Froma a sign draped on an overpass on a Southern California Freeway:
Osama Bin Forgotten
It’s getting a little late for that, what with the camp Marez bombing. I’ll be pleasantly surprised if we manage to restrain ourselves from turning Mosul into a carbon copy of Fallujah.
We’ve already cut Mosul off from the rest of the world, but if we go ahead and trash the place, we’ll be pinned down in Iraq for a decade or more.
This is where my mental whiplash comes with conservatives, god help us all, supporting this misbegotten war on the basis of hard-headed pragmatism. Conservatives are supposed to provide the cautious, considered counterbalance, damnit. This war didn’t even have a focus beyond kicking out a ME tyrant on the basis that he had weapons of mass destruction. That required a mind-boggling myopia about N. Korea, for example.
The very first question that needs answering before war is even considered is, ‘What will this war solve?’ Followed of course, by what are the alternatives, what will the lasting consequences be, what needs to be done in conjunction with the fighting, etc.
As far as I can tell, damned little hard thinking and preparation were done beyond invade, then impose our version of what we think their country should be. Soldiers in the field are left to cope under fire in this insanely underplanned guerilla war. It shouldn’t be surprising that some of them are resort to the desperate pragmatism of everybody’s-a-potential-enemy and treating them accordingly. Hell, if soldiers hold to anything, it’s loyalty and obedience. Look at the rot coming from above, the poisonous disregard for the Geneva Convention and all the hardwon protocols of previous wars. What tone and actual guidance are commanders setting for soldiers fighting this war? I’m get the very sickening impression it’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell.’
Do I think Bush approved torture and humiliation of prisoners? Yes, I do. It seems very congruent with his other actions.
BTW, this is in no way a blanket indictment of the soldiers in Iraq. Along with several organizations, I regularly send packages etc. to some of our local guys over there. They’ve asked us to send books, supplies, toys etc. to pass along to Iraqis. Several who’ve rotated back are mustering up regular shipments of things Iraqi citizens need. So I think the infection is far from universal, but it’s despite the scrambling mess at the top.
Nope.
Means when you’re standing in front of a train you move.
Means when you invade a country and try to win hearts and minds you don’t torture 'em.
How odd!
Could’ve sworn that’s why those rules were created.
And if you keep doing that, and grab innocent civlians to boot, you’re making it more difficult on yourself.
Is my point about pragmatics not getting through to you?
If they make everybody angry at them and people will pick up weapons to fight them, they haven’t helped themselves!
Theeeeeen, why do it?
They were locked up because the administration of the war is piss-poor on the best of days.
Um, are you posting in two threads at once or something?
How on earth can you claim that you’re not defending torture?
You’ve spent your posts , including this very one now, doing just that.
Okay, that’s a strawman though.
Most likely the EO didn’t directly mention children, no.
But what’s at issue is that he may very well have authorized it for people in general.
Holy Doodle! How to respond?!
Think Dresden. You won that war because people at home wanted to win it. They knew they had a job to do and they did it. Yet in Vietnam people protested similar actions that were required to win previous wars.
Well, I don’t disagree with that sentiment, but I don’t really know what you can do in the middle of a shooting war about it, other than to demoralize the will of the US people.
Yep, why does anyone thing Iraq would be any different. I’ll say it again, don’t go to war unless you are willing to do what is necessary to win it.
Is that why you went to war? From what I understand from this board it has something to do with Halliburton, reverse vampires, and the illuminati. Damned if I know, but I don’t think you can give anyone their freedom. They have to work for it themselves.
Uh, Ghengis Khan?
I wonder if this talk of an exit strategy is the problem. Me, if I was sending my citizens to die on foreign grounds I’d be doing it to stay. That’s just a personal thing, though, going back to the Conan school of warfare (that would be the non-fictional figure, right?).
Well, you’d have to discuss that with a doctor, but there are brutal dictators and benevolent dictators. Choose what makes you happy. Kind of what Saddam could have done himself it seems and avoided the whole mess.
Hello! The guys talks to GAWD as if he expects an answer! What do you think?!
Alderan was refering to the ‘illiterate natives’ of where I work which is in Yemen. He was making a comment as if I was some missionary bringing enlightenment to the darkies as opposed to a guy who works with the Yemeni people and does his best to train them to a recognized international standard so that when the oil runs out (Yemen doesn’t have the reserves like Saudi, et al) they will have the best opportunity either help their own people, or help themselves if they want to emmigrate. But then Alderan is an idiot and I don’t expect much more than that from him.
The education levels in Yemen are very low and they don’t have the ability to develop their resources as quickly as they’d like. It doesn’t help that the collectivist culture and rampant corruption puts a huge roadblock in the way of this process.
How does your link say the people there weren’t slaves?
The people who lived in Iraq under Saddam owned squat. Nothing, nadda. At any time Saddam could take anything they did have away from them without a by your leave.
How do you classify people who have no say in their future or government, and what little they do have could be taken at the whim of the ruler of the country? I think ‘slave’ is the correct usage.
Uh, that would be you guys as in the US.
So what are you going to do now? If you want to look to the past: What plan could have been put into place where the results would have been other than they are now?
If you want my opinion it would have been send in enough troops to ensure order is maintained and that the terrorists wouldn’t have room to operate in.
Vietnam =//= WWII.
There was also the fact that the axis powers attacked us, while Vietnam was an imprealistic rumble.
What in the ringtailed rambling!?!
You mean, if the war is prosecuted by venal incompetent slime the only thing one can do is shut up or risk ‘demoralizing the will of the US people?’
Do you really think it’s a good idea to be all amped up over a war that we’re losing?
And they will make a desert and call it peace.
Think of what we’re doing to Iraq and how this possibly constitutes victory.
Your half-assed denial does you no good.
Yes, one of the reasons used to sell this war was the humanitarian angle.
And, yes, billions in no-bid contracts to hallburton were also a factor, see, there aren’t generally ‘single causes’ in this world.
And, by the way, if they have to work at it themselves, why was our mission to give it to them?
Just wondering…
Correct, he’d be the non-imaginary one.
Wanna guess what Conan the Barbarrian’s status is?
Um… we sure as hell didn’t sign on for an endless war, so there better fucking be an exit strategy.
And, if you were president and you’d be ‘doing it to stay’ while citizens were being killed in a bogus war, I hope you’d be impeached.
And, the Conan school of war?
Can I counter that with the Batman school of crimefighting?
So, in other words, you’re scum who’d support a ‘benevolent dictator?’
Don’t want to put words in your mouth.
So the commander in chief is hopelessly out of touch with reality, and you still support his war and believe we should keep our troops there since that’s what you’d do as president.
Just one question, does cognitive dissonance ever make blood shoot out of your ears?
Wow… just… wow.
My link showed that your contention that they’d always been ruled by SH was bullshit.
And, you are aware that the burden of proof lies on you?
No cite will specifically say they weren’t slaves because only batshit crazy motherfuckers would believe they were slaves.
Grok?
These two ideas are not equal, having property is not negated by someone’s ability to take it from you.
Moreoever, in nations/tribes without personal ownership of property, the citizens are not slaves.
Further, in the United States, under certain circumstances the government/banks can take all your property. Does that make us slaves?
I’ll point out, again, that most Americans have no say in the future of their government. Are Americans slaves?
In case you’re wondering, now, they’re not.
Nor were Russians under Stalin.
Or Italians under Mussolini.
People don’t become slaves just because they’re ruled by dictators or tyrants.
Nor do they lose their rights and essential human dignity just because you slap the label ‘slave’ on them.
:smashes head against wall:
Yes!
It is our fault!
It’s our mess!
It is a systemic problem!
If we do more of the same, we’re throwing good money after bad.
The only thing to do now is do it right, not do it as wrongly as humanly possible.
Yeah, well maybe I can see how you’d interpret it that way. I’ve been under a little stress lately and maybe that is coming through. <All within the last 3 weeks> We kicked out our 16 year old son (stepson) out of the house for lying and being a general asshat, I had to fire a good friend and worker for doing something incredibly stupid, my cat died, and then my grandmother died. The cat seems to bother me the most for some reason, dunno why.
As an explanation I’ll use this. Hopefully it will do: Using methods to gain information that will be valuable to your side I can understand and rationalize even though I may not like it. Don’t ask me how getting two people to act like they are giving fellatio to each other accomplishes that goal, or raping women, or killing children either. I don’t endorse that at all and the buggers that do it should be strung up.
Damn, I’m sorry for all that.
Not quite sure what else to say on that front, hang in there.
But, if your interrogation tactics produce two terrorists for every one that you smoke out?
If they turn the entire country against you?
After a certain point, your victory becomes phyric.
So, it looks like you’re defending the idea of torture in certain circumstances, just not those that went down in Iraq?
Mmm…
Still, what’s happening in Iraq is losing us the war. I mean… when you turn that nation against you that you’re trying to get on your side, you’re failing.
Right?
and neither do you, wow, yet again I’ve been mesmerised by another anti Bush/I hate Bush with my soul thread.
Are you fucking kidding me? Do you know what the resistance/insurgents are like? Do you know what will happen once we leave and let them take the reigns without training some Iraqi forces? Jesus, what you’re proposing is a crime that would be larger than the one with us staying there.
Despicable.
I don’t think we should ever abandon the Iraqi people to their fate and ‘throw them to the wolves’ so to speak, and make a quick ‘oooops, sorry, my mistake’
its war, we’re there to help if you cannot somehow see the fact through all the hatred of the Bush administration, then you’re a fucking fool.
Oh please, if we were losing in Iraq, we’d see even larger casualties Vietnam scale, and even then we wouldn’t be losing. The only reason we seem to be is because people believe the war is wrong (justly so) and that the resistance is somewhat reasonable and legitimate, which is adsurb.
We were drawn into WWII, very reluctantly, because an indentifable soverign nation attacked us. That nation was operating from its own interests but was tied by equally indentifiable alliances to the war in Europe. That analogy is painfully inept, save for your point about a nation being committed to winning a war.
I lived through Viet Nam as a very young person and it purely sucked, not the least because it too was packaged as a logical extension of WWII, the ‘good war’. It wasn’t. My father–a fervent, lifelong Republican and field-promoted WWII noncom–ended up driving conscientious objecters to Canada even while we did everything possible to support our family serving and dying in Nam. Know why? Because he knew war, real up close and personal, in all its tedium and terror and faith. Here’s the fact: politicians–and those choose to follow them–decide to wage wars. Actual people have to fight, kill and die in them, on all sides. It’s the most scarring, horrific expression of group will made personal possible.
Will, sacrifice, belief can’t be packaged. Viet Nam flopped because after a while it became all too obvious nobody, from the top down, had the slightest endview after the carnage. We tossed soldiers’ lives down a stupid drainhole of failed politics.
The ruthlessness, intransigence and stupidty of the other ‘side’ doesn’t matter. None of that is justifcation for being stupid in return. The ME is a hellhole but I don’t see–can’t see, the Emporer being naked of everything except the thinnest of rationalizations–that our use of brute force has the slightest potential to solve anything for anybody.
Hope and belief can’t be packaged or enforced either. How in the world could brute force from outside persuade people already whipsawed by firmly entrenched persecution, poverty, oppression, much less tribal and religious conflicts?
There’s no Marshall Plan in the making here. No seed of future peace and justice. Just a stupid, heedless and needless slaughter that serves no one but the Bin Laudens.
If Bush authorized torture, he deserves our hatred.
And, what is your basis for claiming that Reeder doesn’t care about AQ?
People?
Try to mentally walk and chew bubble gum here, but the US and UK pulling out does not equal total anarchy.
If, for instance, we made an immediate mea culpa before the security and general UN councils, renounced cronyism, opened up bidding on reconstruction to all nations, and finally got the UN involved, maybe calamity could be averted.
If we stay, we make things worse.
Thus, staying is a bad idea.
Yes, it’s war.
I for one want to win it
This is not the way.
That’s pretty cool, normally it takes people at least two sentences to contradict themselves.
And, yes, we are losing.
Losing big time.
We’re creating more enemies, and not winning the peace.
See, it’s war, and we’re not winning it… so what does that tell you?
We are fighting a guerilla war on foreign soil with no understanding or sympathy from the indigenous people. That, is a recipe for failure.
We gave fucking notice about Falujah.
And, even then, I posted that anybody who thought Falujah was the start, or end, of anything was dead wrong.
Looks like I was right.
Again, good skills there.
The ability to contradict one’s self in a single sentence surely deserves respect somewhere.
If the war is wrong, the insurgency is justified, because, well, the war is wrong.
Get it?
Yes it does, or Taliban style theocracy, which is worse. I can’t fucking believe you’d advocate the destruction of peoples lives just to prove a point to me and dear olde Bushy.
Why should the US let people who openely critisized the conflict and went out of their way to prevent the liberation of Iraqis now have Oil contracts and rebuilding deals? That smacks of hypocrisy to the Iraqi people and the Americans who went out and freed them from Saddam.
Yes, people. Fucktard.
No, if we stay, things are bad. if we leave, things get worse.
What you are advocating is though is the defeat of forces which are trying to spread Democracy and freedom to forces of Islamism and ideological terror, you know, the thing which we’re supposed to be fighting?
Good thing I didn’t then. I don’t see the casualties as large as Vietnams, even with the large amount of terrorist activity.
Bollocks, read, rinse and repeat. You’d think the US Army is completely stupid.
http://www.patrickmcampbell.com/page2.html
Arrogance and stupidity all in the same pacakge, how efficient of you
Thats a matter of perspective. I personally don’t think we are. Not even close.
Heres some sites I’d like you to visit
http://belmontclub.blogspot.com/
http://www.daggerjag.blogspot.com/
and my favourite
Are you afflicted with some conenital cognitive damage?
I haven’t advocated any destruction, idiot.
Things would be better with UN peacekeepers on the ground.
Does it hurt to swallow so much propaganda, or is your throat used to swallowing massive loads?
See, the people who criticized the conflict?
They were right!.
You will also note that the orriginal reasons for invasion were WMD and terrorism, not ‘liberation’.
I will further note that we got the oil pipelines protected before we got the museums protected or the gas and electricity back on.
Oh, and, [Inigo Montoya] I do not think that word means what you think it does [/Inigo Montoya]
Fucked hard? Fucked soft? So hard to decide!
But, do tell oh enlightened master, just what are these people like?
Your conclusion is not supported by any data.
In fact, it flies in the face of all we know.
A multi-national non-united-states led force would have a far more likely chance of sucess.
Listen monkey-boy.
What I am advocating is an end to this quagmire and the renewal of stability in Iraq.
Oh, and, you don’t spread democracy and freedom at the barrel of a gun.
Yes, you did genius.
You said the defning characteristic of losing would be greater casualites.
But that greater casualites wouldn’t be a sign of losing.
In other words, you contradicted yourself.
No, I think you are completely stupid.
Can your mind not grasp the fact that having a nation of people who don’t want to kill us is better than having a nation of people who do want to kill us?
All the five hundred pound bombs in the world won’t change public opinion in our favor.
Idiot, maybe you missed the part where I was right?
Perspective? ~chuckles~
How many times have elections been pushed back?
How many leaders assasinated?
How much of Iraq do we control?
How many soldiers are dying every week?
How many new terrorists are arriving every day?
How many new insurgents are created every day?
Winning this war? Are you out of your fucking gourd?
By the way, blogs are not cites.
I do not plan on digging through someone’s fancy livejournal in order to get at whatever you think your ‘point winners’ are.
Link me to whatever factual data they contain.
War is war. You’re either in it to win, or not. If not, don’t go in it and waste peoples lives.
Hold on a second there. There were countless threads, or items in threads, about there being no WMD and thus there was no reason for the war. Now all of a sudden you believe the other side when they say it was for something else such as the good of the people in Iraq?..(I think there is a flaw in my reasoning here but, I’m too tired to figure it out at the moment, though).
Didn’t you? It is nice to see that after the victory parade you thought everything would be over. I don’t know where you got this idea from, or why you’d think it was true.
If I was President, I wouldn’t have gone to war with Iraq so you’d have no reason to impeach me. I’d also pull out most of the military from around the world and bring them home. It is time to stop propping up places like the Saudis and let the chips fall where they may. Whoever is in charge of the place after they do fall will still want to sell oil. I’d also see that money like the 80 Billion dollars spent on the war would go to things like finding an alternative source of power so you wouldn’t have to worry about what happened in the ME. Let them lop each others heads off if that is what they want to do and can’t figure out why it is wrong to do so.
I’d talk softly, but carry a big stick. Those that fucked with me and my allies would feel my rightous wrath, so to speak. Otherwise, get out and stop meddling with everybody.
Cool!
Yes. Over someone like Saddam, yes. In order to solve the current situation and restore order until the Iraqis can do it for themselves, yes.
Maybe you missed it. I don’t support it. I like the idea of getting rid of guys like Saddam, though. It is a thing I have with ‘brutal’ dictators. The benevolent ones don’t bother me much.
Only at Christmas.
Where did I say SH always ruled Iraq? While he ruled it the people of Iraq were no more than slaves to his will and whim. Do you think that if someone in Iraq did something that bothered him he couldn’t have had that person summarily executed? Geez, take a pill. Okay they weren’t slaves, they were serfs instead. Happy?
Openly questioning anything isn’t about ‘dear olde Bushey’, much less you. No one is ‘advocating the destruction of peoples (sic) lives’. They’re rightfully concerned about unintended consequences of gung-ho actions.
The US should ‘permit’ open criticism because ‘it’ is nothing more than 'us’, fool. Ownership and responsiblity of goverment is rather the whole point. If the government is driving citizens instead of the reverse, we have no business exporting the ideal by force.
Flagrant, simplistic nonsense. Nobody is advocating the defeat of Democracy, truth, justice and freedom against ruthless terrorists. What’s being questioned is the efficacy of the war. You know, whether it’s actually doing, at great cost, what it was adverstised as doing? Actually what you’re suggesting sounds uncomfortably close to ‘ideological terror’ flipped on end.
It’s barely started. Body counts are horrendous enough, even when they’re openly acknowledged. Secrecy in the name of ‘respect for the dead’ is obscene, not to mention patently ridiculous. Households in WWII with soldiers killed in war put stars in their windows. It was a symbol of shared honor and grief. That common purpose and pride ended with Korea and Viet Nam. Altruism and sacrifice didn’t end, just the faith the goverments respected what the fuck war required in relation to what could be gained in return.
Nobody’s arguing that monsters exist and should be fought, Ryan. The argument is how to fight them. It’s pretty damned stupid to swagger into paranoid, monster-ravaged lands with guns blazing and say, 'Hey, we’re not like that long line of people who’ve made you’re lives miserable! We’re here to HELP!" Odds are they’ve too many monster rationalizations, along with the usual homegrown crooks and opportrunists, to the point of puking.
Being human, most probably chose sides for whatever reasons or just kept their heads down and coped, reserving judgement as a luxury. Don’t you tell me for one minute that I or anyone else should just keep quiet. That incubates monsters.
and how does ‘bring in UN peacekeepers’ equate a good turnaround for all, the insurgents have clearly disregarded the neutrality of any organisation within the country, so how does this come into the grand strategy of everything turning out fine?
Because I don’t think it does.
Could of fooled me, judging by the posts on Iraq you’ve made, you’d gladly see Iraq crash and burn to prove your point.
So France and Russia didn’t abuse their position to get cheap Oil from Saddam from the Oil for Food program? Oh tell me enlightened one, how have I mistaken thee this time? :rolleyes:
Yes, liberation. We went in, somehow set up an Iraqi interim government and now scheduled elections. Strange how you defend tyranny because the prospect of democracy is so dangerous.
Well, these ‘insurgent/freedom fighters’ etc are the very people making the lives of the Iraqi people a misery you know the people who chop off heads? Kill women and children indiscriminately blow up infrastructure destroy countless lives, offer no alternative to the Iraqis other than the shackles of oppression and misery once again. You may say all this about the US in Iraq, but at least we give them a choice to elect who they want.
How do you know? How would it be any different? there are numerous coalition forces in southern Iraq, and they have had their fair share of attacks and battles with the insurgents, albeit on a lower scale, but thats because the Shia majority is pretty much free and liberated from their Sunni Arab oppressors, where as the bulk of the US army is in the Sunni, recently kicked off their pedestal areas where there is a lot of legitimate grievances.
This doesn’t mean it will be a failure, it’ll just mean 20% of the population decided to be complete fucktards about the election process because they couldn’t handle the new power structure.
How would the great one know such things? How about, cite?
because maybe! there is the fact we have to make sure Iraq can pay itself and sustain its economy, as Oil does account for 75% of GDP there, you know, you tend to look at those aspects before kickstarting it towards representative government.
Who says we’re doing it at the barrel of a gun, why not say we removed the force which was in the way of making Iraq a democratic country, such as Saddams power structure and organised terror system. People may have good complaints about American failures and injusticies, but at least America has given them the choice to do what they want, how they want.
What you seem to be advocating is the stability in which the Taliban and Saddam & Co sell, the thing is, oppression isn’t viable anymore, especially not in that area of the world.
What I meant was the casualties were lower and a slight increase is somewhat acceptable if it increases the stability in the area, if not and it becomes the increase Vietnam style in which there was no change, then it isn’t. What I said about Vietnam though is not what we’re seeing in Iraq.
What? So for all those ten years after the Gulf war, no one in Iraq wanted to kill us?
Besides, that appeasement is too costly for us to maintain the status quo, remember the close ally, Saudi Arabia?
Just goes to show you didn’t even read the excerpt that I showed you.
but you’re not though, all you’re giving about the future prospects of Iraq is suspicion and what you think may happen.
Erm what? Never, these elections were orchestrated by Sistani, the CPA was going to have them in 2006.
So that means we should pack up and go home? Because somehow because there leaders have died, they’re not worth it?
large amounts, its just the cities we don’t completely control. On the contrary we control the countryside, one of the main tactics in which usually a rebellion starts.
On average, barring a major atrocity, around 2-3 and thats only in major attacks.
it doesn’t matter, if the society of Iraq and its people are strong enough to not bow to the will of terrorists, it wouldn’t matter how many of them there were.
So we should leave because even if they would set out to create a tyranny all over again, which the US would undoubtebly have to invade again like so many say, we should go because the fight is a hard one?
how about reading the blogs before discrediting them, you might learn a thing or two. and hey! Some are actually in Iraq fighting this war, so those Blogs you dislike might actually prove useful.
Its not a Live Journal, go to Chernkoff, and read the ‘Good news from Iraq part 17’ Plenty of links to the required news services.
What part of “the current strategy we’re using is not only not winning the war, it is losing it.” do you not understand?
And, no. It is immoral to say that once any war is started, we better begin the butchery because, hey, it’s war.
One should try to minimize the horrors of war, not embrace them.
Yes, there is a flaw in your reasoning, and/or reading comp.
No, there were no WMD, so that reason was bogus.
No, there were no AQ connections, so that reason was bogus.
No, it’s not for the sake of the Iraqis, so that reason was bogus.
Which leads me to conclude that there is another reason, one which the public was never informed of.
Um, no, we didn’t.
I didn’t think everything would be done with Bush’s back slapping “mission accomplished” bullshit, I thought it’d be over when we actually won.
And, as for why we’d think the war would be easy?
Maybe because that’s how it was sold?
Remember the controversy over Rumsfeld’s “long hard slog” comment?
That was because we were being told that it wouldn’t be a long hard slog.
Remember the photos of Sadaam statues being torn down?
The predictions that we’d be met as liberators?
All well and good, how does that address the point that we went to war for the wrong reasons and we’re losing the damn thing?
Scum is scum is scum.
You don’t instill freedom and justice via totalitarianism.
Um, I must’ve missed the part where you don’t support it.
As you’ve been arguing in support of it.
And, the fact that ‘benevolent’ tyrants don’t bother you much speaks volumes.
You’re making this too easy kid.
No, they weren’t slaves, or serfs.
And they have the right to self government regardless of what happened under the rule of a tyrant.
Sorry.
I’m going to type real slowly, maybe that’ll help.
The Iraqis hate the American forces and believe we’re up to no good.
We’ve spent any good will we had, and we’re rapidly working on uniting the entire ME against us.
With a multi-national peacekeeping force comprising muslims and non-muslims, we would have a much better shot, especially with America out of the picture.
Now that does not strike me as being particulary difficult.
Um… no.
See, your favored policies will yield only more destruction and death, we’ve seen that, we know that. So if anybody wants destruction in order to prove a point, it is you.
I want this damn fool war to be run right, for a change.
I’m not enlightened. Just a hell of a lot smarter than you .
See, France and Russia had commercial interests in Iraq, but there were still no WMD there and ** we used the pretext of WMD to sell the war at the UN via Powel**.
Try to keep up sport.
And how’re them thar elections and interim government members coming along?
How about Iraqi civil services versus our control of the oil fields?
Tool.
Pardon me, I defend what exactly, you shit-for-brains excuse for a maggot?
That accusation is pretty damn heavy, so fuck off with your bullshit rhetoric, k?
Newsflash: some of the insurgents ** are the Iraqi people**. Kinda throw a kink into your rhetoric, no?
And yes, I know, the people cutting off heads.
Because that is much more horrible than homogenizing people with daisy cutters.
Or raping kids in Abu Graib.
Shock and Awe?
Oh, I’m sorry, your irony meter is turned off, isn’t it?
Hahahahah.
They can vote for whoever they want, as long as it’s someone who we like
How do I know?
Should I draw this for you with crayons?
They hate us, with a passion.
They do not hate the rest of the world with a passion.
Thus, the rest of the world would not be as hated.
Don’t forget Poland!
Have you paid any attention to what’s actually going on with the governmental situation over there?
It’s a turfwar, it’s mob rule by vote. Shit is fucked up man.
Eat it, monkey-boy. And start reading some newspapers, eh?
Yeah, you tend to look to the oil revenues before you make sure that people have electricity and water. If you don’t give a shit about the quality of life of the people you’re ‘liberating’.
I’d also note that getting the infrastructure back up should have been priority number one, and with those massive checks we wrote, we could’ve gotten Iraq to a stable economic plateau as their oil wells came back on line.
Um, because that would be a crazy shit-for-brains lie?
We’re doing it at the barrel of a gun, your rhetorical auto-fellatio not withstanding.
Really?
So when are we leaving?
Fuck you monkey-boy.
I’m advocating UN peacekeepers and the rule of law.
Yes yes, but you still contradicted yourself.
Would you like to go to bed and let the big boys talk about this?
Oh, no, the Iraqi Illuminati aided by Jack the Ripper wanted to kill us.
Just in case you’re too fuzzy headed from being up past your bedtime monkey-boy, some Iraqis may have wanted us dead before, but now due to our actions, a much larger percentage want to kill us.
This isn’t rocket science.
Funny… I never realized that not invading a soverign nation which couldn’t possibly threaten us was appeasement.
God, they should not let lobotomy patients onto computers so soon after surgery.
You want to provide a scrap of proof showing how I didn’t read your excerpt?
Um, no shit-for-brains.
In the English language, ‘was’ implies past tense.
Thus, I was right about Falujah.
And, I’m talking about a clearly predictable course of events spawned by clearly observable conditions.
I’m talking about what will happen.
And just like with Falujah, I trust I will be proven correct.
No, not never. There were calls for earlier direct-voting elections.
They have been postponed.
No, idiot.
Because the puppets who’re in line with America get killed for cooperating with us.
An American supported Iraqi government will not work due to it being perceived as an American catspaw.
Oh, so it’s just the major population centers we don’t control?
You might want to go back and re-work this sentence so it means something. See, the second clause is a total non-sequitor.
1.6: Average number of American soldiers killed in Iraq per day since hostilities began
In February there were twenty American soldiers killed in action, or .79 per day. This was the first month, since the war began, that the troops killed fell to less than one a day
If you want to find more recent stats, be my guest.
Do they sell tickets to your reality?
Cuz it sounds like a wacky place to visit.
Let me tell ya something, when your country is inundated by people with high powered weaponry, it provides a challenge to the rule of law ,no matter how ‘strong’ a nation’s people are.
No you freakin’ moron.
We should leave because we’re making things worse, and the Iraqis don’t hate the UN or most of its member nations, but they do hate us .
I’m not advocating leaving Iraq to the wolves, I’m advocating a responsible and rational course from here on out.
Hey, how about you post a freakin’ cite?
Don’t link me to some blog and expect me to wade through their ramblings to find whatever nuggets you have in mind.
Data is not the plural of anecdote.
If you have facts, or if your blogs have facts, link to them. I will not browse the blogs you have linked to.
Wow, so some good things are happening in Iraq, you don’t say?
Remind me how those’ll help us when we’re either driven from the country or the whole thing goes up in flames?
And, by the way, if you have points to make, why don’t you link to the articles rather than letting some blogger make 'em for you?