Well, there is the possibility that Iraq could be used as a staging area for an Iran invasion.
Got to actually have peace before you can use Iraq for a staging area- and Bush is the best hope Iran has for keeping Iraq from gaining peace.
Two problems with that are that it wouldn't be an effective staging area if they can't get anything approaching stability, and that an Iran invasion would be a lot more significant than invading a country that was completely demoralized by 12 years of bombing, with poor infrastructure, and depleted uranium in saturating the air.
We'd better have a lot more troops on the ground, that's for sure. Either that, or forget the whole thing, pack up our bags, and come home- but Kerry won't do that and neither will Bush.
One of the potential trageties of the Iraq invasion is that Iran is on the verge of overthrowing their fascist theocracy, and now the religious wackos would probably take over Iraq if we withdrew at this point, and there is no sign of having real democracy in Iraq, only an attempt at a puppet dictatorship, which the Iraqis don't seem to be accepting.
There's a larger philosophical point though- Augustine's original just war theory. Is it moral at all to fight a battle between two countries on a third country's territory?
And if Iraq went to a Shiite theocracy, then they would probably become allies with Iran, dispite the Iran/Iraq war, and that might give the Mullahs in Iran enough leverage to stay in power, and so long secular democracy which they had stolen from them 50 years ago, and had almost recovered.
So no matter what Bush does, Iran wins. It's only if Kerry is smart enough to actually win a democracy in Iraq, that Iran loses.
You're fooling yourself if you think Kerry is a hawk.
And you're an idiot if you think Kerry's pre-9-11 voting record has anything more with his being a hawk than Bush's anti-military speeches during the 2000 campaign did.
The sad fact is that every plan Kerry's put forward so far is EXACTLY the plan that's already being executed.
Then where are the other 40,000 troops? Where is Germany, NATO, France?
The only difference Kerry seems to be offering is that he can magically "do it better."
Not if you actually LISTEN to him, which you obviously haven't.
Worse, Kerry has had 19 months now and lots of additional evidence to decide if and how he would have gone to war with Iraq. He still can't make up his mind on either subject even with the added time and information. It's pretty darn easy to be a Monday morning quarterback and Kerry still can't offer a plan for Iraq that's substantially different from what's already being done.
Then why does his website have a plan that is substantially different from what's already being done? Sorry, none of your post makes any sense at all.
hmmmmmm... i admit thers a strange logic to that point. Riding the tiger...
And because our ICBM technology is to the point that we don't need to use human pilots to drop bombs anymore, we don't actually need ANY TROOPS AT ALL IN THE MIDDLE EAST to Nuke everybody there....
Under the assumption that the US was able to sustain it's needs from domestic resources alone (note: I'm not talking about economy, but the fulfillment of basic needs of it's population), that would be a legit and moral superior solution.
If we're talking BASIC needs only- well, we've done it before and we could do it again if necessary.
But, and that's a BigBut(tm), I cant see no way the nation could uphold its current political system, killer arguement that its not going to happen - just too many depending on the daily money fix from the stock markets, the market depending on constant money insertions from abroad.
We'd lose our entire economic system, that's for sure. Have to return basically to a nation of substinence farmers with a lower energy usage signature for a while. It would be a sacrifice. But anybody who thinks that middle east oil is going to be available by the end of the war on terror is fooling themselves.
On that part about the world fighting it out; to your surprise it could turn out that its not going to happen, esspecially if the stream of american weapons stops flooding the arsenals of warlords and american corporations unable to pay their local mercenaries. Nowadays it's a really distant posibility that developed countries will engage in a full scale war against each other, so the only remaining danger indeed is that of failed states creating the climate for terrorism.
Which will of course attack Europe if the United States isn't a target anymore (and the kind of fortress America I'm talking about we wouldn't be- nobody would get more than 10 meters across the border alive).
Atm the prefered target is the US and thats hardly going to change just by a change of politics in the US quickly, so considering the fortress you propose can stand the siege...
It's simply a matter of creating the same kind of deadly robots that we've been using for sport- and equiping them with a simple "patrol these co-ordinates" programming and a GPS unit. Damned easy for our country to do.
it's still the US and terrorists fighting it out, but the nature of the fight is maybe changed. Whats also changed (and without any maybes) is the nature of the US as a nation to build that fortress, but many may consider it a minor change: from the land of the free to the land of the safe, hey but dont worry its still: this land is you're land.... duh.
Yeah, we'd be giving up a lot. The ability to enjoy a day at the beach (all the beaches would be patroled by said robots). The ability for any of us to actually go in the robot patroled zones ourselves without turning on the transponder. The ability of any of us to travel outside of the United States. But let's face it- the rest of the world detests us at this point in time and we can't do any of that NOW!
That's what you get when you surrender you're country to the corporate dickheads, a mess with little chance of a positive solution.
Which says NOTHING about him being in Iraq *before* we invaded.
ever since we blew up his terrorist traning camp in Afghanistan.
But not before we were in Iraq.
The vice president stated this the other day and I have yet to hear an uproar over it. I think you're confused.
I am to some extent- the claim that Zarqawi was in Iraq *before we invaded* is what I'm saying is false. I didn't hear the VP claim, but given the current VP, I wouldn't trust him to do my laundry let alone tell me the truth about Iraq.
This post gets a 4, Insightful. This is a testament to how messed up the/. moderation system has gotten. They need to do somethin about this bias. People caught modding up/down for political reasons aught to be deleted. This is just silly.
What is political about saying that we should be using a tried and proven strategy in the war on terror rather than what any of the current crop of candidates for President are saying? I've yet to hear a single presidental candidate even *try* to analyze the war on terror in historical terms, let alone in updating strategies that have worked against terrorism in the past.
The nuclear option comes from General Titus in 70 A.D. He didn't have nukes of course- he had bronze swords and salt- but he effectively killed 500 Zionist Zealots for every Centurion killed, destroyed Jerusalem, and sowed the fields with salt so that nothing could grow. The fact that we could do effectively the same thing in under 15 minutes today is just technological advance.
How does Kerry intend to get those 200,000 troops?
It's only 40,000 more than we have in Iraq right now- not 200,000 new troops.
Re-instate the draft?
That's what I think he'll do- he claims that better benefits will attract more people to the volunteer military- I say only if they're all idiots.
I thought I heard Kerry say we should reduce the number of troops, train more special forces.
Can you find a quote for that from the post 9-11 era? I can imagine him saying some such thing before 9-11; that was the period where everyone and their brother was saying that (I can find quotes from Bush during the 2000 debates that say the same thing).
From what I can tell Kerry says anything and everything.
Only if you're not listening to everything- that's the big problem with Kerry, you can't take a half a sentence out of context and have any hope of figuring out what he's saying.
If I had to guess
You don't have to guess- 9th grade English sentence deconstruction will get you there as long as you include all the words in the sentence.
I'd say Kerry will pull more troops out and hope the international community fills in for us (which they won't do and they have already stated this).
No- that's his secondary exit strategy. His primary strategy is to add 40,000 more troops to the mess that is already there.
This is similar to his strategy with North Korea, stop building the nuclear weapons and hope North Korea follows.
Can you people please get your story straight? Which is it: Bush is all bluster and no action, or a reckless cowboy who can't wait to fire the guns and can't be bothered with talking?
The sad part is that he's stupid enough to be both- the end result of his "can't wait to fire the guns and can't be bothered with talking" strategy is our army is being wasted on an enemy that hasn't invaded anybody within the last decade, and we've got nothing left for the real threats of terrorist countries who have already gained nukes. Speak Big and Carry a Soft Stick- or in the case of an army already stretched way too thin, no stick at all....
Then why the f*** does Kerry keep saying that this is the wrong war at the wrong time?
Because fighting this war, with limited resources, and the wrong strategy, IS the wrong war at the wrong time.
He CERTAINLY supported Bush's enterence into the war,
Yes
and he CERTAINLY criticizes him for it now.
No, he criticizes Bush for using the WRONG STRATEGY (the wrong war at the wrong time, not wrong to go to war in the first place). Which Kerry has expanded upon beyond belief- I kept falling asleep myself, and I agree with Kerry. You apparently fell asleep after the first phrase and never even heard the rest of the first sentence.
If you don't see that as an inconsistency, then you, my friend, are blind.
I've criticized Kerry on other inconsistencies before- abortion and his belief in the Separation of Church and State while being Catholic chief among them. But I'm sorry- this isn't an inconsistency at all once you figure out what Kerry is actually saying. It's the wrong war (instead of getting bin Laden first so that we'd have 200,000 troops to put into Iraq instead of splitting our focus) at the wrong time (before we had an exit strategy). What's so hard to figure out about that? What is so freakin' hard to figure out that the wrong war at the wrong time refers ONLY to the war and not to the goals of that war?
What I simply don't understand is how people can justify Kerry's vote to attack Iraq while at the same time justifying his current slamming of Bush for Bush's original decision to attack Iraq which Kerry supported. Why do Democrats refuse to see this as an inconsistency?
Because it isn't really an inconsistency at all. We had OTHER OPTIONS for battle plans. The one Kerry seems to support isn't much better- 200,000 troops instead of 160,000 may not have made that much difference- but at least it had an exit strategy. Kerry seems to think it could still be done, in fact. In other words, Kerry's opposition to our current situation in Iraq has nothing to do with going there in the first place and everything to do with tactics and strategy in HOW we went to Iraq. Kucinich would have had to win the Democratic Primary to actually have the Democrats put up an anti-war candidate. Kerry is just as hawkish as Bush is- just a smarter commandeer in chief is all.
Until now international polls show an overwhelming tendency against Bush, but in favor of the american ppl. Such comments definitely do a lot to change that... But I suppose, since the US are the only nation to have ever actualy used nuclear weapons(not to open that can of worms, but the rest of the world definitely remebers the rather dubious circumstances), that constitutes kinda monopoly. So, to summarize you propose to kill millions of innocent ppl of arabic origin. There are words for ppl like you : racist and nazi. How strange, that correlates to the view an increasing part of the world holds towards american policy.
Absolutely. Bush getting us into this war at all will lead us there- why not go all the way, get there a lot quicker, and finish off the rest of the world while we're at it?
Oh and let me assure you, the rest of the world would happily welcome a new american isolationism, esspecially if that means no more pre-emptive strikes and no more military securing of oil contracts...
Exactly, and thus that's the more moral solution, isn't it? Don't fight to begin with- solidify our own borders, create fortress America, stop importing and exporting until such a time that the rest of the world fights it all out. We'd still end up with a ruined economy (part of the problem of having a one-legged stool for an energy policy) but at least we'd still be moral, right?
Putting aside minor considerations like the insanity of anihilating ten time the number of people killed in the twins, SQUARED;
That's not insanity- that's just an expansion of the ratio General Titus used when dealing with Zionist Terror in 70 A.D. Say what you like about the genocide and diaspora of the Jews, it did prevent Zionist Terrorism from bothering the planet again until 1968.
the fact that almost all of them are innocent;
The theory behind the diaspora was that when you're dealing with religious based terrorism, nobody with national identity under that religion is entirely innocent. EVER. They're just potential replacement troops for the terrorists you're going to kill anyway.
ruining the world economy (all this oil gone);
Anybody who thinks we're going to get out of this with anything resembling the pre-9-11 economy is fooling themselves and everybody around them.
possibly causing nuclear winter; fallout carried into Russia, Europe and India; and various other such pesky issues.
They're as guilty as the rest of us for the fate of the middle east- so why the hell not?
And if that's not enough - *Israel*? Why would you want to nuke Israel after the twins?
If it wasn't for Zionist Expansionism, we would not have troops in the Middle East. If not for troops in the middle east, the twins falling would never have happened. Israel's insistance on existing at this point in time is one of two main reasons for the towers falling. The other is oil, and our need to prop up basically an evil and corrupt government that has been teaching their kids to hate us for a hundred years now.
It would have made more sense if you listed France. They also have tons of Muslems in the country. Come on, just between the two of us - you are itching for an excuse to nuke France. Admit it.
Isn't everybody? But the real answer here is- the fallout will take care of France. No need to nuke them directly- and the main message that JIHAD AND THE PRACTICE OF ISLAM WILL NO LONGER BE TOLERATED will have been sent quite adequately with the loss of every Holy City in the Koran and associated commentaries.
In short: You, sir, are a terrorist.
Of course- we become what we fight against or we lose. If there is any truism at all in human warfare once we leave the just war theory behind, it is that.
Yours is exactly the same mindset used by the terrorists who killed hundreds of school children because "their people have been wronged" and they wanted to "fight back" their "just war".
Completely correct. The only difference is, I'd win. You need to have the EXACT SAME mindset of your enemy, down to the last obsession, to win. Otherwise, as Ford tried to tell Slartibartfast about the Kricket Robots, they'll win- because they care and we simply don't.
Then again, I suppose any American deluded enough to call himself a "marxist hacker" isn't expected to be rational...
OTOH, what's your irrational reason for attempting to use limited warfare against an unjust enemy? Are you TRYING to create an entire generation of orphans for al Qaida to recruit?
0.30 x 0.70 == 0.21 chance (minimum, assuming no correlation) that you would believe both of these things siumultaneously. Probably higher with the moniker of "Marixst Hacker 42"
More that I believe the job market is a better indicator of the general health of the economy than the stock market. I'm perfectly willing, however, to agree that the stock market and other economic indicators are better now than they were a year ago- and FAR better now than at the official end of the general recession in November 2001. So no- I'm not in total agreement that the economy as a whole is worse off, only that the jobs market which is most people's personal economy has yet to recover (and is in fact on a very real downward sprial again at the moment-one that promises to destroy the holiday shopping season as average people struggle to pay heating oil bills on an unemployment check).
The real point is that you'd be likely to believe that both of these are false, without bothering to actually analyze either statement at all.
Yes- but closer to a technological version of General Titus's solution to the Zionist Terrorism of 70 A.D.- Kill 500 of theirs for every one of ours that dies, depopulate their lands and pollute them to the point that nobody can live there and prosper for a thousand years or more. Of course- he had to use swords, salt, plows, and slavery to accomplish the Jewish Diaspora. We can be MUCH more efficient with NUKES.
Exactly, Hillary left private industry in order to push a socialistic plan called " Universal Health Care Plan ".
Did she? Or did she PRETEND to leave private industry to push a FAKE socialist plan that left the HMOs in charge of EVERYTHING (just as Kerry's plan will)? That's not socialist, that's corporatist- and just as bad as Cheney starting a war so that his unexercised stock options in Haliburton will be worth more. There is NO difference between the fake conservativeism of the neocons and the fake socialism of the neolibs- the only difference at all is whose stock prices will be artificially inflated.
2nd thought- is it time to bring back "Thou shalt fight battles on YOUR OWN territory?" as part of the requirments of a Just War? That used to be in there back in the 400s- but it seems that Bush and the Iranian Mullahs haven't been reading St. Augustine lately.
And what better way to protect Iran, than to keep the United States fighting in Iraq? Funny- the Mullahs even have the same arguments as Bush (as in what better way to keep the terrorists busy than to have them fight us in Iraq instead of in New York City?)
This is true the upper echelons of the Republican party do not seem to share in the Libertarian view on government that most who call themselves Republican strive for.
Which means that the rank and file are being conned out of their votes- and should be voting Libertarian.
However to be fair, the Democratic parties leadership seems to be pushing to the Socialists viewpoint.
Really? Then why was Hillary Clinton, in 1993, willing to leave PRIVATE INDUSTRY in charge of her UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE PLAN? No, I see the Democratic party leadership pushing corporatism- it's the rank and file democrats who want socialism- and need to switch parties to one of the many socialist third parties.
Do we stick with the ideology that got us to where we are and switch parties?
We should stick with the ideology AND switch parties- because none of the neo* leadership on either side are going to promote the general welfare of you and me, only the power of the corporations to enslave everybody else.
the fact that over 70% of Kerry voters think the US economy is worse than a year ago (wha?!) is partisan too,
Depends on what you think the economy is- the fake dog and pony show called the stock market, or the jobs market adjusted for population increase. The first is better, the second is worse- and the general trend is for the first to continue getting better, and the second to get worse until we're in a depression.
30% think that Bush said Iraq was involved in 9-11
Did you listen to the 2002 State of the Union Address? He said SEVERAL TIMES that Iraq supported al Qaida in their attack on the United States- and was ready to provide a NUKE to al Qaida and that the smoking gun proof would be a "mushroom cloud in Manhattan".
Yes. The reason why is the same reason why he voted to attack Iraq, and why he supported Israel sending cruise missiles into Iraq back in 1994- Weapons of Mass Destruction. The big difference is that we've proven that Iran has a nuclear program that is close enough to completion to already have a small stockpile of warheads.
Fat chance. He favors sanctions, according to his answers in the debates. I'm sure Iran would rather have bill clinton back in the white house, let alone anti-war Kerry.
If you think that's all Kerry favors- then you haven't be listening to what Kerry has said, you've only been listening to the chopped up sound bytes that Bush has been putting into his anti-Kerry advertisements. You don't really think Kerry wants 40,000 more troops to just let them sit around waiting for sanctions to work, do you?
Everyone jumps on Bush for going into Iraq, even though a lot of the terrorists in Afghan traning camps went to Iraq before we went in there (Zarqawi).
You know what's really strange? That you still believe this even though this has been shown many times to be a lie told by a sycophant in the CIA to get promoted.
Now, people are crossing the border from Iran/Syria into Iraq and you're complaining that we aren't attacking Iran?
I'm not complaining about anything- my favored strategy in the war on terror would have Iran, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel, Jordan, and parts of Egypt glowing in the dark WITHIN 72 HOURS OF THE TOWERS FALLING. Anything short of that is a stupid waste of time and American lives- and might as well not have been done at all for all the terrorism it's going to stop.
Who do you think is gonna take action here? The anti-vietnam "hero"? Do you really want another war?
I think that anything short of either total nuclear annihilation or complete isolationism isn't going to win anybody anything- but that at least Kerry is smart enough to see when stuff doesn't work. NEITHER of the major party candidates are going to go for the two options that will work, so we might as well try a few other options that won't.
The Iran situation is not over yet, there may be a diplomatic conclusion, so don't start screaming for war yet.
Yeah, right- like diplomacy is any different than limited warfare when it comes to obsessed religious fundamentalists.
Yes, but that's the difference between Libertarians and the rest of the American Spectrum. Republicans, at least at the leadership level, are just as much for governments taking on a much broader role in everyday life and governing it's citzens rights as Democrats are- just look at the Patriot Act on the one side and the Welfare State on the other.
Both sides claim to be for small government, but when push comes to shove, both sides are for large government in the areas they care about.
Here's a reason why Iran would want Bush to stay in the White House- it gives them four more years of our mistakes in Iraq before we can free up the troops to attack them, and in the meantime it gives their suicide squads plenty of new recruits to send into Iraq to keep us fighting Shi'ites forever.
If the fake neoliberals actually had the tollerance they claim to have, they'd admit that it's a possibility that Bush supporters are actually LIVING IN A DIFFERENT UNIVERSE where Iraq had WMDs and shipped them all out to Syria before the war started.
After all, we each live in our own little world where we are always correct, right?
I too think that depletion of our planet's resources is a terrible thing that ought to be avoided. However, this is a gigantic planet. There are places on this globe where Man has yet to set foot, much less look upon with the naked eye.
Where? I'd love to colonize something- it's only when you move into new territory that you have freedom.
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Well, there is the possibility that Iraq could be used as a staging area for an Iran invasion.
Got to actually have peace before you can use Iraq for a staging area- and Bush is the best hope Iran has for keeping Iraq from gaining peace.
Two problems with that are that it wouldn't be an effective staging area if they can't get anything approaching stability, and that an Iran invasion would be a lot more significant than invading a country that was completely demoralized by 12 years of bombing, with poor infrastructure, and depleted uranium in saturating the air.
We'd better have a lot more troops on the ground, that's for sure. Either that, or forget the whole thing, pack up our bags, and come home- but Kerry won't do that and neither will Bush.
One of the potential trageties of the Iraq invasion is that Iran is on the verge of overthrowing their fascist theocracy, and now the religious wackos would probably take over Iraq if we withdrew at this point, and there is no sign of having real democracy in Iraq, only an attempt at a puppet dictatorship, which the Iraqis don't seem to be accepting.
There's a larger philosophical point though- Augustine's original just war theory. Is it moral at all to fight a battle between two countries on a third country's territory?
And if Iraq went to a Shiite theocracy, then they would probably become allies with Iran, dispite the Iran/Iraq war, and that might give the Mullahs in Iran enough leverage to stay in power, and so long secular democracy which they had stolen from them 50 years ago, and had almost recovered.
So no matter what Bush does, Iran wins. It's only if Kerry is smart enough to actually win a democracy in Iraq, that Iran loses.
You're fooling yourself if you think Kerry is a hawk.
And you're an idiot if you think Kerry's pre-9-11 voting record has anything more with his being a hawk than Bush's anti-military speeches during the 2000 campaign did.
The sad fact is that every plan Kerry's put forward so far is EXACTLY the plan that's already being executed.
Then where are the other 40,000 troops? Where is Germany, NATO, France?
The only difference Kerry seems to be offering is that he can magically "do it better."
Not if you actually LISTEN to him, which you obviously haven't.
Worse, Kerry has had 19 months now and lots of additional evidence to decide if and how he would have gone to war with Iraq. He still can't make up his mind on either subject even with the added time and information. It's pretty darn easy to be a Monday morning quarterback and Kerry still can't offer a plan for Iraq that's substantially different from what's already being done.
Then why does his website have a plan that is substantially different from what's already being done? Sorry, none of your post makes any sense at all.
hmmmmmm... i admit thers a strange logic to that point. Riding the tiger...
...
.... duh.
And because our ICBM technology is to the point that we don't need to use human pilots to drop bombs anymore, we don't actually need ANY TROOPS AT ALL IN THE MIDDLE EAST to Nuke everybody there....
Under the assumption that the US was able to sustain it's needs from domestic resources alone (note: I'm not talking about economy, but the fulfillment of basic needs of it's population), that would be a legit and moral superior solution.
If we're talking BASIC needs only- well, we've done it before and we could do it again if necessary.
But, and that's a BigBut(tm), I cant see no way the nation could uphold its current political system, killer arguement that its not going to happen - just too many depending on the daily money fix from the stock markets, the market depending on constant money insertions from abroad.
We'd lose our entire economic system, that's for sure. Have to return basically to a nation of substinence farmers with a lower energy usage signature for a while. It would be a sacrifice. But anybody who thinks that middle east oil is going to be available by the end of the war on terror is fooling themselves.
On that part about the world fighting it out; to your surprise it could turn out that its not going to happen, esspecially if the stream of american weapons stops flooding the arsenals of warlords and american corporations unable to pay their local mercenaries. Nowadays it's a really distant posibility that developed countries will engage in a full scale war against each other, so the only remaining danger indeed is that of failed states creating the climate for terrorism.
Which will of course attack Europe if the United States isn't a target anymore (and the kind of fortress America I'm talking about we wouldn't be- nobody would get more than 10 meters across the border alive).
Atm the prefered target is the US and thats hardly going to change just by a change of politics in the US quickly, so considering the fortress you propose can stand the siege
It's simply a matter of creating the same kind of deadly robots that we've been using for sport- and equiping them with a simple "patrol these co-ordinates" programming and a GPS unit. Damned easy for our country to do.
it's still the US and terrorists fighting it out, but the nature of the fight is maybe changed. Whats also changed (and without any maybes) is the nature of the US as a nation to build that fortress, but many may consider it a minor change: from the land of the free to the land of the safe, hey but dont worry its still: this land is you're land
Yeah, we'd be giving up a lot. The ability to enjoy a day at the beach (all the beaches would be patroled by said robots). The ability for any of us to actually go in the robot patroled zones ourselves without turning on the transponder. The ability of any of us to travel outside of the United States. But let's face it- the rest of the world detests us at this point in time and we can't do any of that NOW!
That's what you get when you surrender you're country to the corporate dickheads, a mess with little chance of a positive solution.
Exactly my point.
Zarqawi is in Iraq right now waging war on us,
/. moderation system has gotten. They need to do somethin about this bias. People caught modding up/down for political reasons aught to be deleted. This is just silly.
Which says NOTHING about him being in Iraq *before* we invaded.
ever since we blew up his terrorist traning camp in Afghanistan.
But not before we were in Iraq.
The vice president stated this the other day and I have yet to hear an uproar over it. I think you're confused.
I am to some extent- the claim that Zarqawi was in Iraq *before we invaded* is what I'm saying is false. I didn't hear the VP claim, but given the current VP, I wouldn't trust him to do my laundry let alone tell me the truth about Iraq.
This post gets a 4, Insightful. This is a testament to how messed up the
What is political about saying that we should be using a tried and proven strategy in the war on terror rather than what any of the current crop of candidates for President are saying? I've yet to hear a single presidental candidate even *try* to analyze the war on terror in historical terms, let alone in updating strategies that have worked against terrorism in the past.
The nuclear option comes from General Titus in 70 A.D. He didn't have nukes of course- he had bronze swords and salt- but he effectively killed 500 Zionist Zealots for every Centurion killed, destroyed Jerusalem, and sowed the fields with salt so that nothing could grow. The fact that we could do effectively the same thing in under 15 minutes today is just technological advance.
:-) I'm not always what my posts make me out to be- there's a separation of me and my words going on.
No- I'm saying that my post was, if anything, simply supporting Iran's viewpoint that Bush should be elected. It wasn't meant to be anti-anybody.
How does Kerry intend to get those 200,000 troops?
It's only 40,000 more than we have in Iraq right now- not 200,000 new troops.
Re-instate the draft?
That's what I think he'll do- he claims that better benefits will attract more people to the volunteer military- I say only if they're all idiots.
I thought I heard Kerry say we should reduce the number of troops, train more special forces.
Can you find a quote for that from the post 9-11 era? I can imagine him saying some such thing before 9-11; that was the period where everyone and their brother was saying that (I can find quotes from Bush during the 2000 debates that say the same thing).
From what I can tell Kerry says anything and everything.
Only if you're not listening to everything- that's the big problem with Kerry, you can't take a half a sentence out of context and have any hope of figuring out what he's saying.
If I had to guess
You don't have to guess- 9th grade English sentence deconstruction will get you there as long as you include all the words in the sentence.
I'd say Kerry will pull more troops out and hope the international community fills in for us (which they won't do and they have already stated this).
No- that's his secondary exit strategy. His primary strategy is to add 40,000 more troops to the mess that is already there.
This is similar to his strategy with North Korea, stop building the nuclear weapons and hope North Korea follows.
And don't forget those bilateral talks!
Can you people please get your story straight? Which is it: Bush is all bluster and no action, or a reckless cowboy who can't wait to fire the guns and can't be bothered with talking?
The sad part is that he's stupid enough to be both- the end result of his "can't wait to fire the guns and can't be bothered with talking" strategy is our army is being wasted on an enemy that hasn't invaded anybody within the last decade, and we've got nothing left for the real threats of terrorist countries who have already gained nukes. Speak Big and Carry a Soft Stick- or in the case of an army already stretched way too thin, no stick at all....
Then why the f*** does Kerry keep saying that this is the wrong war at the wrong time?
Because fighting this war, with limited resources, and the wrong strategy, IS the wrong war at the wrong time.
He CERTAINLY supported Bush's enterence into the war,
Yes
and he CERTAINLY criticizes him for it now.
No, he criticizes Bush for using the WRONG STRATEGY (the wrong war at the wrong time, not wrong to go to war in the first place). Which Kerry has expanded upon beyond belief- I kept falling asleep myself, and I agree with Kerry. You apparently fell asleep after the first phrase and never even heard the rest of the first sentence.
If you don't see that as an inconsistency, then you, my friend, are blind.
I've criticized Kerry on other inconsistencies before- abortion and his belief in the Separation of Church and State while being Catholic chief among them. But I'm sorry- this isn't an inconsistency at all once you figure out what Kerry is actually saying. It's the wrong war (instead of getting bin Laden first so that we'd have 200,000 troops to put into Iraq instead of splitting our focus) at the wrong time (before we had an exit strategy). What's so hard to figure out about that? What is so freakin' hard to figure out that the wrong war at the wrong time refers ONLY to the war and not to the goals of that war?
What I simply don't understand is how people can justify Kerry's vote to attack Iraq while at the same time justifying his current slamming of Bush for Bush's original decision to attack Iraq which Kerry supported. Why do Democrats refuse to see this as an inconsistency?
Because it isn't really an inconsistency at all. We had OTHER OPTIONS for battle plans. The one Kerry seems to support isn't much better- 200,000 troops instead of 160,000 may not have made that much difference- but at least it had an exit strategy. Kerry seems to think it could still be done, in fact. In other words, Kerry's opposition to our current situation in Iraq has nothing to do with going there in the first place and everything to do with tactics and strategy in HOW we went to Iraq. Kucinich would have had to win the Democratic Primary to actually have the Democrats put up an anti-war candidate. Kerry is just as hawkish as Bush is- just a smarter commandeer in chief is all.
Until now international polls show an overwhelming tendency against Bush, but in favor of the american ppl. Such comments definitely do a lot to change that... But I suppose, since the US are the only nation to have ever actualy used nuclear weapons(not to open that can of worms, but the rest of the world definitely remebers the rather dubious circumstances), that constitutes kinda monopoly. So, to summarize you propose to kill millions of innocent ppl of arabic origin. There are words for ppl like you : racist and nazi. How strange, that correlates to the view an increasing part of the world holds towards american policy.
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Absolutely. Bush getting us into this war at all will lead us there- why not go all the way, get there a lot quicker, and finish off the rest of the world while we're at it?
Oh and let me assure you, the rest of the world would happily welcome a new american isolationism, esspecially if that means no more pre-emptive strikes and no more military securing of oil contracts
Exactly, and thus that's the more moral solution, isn't it? Don't fight to begin with- solidify our own borders, create fortress America, stop importing and exporting until such a time that the rest of the world fights it all out. We'd still end up with a ruined economy (part of the problem of having a one-legged stool for an energy policy) but at least we'd still be moral, right?
Putting aside minor considerations like the insanity of anihilating ten time the number of people killed in the twins, SQUARED;
That's not insanity- that's just an expansion of the ratio General Titus used when dealing with Zionist Terror in 70 A.D. Say what you like about the genocide and diaspora of the Jews, it did prevent Zionist Terrorism from bothering the planet again until 1968.
the fact that almost all of them are innocent;
The theory behind the diaspora was that when you're dealing with religious based terrorism, nobody with national identity under that religion is entirely innocent. EVER. They're just potential replacement troops for the terrorists you're going to kill anyway.
ruining the world economy (all this oil gone);
Anybody who thinks we're going to get out of this with anything resembling the pre-9-11 economy is fooling themselves and everybody around them.
possibly causing nuclear winter; fallout carried into Russia, Europe and India; and various other such pesky issues.
They're as guilty as the rest of us for the fate of the middle east- so why the hell not?
And if that's not enough - *Israel*? Why would you want to nuke Israel after the twins?
If it wasn't for Zionist Expansionism, we would not have troops in the Middle East. If not for troops in the middle east, the twins falling would never have happened. Israel's insistance on existing at this point in time is one of two main reasons for the towers falling. The other is oil, and our need to prop up basically an evil and corrupt government that has been teaching their kids to hate us for a hundred years now.
It would have made more sense if you listed France. They also have tons of Muslems in the country. Come on, just between the two of us - you are itching for an excuse to nuke France. Admit it.
Isn't everybody? But the real answer here is- the fallout will take care of France. No need to nuke them directly- and the main message that JIHAD AND THE PRACTICE OF ISLAM WILL NO LONGER BE TOLERATED will have been sent quite adequately with the loss of every Holy City in the Koran and associated commentaries.
In short: You, sir, are a terrorist.
Of course- we become what we fight against or we lose. If there is any truism at all in human warfare once we leave the just war theory behind, it is that.
Yours is exactly the same mindset used by the terrorists who killed hundreds of school children because "their people have been wronged" and they wanted to "fight back" their "just war".
Completely correct. The only difference is, I'd win. You need to have the EXACT SAME mindset of your enemy, down to the last obsession, to win. Otherwise, as Ford tried to tell Slartibartfast about the Kricket Robots, they'll win- because they care and we simply don't.
Then again, I suppose any American deluded enough to call himself a "marxist hacker" isn't expected to be rational...
OTOH, what's your irrational reason for attempting to use limited warfare against an unjust enemy? Are you TRYING to create an entire generation of orphans for al Qaida to recruit?
0.30 x 0.70 == 0.21 chance (minimum, assuming no correlation) that you would believe both of these things siumultaneously. Probably higher with the moniker of "Marixst Hacker 42"
More that I believe the job market is a better indicator of the general health of the economy than the stock market. I'm perfectly willing, however, to agree that the stock market and other economic indicators are better now than they were a year ago- and FAR better now than at the official end of the general recession in November 2001. So no- I'm not in total agreement that the economy as a whole is worse off, only that the jobs market which is most people's personal economy has yet to recover (and is in fact on a very real downward sprial again at the moment-one that promises to destroy the holiday shopping season as average people struggle to pay heating oil bills on an unemployment check).
The real point is that you'd be likely to believe that both of these are false, without bothering to actually analyze either statement at all.
Yes- but closer to a technological version of General Titus's solution to the Zionist Terrorism of 70 A.D.- Kill 500 of theirs for every one of ours that dies, depopulate their lands and pollute them to the point that nobody can live there and prosper for a thousand years or more. Of course- he had to use swords, salt, plows, and slavery to accomplish the Jewish Diaspora. We can be MUCH more efficient with NUKES.
Exactly, Hillary left private industry in order to push a socialistic plan called " Universal Health Care Plan ".
Did she? Or did she PRETEND to leave private industry to push a FAKE socialist plan that left the HMOs in charge of EVERYTHING (just as Kerry's plan will)? That's not socialist, that's corporatist- and just as bad as Cheney starting a war so that his unexercised stock options in Haliburton will be worth more. There is NO difference between the fake conservativeism of the neocons and the fake socialism of the neolibs- the only difference at all is whose stock prices will be artificially inflated.
2nd thought- is it time to bring back "Thou shalt fight battles on YOUR OWN territory?" as part of the requirments of a Just War? That used to be in there back in the 400s- but it seems that Bush and the Iranian Mullahs haven't been reading St. Augustine lately.
And what better way to protect Iran, than to keep the United States fighting in Iraq? Funny- the Mullahs even have the same arguments as Bush (as in what better way to keep the terrorists busy than to have them fight us in Iraq instead of in New York City?)
How is the parent Anti-Bush? If anything, it's pro-Iran!
The middle of the Andes is pretty uninhabited.
Then what's all of those Incan ruins you keep tripping over? This land has been owned before and will be again- it's not new territory.
So is the northern edge of Siberia along the Arctic ocean.
Sparse!=colonizeable- belongs to the Yakuta Tribe and to Russia.
Plenty of untraversed land in northern Canada.
Which belongs to Canada and has actually been explored for generations by the Inuit and Red Paint Tribes.
It's all claimed by someone, but no one's going to find out if you move there and set up a little camp of your own.
Yeah- right- none of the spy satelites that have 1 meter resolution will notice my pup tent...
This is true the upper echelons of the Republican party do not seem to share in the Libertarian view on government that most who call themselves Republican strive for.
Which means that the rank and file are being conned out of their votes- and should be voting Libertarian.
However to be fair, the Democratic parties leadership seems to be pushing to the Socialists viewpoint.
Really? Then why was Hillary Clinton, in 1993, willing to leave PRIVATE INDUSTRY in charge of her UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE PLAN? No, I see the Democratic party leadership pushing corporatism- it's the rank and file democrats who want socialism- and need to switch parties to one of the many socialist third parties.
Do we stick with the ideology that got us to where we are and switch parties?
We should stick with the ideology AND switch parties- because none of the neo* leadership on either side are going to promote the general welfare of you and me, only the power of the corporations to enslave everybody else.
the fact that over 70% of Kerry voters think the US economy is worse than a year ago (wha?!) is partisan too,
Depends on what you think the economy is- the fake dog and pony show called the stock market, or the jobs market adjusted for population increase. The first is better, the second is worse- and the general trend is for the first to continue getting better, and the second to get worse until we're in a depression.
30% think that Bush said Iraq was involved in 9-11
Did you listen to the 2002 State of the Union Address? He said SEVERAL TIMES that Iraq supported al Qaida in their attack on the United States- and was ready to provide a NUKE to al Qaida and that the smoking gun proof would be a "mushroom cloud in Manhattan".
What are you Bush people smoking?
You think Kerry would attack Iran?
Yes. The reason why is the same reason why he voted to attack Iraq, and why he supported Israel sending cruise missiles into Iraq back in 1994- Weapons of Mass Destruction. The big difference is that we've proven that Iran has a nuclear program that is close enough to completion to already have a small stockpile of warheads.
Fat chance. He favors sanctions, according to his answers in the debates. I'm sure Iran would rather have bill clinton back in the white house, let alone anti-war Kerry.
If you think that's all Kerry favors- then you haven't be listening to what Kerry has said, you've only been listening to the chopped up sound bytes that Bush has been putting into his anti-Kerry advertisements. You don't really think Kerry wants 40,000 more troops to just let them sit around waiting for sanctions to work, do you?
Everyone jumps on Bush for going into Iraq, even though a lot of the terrorists in Afghan traning camps went to Iraq before we went in there (Zarqawi).
You know what's really strange? That you still believe this even though this has been shown many times to be a lie told by a sycophant in the CIA to get promoted.
Now, people are crossing the border from Iran/Syria into Iraq and you're complaining that we aren't attacking Iran?
I'm not complaining about anything- my favored strategy in the war on terror would have Iran, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel, Jordan, and parts of Egypt glowing in the dark WITHIN 72 HOURS OF THE TOWERS FALLING. Anything short of that is a stupid waste of time and American lives- and might as well not have been done at all for all the terrorism it's going to stop.
Who do you think is gonna take action here? The anti-vietnam "hero"? Do you really want another war?
I think that anything short of either total nuclear annihilation or complete isolationism isn't going to win anybody anything- but that at least Kerry is smart enough to see when stuff doesn't work. NEITHER of the major party candidates are going to go for the two options that will work, so we might as well try a few other options that won't.
The Iran situation is not over yet, there may be a diplomatic conclusion, so don't start screaming for war yet.
Yeah, right- like diplomacy is any different than limited warfare when it comes to obsessed religious fundamentalists.
Yes, but that's the difference between Libertarians and the rest of the American Spectrum. Republicans, at least at the leadership level, are just as much for governments taking on a much broader role in everyday life and governing it's citzens rights as Democrats are- just look at the Patriot Act on the one side and the Welfare State on the other.
Both sides claim to be for small government, but when push comes to shove, both sides are for large government in the areas they care about.
Here's a reason why Iran would want Bush to stay in the White House- it gives them four more years of our mistakes in Iraq before we can free up the troops to attack them, and in the meantime it gives their suicide squads plenty of new recruits to send into Iraq to keep us fighting Shi'ites forever.
If the fake neoliberals actually had the tollerance they claim to have, they'd admit that it's a possibility that Bush supporters are actually LIVING IN A DIFFERENT UNIVERSE where Iraq had WMDs and shipped them all out to Syria before the war started.
After all, we each live in our own little world where we are always correct, right?
I too think that depletion of our planet's resources is a terrible thing that ought to be avoided. However, this is a gigantic planet. There are places on this globe where Man has yet to set foot, much less look upon with the naked eye.
Where? I'd love to colonize something- it's only when you move into new territory that you have freedom.