In fact, wasn’t it only September 11th that finally got the US to finally crack down on paramilitary funding?
Basically the US didn’t care about terrorism until it happened at home. Now it’s the biggest threat to peace and stability in the world :rolleyes:
My wife’s church donates to a lot of Arab charities. They have also sent donations of food and funds to North Korea and Iran. What is supposed to happen next?
I didn’t say it wasn’t a ‘big issue’. I said we have a large Irish population, and that the entire situation wasn’t nearly as cut and dried as you and the poster I was responding too seemingly think it was. The US government didn’t support Irish terrorists, it was individual American’s who did (and, frankly, the ‘terrorist’ label is pretty malleable given the situation there and the history behind it).
We have as large an Islamic population as you do (just a WAG there), and I’m pretty sure that individual American citizens do indeed send tangible support to extremist Islamic groups, just as I’m sure that there is a non-zero percentage of your own population that does the same thing. Once you start talking about the British Government giving direct support, then you are crossing the line. I don’t believe that the US government ever directly or indirectly supported Irish terrorist groups, not officially, though they probably supported the equivalent of your ‘Arab charities’ from above in Ireland.
I don’t believe that the situation in Ireland really correlates well wrt the English vs the US and AQ. I also think, again, that this is all hijacking the thread, and I’d be happy to discuss it further with you in another thread…or you can pit me if you like for being an insensitive and ignorant yank sticking his nose into a discussion he has no business being in.
-XT
I hope they have got good legal advice. Various court decisions and agency interpretations have made this a potentially devastating thing to do - unless you are 100% certain what happens with the money. I seem to recall that donating to a purely health based charity that operates in the Gaza Strip, for example, can fall foul of the law if that charities work frees up Hamas to do things other than provide health care.
The U.S. government chose to passively support the I.R.A. by not bringing the full weight of the law down on those who raised funds to murder Irish police and civilians. Prominent politicians, such as Peter King, have spent careers being the lap dogs of terrorists. The U.S. federal court system repeatedly refused to extradite those accused of heinous murders to face justice in the U.K.
Yes, terrorist can be a malleable label. But what other fucking label would you use for shit like this?
Bollocks.
The UK Islamic population is approximately 2.4 million, out of an overall population of 62 million. Muslims make up around 3.8% of the UK population.
Estimates of the US Islamic population run from 1.3 million to 7 million, out of 311 million. Muslims make up from 04% to 1.2% of the US population.
Of course some individual US citizens send support to extremist Islamic groups. But it is illegal and enforced, unlike shaking the tin in shitty fake Irish bars in Boston, Philly & new York to provide a donation to help the boys behind the wire ever was. That money went directly to kill and maim British and Irish people - people whose crime was, for example, to be four years old and shopping for a present for Mum for Mothering Sunday.
Of course you don’t, because you don’t want to see the possibility that the U.S. government’s views on terrorism have been massively hypocritical.
Just about everything has been covered by other people. There’s no point retreading that ground. But just a couple of small comments on things that have not been covered:
The point that I was getting at is despite being utter bastards in the past we’ve long since learnt our lesson and managed to move on in such a way that we still managed to be friends with the people we were bastards to. This goes a long way to explain why so many Brits no longer see a military that can be projected around the globe as something particularly important. Frankly there are far more important things that we care a lot more about.
We no longer have a need to be invading other countries and we like the relative peace that we’ve managed to gain with the rest of the world. We would like to maintain that.
Because it is impolite. It is commonly used as a term of disdain on this board. When we’re liked we are Europeans, when we are disliked we are Euros. You’ve probably never noticed it, but then again you’re not one of the people it is being used against.
Let’s put it this way. If I was trying to have a sensible debate about a serious issue here, but insisted on referring to all Americans as “Yanks”, do you think that my views would be taken seriously?
Maybe I’m just too British, too concerned with matters of politeness and manners.
No…I never noticed it and didn’t know it was impolite. Sorry. Ironically, I actually picked up using the term Euros from some of my English friends when I was doing an IT project in London. It’s what they always seemed to call European mainlanders, so I figured it was a acceptable short hand.
Honestly…yes. I’ve been called a ‘yank’ plenty of times and I always found it hilarious (especially since I was born in Mexico).
No worries…glad you pointed it out as I didn’t want to insult anyone by my use of that term, and if it is in fact insulting it’s good to know.
-XT
Fair enough. Perhaps we need a “dry humour” (sorry humor) smilie. Us chaps aren’t used to you chaps doing dry humor, what?
Yeah, I’ll give you that, having gone back and re-read the comment that prompted Ludovic’s rolleyes.
That’s twice above you’ve tried to put the word “ignorant” into my mouth. You could really oblige by not doing it again.