That's what they said shortly after the invasion. We're still waiting.
And how long did it take for us to fully restore Germany, Italy, and Japan to their pre-war electrification and production levels? I'll give you a hint: it was a lot longer than two years. You're being too impatient, not understanding the size and scope of what's required to change a country that's been mired in dictatorship and sanctions for decades.
This isn't some quick in-and-out intervention here, Iraq is a long-term project. It's not going to be a nice and tidy, wrapped up in between commercial breaks. The President never said it would be and neither did the generals or the Pentagon. In fact, both parties said the exact opposite. You should give people time to do their jobs before condemning their efforts as failures.
Hi, I'm not the AC you were having conversation with, but I'd like to know what makes you think that USA is right?
Let me put your question another way: what makes you think you're right? Everyone has their own ideas of how a "perfect" world would work. Just about everyond has fantasized about how "things would be different if I were running the show," whether it be running countries or running a business.
It's not so much that I think the U.S. is right, it's that the U.S. and I are in agreement about where we'd like the world to be. Not an American dictatorship, but a place where freedom and prosperity are available to all who wish to strive for it.
Note the qualifiers "available to all" and "strive." I don't believe prosperity can be "given" to anyone. Those who don't work for their rewards generally are unable to value them properly. That's why I'm in general disagreement with many socialist or communist ideologies, many of which are championed by left-leaning EU members and the UN.
So, please consider that next time you are asked to go to Iraq.
You're using the "they're savages and thus it's wasteful to try and give them democracy" angle, one I happen to disagree with. The same was said of the English peasantry by the pre-parliamentary monarchy of England. You and I are today proof of the folly of such thinking.
Maybe Arabs can't function as a democracy. Maybe they only understand the rule of force instead of the rule of law. But I don't believe it, and I want to see these people given a chance. It may take ten years, or fifty, or a hundred, but if they eventually enjoy the freedoms we do, it's worth it. It's all worth it.
Such loving, tolerant viewpoints you have. It's such an honor to know that I share this planet with someone like you, who stoops to ad hominem attacks against someone who has done you no wrong and has picked no fight with you. I'll remember your comment the next time someone tries to tell me how much they love free and open dissent.
I've read Order 39, have you? It makes no mention of allowing theft of Iraqi oil or other natural resources. You can try and read it as such, but that's not what it says. I understand it's a hot topic on democraticunderground.com, though. It's supposed to be some sort of talisman to use against anyone claiming we're not there to rape and pillage the country. Sorry, but your interpretation is wrong.
So, since you say Iraqis are more thankful, then they must be getting media from sources that are less after blood. Say, perhaps some leading Arabic news channel.
Far from it. Many of them don't follow Al-Jazeera as closely as some Americans do. But the final straw is not what you see on TV or read in the newspaper, it's what you see with your own two eyes. When they see Marines helping the rebuild things, when they see Marines handing out the cookies and such from MRE's, they realize we're not there to rip out their entrails and choke them with them. There's a lot of Arabs who are somewhat disenchanted with Al-Jazeera, given how pro-Saddam it was right up until Baghdad Bob was shown to be a lying fool.
Sometimes you do have to choose the lesser of two evils, but I fear that governments (not just the US) seldom factor in the future cost of such things and the cost to be paid later.
I'm not going to disagree with you there, but I'm going to give us the benefit of the doubt. Why? Despite what popular opinion outside the U.S. might be, we're not trying to take over the world. We do what we do because we believe in the principles of our country, and spreading democracy and freedom are noble goals. That's a far cry from saying "we're going to rule the world because we like putting people under our thumb." By and large the U.S. wants to do good in the world. It's only because we live in an imperfect world full of gray areas that we have to sometimes associate ourselves with things like Saddam, the Saudi royals, and the now-deposed Shah. You work with what you have and hope you're doing the right thing. Nobody, critics or pundits, have crystal balls telling what the future will hold.
If he was, you're now aware that I own and run a small multimedia company. I employ me, my wife, and five others. But my main job is being an I.T. Director. I have hopes that this will one day change and I'll be able to work solely on my own company, but right now it doesn't generate enough income. Being on a long deployment didn't help things, but at least my company kept my job (the director position) waiting for me while I was gone. Other companies haven't been so forgiving despite laws against it.
So, if you want a summary of my life, I work daily as an I.T. director, I run my own (small) multimedia company after hours, on weekends, or whenever I can, and I'm a USMC reservist recently called to duty and released. I lead a busy life, but there's nothing in this description that's impossible.
Furthermore, the "prewar" numbers don't mention that this is discussing "immediately before we invaded". Before we flattened Iraq's power infrastructure in the first gulf war, they produced 9500 MW.
And precisely who caused Gulf War I? Oh, that's right -- Saddam, when he invaded Kuwait. Or are you going to argue that war, a war fully sanctioned by everyone in the U.N., was somehow uncalled for as well?
The post-cease-fire sanctions prevented the power infrastructure from being rebuilt nationally, which kept the overall figures depressed. Now that Saddam is gone and sanctions removed, that number will soon be back up to pre-1991 levels or higher.
I call bullshit. Just because you supposedly went over to Iraq doesn't mean you know shit about what's going on. In a previous post of yours, you dismissed the Abu Gharib atrocities as not really atrocities, saying:
"Wearing panties on your head and being forced to pose nude for photographs is not an attrocity -- except in your morally twisted mind."
Forgetting that there was at least one Iraqi prisoner beaten to death and then posed with, as well as numerous instances of proven sexual abuse and many allegations of rape and torture. You don't think that's an atrocity? I don't think your opinion is very valid.
You're taking the opportunity to quote me out of context, so I'll take the time to correct you where you're wrong. The fact that you actually quoted one thing but then said I said something else ought to have been evidence enough of the innaccuracy of your post. I stated exactly as you quoted: wearing panties on your head and being forced to pose nude is not an attrocity, and I still stand by that. Being beaten to death is an attrocity and should be punished as such. I never once said or indicated anything otherwise, and I am angered that you would portray my feelings otherwise.
That's funny. I was pretty sure al-Sistani and al-Sadr, who have nothing to do with the Sunnis or the Sunni triangle area were pretty pissed at the continued American presence. Oh, I'm sure they're just an exception too, right? Or maybe you'll claim they're all foreign al Qaeda fighters, even though most media reports say otherwise.
Al-Qaeda is taking advantage of the unrest in an attempt to push its agenda, much like you're taking advantage of misquoting me to serve yours.
In past posts, you've also made the claim that the sarin gas that was fired at troops constitutes weapons of mass destruction.
Sarin gas is a WMD, and you don't need a supertanker full of it for it to be a threat. A single vial the size of your index finger of this stuff can kill hundreds of people. Is that not enough to qualify it as a WMD? If not, what's the lowest limit of deaths you'd accept for a WMD? A thousand? Ten thousand? A million? How many people have to be dead before you'd consider it to actually be a threat? What if it was just one person, but that person was you? As you lay there dying, I'm sure you'd think it was a WMD.
Oh, by the way, USA Today has an article up right now showing actual photographs of a cache of sarin. Forty vials of the stuff, enough to kill several thousand people if properly dispersed. Doesn't that qualify as a WMD? If not, what does? Or are you arbitrarily setting the bar just a little bit above whatever it is we're finding in Iraq so as to discredit what's going on?
I'm just glad they found the stuff (a) before it could be used on any Marines and (b) after I left.
You also dismiss the idea of globalization entirely
I'm not a fan of this "global test" stuff, if that's what you mean, and I'm unapologetic about it. The United States is a sovereign nation. We have no obligation to get anyone's permission to do anything. If we can get others on board for things like Iraq, great. If we can't, we're going to do what we think is right regardless. Too many other countries have agendas that are in conflict with ours for me to feel comfortable submitting our policy to their approval mechanisms.
and then you go on to tell all those who oppose you "Go burn a flag and worship Stalin or something."
All true. Were you expecting me to be sorry? Oh, but you forgot to post the other side of that conversation where the guy was being a complete jerk. Perhaps you were that jerk, and you're just trying to get back at me now. Since you posted AC, we'll never know. Me? I don't hide behind AC. You should try it sometime.
Believe what you will, I really don't care. I've put my life on the line for my country, and I have nothing to prove to you at all. Can you say the same?
How many innocent people did you kill while you were over there? People that were no threat to you or your country?
For your information, I didn't kill any innocent civilians, but thanks for asking. And we never fired at anyone who wasn't pointing a weapon at us first. Remember that when you condemn us.
We were told WMD's were the main reason - no WMD's have been found in Iraq.
Actually, we have found them. Interestingly enough, USA Today has pictures of cache of sarin gas located in Iraq. Sure, it's not much sarin. It would barely fill a suitcase. But it's enough sarin to kill tens of thousands of people if properly dispersed, or maybe only a few thousand if released in a crude fashion via something like an IED (Improvised Explosive Device) in a metropolitan area. Why isn't this getting more press? Damned if I know. Not even Fox is covering it. But the pictures are there. Check (I think) picture #2 of the Flash presentation.
#2 Lack of international consenus before going in/impact on post-war rebuilding.
Everyone, including those in the Bush administration, would've preferred it not go down the way it did. But at some point you have to ask yourself a fundamental question: at what point is enough enough? There were 14 separate resolutions requiring, demanding, and finally threatening Iraq to comply. Suppose you break the law, get convicted, and the judge says to you "don't do it again or I'll throw you in jail." But you do do it again, yet the judge simply says the same thing. After about the fourth or fifth time, you kind of get the idea the judge really doesn't mean it when he says it, so his authority to enforce the law is essentially nullified.
So it is (or was) with the U.N. The U.N. apparently had little or no intention of actually enforcing its resolutions. It apparently expected Saddam to simply obey and that was it. Saddam was far too crafty (or daft, either way) to fall for that, and once he figured out the U.N. didn't want armed conflict, he became determined to see just how far he could push things. After all, if you know your adversary has a limit on what he or she will do, it's in your best interests to hit that limit as often as possible.
In my opinion, diplomacy with the U.N. was destined to fail to begin with, because the U.N. had no intention to ever enforce it's own laws. It is essentially an impotent organization. The fact that numerous high-ranking U.N. officials were also making massive amounts of money from the oil-for-food scandal further complicates the matter, don't you think?
Now, we have no one but the Bush Administration for the shitty post-invasion botchup.
Again, I think we're not having enough patience here. Iraq has never had a functioning modern democracy. Bringing order to a former dictatorship is not an easy task, and no matter how many U.N. countries you may have or whoever's in the Oval Office, that task is going to be difficult, bloody, and long. The Marshall plan in Europe took over a decade to restore Germany and Japan. We should give the Iraqi situation at least that much time before passing judgement on whether this was a "botched" invasion.
The news reports I've heard say that the profits will go to the US to pay for the cost of occupying the country. Sounds like theft to me.
I would agree with you if it were true, but thus far it is not true. The scheme you mention was a rumor floated some time ago. It has not come to pass. Granted, it may come to pass (anything is possible), but as of now it's nothing more than rumor. Given the political downsides of such a plan, I don't think it'd be well received.
First, thanks for putting your life on the line for this country. It's a noble effort, and I admire that.
Thank you. It was no chore for me (and many of my fellow devil dogs). We want to serve. It's as simple as that.
And it's not the 'war on terror,' Rove, Wolfowitz, and Rumsfeld had plans to invade Iraq well before 9/11, and even before the 2000 election. Google for "New American Century," if they haven't removed the documents already.
If I may be so bold, "regime change" for Saddam has been standard American policy since Bush #1 failed to properly finish what he started. Clinton's team had war plans on hand during his entire tenure. The fact that Bush #2 had such plans is not an indication of some sort of pre-9/11 plot, it's standard U.S. policy. We have plans on hand at all times to invade just about any country we're not on completely friendly terms with. This isn't hyper-aggressiveness, this is called "being ready." Saddam's non-compliance with the 1991 cease fire agreement (not a peace treaty, mind you) gave us ample authority to resume the war with or without U.N. approval. Granted it would've been nicer to do it with the full Security Council, but after fourteen years of making pointless resolutions, I don't think the U.N. was interested in enforcing its own declarations. We were.
However, I do not think you can spread democracy with the barrel of a gun; you can't enforce freedom. And violence certainly isn't the answer for places like Afghanistan, Syria, Iran and North Korea. Violence just makes Americans the bad guys, even if it's not warranted.
I agree with you -- partially. Democracy doesn't easily evolve from the barrel of a gun. However, you cannot reasonably expect a multi-decade dictatorship to fall and be replaced with smiling, happy, peaceful, productive citizens overnight. Changes in governments always create at least some chaos. The more drastic the change, the more chaos. Going from a dictatorship to anything else is a drastic change. I think we're all being too quick to judge Iraq here. Look more to what happened with Germany and Japan following WWII. The Marshall plan took more than a decade to evolve, and many of the same problems we're now having in Iraq were present in both postwar Germany and Japan. We're being too impatient here.
Osama bin Laden isn't a political leader; he isn't some James Bond supervillain. He's a petty thug. We don't send Marines to hunt drug lords, we send cops to bring them to justice. We don't give them the chance that their religion is right and they do get those virgins.
Actually, we have sent U.S. armed forces to go after drug lords (or, more correctly, their production areas), but that's beside the point. The problem here is Osama's operation in countries outside the U.S. with the tacit approval of those governments. We faced similar problems in the Korean war, with insurgents dashing back and forth across an imaginary line on the map, knowing we wouldn't pursue. As long as combatants like Osama have a safe haven, we're hamstrung. By showing the U.S. has the will (we already had the firepower) to go after these thugs no matter where they operate, we both disrupt Osama's operations while simultaneously we put pressure on governments not to cooperate him -- or face "serious consequences" like Iraq. The Syrians don't want that. The Iranians don't want that. If they think we're serious (and we are), they're going to stop playing ball with the terrorists. If not, they're not going to be in power for much longer, and believe me, the like being in power.
Thank you for your service. I hope that Iraq quickly becomes the next outsourcing destination.:)
If Iraq develops into a stable, functioning democracy of some type, I would welcome that. The place has been closed and shunned since about 1991 and could use an influx of talent. If the economy continues to improve in Iraq, there's going to be demand. I'd go back. These people deserve a chance to have what we have over here in America -- freedom to exceed, freedom to excel, freedom to make something of themselves. We take it for granted, but just talk about it with someone who's never had it. Such a concept is so new and exhillirating to these people, it really makes you look around and appreciate what we all have on a daily basis.
Selection bias. The Iraqis that don't want you or any other foreign military presence in their country will not walk up to you and tell you that. You might shoot them.
I could claim the same with the news media, and if you were thinking on this objectively you'd have figured that out yourself. As I said, with the news guys, if it bleeds, it leads. Nobody gives a damn what good stuff is going on, they want to show you the bodies, the beheadings, and the smoldering car bombs. No wonder everybody over here thinks the place is a mess, you've been fed nothing but a steady diet of bad news.
So, you're the IT Director for the US Marine Corps?
You're right, Saddam was about as secular as they come...but many in his government were Sunni's and the vast majority of Iraq is not. Non-Sunni Muslim's were discriminated against to a certain degree, to say nothing of the persecution of Kurdish separatists in the north.
While the religious aspects of it weren't pushed, it is clear the power was concentrated in the hands of a few, and resentment of that bred in non-Sunni's.
So, I fear you either are making all this "testimony" up or you lack the critical thinking allowing you to understand that only a thin minority of people came to talk to you. And if they came, of course they were friendly, else they wouldn't have come.
There's more to "testimony" than just what people walked up and said. I have two eyes and they were open most of the time I was there. Was there unrest? Yes. But was there also hope? Exuberance for a better future? Yes on both counts. I never claimed to say these people represented the entire country, I merely wished to say what I saw. It doesn't get airtime over here, it seems.
If you think that most iraqis have forgotten the fact that US did back up Saddam, you're a dreamer.
I've heard this before, and it's the irrefutable truth. Ever hear the dictum "the enemy of my enemy is my friend"? It was coined in WWII and used to justify the Anglo-American alliance with Russia. Stalin was a brutal, murderous thug, but we worked with him to defeat a worse thug, namely Hitler. Should we have ignored Stalin and possibly lost the war because he was a thug? In your view it seems we should have. Fortunately for the world, the allies did not share your view.
Today's world is no different. The U.S. government worked with Saddam to keep Iran, a rabidly anti-U.S. country, from becoming too powerful. Did that mean the U.S. was all buddy-buddy with Saddam and therefore endorsing his type? No. But if you believe all choices in life are so clean cut as to always being able to put all the good guys on one side of the room and all the bad guys on the other side, you're being a bit naive. You work with what you have, taking the lesser of evils when you have no other choice.
So, you're the IT Director for the US Marine Corps?
I'm a reservist who went active and now I'm back. It's that simple. No right-wing conspiracy required. Perhaps if you weren't in such a hurry to sling accusations you'd have thought of it yourself.
Every single poll I've seen has more than 95% of iraqis wanting this.
I'd like to see your source for these polls. This isn't a troll, it's an honest question. You've seen one thing, I've seen something completely different.
Who am I? Why, I'm a Marine who got back from Iraq not long ago. The folks we met were nice and seemed very thankful we were there, the kids especially. The only place we weren't really welcome was in the Sunni Triangle area which is full of old Saddam loyalists who had everything to lose a nothing to gain with Saddam being kicked out.
Why should we be there fighting the desires of the Iraqi people?
Speaking as someone who's been in country and not just reading what CNN/NBC/CBS/ABC is reporting, I find it hard to believe you can ask such a question. The vast majority of the country was tired of being ruled by Saddam and his religious minority. The only way he stayed in power was by intimidation, and the people he intimidated are very happy he's gone. They're doubly happy we're there to prevent his lieutenants from trying to re-establish Ba'athist strongholds and continue his "reign."
If our goal was to get rid of Sadam, we've already done that, so why stick around?
See last two sentences in previous paragraph.
Oh, the real reason is so we can steal their oil. And I do mean steal.
If there's oil theft going on, it's not coming from the Americans. There aren't lines of Texaco supertankers sitting at port just greedily sucking the country dry all so Bush and Halliburton can make a buck. Iraqi oil is being sold to whoever wants it at market prices, the same as in Saudi, the same as in Russia and South America. If we're stealing their oil, precisely why are we paying for it? That kind of goes against the definition of stealing, don't you think?
Plus, most iraqis I've heard interviewed prefer Sadaam to the US. They say things like "at least Sadaam was an Iraqi."
If you did nothing but interview in the Sunni triangle, such reponses would be expected. I'd be shocked if it were otherwise. But outside the Sunni areas it's an entirely different story. You don't hear that story very much because the news organizations are fixated on where the problems are, not where things are going great. Blood and gore sells, but kids going to a newly-opened school don't sell. Roadside bombs boost ratings, but nobody cares whether a water treatment plant or a power plant is back online again. Insurgents shooting RPG's at our Bradley's get lots of airtime, but the kids in the streets giving soldiers and Marines food and water with smiles and thanks gets no screen time at all. You can claim it doesn't happen but I'm willing to bet you haven't been there. I have.
There is a huge difference between legal responsibility (which Microsoft does have here) and moral responsibility. The BSA would have absolute authority to charge Microsoft with a violation with or without Microsoft's actual knowledge of this incident. But that's a long way from claiming Microsoft both had knowledge of and condoned the use of pirated software.
Microsoft has US$64 billion dollars in cash right now. Do you honestly believe they'd quibble about spending $200 for some audio editing software? If you do, you're not thinking logically.
Since I see legions of slashdotters all crowing about their massive, illegal stashes of MP3's, all downloaded with the intent to fsck the RIAA, their large collection of ripped DVD's downloaded to dorm rooms, I fully expect to see those same legions saying "Yeah! Alright! Microsoft is one of us!"
Or will I find a double standard?
Hmmm...this is Slashdot, where hypocrisy is an art form, so I guess I don't have to think too long on that last question.
If anyone out there is even trying to insinuate that Microsfot in some way is condoning piracy because of this, you're just a little too eager to sling mud. Microsoft has thousands of employees strung across hundreds of campuses worldwide. Bill Gates can't personally oversee each and every one of them. If some idiot decides to bring in his warezed copy of Sound Forge because he doesn't want to go to the trouble of putting in a purchase order for the real thing, does that make Microsoft complicit in piracy? I guess on Slashdot it does, where anything and everything negative about Microsoft gets full-press treatment, and anything and everything negative about Linux or Open Source gets a complete pass.
Democrats in denial continue to try and find anything they can lay their hot little hands on to destroy George W. Bush. All rumors, unsubstantiated gossip, and half-baked "truths" will be trumpted to the highest in the hopes that some of it, no matter how ludicrous or absurd, will somehow stick to the President.
One wonders just how much scrutiny the voting system would be under if Kerry had won. One further wonders if this story would've even made it to Slashdot had it been the Republicans complaining about voting irregularities.
Bush won. Kerry lost. Get over it and start planning the next election. Perhaps next time you'll pick a better candidate. I would've voted for Lieberman had you nominated him, but you chose a left-wing flip-flop instead.
I'm actually going to do something even better: I'm going to put you on my Foe list and ignore you from this point forward. I tend to dislike associating with people so obviously intellectually inferior to me, and it's not worth my time to try and beat you over the head with truth, facts, and logic.
Democrats in denial continue to try and find anything they can lay their hot little hands on to destroy George W. Bush. All rumors, unsubstantiated gossip, and half-baked "truths" will be trumpted to the highest in the hopes that some of it, no matter how ludicrous or absurd, will somehow stick to the President.
One wonders just how much scrutiny the voting system would be under if Kerry had won. One further wonders if this story would've even made it to Slashdot had it been the Republicans complaining about voting irregularities.
Bush won. Kerry lost. Get over it and start planning the next election. Perhaps next time you'll pick a better candidate. I would've voted for Lieberman had you nominated him, but you chose a left-wing flip-flop instead.
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That's what they said shortly after the invasion. We're still waiting.
And how long did it take for us to fully restore Germany, Italy, and Japan to their pre-war electrification and production levels? I'll give you a hint: it was a lot longer than two years. You're being too impatient, not understanding the size and scope of what's required to change a country that's been mired in dictatorship and sanctions for decades.
This isn't some quick in-and-out intervention here, Iraq is a long-term project. It's not going to be a nice and tidy, wrapped up in between commercial breaks. The President never said it would be and neither did the generals or the Pentagon. In fact, both parties said the exact opposite. You should give people time to do their jobs before condemning their efforts as failures.
Hi, I'm not the AC you were having conversation with, but I'd like to know what makes you think that USA is right?
Let me put your question another way: what makes you think you're right? Everyone has their own ideas of how a "perfect" world would work. Just about everyond has fantasized about how "things would be different if I were running the show," whether it be running countries or running a business.
It's not so much that I think the U.S. is right, it's that the U.S. and I are in agreement about where we'd like the world to be. Not an American dictatorship, but a place where freedom and prosperity are available to all who wish to strive for it.
Note the qualifiers "available to all" and "strive." I don't believe prosperity can be "given" to anyone. Those who don't work for their rewards generally are unable to value them properly. That's why I'm in general disagreement with many socialist or communist ideologies, many of which are championed by left-leaning EU members and the UN.
So, please consider that next time you are asked to go to Iraq.
You're using the "they're savages and thus it's wasteful to try and give them democracy" angle, one I happen to disagree with. The same was said of the English peasantry by the pre-parliamentary monarchy of England. You and I are today proof of the folly of such thinking.
Maybe Arabs can't function as a democracy. Maybe they only understand the rule of force instead of the rule of law. But I don't believe it, and I want to see these people given a chance. It may take ten years, or fifty, or a hundred, but if they eventually enjoy the freedoms we do, it's worth it. It's all worth it.
Such loving, tolerant viewpoints you have. It's such an honor to know that I share this planet with someone like you, who stoops to ad hominem attacks against someone who has done you no wrong and has picked no fight with you. I'll remember your comment the next time someone tries to tell me how much they love free and open dissent.
I've read Order 39, have you? It makes no mention of allowing theft of Iraqi oil or other natural resources. You can try and read it as such, but that's not what it says. I understand it's a hot topic on democraticunderground.com, though. It's supposed to be some sort of talisman to use against anyone claiming we're not there to rape and pillage the country. Sorry, but your interpretation is wrong.
So, since you say Iraqis are more thankful, then they must be getting media from sources that are less after blood. Say, perhaps some leading Arabic news channel.
Far from it. Many of them don't follow Al-Jazeera as closely as some Americans do. But the final straw is not what you see on TV or read in the newspaper, it's what you see with your own two eyes. When they see Marines helping the rebuild things, when they see Marines handing out the cookies and such from MRE's, they realize we're not there to rip out their entrails and choke them with them. There's a lot of Arabs who are somewhat disenchanted with Al-Jazeera, given how pro-Saddam it was right up until Baghdad Bob was shown to be a lying fool.
Sometimes you do have to choose the lesser of two evils, but I fear that governments (not just the US) seldom factor in the future cost of such things and the cost to be paid later.
I'm not going to disagree with you there, but I'm going to give us the benefit of the doubt. Why? Despite what popular opinion outside the U.S. might be, we're not trying to take over the world. We do what we do because we believe in the principles of our country, and spreading democracy and freedom are noble goals. That's a far cry from saying "we're going to rule the world because we like putting people under our thumb." By and large the U.S. wants to do good in the world. It's only because we live in an imperfect world full of gray areas that we have to sometimes associate ourselves with things like Saddam, the Saudi royals, and the now-deposed Shah. You work with what you have and hope you're doing the right thing. Nobody, critics or pundits, have crystal balls telling what the future will hold.
If he was, you're now aware that I own and run a small multimedia company. I employ me, my wife, and five others. But my main job is being an I.T. Director. I have hopes that this will one day change and I'll be able to work solely on my own company, but right now it doesn't generate enough income. Being on a long deployment didn't help things, but at least my company kept my job (the director position) waiting for me while I was gone. Other companies haven't been so forgiving despite laws against it.
So, if you want a summary of my life, I work daily as an I.T. director, I run my own (small) multimedia company after hours, on weekends, or whenever I can, and I'm a USMC reservist recently called to duty and released. I lead a busy life, but there's nothing in this description that's impossible.
Furthermore, the "prewar" numbers don't mention that this is discussing "immediately before we invaded". Before we flattened Iraq's power infrastructure in the first gulf war, they produced 9500 MW.
And precisely who caused Gulf War I? Oh, that's right -- Saddam, when he invaded Kuwait. Or are you going to argue that war, a war fully sanctioned by everyone in the U.N., was somehow uncalled for as well?
The post-cease-fire sanctions prevented the power infrastructure from being rebuilt nationally, which kept the overall figures depressed. Now that Saddam is gone and sanctions removed, that number will soon be back up to pre-1991 levels or higher.
I call bullshit. Just because you supposedly went over to Iraq doesn't mean you know shit about what's going on. In a previous post of yours, you dismissed the Abu Gharib atrocities as not really atrocities, saying:
"Wearing panties on your head and being forced to pose nude for photographs is not an attrocity -- except in your morally twisted mind."
Forgetting that there was at least one Iraqi prisoner beaten to death and then posed with, as well as numerous instances of proven sexual abuse and many allegations of rape and torture. You don't think that's an atrocity? I don't think your opinion is very valid.
You're taking the opportunity to quote me out of context, so I'll take the time to correct you where you're wrong. The fact that you actually quoted one thing but then said I said something else ought to have been evidence enough of the innaccuracy of your post. I stated exactly as you quoted: wearing panties on your head and being forced to pose nude is not an attrocity, and I still stand by that. Being beaten to death is an attrocity and should be punished as such. I never once said or indicated anything otherwise, and I am angered that you would portray my feelings otherwise.
That's funny. I was pretty sure al-Sistani and al-Sadr, who have nothing to do with the Sunnis or the Sunni triangle area were pretty pissed at the continued American presence. Oh, I'm sure they're just an exception too, right? Or maybe you'll claim they're all foreign al Qaeda fighters, even though most media reports say otherwise.
Al-Qaeda is taking advantage of the unrest in an attempt to push its agenda, much like you're taking advantage of misquoting me to serve yours.
In past posts, you've also made the claim that the sarin gas that was fired at troops constitutes weapons of mass destruction.
Sarin gas is a WMD, and you don't need a supertanker full of it for it to be a threat. A single vial the size of your index finger of this stuff can kill hundreds of people. Is that not enough to qualify it as a WMD? If not, what's the lowest limit of deaths you'd accept for a WMD? A thousand? Ten thousand? A million? How many people have to be dead before you'd consider it to actually be a threat? What if it was just one person, but that person was you? As you lay there dying, I'm sure you'd think it was a WMD.
Oh, by the way, USA Today has an article up right now showing actual photographs of a cache of sarin. Forty vials of the stuff, enough to kill several thousand people if properly dispersed. Doesn't that qualify as a WMD? If not, what does? Or are you arbitrarily setting the bar just a little bit above whatever it is we're finding in Iraq so as to discredit what's going on?
I'm just glad they found the stuff (a) before it could be used on any Marines and (b) after I left.
You also dismiss the idea of globalization entirely
I'm not a fan of this "global test" stuff, if that's what you mean, and I'm unapologetic about it. The United States is a sovereign nation. We have no obligation to get anyone's permission to do anything. If we can get others on board for things like Iraq, great. If we can't, we're going to do what we think is right regardless. Too many other countries have agendas that are in conflict with ours for me to feel comfortable submitting our policy to their approval mechanisms.
and then you go on to tell all those who oppose you "Go burn a flag and worship Stalin or something."
All true. Were you expecting me to be sorry? Oh, but you forgot to post the other side of that conversation where the guy was being a complete jerk. Perhaps you were that jerk, and you're just trying to get back at me now. Since you posted AC, we'll never know. Me? I don't hide behind AC. You should try it sometime.
How are you dif
Reservist hey?
Nah, I still call bullshit.
Believe what you will, I really don't care. I've put my life on the line for my country, and I have nothing to prove to you at all. Can you say the same?
How many innocent people did you kill while you were over there? People that were no threat to you or your country?
For your information, I didn't kill any innocent civilians, but thanks for asking. And we never fired at anyone who wasn't pointing a weapon at us first. Remember that when you condemn us.
We were told WMD's were the main reason - no WMD's have been found in Iraq.
Actually, we have found them. Interestingly enough, USA Today has pictures of cache of sarin gas located in Iraq. Sure, it's not much sarin. It would barely fill a suitcase. But it's enough sarin to kill tens of thousands of people if properly dispersed, or maybe only a few thousand if released in a crude fashion via something like an IED (Improvised Explosive Device) in a metropolitan area. Why isn't this getting more press? Damned if I know. Not even Fox is covering it. But the pictures are there. Check (I think) picture #2 of the Flash presentation.
#2 Lack of international consenus before going in/impact on post-war rebuilding.
Everyone, including those in the Bush administration, would've preferred it not go down the way it did. But at some point you have to ask yourself a fundamental question: at what point is enough enough? There were 14 separate resolutions requiring, demanding, and finally threatening Iraq to comply. Suppose you break the law, get convicted, and the judge says to you "don't do it again or I'll throw you in jail." But you do do it again, yet the judge simply says the same thing. After about the fourth or fifth time, you kind of get the idea the judge really doesn't mean it when he says it, so his authority to enforce the law is essentially nullified.
So it is (or was) with the U.N. The U.N. apparently had little or no intention of actually enforcing its resolutions. It apparently expected Saddam to simply obey and that was it. Saddam was far too crafty (or daft, either way) to fall for that, and once he figured out the U.N. didn't want armed conflict, he became determined to see just how far he could push things. After all, if you know your adversary has a limit on what he or she will do, it's in your best interests to hit that limit as often as possible.
In my opinion, diplomacy with the U.N. was destined to fail to begin with, because the U.N. had no intention to ever enforce it's own laws. It is essentially an impotent organization. The fact that numerous high-ranking U.N. officials were also making massive amounts of money from the oil-for-food scandal further complicates the matter, don't you think?
Now, we have no one but the Bush Administration for the shitty post-invasion botchup.
Again, I think we're not having enough patience here. Iraq has never had a functioning modern democracy. Bringing order to a former dictatorship is not an easy task, and no matter how many U.N. countries you may have or whoever's in the Oval Office, that task is going to be difficult, bloody, and long. The Marshall plan in Europe took over a decade to restore Germany and Japan. We should give the Iraqi situation at least that much time before passing judgement on whether this was a "botched" invasion.
The news reports I've heard say that the profits will go to the US to pay for the cost of occupying the country. Sounds like theft to me.
I would agree with you if it were true, but thus far it is not true. The scheme you mention was a rumor floated some time ago. It has not come to pass. Granted, it may come to pass (anything is possible), but as of now it's nothing more than rumor. Given the political downsides of such a plan, I don't think it'd be well received.
First, thanks for putting your life on the line for this country. It's a noble effort, and I admire that.
Thank you. It was no chore for me (and many of my fellow devil dogs). We want to serve. It's as simple as that.
And it's not the 'war on terror,' Rove, Wolfowitz, and Rumsfeld had plans to invade Iraq well before 9/11, and even before the 2000 election. Google for "New American Century," if they haven't removed the documents already.
If I may be so bold, "regime change" for Saddam has been standard American policy since Bush #1 failed to properly finish what he started. Clinton's team had war plans on hand during his entire tenure. The fact that Bush #2 had such plans is not an indication of some sort of pre-9/11 plot, it's standard U.S. policy. We have plans on hand at all times to invade just about any country we're not on completely friendly terms with. This isn't hyper-aggressiveness, this is called "being ready." Saddam's non-compliance with the 1991 cease fire agreement (not a peace treaty, mind you) gave us ample authority to resume the war with or without U.N. approval. Granted it would've been nicer to do it with the full Security Council, but after fourteen years of making pointless resolutions, I don't think the U.N. was interested in enforcing its own declarations. We were.
However, I do not think you can spread democracy with the barrel of a gun; you can't enforce freedom. And violence certainly isn't the answer for places like Afghanistan, Syria, Iran and North Korea. Violence just makes Americans the bad guys, even if it's not warranted.
I agree with you -- partially. Democracy doesn't easily evolve from the barrel of a gun. However, you cannot reasonably expect a multi-decade dictatorship to fall and be replaced with smiling, happy, peaceful, productive citizens overnight. Changes in governments always create at least some chaos. The more drastic the change, the more chaos. Going from a dictatorship to anything else is a drastic change. I think we're all being too quick to judge Iraq here. Look more to what happened with Germany and Japan following WWII. The Marshall plan took more than a decade to evolve, and many of the same problems we're now having in Iraq were present in both postwar Germany and Japan. We're being too impatient here.
Osama bin Laden isn't a political leader; he isn't some James Bond supervillain. He's a petty thug. We don't send Marines to hunt drug lords, we send cops to bring them to justice. We don't give them the chance that their religion is right and they do get those virgins.
Actually, we have sent U.S. armed forces to go after drug lords (or, more correctly, their production areas), but that's beside the point. The problem here is Osama's operation in countries outside the U.S. with the tacit approval of those governments. We faced similar problems in the Korean war, with insurgents dashing back and forth across an imaginary line on the map, knowing we wouldn't pursue. As long as combatants like Osama have a safe haven, we're hamstrung. By showing the U.S. has the will (we already had the firepower) to go after these thugs no matter where they operate, we both disrupt Osama's operations while simultaneously we put pressure on governments not to cooperate him -- or face "serious consequences" like Iraq. The Syrians don't want that. The Iranians don't want that. If they think we're serious (and we are), they're going to stop playing ball with the terrorists. If not, they're not going to be in power for much longer, and believe me, the like being in power.
Thank you for your service. I hope that Iraq quickly becomes the next outsourcing destination. :)
If Iraq develops into a stable, functioning democracy of some type, I would welcome that. The place has been closed and shunned since about 1991 and could use an influx of talent. If the economy continues to improve in Iraq, there's going to be demand. I'd go back. These people deserve a chance to have what we have over here in America -- freedom to exceed, freedom to excel, freedom to make something of themselves. We take it for granted, but just talk about it with someone who's never had it. Such a concept is so new and exhillirating to these people, it really makes you look around and appreciate what we all have on a daily basis.
Selection bias. The Iraqis that don't want you or any other foreign military presence in their country will not walk up to you and tell you that. You might shoot them.
I could claim the same with the news media, and if you were thinking on this objectively you'd have figured that out yourself. As I said, with the news guys, if it bleeds, it leads. Nobody gives a damn what good stuff is going on, they want to show you the bodies, the beheadings, and the smoldering car bombs. No wonder everybody over here thinks the place is a mess, you've been fed nothing but a steady diet of bad news.
So, you're the IT Director for the US Marine Corps?
You're right, Saddam was about as secular as they come...but many in his government were Sunni's and the vast majority of Iraq is not. Non-Sunni Muslim's were discriminated against to a certain degree, to say nothing of the persecution of Kurdish separatists in the north.
While the religious aspects of it weren't pushed, it is clear the power was concentrated in the hands of a few, and resentment of that bred in non-Sunni's.
So, I fear you either are making all this "testimony" up or you lack the critical thinking allowing you to understand that only a thin minority of people came to talk to you. And if they came, of course they were friendly, else they wouldn't have come.
There's more to "testimony" than just what people walked up and said. I have two eyes and they were open most of the time I was there. Was there unrest? Yes. But was there also hope? Exuberance for a better future? Yes on both counts. I never claimed to say these people represented the entire country, I merely wished to say what I saw. It doesn't get airtime over here, it seems.
If you think that most iraqis have forgotten the fact that US did back up Saddam, you're a dreamer.
I've heard this before, and it's the irrefutable truth. Ever hear the dictum "the enemy of my enemy is my friend"? It was coined in WWII and used to justify the Anglo-American alliance with Russia. Stalin was a brutal, murderous thug, but we worked with him to defeat a worse thug, namely Hitler. Should we have ignored Stalin and possibly lost the war because he was a thug? In your view it seems we should have. Fortunately for the world, the allies did not share your view.
Today's world is no different. The U.S. government worked with Saddam to keep Iran, a rabidly anti-U.S. country, from becoming too powerful. Did that mean the U.S. was all buddy-buddy with Saddam and therefore endorsing his type? No. But if you believe all choices in life are so clean cut as to always being able to put all the good guys on one side of the room and all the bad guys on the other side, you're being a bit naive. You work with what you have, taking the lesser of evils when you have no other choice.
So, you're the IT Director for the US Marine Corps?
I'm a reservist who went active and now I'm back. It's that simple. No right-wing conspiracy required. Perhaps if you weren't in such a hurry to sling accusations you'd have thought of it yourself.
Every single poll I've seen has more than 95% of iraqis wanting this.
I'd like to see your source for these polls. This isn't a troll, it's an honest question. You've seen one thing, I've seen something completely different.
Who am I? Why, I'm a Marine who got back from Iraq not long ago. The folks we met were nice and seemed very thankful we were there, the kids especially. The only place we weren't really welcome was in the Sunni Triangle area which is full of old Saddam loyalists who had everything to lose a nothing to gain with Saddam being kicked out.
Why should we be there fighting the desires of the Iraqi people?
Speaking as someone who's been in country and not just reading what CNN/NBC/CBS/ABC is reporting, I find it hard to believe you can ask such a question. The vast majority of the country was tired of being ruled by Saddam and his religious minority. The only way he stayed in power was by intimidation, and the people he intimidated are very happy he's gone. They're doubly happy we're there to prevent his lieutenants from trying to re-establish Ba'athist strongholds and continue his "reign."
If our goal was to get rid of Sadam, we've already done that, so why stick around?
See last two sentences in previous paragraph.
Oh, the real reason is so we can steal their oil. And I do mean steal.
If there's oil theft going on, it's not coming from the Americans. There aren't lines of Texaco supertankers sitting at port just greedily sucking the country dry all so Bush and Halliburton can make a buck. Iraqi oil is being sold to whoever wants it at market prices, the same as in Saudi, the same as in Russia and South America. If we're stealing their oil, precisely why are we paying for it? That kind of goes against the definition of stealing, don't you think?
Plus, most iraqis I've heard interviewed prefer Sadaam to the US. They say things like "at least Sadaam was an Iraqi."
If you did nothing but interview in the Sunni triangle, such reponses would be expected. I'd be shocked if it were otherwise. But outside the Sunni areas it's an entirely different story. You don't hear that story very much because the news organizations are fixated on where the problems are, not where things are going great. Blood and gore sells, but kids going to a newly-opened school don't sell. Roadside bombs boost ratings, but nobody cares whether a water treatment plant or a power plant is back online again. Insurgents shooting RPG's at our Bradley's get lots of airtime, but the kids in the streets giving soldiers and Marines food and water with smiles and thanks gets no screen time at all. You can claim it doesn't happen but I'm willing to bet you haven't been there. I have.
There is a huge difference between legal responsibility (which Microsoft does have here) and moral responsibility. The BSA would have absolute authority to charge Microsoft with a violation with or without Microsoft's actual knowledge of this incident. But that's a long way from claiming Microsoft both had knowledge of and condoned the use of pirated software.
Microsoft has US$64 billion dollars in cash right now. Do you honestly believe they'd quibble about spending $200 for some audio editing software? If you do, you're not thinking logically.
Since I see legions of slashdotters all crowing about their massive, illegal stashes of MP3's, all downloaded with the intent to fsck the RIAA, their large collection of ripped DVD's downloaded to dorm rooms, I fully expect to see those same legions saying "Yeah! Alright! Microsoft is one of us!"
Or will I find a double standard?
Hmmm...this is Slashdot, where hypocrisy is an art form, so I guess I don't have to think too long on that last question.
If anyone out there is even trying to insinuate that Microsfot in some way is condoning piracy because of this, you're just a little too eager to sling mud. Microsoft has thousands of employees strung across hundreds of campuses worldwide. Bill Gates can't personally oversee each and every one of them. If some idiot decides to bring in his warezed copy of Sound Forge because he doesn't want to go to the trouble of putting in a purchase order for the real thing, does that make Microsoft complicit in piracy? I guess on Slashdot it does, where anything and everything negative about Microsoft gets full-press treatment, and anything and everything negative about Linux or Open Source gets a complete pass.
Like I said, it's an art form here.
Democrats in denial continue to try and find anything they can lay their hot little hands on to destroy George W. Bush. All rumors, unsubstantiated gossip, and half-baked "truths" will be trumpted to the highest in the hopes that some of it, no matter how ludicrous or absurd, will somehow stick to the President.
One wonders just how much scrutiny the voting system would be under if Kerry had won. One further wonders if this story would've even made it to Slashdot had it been the Republicans complaining about voting irregularities.
Bush won. Kerry lost. Get over it and start planning the next election. Perhaps next time you'll pick a better candidate. I would've voted for Lieberman had you nominated him, but you chose a left-wing flip-flop instead.
I'm actually going to do something even better: I'm going to put you on my Foe list and ignore you from this point forward. I tend to dislike associating with people so obviously intellectually inferior to me, and it's not worth my time to try and beat you over the head with truth, facts, and logic.
Democrats in denial continue to try and find anything they can lay their hot little hands on to destroy George W. Bush. All rumors, unsubstantiated gossip, and half-baked "truths" will be trumpted to the highest in the hopes that some of it, no matter how ludicrous or absurd, will somehow stick to the President.
One wonders just how much scrutiny the voting system would be under if Kerry had won. One further wonders if this story would've even made it to Slashdot had it been the Republicans complaining about voting irregularities.
Bush won. Kerry lost. Get over it and start planning the next election. Perhaps next time you'll pick a better candidate. I would've voted for Lieberman had you nominated him, but you chose a left-wing flip-flop instead.