Christ, the offenderati got here quick!
don’t worry, World - from what I’ve seen, Snoopy is not an equal opportunity offenderati.
Yer not from around here, now are ya? Or are you really that young?
I don’t have kids, but if I do, that’ll certainly be one of the first things I teach 'em. If they end up looking anything like me, they’re going to have to learn how to make some pre-emptive strikes.
I’m no fan of Bush, but this is silly.
Did it escape your notice, barely-sentient Meat, that the U.S. and Britain are engaged in a war with al-Qaeda? Or that a normal part of war is not only wishing, but actually inflicting, death on people, namely the persons with whom you are at war?
And they had what to do with Iraq again?
How many times do I have to tell you people, he looks like a chimp, not a dag’gon monkey!
To those crying a river for GW because someone mocked his looks in a Pit rant: blow it out your ass. GW is a big boy. *He had a whole series on Comedy Central making fun of him *. Why? Because he’s hilarious! Funny looking, funny sounding, says crazy-stupid shit.
Or at least he was hilarious until he wiped his ass with the Constitution. I’m sure our kids will think giving the executive the right to lock Americans away forever by decree was a funny joke. ha ha.
Nothing whatsoever. Neither does the article SentientMeat cites, which refers to the killing of al-Qaeda members in Yemen and is not even tangentially related to Iraq.
There may be legitimate objections to the killing of al-Qaeda members in Yemen (personally I wish the no-goods had been captured, not because I sympathize with them but because they might have provided valuable intelligence). But complaining that we “wish death on people” with whom we are at war? Please.
Having posted in haste, I had no time to deal with the rest of the OP.
Come now. Bush was riding high in opinion polls after having given the Taliban their thoroughly deserved comeuppance. The failure to capture Osama bin Laden personally did not upset the American public when they saw his headquarters and training infrastructure scattered to the winds.
There was no popular pressure on Bush at all to invade Iraq. The best he could possibly have hoped for was a quick, cheap victory followed by an easy disengagement, as his father achieved. You will notice that did not help his father in 1992. At best, the war with Iraq was not going to help Bush get re-elected; at worst (and it’s looking like the worst, from Bush’s point of view) it would doom his re-election chances.
No, Bush thought that by knocking off Saddam Hussein he could personally rebuild Iraq as a democracy in the image of post-WW2 Japan or Germany, and that this would lead to democracy and prosperity flowering in the Middle East, which would undercut the resentment and frustration on which terrorism feeds. A pipe dream? Probably. Hubris? Almost certainly. A re-election scheme? No way.
Bollocks is correct. But Blair based that “45 minutes” story on British intelligence, not anything Bush told him.
Even the silliness about yellowcake uranium was based on British intelligence (though Bush deserves ridicule for browbeating the CIA into withdrawing its objections to the story, then turning around and pinning the blame on the CIA when it turned out to be rubbish).
BTW, SentientMeat, as silly as your OP is, I shouldn’t have made fun of your name. I’ve read the short story you based it on, and I love it. But this is the Pit, you know.
Somehow I bet that 45 minute bullshit had the Bush administration’s blessing before it was ever said. Just a hunch.
funny you should mention this. I’ve just finihed reading a “Chelsea House” Biography written by NIt M. Renfrew “a freelance journalist specialising in U.S. intelligence and national security affairs” and Vito Perrone Director of Teaching Education and Chair of Teaching at Harvard, who concluded that given the lips of the Kurdish victims during the Iran-Iraq war had blue lips amongst other symptoms, that cyanide poisoning was the cause of death. Furthering that, they made the point that Iran had held the town where the gas attack took place, and that the Iranians were known to have had cyanide gas supplies at the time, whereas Iraq did not.
Given that the credibility of the American administration during this time is minimal at best, and that the Press had then, and has now, no credibility, i’m prepared to go out on a limb and say that in this instance, perhaps Saddam isn’t the evil bastard he is made out to be. In fact, he had many programs running before the outbreak of war to improve his countries literacy rates (which were successful) and modernise/industrialise his country.
You can, of course, believe that he was a villanious murderer, but I choose to believe otherwise.
Sometimes, I’m just too trusting.
preview is of course, a very good friend of mine.
Genocide eh? Then I’m sure there are other places we’ll be liberating in the near future as well.
Sancho Panza with atrocious teeth. Classic. So I presume we’re tilting at banana trees?
One question: thanks to London_Calling, I had an opportunity to learn about Mr. Blair’s virtual de-pantsing prior to the President’s speech. What’s the man-on-the-street opinion on the confrontational PMQs?
I wonder to what degree this is true.
I do think that playing up the weapons of mass destruction angle to justify the war was a mistake. The only realistic way to end the sanctions, it appeared to me, was to end Saddam’s regime. With Israel nuclearized, and Saddam racing for a nuclear weapon nothing good could ever come from that.
Which raises the issue again of why the US didn’t even guard Tuwaitha very well after the initial invasion.
Why is “genocide” even questionable in this case? Saddam literally “drained the swamps” to destroy the Marsh Arabs – among other persecuted majorites and personal enemies. The body count, according to preliminary NGOHR estimates, is well into the hundreds of thousands.
Because if we are going after true genocidal maniacs who actually pose a threat to the world there are other places to start.
Exactly. That’s why we rushed in to help in Rwanda…oh wait, no, it was Nigeria…no, no, that wasn’t it…Uganda? hmmm…ah, the Congo…surely our high sense of what is moral caused us to intercede there. No? Now why do you suppose the best we could muster for those poor sods was a tongue-clucking?
…or, alternately, given the fact that we indeed CAN’T rush in against all the world’s dictators, we should pick and choose which ones we do take action against, taking into account our own national interest (which, of course, is all any President is really responsible for)?
I must say I’ve never gotten the “if we can’t help them all, we shouldn’t help any of them” stance. My volunteering for turkey giveout at my church in the Archdiocese of NY on Wednesday won’t do a damn thing for poor people in the Diocese of Rockville Center. So?
So where are those WMD again? You know the thing that sets Saddam apart from everyother tinpot dictator.
Oh wait, they don’t exist, that’s right.
It’s funny (in the sad way) to observe all the misunderstanding on both sides from down here.
Mr Meat, you disappoint me… I’ve seen some posts from you that suggest a marvellous understanding of the world around you, but you’re not even close when it comes to this whole mess. Do you really believe Bush had much say in the events of the past year? Could it be that mayyyybe the military/corporate power (and whose interests do they serve, ultimately? even if Bush WASN’T a dupe, whose interest would he be serving? yet you apologise to the Americans, lest they confuse your animosity as being directed toward them…?) that erected him as a puppet were involved? That’s all he is… a puppet… a mouthpiece, or right now, a handy decoy. Ultimate bait! certainly got you, and from what I saw on the news last night, many of your fellow citizens.
Carry on making fun of his appearance. At least that’s funny.
Well Swoop, you certainly have my attention.