that.
They believed in LESS government. Look up the word LESS. What we have now is a government that people want to have do everything, and it can't do that.
So you'd like free handouts for Drugs as well? Like I said before, Government doing Medicare is a BAD idea.
It is a crappy idea. Social Security has a huge funding gap that will only be fixed by reducing benefits and raising taxes. Individual Accounts can only work if the money removed form the Social Security revenue stream by these accounts is either accounted for by reducing benefits, or raising taxes.
So throwing more money at it will fix it huh? Yeah. Ok. NOT.
You and Bush are hypocrits. If freeing people form tyranny through force is a good foreign policy, we need to invade Pakistan where a military dictator is in charge who overthru the democratically elected government. Oh, and China, and North Korea, much of Africa, and most of the rest of the Middle East.
Ah, but they have not invaded another country, lost, and agreed to things to end the hostility. Saddam didn't do what he said. So, when do you say "enough is enough"??
It is not the right thing to do because by the justification for war in Iraq the United States must be invading a lot more contries. If you agree that the US should invade the countries I described above, plus more I cannot think of now, then maybe your opinion is internally consistent. As is you are probably insane.
Another reason why I don't like Democrats. You pander being the party that is inclusive, yet look at your statements. You probably a card carrying member of the Ku Klux Klan.
Somehow, I don't think they would approve......
I believe we went there because, as everyone did at the time, Saddam had weapons. And he had a shit load of weapons. Not the Nuclear or Biological ones we thought. Though that seems funny because Libya had a Nuclear program.....anyhow. Yeah, so it turns out there were none. But then why did Saddam keep acting like he had them? Not letting UN Inspectors access. Thumbing his nose at the whole process.
I still believe it was the right thing to go in and allow the people in Iraq to create their own government. We in the USA hear about the bad things, but there is a lot of good being done in the country.
Ok, MINUS the slavery and women voting thing. Government is too big. I don't want State Health Care, nor do I want to have it provide for my retirement. Both are bad ideas I think.
Can you say "Al-Jazeera"? What? Never heard of it? Oh, thats right, we started using the forementioned device to start blocking them ;-)
Look, Kerry scares me. He can't answer a question directly. He's now even wearing one of those Lance Armstrong bracelets. Great. This guy will sell his soul to be President.
I don't think government should be involved in all it does, and Kerry wants to expand it. Government Health Care? Are any of you who use Slashdot going to use it? But you are going to get taxed to pay for it. Bush's plan about individual Social Security accounts is a great idea. But what that basically is is a sort of "retirement plan", which everyone should do anyways. Why do we all think we are "entitled" to all these things?
If I had a time machine and could bring back a Jefferson, or Franklin, or Adams, they would be shocked.
But back to Kerry and Bush. I don't agree on Bush on everything, but I think giving the Iraq people the chance of freedom is priceless. I know people serving in Iraq, and they believe they are doing good work and are proud to help there. That right there is my reason to vote for another 4 years. With everyone's "TV" mentality, where you want something done 5 minutes ago, War in Iraq is not fast nor easy. But it is the right thing to do. And in light of the United Nations possibly being corrupt, why would I want Kerry to go and work with them?