Neither Clinton nor Kerry ever said that Iraq was enough of a threat to justify an attack on sovereignty.
Surely you recall though that our stated policy vis a vis Iraq under Clinton was “regime change.” That points been made innumberable times.
As for Kerry I certainly got the impression from various things including the quotes of Kerry in this thread, the signing of the authorization and his statements during the debates that Kerry thought so.
Kerry said (my paraphrase) “Was Saddam a threat? Absolutely. Did we need to do something about it? Absolutely. But this administration rushed to judgement. I would have done it smarter and better. I would have built consensus and brought a true coalition into Iraq.”
Please don’t make me hunt for the original language. He repeated words to this effect several times across all three debates. I beleive that’s a good faith reconstruction of his expressed sentiments.
It certainly seems to me that Kerry thought an attack to institute regime change was justified. He just thought Bush did it prematurely, poorly, without a consensus or a true coaltion.
My word, you’re a weasely little fucktard. I don’t give a tinker’s dam what Sherman’s term for what he did was. Don’t you ever get tired of citing irrelevancies. We aint talkin’ 'bout William Tecumseh Sherman’s definition; we’re talking about turdmonger Scylla’s definition, which I remind you is:
Destroying the enemy and taking over the country he is in.
Furthermore, we’re taking apart your pathetically misinformed assertion that this is some sort of norm for warfare; an “old school” style of conflict between nations. Duck and weave as you might, you have yet to confront the real fact that your answer to 'luci’s reasonable question “how many lives does it take” was ludicrously bellicose and jarringly at odds with history.
Stupid is as stupid posts, Scylla. You’re pretty much ate up with stupid at this point.
I’m sorry. You brought up the term and presumed to “lecture” me on the subject because I was “ahistorical” and “moronic.”
Since you brought it up, I presumed (wrongly) that you were not wholly ignorant of the concept.
You are demonstrating great ignorance and dishonesty to suggest that the above is my definition of total war. I make no mention of total war in the post #271 where you took that from. Here is the post in it’s entirety:
(my bolding there)
You are lying when you say that is my definition of total war.
Your brought up the term and presumed to “lecture” me on it for being “moronic” and “ahistorical.”
It became abundantly clear when you claimed Sherman didn’t practice total war that you were wholly ignornant of the subject.
I had hoped that you would have the good grace to realize what you have done and correct it, by admitting your error and retracting the charges of “moronic” and “ahystorical” and “stupid” (charges I might that in light of current information appear pretty ironic.)
Instead of taking the high road you have chosen to call me more names and deliberately misquote me in an attempt to weasel free.
I think that it’s pretty despicable to lie, and misquote in an attempt to blame me for your own stupidity.
I see no integrity in your actions.
“Old school” was of course what I was defining. Since you know that, you cannot claim that your misquote was an honest mistake. You have knowingly engaged in a lie.
Your lack of honesty and your ignorance gets in the way of discussing whatever point it is you might be making with me (and sadly, I suspect you actually don’t have a point.)
There can be no meaninful communication without a minimum of integrity. You have failed to meet that minimum.
That is exactly correct.
Aw, heck, I get it now! Got me good, that time, he did! He’s not really being a sanctimonious, supercilious knob, it’s just his droll Scylla wit! Took a while to catch on, but the tip off was that bit about how he was willing to share the vast compendium of his knowledge (The World’s Foremost Authority!), if only I were willing to sit humbly at his feet and take notes. Oh, man, I shoulda got that right off! Nobody is that much of a self-obssessed peckerhead, not even Scylla! I mean, that goes to eleven!
Well, son-of-a-gun! Got me good that time!
Xeno:
At the risk of damaging our friendship, I think I’d like to engage in a little gloating here. Let’s see what has been proven demonstrably here:
You talked down to me and presumed to lecture me and educate me… so you have displayed Arrogance
You knew nothing about the subject… so you have displayed ignorance
You did it anyway… which is Stupid. Stupidity
You refuse to admit your error lack of integrity
You lied in an attempt to cover it up by misquoting me Dishonesty
So you are Arrogant, Ignorant, Stupid, Lack Integrity, and are a Liar.
I’m sure you’re not these things all the time. I won’t engage in hyperbole and pretend that your are these things. You may be a swell guy.
But…
In this thread, you are provably and demonstrably an Arrogant, Ignorant, Stupid Liar without Integrity.
Personally, I think you should be proud. It must be pretty tough to hit all those marks in all those areas in just a handful posts, and do it all in a single thread.
Congratulations.
You’re no expert alright. What you are is a pompous jackass with a narcissistic personality disorder. And a callous motherfucker at that.
Call it what the fuck you want and discuss it over brandy and a cigar with as many other warmongering assholes as you’d like, it remains a barbaric act of aggression against a nation that had done nothing to warrant same.
All else is unmitigated bullshit of the lowest kind. Semantic games designed to make you feel better.
But hey! Every cloud has a silver lining. At least you won’t be asking yourselves “why” the next time one of your cities blows-up. Nor will you be pondering why the world isn’t as sympathetic as it was the last time it happened. Thanks to your Great Misleader’s murderous actions, the ‘if’ part of the equation is no longer in play.
Besides, I am sure you’ll understand if the other side wants to engage in some ‘total war’ of their own. As it stands today, they’ve got a lot of catching up to do.
You sick fuck.
Redfury:
It’s hard for me to get too worked up about your sentiments since they are founded on a misconception.
What is it that you think I’m advocating that makes me a sick fuck?
Could you please quote me and tell me the post numbers so that I can examine the context, as well?
Up to a point. The people of Iraq have been ill-used; by Saddam, by the US, by the insurgents. No matter which side wins, the Iraqis lose.
Saddam richly warranted being deposed from power, but his people didn’t deserve the suffering that has been inflicted on them, and, sadly, they are the one’s suffering for Saddam’s sins.
If the Americans had restored law and order after the defeat of Saddam, if they had worked harder to restore the Iraqi infrastructure, if they had used the Iraqi army to keep order and maintain employemnt instead of disbanding it, I’d be more sanguine about supporting my country’s troops. As it is, I want America to defeat the insurgents, restore full Iraqi sovereignty, and pull out.
Hey, fuckface, wishing death on Dopers (like me and the other DC and NYC-area posters) is forbidden.
This, Scylla is how your posts usually look to me. It’s kind of like a Cliff’s Notes for those of us without enough time to wade through your useless verbosity.
Not such sentiment expressed or implied in my post. Merely pointing out that blowback for the barbaric actions that Scylla is so arderntly defending is almost assured. Thus eliminating the “whys” that were so prevalent after the first attack.
Not exactly a novel theory nor one solely of my own making. Simple common sense will lead you to the same conclusion. In fact, you were warned of the likely repercussions by your own intelligence agencies prior to getting into this whole clusterfuck. But like anything else that pointed away from the prevalent neocon ideology in Washington, it was discarded as just more of the same “anti-war histrionics,” or whatever Orwellian term it was they used.
As an aside, I lived a mere fourty miles away from Ground Zero (Stamford, Ct) at the time of the attacks and I donated as much blood as I was allowed to for the next few weeks. Being an universal donor it was in rather high demand. Needless to say I don’t wish a repeat experience of those days to anyone.
Which is exactly one of the points I’ve been hamering home from day one – even to you on your pro-war days. But I also think that it’s too late now. You reap what you sow.
Scylla’s side has won. As has OBL’s. The rest of us will just have to try to avoid getting caught in the crossfire. And keep trying to knock some sense into them
For the time being we should count our blessings – at least we’re not in Fajullah.
PS-BTW I fully agree with the first part of your post. If wishes were horses…
And who are the “insurgents”? Do we know? We are told that they are “foreign fighters” and, no doubt, some number of them are. But from long ago, from the “light at the end of the tunnel”, I have learned that immediate skepticism of any government statement is justified. In matters of war, even more so.
For if we are going to suggest that foreigners have no right to intervene in Iraq’s conflicts, well, then, what are US Marines doing there? If they are illegal combatants, what are we? True, we are there at the invitation of the “sovereign” government of Iraq, but only a blockhead would claim such government represents anything other than our own power, and our own will.
Our case is even weaker regarding those combatants who are, in fact, Iraqis. All common law recognizes the right of the invaded to resist the invader, the laudable intent of the invaders notwithstanding.
“Restore soverignty”? To whom? Surely not to Saddam, so “restore” isn’t the word. If our solemn words about “democracy” are anything more than sanctimonious bullshit, we mean to hand the country over to the Shia majority. The same Shia majority we encouraged to rebel not so many years ago, with disastrous consequences. Well, disaster to them, we hardly noticed. Think they love us? Would you?
Does anyone here seriously believe that we will hand over Iraq to a hostile government, regardless of its democratic legitimacy?
We will hand Iraq over to a strongman, Allawi, if he has the stuff, someone else if he hasn’t. Someone who can be trusted to make the correct decisions, someone not too delicate to shed a bit of blood, as need be. Elections? Yes, of course, elections. That word is plastic, flexible, subject to a wonderful variety of interpretations. You don’t think them fair and free? Tell it to the Marines.
But then what do I know of such things? I have only played poker with mere grunts, what do they know of war, compared the austere vision of a Scylla, with his vast expertise in things martial?
You’re the self-professed brainiac here – and hunter extraordinaire, rugged woodsman, marathon-man, model hubby, father of the century, terrorism expert, war buff, sucessful entrepreneur, political purveyor of all that is right, Swift Vet Truth Seeker, inventor of a new method of running (or was that walking? I forget, what with so many accomplishments), body by Mattel, looks by Greek Gods…and tons of other shit that scapes me at the moment.
Thus I’m rather baffled that a man of your standing, the prototypical American Perfect Male, doesn’t understand what I am on about.
Tell you what: Go sit under a tree. Maybe an apple will fall on your head and you’ll be able to piece it all togther.
You remind me of a sig-line a Doper used to have: Warning! Cape does not enable user to fly!
I’ll be willing to accept this mindset -
I’ll actively try to understand it, for it would ease my mind -
if you can answer my first question truthfully:
Do you have any loved ones in Iraq?
Elucidator, it doesn’t help to list everything we shouldn’t do and not come up with any solutions to what we should do.
Yes, I’m skeptical of everthing Bushco says, but real people on both sides are dying. Supposedly, we went into Iraq to help the people under Saddam’s thumb, but all we have managed to do is to wreck the country and turn an impoverished dictatorship into bloody anarchy.
There has to be a solution to this war that will satisfy equally the various factions in Iraq, but I’m damned if I know what it is.
We can’t hand the government over to the Shi’a clerics because most Iraqis, including the Shi’a themslevers, real;ize what a disater the Iranian experiment has been. Iraqis by and large have a secualr outlook, and they deserve beter than to be under the thumb of the clergy. There should definitely be a consulting role for the clergy in the government, but we also have to find a way for the Sunni minority to be included in their government.
I apologize for the “fuckface,” BTW–I thought you were chortling over the prospect of bloody revenge on the US in its own territory, but I see I was wrong. Frankly, I think something horrible will happen here in the next few years.
Doesn’t look like you’ll be finding out in the near future either:
**Screams will not be heard **
**
Then again, you could always rely on the Doper ubermensch who hobnobs with “professors at the Army War College” to give you the inside scoop.
On preview: no worries, gobear. I can see how my post may have been misconstrued.
I am getting more and more confident that I’ll be posting another “I Told You So” thread in 2006.
Despite huge amounts of evidence that one factor that played in peopl’s decision to vote for Bush was the shrill and incessant hatred of middle America and its values that the left espouses, many of the liberals here have continued to deny that either it exists, or, if it does exist, it influenced votes, or, if it influenced votes, the voters so influenced were idiots.
The “straw that broke the camel’s back” for me – that led me to post this – is this IMHO thread, in which people who voted for Bush were asked to share their reasons. This is IMHO, mind you, NOT a forum for debating or for personal attacks, and the OP seemed genuinely grateful to be getting the insight from the answers.
Many answers noted the hostile and dismissive attitude they picked up from the left - not from Kerry, mind you, but from Barbra Streisand, Michael Moore, and the like. They also cited the hostile attitude of the left here on this board as emblematic of the issue.
These are not new. But most posters here continue to disregard this as a possibility. “If you voted based on how much you hate Michael Moore, then you’re a moron!”
Er… exactly the problem. People DID do that. And now your reaction is to… call them morons. That doesn’t help the problem, does it? It doesn’t even acknowledge that the problem exists. The goal in an election is to sell people on your side’s point of view. The method of denying there’s a problem, and then saying that people that didn’t get the sale are idiots really won’t work.
I’m reminded of the Simpson’s episode where Barney watches a tape of himself getting drunk at a party. At one point, Lisa tells him, “Mr. Gumbel, you’re scaring me!”
“No I’m not,” Barney calmly slurs in reply.
Just as the drunk Barney did not get it - that if Lisa says he’s scaring her, then YES, he is scaring her – so too it’s becoming clear to me that the left doesn’t get it. You don’t get it.
There will be replies to this post, telling me that I’m wrong, that such voters are idiots, or that they’re lying - they never would have been Democratic voters anyway, or that they’re exceptions… anything except admitting the truth: these are real people, there are a lot of them, and this is what happened.
The True Believers can’t bring themselves to admit or even understand it.
And that’s why they lost in 2000, in 2002, in 2004, and will lose again in 2006. Because they won’t use any introspection and understanding. Because they just don’t get it.
By the way, special jeers for Jinx, who barges into that IMHO thread, which does not invite debate, and begins a post attacking the posters there with “You must be asleep!” That’s precisely what these guys were complaing about - being called idiots by the left - and what does Jinx do, in a forum that is nor for debates?
Also jeers for justwannano, who does a stepped-down version of the same thing. Nice going.