It was, in the '92/'93 U.N. weapons inspectors reports. You know, the ones where it discussed Iraq having thousands of liters of anthrax solution. The same reports Tony Blair discussed in Britain before the war.
The left (much as I hate that term, and as much to the 'left' as I am in certain respects) is in serious denial about this issue, and that denial is going to cost them dearly over the next few years.
Right, a major victory. If you think this is going to change any of the resistance in a Iraq, if you think less Americans are going to die in that horrible place because of this... you are an idiot. This was a powerplay by the Iraqis, Saddam was found because they no longer needed/wanted him.
This was a power play by "the Iraqis"? Many Iraqis were out in the street celebrating today...what of them?
The resistance in Iraq is diverse, so you will be eating crow the minute another terrorist sets off a car bomb in Iraq.
Not at all...I don't expect this to completely end the resistance. It will die off over time, though, particularly as a legitimate, democratic Iraqi government assumes power. After that, we'll leave.
It is so sad that people like you are so easily blinded by the obvious.
Heh, "blinded by the obvious". I think of it as "persuaded by the facts".
It is people like you that elected Bush,
Yes it is. You had to consider the alternative. Sometimes the two-party system (one of my favorite pet peeves) gets ugly.
and without even knowing you, I hate you.
You, sir, have achieved the first step towards becoming a terrorist. Congratulations.
I, on the other hand, can only pity you and your weak mind.
There was no justified reason to invade that country.
Saddam's capture is completely meaningless to the safety of the world.
I disagree. WMDs have been eliminated (one way or the other - that is unless they're now in Syria, Iran or some other terrorist hotbed). Terrorist training camps have been shut down. And, regardless of anywhere else, the Iraqi people are much safer than they were while Saddam was in power.
This is just the same as another "Mission Accomplished" banner for Bush. Just because he was captured does not justify the war.
BTW, the first "Mission Accomplished" banner was fully justified - the first mission was taking down the Hussein government.
As you've probably already figured out, I feel the war was perfectly justified, if a war ever is.
I thought he was a U.S. citizen, so you have a point. I'm pretty sure the powers that be wouldn't want anyone to get similar ideas as a straight terrorist tactic.
Were those attacks politically motivated? I thought money was the goal, though perhaps that doesn't rule out terrorism regardless...
04Jul02 El Al Counter shooting at LAX. Shooter was Egyptian.
That one doesn't invalidate my point, since those who died weren't citizens... Nasty business though.
Whoops, I also missed Spain in my first response - and they lost some brave souls just the other day. None of us should ever forget the sacrifices made in the name of our way of life.
I hear Spain is a very pleasant tourist destination. It will definitely be on my next European travel itinerary.:-)
I see you're as good at changing the subject and dodging the question as the President you so admire.
I thought he was an incompetent idiot? Can't have it both ways pal...:-)
You outline for me, as I asked, the disastrous state of affairs we'd be in if Gore had been elected (sic), and then I will respond to any of your further claims.
I see I need to spell things out for you a little more:
The economy would have already been in trouble for either elected President.
9/11 would have caused a further economic disaster for either President.
Gore's foreign policy would have been much weaker than Bush's, and likely we would have had several more domestic attacks, truly crippling the economy and sending us into a depression (not recession). You know, deflation.
Gore wouldn't have attacked Afghanistan or Iraq, thus leaving those terrorist-friendly states to train thousands of more terrorists and manufacure even nastier weapons, exacerbating the problem further.
I could go on, but I'm sure you get the general picture...
However, that is all speculation, whereas I'd prefer to stick to the facts at hand. Care to discuss those now?;-)
One could wonder, would there have been an 9/11 if the Bush administration ware not elected?
According to reports, the attack had been planned for years. Al Qaida (however they're spelling it this week) hates America for supporting Israel - and Clinton did as much of that as anyone.
What about Fidel Castro? Everyone's been saying the same about him for years. He's a despot! He tortures his people!
Sure, but Castro had treaties with the Soviets, who (in theory at least) would have backed him up with nuclear weapons.
While it's too bad the U.S. has neither the resources or the international good will;-) to take on every evil dictator around the world, the occasional win should be savored to the fullest.:-)
NO ONE SUPPORTS SADDAM HUSSEIN! But you straw-man slayers cannot understand the nuances of the worlds objections... YOU CANNOT UNILATERALLY ATTACK FOREIGN NATIONS! UNDER ANY GODDAMNED IMAGINED (real or otherwise) REASONS!
Yeah, I'm sure you objected in just the same way when Clinton attacked Bosnia without U.N. approval...NOT!
The U.N. clearly reneged on it's responsibilities in this case. Saddam could have avoided the war if he had just come clean on his WMD, which the U.N. knew existed from previous inspections. Big miscalculation on Saddam's part - I'm quite happy it worked out this way despite the cost.
France in particular should be extremely ashamed of it's role. Good old Iraq Jack Chirac also miscalculated in a big way.;-)
The international press (for example the press in my country, Austria)
Before I go any further, I just want to compliment you on your country's Glock pistols...great stuff!:-)
(Just out of curiousity, are you allowed to own them?)
is assuming the opposite to happen. And I share their view. Central Europe believes these assaults to happen because the Iraquis would prefer the US to move out of their country.
Many of the attacks are coming from foreign fighters in Iraq. While I'm sure there's resistance (20%+ of any population is always going to fall for the "big lie"), I think most educated Iraqis see the present situation as a big win for Iraq.
With Saddam Hussain being put on display in a humiliative fashion - him playing the role of a broken man whose two sons have been killed by the very forces that now have control of his life - this might anger those who lead these assaults even more.
No, the typical Muslim will view Saddam with contempt for not following through on his many promises to go down fighting and become a martyr. His "approval rating" is even worse in Iraq, where most know of his many crimes against his own people.
The situation down there is not a beautiful one; the rest of the world blames the many problems on the Bush administration.
What, not on the terrorists or extremist Muslims? Unlike the Old World powers (who seemed to prefer to simply profit from Saddam), the U.S. had the will to take on a nasty dictator who was openly supporting terrorism. That little detail seems to escape all the detractors...
We are sincerely hoping that you will vote their asses out of office next time
Sorry, but it's not going to happen IMNSHO. Especially after this!
and elect somebody with a finer understanding of the world into what's easily the world's most important political function.
Who, Howard Dean? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! His tenure would be an unmitigated disaster for U.S. prestige and interests worldwide.
The rest of the world needs a different US. You might not care, tho - but I for one hope you do.
The rest of the world might want a different U.S., but the President acts strictly for the interests of his own country. I, for one, think Bush has done an amazingly good job with foreign policy. Not one citizen has died from foreign terrorism on U.S. soil since 9/11...that is a tremendous track record for the Bush administration. I shudder to think where we'd be today if Gore had won in 2000.
The 'War on Terror' cannot be won by capturing anyone! You can only 'win' by solving the problems that only serve to create more and more terrorists.
Exactly. An excellent way to begin solving many of those problems is to create a strong, stable democracy in place of a brutal dictatorship, in a pivotal Middle Eastern country.
Historically, as people worldwide have been exposed to democracy, they've wanted it for themselves. It's happening in Iraq right now.
So does this mean that Bruce Willis is going to cough up his $1 million reward?
Only if someone besides the troops can claim responsibility (that person will also get $10 million from Uncle Sam if so). If it's only the soldiers, they can't claim a reward...though I'll bet Bruce will throw one heck of a party for them when they return to the States!:-)
You could have said something similar about Saddam yesterday.
The correct statement (with proper tenses) is: "Have we been able to find Bin Laden? Not yet.".
Bin Laden isn't tied to a single country as was Saddam. His operation has been greatly hindered, and he'll go down...eventually.
In the meantime, don't mistake the fact that this is a great victory for the coalition and President Bush, and a major psychological blow for the Baathist resistance.:-)
smebody flames a guy with a UID of glock27. somebody is really fscking stupid. personally, i like a 1911a1, but hey, that's just me.
I chose the 27 as my personal defense weapon since it has plenty of stopping power (.40 S&W), is quite concealable, is reasonably accurate, and carries the full legal (sigh) compliment of 10 rounds (9+1).
Recommended!:-)
Since large capacity mags were banned, it makes the most sense to go for the max capability in the smallest package, IMO. Come to think of it, if I want 20 round "magazine capacity" I should just get a second 27...now there's a good thought! Heck, I really enjoy the "Akimbo" pistols in RTCW ET, might as well try it in real life...;-)
(BTW, I chose my handle quite on impulse...I didn't expect to make over 700 posts to/. at that point.../. is a great forum for free speech and free thinking of all kinds - subject to moderator approval of course.;)
Why do you think there is a center to the universe.
I don't - in fact that was my point exactly.:-)
I was pointing out that the Universe is very clearly different from what our ancestors understood it to be when Christianity was invented. A very humanity-centric God was much more believable when there was only one Sun, rather than ~10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 of them.;-)
Seriously, I think the scientific method is one of man's greatest creations. It's the ultimate physical survival tool. However, the notion that ALL of human experience can be quantified and neatly plugged into this religion...oh, excuse me...method...is pretty ridiculous.
I don't think I claimed that "all of human experience can be quantified and neatly plugged in...". Care to cite my posts?
My point was that questions which are subject to the scientific method may be answered by said method. And despite Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and other chaotic effects there are large bodies of science which behave very predictably at large scales - otherwise there would be no life, us or (for instance) washing machines.;-)
Used incorrectly, the SM is just another set of mental blinders, a way of artificially restricting the range of possibilities so that our results conveniently match our expectations. There are other ways of knowing.
Sure. Now, please explain your favored "other way of knowing" which lies outside scientific principles...at least I'll have one last good laugh tonight. =)
Seriously, I think we should all keep an open mind with the idea that there may well be objective reality which may not be described by our current scientific knowledge or theories. On the other hand, in my personal experience virtually everything that attempts to fit outside scientific thought turns out to be, given sufficient investigation, gibberish. YMMV.;-) (Of course, anything that does turn out to be "real" must be accounted for by scientific thought, sooner or later...that is the nature, and the power of, the scientific method.)
Agreeing with your point but including a subtle modification.
While the Catholic Church has taken a beating at the hands of the Scientific Method, claims to "absolute truth" were little more than the unsubstantiated blustering of a few arrogant Pontifexs.
It is generally understood within the Church that the Pope (and consequently his Church) is infallible on matters of doctrine only. This stems from the Petrine Doctrine. The Petrine Doctrine in turn, derives from Matthew 16:19 wherein Christ says
"And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."
Well, being a mite on the cynical side, I view this as "spin control", as I indicated in my first post. In other words, while there was no proof that it was incorrect, the Church was quite happy to claim that it was the sole repository of "truth", and every word in the Bible should be taken literally. Once it became clear (over the course of decades) that the scientific method was proving beyond a reasonable doubt that Church doctrine was incorrect, the Church began it's modern practice of not disputing things subject to the scientific method, while claiming it knows the "truth" about all things not scientifically provable.;-)
I'm quite sure that as science progresses, there will be further conflict between religious dogma and scientific method.
I believe in God (in absence of evidence one way or the other I prefer the Universe to have some purpose, and "what caused the Big Bang?" is an interesting question), but I'm no fan of organized religion. Anyone who claims to know the "one true way" is suspect in my book - particularly when they want my money.;-)
Of course, whether the mighty God that created the entire Universe of 100 billion+ galaxies(!) over 13 billion years ago cares about our species' sexual preferences or any individual activity is another interesting question entirely...
It's a much different Universe than one in which the Earth is the only habitable spot, in the very special position of "center".
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps some sane moderators could re-evaluate the parent post's status as "-1 Flamebait", while the grandparent is rated "+5 Insightful"...?
TIA! =)
It was, in the '92/'93 U.N. weapons inspectors reports. You know, the ones where it discussed Iraq having thousands of liters of anthrax solution. The same reports Tony Blair discussed in Britain before the war.
The left (much as I hate that term, and as much to the 'left' as I am in certain respects) is in serious denial about this issue, and that denial is going to cost them dearly over the next few years.
If y'all want a piece of me, let's set up some RTCW/ET action - I certainly wouldn't mind having you in my sights... =)
Now, back to football, cold beer and a cigar or two...time to celebrate today! =)
Oh, and by the way, Merry Christmas!
Hi, Anonymous! You've been busy today! ;-)
Democracy will change that - through freedom of speech, and freedom of thought. You'll see...
This was a power play by "the Iraqis"? Many Iraqis were out in the street celebrating today...what of them?
The resistance in Iraq is diverse, so you will be eating crow the minute another terrorist sets off a car bomb in Iraq.
Not at all...I don't expect this to completely end the resistance. It will die off over time, though, particularly as a legitimate, democratic Iraqi government assumes power. After that, we'll leave.
It is so sad that people like you are so easily blinded by the obvious.
Heh, "blinded by the obvious". I think of it as "persuaded by the facts".
It is people like you that elected Bush,
Yes it is. You had to consider the alternative. Sometimes the two-party system (one of my favorite pet peeves) gets ugly.
and without even knowing you, I hate you.
You, sir, have achieved the first step towards becoming a terrorist. Congratulations.
I, on the other hand, can only pity you and your weak mind.
There was no justified reason to invade that country.
I already posted a fine response to that particular silliness.
Saddam's capture is completely meaningless to the safety of the world.
I disagree. WMDs have been eliminated (one way or the other - that is unless they're now in Syria, Iran or some other terrorist hotbed). Terrorist training camps have been shut down. And, regardless of anywhere else, the Iraqi people are much safer than they were while Saddam was in power.
This is just the same as another "Mission Accomplished" banner for Bush. Just because he was captured does not justify the war.
BTW, the first "Mission Accomplished" banner was fully justified - the first mission was taking down the Hussein government.
As you've probably already figured out, I feel the war was perfectly justified, if a war ever is.
You delusional moron.
Pot, kettle, black. :-)
I thought he was a U.S. citizen, so you have a point. I'm pretty sure the powers that be wouldn't want anyone to get similar ideas as a straight terrorist tactic.
Were those attacks politically motivated? I thought money was the goal, though perhaps that doesn't rule out terrorism regardless...
04Jul02 El Al Counter shooting at LAX. Shooter was Egyptian.
That one doesn't invalidate my point, since those who died weren't citizens... Nasty business though.
Whoops, I also missed Spain in my first response - and they lost some brave souls just the other day. None of us should ever forget the sacrifices made in the name of our way of life.
I hear Spain is a very pleasant tourist destination. It will definitely be on my next European travel itinerary. :-)
I thought he was an incompetent idiot? Can't have it both ways pal... :-)
You outline for me, as I asked, the disastrous state of affairs we'd be in if Gore had been elected (sic), and then I will respond to any of your further claims.
I see I need to spell things out for you a little more:
I could go on, but I'm sure you get the general picture...
However, that is all speculation, whereas I'd prefer to stick to the facts at hand. Care to discuss those now? ;-)
Don't forget Poland. I'm sure I'll enjoy vacationing there more than I would have France... =)
(I would guess the food will be better in Italy though...)
According to reports, the attack had been planned for years. Al Qaida (however they're spelling it this week) hates America for supporting Israel - and Clinton did as much of that as anyone.
Sure, but Castro had treaties with the Soviets, who (in theory at least) would have backed him up with nuclear weapons.
While it's too bad the U.S. has neither the resources or the international good will ;-) to take on every evil dictator around the world, the occasional win should be savored to the fullest. :-)
I suppose you don't remember that the .com bubble had burst and the stock market crashed before the 2000 Presidential elections...
I also suppose you don't think the 9/11 attacks would have had a horrific effect on the U.S. economy if Gore had been in power...?
Now, who were you saying is in the 20% in this country again...?
ROFL.
Yeah, I'm sure you objected in just the same way when Clinton attacked Bosnia without U.N. approval...NOT!
The U.N. clearly reneged on it's responsibilities in this case. Saddam could have avoided the war if he had just come clean on his WMD, which the U.N. knew existed from previous inspections. Big miscalculation on Saddam's part - I'm quite happy it worked out this way despite the cost.
France in particular should be extremely ashamed of it's role. Good old Iraq Jack Chirac also miscalculated in a big way. ;-)
Before I go any further, I just want to compliment you on your country's Glock pistols...great stuff! :-)
(Just out of curiousity, are you allowed to own them?)
is assuming the opposite to happen. And I share their view. Central Europe believes these assaults to happen because the Iraquis would prefer the US to move out of their country.
Many of the attacks are coming from foreign fighters in Iraq. While I'm sure there's resistance (20%+ of any population is always going to fall for the "big lie"), I think most educated Iraqis see the present situation as a big win for Iraq.
With Saddam Hussain being put on display in a humiliative fashion - him playing the role of a broken man whose two sons have been killed by the very forces that now have control of his life - this might anger those who lead these assaults even more.
No, the typical Muslim will view Saddam with contempt for not following through on his many promises to go down fighting and become a martyr. His "approval rating" is even worse in Iraq, where most know of his many crimes against his own people.
The situation down there is not a beautiful one; the rest of the world blames the many problems on the Bush administration.
What, not on the terrorists or extremist Muslims? Unlike the Old World powers (who seemed to prefer to simply profit from Saddam), the U.S. had the will to take on a nasty dictator who was openly supporting terrorism. That little detail seems to escape all the detractors...
We are sincerely hoping that you will vote their asses out of office next time
Sorry, but it's not going to happen IMNSHO. Especially after this!
and elect somebody with a finer understanding of the world into what's easily the world's most important political function.
Who, Howard Dean? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! His tenure would be an unmitigated disaster for U.S. prestige and interests worldwide.
The rest of the world needs a different US. You might not care, tho - but I for one hope you do.
The rest of the world might want a different U.S., but the President acts strictly for the interests of his own country. I, for one, think Bush has done an amazingly good job with foreign policy. Not one citizen has died from foreign terrorism on U.S. soil since 9/11...that is a tremendous track record for the Bush administration. I shudder to think where we'd be today if Gore had won in 2000.
Exactly. An excellent way to begin solving many of those problems is to create a strong, stable democracy in place of a brutal dictatorship, in a pivotal Middle Eastern country.
Historically, as people worldwide have been exposed to democracy, they've wanted it for themselves. It's happening in Iraq right now.
Plenty of partying in Baghdad tonight! =)
Heh, he would have won (IMO) without this. Now, barring total disaster, the next election will be a "slam dunk".
The fact that the economy is now turning around was already taking away the Democrat's last real issue against Dubya. ;-)
Only if someone besides the troops can claim responsibility (that person will also get $10 million from Uncle Sam if so). If it's only the soldiers, they can't claim a reward...though I'll bet Bruce will throw one heck of a party for them when they return to the States! :-)
You could have said something similar about Saddam yesterday.
The correct statement (with proper tenses) is: "Have we been able to find Bin Laden? Not yet.".
Bin Laden isn't tied to a single country as was Saddam. His operation has been greatly hindered, and he'll go down...eventually.
In the meantime, don't mistake the fact that this is a great victory for the coalition and President Bush, and a major psychological blow for the Baathist resistance. :-)
I chose the 27 as my personal defense weapon since it has plenty of stopping power (.40 S&W), is quite concealable, is reasonably accurate, and carries the full legal (sigh) compliment of 10 rounds (9+1).
Recommended! :-)
Since large capacity mags were banned, it makes the most sense to go for the max capability in the smallest package, IMO. Come to think of it, if I want 20 round "magazine capacity" I should just get a second 27...now there's a good thought! Heck, I really enjoy the "Akimbo" pistols in RTCW ET, might as well try it in real life... ;-)
(BTW, I chose my handle quite on impulse...I didn't expect to make over 700 posts to /. at that point... /. is a great forum for free speech and free thinking of all kinds - subject to moderator approval of course.;)
True, though the "Redundant" mod gets the point across rather well...
Some jokes just get better with the retelling, though. ;-)
Chalk it up to my strange sense of humor... =)
Very nice. I guess the approach is "I don't agree, therefore I'll censor you."
Good luck... :-)
Can you imagine a Beowulf cluster of...?
I don't - in fact that was my point exactly. :-)
I was pointing out that the Universe is very clearly different from what our ancestors understood it to be when Christianity was invented. A very humanity-centric God was much more believable when there was only one Sun, rather than ~10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 of them. ;-)
Just IMO, of course...
I don't think I claimed that "all of human experience can be quantified and neatly plugged in...". Care to cite my posts?
My point was that questions which are subject to the scientific method may be answered by said method. And despite Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and other chaotic effects there are large bodies of science which behave very predictably at large scales - otherwise there would be no life, us or (for instance) washing machines. ;-)
Used incorrectly, the SM is just another set of mental blinders, a way of artificially restricting the range of possibilities so that our results conveniently match our expectations. There are other ways of knowing.
Sure. Now, please explain your favored "other way of knowing" which lies outside scientific principles...at least I'll have one last good laugh tonight. =)
Seriously, I think we should all keep an open mind with the idea that there may well be objective reality which may not be described by our current scientific knowledge or theories. On the other hand, in my personal experience virtually everything that attempts to fit outside scientific thought turns out to be, given sufficient investigation, gibberish. YMMV. ;-) (Of course, anything that does turn out to be "real" must be accounted for by scientific thought, sooner or later...that is the nature, and the power of, the scientific method.)
I look forward to your reply.
While the Catholic Church has taken a beating at the hands of the Scientific Method, claims to "absolute truth" were little more than the unsubstantiated blustering of a few arrogant Pontifexs.
It is generally understood within the Church that the Pope (and consequently his Church) is infallible on matters of doctrine only. This stems from the Petrine Doctrine. The Petrine Doctrine in turn, derives from Matthew 16:19 wherein Christ says
"And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."
Well, being a mite on the cynical side, I view this as "spin control", as I indicated in my first post. In other words, while there was no proof that it was incorrect, the Church was quite happy to claim that it was the sole repository of "truth", and every word in the Bible should be taken literally. Once it became clear (over the course of decades) that the scientific method was proving beyond a reasonable doubt that Church doctrine was incorrect, the Church began it's modern practice of not disputing things subject to the scientific method, while claiming it knows the "truth" about all things not scientifically provable. ;-)
I'm quite sure that as science progresses, there will be further conflict between religious dogma and scientific method.
I believe in God (in absence of evidence one way or the other I prefer the Universe to have some purpose, and "what caused the Big Bang?" is an interesting question), but I'm no fan of organized religion. Anyone who claims to know the "one true way" is suspect in my book - particularly when they want my money. ;-)
Of course, whether the mighty God that created the entire Universe of 100 billion+ galaxies(!) over 13 billion years ago cares about our species' sexual preferences or any individual activity is another interesting question entirely...
It's a much different Universe than one in which the Earth is the only habitable spot, in the very special position of "center".