Also, correct me if i'm wrong, but they are angry cause they cartoons are depicting Muhammad as a terrorist among one of the cartoons correct?
Actually, that has little or nothing to do with it. They're pissed because someone drew a picture of Muhammad, which is forbidden in Islam (the reasoning being that if you start showing pictures of the prophet, that could lead to idolatry). So any kind of image of the prophet can be seen as a "graven image" and against the will of Allah. That by itself is a pretty reasonable view point, but killing people and destroying property over it is not.
I made an analogy. You're free to think (and say) it was a poor one, but that's all it was. And I stand by my assertion that RMS is as wrong thinking the developers could effectively vote on whether to go with GPLv3 as he would be if he had said you could choose to do so. Is that clearer now?
The actual Linux kernel itself, less the various modules on which it depends, is effectively owned by Linus Torvalds. He gets the final say on which license under which it is protected, no one else. Even if every single person other than Linus decided to go with GPLv3, the most they could do would be to fork it. But since Linus owns the trademark "Linux", he could prevent them from calling it anything resembling "Linux", so I fail to see how them doing so would be effective.
Last time I checked, the Moon orbits the Earth in such a way that the same side of it always faces Earth, however, during a solar eclipse, the side of the Moon that faces away from Earth faces the Sun, so how are there places on the Moon that are "permanently in shadow?"
According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon, the Moon's axial tilt is only 3.6 to 6.69 degrees. So at the poles, there could be spots in deep craters that never get sunlight.
This seems aimed at TiVO. If you have to have TiVO's keys to make a modified version run, then TiVO has to provide their signing keys.
You'd only need them on hardware that requires the key in the first place. So you couldn't take TiVO's code, modify it, and load it back onto a TiVO box. However, you can take the source, modify it, and run it on a different computer. So what's the problem??
I always thought the FSF was about Free Software. Now it seems they want Free Hardware, too.
Nothing else has ever been valid,' LinuxWatch is reporting that Richard Stallman has said it's ultimately up to the developers.
Stallman couldn't be more wrong if he said whether Linux goes to GPLv3 is ultimately up to him (which might be his next press release, I don't know). Linus Torvalds holds the trademark for Linux, he's the one in charge of the project, in what way, shape, or form could anyone else force the project to go to a new license? Maybe his corporate masters could, but last I checked OSDL doesn't seem to much care about exercising that kind of control (and if they did, it's not like he couldn't get a new job in seconds).
Maybe someone can explain Stallman's "reasoning", but really, this just seems like more evidence that the man has completely lost touch with reality.
All you have to do to get past all that is do about forty or fifty pushups when you first get the injection, then be sure to exercise your arm every morning to work out the kinks. The pox likes to fester in the muscles, but if you get enough blood flowing through you're fine.
Too bad politicians can score big points on the cheap with their constituents by speaking out in favor of importing drugs from other countries where the cost is cheaper.
Except the reason the prices are lower in other countries is because of governmental regulation. Canada, for instance, won't let pharmaceutical companies sell drugs for more than a set amount. Which means prices go up in the States to compensate.
Canada's not the only country that does this. Europe is even worse, especially considering the size of the markets involved. Canada is about 1/5th the size of the US, while Europe is half again as large (population-wise). Maybe the real solution is to enforce huge tariffs on outgoing medical products, and use that money to defray the costs of drug care for elderly and poor Americans. If those governments want to meddle in the market, maybe ours should, too.
So we've got one guy making wild pronouncements and attacking anyone who disagrees with him, and another trying to use the legal system to slowly, and subtly, change a perceived wrong. I guess that means RMS is John Brown and Lessig is Lincoln. And we all know how they both ended up.
(For those who don't know, Brown was a abolitionist terrorist who tried to start a slave uprising in the south just prior to the Civil War. He and most of his followers were executed for their actions during the raid on the armory at Harper's Ferry. Lincoln, of course, was the 16th US President, and is now so well respected his image is engraved upon Mt Rushmore and the five dollar bill, and he has his own memorial in Washington, DC.)
I 100% agree with you. However, I find it more than a little ironic this is precisely what Kerry said in the 2004 debates and was his position all along. Look what it got him.
Most of life is all about timing. November 2004 wasn't the time to start pointing out problems with the original mission, and then justify continuing support for it in its present form. Maybe now is. A lot has happened, and a lot of respected conservatives are starting to question the intelligence, in both senses of the word, that led to the war.
If you knew anything about congressman Murtha you would know he is (or was) considered fairly conservative - which is why his speaking out had such impact. Of course, I expect him to be branded a 'leftist' now, especially since that's equivalent to being called a communist these days.
"Left" and "right" are not absolute terms, but relative. Also, you can be either "left" or "right" on one issue, but be on the other side of the aisle on others. When it comes to the war, Murtha is definitely on the left side of the aisle now, even if he wasn't before.
As for "leftist" being like a "communist", that's always been the case: the communist party has always been in the far left, politically. If anything, they're the definition of "leftist". Whether being called a "communist" is a perjorative or not is in the eyes of the beholder. I consider it to be, but VI Lenin would probably disagree if he were still around.
Also, to make your analogy more appropriate, remember that the woman trapped in the car has a gun and wants to kill you.
Google Chappaquiddick, since you didn't seem to get the reference.
I'm a bit of a leftie, and these days, we have fairly short fuses when it comes to accusations of treason or unpatriotism, and tend to see them where they really aren't. So my bad there, and thanks for clearing that up.
No problemo. People used to jump down my throat for wanting to impeach Clinton for lying to a Federal judge during a civil rights case saying "You just don't like him!" I didn't like having unfounded charges thrown at me, so I'm going to avoid doing it to others when I can (but don't get me started on Cindy Sheehan, especially now that's she such good pals with Hugo Chavez!)
This argument makes little sense to me. How would having a timetable make terrorists more likely to attack after the US withdraws than not having a timetable? If terrorists are waiting for the US to leave before stepping up attacks, why wouldn't they go into hiding and stop their attacks, then resume once the Bush Administration declares that we've won, packs up their things, and goes home?
I can't speak for anyone else, but my reasoning is that if the US pulls out in, say, six months, it's a lot easier to lay low for six months, then start up again in even more force, than it is to lay low indefinitely. The one lets you tell your followers "We know when to start again, so we're not giving up, we're biding our time." The other means you tell them "We're not sure when we'll start up again, but it'll be Real Soon Now!" Kinda hard to keep your troops motivated with the last one. Witness some of the morale problems the US is having with our own troops because they don't know when it'll be over. Our guys are trained professionals, with plenty of built in support thanks to the USO and Morale, Welfare, and Recreation (MWR) facitilies on bases, and it still sucks not knowing how much longer things will last.
Also, it seems to me that most of the insurgents are following charasmatic leaders, not so much because they agree with them but just because of their charasma. So if the leaders start saying "See, we got them to leave", how much more legitimacy would that give them to their followers?
Having said all that, it's kinda moot if you were even close to accurate before, regarding the INA wanting a time table. If that's the case, then we pretty much have to come up with one, no matter how foolish some of us might view it.
First, and with respect to your service, impugning the character of Jack Murtha is beneath you.
I didn't intend to impugn his character, rather to criticize his stance. And while the actual resolution he proposed sounds reasonable and learned (thanks for the link, btw), his press release literally screams for immediate withdrawal. Part of the release is quoted here. Since democracyrising.us can hardly be considered a shill site for the administration, I think it's safe to assume they're not taking his words terribly out of context.
I think the reason some people are against a timetable is because it gives insurgents and terrorists a date they can shoot for (no pun intended) when they can resume operations. While I agree with that stance, I do think we need to give something like that to the INA (I keep calling it the Iraqi National Congress, don't know where that confusion came from). Afterall, it's their country, and we're just guests now. If they want to do something we think is foolish, well, there's not much we can do about that.
As for their politicians condemning terrorists without condemning insurgents, that's probably more pandering to their own base than anything else. I wouldn't put too much stock in it. Besides, it's a lot easier to condemn people who are killing innocent civilians than it is those who are targetting police and/or soldiers. The second group is bad enough, but the first is absolutely horrific.
When Iraqis decide they want our help they will ask for it, we cannot force it down their throats by pure force of will and large amounts of money.
The INC has repeatedly said they want us to stay for the time being. Is that close enough to them asking for help outright that it settles your concerns? Or would you want us to leave, then be asked to come back?
You know, as a rule, I don't reply to ACs (if you can't take the time to create an account, why should I bother reading your thoughts?) But these are some good questions, and deserve to be answered.
Do you have the actual quotes? My impression was that they were arguing for a phased withdrawal on a timetable of a year or so.
"Our military has done everything that has been asked of them, the U.S. can not accomplish anything further in Iraq militarily. IT IS TIME TO BRING THEM HOME." [Emphasis in original.]
Saying "it is time" in such an emphatic manner does not sound even a little like asking for a time table.
So almost three years after the invasion the Iraqi people are still worse off than they were before the invasion? I mean, if progress is really that slow then can you actually guarantee that the USA will ever achieve its goal in Iraq - whatever that is?
The Iraqi army is a shadow of its former self, but is getting stronger. Ditto the police. Oil production is below pre-war levels, but getting better. Can anyone guarantee anything will get better? Nope, not one way or the other. But I can guarantee that the US has a moral responsibility to do everything we can to help. Now, if the INC decides that we're more of a hindrance than a help, they can tell us to leave. But that should be their call, not ours.
Or maybe it would be like walking away from some guy looking to get in a bar fight. Have you actually sat down and thought through what would happen if the USA left or do you just take Bush's word for it that Bin Laden would become supreme dictator of Iraq when the few thousand insurgents defeated the hundred thousand strong Shiite militias armed by the USA?
I'd agree with that premise if we were not already there. If you want to use the bar fight analogy, it's like getting into a bar fight with a guy, then leaving afterwards to let the owner of the bar clean up. The least we can do is put the table back and pay for the broken mirror.
That seems to be the level that most Americans understand this: "If I walk away from this bar fight then people will realize just how small my penis is."
Leaving aside the simple truth in your statement, it has nothing to do with what I said. What I said was "I mean, what kind of man does that?" By that I mean, what kind of man walks away from a problem he created to leave others to deal with? Maybe your parents raised you to pawn off your responsibilities on other people, but mine raised me to stand up, accept responsibility, and act on it.
You've got me, I'm actually Karl Rove, and I'm laying the groundwork for my next hand-picked Presidential candidate. The Senator will be making his surprise announcement, echoing these very thoughts, in about 20 minutes.
For all of you who just simply want to pull troops today just imagine if a country with the resources of Iraq becomes the next Afganistan.
See my other post on this topic to see what I think of withdrawing. But for an example of the kind of country you're describing, there already is one, and it borders both Iraq and Afghanistan.
First let me say, I'm a Bush supporter. I'm in the Reserves, and I participated in Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). I was lucky enough to be 1500 miles from the front lines, unlike the rest of my unit, but in any event I was there and I've got the tee-shirt to prove it. When the war first started, I was completely in favor of it. Today, I don't regret that we went in at all, and think in the long run the Iraqi people (and by extension the rest of the Middle East) will be much better off with a participatory democracy than living under the heel of a thug.
Having said all that, it's becoming more and more worrisome to me the degree to which the administration apparently ignored or possibly fabricated evidence. I remember saying at the time that it was a fool's errand to use WMD and/or terrorism as the reason to go to war, and that it seemed more like slick marketing than actual strategery. We had plenty of reasons to go in, and none of them had anything to do with WMDs or terrorism. Like the fact that the Iraqi forces habitually fired on US and UK aircraft patrolling the UN mandated No Fly Zones (considering that just prior to the war, I was working in the Turkish command center that controlled the Northern No Fly Zone and had friends and, literally, family flying over Iraq, yeah, I kinda took it personally).
But apparently someone, somewhere, decided that overt acts of aggression in violation of a cease-fire agreement weren't sufficient reason to justify reopening hostilities. So they decided to use weak or non-existant evidence to justify it, instead. Stupid. Just fucking stupid.
So now here we are, not-quite-three years later. We've spent billions of dollars, have hundreds of thousands of troops on the ground, and have thousands of war dead. What's the solution? Well, on the right you have people saying "It wasn't a lie, it was just a mistake." Well, when it comes to something of this magnitude, does it really matter if the root was incompetence or malfeasance? Sure, maybe from a criminal point of view (for instance, I'm not convinced there's a case for impeachment here). But not a whom-do-you-trust-to-run-the-country point of view.
Then on the left we have people like Murtha and Kennedy screaming that we should leave, RIGHT NOW GODDAMNIT!!! That's just insane, we can't leave the Iraqis in a worse position than we found them. That would be like walking away from a car stuck underwater with a woman trapped inside. I mean, what kind of man does that?
So here's what I want to see from politicians: be willing to say "Looks like we screwed up. We completely apologize to the Iraqi people and ask that you forigive us. We promise, to our citizens and the world, that we'll never again invade another country without an individual declaration of war passed by the Congress, ensuring that there will be a full debate before we, as a nation, take the lives of other human beings. We also promise that, now that we're in Iraq, we need to do right by the Iraqis and help them fix all the problems we caused. To that end, we'll follow the policies implemented by the Iraqi National Congress, and be willing to lend whatever assistance they request of us.[1]" Any politician who can say that, consistently, with a straight face, would get my vote.
[1] I know this would be effectively giving the Iraqi government a blank check, but I think that would be worth it to gain some much needed good will.
How about a damage system that actually impairs your avatar? Got shot in the leg? Ok, now you limp everywhere. Boot to the head? Ok, everything is fuzzy and you have tunnel vision. Stabbed in the back? Now you can't raise your weapon up to eye level and have to shoot from the hip.
How many here, have had a win-sysadmin, send out messages "please don't open mails with the subjest 'OpenMePlease', it will possibly cause bad things."
When I've had Exchange admins send me things like that before, I usually point out how easy it is to set up Spam Assassin on a Linux box. Problem solved!
I don't know about that. 'Aquaman' looks like it's gonna be pretty good. Though I'm not sure about Mandy Moore as Aquagirl, I think an unknown would've been a better choice.
I'm hereby preemptively invoking Godwin's Law, because you just gave the exact same rationale for abortions that the Nazis did for their experiments. "It's not a person, so what's the moral question?"
Guess you're in favor of harvesting organs from people in a coma, too. They can't feel it, so what's the harm? (And by "feel it", I mean "scream in pain to let us know they feel it".)
Slashdot Mirror
Also, correct me if i'm wrong, but they are angry cause they cartoons are depicting Muhammad as a terrorist among one of the cartoons correct?
Actually, that has little or nothing to do with it. They're pissed because someone drew a picture of Muhammad, which is forbidden in Islam (the reasoning being that if you start showing pictures of the prophet, that could lead to idolatry). So any kind of image of the prophet can be seen as a "graven image" and against the will of Allah. That by itself is a pretty reasonable view point, but killing people and destroying property over it is not.
Beware those who are devoid of tolerance.
No kidding! I can't stand assholes like that!
I made an analogy. You're free to think (and say) it was a poor one, but that's all it was. And I stand by my assertion that RMS is as wrong thinking the developers could effectively vote on whether to go with GPLv3 as he would be if he had said you could choose to do so. Is that clearer now?
The actual Linux kernel itself, less the various modules on which it depends, is effectively owned by Linus Torvalds. He gets the final say on which license under which it is protected, no one else. Even if every single person other than Linus decided to go with GPLv3, the most they could do would be to fork it. But since Linus owns the trademark "Linux", he could prevent them from calling it anything resembling "Linux", so I fail to see how them doing so would be effective.
Last time I checked, the Moon orbits the Earth in such a way that the same side of it always faces Earth, however, during a solar eclipse, the side of the Moon that faces away from Earth faces the Sun, so how are there places on the Moon that are "permanently in shadow?"
According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon, the Moon's axial tilt is only 3.6 to 6.69 degrees. So at the poles, there could be spots in deep craters that never get sunlight.
Ultimately, where there is [water in a solid form], there is water.
Really? You dont say?
This seems aimed at TiVO. If you have to have TiVO's keys to make a modified version run, then TiVO has to provide their signing keys.
You'd only need them on hardware that requires the key in the first place. So you couldn't take TiVO's code, modify it, and load it back onto a TiVO box. However, you can take the source, modify it, and run it on a different computer. So what's the problem??
I always thought the FSF was about Free Software. Now it seems they want Free Hardware, too.
RMS said this is up to Linux kernel developers. Where did he say this is up to him?
Can you explain your reasoning. How did you reach this understanding?
I never said he did. Go re-read my post.
Nothing else has ever been valid,' LinuxWatch is reporting that Richard Stallman has said it's ultimately up to the developers.
Stallman couldn't be more wrong if he said whether Linux goes to GPLv3 is ultimately up to him (which might be his next press release, I don't know). Linus Torvalds holds the trademark for Linux, he's the one in charge of the project, in what way, shape, or form could anyone else force the project to go to a new license? Maybe his corporate masters could, but last I checked OSDL doesn't seem to much care about exercising that kind of control (and if they did, it's not like he couldn't get a new job in seconds).
Maybe someone can explain Stallman's "reasoning", but really, this just seems like more evidence that the man has completely lost touch with reality.
All you have to do to get past all that is do about forty or fifty pushups when you first get the injection, then be sure to exercise your arm every morning to work out the kinks. The pox likes to fester in the muscles, but if you get enough blood flowing through you're fine.
At least, that worked for me.
Too bad politicians can score big points on the cheap with their constituents by speaking out in favor of importing drugs from other countries where the cost is cheaper.
Except the reason the prices are lower in other countries is because of governmental regulation. Canada, for instance, won't let pharmaceutical companies sell drugs for more than a set amount. Which means prices go up in the States to compensate.
Canada's not the only country that does this. Europe is even worse, especially considering the size of the markets involved. Canada is about 1/5th the size of the US, while Europe is half again as large (population-wise). Maybe the real solution is to enforce huge tariffs on outgoing medical products, and use that money to defray the costs of drug care for elderly and poor Americans. If those governments want to meddle in the market, maybe ours should, too.
So we've got one guy making wild pronouncements and attacking anyone who disagrees with him, and another trying to use the legal system to slowly, and subtly, change a perceived wrong. I guess that means RMS is John Brown and Lessig is Lincoln. And we all know how they both ended up.
(For those who don't know, Brown was a abolitionist terrorist who tried to start a slave uprising in the south just prior to the Civil War. He and most of his followers were executed for their actions during the raid on the armory at Harper's Ferry. Lincoln, of course, was the 16th US President, and is now so well respected his image is engraved upon Mt Rushmore and the five dollar bill, and he has his own memorial in Washington, DC.)
I 100% agree with you. However, I find it more than a little ironic this is precisely what Kerry said in the 2004 debates and was his position all along. Look what it got him.
Most of life is all about timing. November 2004 wasn't the time to start pointing out problems with the original mission, and then justify continuing support for it in its present form. Maybe now is. A lot has happened, and a lot of respected conservatives are starting to question the intelligence, in both senses of the word, that led to the war.
If you knew anything about congressman Murtha you would know he is (or was) considered fairly conservative - which is why his speaking out had such impact. Of course, I expect him to be branded a 'leftist' now, especially since that's equivalent to being called a communist these days.
"Left" and "right" are not absolute terms, but relative. Also, you can be either "left" or "right" on one issue, but be on the other side of the aisle on others. When it comes to the war, Murtha is definitely on the left side of the aisle now, even if he wasn't before.
As for "leftist" being like a "communist", that's always been the case: the communist party has always been in the far left, politically. If anything, they're the definition of "leftist". Whether being called a "communist" is a perjorative or not is in the eyes of the beholder. I consider it to be, but VI Lenin would probably disagree if he were still around.
Also, to make your analogy more appropriate, remember that the woman trapped in the car has a gun and wants to kill you.
Google Chappaquiddick, since you didn't seem to get the reference.
I'm a bit of a leftie, and these days, we have fairly short fuses when it comes to accusations of treason or unpatriotism, and tend to see them where they really aren't. So my bad there, and thanks for clearing that up.
No problemo. People used to jump down my throat for wanting to impeach Clinton for lying to a Federal judge during a civil rights case saying "You just don't like him!" I didn't like having unfounded charges thrown at me, so I'm going to avoid doing it to others when I can (but don't get me started on Cindy Sheehan, especially now that's she such good pals with Hugo Chavez!)
This argument makes little sense to me. How would having a timetable make terrorists more likely to attack after the US withdraws than not having a timetable? If terrorists are waiting for the US to leave before stepping up attacks, why wouldn't they go into hiding and stop their attacks, then resume once the Bush Administration declares that we've won, packs up their things, and goes home?
I can't speak for anyone else, but my reasoning is that if the US pulls out in, say, six months, it's a lot easier to lay low for six months, then start up again in even more force, than it is to lay low indefinitely. The one lets you tell your followers "We know when to start again, so we're not giving up, we're biding our time." The other means you tell them "We're not sure when we'll start up again, but it'll be Real Soon Now!" Kinda hard to keep your troops motivated with the last one. Witness some of the morale problems the US is having with our own troops because they don't know when it'll be over. Our guys are trained professionals, with plenty of built in support thanks to the USO and Morale, Welfare, and Recreation (MWR) facitilies on bases, and it still sucks not knowing how much longer things will last.
Also, it seems to me that most of the insurgents are following charasmatic leaders, not so much because they agree with them but just because of their charasma. So if the leaders start saying "See, we got them to leave", how much more legitimacy would that give them to their followers?
Having said all that, it's kinda moot if you were even close to accurate before, regarding the INA wanting a time table. If that's the case, then we pretty much have to come up with one, no matter how foolish some of us might view it.
First, and with respect to your service, impugning the character of Jack Murtha is beneath you.
I didn't intend to impugn his character, rather to criticize his stance. And while the actual resolution he proposed sounds reasonable and learned (thanks for the link, btw), his press release literally screams for immediate withdrawal. Part of the release is quoted here. Since democracyrising.us can hardly be considered a shill site for the administration, I think it's safe to assume they're not taking his words terribly out of context.
I think the reason some people are against a timetable is because it gives insurgents and terrorists a date they can shoot for (no pun intended) when they can resume operations. While I agree with that stance, I do think we need to give something like that to the INA (I keep calling it the Iraqi National Congress, don't know where that confusion came from). Afterall, it's their country, and we're just guests now. If they want to do something we think is foolish, well, there's not much we can do about that.
As for their politicians condemning terrorists without condemning insurgents, that's probably more pandering to their own base than anything else. I wouldn't put too much stock in it. Besides, it's a lot easier to condemn people who are killing innocent civilians than it is those who are targetting police and/or soldiers. The second group is bad enough, but the first is absolutely horrific.
When Iraqis decide they want our help they will ask for it, we cannot force it down their throats by pure force of will and large amounts of money.
The INC has repeatedly said they want us to stay for the time being. Is that close enough to them asking for help outright that it settles your concerns? Or would you want us to leave, then be asked to come back?
You know, as a rule, I don't reply to ACs (if you can't take the time to create an account, why should I bother reading your thoughts?) But these are some good questions, and deserve to be answered.
o ntent&do_pdf=1&id=368, quoting Murtha's press release (can't find the original press release, I'm sure it's out there somewhere):
Do you have the actual quotes? My impression was that they were arguing for a phased withdrawal on a timetable of a year or so.
From http://democracyrising.us/index2.php?option=com_c
"Our military has done everything that has been asked of them, the U.S. can not accomplish anything further in Iraq
militarily. IT IS TIME TO BRING THEM HOME." [Emphasis in original.]
Saying "it is time" in such an emphatic manner does not sound even a little like asking for a time table.
So almost three years after the invasion the Iraqi people are still worse off than they were before the invasion? I mean, if progress is really that slow then can you actually guarantee that the USA will ever achieve its goal in Iraq - whatever that is?
The Iraqi army is a shadow of its former self, but is getting stronger. Ditto the police. Oil production is below pre-war levels, but getting better. Can anyone guarantee anything will get better? Nope, not one way or the other. But I can guarantee that the US has a moral responsibility to do everything we can to help. Now, if the INC decides that we're more of a hindrance than a help, they can tell us to leave. But that should be their call, not ours.
Or maybe it would be like walking away from some guy looking to get in a bar fight. Have you actually sat down and thought through what would happen if the USA left or do you just take Bush's word for it that Bin Laden would become supreme dictator of Iraq when the few thousand insurgents defeated the hundred thousand strong Shiite militias armed by the USA?
I'd agree with that premise if we were not already there. If you want to use the bar fight analogy, it's like getting into a bar fight with a guy, then leaving afterwards to let the owner of the bar clean up. The least we can do is put the table back and pay for the broken mirror.
That seems to be the level that most Americans understand this: "If I walk away from this bar fight then people will realize just how small my penis is."
Leaving aside the simple truth in your statement, it has nothing to do with what I said. What I said was "I mean, what kind of man does that?" By that I mean, what kind of man walks away from a problem he created to leave others to deal with? Maybe your parents raised you to pawn off your responsibilities on other people, but mine raised me to stand up, accept responsibility, and act on it.
You've got me, I'm actually Karl Rove, and I'm laying the groundwork for my next hand-picked Presidential candidate. The Senator will be making his surprise announcement, echoing these very thoughts, in about 20 minutes.
Idiot.
For all of you who just simply want to pull troops today just imagine if a country with the resources of Iraq becomes the next Afganistan.
See my other post on this topic to see what I think of withdrawing. But for an example of the kind of country you're describing, there already is one, and it borders both Iraq and Afghanistan.
First let me say, I'm a Bush supporter. I'm in the Reserves, and I participated in Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). I was lucky enough to be 1500 miles from the front lines, unlike the rest of my unit, but in any event I was there and I've got the tee-shirt to prove it. When the war first started, I was completely in favor of it. Today, I don't regret that we went in at all, and think in the long run the Iraqi people (and by extension the rest of the Middle East) will be much better off with a participatory democracy than living under the heel of a thug.
Having said all that, it's becoming more and more worrisome to me the degree to which the administration apparently ignored or possibly fabricated evidence. I remember saying at the time that it was a fool's errand to use WMD and/or terrorism as the reason to go to war, and that it seemed more like slick marketing than actual strategery. We had plenty of reasons to go in, and none of them had anything to do with WMDs or terrorism. Like the fact that the Iraqi forces habitually fired on US and UK aircraft patrolling the UN mandated No Fly Zones (considering that just prior to the war, I was working in the Turkish command center that controlled the Northern No Fly Zone and had friends and, literally, family flying over Iraq, yeah, I kinda took it personally).
But apparently someone, somewhere, decided that overt acts of aggression in violation of a cease-fire agreement weren't sufficient reason to justify reopening hostilities. So they decided to use weak or non-existant evidence to justify it, instead. Stupid. Just fucking stupid.
So now here we are, not-quite-three years later. We've spent billions of dollars, have hundreds of thousands of troops on the ground, and have thousands of war dead. What's the solution? Well, on the right you have people saying "It wasn't a lie, it was just a mistake." Well, when it comes to something of this magnitude, does it really matter if the root was incompetence or malfeasance? Sure, maybe from a criminal point of view (for instance, I'm not convinced there's a case for impeachment here). But not a whom-do-you-trust-to-run-the-country point of view.
Then on the left we have people like Murtha and Kennedy screaming that we should leave, RIGHT NOW GODDAMNIT!!! That's just insane, we can't leave the Iraqis in a worse position than we found them. That would be like walking away from a car stuck underwater with a woman trapped inside. I mean, what kind of man does that?
So here's what I want to see from politicians: be willing to say "Looks like we screwed up. We completely apologize to the Iraqi people and ask that you forigive us. We promise, to our citizens and the world, that we'll never again invade another country without an individual declaration of war passed by the Congress, ensuring that there will be a full debate before we, as a nation, take the lives of other human beings. We also promise that, now that we're in Iraq, we need to do right by the Iraqis and help them fix all the problems we caused. To that end, we'll follow the policies implemented by the Iraqi National Congress, and be willing to lend whatever assistance they request of us.[1]" Any politician who can say that, consistently, with a straight face, would get my vote.
[1] I know this would be effectively giving the Iraqi government a blank check, but I think that would be worth it to gain some much needed good will.
We all know the case for war was bullshit! That's why we voted!
If "we all" knew that, then why did Bush get re-elected?
How about a damage system that actually impairs your avatar? Got shot in the leg? Ok, now you limp everywhere. Boot to the head? Ok, everything is fuzzy and you have tunnel vision. Stabbed in the back? Now you can't raise your weapon up to eye level and have to shoot from the hip.
Now that would be an interesting game experience!
How many here, have had a win-sysadmin, send out messages "please don't open mails with the subjest 'OpenMePlease', it will possibly cause bad things."
When I've had Exchange admins send me things like that before, I usually point out how easy it is to set up Spam Assassin on a Linux box. Problem solved!
I don't know about that. 'Aquaman' looks like it's gonna be pretty good. Though I'm not sure about Mandy Moore as Aquagirl, I think an unknown would've been a better choice.
Oh. My. God.
I'm hereby preemptively invoking Godwin's Law, because you just gave the exact same rationale for abortions that the Nazis did for their experiments. "It's not a person, so what's the moral question?"
Guess you're in favor of harvesting organs from people in a coma, too. They can't feel it, so what's the harm? (And by "feel it", I mean "scream in pain to let us know they feel it".)