I had exactly the same experience, and so his gradual devolution is all the more shocking. I read Treason and was struck by how sensitively he captured the deep friendship between Lanik and Helmut; it's almost impossible to reconcile with his truly vehement anti-gay statements.
Orson Scott Card sounds like the classic case of a repressed homosexual lashing out at others who openly live as a homosexual.
The problem is that cross-domain cookie setting, and resource requests are a core functionality in web browsers... Not just for advertising, but simply a working site that loads remote resources.
So is JavaScript, but I still browse with NoScript on by default and selectively enable when I want JavaScript. Along those lines, I also use RequestPolicy to block cross-domain requests by default, and selectively enable pages that need it. This works "fine" for a surprising number of sites (I put "fine" in quotes because the experience is quite different than standard browsing: in many ways better, but in some ways worse).
No, I never said it was. I admit my frustration got the better of me after feeling like I was talking with a brick wall in regards to the UN involvement, the misreading of US as UN, and finally finished off with two absurd responses to a referenced timeline.
But if you really want to get somewhere in a conversation, it's best not to initiate that kind of childishness.
True enough, but if you want to claim the maturity mantle, you shouldn't be responding in kind, as it only escalates.
Because it actually proves my point - that Bush clearly got us involved in Somalia as an election-time ploy.
It's not quite so simple as that, because it also showed that Bush didn't run off and start a war just to get re-elected on his own initiative. There was pressure by the UN, media, and the public, and the action he took was limited to an airlift, with actual ground troops coming after he had lost the election. I can easily summarize that as "Bush does the right thing in response to public and political pressure during an election season, despite reluctance to get militarily involved in a non-strategic combat zone."
And the reality hasn't changed, that it's as near to certain as we can get without being mind-readers that none of the above reasons were what motivated Bush to involve the US in Somalia.
If anybody is mind-reading it is you, and rather badly. First you ignored all the surrounding context, and ever since it has been brought up have tried to downplay it. It's completely biased.
Because it appeared to me you were referring to the entire US involvement in Somalia, and not just the December military increase.
That's where careful reading comes into play. I wasn't referring to poll numbers (and even explicitly said so after your first reply), the timeline was dated, and I quoted from the timeline. By the second time you had replied, you had zero excuse for talking about counting the vote and 2000 without providing your contrary evidence, which you provided after the fact.
Otherwise, as I've already stated and I know you read, we wouldn't have caused humanitaran crises ourselves in Iraq and elsewhere, as we have under *all Presidents* - and SPECIFICALLY in the face of public pressure from within the US, from the UN, and from the world.
Strategic decisions usually dominate, but that doesn't mean humanitarian reasons never come into play. The UN was created to mitigate them, and I think Somalia is a perfect example.
If Bush responds to public and outside political pressure for a non-strategic asset during an election season, it is at least arguable it was for a good reason, even if his motivation was to get elected. And when he commits combat troops after further political pressure after he had already lost the election, now you have to invent a new reason, that he was concerned with his legacy (like Kennedy or Johnson had their legacy improved by upping the ante in Vietnam?).
A clear mission has specific targets and territories - get this guy, remove this government from this area, destroy these facilities.
"Secure food aid to areas of famine." And the thing is, by all accounts already documented and not disputed by you, it worked.
And the bottom line, if there was "no good reason" for the US to be in Somalia, there was "no good reason" for Clinton to approve the mission shift to go after Aidid and for US combat troops to have died as a result 10 months into Clinton's presidency and role as Commander in Chief.
So, I just request that you read some works
Sorry, I'm not going to "read some works" suggested by you at the 11th hour. You've had all along to reference them if you wanted to, and even here you aren't specific. This is my last post, as all points have been made multiple times, and I'm tired of going in circles.
You mean, after deciding in a display of maturity that is apparently difficult for you,
Repeated interjections of "LOL!" is not mature.
OK, great. Also, you're missing the part where he originally dedicated the US military to the Somali campaign - right before the August Presidential campaign. Would you care to acknowledge that reality?
I've already acknowledged it, though an airlift versus a ground invasion hardly proves your point.
Would you care to acknowledge that you were talking like a jackass when, based on the timeline I dug up for you, you made stupid comments like "No election is over for a candidate until all the votes are counted"? I had explicitly quoted "With only weeks left in his term as president, George Bush responds to the UN request, proposing that US combat troops lead an international UN force to secure the environment for relief operations." from the Dec. 4th entry.
Soooooo.....which part of that proves me wrong?
All of it, unless you want to claim that the UN never has a good reason to attempt aid or try to keep the peace (which is in their charter), or that the US should never aid in those efforts, despite being part of the UN. It wouldn't even surprise me one bit if I trawled through your comments and found something in favor of US or UN intervention for humanitarian reasons.
Probably the most likely is, the situation in Somalia was going to fall apart and leave Bush looking extra bad before he handed the mess to Clinton.
Uh huh, no idle speculation there. And why was the UN pressuring the US to act in the first place? Was it to help with Bush's chances of getting elected, or to make him look good before he left?
Meanwhile, the facts haven't changed: There was a humanitarian disaster, there was public pressure to do something about it, and both the UN and US did something about it. There's at least an arguably good reason for all of this.
LOL indeed, even if half of the statement was logically acceptable, you still haven't explained how that leaves the President who involved the US military in a third-world guerrilla conflict with no clear mission, blameless.
I didn't say Bush was blameless, but Clinton owned the shift in mission and resulting casualties, and I gave a rough 80% figure. The clear mission was the one Bush initiated, which was to provide a secure environment for aid to stop the famine, and it was successful at doing that. The long-term exit strategy was not successful, but it was Clinton's responsibility to make decisions as the situation evolved, and troops died as a result of those decisions. Clinton could have said no to any offensive operations.
Yes, it really is. To have to go and post reality that you should already be aware of, but are being extremely resistant to.
Really, so several posts later after demonstrating ignorance about the operation to which I then corrected you with references, and talking about ridiculous claims of "counting the vote" of a month-old election when shown a timeline, you finally decide you have to back up your own claims and this is some extraordinary effort on your part? "LOL!"
Sure, Bush committed US troops to invade once he couldn't be elected any more.
So if he was so keen on being re-elected, why would he commit troops to a ground invasion after he had lost the election?
I did respond, with the metaphor of bank robbers. You apparently didn't get my response.
Sorry, I see it now. I don't know what happened, but now that I see it, I'll respond here:
Those reasons stated for the invasion are, quite frankly, utterly bogus. Otherwise, the US and the other nations involved in the Somalia action would have stayed and fixed Somalia's problems *regardless* of Clinton, Blackhawk Down, or anything else.
And you actually follow politics? It happens a lot that there's political pressure to take action to correct some wrong, the action is taken and we get some gory stories of soldiers dying, because that tends to happen in military actions, and then there's political pressure to withdraw. This is one of the reasons why the UN is so ineffective.
And to claim the reason was "bogus" because Bush wanted to get elected, while ignoring the motivations for the UN, ignoring the actual humanitarian disaster, the media coverage, and the actual good that was done when action was taken, or that the real military intervention occurred after Bush had lost the election, is to have blinders on.
If someone robbed a bank and claimed it was "to free all that money, and release it into the economy while giving the tellers the day off", would you believe them? More importantly, would those possible good reasons excuse the action?
The "more importantly" is entirely the point. We're talking about actual facts on the ground, and what action any President of the United States should have taken. Was there a humanitarian disaster? There was. Was it worth intervening? That's the point of the UN, to prevent humanitarian disasters. Did they initially accomplish the stated goals? Yes, they did.
LOL! So, I can't blame Bush for Bush's own actions. But you can blame Clinton for the results of Bush's actions. How does that make sense?
Because Clinton was the Commander in Chief and made the decision to change the mandate from a defensive one to an offensive one. "LOL!"
And Jennifer Pawluck, the photographer, was a light-skinned student living in Montreal, who hardly looks like the type the Canadian police would go rounding up just for kicks, even assuming the Canadian police would do that to somebody of color (which I highly doubt anyways).
It seems obvious that you will think only the best of the cops no matter how much evidence to the contrary there might be.
No, what's obvious is I don't accept your strawmen characterizations as facts. I never disputed the accounts of the two protests you linked to, for example.
Colored people in New York were being arrested for no reason and then held for a day or two while they try to come up with charges. This was the policy as handed down from the top. I'm not going to do any more research for you, you can use Google as easily as I can.
What makes it my research? You claim the point, you provide the evidence. I do the same when asked of me, and often I do it in advance.
However, I'm actually familiar with this story, and it was a quota system. And this is why I'm insistent on you providing the evidence for your claims, because this story identifies the problem as "stop-and-frisk", and says they actually let go nearly 9 out of 10 people. It's also in New York City, not Montreal, Canada. It's still an appalling story, but the details matter.
How about Waco, people won't come out of their building they just kill them all.
Again, an extreme example, and again, missing several details, such as the nature of the compound (heavily armed religious cult with an End of Times complex), the length of the standoff that occurred before the building was finally assaulted with heavy equipment (51 days), or dispute about who started the fire (there's even evidence from witnesses inside the building that it was the Branch Davidians).
Or that cop that went on the killing spree.
Are you talking about Dorner, the fired cop with a grudge who went after other cops? I don't know. See, you can list a bunch of examples from the top of your head, that doesn't make them true or easy to know what exactly you are referencing so I can verify it.
While there's police abuse that occurs far too often, that doesn't mean some random student from Montreal just happened to have been rounded up and had nothing to do with student protests or didn't have a political reason for photographing and sharing online some graffiti that depicted the assassination of a hated police commander.
The idiot comment still applies, since your original comment was based on the chronology link I had provided. As for your latest reply, I won't repeat my reply here, but kudos for managing to salvage some semblance of intelligence.
I mean, wow. Ok, if this is the level I have to go, fine.
Wow, you actually have to provide evidence for one of your claims, like I've been doing all along. That's some level you have to go to.
"In August 1992, as the U.S. presidential election campaign was beginning, President Bush ordered the U.S. military to begin a humanitarian relief airlift to Somalia."
An airlift is not the same as a military invasion, which did not happen until "after he had lost the election to Bill Clinton". And you still haven't responded to the argument of "no good reason": regardless as to who was in the office, was there a good reason for the President of the United States to take action in Somalia?
It looks like the decisions you blame on Clinton were actually made by Bush, when Bush was no longer accountable via reelection.
Wrong. You can't blame Bush for escalating the mission from a protection of aid to going after Aidid. Bush never ordered such action. This has already been documented.
No election is over for a candidate until all the votes are counted - and as we saw in 2000, not even then.
I'm sorry, you're acting like a complete idiot now. The chronology gives Dec. 4 as the date of Bush's offer to the UN to send in troops. They accepted the offer on Dec. 5. The election was on Nov. 3 and had long since been counted. Please stop digging yourself a deeper hole and acknowledge your mistake, or provide credible evidence for an alternative timeline, or I'm going to stop responding.
Oh, I get what you're saying completely. I just disagree with it
No, you don't fucking get it at all. When you make a claim about there being "for no good reason", there's a strong implication that there is no good reason at all, not just whatever personal motivations Bush had. It doesn't even matter what his motivations were if it was the right thing for him to do as President of the United States. That is why I mentioned the UN and have backed it up with other sources to indicate why Bush's decision may have been a good one.
You never disputed any facts about the humanitarian crisis or even argued that it wasn't worthy of intervention, instead merely focusing on what Bush had done in the past, and as it turns out, even gave a completely invalidated alternative reason, to pump up election numbers.
How does that invalidate it? You don't think people do desperate things when they're behind?
Again, please read carefully, and do some critical thinking as well. The election was over, not just by poll numbers, but by the actual result. At that point the only way he was going to remain president was by staging a coup.
If you would bother to pay any attention to what the police do on a daily basis you would not have to ask if that was a routine occurrence.
If you weren't a jackass you wouldn't extrapolate from a few extreme protest cases to what happens on a daily basis. The police do not, in fact, routinely round up thousands of innocent people just walking about, not on a daily basis, not on any basis.
The risk of running into a criminal and coming to harm is much less than having a police officer cause me harm.
I've had several interactions with the police in my lifetime, and they have been mostly positive.
Are you saying that because the UN agreed to it, that automatically means that Bush 1 wasn't pursuing the war for his own purposes?
I don't see how you can be following what I wrote and not already get the gist of what I'm saying. When you originally stated, "Bush 1 started the Somalia conflict. For no good reason [..]", it's completely bullshit to ignore the actual good reasons there were for intervening. Whether Bush personally cared or not is besides the point, and this is the last time I'm going to repeat myself.
(1) that Bush's efforts were a near-complete success
You're right, that wasn't clear in the link. That's mostly from memory of watching documentaries. There was one in particular that talked about how Aidid's son was in the Marines providing relief, and that the operation was largely a success.
However, I have found corresponding evidence from the Operation Restore Hope page, such as this quote from a cited page: "By March 1993, mass starvation had been overcome, and security was much improved."
I also found a chronology that completely invalidates your initial claim that Bush "was looking for a way to shore up his numbers for re-election":
"With only weeks left in his term as president, George Bush responds to the UN request, proposing that US combat troops lead an international UN force to secure the environment for relief operations. On December 5, the UN accepts his offer, and Bush orders 25,000 US troops into Somalia. On December 9th, the first US Marines land on the beach."
He had already lost the election by that point.
Clinton undermined by doing something Bush would not have done
I never said that. I don't even fault Clinton's decision, as I probably would have done the same thing. I just said he owns his decision, as it was his to make as Commander in Chief.
(3) means the entire situation becomes 100% Clinton's fault.
It's not 100%, but easily 80%.
You would have to at least specifically prove that Clinton mishandled the situation in a way that led to Blackhawk Down
No, it isn't about mishandled, it's about making decisions that lead US soldiers to die. You claimed no such military actions were initiated by Clinton. Per the chronology link: "While Clinton supported this expansion of the UN's mandate, he simultaneously ordered the number of US troops in Somalia to be reduced and replaced by UN troops."
I left the bit in the end about his reducing troops lest you think I was being selective, but it doesn't change the fact that the mission changed and Clinton was making decisions that led to American deaths.
So because you like to stay blind to the situation that makes everything OK?!?
I didn't say everything was OK. I was responding to a specific situation in which both essential details were omitted (by the original poster) and the link between the photographer and protest movement was hand-waved away (by you).
Since you are such an idiot that you are incapable of doing your own research
It's up to you to provide evidence for your own points.
The 2004 Republican Convention in New York. Thousands of people rounded up and arrested.
So, is this a routine occurrence, or is it likely that somebody swept up in a protest arrest, and then posted a picture of violent graffiti associated with that protest movement was also part of the protest?
I'll tell you what, I rejoice inside when I hear news of someone killing a police officer. I would do the same for you as you seem to be as big a part of the problem to me.
That's because you're the type of violent person that you loathe so much. History is full of such people bringing about their own hell once they come to power.
OK, well that's not exactly what I've read. Do you have any nonpartisan sources for this analysis?
I'm going by the Wikipedia link I've already given, which matches what I've seen in journalist stories. Do you have a source that says otherwise?
Oh, come on. It was no more 'led' by the UN
I said it was led by the US. Please read carefully before going on a rant. I also said it was a UN mission, which it was, and you can easily find the UN resolutions on the Wikipedia page. The UN approved the mission because that's the kind of thing the UN was created for.
So, just because the police are a huge mob-like organization that routinely breaks the law and rounds up innocent people, that somehow means anything about the people they round up?
Funny, but I've never been "rounded up" or even seen such an operation. What it means, in this case, is that it wasn't just an interesting piece of art to her. Partisans who omit essential details or create straw men like you have done are only preaching to the choir. Anybody the least bit skeptical will easily dismiss you as propagandists.
So, Bush 1 starts the fire, hands it over to Clinton, and when the fire gets bigger it becomes all Clinton's fault and not any of it is Bush 1's.
The fire didn't get bigger. It was smaller, and they wanted to extinguish it completely. It was Clinton's decision how to handle the situation, either by withdrawing, if there was "no good reason" for the US to be there, or to take another approach. If Aidid was captured and the situation was brought to a satisfactory end, of course Clinton would take the credit for it, and deservedly so. When it goes wrong and he pulls out amid public outcry, he owns that as well. You can't have it both ways.
For invading Bush 1 invading Somalia?
It was a UN mission led by the US for a good cause. Why would the UN care about Bush's re-election chances? It doesn't matter if Bush personally cared if there was in fact a good reason.
That's why I said "military actions that Clinton started".
It was Clinton's decision to escalate the mission. He has to own the consequences.
Pardon me if I consider Bush 1's stated "humanitarian" reasons for the Somalia action more than a little suspect, due to that previous context.
Then you can blame the UN too. And even if you are cynical if Bush really cared or not, the humanitarian reason existed, so you can't claim it was for "no good reason".
I'll take the military actions that Clinton started any day - because they went without *one single US soldier killed in combat* and they ended with full success in less than a year.
What?? Blackhawk Down, and it ended with our soldiers being dragged through the streets and an eventual pullout of our forces, followed by mass famine due to the warlords that the original action had put a stop to.
OH, and FYI - Bush 1 started the Somalia conflict. For no good reason, except that the first Iraq invasion was over, he failed to topple Saddam, and he was looking for a way to shore up his numbers for re-election.
"No good reason" being a humanitarian disaster. The UN approved, and the plan worked: International aid was getting to where it was supposed to. What happened next was on Clinton's watch, when they wanted to remove a particular warlord who wasn't cooperating.
The loss and withdrawal in Somalia had deep consequences, making America look weak and prompting failure to take action elsewhere. I don't blame Clinton for losing a few forces, but I do blame him for being overly sensitive to poll numbers.
If you worked for him, he would be glad you didn't waste time listening to a telemarketer call.
If he got to a point where the telemarketer was ranting at him, he was already wasting time. I don't even answer the phone any more if I don't recognize the number, but back when I did I would just set the phone aside until I heard the busy signal. I'd much rather waste their time than mine.
(given how easy it is to check and adjust tire pressure and that it can't fix tire leaks and blowouts
You really should be checking your tire pressure once a month. It isn't hard, but it's an easy thing to forget or put off. Plus a slow leak (one that takes several days to be significant), of which I've encountered many times, shouldn't be a problem for auto-inflating tires.
But I did some checking, and it seems like it isn't even a standard option yet. But one thing that is standard in new cars is the Tire Pressure Monitoring System, which will let you know if your tire is seriously under-inflated.
If that is your idea of a question, then I'm happy I don't have to deal with your questions more often.
Welcome to Slashdot, where the comments are harsh, but it's just a microcosm of real-world reaction when something seems like crap based on previous experience. As a developer having a thick skin and some patience can help.
I have put the highlighting explanation into the manual
Oh dear, showing your old-man syndrome again. When was this juvenile comeback last popular, in the early 90s Usenet?
Defining a word with itself - fail.
"gave consideration to" is just another way of saying "considered it". Just fucking google it if you don't believe me and want to see some examples. The only failure here is your pitiful lack of English skills. I referred you to the dictionary if you really have a problem with "considered".
Selective misquoting to avoid answering the hard question - fail.
I'm not avoiding any hard questions, nor have I misquoted anything. What "hard" question did I not answer? Now avoiding -- you are doing that by not acknowledging your original statement, along with your continual dance away from it.
It means you considered it. If you have trouble with considered, check the dictionary.
Those are your words, not mine anyway.
Here are your words: "I drive a 14 year old car. I am far from poor, I drive it because there hasn't really been another vehicle that has appealed to me since."
You explicitly mentioned why you drove a 14 year old car and did not buy a new one -- unless you want to be completely ridiculous and claim that's an unjust implication on my part.
Seriously what the fuck is wrong with you? Are you projecting your own shit here?
You're the one changing your argument after the fact. Why would you need to do that if the mark was untrue? But you know what? I apologize. Your comment was harmless, and if you want to drive around in a 14 year old car when you are "far from poor", it's no skin off my back.
You really don't, because he stated that cost wasn't part of the equation.
Even with a somewhat increased level of maintenance for a Civic, it's still cheaper and more convenient to maintain than most new cars.
I can understand the cheaper, but not the more convenient. Old cars have things break down more frequently. New cars have new perks to reduce maintenance (like auto-inflating tires). And when you're talking about scrounging around looking for a piece out of a junkyard for a month, as this guy had to, that doesn't sound very convenient either.
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I had exactly the same experience, and so his gradual devolution is all the more shocking. I read Treason and was struck by how sensitively he captured the deep friendship between Lanik and Helmut; it's almost impossible to reconcile with his truly vehement anti-gay statements.
Orson Scott Card sounds like the classic case of a repressed homosexual lashing out at others who openly live as a homosexual.
The problem is that cross-domain cookie setting, and resource requests are a core functionality in web browsers... Not just for advertising, but simply a working site that loads remote resources.
So is JavaScript, but I still browse with NoScript on by default and selectively enable when I want JavaScript. Along those lines, I also use RequestPolicy to block cross-domain requests by default, and selectively enable pages that need it. This works "fine" for a surprising number of sites (I put "fine" in quotes because the experience is quite different than standard browsing: in many ways better, but in some ways worse).
Oh, but calling people an idiot is [mature]?
No, I never said it was. I admit my frustration got the better of me after feeling like I was talking with a brick wall in regards to the UN involvement, the misreading of US as UN, and finally finished off with two absurd responses to a referenced timeline.
But if you really want to get somewhere in a conversation, it's best not to initiate that kind of childishness.
True enough, but if you want to claim the maturity mantle, you shouldn't be responding in kind, as it only escalates.
Because it actually proves my point - that Bush clearly got us involved in Somalia as an election-time ploy.
It's not quite so simple as that, because it also showed that Bush didn't run off and start a war just to get re-elected on his own initiative. There was pressure by the UN, media, and the public, and the action he took was limited to an airlift, with actual ground troops coming after he had lost the election. I can easily summarize that as "Bush does the right thing in response to public and political pressure during an election season, despite reluctance to get militarily involved in a non-strategic combat zone."
And the reality hasn't changed, that it's as near to certain as we can get without being mind-readers that none of the above reasons were what motivated Bush to involve the US in Somalia.
If anybody is mind-reading it is you, and rather badly. First you ignored all the surrounding context, and ever since it has been brought up have tried to downplay it. It's completely biased.
Because it appeared to me you were referring to the entire US involvement in Somalia, and not just the December military increase.
That's where careful reading comes into play. I wasn't referring to poll numbers (and even explicitly said so after your first reply), the timeline was dated, and I quoted from the timeline. By the second time you had replied, you had zero excuse for talking about counting the vote and 2000 without providing your contrary evidence, which you provided after the fact.
Otherwise, as I've already stated and I know you read, we wouldn't have caused humanitaran crises ourselves in Iraq and elsewhere, as we have under *all Presidents* - and SPECIFICALLY in the face of public pressure from within the US, from the UN, and from the world.
Strategic decisions usually dominate, but that doesn't mean humanitarian reasons never come into play. The UN was created to mitigate them, and I think Somalia is a perfect example.
If Bush responds to public and outside political pressure for a non-strategic asset during an election season, it is at least arguable it was for a good reason, even if his motivation was to get elected. And when he commits combat troops after further political pressure after he had already lost the election, now you have to invent a new reason, that he was concerned with his legacy (like Kennedy or Johnson had their legacy improved by upping the ante in Vietnam?).
A clear mission has specific targets and territories - get this guy, remove this government from this area, destroy these facilities.
"Secure food aid to areas of famine." And the thing is, by all accounts already documented and not disputed by you, it worked.
And the bottom line, if there was "no good reason" for the US to be in Somalia, there was "no good reason" for Clinton to approve the mission shift to go after Aidid and for US combat troops to have died as a result 10 months into Clinton's presidency and role as Commander in Chief.
So, I just request that you read some works
Sorry, I'm not going to "read some works" suggested by you at the 11th hour. You've had all along to reference them if you wanted to, and even here you aren't specific. This is my last post, as all points have been made multiple times, and I'm tired of going in circles.
You mean, after deciding in a display of maturity that is apparently difficult for you,
Repeated interjections of "LOL!" is not mature.
OK, great. Also, you're missing the part where he originally dedicated the US military to the Somali campaign - right before the August Presidential campaign. Would you care to acknowledge that reality?
I've already acknowledged it, though an airlift versus a ground invasion hardly proves your point.
Would you care to acknowledge that you were talking like a jackass when, based on the timeline I dug up for you, you made stupid comments like "No election is over for a candidate until all the votes are counted"? I had explicitly quoted "With only weeks left in his term as president, George Bush responds to the UN request, proposing that US combat troops lead an international UN force to secure the environment for relief operations." from the Dec. 4th entry.
Soooooo.....which part of that proves me wrong?
All of it, unless you want to claim that the UN never has a good reason to attempt aid or try to keep the peace (which is in their charter), or that the US should never aid in those efforts, despite being part of the UN. It wouldn't even surprise me one bit if I trawled through your comments and found something in favor of US or UN intervention for humanitarian reasons.
Probably the most likely is, the situation in Somalia was going to fall apart and leave Bush looking extra bad before he handed the mess to Clinton.
Uh huh, no idle speculation there. And why was the UN pressuring the US to act in the first place? Was it to help with Bush's chances of getting elected, or to make him look good before he left?
Meanwhile, the facts haven't changed: There was a humanitarian disaster, there was public pressure to do something about it, and both the UN and US did something about it. There's at least an arguably good reason for all of this.
LOL indeed, even if half of the statement was logically acceptable, you still haven't explained how that leaves the President who involved the US military in a third-world guerrilla conflict with no clear mission, blameless.
I didn't say Bush was blameless, but Clinton owned the shift in mission and resulting casualties, and I gave a rough 80% figure. The clear mission was the one Bush initiated, which was to provide a secure environment for aid to stop the famine, and it was successful at doing that. The long-term exit strategy was not successful, but it was Clinton's responsibility to make decisions as the situation evolved, and troops died as a result of those decisions. Clinton could have said no to any offensive operations.
Yes, it really is. To have to go and post reality that you should already be aware of, but are being extremely resistant to.
Really, so several posts later after demonstrating ignorance about the operation to which I then corrected you with references, and talking about ridiculous claims of "counting the vote" of a month-old election when shown a timeline, you finally decide you have to back up your own claims and this is some extraordinary effort on your part? "LOL!"
Sure, Bush committed US troops to invade once he couldn't be elected any more.
So if he was so keen on being re-elected, why would he commit troops to a ground invasion after he had lost the election?
I did respond, with the metaphor of bank robbers. You apparently didn't get my response.
Sorry, I see it now. I don't know what happened, but now that I see it, I'll respond here:
Those reasons stated for the invasion are, quite frankly, utterly bogus. Otherwise, the US and the other nations involved in the Somalia action would have stayed and fixed Somalia's problems *regardless* of Clinton, Blackhawk Down, or anything else.
And you actually follow politics? It happens a lot that there's political pressure to take action to correct some wrong, the action is taken and we get some gory stories of soldiers dying, because that tends to happen in military actions, and then there's political pressure to withdraw. This is one of the reasons why the UN is so ineffective.
And to claim the reason was "bogus" because Bush wanted to get elected, while ignoring the motivations for the UN, ignoring the actual humanitarian disaster, the media coverage, and the actual good that was done when action was taken, or that the real military intervention occurred after Bush had lost the election, is to have blinders on.
If someone robbed a bank and claimed it was "to free all that money, and release it into the economy while giving the tellers the day off", would you believe them? More importantly, would those possible good reasons excuse the action?
The "more importantly" is entirely the point. We're talking about actual facts on the ground, and what action any President of the United States should have taken. Was there a humanitarian disaster? There was. Was it worth intervening? That's the point of the UN, to prevent humanitarian disasters. Did they initially accomplish the stated goals? Yes, they did.
LOL! So, I can't blame Bush for Bush's own actions. But you can blame Clinton for the results of Bush's actions. How does that make sense?
Because Clinton was the Commander in Chief and made the decision to change the mandate from a defensive one to an offensive one. "LOL!"
But, I am fortunate enough to be a white male.
And Jennifer Pawluck, the photographer, was a light-skinned student living in Montreal, who hardly looks like the type the Canadian police would go rounding up just for kicks, even assuming the Canadian police would do that to somebody of color (which I highly doubt anyways).
It seems obvious that you will think only the best of the cops no matter how much evidence to the contrary there might be.
No, what's obvious is I don't accept your strawmen characterizations as facts. I never disputed the accounts of the two protests you linked to, for example.
Colored people in New York were being arrested for no reason and then held for a day or two while they try to come up with charges. This was the policy as handed down from the top. I'm not going to do any more research for you, you can use Google as easily as I can.
What makes it my research? You claim the point, you provide the evidence. I do the same when asked of me, and often I do it in advance.
However, I'm actually familiar with this story, and it was a quota system. And this is why I'm insistent on you providing the evidence for your claims, because this story identifies the problem as "stop-and-frisk", and says they actually let go nearly 9 out of 10 people. It's also in New York City, not Montreal, Canada. It's still an appalling story, but the details matter.
How about Waco, people won't come out of their building they just kill them all.
Again, an extreme example, and again, missing several details, such as the nature of the compound (heavily armed religious cult with an End of Times complex), the length of the standoff that occurred before the building was finally assaulted with heavy equipment (51 days), or dispute about who started the fire (there's even evidence from witnesses inside the building that it was the Branch Davidians).
Or that cop that went on the killing spree.
Are you talking about Dorner, the fired cop with a grudge who went after other cops? I don't know. See, you can list a bunch of examples from the top of your head, that doesn't make them true or easy to know what exactly you are referencing so I can verify it.
While there's police abuse that occurs far too often, that doesn't mean some random student from Montreal just happened to have been rounded up and had nothing to do with student protests or didn't have a political reason for photographing and sharing online some graffiti that depicted the assassination of a hated police commander.
I didn't ignore it, I already replied. "LOL!"
The idiot comment still applies, since your original comment was based on the chronology link I had provided. As for your latest reply, I won't repeat my reply here, but kudos for managing to salvage some semblance of intelligence.
I mean, wow. Ok, if this is the level I have to go, fine.
Wow, you actually have to provide evidence for one of your claims, like I've been doing all along. That's some level you have to go to.
"In August 1992, as the U.S. presidential election campaign was beginning, President Bush ordered the U.S. military to begin a humanitarian relief airlift to Somalia."
An airlift is not the same as a military invasion, which did not happen until "after he had lost the election to Bill Clinton". And you still haven't responded to the argument of "no good reason": regardless as to who was in the office, was there a good reason for the President of the United States to take action in Somalia?
It looks like the decisions you blame on Clinton were actually made by Bush, when Bush was no longer accountable via reelection.
Wrong. You can't blame Bush for escalating the mission from a protection of aid to going after Aidid. Bush never ordered such action. This has already been documented.
No election is over for a candidate until all the votes are counted - and as we saw in 2000, not even then.
I'm sorry, you're acting like a complete idiot now. The chronology gives Dec. 4 as the date of Bush's offer to the UN to send in troops. They accepted the offer on Dec. 5. The election was on Nov. 3 and had long since been counted. Please stop digging yourself a deeper hole and acknowledge your mistake, or provide credible evidence for an alternative timeline, or I'm going to stop responding.
Oh, I get what you're saying completely. I just disagree with it
No, you don't fucking get it at all. When you make a claim about there being "for no good reason", there's a strong implication that there is no good reason at all, not just whatever personal motivations Bush had. It doesn't even matter what his motivations were if it was the right thing for him to do as President of the United States. That is why I mentioned the UN and have backed it up with other sources to indicate why Bush's decision may have been a good one.
You never disputed any facts about the humanitarian crisis or even argued that it wasn't worthy of intervention, instead merely focusing on what Bush had done in the past, and as it turns out, even gave a completely invalidated alternative reason, to pump up election numbers.
How does that invalidate it? You don't think people do desperate things when they're behind?
Again, please read carefully, and do some critical thinking as well. The election was over, not just by poll numbers, but by the actual result. At that point the only way he was going to remain president was by staging a coup.
If you would bother to pay any attention to what the police do on a daily basis you would not have to ask if that was a routine occurrence.
If you weren't a jackass you wouldn't extrapolate from a few extreme protest cases to what happens on a daily basis. The police do not, in fact, routinely round up thousands of innocent people just walking about, not on a daily basis, not on any basis.
The risk of running into a criminal and coming to harm is much less than having a police officer cause me harm.
I've had several interactions with the police in my lifetime, and they have been mostly positive.
Are you saying that because the UN agreed to it, that automatically means that Bush 1 wasn't pursuing the war for his own purposes?
I don't see how you can be following what I wrote and not already get the gist of what I'm saying. When you originally stated, "Bush 1 started the Somalia conflict. For no good reason [..]", it's completely bullshit to ignore the actual good reasons there were for intervening. Whether Bush personally cared or not is besides the point, and this is the last time I'm going to repeat myself.
(1) that Bush's efforts were a near-complete success
You're right, that wasn't clear in the link. That's mostly from memory of watching documentaries. There was one in particular that talked about how Aidid's son was in the Marines providing relief, and that the operation was largely a success.
However, I have found corresponding evidence from the Operation Restore Hope page, such as this quote from a cited page: "By March 1993, mass starvation had been overcome, and security was much improved."
I also found a chronology that completely invalidates your initial claim that Bush "was looking for a way to shore up his numbers for re-election":
"With only weeks left in his term as president, George Bush responds to the UN request, proposing that US combat troops lead an international UN force to secure the environment for relief operations. On December 5, the UN accepts his offer, and Bush orders 25,000 US troops into Somalia. On December 9th, the first US Marines land on the beach."
He had already lost the election by that point.
Clinton undermined by doing something Bush would not have done
I never said that. I don't even fault Clinton's decision, as I probably would have done the same thing. I just said he owns his decision, as it was his to make as Commander in Chief.
(3) means the entire situation becomes 100% Clinton's fault.
It's not 100%, but easily 80%.
You would have to at least specifically prove that Clinton mishandled the situation in a way that led to Blackhawk Down
No, it isn't about mishandled, it's about making decisions that lead US soldiers to die. You claimed no such military actions were initiated by Clinton. Per the chronology link: "While Clinton supported this expansion of the UN's mandate, he simultaneously ordered the number of US troops in Somalia to be reduced and replaced by UN troops."
I left the bit in the end about his reducing troops lest you think I was being selective, but it doesn't change the fact that the mission changed and Clinton was making decisions that led to American deaths.
So because you like to stay blind to the situation that makes everything OK?!?
I didn't say everything was OK. I was responding to a specific situation in which both essential details were omitted (by the original poster) and the link between the photographer and protest movement was hand-waved away (by you).
Since you are such an idiot that you are incapable of doing your own research
It's up to you to provide evidence for your own points.
The 2004 Republican Convention in New York. Thousands of people rounded up and arrested.
So, is this a routine occurrence, or is it likely that somebody swept up in a protest arrest, and then posted a picture of violent graffiti associated with that protest movement was also part of the protest?
I'll tell you what, I rejoice inside when I hear news of someone killing a police officer. I would do the same for you as you seem to be as big a part of the problem to me.
That's because you're the type of violent person that you loathe so much. History is full of such people bringing about their own hell once they come to power.
OK, well that's not exactly what I've read. Do you have any nonpartisan sources for this analysis?
I'm going by the Wikipedia link I've already given, which matches what I've seen in journalist stories. Do you have a source that says otherwise?
Oh, come on. It was no more 'led' by the UN
I said it was led by the US. Please read carefully before going on a rant. I also said it was a UN mission, which it was, and you can easily find the UN resolutions on the Wikipedia page. The UN approved the mission because that's the kind of thing the UN was created for.
So, just because the police are a huge mob-like organization that routinely breaks the law and rounds up innocent people, that somehow means anything about the people they round up?
Funny, but I've never been "rounded up" or even seen such an operation. What it means, in this case, is that it wasn't just an interesting piece of art to her. Partisans who omit essential details or create straw men like you have done are only preaching to the choir. Anybody the least bit skeptical will easily dismiss you as propagandists.
So, Bush 1 starts the fire, hands it over to Clinton, and when the fire gets bigger it becomes all Clinton's fault and not any of it is Bush 1's.
The fire didn't get bigger. It was smaller, and they wanted to extinguish it completely. It was Clinton's decision how to handle the situation, either by withdrawing, if there was "no good reason" for the US to be there, or to take another approach. If Aidid was captured and the situation was brought to a satisfactory end, of course Clinton would take the credit for it, and deservedly so. When it goes wrong and he pulls out amid public outcry, he owns that as well. You can't have it both ways.
For invading Bush 1 invading Somalia?
It was a UN mission led by the US for a good cause. Why would the UN care about Bush's re-election chances? It doesn't matter if Bush personally cared if there was in fact a good reason.
That's why I said "military actions that Clinton started".
It was Clinton's decision to escalate the mission. He has to own the consequences.
Pardon me if I consider Bush 1's stated "humanitarian" reasons for the Somalia action more than a little suspect, due to that previous context.
Then you can blame the UN too. And even if you are cynical if Bush really cared or not, the humanitarian reason existed, so you can't claim it was for "no good reason".
I'll take the military actions that Clinton started any day - because they went without *one single US soldier killed in combat* and they ended with full success in less than a year.
What?? Blackhawk Down, and it ended with our soldiers being dragged through the streets and an eventual pullout of our forces, followed by mass famine due to the warlords that the original action had put a stop to.
OH, and FYI - Bush 1 started the Somalia conflict. For no good reason, except that the first Iraq invasion was over, he failed to topple Saddam, and he was looking for a way to shore up his numbers for re-election.
"No good reason" being a humanitarian disaster. The UN approved, and the plan worked: International aid was getting to where it was supposed to. What happened next was on Clinton's watch, when they wanted to remove a particular warlord who wasn't cooperating.
The loss and withdrawal in Somalia had deep consequences, making America look weak and prompting failure to take action elsewhere. I don't blame Clinton for losing a few forces, but I do blame him for being overly sensitive to poll numbers.
:)
If you worked for him, he would be glad you didn't waste time listening to a telemarketer call.
If he got to a point where the telemarketer was ranting at him, he was already wasting time. I don't even answer the phone any more if I don't recognize the number, but back when I did I would just set the phone aside until I heard the busy signal. I'd much rather waste their time than mine.
(given how easy it is to check and adjust tire pressure and that it can't fix tire leaks and blowouts
You really should be checking your tire pressure once a month. It isn't hard, but it's an easy thing to forget or put off. Plus a slow leak (one that takes several days to be significant), of which I've encountered many times, shouldn't be a problem for auto-inflating tires.
But I did some checking, and it seems like it isn't even a standard option yet. But one thing that is standard in new cars is the Tire Pressure Monitoring System, which will let you know if your tire is seriously under-inflated.
If that is your idea of a question, then I'm happy I don't have to deal with your questions more often.
Welcome to Slashdot, where the comments are harsh, but it's just a microcosm of real-world reaction when something seems like crap based on previous experience. As a developer having a thick skin and some patience can help.
I have put the highlighting explanation into the manual
I'm glad something useful came out of this.
BZZT
Oh dear, showing your old-man syndrome again. When was this juvenile comeback last popular, in the early 90s Usenet?
Defining a word with itself - fail.
"gave consideration to" is just another way of saying "considered it". Just fucking google it if you don't believe me and want to see some examples. The only failure here is your pitiful lack of English skills. I referred you to the dictionary if you really have a problem with "considered".
Selective misquoting to avoid answering the hard question - fail.
I'm not avoiding any hard questions, nor have I misquoted anything. What "hard" question did I not answer? Now avoiding -- you are doing that by not acknowledging your original statement, along with your continual dance away from it.
Just what does "gave consideration" mean
It means you considered it. If you have trouble with considered, check the dictionary.
Those are your words, not mine anyway.
Here are your words: "I drive a 14 year old car. I am far from poor, I drive it because there hasn't really been another vehicle that has appealed to me since."
You explicitly mentioned why you drove a 14 year old car and did not buy a new one -- unless you want to be completely ridiculous and claim that's an unjust implication on my part.
Seriously what the fuck is wrong with you? Are you projecting your own shit here?
You're the one changing your argument after the fact. Why would you need to do that if the mark was untrue? But you know what? I apologize. Your comment was harmless, and if you want to drive around in a 14 year old car when you are "far from poor", it's no skin off my back.
so I understand where this guy is coming from
You really don't, because he stated that cost wasn't part of the equation.
Even with a somewhat increased level of maintenance for a Civic, it's still cheaper and more convenient to maintain than most new cars.
I can understand the cheaper, but not the more convenient. Old cars have things break down more frequently. New cars have new perks to reduce maintenance (like auto-inflating tires). And when you're talking about scrounging around looking for a piece out of a junkyard for a month, as this guy had to, that doesn't sound very convenient either.