The online equivalent of stealing should be a crime. But copyright infringment is not stealing. It's reproducing duplicates.
Actually, it's reproducing duplicates without permission, which is expressly forbidden by the copyright covering movies and music. Unless the copyright holder says you can copy it for distribution, you can't copy it. Period.
I will point out, however, that even if the fuel rods did melt, the floor of the reactor vessel did not fail, which means Chernobyl didn't "meltdown" any more than Three Mile Island did, and TMI most certainly didn't meltdown. It experienced a partial meltdown, where fuel rods and other internal reactor components got hot enough to melt, but the reactor vessel never experienced thermal failure. TMI successfully shut down. Chernobyl's pressure vessel failed due to excess steam pressure, a consequence of its inferior design. Neither accident resulted in a critical mass of fuel rod debris burning a hole in the reactor vessel.
Getting back to the original poster, he described a catastrophic meltdown. Neither Chernobyl or TMI fit that description.
Feeling a bit snippy this morning? Jeez. A simple link without the attitude would've sufficed. I've never seen these pictures, and all the info to date I've heard led me to believe the core did not suffer a meltdown. I thank you for pointing this info out to me. Now go be a jerk to someone else if it makes you feel better.
As an addendum, I will say that if the Chernobyl reactor had not blown up, it most likely would have melted down catastrophically, as it was generating significantly more power during the accident than it was rated for and had lost the capacity to cool or control the reaction.
Wikipedia, being a public-maintained setup, can't always be trusted. Note the following excerpts:
On April 26, 1986 at 1:23:58 am local time, the fourth reactor of the Chernobyl power plant - known as Chernobyl-4 - suffered a catastrophic nuclear meltdown that resulted in a series of explosions and fire.
and this
The fuel rods began to melt and the steam pressure rapidly increased causing a large explosion, displacing and destroying the reactor lid, rupturing the coolant tubes and then blowing a hole in the roof. When outside air contacted the graphite moderator of the core, the graphite began to burn. The fire dispersed most of the radioactive contamination.
The phrase "the fuel rods began to melt" is not the same thing as "the fuel rods melted and formed a critical mass which caused the reactor vessel to fail." The latter is the accepted definition of a meltdown, so clearly Chernobyl did not experience a catastrophic meltdown as outlined in the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article.
This may seem pedantic, but the distinction is important. Claiming something underwent a "meltdown" means something much different than "the reactor sustained internal thermal damage." Most critically, the reactor vessel was not ruptured due to thermal events (as in a meltdown) but due to a buildup of steam pressure beyond containment structural limits. A meltdown also results in a critical mass of slag literally burning its way through the floor of the reactor vessel, building foundation, and everything else on its way down to the water table. This did not occur, so Chernobyl did not, in fact, experience a catastrophic meltdown. Three Mile Island came closer to this than Chernobyl did, but due to Chernobyl's inferior design (or TMI's superior design, whichever) it blew up before it could meltdown.
Since the time between generations is about a millionth of a section, this means that a reactor core that's 'prompt-critical' would quickly escalate in temperature until the structural integrity of the core failed, and you have a molten slag of Uranium - which is exactly what happened at Chernobyl.
What you're describing here is a "meltdown," sometimes known as a China Syndrome. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I was under the impression that Chernobyl did not experience a meltdown. An explosion and fire occured at Chernobyl due to operators disconnecting various safety systems, but I don't recall any problems with a meltdown, critical mass slag, or failure of the reactor vessel due to some sort thermal event. Meltdowns don't cause explosions (witness that Three Mile Island, which underwent a partial meltdown, didn't blow up) but an explosion is exactly what happened at Chernobyl.
Now, if an actual meltdown ever occurs, it's highly probable the critical mass would sink right down through the floor, through the ground, and eventually hit the water table in a catastrophic explosion of steam. This, however, has never happened in human history as far as I'm aware.
Somewhat slightly different to the Slashdot version wouldn't you say?
How dare you remove the anti-MS slant from this article by stating truthful facts! Have you no bias, sir? Don't you know that it's blasphemy to not try and take the most negative possible stance on anything regarding Windows whilst simultaneously praising how Linux is completely immune to these things? And how dare you suggest that a botched kernel or buggy driver could cause a kernel panic! By revealing such truths, you destabilize the endless war on Slashdot to make Microsoft responsible for cancer, hunger, and the lack of world peace!
LiIon batteries are lighter than most engines and transmissions.
I hate to point this out, but merely restating your original statement doesn't prove anything. If you wish to disprove his assertion, go find the weight of common engines and transmissions and compare them with the weight of common electric car batteries.
However, I have a bad feeling you're not going to come out on top in this argument. Li-Ion batteries are very light -- the lightest you're going to get with the possible exception of zinc-air batteries (which have lower energy densities). Example:
Let us a GM LS6 V8 engine with all accessories. GM Performance Parts catalog says this combo weighs around 390 pounds. I've searched in vain for figures on the weight of a complimentary transmission, the 4L60-E 4-speed automatic or the Borg-Warner T-56 6-speed manual, but let us assume it weighs about 200 pounds. That's 590 pounds of motor and transmission, capable of producing and transmitting 405 flywheel horsepower (302,130 watts). Assume a 15 US gallon tank full of premium gasoline (6.3lbs/gallon) and you get another ~95 pounds, for a grand total of 685 pounds. Note I'm discounting things like a differential and other suspension-related doohickies since all we're trying to do here is compare powertrains.
Now what kind of electric setup can you fit in 685 pounds? Lithium-ion's gravimetric energy density is 140 Wh/kg (sorry for the sudden metric conversion, but I'm going with the quickest figures I can find which happen to be all metric). Gasoline has a gravimetric energy density of 12,200 Wh/kg. This means you need eighty-seven times as much battery weight as you do gasoline in order to get similar range or performance figures. Pure lithium has a higher energy density ( 250 Wh/kg) than lithium-ion, but pure lithium is not a practical battery element for a variety of reasons. I think in weight alone you're going to have a problem reaching that 685 pound (311 kg) figure with any kind of electric setup.
Electric cars have shown that they can provide very good range at about the same price as a conventional car.
You can get equal performance but you won't get equal range. You can get equal range but not as good performance (all, of course, assuming identical car weights and drag coefficients). Perhaps you're starting to understand why electic cars haven't left internal combustion engines in the dust on new car sales.
And the battery replacement comes in under the cost of regular maintenance on a conventional vehicle as well.
Li-Ion also suffers from relatively short battery life. Check the following excerpt:
Aging is a concern with most lithium-ion batteries and many manufacturers remain silent about this issue. Some capacity deterioration is noticeable after one year, whether the battery is in use or not. The battery frequently fails after two or three years. It should be noted that other chemistries also have age-related degenerative effects. This is especially true for nickel-metal-hydride if exposed to high ambient temperatures.
Properly cared for, the above GM LS6 engine and transmission might be expected to live for 200,000 miles with little more than oil changes, clutch replacements, and common tuneups. Given that the average American drives around 30,000 miles per year, that gives it an expected lifetime of almost seven years. Li-Ion packs would have to be replaced every two years at the most based on current battery technology. Li-Ion is fantastically expensive compared to run-of-the-mill lead-acid batteries or even NiCad or NiMH batteries. There's a reason GM went with lead-acid for the EV1, namely cheaper batteries and (supposedly) longer lifetimes.
I have very little regard for the interpretation of the courts or of the legal profession.
As do I, but one of the foundations of our Constitution is the Supreme Court's duty to properly interpret it, making sure the Executive and Legislative branches don't monkey around where they shouldn't. The Supreme Court is doing the job it's supposed to do. It's not required that we agree with them.
Amendment 10 is very particular in its statement that, if it's not specifically mentioned in the Constitution, then it's not something the Feds have any jurisdiction over. Interstate commerce CANNOT (per Amd 9) be enumerated to include internet access. Conducting transactions with vendors in other states is interstate commerce, but as long as your ISP has a local office, it's intrastate commerce.
Existing case law does not agree with you, based largely on the fact that a local ISP could not function without implicitly providing access to other areas of the Internet, those being interstate or international. It's a stretch, no doubt about it, and I don't like it. But case law firmly supports it.
Although I agree with you that I'd prefer the Federal Government stay out of things like this, your interpretation of the Constitution is not correct. Or, at least it's not correct based upon existing case law.
I point you to this excellent breakdown at Wikipedia.org. The Interstate Commerce clause, as it's typically referred to, has been the source of considerable Constitutional debate for a long, long time. Here is the actual verbage:
"Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution empowers the United States Congress
"To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes".
The key phrase here is "among the several States." Key court cases such as Gibbons v. Ogden (1824), Swift v. United States (1905), and Stafford v. Wallce (1922) have repeatedly confirmed the Federal Government's role in regulating interstate commerce. This is not to say the FedGov has rights to interfere with internal state commerce (although it does) but the wording strongly points to the right of the FedGov to regulate commerce between the states, or commerce that involves more than one state. Telecom, and by extension ISP's, fall under such rules.
There's another article here that lays it out again. The same conclusion is met, supported by existing case law.
As I stated in the beginning, I'm all for less government intrusion, but in this case it seems the Founding Fathers wanted the FedGov to have this power. Short of a disqualifying amendment, I don't see that changing. Your references to Amendment IX and X are not relevant since they only refer to things not explicitly defined in the Constitution. Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 does explicitly define the role and is not subject to Amendment IX or X.
FWIW, I am not a lawyer, but I have spent more than a passing amount of time studying Constitutional law as a personal hobby.
Look, you and I are just not going to agree on this. You throw your figures in from your sources, I throw them in from mine. It proves nothing to you or me since neither of us is going to believe the other. I feel this has gotten to the point where I'm wasting my time with you, and I don't wish to waste my time.
I see things differently than you, and I wish I could let you see the things I've seen with my own two eyes. Perhaps they would alter your perception, but perhaps not. You seem intent on wanting us to fail, whether out of some sort of anti-military hatred or some hatred of Bush or hatred of America I cannot tell. I wish I knew what made you come to these conclusions that make you hate us so. I feel no animosity towards you, just confusion over why you are the way you are, so full of loathing and anger. Perhaps one day you'll understand.
You know, I'm getting four or five similar posts, all from AC. I get the feeling you're all the same person. I'll make you a deal: I'll continue this if you have the guts to stop posting AC and take karma responsibility for what you're saying. Unless you wish to do that, I'm not going to give you the dignity of further reponses.
Easy. You claimed his 15,000 civilain death # was from the lancet document. It wasn't. The Lancet numbers are acutally in excess of 100,000. You just repeated verbatim another argument you heard without even reading it. Anyone who was actually familiar with the Lancet document would know that it was over 100,000 and therefore would not tell someone who claimed a conservative number of civilian deaths, 15,000, that they were using the discredited Lancet document.
I assumed his source was the Lancet document simply because it was so out of proportion with what Iraqi hospitals are reporting. You are correct, the Lancet report specifies 100,000 deaths. It's just as wrong as his 15,000 figure, though, so the point is moot. Iraqi hospital counts show roughly 3,500 dead and 15,000 wounded.
Also, you claimed sarin gas was proof that there were WMD and that you were glad it was found before it could be used against Marines. But it wasn't sarin gas at all. Now what are you going to say?
This is where you expect some sort of ridiculous claim that it really was sarin, that it's all a conspiracy, blah blah blah. However, it apparently wasn't sarin. But let's take that and run with it for a moment, shall we?
Suppose I hand you a package of vials with "sarin" written all over them. I ask you to open one of the vials and pour a little on your skin. Would you? You know nothing about what might actually be in the vials, but it sure as hell might be lethal. You might argue that you'd feel perfectly comfortable pouring an unknown substance labelled "sarin" on your skin, but I think you'd be lying.
This is a nice summation of why we're in Iraq right now. Did Saddam have WMD's? Maybe, maybe not. But he gave every indication that he did have them (why else did he threaten U.N. inspectors?). So, do you leave a guy like Saddam with that capability (i.e. pour the sarin on your skin) because you think he's harmless, or do you take steps to either remove the threat, remove the ambiguity, or both?
And here's a question you're sure to not answer: why in the world are Iraqi insurgents carrying around sarin gas test kits? The U.S. doesn't use sarin, so why do they have test kits? Food for thought, but you're not hungry it seems.
It's called a proportional response. You attack a country when the country is attacking someone else.
One of your noted countrymen, Sir Winston Churchill, once observed that "at some point, a memo would've stopped Hitler." He was, of course, referring to the miniscule steps Hitler started taking when he came to power, starting with small things like re-militarizing the Rhineland, moving on to openly defying the Versailles treat, annexing Austria, gobbling up Czechoslovakia, and ultimately kicking off the bloodiest war in human history by invading Poland. At every step, Hitler tried something, observed the reponse (or lack thereof) and determined that the Allies really, really, really didn't want to go back to war -- and that they'd endure just about anything Germany did to avoid it. Imagine how different things might've been if Britain and France had, at the first provocation, sent troops in to re-occupy the country. Fifty million lives might've been saved if someone had just done something forceful instead of just standing around and agreeing at how awful it all was, and how it was such a shame, and how it was just so ungentlemanly, and my-wasn't-that-a-lovely-speech-at-the-League-of-Na tions-yesterday. Bloody hell, is it tea time yet?
I live in Britain, and the BBC isn't bothered about viewing figures. They have no sponsors, so they aren't worried about how many people see their adverts (as they have none). I've seen footage of Iraqis most likely not seen in the US, and I still can't see that most Iraqis like the Americans.
News reporters are encouraged to find juicy stories, adverts or no adverts. You've got two headlines: "37 GI's killed by car bomb" or "Water treatment plant re-opens"...which do you think is more likely to get press?
The whole Fallujah thing certainly didn't help. A town has a few insurgents in it (after most left), and it gets levelled by the Americans.
Allawi has stated that approximately 30% of the buildings in Fallujah have sustained at least minor damage. That's hardly "levelled." If you want to see levelled, go find some WWII photos of Dresden.
The civilians in the town who can't leave are trapped in their houses as the inaccurate US ordnance falls all around them. As that mosque incident proved, US military isn't exactly well behaved. It seems restraint isn't something they learn.
I disagree. The civilians were encouraged to leave before the city was cordoned off. As for your claims of inaccurate weapons, you're off again. Several fortified insurgent buildings were completely destroyed by laser-guided munitions without damaging adjacent apartment buildings. Your claims are exaggerated and totally dismiss the fact that we are exercising considerable restraint. After all, if we wanted to destroy the city quickly and without infantry losses, why not use a tactical nuke? We've got 'em, and it'd be very easy to use 'em, but we don't because we're not there to blow all the Muslims to kingdom come and steal every last drop of oil.
Remember - just because you're there, doesn't mean you see the big picture. Just like an ant can't see most of the field he's walking in, you can't see most of the entire country, which includes the people and their opinions.
Normally I'd agree with you, but when the overwhelming preponderance of what I personally see over various areas of the country is so largely at odds with what's being reported, I can't agree with it. And I know how the reporters operated, always trying to get into areas where strife and hatred were most concentrated. You couldn't beg some of these news teams to attend the opening of a hospital because they knew their stateside editors didn't want that kind of reporting. They wanted blood, bullets, and gore. I knew of reporters that actually would've liked to do positive stories but considered it to be professional suicide.
Now, I'll make fun of you. Saddam wasn't particularly religious; he was merely a self-interested and petty tyrant. Bin Laden doesn't miss him, and never liked him. Hussein would only wrap himself in a cloak of Islam if he thought it'd win him some popularity or credibility, with his people at home and with Iraq's neighbors.
This seems to be the most mis-intepreted portion of my post, so I'm betting I phrased it poorly. Here is what I was saying: Saddam and most of his government was Sunni, but the majority of Iraq is Shi'ite. The Shi'ite didn't like this state of affairs, because although Saddam did not impose religious law on Iraq, the state of affairs amounted to a religious minority ruling over a religious majority. I never stated it was an Islamic law state, I was referring to the makeup of Saddam's former government. Post-invasion, there was a lot of violence directed at Sunni's by Shi'ites, much of it pent-up hatred over being dominated by them for decades.
Besides, how is "Saddam was bad" an argument for invading Iraq?
It isn't an argument, and that's not the argument used to justify it. Saddam signed a cease-fire in 1991 where he obligated himself to full and unfettered disclosure of all weapons programs. Over 12 years he systematically did all he could to not comply with that agreement. Realistically we should've started shooting again as soon as he failed to live up to his end, but Bush #1 failed to finish what he started. Clinton similarly vacilated. Bush #2 is cleaning up the loose ends left by the prior two presidents, no further justification required.
Saddam was only a threat to his own people. If that justifies the war, then we're witnessing a monumental foreign policy undertaking. Roll up your sleeves, gentlemen, because we have work do to. We won't rest until there's no bad people in the world.
If a convicted, unrepentant pedophile lives next door your family and you have young children, is that person a potential threat to your children? Or is the pedophile only a threat to himself? Quick answer: if you'd trust that arrangement implicitly, you're more naive than I first thought.
Your argument that Saddam was only a threat to his own people assumes he never looks at the kids in the apartment across the hall. Hey, he might just keep into his own business, but he might not. The "might not" has significant negative impact, significant enough that only a fool would ignore it.
Just curious, you criticize CNN/NBC/CBS/ABC (and another person threw in the BBC for good measure) for reporting on the Iraq war, but you offer no cites or substantive reasons or backing as to why those media outlets are not reporting the truth.
I never said they weren't reporting the truth, I said they were reporting only a portion of what's really going on there. All the cameras and talking heads are clustered where there's trouble, but none are to be found where things are getting back to normal.
Let me illustrate with an analogy. Suppose you were interviewing for a job. However, someone else made your resume, and that person went through your entire life and highlighted every mistake, every failing, and every negative aspect of your life. Is this resume an accurate representation of you as a person? Of course not! The same would be true if someone whitewashed your life and highlighted only the good points. You are the sum of your actions and should be judged on the sum, not on specific sections of it. The same can be said of the Iraq situation. The only problem is, almost nobody is hearing the good side of the story. I don't think it requires major leaps of logic to see why -- ratings are better when blood and gore are on the screen.
And your argument loses all credibility when you mention Saddam and his religious minority. Saddam was about the least religious leader in the middle east. Islamic Fundamentalists didn't like Saddam. They looked forward to the day he was gone so they could try and establish their own gov't just like they did with Iran.
You've misinterpreted what I stated. I never said he ran a religious government. Iraq is well known to be the most secular of all Arabic nations. However, there is a substantial divide in the country along religious lines. Saddam and almost all of his government were Sunni's, but the Sunni's are outnumbered by the Shi'ites. Saddam didn't practice Islamic law, but it is accurate to say that one religious group (a minority at that) was exercising rule over another. The Shi'ites didn't like this, and it evolved into discontent -- discontent that was brutally supressed by Saddam.
When it's done to a PoW, it's a war crime. So you approve of US troops committing war crimes, but not when Iraqis do it to you? Double standards ahoy!
I'll thank you to not put words in my mouth. I never mentioned war crimes, I mentioned attrocities. The two can be, and in this case are, totally different things. There is no double standard here, but you're quite anxiously looking for one it seems. Even if you have to manufacture it.
The 15,000 dead is the conservative estimate. The Lancet report was 100,000-200,000+. He wasn't sloppy with his sources, but was doing you a favour. Maybe you should do some research yourself.
Iraqi hospitals are reporting civilian dead figures at roughly 3,500, with wounded numbering around 15,000. The Lancet report is an estimate based on projections. The hospital numbers are real data. The latter has far more relevance than the former.
As for that sarin, even the caption said it was suspected sarin, nothing definite. Even if it was sarin, it's only dangerous if it has a method of delivery. As you can see, 40 vials of this "sarin" isn't dangerous. It has to be weaponised first, which turns the raw material into a weapon. What about those 300+ tons of explosives that went missing? I suppose that wasn't the US's fault...
I'll freely admit the suspected sarin has now been identified as a sarin gas test kit. It does raise the question, however, of why insurgents are carrying around sarin gas test kits. After all, the U.S. doesn't use or maintain sarin gas in this theater. But I see you've completely glossed over that little question.
As for the 300+ tons of "missing" explosives, perhaps you're a little behind on current events. There is no evidence these explosives were removed after the invasion. Reporters with troops during the initial invasion stated many of these bunkers were empty or lacking the IAEC seal, meaning anyone could've come in and taken anything anywhere. And you completely discount the fact that over 400,000 tons of explosives have been secured and destroyed when you quibble about 0.075% that's supposedly "missing." Talk about swallowing a camel but choking on a gnat.
The primary distinction between our viewpoints, I suspect, is that you subscribe more to an ends-justify-the-means philosophy than I do. While there is some appeal to me for the pragmatism of that position, I feel that it's a very slippery slope to go down. Again, giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, the administration may have honestly believed in an imminent threat to our national security.
You've hit upon it squarely: I am a pragmatist and I do (in general) follow the ends-justify-the-means philosophy. I can certainly come up with an infinite number of scenarios where such a philosophy is a bad idea, but all of them require malice on the part of the one (or ones) making the ends and justifying the means. I feel something like that requires someone to be fundamentally (to use an overused phrase) "evil," and that's not a character trait I think applies to the current administration or Americans in general. Therefore I give them the benefit of the doubt. There are also ample historical precendents reinforcing the current policy. Opponents respect strength, often more than they respect statesmanship. The more thuggish the opponent, the more they respect strength, and vice versa. The argument could be made that Iraq is being made an example of what happens to countries that flout their agreements, thumb their noses at international accords, and work with, shelter, or otherwise fund terrorism. Even if that were the only justification for the war, I'd still think it was a fantastic idea. Why? If Libya, Iran, and Syria start to address the seething hatred fomenting in their own borders, it's worth it in the long run.
What bothers me is that even now in the face of evidence refuting the claims used to justify the invasion of Iraq, our president and his team continue to gloss over the annoying details that don't fit their worldview. I feel strongly that there was some serious spin happening in the leadup to the war, and it persisted as the war progressed.
I agree that pre-war justification was heavy on the "he's got WMD's!" argument, but post-invasion rhetoric has downplayed it. Intelligence was largely wrong, no doubt about it. Is that the fault of the President?
The President had a difficult choice to make. On the one hand you had CIA reports saying Saddam had nukes. Clinton had the same intel, as did Chirac, Schroeder, Putin, Blair, and many others. There was no widespread dissent on the conclusions drawn by the intelligence. One nuke, one sarin bomb, or one anthrax dispersal device could kill tens of thousands of Americans. Do you bet that the intelligence is wrong and do nothing or do you say "I can't take the chance that the intelligence isn't wrong. We're going in." Keep in mind that if Bush hadn't made the call and WMD's had been smuggled out of Iraq for use against Americans, the death toll could've been catastrophic.
It was a difficult call. I don't think any one of us here can understand the pressures of the Oval Office, knowing that hundreds of millions of Americans depend on you to make the right decision. Had I been in that man's shoes, I would've done the same thing. You don't trust the safety of the U.S. to a murdering dictator with nothing to lose.
My problem is that I feel that we the people were misled. If the case for war was so compelling, why did the Bush team need to gin up the rationalizations they've been using? It just doesn't pass the sniff test. We didn't see this level of questioning and divisiveness when we invaded Afghanistan. There was a clear threat in that case, and besides, they weren't an internationally recognized sovereign state (recognition by a handful of Arab countries notwithstanding).
The Taliban's ties to Osama were very clear, which made the case easier, especially being so close after 9/11. Iraq was different because we weren't pursuing Osama, we were pursuing terror in general.
I suspect that the nuances of diplomacy are more than a little foreign to you, hence your incorrect interpretation of the UN resolutions. If it were as cut and dried as you presume, the world would have almost certainly attacked Israel some years ago, as it is also in material breach of a number of UN resolutions.
It would seem that you're the one with the incorrect interpretation. The resolutions you speak of are all "non-binding" resolutions against Israel. The ones regarding Iraq were not. This means one of two things: either you were aware of the distinction and chose to ignore it, or you were unaware of it and thus ignorant about what you're talking about. Either way it makes you wrong.
You have a curious view of the UN. In previous posts, you condemn it as impotent and unwilling to enforce it's own laws, and yet when it suits you, you invoke the UN to justify something that international scholars with academic credentials in the field condemn.
Stalin coined the term "useful idiots" and I think it's appropriate here (although I loathe Stalin immensely). I can condemn the actions the U.N. takes (or, in this case, refuses to take), but that doesn't mean their resolutions are uniformly worthless. You should be intelligent enough to know the difference.
So, when Bush et. al. claimed that Saddam Hussein was partly responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks, it was a lie, and a real whopper at that.
Bush never said that. He said there were links between Al-Qaeda and Iraq, and the 9/11 commission confirmed that association. Chairman of the 9/11 Commission Thomas Kean has confirmed "there were contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda." There is a subtle distinction between saying Iraq was not involved in 9/11 and Iraq was not involved with Al-Qaeda. The former is most likely not true, but the latter is unarguably true. Bush said he would pursue Al-Qaeda in general, not just the 9/11 terrorists. There is no inconsistency here unless you're purposefully leaving out relevant information.
It is beyond debate whether the politicans lied to us. They clearly did.
No, they didn't. You need to look up the definition of the word "lie," it seems. A lie is a statement made with the knowledge that is is false. If five doctors examined you and each independently determined you had cancer, but then surgery revealed it to not be cancer, did the doctors all lie to you? No. They operated on the best available information, even if the wrong conclusion was drawn. That is not a lie, that, at worst, is a mistake.
But you're ignoring the larger picture here. The U.S. was not under any obligation to find WMD's, the burden was on Saddam to provide unfettered, open access to weapons programs or face "serious consequences." He didn't live up to his side of the bargain. Whether he had them or not is immaterial, he refused to honor a signed cease-fire agreement. You may not think that was enough to warrant an invasion, but your opinion doesn't matter; it was, and remains, a legal, legitimate use of force to enforce a cease-fire agreement signed in 1991. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's wrong or illegal.
It is logically impossible to prove that something does not exist. Your example is a hollow one that is more suited to rhetoric than rational discussion.
But your conclusions that "there were no WMD's" are therefore just as hollow. You cannot prove they did not exist, you can only point to failure to find them thus far. You complete dismiss the fact that (a) weapons of this type are easily hidden to the point of being practically unfindable, and (b) weapons of this type are easily transportable, and Saddam had ample opportunity to have them smuggled out of the country before the war -- perhaps to the neighboring Baathist regime of Syria. I can't prove it happened, but you can't prove it didn't happen. You are, however, more than willing to acc
After carpet bombing their entire power, fuel production, and fuel transportation infrastructures? (in Iraq, unlike GWI, we largely avoided hitting power infrastructure). Unfortunately, I can't find that data; although if you want to compare this to postwar Germany, Japan, etc, there were almost no deaths of any occupying troops after the war.
With today's more accurate bombing, it's possible to acheive similar levels of effects (i.e. power losses, no water, etc.) with much less collateral damage. That doesn't mean the bombed-out power plants are any eaiser to replace than they were in 1945, it just means things don't look as destroyed. Appearances can be deceiving.
As for your contention that there were "almost no deaths" of occupying troops after the war, there were actually more than what we have currently in Iraq. There were organized programs of assassination aimed at both the occupiers and Germans who worked with them, almost identical to what we're in today. You can read more on this in The Fall of Berlin 1945. Good history book.
You're kidding, right? We were supposed to be down to ~30,000 troops by last fall. How's that goin? Do you think that we *planned* to be using stop-loss orders and activating the Ready Reserve?
There is an old axiom that says "no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy." As I recall, everyone including the U.S. military was predicting invasion casualties in the thousands or tens of thousands, yet actual losses were well under a thousand. So, those predicting gloom and doom for our armed forces were wrong, yet I see you assigning no blame there. Was Rumsfeld wrong on troop allocation numbers? Perhaps. Does that make him wrong on everything? Absolutely not, and you should stop trying to paint him otherwise.
Kenneth Aldeman, a Rumsfeld ally on the Defense Policy Board, actually used the word "cakewalk". Bush stated "the United States and our allies have prevailed." on his infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech (from which we have since had to notably increase troop deployment numbers - including one of my friends, who had is MOS changed from lab tech to combat medic so that they could deploy him). Perle stated that all resistance would "collapse after the first whiff of gunpowder." I could keep on going if you wanted.
Please do if it makes you feel any better, but it proves nothing. A lot of this could be filed under pre-war psyops, trying to psych the enemy out. Saddam was watching this. No doubt a lot of his commanders were as well. Don't think this "posturing" by the talking heads and policymakers didn't have at least some small effect.
As for what's happened post-invasion, anyone who knows anything about military history knows that conquering a city is easy but keeping it is hard. We are trying to return Iraq to normalcy as soon as possible, and this means we can't have dawn to dusk curfews, security checkpoints every fifty yards, and so forth. The unfortunate side effect of this is that it allows insurgents more lattitude. The insurgents could easily be crushed (as they are being right now in Fallujah) with more military force, but to our credit we are not using all of our available force to bludgeon the city into submission. You refuse to acknowledge that, again painting yourself as someone all too willing to see only the bad and none of the good. I cannot see how you could consider yourself even remotely objective when you're so close-minded on this subject.
We are not in Iraq for the purpose of "spreading democracy and freedom". We are in Iraq because the current administration feels that our efforts there serve our national interests.
One could argue that spreading freedom and democracy is in our national interests, so our viewpoints are not as incompatible as you might think. After all, other countries that more or less subscribe to "our" way of governing and recognizing freedom are far less likely to be threats to us as compared to, say, hard-line theocracies like the former Taliban.
there because we have a heavily oil-dependent economy, and because forcibly establishing a US-friendly 'democracy' in Iraq helps to protect our longer-term interests.
Again, no disagreement here, but if Iraqi's ultimately receive freedom because of what we've done, that should be factored into the "plus" column for us and them, don't you think? Further, there is no shame in looking after our long-term interests unless you view America's interests to somehow be worse than everyone else's. Personally, I'd much rather have a world full of free democracies than one dominated by tinpot dictators, religious monarchies, or murdering thugs.
You may not change your mind about the rightness or wrongness of our actions in Iraq, but at least you won't look like a brainwashed patsy to those who are willing to accept reality.
I'm sorry if you view me in that light. It is not brainwashing, it's called observation and drawing your own conclusions. Based on what I've seen, we're doing far more good than harm. An injection in the arm causes temporary pain for the long-term benefits of disease resistance.
Fifty years from now, assuming Iraq develops into a stable and relatively free democracy, what's going on in Fallujah will be viewed in a totally different light. There is historical precedent for this. Consider an article written in Life magazine in 1945 about how "America is losing the peace in Europe" and how European allies felt the U.S. was botching post-war occupation. Insurgents were running wild, hard-liners were trying to get back into power, desolation was everywhere...sounds like what the news is reporting today, doesn't it? But the former Axis powers are today stable, functioning, if-not-quite-fully-democratic nations. Doesn't sound like we did a bad job after all, does it? Based on the press's ability to call these things in the past, I'm far more inclined to think we're doing the right thing. If they got it so badly wrong before, they're almost certainly still getting it just as wrong.
For the record, I approved of what we did in Afghanistan (I actually felt that we didn't do enough!). I also feel that now that we're in Iraq, it would be a mistake to turn it into a politician-directed war like Vietnam.
I couldn't agree more. The problem is, with all the negative coverage being heaped upon the war, with every negative thing being magnified beyond belief and every positive thing being buried as much as possible, politicians are feeling pressure to hurry things up, to make everything all neat and tidy, wrapped up during a commercial break. This is the worst possible thing we could do, and I think Bush doesn't want to do it that way. Neither does Rummy or Cheney. If everybody would just quit screaming the sky is falling, people could do their jobs and do them well.
Unfortunately that means a lot more casualties on both sides, and some more "we had to destroy the city to save the city" situations like Fallujah.
Actually, you should read some of the BDA (Bomb Damage Assessment) reports I've seen. We've destroyed insurgent-filled homes without taking down apartments right next door. Sure, things go awry sometimes, but you must consider that the U.S. is taking unheard-of measures to keep collateral damage as low as possible, even to the point of accepting additional risk to soldiers and Marines. Despite the fact that it put my
He didn't misquote you; he posted entire sections of what you said.
My choice of words was poor. You're right, he was not misquoting me, he was quoting me out of context. Consider the statement suitably modified.
If you like flame wars, then by all means continue what you were doing. I'm sorry for being harsh. I really am a nice person.
You're not being harsh and I respect your opinion. I'm not trying to participate in a flame war here, I'm trying to answer the unfounded accusations being made against me. Nobody likes having things attributed to them that are not genuine, and I felt it necessary to clear the air. The other "gentleman" will likely dispute this, but at this point I don't care, I've said my piece.
While it must be agreed that democracy and freedom are noble goals, it is unclear whether the unlawful invasion and occupation of Iraq had anything to do with spreading democracy and freedom.
Your use of the term "unlawful" implies a law was broken in order to facilitate the invasion of Iraq. This is a common misconception, and I'll be happy to point out why you're wrong.
First, the 1991 Gulf War was not a peace treaty, it was a cease-fire agreement. There's a significant legal distinction between the two. A peace treaty ends a war, but a cease-fire merely stops the shooting without stopping the war. Technically speaking, a state of war has existed between Iraq and the U.S. since 1991, so the invasion was not some new thing, it was the resumption of an old thing.
The cease-fire was conditional as well. One of the many conditions was that Saddam fully disclose all weapons programs and materials regarding WMD's or plans to produce them. This he did not do, so the cease-fire was nullified almost immediately. We would've legally been within our rights to have resumed open hostilities 14 days after the cease-fire, but instead it took us 14 years. That doesn't change the fact that it was legal.
But let's forget the cease-fire and concentrate instead on U.N. resolution 1441, which was unanimously agreed upon by the entire security council -- including France, Germany, and Russia. I quote verbatim from the resolution:
"1.Decides that Iraq has been and remains in material breach of its obligations under relevant resolutions, including resolution 687 (1991), in particular through Iraq's failure to cooperate with United Nations inspectors and the IAEA, and to complete the actions required under paragraphs 8 to 13 of resolution 687 (1991);
This establishes Iraq was in material breach of its signed agreements, which sets the stage for the penalties of non-compliance. These are outlined as:
"13.Recalls, in that context, that the Council has repeatedly warned Iraq that it will face serious consequences as a result of its continued violations of its obligations;
"Serious consequences" were laid out as the punishment for non-compliance. Those consequences included resumption of hostilities. There is not, and there never has been, anything "illegal" about this war. If you wish to disregard the volumes of information available that prove this, you are beyond help.
Sure, the politicians made that one of the justifications, although it was a late addition to the schedule after the previous justifications had been exposed as lies.
Lies? Then I suppose this stuff (see slide #2) doesn't really exist. Forty vials of sarin are enough to kill ten times as many people that died on 9/11. It doesn't matter that you can fit it into a briefcase, it is a WMD, a substanced banned by U.N. declaration, and quite notably not disclosed by the Iraqis. You can claim all day long that this "little bit" of sarin isn't justification for an invasion. However, if it had been used to kill thousands of Americans, or thousands of Europeans, would they be any less dead because you refuse to call it a WMD?
I wonder how "free" Iraq will be in the future. Would your government recognize and accept it if the Iraqi people voted to establish an Islamic theocracy in a fair, democratic election?
I don't know the answer to that and neither do you. Given Iraq's history of being relatively secular (especially in comparison to the surrounding theocracies), I would say the likelihood of that happening is rather low without outside influence (i.e. an influx of non-Iraqi insurgents). If the armed forces are allowed to do their jobs and given the time to do them right, this will not happen.
I'm not, because of the deliberate lies we were fed
Slashdot Mirror
The online equivalent of stealing should be a crime. But copyright infringment is not stealing. It's reproducing duplicates.
Actually, it's reproducing duplicates without permission, which is expressly forbidden by the copyright covering movies and music. Unless the copyright holder says you can copy it for distribution, you can't copy it. Period.
I will point out, however, that even if the fuel rods did melt, the floor of the reactor vessel did not fail, which means Chernobyl didn't "meltdown" any more than Three Mile Island did, and TMI most certainly didn't meltdown. It experienced a partial meltdown, where fuel rods and other internal reactor components got hot enough to melt, but the reactor vessel never experienced thermal failure. TMI successfully shut down. Chernobyl's pressure vessel failed due to excess steam pressure, a consequence of its inferior design. Neither accident resulted in a critical mass of fuel rod debris burning a hole in the reactor vessel.
Getting back to the original poster, he described a catastrophic meltdown. Neither Chernobyl or TMI fit that description.
Feeling a bit snippy this morning? Jeez. A simple link without the attitude would've sufficed. I've never seen these pictures, and all the info to date I've heard led me to believe the core did not suffer a meltdown. I thank you for pointing this info out to me. Now go be a jerk to someone else if it makes you feel better.
As an addendum, I will say that if the Chernobyl reactor had not blown up, it most likely would have melted down catastrophically, as it was generating significantly more power during the accident than it was rated for and had lost the capacity to cool or control the reaction.
and this
The phrase "the fuel rods began to melt" is not the same thing as "the fuel rods melted and formed a critical mass which caused the reactor vessel to fail." The latter is the accepted definition of a meltdown, so clearly Chernobyl did not experience a catastrophic meltdown as outlined in the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article.
This may seem pedantic, but the distinction is important. Claiming something underwent a "meltdown" means something much different than "the reactor sustained internal thermal damage." Most critically, the reactor vessel was not ruptured due to thermal events (as in a meltdown) but due to a buildup of steam pressure beyond containment structural limits. A meltdown also results in a critical mass of slag literally burning its way through the floor of the reactor vessel, building foundation, and everything else on its way down to the water table. This did not occur, so Chernobyl did not, in fact, experience a catastrophic meltdown. Three Mile Island came closer to this than Chernobyl did, but due to Chernobyl's inferior design (or TMI's superior design, whichever) it blew up before it could meltdown.
Since the time between generations is about a millionth of a section, this means that a reactor core that's 'prompt-critical' would quickly escalate in temperature until the structural integrity of the core failed, and you have a molten slag of Uranium - which is exactly what happened at Chernobyl.
What you're describing here is a "meltdown," sometimes known as a China Syndrome. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I was under the impression that Chernobyl did not experience a meltdown. An explosion and fire occured at Chernobyl due to operators disconnecting various safety systems, but I don't recall any problems with a meltdown, critical mass slag, or failure of the reactor vessel due to some sort thermal event. Meltdowns don't cause explosions (witness that Three Mile Island, which underwent a partial meltdown, didn't blow up) but an explosion is exactly what happened at Chernobyl.
Now, if an actual meltdown ever occurs, it's highly probable the critical mass would sink right down through the floor, through the ground, and eventually hit the water table in a catastrophic explosion of steam. This, however, has never happened in human history as far as I'm aware.
Somewhat slightly different to the Slashdot version wouldn't you say?
How dare you remove the anti-MS slant from this article by stating truthful facts! Have you no bias, sir? Don't you know that it's blasphemy to not try and take the most negative possible stance on anything regarding Windows whilst simultaneously praising how Linux is completely immune to these things? And how dare you suggest that a botched kernel or buggy driver could cause a kernel panic! By revealing such truths, you destabilize the endless war on
Slashdot to make Microsoft responsible for cancer, hunger, and the lack of world peace!
You're new here, aren't you?
I hate to point this out, but merely restating your original statement doesn't prove anything. If you wish to disprove his assertion, go find the weight of common engines and transmissions and compare them with the weight of common electric car batteries.
However, I have a bad feeling you're not going to come out on top in this argument. Li-Ion batteries are very light -- the lightest you're going to get with the possible exception of zinc-air batteries (which have lower energy densities). Example:
Let us a GM LS6 V8 engine with all accessories. GM Performance Parts catalog says this combo weighs around 390 pounds. I've searched in vain for figures on the weight of a complimentary transmission, the 4L60-E 4-speed automatic or the Borg-Warner T-56 6-speed manual, but let us assume it weighs about 200 pounds. That's 590 pounds of motor and transmission, capable of producing and transmitting 405 flywheel horsepower (302,130 watts). Assume a 15 US gallon tank full of premium gasoline (6.3lbs/gallon) and you get another ~95 pounds, for a grand total of 685 pounds. Note I'm discounting things like a differential and other suspension-related doohickies since all we're trying to do here is compare powertrains.
Now what kind of electric setup can you fit in 685 pounds? Lithium-ion's gravimetric energy density is 140 Wh/kg (sorry for the sudden metric conversion, but I'm going with the quickest figures I can find which happen to be all metric). Gasoline has a gravimetric energy density of 12,200 Wh/kg. This means you need eighty-seven times as much battery weight as you do gasoline in order to get similar range or performance figures. Pure lithium has a higher energy density ( 250 Wh/kg) than lithium-ion, but pure lithium is not a practical battery element for a variety of reasons. I think in weight alone you're going to have a problem reaching that 685 pound (311 kg) figure with any kind of electric setup.
Electric cars have shown that they can provide very good range at about the same price as a conventional car.
You can get equal performance but you won't get equal range. You can get equal range but not as good performance (all, of course, assuming identical car weights and drag coefficients). Perhaps you're starting to understand why electic cars haven't left internal combustion engines in the dust on new car sales.
And the battery replacement comes in under the cost of regular maintenance on a conventional vehicle as well.
Li-Ion also suffers from relatively short battery life. Check the following excerpt:
Source: http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-5.htm
Properly cared for, the above GM LS6 engine and transmission might be expected to live for 200,000 miles with little more than oil changes, clutch replacements, and common tuneups. Given that the average American drives around 30,000 miles per year, that gives it an expected lifetime of almost seven years. Li-Ion packs would have to be replaced every two years at the most based on current battery technology. Li-Ion is fantastically expensive compared to run-of-the-mill lead-acid batteries or even NiCad or NiMH batteries. There's a reason GM went with lead-acid for the EV1, namely cheaper batteries and (supposedly) longer lifetimes.
I think it's safe to say that your ar
I have very little regard for the interpretation of the courts or of the legal profession.
As do I, but one of the foundations of our Constitution is the Supreme Court's duty to properly interpret it, making sure the Executive and Legislative branches don't monkey around where they shouldn't. The Supreme Court is doing the job it's supposed to do. It's not required that we agree with them.
Amendment 10 is very particular in its statement that, if it's not specifically mentioned in the Constitution, then it's not something the Feds have any jurisdiction over. Interstate commerce CANNOT (per Amd 9) be enumerated to include internet access. Conducting transactions with vendors in other states is interstate commerce, but as long as your ISP has a local office, it's intrastate commerce.
Existing case law does not agree with you, based largely on the fact that a local ISP could not function without implicitly providing access to other areas of the Internet, those being interstate or international. It's a stretch, no doubt about it, and I don't like it. But case law firmly supports it.
I point you to this excellent breakdown at Wikipedia.org. The Interstate Commerce clause, as it's typically referred to, has been the source of considerable Constitutional debate for a long, long time. Here is the actual verbage:
The key phrase here is "among the several States." Key court cases such as Gibbons v. Ogden (1824), Swift v. United States (1905), and Stafford v. Wallce (1922) have repeatedly confirmed the Federal Government's role in regulating interstate commerce. This is not to say the FedGov has rights to interfere with internal state commerce (although it does) but the wording strongly points to the right of the FedGov to regulate commerce between the states, or commerce that involves more than one state. Telecom, and by extension ISP's, fall under such rules.
There's another article here that lays it out again. The same conclusion is met, supported by existing case law.
As I stated in the beginning, I'm all for less government intrusion, but in this case it seems the Founding Fathers wanted the FedGov to have this power. Short of a disqualifying amendment, I don't see that changing. Your references to Amendment IX and X are not relevant since they only refer to things not explicitly defined in the Constitution. Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 does explicitly define the role and is not subject to Amendment IX or X.
FWIW, I am not a lawyer, but I have spent more than a passing amount of time studying Constitutional law as a personal hobby.
Look, you and I are just not going to agree on this. You throw your figures in from your sources, I throw them in from mine. It proves nothing to you or me since neither of us is going to believe the other. I feel this has gotten to the point where I'm wasting my time with you, and I don't wish to waste my time.
I see things differently than you, and I wish I could let you see the things I've seen with my own two eyes. Perhaps they would alter your perception, but perhaps not. You seem intent on wanting us to fail, whether out of some sort of anti-military hatred or some hatred of Bush or hatred of America I cannot tell. I wish I knew what made you come to these conclusions that make you hate us so. I feel no animosity towards you, just confusion over why you are the way you are, so full of loathing and anger. Perhaps one day you'll understand.
You know, I'm getting four or five similar posts, all from AC. I get the feeling you're all the same person. I'll make you a deal: I'll continue this if you have the guts to stop posting AC and take karma responsibility for what you're saying. Unless you wish to do that, I'm not going to give you the dignity of further reponses.
Easy. You claimed his 15,000 civilain death # was from the lancet document. It wasn't. The Lancet numbers are acutally in excess of 100,000. You just repeated verbatim another argument you heard without even reading it. Anyone who was actually familiar with the Lancet document would know that it was over 100,000 and therefore would not tell someone who claimed a conservative number of civilian deaths, 15,000, that they were using the discredited Lancet document.
I assumed his source was the Lancet document simply because it was so out of proportion with what Iraqi hospitals are reporting. You are correct, the Lancet report specifies 100,000 deaths. It's just as wrong as his 15,000 figure, though, so the point is moot. Iraqi hospital counts show roughly 3,500 dead and 15,000 wounded.
Also, you claimed sarin gas was proof that there were WMD and that you were glad it was found before it could be used against Marines. But it wasn't sarin gas at all. Now what are you going to say?
This is where you expect some sort of ridiculous claim that it really was sarin, that it's all a conspiracy, blah blah blah. However, it apparently wasn't sarin. But let's take that and run with it for a moment, shall we?
Suppose I hand you a package of vials with "sarin" written all over them. I ask you to open one of the vials and pour a little on your skin. Would you? You know nothing about what might actually be in the vials, but it sure as hell might be lethal. You might argue that you'd feel perfectly comfortable pouring an unknown substance labelled "sarin" on your skin, but I think you'd be lying.
This is a nice summation of why we're in Iraq right now. Did Saddam have WMD's? Maybe, maybe not. But he gave every indication that he did have them (why else did he threaten U.N. inspectors?). So, do you leave a guy like Saddam with that capability (i.e. pour the sarin on your skin) because you think he's harmless, or do you take steps to either remove the threat, remove the ambiguity, or both?
And here's a question you're sure to not answer: why in the world are Iraqi insurgents carrying around sarin gas test kits? The U.S. doesn't use sarin, so why do they have test kits? Food for thought, but you're not hungry it seems.
It's called a proportional response. You attack a country when the country is attacking someone else.
a tions-yesterday. Bloody hell, is it tea time yet?
One of your noted countrymen, Sir Winston Churchill, once observed that "at some point, a memo would've stopped Hitler." He was, of course, referring to the miniscule steps Hitler started taking when he came to power, starting with small things like re-militarizing the Rhineland, moving on to openly defying the Versailles treat, annexing Austria, gobbling up Czechoslovakia, and ultimately kicking off the bloodiest war in human history by invading Poland. At every step, Hitler tried something, observed the reponse (or lack thereof) and determined that the Allies really, really, really didn't want to go back to war -- and that they'd endure just about anything Germany did to avoid it. Imagine how different things might've been if Britain and France had, at the first provocation, sent troops in to re-occupy the country. Fifty million lives might've been saved if someone had just done something forceful instead of just standing around and agreeing at how awful it all was, and how it was such a shame, and how it was just so ungentlemanly, and my-wasn't-that-a-lovely-speech-at-the-League-of-N
I live in Britain, and the BBC isn't bothered about viewing figures. They have no sponsors, so they aren't worried about how many people see their adverts (as they have none). I've seen footage of Iraqis most likely not seen in the US, and I still can't see that most Iraqis like the Americans.
News reporters are encouraged to find juicy stories, adverts or no adverts. You've got two headlines: "37 GI's killed by car bomb" or "Water treatment plant re-opens"...which do you think is more likely to get press?
The whole Fallujah thing certainly didn't help. A town has a few insurgents in it (after most left), and it gets levelled by the Americans.
Allawi has stated that approximately 30% of the buildings in Fallujah have sustained at least minor damage. That's hardly "levelled." If you want to see levelled, go find some WWII photos of Dresden.
The civilians in the town who can't leave are trapped in their houses as the inaccurate US ordnance falls all around them. As that mosque incident proved, US military isn't exactly well behaved. It seems restraint isn't something they learn.
I disagree. The civilians were encouraged to leave before the city was cordoned off. As for your claims of inaccurate weapons, you're off again. Several fortified insurgent buildings were completely destroyed by laser-guided munitions without damaging adjacent apartment buildings. Your claims are exaggerated and totally dismiss the fact that we are exercising considerable restraint. After all, if we wanted to destroy the city quickly and without infantry losses, why not use a tactical nuke? We've got 'em, and it'd be very easy to use 'em, but we don't because we're not there to blow all the Muslims to kingdom come and steal every last drop of oil.
Remember - just because you're there, doesn't mean you see the big picture. Just like an ant can't see most of the field he's walking in, you can't see most of the entire country, which includes the people and their opinions.
Normally I'd agree with you, but when the overwhelming preponderance of what I personally see over various areas of the country is so largely at odds with what's being reported, I can't agree with it. And I know how the reporters operated, always trying to get into areas where strife and hatred were most concentrated. You couldn't beg some of these news teams to attend the opening of a hospital because they knew their stateside editors didn't want that kind of reporting. They wanted blood, bullets, and gore. I knew of reporters that actually would've liked to do positive stories but considered it to be professional suicide.
Now, I'll make fun of you. Saddam wasn't particularly religious; he was merely a self-interested and petty tyrant. Bin Laden doesn't miss him, and never liked him. Hussein would only wrap himself in a cloak of Islam if he thought it'd win him some popularity or credibility, with his people at home and with Iraq's neighbors.
This seems to be the most mis-intepreted portion of my post, so I'm betting I phrased it poorly. Here is what I was saying: Saddam and most of his government was Sunni, but the majority of Iraq is Shi'ite. The Shi'ite didn't like this state of affairs, because although Saddam did not impose religious law on Iraq, the state of affairs amounted to a religious minority ruling over a religious majority. I never stated it was an Islamic law state, I was referring to the makeup of Saddam's former government. Post-invasion, there was a lot of violence directed at Sunni's by Shi'ites, much of it pent-up hatred over being dominated by them for decades.
Besides, how is "Saddam was bad" an argument for invading Iraq?
It isn't an argument, and that's not the argument used to justify it. Saddam signed a cease-fire in 1991 where he obligated himself to full and unfettered disclosure of all weapons programs. Over 12 years he systematically did all he could to not comply with that agreement. Realistically we should've started shooting again as soon as he failed to live up to his end, but Bush #1 failed to finish what he started. Clinton similarly vacilated. Bush #2 is cleaning up the loose ends left by the prior two presidents, no further justification required.
Saddam was only a threat to his own people. If that justifies the war, then we're witnessing a monumental foreign policy undertaking. Roll up your sleeves, gentlemen, because we have work do to. We won't rest until there's no bad people in the world.
If a convicted, unrepentant pedophile lives next door your family and you have young children, is that person a potential threat to your children? Or is the pedophile only a threat to himself? Quick answer: if you'd trust that arrangement implicitly, you're more naive than I first thought.
Your argument that Saddam was only a threat to his own people assumes he never looks at the kids in the apartment across the hall. Hey, he might just keep into his own business, but he might not. The "might not" has significant negative impact, significant enough that only a fool would ignore it.
Just curious, you criticize CNN/NBC/CBS/ABC (and another person threw in the BBC for good measure) for reporting on the Iraq war, but you offer no cites or substantive reasons or backing as to why those media outlets are not reporting the truth.
I never said they weren't reporting the truth, I said they were reporting only a portion of what's really going on there. All the cameras and talking heads are clustered where there's trouble, but none are to be found where things are getting back to normal.
Let me illustrate with an analogy. Suppose you were interviewing for a job. However, someone else made your resume, and that person went through your entire life and highlighted every mistake, every failing, and every negative aspect of your life. Is this resume an accurate representation of you as a person? Of course not! The same would be true if someone whitewashed your life and highlighted only the good points. You are the sum of your actions and should be judged on the sum, not on specific sections of it. The same can be said of the Iraq situation. The only problem is, almost nobody is hearing the good side of the story. I don't think it requires major leaps of logic to see why -- ratings are better when blood and gore are on the screen.
And your argument loses all credibility when you mention Saddam and his religious minority. Saddam was about the least religious leader in the middle east. Islamic Fundamentalists didn't like Saddam. They looked forward to the day he was gone so they could try and establish their own gov't just like they did with Iran.
You've misinterpreted what I stated. I never said he ran a religious government. Iraq is well known to be the most secular of all Arabic nations. However, there is a substantial divide in the country along religious lines. Saddam and almost all of his government were Sunni's, but the Sunni's are outnumbered by the Shi'ites. Saddam didn't practice Islamic law, but it is accurate to say that one religious group (a minority at that) was exercising rule over another. The Shi'ites didn't like this, and it evolved into discontent -- discontent that was brutally supressed by Saddam.
When it's done to a PoW, it's a war crime. So you approve of US troops committing war crimes, but not when Iraqis do it to you? Double standards ahoy!
I'll thank you to not put words in my mouth. I never mentioned war crimes, I mentioned attrocities. The two can be, and in this case are, totally different things. There is no double standard here, but you're quite anxiously looking for one it seems. Even if you have to manufacture it.
The 15,000 dead is the conservative estimate. The Lancet report was 100,000-200,000+. He wasn't sloppy with his sources, but was doing you a favour. Maybe you should do some research yourself.
Iraqi hospitals are reporting civilian dead figures at roughly 3,500, with wounded numbering around 15,000. The Lancet report is an estimate based on projections. The hospital numbers are real data. The latter has far more relevance than the former.
As for that sarin, even the caption said it was suspected sarin, nothing definite. Even if it was sarin, it's only dangerous if it has a method of delivery. As you can see, 40 vials of this "sarin" isn't dangerous. It has to be weaponised first, which turns the raw material into a weapon. What about those 300+ tons of explosives that went missing? I suppose that wasn't the US's fault...
I'll freely admit the suspected sarin has now been identified as a sarin gas test kit. It does raise the question, however, of why insurgents are carrying around sarin gas test kits. After all, the U.S. doesn't use or maintain sarin gas in this theater. But I see you've completely glossed over that little question.
As for the 300+ tons of "missing" explosives, perhaps you're a little behind on current events. There is no evidence these explosives were removed after the invasion. Reporters with troops during the initial invasion stated many of these bunkers were empty or lacking the IAEC seal, meaning anyone could've come in and taken anything anywhere. And you completely discount the fact that over 400,000 tons of explosives have been secured and destroyed when you quibble about 0.075% that's supposedly "missing." Talk about swallowing a camel but choking on a gnat.
The primary distinction between our viewpoints, I suspect, is that you subscribe more to an ends-justify-the-means philosophy than I do. While there is some appeal to me for the pragmatism of that position, I feel that it's a very slippery slope to go down. Again, giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, the administration may have honestly believed in an imminent threat to our national security.
You've hit upon it squarely: I am a pragmatist and I do (in general) follow the ends-justify-the-means philosophy. I can certainly come up with an infinite number of scenarios where such a philosophy is a bad idea, but all of them require malice on the part of the one (or ones) making the ends and justifying the means. I feel something like that requires someone to be fundamentally (to use an overused phrase) "evil," and that's not a character trait I think applies to the current administration or Americans in general. Therefore I give them the benefit of the doubt. There are also ample historical precendents reinforcing the current policy. Opponents respect strength, often more than they respect statesmanship. The more thuggish the opponent, the more they respect strength, and vice versa. The argument could be made that Iraq is being made an example of what happens to countries that flout their agreements, thumb their noses at international accords, and work with, shelter, or otherwise fund terrorism. Even if that were the only justification for the war, I'd still think it was a fantastic idea. Why? If Libya, Iran, and Syria start to address the seething hatred fomenting in their own borders, it's worth it in the long run.
What bothers me is that even now in the face of evidence refuting the claims used to justify the invasion of Iraq, our president and his team continue to gloss over the annoying details that don't fit their worldview. I feel strongly that there was some serious spin happening in the leadup to the war, and it persisted as the war progressed.
I agree that pre-war justification was heavy on the "he's got WMD's!" argument, but post-invasion rhetoric has downplayed it. Intelligence was largely wrong, no doubt about it. Is that the fault of the President?
The President had a difficult choice to make. On the one hand you had CIA reports saying Saddam had nukes. Clinton had the same intel, as did Chirac, Schroeder, Putin, Blair, and many others. There was no widespread dissent on the conclusions drawn by the intelligence. One nuke, one sarin bomb, or one anthrax dispersal device could kill tens of thousands of Americans. Do you bet that the intelligence is wrong and do nothing or do you say "I can't take the chance that the intelligence isn't wrong. We're going in." Keep in mind that if Bush hadn't made the call and WMD's had been smuggled out of Iraq for use against Americans, the death toll could've been catastrophic.
It was a difficult call. I don't think any one of us here can understand the pressures of the Oval Office, knowing that hundreds of millions of Americans depend on you to make the right decision. Had I been in that man's shoes, I would've done the same thing. You don't trust the safety of the U.S. to a murdering dictator with nothing to lose.
My problem is that I feel that we the people were misled. If the case for war was so compelling, why did the Bush team need to gin up the rationalizations they've been using? It just doesn't pass the sniff test. We didn't see this level of questioning and divisiveness when we invaded Afghanistan. There was a clear threat in that case, and besides, they weren't an internationally recognized sovereign state (recognition by a handful of Arab countries notwithstanding).
The Taliban's ties to Osama were very clear, which made the case easier, especially being so close after 9/11. Iraq was different because we weren't pursuing Osama, we were pursuing terror in general.
Whatever. We're committed for at least the next f
Discredited? Where? Point me to where it's been shot down and I'll address it.
I suspect that the nuances of diplomacy are more than a little foreign to you, hence your incorrect interpretation of the UN resolutions. If it were as cut and dried as you presume, the world would have almost certainly attacked Israel some years ago, as it is also in material breach of a number of UN resolutions.
It would seem that you're the one with the incorrect interpretation. The resolutions you speak of are all "non-binding" resolutions against Israel. The ones regarding Iraq were not. This means one of two things: either you were aware of the distinction and chose to ignore it, or you were unaware of it and thus ignorant about what you're talking about. Either way it makes you wrong.
You have a curious view of the UN. In previous posts, you condemn it as impotent and unwilling to enforce it's own laws, and yet when it suits you, you invoke the UN to justify something that international scholars with academic credentials in the field condemn.
Stalin coined the term "useful idiots" and I think it's appropriate here (although I loathe Stalin immensely). I can condemn the actions the U.N. takes (or, in this case, refuses to take), but that doesn't mean their resolutions are uniformly worthless. You should be intelligent enough to know the difference.
So, when Bush et. al. claimed that Saddam Hussein was partly responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks, it was a lie, and a real whopper at that.
Bush never said that. He said there were links between Al-Qaeda and Iraq, and the 9/11 commission confirmed that association. Chairman of the 9/11 Commission Thomas Kean has confirmed "there were contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda." There is a subtle distinction between saying Iraq was not involved in 9/11 and Iraq was not involved with Al-Qaeda. The former is most likely not true, but the latter is unarguably true. Bush said he would pursue Al-Qaeda in general, not just the 9/11 terrorists. There is no inconsistency here unless you're purposefully leaving out relevant information.
It is beyond debate whether the politicans lied to us. They clearly did.
No, they didn't. You need to look up the definition of the word "lie," it seems. A lie is a statement made with the knowledge that is is false. If five doctors examined you and each independently determined you had cancer, but then surgery revealed it to not be cancer, did the doctors all lie to you? No. They operated on the best available information, even if the wrong conclusion was drawn. That is not a lie, that, at worst, is a mistake.
But you're ignoring the larger picture here. The U.S. was not under any obligation to find WMD's, the burden was on Saddam to provide unfettered, open access to weapons programs or face "serious consequences." He didn't live up to his side of the bargain. Whether he had them or not is immaterial, he refused to honor a signed cease-fire agreement. You may not think that was enough to warrant an invasion, but your opinion doesn't matter; it was, and remains, a legal, legitimate use of force to enforce a cease-fire agreement signed in 1991. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's wrong or illegal.
It is logically impossible to prove that something does not exist. Your example is a hollow one that is more suited to rhetoric than rational discussion.
But your conclusions that "there were no WMD's" are therefore just as hollow. You cannot prove they did not exist, you can only point to failure to find them thus far. You complete dismiss the fact that (a) weapons of this type are easily hidden to the point of being practically unfindable, and (b) weapons of this type are easily transportable, and Saddam had ample opportunity to have them smuggled out of the country before the war -- perhaps to the neighboring Baathist regime of Syria. I can't prove it happened, but you can't prove it didn't happen. You are, however, more than willing to acc
After carpet bombing their entire power, fuel production, and fuel transportation infrastructures? (in Iraq, unlike GWI, we largely avoided hitting power infrastructure). Unfortunately, I can't find that data; although if you want to compare this to postwar Germany, Japan, etc, there were almost no deaths of any occupying troops after the war.
With today's more accurate bombing, it's possible to acheive similar levels of effects (i.e. power losses, no water, etc.) with much less collateral damage. That doesn't mean the bombed-out power plants are any eaiser to replace than they were in 1945, it just means things don't look as destroyed. Appearances can be deceiving.
As for your contention that there were "almost no deaths" of occupying troops after the war, there were actually more than what we have currently in Iraq. There were organized programs of assassination aimed at both the occupiers and Germans who worked with them, almost identical to what we're in today. You can read more on this in The Fall of Berlin 1945. Good history book.
You're kidding, right? We were supposed to be down to ~30,000 troops by last fall. How's that goin? Do you think that we *planned* to be using stop-loss orders and activating the Ready Reserve?
There is an old axiom that says "no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy." As I recall, everyone including the U.S. military was predicting invasion casualties in the thousands or tens of thousands, yet actual losses were well under a thousand. So, those predicting gloom and doom for our armed forces were wrong, yet I see you assigning no blame there. Was Rumsfeld wrong on troop allocation numbers? Perhaps. Does that make him wrong on everything? Absolutely not, and you should stop trying to paint him otherwise.
Kenneth Aldeman, a Rumsfeld ally on the Defense Policy Board, actually used the word "cakewalk". Bush stated "the United States and our allies have prevailed." on his infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech (from which we have since had to notably increase troop deployment numbers - including one of my friends, who had is MOS changed from lab tech to combat medic so that they could deploy him). Perle stated that all resistance would "collapse after the first whiff of gunpowder." I could keep on going if you wanted.
Please do if it makes you feel any better, but it proves nothing. A lot of this could be filed under pre-war psyops, trying to psych the enemy out. Saddam was watching this. No doubt a lot of his commanders were as well. Don't think this "posturing" by the talking heads and policymakers didn't have at least some small effect.
As for what's happened post-invasion, anyone who knows anything about military history knows that conquering a city is easy but keeping it is hard. We are trying to return Iraq to normalcy as soon as possible, and this means we can't have dawn to dusk curfews, security checkpoints every fifty yards, and so forth. The unfortunate side effect of this is that it allows insurgents more lattitude. The insurgents could easily be crushed (as they are being right now in Fallujah) with more military force, but to our credit we are not using all of our available force to bludgeon the city into submission. You refuse to acknowledge that, again painting yourself as someone all too willing to see only the bad and none of the good. I cannot see how you could consider yourself even remotely objective when you're so close-minded on this subject.
We are not in Iraq for the purpose of "spreading democracy and freedom". We are in Iraq because the current administration feels that our efforts there serve our national interests.
One could argue that spreading freedom and democracy is in our national interests, so our viewpoints are not as incompatible as you might think. After all, other countries that more or less subscribe to "our" way of governing and recognizing freedom are far less likely to be threats to us as compared to, say, hard-line theocracies like the former Taliban.
there because we have a heavily oil-dependent economy, and because forcibly establishing a US-friendly 'democracy' in Iraq helps to protect our longer-term interests.
Again, no disagreement here, but if Iraqi's ultimately receive freedom because of what we've done, that should be factored into the "plus" column for us and them, don't you think? Further, there is no shame in looking after our long-term interests unless you view America's interests to somehow be worse than everyone else's. Personally, I'd much rather have a world full of free democracies than one dominated by tinpot dictators, religious monarchies, or murdering thugs.
You may not change your mind about the rightness or wrongness of our actions in Iraq, but at least you won't look like a brainwashed patsy to those who are willing to accept reality.
I'm sorry if you view me in that light. It is not brainwashing, it's called observation and drawing your own conclusions. Based on what I've seen, we're doing far more good than harm. An injection in the arm causes temporary pain for the long-term benefits of disease resistance.
Fifty years from now, assuming Iraq develops into a stable and relatively free democracy, what's going on in Fallujah will be viewed in a totally different light. There is historical precedent for this. Consider an article written in Life magazine in 1945 about how "America is losing the peace in Europe" and how European allies felt the U.S. was botching post-war occupation. Insurgents were running wild, hard-liners were trying to get back into power, desolation was everywhere...sounds like what the news is reporting today, doesn't it? But the former Axis powers are today stable, functioning, if-not-quite-fully-democratic nations. Doesn't sound like we did a bad job after all, does it? Based on the press's ability to call these things in the past, I'm far more inclined to think we're doing the right thing. If they got it so badly wrong before, they're almost certainly still getting it just as wrong.
For the record, I approved of what we did in Afghanistan (I actually felt that we didn't do enough!). I also feel that now that we're in Iraq, it would be a mistake to turn it into a politician-directed war like Vietnam.
I couldn't agree more. The problem is, with all the negative coverage being heaped upon the war, with every negative thing being magnified beyond belief and every positive thing being buried as much as possible, politicians are feeling pressure to hurry things up, to make everything all neat and tidy, wrapped up during a commercial break. This is the worst possible thing we could do, and I think Bush doesn't want to do it that way. Neither does Rummy or Cheney. If everybody would just quit screaming the sky is falling, people could do their jobs and do them well.
Unfortunately that means a lot more casualties on both sides, and some more "we had to destroy the city to save the city" situations like Fallujah.
Actually, you should read some of the BDA (Bomb Damage Assessment) reports I've seen. We've destroyed insurgent-filled homes without taking down apartments right next door. Sure, things go awry sometimes, but you must consider that the U.S. is taking unheard-of measures to keep collateral damage as low as possible, even to the point of accepting additional risk to soldiers and Marines. Despite the fact that it put my
He didn't misquote you; he posted entire sections of what you said.
My choice of words was poor. You're right, he was not misquoting me, he was quoting me out of context. Consider the statement suitably modified.
If you like flame wars, then by all means continue what you were doing. I'm sorry for being harsh. I really am a nice person.
You're not being harsh and I respect your opinion. I'm not trying to participate in a flame war here, I'm trying to answer the unfounded accusations being made against me. Nobody likes having things attributed to them that are not genuine, and I felt it necessary to clear the air. The other "gentleman" will likely dispute this, but at this point I don't care, I've said my piece.
Your use of the term "unlawful" implies a law was broken in order to facilitate the invasion of Iraq. This is a common misconception, and I'll be happy to point out why you're wrong.
First, the 1991 Gulf War was not a peace treaty, it was a cease-fire agreement. There's a significant legal distinction between the two. A peace treaty ends a war, but a cease-fire merely stops the shooting without stopping the war. Technically speaking, a state of war has existed between Iraq and the U.S. since 1991, so the invasion was not some new thing, it was the resumption of an old thing.
The cease-fire was conditional as well. One of the many conditions was that Saddam fully disclose all weapons programs and materials regarding WMD's or plans to produce them. This he did not do, so the cease-fire was nullified almost immediately. We would've legally been within our rights to have resumed open hostilities 14 days after the cease-fire, but instead it took us 14 years. That doesn't change the fact that it was legal.
But let's forget the cease-fire and concentrate instead on U.N. resolution 1441, which was unanimously agreed upon by the entire security council -- including France, Germany, and Russia. I quote verbatim from the resolution:
This establishes Iraq was in material breach of its signed agreements, which sets the stage for the penalties of non-compliance. These are outlined as:
"Serious consequences" were laid out as the punishment for non-compliance. Those consequences included resumption of hostilities. There is not, and there never has been, anything "illegal" about this war. If you wish to disregard the volumes of information available that prove this, you are beyond help.
Sure, the politicians made that one of the justifications, although it was a late addition to the schedule after the previous justifications had been exposed as lies.
Lies? Then I suppose this stuff (see slide #2) doesn't really exist. Forty vials of sarin are enough to kill ten times as many people that died on 9/11. It doesn't matter that you can fit it into a briefcase, it is a WMD, a substanced banned by U.N. declaration, and quite notably not disclosed by the Iraqis. You can claim all day long that this "little bit" of sarin isn't justification for an invasion. However, if it had been used to kill thousands of Americans, or thousands of Europeans, would they be any less dead because you refuse to call it a WMD?
I wonder how "free" Iraq will be in the future. Would your government recognize and accept it if the Iraqi people voted to establish an Islamic theocracy in a fair, democratic election?
I don't know the answer to that and neither do you. Given Iraq's history of being relatively secular (especially in comparison to the surrounding theocracies), I would say the likelihood of that happening is rather low without outside influence (i.e. an influx of non-Iraqi insurgents). If the armed forces are allowed to do their jobs and given the time to do them right, this will not happen.
I'm not, because of the deliberate lies we were fed