I do. Weirddave, I hereby challenge you to take up the cudgels and the pepper-spray against the very next Arab- and/or Muslim-American you might see. This challenge does not in any way imply any assumption on my part of criminal or civil or even rhetorical liability for any such actions, but, nevertheless, if you do not rise to the challenge, you are a loser and a pussy! 
Fine. We’ll both go to the middle east. I suppose we’ll meet in Tel Aviv or something before we separate to our respective destinations, me to the Knesset and you to the occupied territories. No media, no photo op, you’re just going to show up and start lobbying for Israeli children. On my dime. Dio declined, do you want to take it through to the logical end? If so, send me your contact information through private IM so I can get it started. Your move. I WILL do it. Will you?
Coward
Yeah, I’m not willing to fuck over my wife and kids to prove a point to some insane loser on the internets. The only possible explanation is that I’m a coward.
Maybe you should try to be a little more responsible yourself. Bush’s recession isn’t over yet.
I have a wife and kids too. They stand behind me cheering when I take a stand for what’s right. What do your wife and kids do Mr. Expediency?
Fuck over my wife and kids? You couldn’t be more wrong. MY wife and kids cheer when I take a stand for what’s right. I don’t know what your wife and kids do, but I suspect that you look poorly when they do it. I am giving you the opportunity to put your money(actually my money) where your mouth is, but you decline. You’re a poor man and a poor person. If I was you, I’d kill myself for being so hopeless.
Really? Your wife and kids literally stand and cheer for you for “taking a stand that’s right” (whatever that means)? I’m happy for you. Keep taking those stands.
In my case, the right thing to do is not to take off and fuck them over to prove a point to a total stranger on the internet.
You already said that. I’m extremely happy for you. That must get awfully noisy, though.
You don’t know what my wife and kids do when? When I take a stand for what’s right? What the fuck are you babbling about?
Is that supposed to hurt my feelings? Jesus, dude. Put down the bottle.
I guarantee you, my wife does not think that “what’s right” for me to do is to ditch her and the kids to go on a vaction with some complete stranger from the intarweb. Jesus. Grow the fuck up, will you. Does yoiur own wife even know you’re offering people free vacations on the internet?
As an incidental note, I tried to find this alleged moment when Sevastapol corrected me on something and found a thread from last May in which Sevastapol couldn’t even admit that women’s suffrage was a good thing, because that would “corner” him (his word) into admitting something positive about Israel.
The only moment, I figure, he even came close to correcting me about anything was when he pointed out that Kazhakstan and Azerbaijan has higher literacy rates than Israel, in response to my (cited) statement that Israel had higher literacy rates than its neighbors. I had quickly compiled a list of Islamic-majority Mediterranean and Middle-East states for comparison. It had not occurred to me to head 1000 miles into Asia Minor and throw in former Soviet Republics.
At Sevastapol’s suggestion, I started a spin-off thread about Hamas in which I listed my beliefs about the organization and the justifications thereof, inviting correction. He didn’t post to it once.
Based on this, I call his post #300 in this thread a lie, and him a liar.
Don’t spoil this thread with a sideshow, it’s taken a turn to the interesting.
I realize you don’t like to be called on your bullshit, Sevastapol (who does, after all?), but a viable strategy is to stop spreading it, rather than transparent attempts at deflection.
By the way, I don’t think it would be so easy for Dio to enter the Gaza Strip.
However, I checked a bit and it seems that Hamas has an office in Damascus. As far as I know, Syria does issue tourist visas to Americans.
So it does seem theoretically possible for Dio to travel to Syria and engage in the sort of protest which has been described.
Actually, I do think there’s a pretty good chance that Syrian police would arrest Dio and put him on a plane back to Minnesota before he was beaten by an angry mob.
Of course I don’t wish death on any poster here, but I do think Dio has a decent chance of surviving the experience while proving what every sane person knows already. Which he himself probably knows already which, I would guess, has a lot to do with why he chickened out.
Wow, I’m really impressed by the size of your virtual penises.
Incidentally, the death toll is up to 315. In retaliation for the death of 0.
I hope this action is turning point in the US’s public opinion of Israel. Unfortunately, due to the absurdly partisan media coverage, it’s very unlikely.
Too bad Hamas is so fucking inept; otherwise, the tolls would be more even.
For the sake of accuracy, there was one victim, a man in the Israeli town of Netivot. I have no problem condemning civilian casualties from both sides.
No, I don’t think they would be.
I don’t know what to make of TLCtugger ads to “undo circumcision damage” showing up in this thread. Especially considering what I’d guess to be the high circumcision rates in Israel.
Yeah, and making them fear you has worked so damn well so far right?
I have absolutely no dog in the fight between who is right and who is wrong in this, (in terms of the original dispute) but there are a few things that make me come down on the side of Palestine.
Chief amongst this is the disproportionality (is that a word?) of the Israeli resonse - do you need a cite for how many orders of magnitude greater the destruction and death is on the Palestinian side from the latest round? Israel is just acting like a huge bully.
And why should you be any different? Because you are the ones with the resources! What is more of a problem - one death amongst your citizenry or a few hundred? Which is going to create more hatred to perpetuate a war - a few dozens of rockets or many thousands of tonnes of high explosives dropped on residential areas as kids are coming home from school?
Just out of curiosity, how many mortars and rockets should be fired at Israel before they’re allowed to respond?
FTR, Yahoo’s front page is reporting that over 180 of the 300 plus killed are Hamas militants. So that’s not too bad a kill ratio in such an urbanized environment.
I don’t like seeing civilians of any kind being killed or hurt, but I also don’t see what else Israel can be expected to do about it. Just allow Hamas to launch rockets into Israel at will?
I will say this again: Those Qassam rockets have lousy accuracy, and Hamas is just firing them at random into Israel, not giving a shit whom they kill.
By the casualty reports, Israel is at least making an effort to minimize civilian casualties, a task made all the more difficult because the Hamas side encourages the death of their own due to how and where they position their launch sites, as well as being pretty woven into the fabric of the general Palestinian population.
Alessan, are you perhaps in danger of being called up as a reservist?
Actually I saw a video the other day which purported to show Hamas agents launching a mortar attack from a school building. If it’s true that Hamas engages in this sort of conduct, it’s mucho scummy.
My opinion only.
I don’t know. Are the only options here either a) Doing nothing or b) Killing 300 civilians?