1. Assanage hasn't even been charged with a crime 2. Which wouldn't be rape, but "sex by surprise" if he were charged 3. He got permission to leave the country and it was granted 4. He's offered to answer questions remotely - offers that have been rebuffed
So, does this look like a normal prosecution or a witch hunt to you?
He's not even charged with a crime yet in the country he's going to be extradited to. So care to fix the rest of your sentence?
Because it's totally inconceivable that anyone who has made it his mission to reveal the embarrassing and incriminating secrets of the world could possibly..........
Nevermind the vast majority of OWS protesters were middle class and not homeless. And nevermind that many of those that were homeless got that way due to bank fraud.
As usual, the fault in these incidents lie with both sides; the cops, for often being quick to move into "riot control" mode, and the protesters, because they believe that nobody will give a shit about their cause if there aren't at least a few of them with blood pouring down their foreheads.
Ah, another person who's bought the "police clash with protesters" framing from the media. Because exercising your Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Assembly is totally asking to have your head cracked open.
If a video is selectively edited to portray a cop as a racist when he's not (like was done to Zimmerman's 911 tape by a network affiliate) then go ahead and sue for defamation.
one or the other: both police and demonstrators can engage the court of public opinion, or both police and demonstrators must keep their footage for an actual court of law.
That's absurd. Police officers are public servants and are held to a higher standard than private citizens.
Actually, that's all fascist drivel pulled out of the asses of neocons, actually. There is no third category that allows you to throw people into a black hole without rights and forget about them. Either you are holding P.O.W.s, which then need to be released when the war is over, or they are suspected criminals. Either group has rights.
because they are considered insurgents or partisans rather than regular armies.
More BS. You also cannot round people up when they are resisting your hostile invading army and pretend they are doing something wrong by resisting you without putting on a uniform that you approve of. Go dig out your BluRay copy of "Red Dawn" and count how many times the Wolverines could have been rounded up and thrown in a Soviet Gulag according to the pulled-from-the-asses-of-necons rules you are repeating.
You are spinning and rationalizing. And it's beneath you.
The US didn't ignore the ABM treaty, it withdrew from it as was allowed under the treaty.
Pedantry over "ignored" is noted, and met with...pretty much every treaty ever signed with any of the native tribes.
Bush and Obama aren't ignoring the Geneva conventions - Al Qaeda is not entitled to their protections due to fighting in an unlawful manner
The sheer, soulless, unmitigated arrogance in bombing weddings, rescuers trying to help the wounded and then finally bombing the funerals for the dead, and then having the gall to whine about "fighting in an unlawful manner"? Fuck that neocon bullshit. Either Al Queda operatives are soldiers and captured ones should be treated as P.O.W.s, or they are suspected criminals. Either classification carries rights.
There is NO third category that allows you to kidnap people and torture them, or simply assassinate them along with any poor bastards that happen to be standing nearby.
but captured Al Qaeda members are still being treated in a humane fashion at Guantanamo Bay prison camp
We've held people there for nearly 10 years, many of which we knew were innocent, some of which were even captured as minors. The president's of both parties have insisted they have no rights, with the current one even insisting he has 'post acquittal detention' powers. As in: Obama will keep them imprisoned, even if ordered released by a court of law.
A broad coalition of nations is dealing with Iran and its unacceptable behavior, but if it makes you happier - Iran has been threatening to attack the US, Europe, Israel, and various Arab nations for some time, not to mention making veiled threats of genocide, and engaging in an active campaign of terrorism and assassination around the world.
Every single word in those two sentences was a total lie. It's been 200 years since Iran attacked another nation - compared to dozens of first strikes and wars of choice for both Israel and the U.S. since WWII alone. Iran's "threats" have been retaliatory in nature, as in "we will strike back if we are attacked". Well, no shit, Sherlock. The "genocide" shit is another lie based on a willful mistranslation by the press. The 'torture and assassination around the world' shit is pure projection, as it's the U.S. doing that shit with CIA blacksites and drones.
The Secretary of Defense has clearly stated that Iran has no nuclear weapons program. But even if they did, they have every reason to want such weapons as a deterrent to Israel and their arsenal of 200+ nuclear warheads. The United States has stated that it will treat 'cyberattacks' as an act of war - guess what Stuxnet under U.S. rules? And of course it's actually the United States in violation of the U.N. charter with it's multiple belligerent threats towards Israel.
So, you want to walk back that hairball of propaganda and tell us just who is threatening who here?
No, I don't have this wrong. I didn't say "responsible for the creation of fundamentalist Islam", but the rise. And yes, the rise of Fundamentalist Islam in the world is a direct backlash to western imperialism.
Fundamentalist Islam has existed since the founding if Islam around 610 AD/CE
And Galileo was questioning Church doctrine while making advances in astronomy in the 16th Century. Does that mean that it was common for people to publicly question the Church or that the scientific method had replaced superstition?
Not so much. And of course if you know a modicum of Muslim history, you know that it was far better than Christianity on the sciences or tolerance for other faiths, for centuries.
So, to get back to 'Drones, Vruses and Blowback', Iran had a peaceful, secular democracy until it was overthrown by Britain and the United States. Iraq had a secular totalitarian government until it was overthrown by the United States and largely replaced with a theocracy. And now the greatest recruitment tool that Al Queda has is the news that America has bombed another wedding, funeral, or otherwise escalated it's murder-by-drone campaign.
Hardly. Tuition has increased over 400% since 1985, and doubled in the last decade. Your link plays the "lies, damn lies and statistics" game by talking about how scholarships and grants have increased while leaving out the fact that not everyone has access to the same scholarships and grants.
And of course fuel, housing and health care costs have exploded right along with tuition, while wages have stagnated or declined. And that was before the crash in 2008.
My parents helped with room and board; not tuition. They weren't especially wealthy. This strikes me as quite reasonable.
Don't you mean room and board and utilities and food? A few thousand dollars in subsidy a year that many other students didn't have? Nah, I'm sure that had nothing to do with you being able to graduate debt-free compared to those other students.
The grand total would have been about $20k for four years (ending in 1997).
In 1997? Like I said, you're speaking from an entirely separate universe from today's college grads. Tuition was far cheaper, and it was relatively easy to find a job as it was at the height of the tech bubble. You're like somebody in California bragging about how quickly he paid off his house, without mentioning that he bought it before the passage of Prop 13.
How does having a $400/mo loan payment affect my ability to compete in the job market? If I had that kind of obligation I'd live more frugally than I might otherwise. My need to live frugally would have no bearing on my ability to get hired and perform well in a job.
How does it not? No matter how little you are willing to work for, an even more frugal worker from India can undercut your lowest acceptable salary by almost five thousand dollars a year.
You make an excellent argument for not attending a public university in California.
You're making an excellent attempt to avoid the point: that expensive tuition rates are hardly limited to "top" schools. If this were only a matter of students being able to afford to get in Haaaarvaaard or the Vietnamese equivalent, this wouldn't be an issue.
We're not talking about call centers in India.
You skipped over the key word: "there's a reason that so many call centers are located in India". And that reason is the fact that India was a British Colony, which means that English is still a commonly taught language in Indian schools.
And did you notice the dichotomy in your storyline? We should open our borders to many educated foreign workers. But we don't really have to worry about many foreign workers taking jobs here because not that many will have sufficient fluency in English.
Which one is it?
Most, while fluent, still can't communicate as well as native speakers.
"Most" is mostly not relevant when you're talking about a couple of countries with a couple billion people between them. India's middle class alone is the size of the entire U.S. population.
For the kinds of positions I'm talking about, yes we are.
No. We're not. Manufacturing has largely moved offshore, but you don't need a masters to stamp widgets on an assembly line. The overwhelming majority of goods are designed in the United States, which means the overwhelming majority of employees of those businesses are Americans.
Which, again, will all be solved by your brilliant proposal to let foreigners compete for American jobs without Americans having the benefit of foreign costs of living - an issue you don't seem to be interested
Many/most weren't happy with the Americans being there, and were looking forward to their leaving, but they were ALL glad Saddam was gone, and that his incredibly corrupt dictatorship was gone, as well.
Must point out that this is changing the subject. Whether or not people are glad that Saddam is gone is an entirely different matter from whether the Iraqi's were better served by the U.S. invasion or if Saddam had been left in power instead.
And all evidence indisputably points to the latter:
Over a million Iraqis killed in the invasion or during the sectarian civil war that resulted from Saddam's overthrow and Rumsfeld's half-assed planning: much worse than if Saddam had been left in power.
Millions of refugees from the invasion and civil war: much less than if Saddam had been left in power.
Infrastructure bombed back to the 19th Century. Large parts of Baghdad lucky to have power for a couple hours out of the day. Much worse than if Saddam had been left in power.
Huge decline in women's rights. Much worse than if Saddam had been left in power.
Zero activity from Al Queda or one of their franchises compared to the rapid growth after Saddam was removed from power.
Generally, the same sort of people that supported the Iraq invasion also want Iran contained. Well, Saddam and the ruling Baath party were Sunni - removing them from power in majority-Shiite Iraq means that majority-Shiite Iran now has a friendly neighbor and border instead of an enemy.
My son spent two tours on Iraq: He got to know many if the Iraqis personally, and pretty well. He even keeps in touch with some of them now that he's out of the Army. One thing for SURE: It's better now than under Saddam. NOBODY he talked to disputed that!
Uh huh. Did he talk to ANY of the millions of aforementioned refugees? How about one of the innocent people we brutally tortured in Abu Garib? Or one of the dissidents we turned over to our puppet government for the same - one of the reasons why Bradley Manning allegedly decided to become a whistleblower?
Maybe one of the Iraqi women who remained in mourning robes for years, because before it was time to take the robes off, another family member would be killed by U.S. forces or in the sectarian civil war?
The problem is that since WWII the groups we tend to fight ignore all treaties.
Like when we ignored the anti-ballistic missile shield treaty when Bush was president, or ignoring the U.N. treaties on torture under both Bush and Obama, or threatening to attack another country (Iran) under both Bush and Obama, to ignoring Geneva Conventions, to ignoring silly treaties on how wars may only be fought for defense or humanitarian reasons....
That's snark, right? The problem with that storyline is that the United States is happy to support coups against secular, civil-rights-respecting countries if they tell the U.S. to go fuck itself. See: Iran, Venezuela.
...while also supporting nasty dictatorships as long as they play ball with the United States. See: Egypt, Libya, Iraq (before the Gulf War), Pinochete, etc etc etc.
Every once in a while they overplay their hand and make it plain what their agenda really is. Like when we were bombing Gaddafi to "support a people's revolution" even as we were busy selling arms to Yemen and Bahrain....to be used on protestors in those countries.
Let's not pretend it's as black and white as you're trying to paint it.
No. It's exactly that black and white. You would be telling people to shove their nuance and excuses up an orifice if a hostile military force first blew up your family, then blew up rescuers trying to save members of your family, and if that wasn't enough, bombed your family's funeral.
They are trying to minimize civilian casualties.
Then they wouldn't be sending drones into populated areas or even using cluster bombs.
Just like people who died on the battlefields of World War II are considered to have been soldiers
Another bullshit rationalization.
1) Many if not most of these people are no where near a battlefield 2) We were in declared wars with Germany, Italy, and Japan. NOT so with Yemen or Pakistan.
And you can also skip tired AUMF excuse, as that only authorized force against those that attacked us on 911 - something Yemenis and Pakistanis had nothing to do with. Still waiting on that invasion and occupation of Saudi Arabia, though.
So it's cowardly to remotely fly a drone and fire on people, but it's not cowardly to dress as a civilian, snipe at the enemy clearly outfitted as non-civilians, then when the enemy comes after them, hide their weapon and claim to just be a regular civilian?
i don't really understand an analysis of the usa's lack of moral loftiness when we are dealing with organizations within pakistan whose own methods make the usa's drones and cyberwarfare look like jaywalking. the goal is to defeat these organizations, not look like paragon of moral virtue
Are those organizations within Pakistan funded by American taxpayers? Are those organizations within Pakistan running drone wars on American citizens on American soil? Are you really sure you want to throw rocks here after Bush/Obama torture, assassinations, and holding innocent people in prison without trials?
U.S. v. Pakistan on transparency and accountability A Pakistani Supreme Court ruling does something unthinkable in the US: compels disclosure of detainee abuse
A federal appeals panel on Monday turned away efforts by a U.S. citizen who was detained for nearly four years as an "enemy combatant." Jose Padillaâ(TM)s efforts to reinstate a lawsuit against former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other government officials were rejected by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond.
vs
Seven men detained by Pakistan's spy agency, the ISI, appeared in court Monday in a landmark case that places one of the nation's most powerful institutions under the scrutiny of its highest court..
Pakistan's Supreme Court ordered the government to give each detainee a medical exam and report the results in four days. The court also ordered the spy agency to produce all documents related to the detention of the men by the first week of March. . . .
Of course we did. There's a term for taking over a country by use of military force: conquering.
We toppled a regime and replaced it with a puppet government.
Fixed that for you.
We left on schedule from an agreement forged by the President that took us to the war.
Nevermind the thousands of mercenaries we still have in the country, the gigantic military fortress they call an "embassy" that we constructed, and that troops were largely redeployed to nearby military bases where they can quickly be redeployed back into Iraq.
The goals? Eliminate Saddam. Check--he's dead. Unseat the Baath party. Done. Set up an elected government. Done. Get rid of their WMD. Done (helps they were pretty much gone when we got there--oopsie). All covered. It's called a WIN.
Not just making up shit, but being full of it as well. We went in because of the WMD's and Saddam's ties to Al Queda. Neither of which existed at the time, as any non-hack strategist could have told you.
What we did do: spend trillions on a bogus war, made Iraq far worse than it ever was under Saddam, gave Iran more influence over the country, and lose over 4,000 American troops in the process.
Not when you conveniently classify everyone killed in your attacks as a "militant", until proven otherwise. i.e., official military policy from Obama.
2 - Lots of insurgencies have failed against larger better equipped adversaries.
Sure have - when those larger, better equipped adversaries are willing to wipe out any resistance or otherwise get really nasty. Like how the Conquistadors broke some Indian rebellions by chopping off one foot from every adult male. Think the U.S. military well ever go that far to crush resisting populations?
1. You graduated a long time ago and you are comparing apples to irrelevant oranges by putting your experience next to today's grads. The cost of higher education is in a different universe from where it was just ten years ago.
2. You served in the military and got some GI Bill funding. Bully for you, but it is not reasonable to expect people to sign up for military service as a condition of higher education.
3. Your family paid for your education. Not exactly new - Bush would have been a community college dropout without his daddy's money. Not everyone has a rich-assed dad though.
4. You benefited from some other generous benefit or happenstance not available to the vast majority of the population. Full ride athletic scholarship, maybe. Hell, lets say your ability really matches your ego - not everyone can be in the top 5% for obvious mathematical reasons.
If I had to take on five or six figures of student loan debt in order to get a high-paying job (that would allow me to repay my student loan debt in short order) then I'd do it and call it a bargain.
And how well are you going to be able to compete when you have to pay $400 a month on your student loans - when the cheap import labor has no such costs to deal with? No matter how little you are willing to work for, that's still $4800 more per year than your competition has to worry about.
Top universities in China and India aren't free
They're practically free next to an American education.
Especially when one considers that the average Chinese or Indian has income much lower than the average American.
Especially when one considers that both India and China have a larger middle class (for their) countries than the U.S. does in total. And since when was this limited to "top" universities? California public unis now cost more than Ivy Leage schools.
You're a native English speaker. They're not. You don't think that gives you a leg up?
I think this is the weakest one yet. You don't know there's a reason that so many call centers are located in India, or that people can't learn a second language? Or that if only 1% of Chinese students learn fluent English and want to work in America, that equates to over 10 million competitors for American jobs?
We're competing with them regardless of where they are.
No. We're not. If I'm good a math and want to teach it in high school, I actually don't have to compete with math grads from Bangladesh. Same for medical doctors or engineers. Your brilliant proposal would take care of that, though.
Bringing them here lets Americans drives a steak through what's left of the middle class
Fixed that for you. An American gets an American job - and there's plenty of competition for the jobs out there with six unemployed people for every open position - and his salary by and large stays within the American economy. Whereas your cheap imported labor from India or Vietnam will end up sending much of their paychecks back home. Out of the American economy.
And when, exactly, do we get Vietnamese prices for housing and medical care to go along with Vietnamese labor willing to work for half as much money? Your proposal makes some measure of sense if your last name is Walton or Koch. Otherwise, you're shooting off your feet and mine with a cannon. Thanks but no thanks.
MIC being the military-industrial complex, or as I like to call it, the military-industrial-congressional-contractor-prison-surveillance complex. Young people, go get computer science degrees with a specialization in security, so you can either work for the Pentagon or work for contractors working for the Pentagon.
The U.S. is the leading developer and perpetrator of cyberwarfare, not the leading target. The New York Times this morning has a long excerpt from a new book by its hawkish national security reporter David Sanger â" the book is entitled âoeConfront and Conceal: Obamaâ(TM)s Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Powerâ â" which reveals that President Obama personally oversaw the development, and ordered the deployment, of the worldâ(TM)s most sophisticated computer virus, unleashed (in cooperation with Israel) on Iranâ(TM)s nuclear enrichment facility.
Isnâ(TM)t it amazing how the U.S. is constantly the worldâ(TM)s first nation to use new, highly destructive weapons â" at the same time that it bombs, invades, and kills more than any other country by far â" and yet it still somehow gets its media to tell its citizenry that it is Americaâ(TM)s Enemies who are the aggressors and the U.S. is simply a nation of peace seeking to defend itself.
Needless to say, if any cyber-attack is directed at the U.S. â" rather than by the U.S. â" it will be instantly depicted as an act of unparalleled aggression and evil: Terrorism. Just last year, the Pentagon decreed that any cyberattack on the U.S. would be deemed âoean act of war.â
Slashdot Mirror
1. Assanage hasn't even been charged with a crime
2. Which wouldn't be rape, but "sex by surprise" if he were charged
3. He got permission to leave the country and it was granted
4. He's offered to answer questions remotely - offers that have been rebuffed
So, does this look like a normal prosecution or a witch hunt to you?
Cue the authoritarian douchebags who are hoping that no one will notice that the guy hasn't even been charged yet.
Do you own a mirror?
He's not even charged with a crime yet in the country he's going to be extradited to. So care to fix the rest of your sentence?
And how many PC users buy a new PC laptop or change the memory/hdd "every year".
Nevermind the vast majority of OWS protesters were middle class and not homeless. And nevermind that many of those that were homeless got that way due to bank fraud.
Next fascist talking point?
Ah, another person who's bought the "police clash with protesters" framing from the media. Because exercising your Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Assembly is totally asking to have your head cracked open.
If a video is selectively edited to portray a cop as a racist when he's not (like was done to Zimmerman's 911 tape by a network affiliate) then go ahead and sue for defamation.
That's absurd. Police officers are public servants and are held to a higher standard than private citizens.
Actually, that's all fascist drivel pulled out of the asses of neocons, actually. There is no third category that allows you to throw people into a black hole without rights and forget about them. Either you are holding P.O.W.s, which then need to be released when the war is over, or they are suspected criminals. Either group has rights.
More BS. You also cannot round people up when they are resisting your hostile invading army and pretend they are doing something wrong by resisting you without putting on a uniform that you approve of. Go dig out your BluRay copy of "Red Dawn" and count how many times the Wolverines could have been rounded up and thrown in a Soviet Gulag according to the pulled-from-the-asses-of-necons rules you are repeating.
But the point is Slashdotters whining about how "liberal" supposedly is.
You are spinning and rationalizing. And it's beneath you.
Pedantry over "ignored" is noted, and met with...pretty much every treaty ever signed with any of the native tribes.
The sheer, soulless, unmitigated arrogance in bombing weddings, rescuers trying to help the wounded and then finally bombing the funerals for the dead, and then having the gall to whine about "fighting in an unlawful manner"? Fuck that neocon bullshit. Either Al Queda operatives are soldiers and captured ones should be treated as P.O.W.s, or they are suspected criminals. Either classification carries rights.
There is NO third category that allows you to kidnap people and torture them, or simply assassinate them along with any poor bastards that happen to be standing nearby.
We've held people there for nearly 10 years, many of which we knew were innocent, some of which were even captured as minors. The president's of both parties have insisted they have no rights, with the current one even insisting he has 'post acquittal detention' powers. As in: Obama will keep them imprisoned, even if ordered released by a court of law.
Every single word in those two sentences was a total lie. It's been 200 years since Iran attacked another nation - compared to dozens of first strikes and wars of choice for both Israel and the U.S. since WWII alone. Iran's "threats" have been retaliatory in nature, as in "we will strike back if we are attacked". Well, no shit, Sherlock. The "genocide" shit is another lie based on a willful mistranslation by the press. The 'torture and assassination around the world' shit is pure projection, as it's the U.S. doing that shit with CIA blacksites and drones.
The Secretary of Defense has clearly stated that Iran has no nuclear weapons program. But even if they did, they have every reason to want such weapons as a deterrent to Israel and their arsenal of 200+ nuclear warheads. The United States has stated that it will treat 'cyberattacks' as an act of war - guess what Stuxnet under U.S. rules? And of course it's actually the United States in violation of the U.N. charter with it's multiple belligerent threats towards Israel.
So, you want to walk back that hairball of propaganda and tell us just who is threatening who here?
By destabilizing the region for a decade and thus increasing gas prices?
Snort. Iraq was as much of a threat to Israel as Ray Charles is to a heavyweight boxing champ. And Ray Charles is blind.
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And dead.
No, I don't have this wrong. I didn't say "responsible for the creation of fundamentalist Islam", but the rise. And yes, the rise of Fundamentalist Islam in the world is a direct backlash to western imperialism.
And Galileo was questioning Church doctrine while making advances in astronomy in the 16th Century. Does that mean that it was common for people to publicly question the Church or that the scientific method had replaced superstition?
Not so much. And of course if you know a modicum of Muslim history, you know that it was far better than Christianity on the sciences or tolerance for other faiths, for centuries.
So, to get back to 'Drones, Vruses and Blowback', Iran had a peaceful, secular democracy until it was overthrown by Britain and the United States. Iraq had a secular totalitarian government until it was overthrown by the United States and largely replaced with a theocracy. And now the greatest recruitment tool that Al Queda has is the news that America has bombed another wedding, funeral, or otherwise escalated it's murder-by-drone campaign.
Hardly. Tuition has increased over 400% since 1985, and doubled in the last decade. Your link plays the "lies, damn lies and statistics" game by talking about how scholarships and grants have increased while leaving out the fact that not everyone has access to the same scholarships and grants.
And of course fuel, housing and health care costs have exploded right along with tuition, while wages have stagnated or declined. And that was before the crash in 2008.
Don't you mean room and board and utilities and food? A few thousand dollars in subsidy a year that many other students didn't have? Nah, I'm sure that had nothing to do with you being able to graduate debt-free compared to those other students.
In 1997? Like I said, you're speaking from an entirely separate universe from today's college grads. Tuition was far cheaper, and it was relatively easy to find a job as it was at the height of the tech bubble. You're like somebody in California bragging about how quickly he paid off his house, without mentioning that he bought it before the passage of Prop 13.
How does it not? No matter how little you are willing to work for, an even more frugal worker from India can undercut your lowest acceptable salary by almost five thousand dollars a year.
You're making an excellent attempt to avoid the point: that expensive tuition rates are hardly limited to "top" schools. If this were only a matter of students being able to afford to get in Haaaarvaaard or the Vietnamese equivalent, this wouldn't be an issue.
You skipped over the key word: "there's a reason that so many call centers are located in India". And that reason is the fact that India was a British Colony, which means that English is still a commonly taught language in Indian schools.
And did you notice the dichotomy in your storyline? We should open our borders to many educated foreign workers. But we don't really have to worry about many foreign workers taking jobs here because not that many will have sufficient fluency in English.
Which one is it?
"Most" is mostly not relevant when you're talking about a couple of countries with a couple billion people between them. India's middle class alone is the size of the entire U.S. population.
No. We're not. Manufacturing has largely moved offshore, but you don't need a masters to stamp widgets on an assembly line. The overwhelming majority of goods are designed in the United States, which means the overwhelming majority of employees of those businesses are Americans.
Which, again, will all be solved by your brilliant proposal to let foreigners compete for American jobs without Americans having the benefit of foreign costs of living - an issue you don't seem to be interested
Must point out that this is changing the subject. Whether or not people are glad that Saddam is gone is an entirely different matter from whether the Iraqi's were better served by the U.S. invasion or if Saddam had been left in power instead.
And all evidence indisputably points to the latter:
Millions of refugees from the invasion and civil war: much less than if Saddam had been left in power.
Infrastructure bombed back to the 19th Century. Large parts of Baghdad lucky to have power for a couple hours out of the day. Much worse than if Saddam had been left in power.
Huge decline in women's rights. Much worse than if Saddam had been left in power.
Zero activity from Al Queda or one of their franchises compared to the rapid growth after Saddam was removed from power.
Generally, the same sort of people that supported the Iraq invasion also want Iran contained. Well, Saddam and the ruling Baath party were Sunni - removing them from power in majority-Shiite Iraq means that majority-Shiite Iran now has a friendly neighbor and border instead of an enemy.
Uh huh. Did he talk to ANY of the millions of aforementioned refugees? How about one of the innocent people we brutally tortured in Abu Garib? Or one of the dissidents we turned over to our puppet government for the same - one of the reasons why Bradley Manning allegedly decided to become a whistleblower?
Maybe one of the Iraqi women who remained in mourning robes for years, because before it was time to take the robes off, another family member would be killed by U.S. forces or in the sectarian civil war?
Like when we ignored the anti-ballistic missile shield treaty when Bush was president, or ignoring the U.N. treaties on torture under both Bush and Obama, or threatening to attack another country (Iran) under both Bush and Obama, to ignoring Geneva Conventions, to ignoring silly treaties on how wars may only be fought for defense or humanitarian reasons....
You think that's insightful? You might be interested in this site, you will find an endless stream of similarly "insightful" commentary....
And who is responsible for the rise of fundamentalist Islam? You can start by looking at the nearest mirror, and then at our closest "allies".
That's snark, right? The problem with that storyline is that the United States is happy to support coups against secular, civil-rights-respecting countries if they tell the U.S. to go fuck itself. See: Iran, Venezuela.
...while also supporting nasty dictatorships as long as they play ball with the United States. See: Egypt, Libya, Iraq (before the Gulf War), Pinochete, etc etc etc.
Every once in a while they overplay their hand and make it plain what their agenda really is. Like when we were bombing Gaddafi to "support a people's revolution" even as we were busy selling arms to Yemen and Bahrain....to be used on protestors in those countries.
No. It's exactly that black and white. You would be telling people to shove their nuance and excuses up an orifice if a hostile military force first blew up your family, then blew up rescuers trying to save members of your family, and if that wasn't enough, bombed your family's funeral.
Then they wouldn't be sending drones into populated areas or even using cluster bombs.
Another bullshit rationalization.
1) Many if not most of these people are no where near a battlefield
2) We were in declared wars with Germany, Italy, and Japan. NOT so with Yemen or Pakistan.
And you can also skip tired AUMF excuse, as that only authorized force against those that attacked us on 911 - something Yemenis and Pakistanis had nothing to do with. Still waiting on that invasion and occupation of Saudi Arabia, though.
....whined General Bratchenko.
Are those organizations within Pakistan funded by American taxpayers? Are those organizations within Pakistan running drone wars on American citizens on American soil? Are you really sure you want to throw rocks here after Bush/Obama torture, assassinations, and holding innocent people in prison without trials?
Greenwald:
Do you own a mirror?
Of course we did. There's a term for taking over a country by use of military force: conquering.
Fixed that for you.
Nevermind the thousands of mercenaries we still have in the country, the gigantic military fortress they call an "embassy" that we constructed, and that troops were largely redeployed to nearby military bases where they can quickly be redeployed back into Iraq.
Not just making up shit, but being full of it as well. We went in because of the WMD's and Saddam's ties to Al Queda. Neither of which existed at the time, as any non-hack strategist could have told you.
What we did do: spend trillions on a bogus war, made Iraq far worse than it ever was under Saddam, gave Iran more influence over the country, and lose over 4,000 American troops in the process.
Not when you conveniently classify everyone killed in your attacks as a "militant", until proven otherwise. i.e., official military policy from Obama.
Sure have - when those larger, better equipped adversaries are willing to wipe out any resistance or otherwise get really nasty. Like how the Conquistadors broke some Indian rebellions by chopping off one foot from every adult male. Think the U.S. military well ever go that far to crush resisting populations?
Then:
1. You graduated a long time ago and you are comparing apples to irrelevant oranges by putting your experience next to today's grads. The cost of higher education is in a different universe from where it was just ten years ago.
2. You served in the military and got some GI Bill funding. Bully for you, but it is not reasonable to expect people to sign up for military service as a condition of higher education.
3. Your family paid for your education. Not exactly new - Bush would have been a community college dropout without his daddy's money. Not everyone has a rich-assed dad though.
4. You benefited from some other generous benefit or happenstance not available to the vast majority of the population. Full ride athletic scholarship, maybe. Hell, lets say your ability really matches your ego - not everyone can be in the top 5% for obvious mathematical reasons.
And how well are you going to be able to compete when you have to pay $400 a month on your student loans - when the cheap import labor has no such costs to deal with? No matter how little you are willing to work for, that's still $4800 more per year than your competition has to worry about.
They're practically free next to an American education.
Especially when one considers that both India and China have a larger middle class (for their) countries than the U.S. does in total. And since when was this limited to "top" universities? California public unis now cost more than Ivy Leage schools.
I think this is the weakest one yet. You don't know there's a reason that so many call centers are located in India, or that people can't learn a second language? Or that if only 1% of Chinese students learn fluent English and want to work in America, that equates to over 10 million competitors for American jobs?
No. We're not. If I'm good a math and want to teach it in high school, I actually don't have to compete with math grads from Bangladesh. Same for medical doctors or engineers. Your brilliant proposal would take care of that, though.
Fixed that for you. An American gets an American job - and there's plenty of competition for the jobs out there with six unemployed people for every open position - and his salary by and large stays within the American economy. Whereas your cheap imported labor from India or Vietnam will end up sending much of their paychecks back home. Out of the American economy.
And when, exactly, do we get Vietnamese prices for housing and medical care to go along with Vietnamese labor willing to work for half as much money? Your proposal makes some measure of sense if your last name is Walton or Koch. Otherwise, you're shooting off your feet and mine with a cannon. Thanks but no thanks.
MIC being the military-industrial complex, or as I like to call it, the military-industrial-congressional-contractor-prison-surveillance complex. Young people, go get computer science degrees with a specialization in security, so you can either work for the Pentagon or work for contractors working for the Pentagon.
Greenwald: