The same “rational self-interest” that’s caused them to uphold his veto of children’s health insurance, that is? :dubious:
That is pertinent, but I would not go so far as to claim RSI is the guiding principle. There is sufficient quantity there to prevent a top shelf & 11th hour military engagement.
As I wrote earlier, there is an internal tension. Both GOP factions recognise defeat is coming in 2008. Question: what do you do?
- Throw caution to the wind as your time is up; or
- Invest in 2012.
I think enough favour the latter. It’s an old guard vs young turks game.
Wishful thinking, friend. GOP votes against Bush have lately come mostly from those Congresscritters who have already decided to leave. Your evidence that a significant portion of the rest are willing to go against him on *anything * is, well, what? It isn’t even party-before-country, it’s either Bush-before-everything, or simple fear/paralysis. And if that hasn’t been shed by now, why would you think it will in the next year?
Magnitude of the step we’re contemplating. It’s a whole other order.
Won’t matter anyway if we’re only referring to a bombing mission, not a full war. Cheney doesn’t need anybody’s authorization at all for that.
Not that anybody else would care about the difference, though.
Yep…gotta plead guilty to that. But in my defense, it wasn’t like I had much of a choice, my Dad being a business-owner and I, the only heir to said Throne (have a sis, but as you well know, women are supposed to stay home and bear children 
so that wasn’t an option). The only “out” I was given was to study medicine instead…bleeh.
Lastly, and to be honest, I really majored in Partying.
Talk about a “trip.” Those were the days my friend.
:::sigh:::
On another, more pertinent, note:
US denies being on warpath with Iran
Guess we can all breathe a big sigh of relief now. Because as we all know, this WH wouldn’t dare lie about its true intentions…
You know, a lot of the things you say really get my hackles up, but then every now and then you make a comment that makes me think, now there’s a pretty cool dude.
So what I’m saying is, pick a persona and stick with it! How else are we moderates supposed to make a caricature of you in these debates? 
Nope. No persona here, I assure you. Might not speak as I write, as I wouldn’t have the time to thread my thoughts together as clearly as one can here without the need to respond immediately. However, the main thrust of my arguments remain the same. I used to meet tons of on-line people F2F in years past, and it used to shock many of them how close I was/am to what said/portrayed on-line. Besides I’m way too lazy to have more than one persona – hard to remember what I said to whom in some sort of of personal duality. Thus I try to remain consistent. To myself principally.
As for “making a caricature of me,” mayhaps, XT, would be willing to help you try…however he’s batting room-temperature IQ in trying to make that happen
Lastly, moderate you may well be – a lá John Mace* of sorts. But through our exchanges, I never have for the life of me, found you to be an ideologue. You come across as someone really sincere in their beliefs. And better yet, not someone whose been spoon-fed platitudes and lies to get to their point across…and can and does digest ‘new’ information that might be contrary to their POV.
All the best,
~Red
*Disagree with him a ton. Yet respect both his opinions and his well laid-out train of thought, for it only makes me question the strength of my own convictions and/or conclusions.
Politics are all about personal relationships. Information Theory is a fascinating subject for anyone who has the time. Who knows how efficient the chain of communication between April Glaspie and George HW was? George HW was an amazing player on the international stage long before he was president, the direct opposite of his son whose strength was domestic connections, which didn’t help him as much when he got mired in foreign policy following the interests of his domestic allies. George HW on the other hand was incredible with foreign policy. His career before the Presidency was professional spook. He always worked for the CIA, pretty much as long as there was a CIA, and his Daddy had a huge hand in forming the CIA. HW, grew up with the CIA. The son’s career was defined by crashing companies in order to provide tax shelters for multi-billionaire’s and avenues for access to his VP and Presidential Father. W got out of bad investments by selling shares of dying companies to the Saudi royal family for access to Daddy. You can see a reflection in their presidencies of the relative experiences they had leading up to the Presidency. Daddy’s foreign policy was far more nuanced than the Son’s but the Son knew far better how to play the electorate. His Daddy had direct access to the President ever since Nixon. This sort of access to power helped him with foreign policy but made him a remote figure to the American, “I like the guy that reminds me of me.” electorate. Thus he was not re-elected because Bubba was better in the campaigns, more mediapathic. Young people like me found him charming, not creepy.
NP - KMFDM - Megalomaniac
But that assumption seems to lead to contradictory conclusions about the likely consequences of our own actions.
I mean, on the one hand, such people are claiming that the Iranians are irrational (read: batshit insane) enough to actually USE a nuke in an unprovoked attack, if they do in fact end up getting a nuke in the future.
But the same people seem to be claiming that on the other hand, the Iranians are rational enough to respond prudently to our aggressive tactics (e.g., sanctions, bombing strikes), by giving in to our wishes and abandoning their nuclear program, without doing anything suicidally destructive in retaliation.
I don’t see how both these lines of reasoning can be true simultaneously. ISTM that if the Iranians are insane enough to use a nuclear weapon in a first strike a few years down the road—knowing full well that it would cause the instant obliteration of their country—then they might well be insane enough to react to a near-term aggressive move on our part by some equally catastrophic and foolhardy action that could send the ME up in flames right now.
Can’t have it both ways. Either (1) the Iranians are so batshit crazy as to be deaf to the promptings of self-interest and nobody can predict what stupid thing they might not do; or else (2) the Iranians can be assumed to be reasonably rational self-interested actors, and we should base our Iran policy on that assumption.
Its called a trajectory of pyscho-pathology, a rarified offshoot of statistical and Freudian analysis. You’re not smart enough to understand (I barely grasp it myself), but to put in terms within your reach, the Iranians are quite sane now, but won’t be for long. The status of their mental health can be determined by the extent to which they disagree with the accepted standard for sanity, i.e., us. (I will brook no mockery on this point, it has long been established that the most heavily armed nation is unanimously accepted as the most sane. That’s a true fact, and you can look it up.)
They are sane enough yet that belligerence, hostility, and threats might still induce an attitude of trust and acceptance on their part, and a compliant, submissive posture in their foreign policy. If these generous attempts at outreach and rapport, offered in the spirit of “really tough love”, are spurned, we can reasonably conclude that Iran has slipped ever furthur into derangement, and will continue to deteriorate to a level of psychopathology you so colorfully describe as “batshit”.
To put it most simply, they aren’t that crazy today, but will be tomorrow, unless they do what we tell them to do, which would prove that they are sane, and they don’t have to fly the mission.
Thanks for the explanation, luc! Og’s hairy loincloth, I only wish that line of thinking was too smart or rarefied for me to understand…
Hmm, interesting. Why do you imagine Og’s loincloth as being “hairy”? Is it hairier than your own loincloth? And how do you feel about that?
It is a matter of scriptural authority. Og said it, I believe it, that settles it.
The irony of this statement is pretty much off the charts…on so many levels. You really should take a look around sometime Red. I haven’t insulted you in this or any other GD thread. I haven’t made a caricature out of you…you do that all on your own without any help from me at all. The one thing I said about you that could have been construed as nasty I said in the Pit thread that spun off of this one…and it was pretty mild as far as the Pit is concerned. You on the other hand have pretty consistently attempted to mis characterize my own statements, build strawman about my positions, and generally rant and rave about things I haven’t even said in this thread.
Serious…you really need to get a grip.
-XT
Meanwhile, Mohammed El-Baradei says the UN has no evidence the Iranians are trying to make nuclear weapons.
A few days after 9/11 there was a huge pro-US rally/vigil in Teheran. At the time they had a moderate, pro-western president, no nuclear program, and were preoccupied with a student-led pro-democracy movement.
I think a sophisticated carrot-and-stick, good-cop/bad-cop diplomatic initiative was warranted. Instead of calling them “Axis of Evil”, we should have sent a message thru back channels to Ayatolla Khanmeni and the Revolutionary Council that the US will no longer look the other way while Iran supports terrorist organizations. But if Iran does cut its ties to Hezbolla and shows some progress on getting with the program on opposing terrorism re-joining the community of responsible nations, then the US could dangle the promise of restored diplomatic relations.
I kind of wish we had tried that, but I guess the administration knows what it’s doing. After all, the US wins every war with “World” in the title. And afterwards, we’ll enjoy a period of economic prosperity.
Iran was the first country to offer us use of its airspace in order to bomb Afghanistan.
I’m sorry, but this and other false claims about Iran keep popping up, and I wish they wouldn’t.
Iran’s nuclear program goes back to at least 1959.
They’ve most likely been toying with enrichment and deliberate plutonium extraction for more than thirty years.
Moderator’s Warning: RedFury, personal insults in GD are forbidden…as you ought to know, having been warned about them repeatedly:
Back in January 2005.
Twice in the same thread in May 2006.
And most recently in September 2007.
Plus a warning in the Pit for a threat of physical violence.
You need to keep your temper, or else stay out of Great Debates (and even in the Pit you’ve been warned to tone it down). Another violation of the rules and you’ll likely be looking at a thirty-day suspension at the minimum.