Where do you figure that from? Maybe I'm missing something, but this is news to me. Devolution means more local government. It doesn't mean complete independence from the UK and it doesn't mean reunification of Ireland. I'm not saying that will never happen, but I don't think it's gonna happen anytime soon. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation, the majority of people in NI are 'loyalists' and want to remain in the UK... that probably isn't going to change anytime soon, and like it or not there would probably be a whole other lot of terrorists bombing Dublin if Ireland were united.
I see it because Devolution means more people from the South will move in- and the minority will be loyalists rather soon. As for terrorists bombing Dublin- well, they did that 400 years ago as well. Same set of terrorists as far as I'm concerned. If they want to be a part of England that much, let them move back to Scotland where they came from.
Except that most of them have lived in Ireland for generations, and aren't about to be told to leave by some jumped up bloke in a balaclava who thinks he's Mr. Almighty because he can get hold of explosives.
Then they've got a serious problem with history- because they haven't lived there that many generations. And how they got there was by terrorism to begin with- which makes them terrorists in my book.
But not eradicating Christianity altogether? Why not? How do you know that Christian fundamentalists form the minority? Or how to tell a fundamentalist from a non-fundamentalist?
Actually, there are some pretty basic rules. Unlike Islam, you see, Christianity has a single head- the Pope or Patriarch, depending on the sect- and a Code of Canon Law that separates out the Sola Scriptura fundamentalists from the older sects.
And the Muslims who aren't fundamentalists don't give a shit about Mecca. They know that Islam is more than a city or a book.
wut. What war with spain? The last time the UK was at war with spain was, christ, the 18th century?
Yep, that's exactly right- there has been NO need for the UK to control Ireland since the 18th century. ALL of the rest has been human rights violations.
Ireland was never useful as a strategic property, unless you planned to invade the US or something.
Wrong. During the Reformation, when England went Protestant, a very real fear was that the Catholic Spanish Armada would use Catholic Ireland as a steping stone to attack England. To prevent that, Cornwall invaded Ireland, and used Scotish Presbyterian settlers to kick the Irish off their land. ALL of the "troubles" can be traced to that invasion.
And the IRA only fought over the north; the south, and vast majority, is completely free.
You don't think the IRA started in 1921 do you? No, they've been around since the 1700s.
And it still remains in UK hands, so the IRA didn't get what they wanted.
Actually, the UK is negotiating a date to hand it over- and the IRA already got an election out of the deal.
Ah, but here you have the main problem. The Unionists and the Loyalists did have strongly opposing views and historically haven't been prepared to concede any ground. Left to their own devices, there would probably be all-out civil war before long.
As long as it doesn't cross the channel, or spill down into Southern Ireland, who cares if the Ulsterites smash up their own town?
I sincerely doubt it. There's still a large enough group of Unionists to not only cause trouble, but to have sex and make babies.
Yeah, but if the IRA are bombing those babies, there won't be many that grow up, will there?
The Irish problem has existed in one form or another since the 1600's. To expect it to die in one generation is optimistic in the extreme.
The only "problem" is occupation of a foreign nation by England long after the original reasons for the occuptation have been rectified. There's no reason left for the Unionists to hang on, other than to waste English taxpayer money.
Why should incompetence on the part of a US government department be taken out on the rest of the world?
If the US government was competent, we would have cut off OPEC without a penney back in 1974 and developed celulose ethanol back then (it's not like we didn't know about jungle rot turning cotton into sugar- that was discovered back in the 1940s).
I've never even clapped eyes on a US Visa form - the closest I've seen is the "temporary visitors visa" they're issuing now at airports. Have you actually read one of those? It asks, straight up, "Are you planning on any terrorist activities? Tick Yes: No: ", along with a number of other equally inane questions.
Yep, I've not only seen those, I've seen JPG scans of what the 9/11 hijackers turned in. They uniformly refused to answer that question- and most others. In fact all they did was write in their names for the most part. Of course, from my point of view, if we had a competant government, nobody would be allowed across the border at all- it's pretty easy to see that globalization has been a losing proposition for the United States.
However, the biggest mistake it makes is that it assumes someone who's serious about waging an attack on US soil will either A: answer honestly or B: not have a properly planned alibi in advance.
I guess the sad part is that the 9/11 terrorists all seemed to fall into category B- AND WERE LET IN ANYWAY, down to the point of Mohammed Atta being granted a student visa in March 2002- six months after the attack.
But there also exist radical Christians - who consider it perfectly acceptable to blow up abortion clinics. Should we round up Christians too?
I personally support the raiding of fundamentalist Christian churches for such people. Anybody who thinks they're supporting the right to life by taking that right away from doctors is somebody I'd turn in myself if I met them at Church.
How about groups like animal rights campaigners who attack vivisection laboratories?
Yep, them too.
Round up everyone who's shown a sympathetic attitude towards animals?
And especially the vegetarians.....stupid idiots who don't know the food chain.
All 1 billion followers of Islam, including the 99.99% who would never even consider strapping Semtex to themselves then going for a walk in a crowded city?
How sure are you? I'd suggest we start with the 100,000 followers of the myth of the Islamic Nation and Personal Jihad, and the 10,000 clerics who preach hate to them.
Really? This can't be done overnight, and while you're in the process of doing it, you're creating an excellent recruitment campaign for the hardline terrorists.
Which is why you start with nuking Mecca- something you CAN do overnight that sends a message that Allah either doesn't exist or hates Moslems.
Northern Ireland is still part of the United Kingdom because ~99% of voters voted that way in the referendum, the majority feel it is in their interests both culturally and economically not to join with the rest of Ireland.
My point had nothing to do with referendums. Or even for that matter modern interests. It had to do with the UK's interest in Ireland to begin with- as a military buffer against Spain during the Protestant Reformation.
Not that Americans who've sponsored the terrorists have bothered with trivial details ("Hey I'm a 1/16th Irish you know! A United Ireland is what you want you say, people struggling against an oppressive English regime? Sure have some money to blow up children in Scotland to further your case!").
Doesn't matter one whit. If Ulster was flattened, there'd be nothing left to fight over.
The "Brute Force and Ignorance" approach you suggested would only have served to punish the majority of the population, who did not in the least support the terrorists, or the small number that voted in favour of independence.
They still have the choice of moving back to England- or to Southern Ireland. If they don't support the terrorists, they no longer need to be in Northern Ireland.
Withdrawing to please the minority, and to fuck over the the vast majority of the population who are more aligned culturally and economically with the UK than with a much more rural Southern Ireland?
For the UK that's a loss- supporting a foreign colony that doesn't need to be there any more from a strategic standpoint.
The majority who don't want to be in the Euro (and who won't even get a vote in the matter - unless those of us on the mainland) or have their economic fortunes tied to it, that don't want their legislation to be heavily influenced by lobbying from the Roman Catholic church (e.g. divorce was only legalised 10 years ago, abortions are still illegal) and that don't want to be generally fucked over over by what - in the nicest possible way - is still a culturally and economically a more "backward" (for want of a better word) nation.
Then those people should move back to Scotland where their ancestors came from.
The majority who don't want to be in the Euro (and who won't even get a vote in the matter - unless those of us on the mainland) or have their economic fortunes tied to it, that don't want their legislation to be heavily influenced by lobbying from the Roman Catholic church (e.g. divorce was only legalised 10 years ago, abortions are still illegal) and that don't want to be generally fucked over over by what - in the nicest possible way - is still a culturally and economically a more "backward" (for want of a better word) nation.
And that's worth keeping what is essentially a foreign colony on the island, at great expense to the British Taxpayer?
If the inhabitants of Northern Ireland *wanted* unification, they'd be supported by the government fully (those of us in the UK don't mind in the least - it's entirely their business), but they don't, and for very good reason (more so now than ever given the introduction of the Euro).
Then they should stop the occupation and move back to England/Scotland where they belong.
[ FWIW, for those that are interested, I'm generally in favour of a United Ireland and of a single currency in Europe, I'm just not in favour of screwing over the inhabitants of Northern Ireland to impose either of them. ]
Well, neither am I- the crown should offer them land in Scotland to pay them back for Cromwell's Folly.
That implies that existing roundabout way back, like, whenever is a necessary condition for being acceptable to our ham-dodging, turbanned neighbours.
With respect to matters of LAW, this is correct.
Now, apparently, it (that's to say very very prior art) isn't needed, so long as the thing is nationalise.
Wrong property. What you should have said is "So long as the thing is an object that has no force of law".
You misunderstood the essential difference. You listed physical inventions- the Koran has no problem with the advancement of SCIENCE. Corporations are not an invention- they are an artifact of LAW, and the Koran has a specific problem with the advancement of LAW. In other words, there's an essential difference between a corporation and an airliner- one is an artificial legal person, the other is a physical object. Corporations don't really exist outside of the law- outside of the contracts that give them life. They are a legal myth. And since all law was written in the Koran, and given by the Prophet Mohammed to the people, one cannot have law that contradicts the Koran.
Similar. General Titus started with a 1:500 ratio, and ended with selling the Jews into slavery, reducing Jerusalem to rubble "Not one stone upon another", and sowing the fields with salt to prevent the growing of grain and thus resettlement of the area. My method would do all of this with a single stroke, except for I don't need no slaves and would settle for a 1:250000 ratio instead.
The Irish Republic has only existed in its current form since 1921. And the IRA in its current form has only existed since 1969. "Threatening to blow up" Northern Ireland would quite likely have united the Unionists and the Loyalists all right - against the UK. And it's not generally held to be a good idea to nuke a country that's only about 100 miles away.
Ah, but you see, the key is that at that point, the UK doesn't have to let the nuke off- once the Unionists and Loyalists are talking, the UK just needs to withdraw it's troops- under the cover that they still don't give a shit about civilians, but it's a bad idea to nuke your own troops.
Now, this may equally be the fault of a succession of Tory governments, but the thing you have to recall is that throughout the most recent spate of troubles (which began in the late '60s, but really kicked off following Bloody Sunday in 1972), the UK policy was "We shall never negotiate with terrorists". As soon as an organisation was found to have terrorist links, they were essentially out of any discussion.
Yes, that doesn't work either. It's neither surrender nor genocide.
The problem here is that every damn organisation which was complaining about the situation in NI had terrorist links.
Yep. Which is why they should have simply withdrawn- and let the people in NI sort it out.
Beyond that, the UK and the Republic of Ireland have been trying to broker a peace between the Unionists and the Loyalists, with varying degrees of success. It seems fairly quiet right now, and the IRA has "officially" declared that it's given up on violence - though if history teaches us anything, it suggests that this peace won't last forever.
If the UK withdraws support from the Unionists, and the RI withdraws support from the IRA, they'll still fight- but eventually they'll die and the Southern Irish will be able to resettle the northern six counties. There's no need at all for the UK to be there anymore.
The 9/11 terrorists were all legitimately in the US.
Only if you think leaving 3/4ths of the form blank is a valid Visa application- or that it's legal to issue Visas to people on FBI watch lists. Apparently the INS in 2001 agreed with you- but I most certainly didn't. I'm the type of guy who supports the idea of machine gun nests with overlapping fields of fire on the Northern and Southern borders.
The 7/7 bombers in the UK were all legitimately here, and in many cases had been for some years. Are you suggesting we round up every single Muslim the world over?
At this point, I don't see that we have any choice in the matter. We either do this, or we might as well surrender now, give up democracy and install a Calphate in London and Washington DC and start charging poll taxes on Christians and Jews.
It's precisely this "STFU and do as we bloody well tell you or we'll send the army in, you see if we don't!" attitude that had Saddam Hussein applauding the 9/11 terrorists, that has made the short, simple "get into Iraq, topple Hussein, sort them out with a democratic government, get out" the long drawn-out affair it's turning into and that has resulted in the likes of North Korea becoming less and less co-operative with the UN.
Actually, no- it isn't. The current status quo is to just talk, or maybe fight a limited, conventional war here and there. I'm saying the proper way to deal with North Korea would be to turn South Korea into an Island- and then it doesn't matter because there IS no North Korea to become "less and less co-operative with the UN." Similarly, I see no other solution to Islamic Terrorism than to eliminate Islam from the world.
If they thought Israel had given up and was seriously considering simply annihilating them completely, would they have elected Hamas?
I think Hamas was elected more due to the corruption of Fatah than anything else- kind of like in America, during a recession whoever's in power gets voted out. Too many failed promises will lead any government to failure.
The Reformers definitely did *not* mean by "Sola Scriptura", "the right of every man to define scripture for themselves." If they had, then they would have accepted the Anabaptist movements and even would have had no real argument against the Catholic apologists.
Agreed- though the Anabaptists WERE eventually accepted (the Congregationalists are the modern form of this) and many have no problem when faced with Catholic Apologetics today. My analogy holds- much as bin Laden has lost control of the Jihad once he started preaching that anybody can declare a Jihad, the Reformers soon lost control of the Reformation- resulting in the 32,000+ Christian denominations that exist today.
For Luther and Calvin, "Sola Scriptura" meant that Scripture alone -- not even the individual's conscience -- was the supreme authority in matters of faith and doctrine. The *interpretation* of Scripture was still carried out in community, with considerable deference given to the church fathers.
True- but in practice it quickly became (well, by the third generation of schisms) individual interpretation of scripture- and even for that matter, individual interpretation of the scriptures an individual knows about (which for modern American Christian Fundamentalists, seems to be about as much of the Bible as the Islamic Jihadists know of the Koran, 20-30 individual verses taken out of context).
A really good work on this exact topic is The Shape of Sola Scriptura by Keith Mathison.
I've read it- it's too bad he didn't include that infamous quote of Luther, who saw how the teaching was being deformed even within his lifetime "Ev'ry scullery maid her own Pope".
You know, this is a lot more on topic than you think- there's a hell of a lot of parallelism between what Sola Scriptura was meant vs what it became; and the current Islamic Reformation. The original Moslems are "People of the Book"- either no interpretation at all, or interpretation centered in a few schools of thought among the clerics. bin Laden's group is more like your average Televangelist- he's got an ulterior motive and he's preaching Koran at us in support of that motive.
And yet from the evidence it would seem that airliners, semtex, AK47s and the internet did. Go figure.
Such wonders can be owned by the Caliphate, no problem under Islamic law. A corporation is different from these other inventions- it's an artificial person given special rights under the government, and requires law to exist. In the United States, a corporation has rights that citizens do not.
So when some white guy assaults me, you and your family members should have the crap kicked out of you all to discourage him?
If that white guy was a cop and my cousin, and my entire family are members of the KKK- YES. It's the only way to stop that kind of behavior.
What's that? His actions are nothing to do with you?
If he's a member of my family, and we raised him with a racist faith, and we let him become a cop instead of putting him in a mental institution, it has *everything* to do with us.
But of course all of the families living in Mecca are responsible for the actions of twenty or thirty people who between them crashed the planes on 11th September, let off the July bombs in London and the train bombing in Madrid. It's that confused and racist thinking (basing your treatment of people on their race rather than their actions), that leads to things like invading Iraq in the "War on Terror" when the great evil Al Quaeda actually were enemies of Saddam's regime. And they were no doubt rejoicing to see him fall and the country (formerly secular for all that it was a dictatorship) opened up to becoming a theocracy and it's people hating the USA.
Actually, no- the invasion of Iraq had almost nothing to do with 9-11, and EVERYTHING to do with the oil for food scandal (not so much that it was going on, but it was being conducted in Euros instead of US$). The connection to terrorists happened only after Saddam Hussein was already out of power.
You're attitude is ultimately an all or nothing extermination of other races.
Actually, it's a peacefull planet- after the extermination of all of those troublesome human beings.
And if that were ever achieved.
It's been possible since 1965.
The remaining callous survivors would surely find some other way to divide themselves into groups that can go to war against each other.
There are no survivors of nuclear fire to divide themselves into groups.
Because if a few minor physiological differences are sufficient to justify lumping millions of people into the same category, then I'm sure there are other genetic differences that could be used. It's all about power.
Yes, it is- and that search for power means the end of the world populated by human beings.
And if the whole world became white, that need to be in control wouldn't vanish because racial unity only exists in the presence of other races. So the same cycle begins again.
At this point, that isn't even a choice- the whites no longer have replacement population growth, and haven't for several decades now.
Only this time, there's a bit less of the World, and bit less cultural variety to be wiped out, 'cause it's already been nuked or exterminated.
And eventually it will all be exterminated- because human beings are not capable of self-government.
By the way, if you think your "us and them" division isn't racial, but is based on religious belief and is only co-inicidentally racist for historical reasons, then you really need to get to know more muslims. "They" are not a they, anymore than you and Bush or Putin or Britney or Hitler or Trotsky are a homogenous group of believers.
Actually, I consider all four of those to be a homogenous group of believers- believers in something that Islam has been missing for several centuries now. Look for what those four have in common- and what Islam currently lacks- and you'll see what I mean. In fact, bin Laden accidentally introduced this to Islam- in a fashion almost as twisted as Hitler himself- and it's now out of his control.
That one thing is that MANKIND HAS THE RIGHT TO INTERPRET MORALITY FOR HIMSELF. It's a very dangerous belief. For the most part- 9/10 people- they have no problem with this belief. But it's that 1/10th of humanity who think they're better than everybody else that causes the problem. And I'm convinced we're now at t
Well, that's the problem with Sola Scriptura. It was a problem during the Christian Protestant Reformation, and it's a problem with the Islamic Reformation. Once you allow people like bin Laden to declare Jihad, it's his version of scripture that counts, not the version taught by more moderate schools of Islamic thought. And since HIS version is genocidal, your only choice is to convert to his version or die, same as anybody else. That's why the Wahhabists consider other muslims to be Infidels.
In other words, I've got a much better handle on this than most Moslems do- because they can't imagine that the Justice of God would come at the muzzle of a gun or the point of a sword. Just as the stupid Christians think they can overcome a genocidal attack with prayer.
The UK couldn't say "put YOUR historical differences behind you" as we were the party the IRA was opposed to. We were in talks with Sinn Feinn (for want of a better word, the "politically correct", not-blowing-everyone-up branch of the IRA) for years, but it never achieved anything because for years neither us nor Sinn Feinn were prepared to concede any ground, and we had polar viewpoints.
The IRA hadn't had diametrically opposed point of view to the UK since the 1900s- there was no need left to keep up the occupation of Ireland and there is no real reason left to keep up the occupation of Northern Ireland today. The strategic value that Cornwall invaded Ireland for (as a buffer against Spain) is long gone. All that was left for the UK was a negotiated withdrawl- and being big brother smash flat would have gone a long way to getting the holdouts (the Ulstermen) to the table.
Who's "They"? If we're talking about the Islamic extremists, the main reason they've taken it upon themselves to declare the Western world (and in particular, the US and allies) to be fair targets is because they don't like US foreign policy.
Yes, but the reason has become eclipsed by their own rhetoric. To get the common man to fight, they had to bring back the idea of Jihad- and in a twist worthy of Martin Luther Himself, Sola Scriptura (the right of every man to define scripture for themselves). The original reasons don't matter anymore- all that is left is the hatred.
They're hardly going to start liking US foreign policy if every time they have a minor victory somewhere in the world, the US response is to march over to the middle east and overthrow an existing government there. There are enough Muslims in the world today that if only 0.05% worldwide embrace violence (a significantly larger number than are now), the US is going to be playing a global game of Whack-a-Mole.
And we're stuck that way- the only thing we can do is make the Whack-a-Mole more efficient by using a bigger hammer. Whack-a-Mole is an easy game if you use a sheet of plywood instead of the hammer- same thing here. bin Laden and al Qaida is no more in control than the guy who lights the fuse on a stick of dynamite- and a rather short fuse at that.
On top of that, a number of nations which are likely to be at least slightly sympathetic to Islamic extremists (purely because they're likely to be sympathetic to any viewpoint that isn't pro-US) are within easy nuking distance of US allies. The US might have trouble retaining allies when North Korea is threatening to nuke anyone within range who proclaims US loyalty.
Given current US trade balances- we might be better off without those so-called "allies". But I'd be willing to bet that if we became a global version of North Korea- and we can, there is currently a US nuclear submarine within range of every square inch of habitable land on the planet, and we've got the GPS targeting computers neccessary to surgically target a square inch of land- there would be no shortage of allies. Because in the end, it's the same equation- but North Korea can only hit 7 targets without a large amount of manufacturing- where the US can hit 7000 and still have warheads left over.
Yeah, but if it wasn't for them, it'd be something else. Corporate ethics reached the tipping point in the 1960s- for my entire life rights has not been what our government has been about, but rather the restriction of competition and the destruction of the market under it's own weight.
I would say that the biggest problem Israel has is that the US restrains it from attacking its enemies. So, all that we get is a frustrating deadlock when Israel has the power to flatten all who attack it.
Israel doesn't *have* to pay attention to the US- their economy is stronger than the United States currently. They choose to self-restrain; in part because they want to be able to settle the Palestinian territories, in part because they view themselves as somehow *better* than their enemies. But that better is weakness.
I would expect that the wholsale depopulation of Gaza, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights with NO subsequent settlement would send the proper message- and end Hamas entirely.
I fully expect most of my Democratic priviledges to slowly dissapear in an effort to end terrorism, actually... Hooray for voting by party instead of voting by qualification.:(
It's entirely possible, but it's not in the best interests of the oligarchy to do away with human-created law just yet, thus the conflict. You see, in Islamic theology, there is only one allowable author of law: Allah, who preaches it through his prophet Mohammed. This law was written a long time ago and no changes to it are possible, or even considered a good idea. That's significantly *NOT* good for the corporate oligarchy- who needs to be able to bribe politicians to change law to prevent competitors from eating into their market share. Thus- while democratic priviledges might disappear, this will do nothing to end terrorism, because the main beef the terrorists have with corporatism has nothing to do with how laws get changed, but rather IF they get changed at all. Large corporations are not possible under Koranic law, because they didn't exist when Mohammed was alive, thus they cannot be given government approval now. That's why you have, instead of a stock market, a few rich family names in Saudi Arabia who own everything.
Which served the UK so well when we had the IRA blowing something up every 6-9 months at the height of the troubles.
Really? I don't remember the UK nuking Ulster....
What they cared about was Northern Ireland becoming free of UK rule - presumably it would then have come under the auspices of Eire. Blowing up Northern Ireland (or, for that matter, the Republic of Ireland) would simply have sent out a great big message to any remaining Irish saying "We don't care about you, we don't care about civilian casualties, we just want control of that bit of land". By the same token, we couldn't abandon Northern Ireland unilaterally, as there was another group (the Ulster Unionists) who wanted to remain part of Great Britain and had no problem with retaliating against the IRA.
Exactly- that message is basically what we want to send to the Arab States. Because unlike Northern Ireland- where the Ulster Unionists would have wanted to live as much as the IRA did, and if it had become clear that the UK had a "put your historical differences behind you and make peace, or we will make the peace of the grave" mentality the talks would have started *much* earlier- I doubt that even this will make the Arabs come to the table. The *only* thing they will accept is total victory- or total loss. We *will* have to turn the desert into glass to end this- the only question is when will we figure that out?
Ahhhhhh so *thats* what Israel has been up to all this time... I thought it was a 'terrorist state' already but this sheds more light on the situation.
The problem is that the Israelis, like everbody else in the modern world, has gotten out of the practice of real terrorism. Otherwise they would have taken a lesson from their own experience in the 1940s and cranked up the gas chambers by now.
Im not suggesting that this is always the way to go. However I think it would be a more positive step to allow some other hope for people who firmly beleive that their only option to fight back is to wire exoplosives to themselves and walk into crowed cafes or crash airliners into large, occupied skyscrapers. There will always be nutter prepared to do this for their cause... but the nutters need a support network. A support network involves money and people. The IRA got into trouble when their US fundign started drying up. But there were still nutter to blow stuff up. Its because the animosity and hatred become an instituion. Its viewed as a good thing to hate the english/americans/whoever.
Hope of what? The current wish is for a world-wide caliphate under Islamic law providing the Justice of Allah. Are you willing to give up democracy to end terrorism? It's certainly a way to go.
The IRA merely wanted Ireland- and since the war with Spain ended, Ireland's usefullness as strategic property has been gone, it was easy to give the IRA what they wanted. Are you really willing to give Allah your support to the extent of censoring anything that isn't in the Koran?
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Where do you figure that from? Maybe I'm missing something, but this is news to me. Devolution means more local government. It doesn't mean complete independence from the UK and it doesn't mean reunification of Ireland. I'm not saying that will never happen, but I don't think it's gonna happen anytime soon. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation, the majority of people in NI are 'loyalists' and want to remain in the UK... that probably isn't going to change anytime soon, and like it or not there would probably be a whole other lot of terrorists bombing Dublin if Ireland were united.
I see it because Devolution means more people from the South will move in- and the minority will be loyalists rather soon. As for terrorists bombing Dublin- well, they did that 400 years ago as well. Same set of terrorists as far as I'm concerned. If they want to be a part of England that much, let them move back to Scotland where they came from.
We'll see if the meek can avoid the nuclear fire....
Yep- that's the idea. Though I'd think more like 1600 years or so- you've also got to break the west off of stupid fossil fuels.
Except that most of them have lived in Ireland for generations, and aren't about to be told to leave by some jumped up bloke in a balaclava who thinks he's Mr. Almighty because he can get hold of explosives.
Then they've got a serious problem with history- because they haven't lived there that many generations. And how they got there was by terrorism to begin with- which makes them terrorists in my book.
But not eradicating Christianity altogether? Why not? How do you know that Christian fundamentalists form the minority? Or how to tell a fundamentalist from a non-fundamentalist?
Actually, there are some pretty basic rules. Unlike Islam, you see, Christianity has a single head- the Pope or Patriarch, depending on the sect- and a Code of Canon Law that separates out the Sola Scriptura fundamentalists from the older sects.
And the Muslims who aren't fundamentalists don't give a shit about Mecca. They know that Islam is more than a city or a book.
wut. What war with spain? The last time the UK was at war with spain was, christ, the 18th century?
Yep, that's exactly right- there has been NO need for the UK to control Ireland since the 18th century. ALL of the rest has been human rights violations.
Ireland was never useful as a strategic property, unless you planned to invade the US or something.
Wrong. During the Reformation, when England went Protestant, a very real fear was that the Catholic Spanish Armada would use Catholic Ireland as a steping stone to attack England. To prevent that, Cornwall invaded Ireland, and used Scotish Presbyterian settlers to kick the Irish off their land. ALL of the "troubles" can be traced to that invasion.
And the IRA only fought over the north; the south, and vast majority, is completely free.
You don't think the IRA started in 1921 do you? No, they've been around since the 1700s.
And it still remains in UK hands, so the IRA didn't get what they wanted.
Actually, the UK is negotiating a date to hand it over- and the IRA already got an election out of the deal.
Ah, but here you have the main problem. The Unionists and the Loyalists did have strongly opposing views and historically haven't been prepared to concede any ground. Left to their own devices, there would probably be all-out civil war before long.
As long as it doesn't cross the channel, or spill down into Southern Ireland, who cares if the Ulsterites smash up their own town?
I sincerely doubt it. There's still a large enough group of Unionists to not only cause trouble, but to have sex and make babies.
Yeah, but if the IRA are bombing those babies, there won't be many that grow up, will there?
The Irish problem has existed in one form or another since the 1600's. To expect it to die in one generation is optimistic in the extreme.
The only "problem" is occupation of a foreign nation by England long after the original reasons for the occuptation have been rectified. There's no reason left for the Unionists to hang on, other than to waste English taxpayer money.
Why should incompetence on the part of a US government department be taken out on the rest of the world?
If the US government was competent, we would have cut off OPEC without a penney back in 1974 and developed celulose ethanol back then (it's not like we didn't know about jungle rot turning cotton into sugar- that was discovered back in the 1940s).
I've never even clapped eyes on a US Visa form - the closest I've seen is the "temporary visitors visa" they're issuing now at airports. Have you actually read one of those? It asks, straight up, "Are you planning on any terrorist activities? Tick Yes: No: ", along with a number of other equally inane questions.
Yep, I've not only seen those, I've seen JPG scans of what the 9/11 hijackers turned in. They uniformly refused to answer that question- and most others. In fact all they did was write in their names for the most part. Of course, from my point of view, if we had a competant government, nobody would be allowed across the border at all- it's pretty easy to see that globalization has been a losing proposition for the United States.
However, the biggest mistake it makes is that it assumes someone who's serious about waging an attack on US soil will either A: answer honestly or B: not have a properly planned alibi in advance.
I guess the sad part is that the 9/11 terrorists all seemed to fall into category B- AND WERE LET IN ANYWAY, down to the point of Mohammed Atta being granted a student visa in March 2002- six months after the attack.
But there also exist radical Christians - who consider it perfectly acceptable to blow up abortion clinics. Should we round up Christians too?
I personally support the raiding of fundamentalist Christian churches for such people. Anybody who thinks they're supporting the right to life by taking that right away from doctors is somebody I'd turn in myself if I met them at Church.
How about groups like animal rights campaigners who attack vivisection laboratories?
Yep, them too.
Round up everyone who's shown a sympathetic attitude towards animals?
And especially the vegetarians.....stupid idiots who don't know the food chain.
All 1 billion followers of Islam, including the 99.99% who would never even consider strapping Semtex to themselves then going for a walk in a crowded city?
How sure are you? I'd suggest we start with the 100,000 followers of the myth of the Islamic Nation and Personal Jihad, and the 10,000 clerics who preach hate to them.
Really? This can't be done overnight, and while you're in the process of doing it, you're creating an excellent recruitment campaign for the hardline terrorists.
Which is why you start with nuking Mecca- something you CAN do overnight that sends a message that Allah either doesn't exist or hates Moslems.
Northern Ireland is still part of the United Kingdom because ~99% of voters voted that way in the referendum, the majority feel it is in their interests both culturally and economically not to join with the rest of Ireland.
My point had nothing to do with referendums. Or even for that matter modern interests. It had to do with the UK's interest in Ireland to begin with- as a military buffer against Spain during the Protestant Reformation.
Not that Americans who've sponsored the terrorists have bothered with trivial details ("Hey I'm a 1/16th Irish you know! A United Ireland is what you want you say, people struggling against an oppressive English regime? Sure have some money to blow up children in Scotland to further your case!").
Doesn't matter one whit. If Ulster was flattened, there'd be nothing left to fight over.
The "Brute Force and Ignorance" approach you suggested would only have served to punish the majority of the population, who did not in the least support the terrorists, or the small number that voted in favour of independence.
They still have the choice of moving back to England- or to Southern Ireland. If they don't support the terrorists, they no longer need to be in Northern Ireland.
Withdrawing to please the minority, and to fuck over the the vast majority of the population who are more aligned culturally and economically with the UK than with a much more rural Southern Ireland?
For the UK that's a loss- supporting a foreign colony that doesn't need to be there any more from a strategic standpoint.
The majority who don't want to be in the Euro (and who won't even get a vote in the matter - unless those of us on the mainland) or have their economic fortunes tied to it, that don't want their legislation to be heavily influenced by lobbying from the Roman Catholic church (e.g. divorce was only legalised 10 years ago, abortions are still illegal) and that don't want to be generally fucked over over by what - in the nicest possible way - is still a culturally and economically a more "backward" (for want of a better word) nation.
Then those people should move back to Scotland where their ancestors came from.
The majority who don't want to be in the Euro (and who won't even get a vote in the matter - unless those of us on the mainland) or have their economic fortunes tied to it, that don't want their legislation to be heavily influenced by lobbying from the Roman Catholic church (e.g. divorce was only legalised 10 years ago, abortions are still illegal) and that don't want to be generally fucked over over by what - in the nicest possible way - is still a culturally and economically a more "backward" (for want of a better word) nation.
And that's worth keeping what is essentially a foreign colony on the island, at great expense to the British Taxpayer?
If the inhabitants of Northern Ireland *wanted* unification, they'd be supported by the government fully (those of us in the UK don't mind in the least - it's entirely their business), but they don't, and for very good reason (more so now than ever given the introduction of the Euro).
Then they should stop the occupation and move back to England/Scotland where they belong.
[ FWIW, for those that are interested, I'm generally in favour of a United Ireland and of a single currency in Europe, I'm just not in favour of screwing over the inhabitants of Northern Ireland to impose either of them. ]
Well, neither am I- the crown should offer them land in Scotland to pay them back for Cromwell's Folly.
That implies that existing roundabout way back, like, whenever is a necessary condition for being acceptable to our ham-dodging, turbanned neighbours.
With respect to matters of LAW, this is correct.
Now, apparently, it (that's to say very very prior art) isn't needed, so long as the thing is nationalise.
Wrong property. What you should have said is "So long as the thing is an object that has no force of law".
You misunderstood the essential difference. You listed physical inventions- the Koran has no problem with the advancement of SCIENCE. Corporations are not an invention- they are an artifact of LAW, and the Koran has a specific problem with the advancement of LAW. In other words, there's an essential difference between a corporation and an airliner- one is an artificial legal person, the other is a physical object. Corporations don't really exist outside of the law- outside of the contracts that give them life. They are a legal myth. And since all law was written in the Koran, and given by the Prophet Mohammed to the people, one cannot have law that contradicts the Koran.
Similar. General Titus started with a 1:500 ratio, and ended with selling the Jews into slavery, reducing Jerusalem to rubble "Not one stone upon another", and sowing the fields with salt to prevent the growing of grain and thus resettlement of the area. My method would do all of this with a single stroke, except for I don't need no slaves and would settle for a 1:250000 ratio instead.
The Irish Republic has only existed in its current form since 1921. And the IRA in its current form has only existed since 1969. "Threatening to blow up" Northern Ireland would quite likely have united the Unionists and the Loyalists all right - against the UK. And it's not generally held to be a good idea to nuke a country that's only about 100 miles away.
Ah, but you see, the key is that at that point, the UK doesn't have to let the nuke off- once the Unionists and Loyalists are talking, the UK just needs to withdraw it's troops- under the cover that they still don't give a shit about civilians, but it's a bad idea to nuke your own troops.
Now, this may equally be the fault of a succession of Tory governments, but the thing you have to recall is that throughout the most recent spate of troubles (which began in the late '60s, but really kicked off following Bloody Sunday in 1972), the UK policy was "We shall never negotiate with terrorists". As soon as an organisation was found to have terrorist links, they were essentially out of any discussion.
Yes, that doesn't work either. It's neither surrender nor genocide.
The problem here is that every damn organisation which was complaining about the situation in NI had terrorist links.
Yep. Which is why they should have simply withdrawn- and let the people in NI sort it out.
Beyond that, the UK and the Republic of Ireland have been trying to broker a peace between the Unionists and the Loyalists, with varying degrees of success. It seems fairly quiet right now, and the IRA has "officially" declared that it's given up on violence - though if history teaches us anything, it suggests that this peace won't last forever.
If the UK withdraws support from the Unionists, and the RI withdraws support from the IRA, they'll still fight- but eventually they'll die and the Southern Irish will be able to resettle the northern six counties. There's no need at all for the UK to be there anymore.
The 9/11 terrorists were all legitimately in the US.
Only if you think leaving 3/4ths of the form blank is a valid Visa application- or that it's legal to issue Visas to people on FBI watch lists. Apparently the INS in 2001 agreed with you- but I most certainly didn't. I'm the type of guy who supports the idea of machine gun nests with overlapping fields of fire on the Northern and Southern borders.
The 7/7 bombers in the UK were all legitimately here, and in many cases had been for some years. Are you suggesting we round up every single Muslim the world over?
At this point, I don't see that we have any choice in the matter. We either do this, or we might as well surrender now, give up democracy and install a Calphate in London and Washington DC and start charging poll taxes on Christians and Jews.
It's precisely this "STFU and do as we bloody well tell you or we'll send the army in, you see if we don't!" attitude that had Saddam Hussein applauding the 9/11 terrorists, that has made the short, simple "get into Iraq, topple Hussein, sort them out with a democratic government, get out" the long drawn-out affair it's turning into and that has resulted in the likes of North Korea becoming less and less co-operative with the UN.
Actually, no- it isn't. The current status quo is to just talk, or maybe fight a limited, conventional war here and there. I'm saying the proper way to deal with North Korea would be to turn South Korea into an Island- and then it doesn't matter because there IS no North Korea to become "less and less co-operative with the UN." Similarly, I see no other solution to Islamic Terrorism than to eliminate Islam from the world.
If they thought Israel had given up and was seriously considering simply annihilating them completely, would they have elected Hamas?
I think Hamas was elected more due to the corruption of Fatah than anything else- kind of like in America, during a recession whoever's in power gets voted out. Too many failed promises will lead any government to failure.
The Reformers definitely did *not* mean by "Sola Scriptura", "the right of every man to define scripture for themselves." If they had, then they would have accepted the Anabaptist movements and even would have had no real argument against the Catholic apologists.
Agreed- though the Anabaptists WERE eventually accepted (the Congregationalists are the modern form of this) and many have no problem when faced with Catholic Apologetics today. My analogy holds- much as bin Laden has lost control of the Jihad once he started preaching that anybody can declare a Jihad, the Reformers soon lost control of the Reformation- resulting in the 32,000+ Christian denominations that exist today.
For Luther and Calvin, "Sola Scriptura" meant that Scripture alone -- not even the individual's conscience -- was the supreme authority in matters of faith and doctrine. The *interpretation* of Scripture was still carried out in community, with considerable deference given to the church fathers.
True- but in practice it quickly became (well, by the third generation of schisms) individual interpretation of scripture- and even for that matter, individual interpretation of the scriptures an individual knows about (which for modern American Christian Fundamentalists, seems to be about as much of the Bible as the Islamic Jihadists know of the Koran, 20-30 individual verses taken out of context).
A really good work on this exact topic is The Shape of Sola Scriptura by Keith Mathison.
I've read it- it's too bad he didn't include that infamous quote of Luther, who saw how the teaching was being deformed even within his lifetime "Ev'ry scullery maid her own Pope".
You know, this is a lot more on topic than you think- there's a hell of a lot of parallelism between what Sola Scriptura was meant vs what it became; and the current Islamic Reformation. The original Moslems are "People of the Book"- either no interpretation at all, or interpretation centered in a few schools of thought among the clerics. bin Laden's group is more like your average Televangelist- he's got an ulterior motive and he's preaching Koran at us in support of that motive.
And yet from the evidence it would seem that airliners, semtex, AK47s and the internet did. Go figure.
Such wonders can be owned by the Caliphate, no problem under Islamic law. A corporation is different from these other inventions- it's an artificial person given special rights under the government, and requires law to exist. In the United States, a corporation has rights that citizens do not.
So when some white guy assaults me, you and your family members should have the crap kicked out of you all to discourage him?
If that white guy was a cop and my cousin, and my entire family are members of the KKK- YES. It's the only way to stop that kind of behavior.
What's that? His actions are nothing to do with you?
If he's a member of my family, and we raised him with a racist faith, and we let him become a cop instead of putting him in a mental institution, it has *everything* to do with us.
But of course all of the families living in Mecca are responsible for the actions of twenty or thirty people who between them crashed the planes on 11th September, let off the July bombs in London and the train bombing in Madrid. It's that confused and racist thinking (basing your treatment of people on their race rather than their actions), that leads to things like invading Iraq in the "War on Terror" when the great evil Al Quaeda actually were enemies of Saddam's regime. And they were no doubt rejoicing to see him fall and the country (formerly secular for all that it was a dictatorship) opened up to becoming a theocracy and it's people hating the USA.
Actually, no- the invasion of Iraq had almost nothing to do with 9-11, and EVERYTHING to do with the oil for food scandal (not so much that it was going on, but it was being conducted in Euros instead of US$). The connection to terrorists happened only after Saddam Hussein was already out of power.
You're attitude is ultimately an all or nothing extermination of other races.
Actually, it's a peacefull planet- after the extermination of all of those troublesome human beings.
And if that were ever achieved.
It's been possible since 1965.
The remaining callous survivors would surely find some other way to divide themselves into groups that can go to war against each other.
There are no survivors of nuclear fire to divide themselves into groups.
Because if a few minor physiological differences are sufficient to justify lumping millions of people into the same category, then I'm sure there are other genetic differences that could be used. It's all about power.
Yes, it is- and that search for power means the end of the world populated by human beings.
And if the whole world became white, that need to be in control wouldn't vanish because racial unity only exists in the presence of other races. So the same cycle begins again.
At this point, that isn't even a choice- the whites no longer have replacement population growth, and haven't for several decades now.
Only this time, there's a bit less of the World, and bit less cultural variety to be wiped out, 'cause it's already been nuked or exterminated.
And eventually it will all be exterminated- because human beings are not capable of self-government.
By the way, if you think your "us and them" division isn't racial, but is based on religious belief and is only co-inicidentally racist for historical reasons, then you really need to get to know more muslims. "They" are not a they, anymore than you and Bush or Putin or Britney or Hitler or Trotsky are a homogenous group of believers.
Actually, I consider all four of those to be a homogenous group of believers- believers in something that Islam has been missing for several centuries now. Look for what those four have in common- and what Islam currently lacks- and you'll see what I mean. In fact, bin Laden accidentally introduced this to Islam- in a fashion almost as twisted as Hitler himself- and it's now out of his control.
That one thing is that MANKIND HAS THE RIGHT TO INTERPRET MORALITY FOR HIMSELF. It's a very dangerous belief. For the most part- 9/10 people- they have no problem with this belief. But it's that 1/10th of humanity who think they're better than everybody else that causes the problem. And I'm convinced we're now at t
Well, that's the problem with Sola Scriptura. It was a problem during the Christian Protestant Reformation, and it's a problem with the Islamic Reformation. Once you allow people like bin Laden to declare Jihad, it's his version of scripture that counts, not the version taught by more moderate schools of Islamic thought. And since HIS version is genocidal, your only choice is to convert to his version or die, same as anybody else. That's why the Wahhabists consider other muslims to be Infidels.
In other words, I've got a much better handle on this than most Moslems do- because they can't imagine that the Justice of God would come at the muzzle of a gun or the point of a sword. Just as the stupid Christians think they can overcome a genocidal attack with prayer.
The UK couldn't say "put YOUR historical differences behind you" as we were the party the IRA was opposed to. We were in talks with Sinn Feinn (for want of a better word, the "politically correct", not-blowing-everyone-up branch of the IRA) for years, but it never achieved anything because for years neither us nor Sinn Feinn were prepared to concede any ground, and we had polar viewpoints.
The IRA hadn't had diametrically opposed point of view to the UK since the 1900s- there was no need left to keep up the occupation of Ireland and there is no real reason left to keep up the occupation of Northern Ireland today. The strategic value that Cornwall invaded Ireland for (as a buffer against Spain) is long gone. All that was left for the UK was a negotiated withdrawl- and being big brother smash flat would have gone a long way to getting the holdouts (the Ulstermen) to the table.
Who's "They"? If we're talking about the Islamic extremists, the main reason they've taken it upon themselves to declare the Western world (and in particular, the US and allies) to be fair targets is because they don't like US foreign policy.
Yes, but the reason has become eclipsed by their own rhetoric. To get the common man to fight, they had to bring back the idea of Jihad- and in a twist worthy of Martin Luther Himself, Sola Scriptura (the right of every man to define scripture for themselves). The original reasons don't matter anymore- all that is left is the hatred.
They're hardly going to start liking US foreign policy if every time they have a minor victory somewhere in the world, the US response is to march over to the middle east and overthrow an existing government there. There are enough Muslims in the world today that if only 0.05% worldwide embrace violence (a significantly larger number than are now), the US is going to be playing a global game of Whack-a-Mole.
And we're stuck that way- the only thing we can do is make the Whack-a-Mole more efficient by using a bigger hammer. Whack-a-Mole is an easy game if you use a sheet of plywood instead of the hammer- same thing here. bin Laden and al Qaida is no more in control than the guy who lights the fuse on a stick of dynamite- and a rather short fuse at that.
On top of that, a number of nations which are likely to be at least slightly sympathetic to Islamic extremists (purely because they're likely to be sympathetic to any viewpoint that isn't pro-US) are within easy nuking distance of US allies. The US might have trouble retaining allies when North Korea is threatening to nuke anyone within range who proclaims US loyalty.
Given current US trade balances- we might be better off without those so-called "allies". But I'd be willing to bet that if we became a global version of North Korea- and we can, there is currently a US nuclear submarine within range of every square inch of habitable land on the planet, and we've got the GPS targeting computers neccessary to surgically target a square inch of land- there would be no shortage of allies. Because in the end, it's the same equation- but North Korea can only hit 7 targets without a large amount of manufacturing- where the US can hit 7000 and still have warheads left over.
Yeah, but if it wasn't for them, it'd be something else. Corporate ethics reached the tipping point in the 1960s- for my entire life rights has not been what our government has been about, but rather the restriction of competition and the destruction of the market under it's own weight.
I would say that the biggest problem Israel has is that the US restrains it from attacking its enemies. So, all that we get is a frustrating deadlock when Israel has the power to flatten all who attack it.
Israel doesn't *have* to pay attention to the US- their economy is stronger than the United States currently. They choose to self-restrain; in part because they want to be able to settle the Palestinian territories, in part because they view themselves as somehow *better* than their enemies. But that better is weakness.
Never saw it- did it too borrow tactical information from General Titus's campaign to start the Diaspora of the Jews in 70 AD?
I would expect that the wholsale depopulation of Gaza, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights with NO subsequent settlement would send the proper message- and end Hamas entirely.
I fully expect most of my Democratic priviledges to slowly dissapear in an effort to end terrorism, actually... Hooray for voting by party instead of voting by qualification. :(
It's entirely possible, but it's not in the best interests of the oligarchy to do away with human-created law just yet, thus the conflict. You see, in Islamic theology, there is only one allowable author of law: Allah, who preaches it through his prophet Mohammed. This law was written a long time ago and no changes to it are possible, or even considered a good idea. That's significantly *NOT* good for the corporate oligarchy- who needs to be able to bribe politicians to change law to prevent competitors from eating into their market share. Thus- while democratic priviledges might disappear, this will do nothing to end terrorism, because the main beef the terrorists have with corporatism has nothing to do with how laws get changed, but rather IF they get changed at all. Large corporations are not possible under Koranic law, because they didn't exist when Mohammed was alive, thus they cannot be given government approval now. That's why you have, instead of a stock market, a few rich family names in Saudi Arabia who own everything.
Which served the UK so well when we had the IRA blowing something up every 6-9 months at the height of the troubles.
Really? I don't remember the UK nuking Ulster....
What they cared about was Northern Ireland becoming free of UK rule - presumably it would then have come under the auspices of Eire. Blowing up Northern Ireland (or, for that matter, the Republic of Ireland) would simply have sent out a great big message to any remaining Irish saying "We don't care about you, we don't care about civilian casualties, we just want control of that bit of land". By the same token, we couldn't abandon Northern Ireland unilaterally, as there was another group (the Ulster Unionists) who wanted to remain part of Great Britain and had no problem with retaliating against the IRA.
Exactly- that message is basically what we want to send to the Arab States. Because unlike Northern Ireland- where the Ulster Unionists would have wanted to live as much as the IRA did, and if it had become clear that the UK had a "put your historical differences behind you and make peace, or we will make the peace of the grave" mentality the talks would have started *much* earlier- I doubt that even this will make the Arabs come to the table. The *only* thing they will accept is total victory- or total loss. We *will* have to turn the desert into glass to end this- the only question is when will we figure that out?
That seems to be working rather well for Israel...
When did Israel nuke Mecca? Or start killing the families of known Hamas terrorists? Israel is almost as bad at this as the United States is.
Ahhhhhh so *thats* what Israel has been up to all this time... I thought it was a 'terrorist state' already but this sheds more light on the situation.
The problem is that the Israelis, like everbody else in the modern world, has gotten out of the practice of real terrorism. Otherwise they would have taken a lesson from their own experience in the 1940s and cranked up the gas chambers by now.
Im not suggesting that this is always the way to go. However I think it would be a more positive step to allow some other hope for people who firmly beleive that their only option to fight back is to wire exoplosives to themselves and walk into crowed cafes or crash airliners into large, occupied skyscrapers. There will always be nutter prepared to do this for their cause... but the nutters need a support network. A support network involves money and people. The IRA got into trouble when their US fundign started drying up. But there were still nutter to blow stuff up. Its because the animosity and hatred become an instituion. Its viewed as a good thing to hate the english/americans/whoever.
Hope of what? The current wish is for a world-wide caliphate under Islamic law providing the Justice of Allah. Are you willing to give up democracy to end terrorism? It's certainly a way to go.
The IRA merely wanted Ireland- and since the war with Spain ended, Ireland's usefullness as strategic property has been gone, it was easy to give the IRA what they wanted. Are you really willing to give Allah your support to the extent of censoring anything that isn't in the Koran?