Actually, Belgium surrendered on one day, because it was unable to oppose the German invasion, and the Germans bombed Brussels into rubble the next day just to prove they could.
[/QUOTE]
Actually, Belgium was imvaded on May 10 and surrendered on the 28th. As far as the Germans bombing Brussels into rubble the next day, to quote Wikipedia, “Beginning on May 10, 1940, Brussels was bombed by the German army; however, most of the war damage to the city took place in 1944–1945.”
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
Please consider passing along copies of this article to students in high school, college and university as it contains information about the American past that is very meaningful today – history about America that very likely is completely unknown by them (and their instructors, too). By being denied the facts of our history, they are at a decided disadvantage when it comes to reasoning and thinking through the issues of today. They are prime targets for misinformation campaigns beamed at enlisting them in causes and beliefs that are special interest agenda driven.
[/QUOTE]
Because if there’s one thing our students desperately need, it’s Spam that, judging from that brief excerpt, commits one factual error per sentence.
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
If the US can create a reasonably democratic and stable Iraq, then we have an ally, like England , in the Middle East, a platform, from which we can work to help modernize and moderate the Middle East.
[/QUOTE]
An ally like England? Curses! The damn yanks have seen through the dastardly Scottish/Welsh plan to destroy their nation! Och, and it was so close to completion, boyos!*
Oh, and the RAF won the Battle of Britain, but I see the flaws with that particular part have already been brought up.
*Sterotypes provided by the Royal Stereotyping Academy of Oxford.
Maximum enjoyment!
[/QUOTE]
I like s’mores as much as the next guy, but where do Opal and Profit! enter into the equation?
(patting my body) Nope, fat but alive. Next?
Yes, and the author needs more.
As an amateur historian, like Mr Kraft, I agree. Unfortunately for Mr Kraft, what comes from more knowledge of history, especially military history, is the realization of just how wrong he is on everything else. Dude should study more. He’s embarassing himself.
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
Does she include the 3,287 other email addresses with it also? The way I got one person to quit was to send a snarky and full of total silly stuff, to the tune of about 3 pages worth, to ‘Reply to all’ that I really appreciated (my relatives email address) FWDing all this stuff to me.
They had a fun few days with their email.
I also had one I just never opened his email again and one time he asked why I never reply anymore and I told him that I had asked him to learn how to clean up / strip the part he wanted me to see which he refused to do so I had no choice but to delete his all the time.
If it is not worth the time and effort to strip and redo, it is not worth my time to see it. (Usually the same thing that has been going around for the last 3 years.)
You might go at her with the idea of showing her how to do it right and how to be a good ‘internet’ person. She may not get offended that way. All the extra work will kill off most of her enthusiasm for that stuff in a week or so.
Or just do not open anything that has ‘FWD’ in the subject line.
If your email must be downloaded to see the subject line ( bad email client IMO ) you might splain to her that your mail is being clogged up and you can’t accept so much from her.
Or just block her until she listens to reason.
If a nice relative can’t splain to her without her melting down, she is in for a rough ride on the net. IMO
YMMV
Good luck.
[/QUOTE]
I think friend Gus should have taken his own advice on this one.
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
(2) We created a battle, a confrontation, a flash point, with Islamic terrorism in Iraq. We have focused the battle. We are killing bad people, and the ones we get there we won’t have to get here. We also have a good shot at creating a democratic, peaceful Iraq, which will be a catalyst for democratic change in the rest of the Middle East, and an outpost for a stabilizing American military presence in the Middle East for as long as it is needed.
[/QUOTE]
Jeez, I don’t think even W believes this shit any more!
There are a couple of good core points there, but the history is so shoddy and inaccurate that they’re not obvious but must be separated like wheat from chaff.
Oh and Diogenes? There are 1.2 billion Muslims in the world, and I think that classifying only one one hundredth of a percent of them as fanatical is way, way, wayyyy low. 1% of any group of any size is batshit crazy, when you’re talking about religion (any religion) I’d venture that 5-10% is much more realistic. In any event, there are a not insignificant number of fanatical Muslims who DO fit the profile painted by the glurge in the OP, something which should not be poo-pooed away because it inconveniently disagrees with your ideology.
:rolleyes:
:rolleyes:
:rolleyes:
Now, this would be easier or at least more satisfying if I could grab you by the collar and shake you up untill making you understand that there´s zero possibility of having a vicious war and stablishing a happyla-la-land on the same space/time coordintes.
Geez!, what´s up with people that peddle that crap of an argument? Do you actually think at all?
The original piece is about three years old. It described pre-Pearl Harbor America and refers to that period as “sixty-three years ago.” At some point someone updated the number of troops who have been killed, but it is over 3700 now, not 3,000. We passed the 9-11 total long ago.
And that doesn’t include the unspeakable number of other troops and Iraqi citizens and other human beings slaughtered.
As I read the first paragraph about the sacrifices that were made on the homefront during World War II, I couldn’t help but wonder why this President hadn’t taken advantage of the spirit of unity that this country felt after 9-11. It would have been very understandable if he had called upon us to conserve gasoline and oil in every way possible. We on the homefront were wanting to do something. The moment passed.
The “voice” of the author changes considerable during the piece. At the beginning he sounds a little like Walter Cronkite or Lowell Thomas. But that begins to break down and eventually a trembling Barney Phife shows up.
[QUOTE=Weirddave]
There are a couple of good core points there
[/quote]
No there aren’t. The Nazis were a real threat to the US, radical Islam is not.
I actually said a thousandth of one percent, not a hundred. There are only a few thousand Muslims who could catually be classified as violent terrorists. There may be a lot more fundy, fanatical assholes than that but most of them are not terrorists. There is a lot of space in between just being an intolerant asshole and being an intolerant asshole with a bomb strapped to your back. Not everybody that bashes the queers or pickets an abortion clinic is going to go on a bombing spree like eric Rudolph.
The percentage of Muslims who are irrationally and suicidally violent is not significant enough to warrant anything close to the Chicken Little rhetoric quoted by the OP.
ETA, what “ideology” do you imagine I’m defending?
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
Can this have even a glimmer of reality? Any truth hiding in this? A sliver of what is to come? Is it that important?
This fuckin shite scares me… Total bunk, … right???
[/QUOTE]
Where do you start. Its appalling gibberish, riddled with so many historical inaccuracies I almost want to weep.
The most intelligent comment was at the start “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” The author obviously failed to learn his history and certainly should be made to repeat the subject!
WW2 did not start in 1928. It did not last 17 years. The Russians did not lose 24 million people at Moscow and Stalingrad alone. Belgium did not surrender in a day. Brussels was not bombed into rubble. Britain did not narrowly escape invasion. “Europe” did not spend 50 years fighting Napoleon. Peace activists are not killed in Spain (sheesh!)
No, what we call “WWI” began before 1914 and extended past today. Among others, Kraft assumes it ended. We have enough to straighten out in what is assumed to be “Europe”–and I consider the Americas an extension of Europe–to give two shits about what is happening in Mesopotamia. It wasn’t our fight and we shouldn’t have involved ourselves in it.
[QUOTE=dropzone]
No, what we call “WWI” began before 1914 and extended past today. Among others, Kraft assumes it ended. We have enough to straighten out in what is assumed to be “Europe”–and I consider the Americas an extension of Europe–to give two shits about what is happening in Mesopotamia. It wasn’t our fight and we shouldn’t have involved ourselves in it.
[/QUOTE]
Come to think of it, the existence of Iraq as a multinational, multiconfessional state is a direct result of WWI. One more mess that still hasn’t been straightened out (and won’t be in my lifetime or yours).
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
Come to think of it, the existence of Iraq as a multinational, multiconfessional state is a direct result of WWI. One more mess that still hasn’t been straightened out (and won’t be in my lifetime or yours).
[/QUOTE]
No, it’s not likely it will.
(edited to add) We forget how recent WWI was. I’ve known participants and, for them, it was extremely recent history. Their children view it as just happening, especially if it affected their birthrights. It is completely here-and-now for many people.
[QUOTE=fessie]
Care to expand on that? I don’t understand what you mean (although Google did find a thesis from Harvard that might be fun to read).
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
Why don’t we see Peace Activist demonstrating in Iran, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Spain, North Korea, in the places that really need peace activism the most?
[/QUOTE]
Wait, what?
SPAIN?
Generalisimo Francisco Franco is still dead. Spain is a first-world liberal democratic constitutional monarchy which is a member of the European Union – and as it happens, some of the largest peace protests in history took place there, with upwards of a million people protesting in Barcelona against the Iraq war in 2003.
y’all jumping on Gus as tho he believes the quoted text - did you miss his last sentance?
[QUOTE=GusNSpot]
… Total bunk, … right???
[/QUOTE]
Seems to me he just wants confirmation that it is, indeed, hogwash (which you all have done, thank you) but he does not subscribe to it, nor is he advocating it be passed along.
Unfortunately, when Giraffe recoded the OP, it became unclear what was quoted and what was Gus’ own statement.
Not to mention including Ireland as one of our allies in WWII.
Dude, Ireland was neutral during WWII. They were sympathetic to the Allied side, but Ireland as a country stayed out of the war. Of course, plenty of Irish citizens fought for the allies.