I fulfilled the request of the OP in spades. I could, if you like, dig out some of the other times when I said that the WMD claim was a lie, but you’re still not going to be happy with that, given that you’re still on my shit after no less than four concessions in just this thread.
As far as North Korea goes, they violated an agreement signed back in 1994 by your boy Clinton and brokered by your boy Carter, they withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and they’re posturing like they’re ready to launch on our Wset Coast and attack South Korea if we don’t give in to their demands, so if it were up to me we’d get that fucker Kim, too. The only reason we don’t is because they have nukes. Do the people of North Korea deserve better? Absolutely. Can we get rid of Kim without killing all of them in a nuclear holocaust? Doubtful.
As far as minty’s question goes, at first I thought that the first part of it was closer to the truth. Later, after time had passed, the second part became the evident truth. Does that mean that I adocate running away? No. Does that mean that I think getting rid of Saddam wasn’t a good thing? No. Does that mean that I think the people of Iraq aren’t going to be better off without Saddam? No. So I still support the war, even with the lie that led us there.
Oh, and just so you can see it I’ll bold it for you so you can quit fucking asking me: BUSH LIED ABOUT THE “IMMINENT THREAT OF WMDS”. THEY DIDN’T EXIST.
So you can take that and ram it up your ass. That’s the fifth and last time I will make a statement conceding to the OP. If you want more make a recording, loop it for yourself, and masturbate to it.
Right here, babe (scroll up): “How do you fight the terrorists? How do you prevent another 9/11?” Etc. The context was, and is, the invasion of Iraq, which, unlike the Taliban, we know to have had bugger-all to do with 9/11. But that has not stopped Bush from continuing to make the insinuation, nor our interlocutor from loyally repeating it, has it?
Since I know you to be a solid citizen, I’ll accept your apology in advance. And no, since you bring it up, I don’t want Superscyllious’s blood, only the cessation of his lying and weaseling. We are, after all, about fighting ignorance here, not propagating it. But I don’t think I’ll stay up late waiting.
So we’re not going to hear about any examples of anti-war perfidy, are we? Pity.
Isn’t that still at least as likely as before? Now, Iraqi central authority is gone, with only the US DOD to take its place, but is that going to last forever? What happens then?
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I think there were AMPLE good reasons to go to war in Iraq all in the US’s interests (whether or not we’re doing WELL over there is another debate altogether) but in this day and age of 10 second (or less) sound bites and shoddy media (plus a woefully ignorant electorate) you can’t sell a complicated and radical change of strategy to preserve US interests in the Mid-east and get anything accomplished.
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I’m going to have to disagree with that. If the case is strong, it can be explained, and it gives the public too little credit for patriotism. I refuse to think we’re really as cynical as a people as our current leadership is. We do know, or eventually find out, when we’re being lied to, and that always makes the leadership situation worse, not better.
WMD, true. Oil, not so sure - you already made the point about Saudi instability, but not by extending it to the effect on the stability of oil prices if there were to be a revolution of any kind there. That makes the availability of another price-stable source pretty attractive to oilmen, doesn’t it?
Possibly so, but that’s a statement of simple hope rather than policy analysis. The lies remain, and the public’s knowledge that he’s a liar will forever cripple Bush’s ability to get the support to do anything more than he already has.
Airman Doors, USAF, even if he did not mention 9/11, all points in that quote are debatable and many times, even in this thread, shown to be misleading at best.
I am beginning to believe 9/11 is being avoided (“I don’t care getting the perpetrators of 9/11”) because it shows that, regarding Iraq, we are losing the focus of what the war on terror was supposed to be.
Well, it ain’t that sexy, AFD At my advancing age, I would need at least a hot lesbo scene with J Lo and Britteny.
Look, I’m gonna take a chance here, 'cause I think you’re a pretty decent fellow, and I’d hate for you to think otherwise. So take this for what its worth, but be assured: I have no intention, none whatsoever, of dissing you.
Have you ever noticed how rarely SDMB posters refer to thier military history, thier veteran status?
As it happens, I’m a life-long feather merchant and Rear Echelon Motherfucker, despite years as a “brat”. (Used to play amongst the mothballed airplanes at Davis Monthan, Tucson. Lived on base during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Went to school waiting for the world to end. The colonels kids didn’t go. Second Looies kids go…but enough, you know the drill…) In later life, circumstances were such that I had a lot of contact with returning 'Nam vets. And here’s what I noticed: about six months after you stop lacing up combat boots, the indoctrination starts to wear off. Now, of course, uniformity and conformity is essential to a military, it can’t be helped, its one of the lesser evils of war.
I sense you are conflicted. You see the truth but don’t want to agree with people that you have been taught to hold in contempt, wishy-washy liberals who have no concept of duty, honor, and sacrifice. It ain’t so. It just ain’t so. Al Gore only typed reports in Saigon, but that’s ten thousand miles closer to The Shit than GeeDubya ever got.
Col. Clyde Slyman, USMC, who I mentioned before, told the truth to a confused young man. I have damn few personal heroes, but he’s on the list. I make this gesture to, in some measure, repay him. If I am out of line, I sincerely apologize, and trust you to overlook it.
Do not take it to much to heart,Syclla. Some of us have spent what seems like a lifetime arguing with fools and villains and being civil about it. It is regarded as really bad form to find language like this in the transcript:
Mr. Gelding: Scylla, you fucking idiot, are you really that God damned ignorant or are you just pulling my chain.
I said before that the proposition you advance, justification by power, the Big Dawg approach to international relations, is just appalling. That I have not been reduced to sputtering and sarcasm is just because I have grown use to having people spout the most irrational, fantastic, excrement to my face in hopes that a jury will not see through the sanctimonious blather to the black villainy that lies beneath. I’ll be civil, friend, but there may be a layer of contempt for the fundamental dishonesty and rapaciousness nature of the policy our President has chosen, and which you have chosen to defend, beneath the civility.
None-the-less, like Brutus’s analysis that the war is motivated by only oil, your view that the war is motivated by the Big Dawg approach to the world, devoid of any hypocrisy about brutality to his own people and the blessings of democracy, is most refreshing.
You have, I fear, not heard the last of this. Now is the time to tighten your cinch. It’s going to be a long, hard ride.
Look, in the time that I’ve been here, I’ve been open to the “liberal” viewpoint. In some cases, I’ve even taken to them. I am now indifferent to abortion (or as indifferent as one can be), I am for gay rights and gay marriage, I am on record as admitting that Bush was dishonest, I am on record as stating that I will not vote for Bush in the next election, and I agree with you guys that the pretext that Bush ultimately used to justify this war was false.
What the hell else do you want from me? You want me to suddenly think that Bush didn’t “win” the election? You want me to become a champion of affirmative action? You want me to kneel at the altar of Saint Clinton?
My viewpoints are flexible, but you have to convince me that I am wrong. In some respects you have done so, in others you haven’t. I admitted where I was wrong, and I told you why I think the rest of it is right. Your constant harping on the rest of it doesn’t change the fact that we have to stay, we have to get it done, and looking at the overall picture of a free and democratic Iraq, we still did the right thing. Whatever the circumstances that led us there were.
Your Col. Slyman was an honorable man, but he had a different viewpoint from mine. What you see as truth I see as perspective. I don’t see why you can claim something as incontribertible because you heard it from someone and I can’t see things from a different perspective. Maybe one day I’ll see things from your point of view, but this day I don’t.
So, can you please get the hell off my back? I’m being fair with you right now, as try to be with everyone else at all times, but even more so now because you’re being reasonable, rational, and polite, which I respect. Nonetheless, we simply don’t agree on this, and it’s a bit disingenuous for you and your posse to accuse me of dishonesty simply because I disagree with you. I have said nothing dishonest in this thread, and yet somehow I still find myself having to defend myself from attacks, simply because I don’t believe what you guys believe.
Not “on your back”. Sorry to have offended you, wasn’t my intention. Don’t have a “posse”, and if you can point out to me where I accused you of dishonesty, I’ll rim a cat.
Not why the war is “justified,” just why Iraq, why now.
Gulf War I and all the ramifications.
Constant patrolling the no-fly zones and being shot at. The inspection circle jerk. Basing US forces in Saudi – al Qaeda uses that as a pretext for being heinous murdering pigs.
Saddam actually used WMDs fairly recently, albeit “only” chemical.
Saddam has advanced nuclear technology and know how, originally from France. The only thing keeping him from reconstituting a nuclear program was the US enforcing the embargo.
Iraq bisects Iran and Syria, the two biggest terror supporting nations – after the old Afghanistan. Macrostrategy, in other words.
Saddam Hussein was not your ordinary dictator.
But for CNN covering up their best news stories for years, the world would have a very different picture of the man right now. I know “nobody likes Saddam, but getting rid of him was the height of immorality.”
OTOH, blaming the US for “creating Saddam” is just fine.
Bottom line, Saddam was directly responsible for more Arab deaths than any other leader in modern times except Khomeni.
I know, only liberals care about people. Now mention Guatemala (the size of my neighborhood).
HRNGOs estimate that Saddam killed over 300,000 in his killing fields, others say possibly upwards of 500,000. This excludes war dead.
7) Getting rid of the sanction with Saddam in power would have been crazy.
8) France and Germany – once in favor of #7 – are NOT our allies. The whole Democratic song and dance about getting them on board (yes, I watch those dental trip… debates) ignores the the whole anti-mondialisation (anti-US in a nutshell) nature of European foreign policy. The Democrats don’t even understand the game, much less know how to play it.
Consider lokji’s frighteningly undemocratic argument: Bush had to lie because the people are too lazy, stupid, and unconcerned to support his agenda otherwise. Clearly, if his analysis is correct, then the Bush administration has little more than contempt for democracy and the democratic values the US supposedly represents. He is not interested in putting his case before the people in open and honest debate, and letting them (us) decide whose arguments hold most merit. He would rather co-opt the democratic process with spin, misrepresentation, and outright lies.
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I don’t see how my arguement was ‘frighteningly undemocratic’… just my take on the political realities as they have been for quite some time. It’s not as if there was any really active attempt to bury facts and knowledge about the underlying reasons for the war for those who wanted to inform themselves. Those who choose not to take any active role as informed citizens get to make up their minds based on the most superficial spin availiable from both sides and usually can’t be bothered to vote either. It’s their choice. Very democratic.
When exactly was the last time a US president went before the people and congress and laid out in detail the reasons for choosing a military solution, complete with background and subleties… including future ramifications and goals THEN waited for everybody to debate it ad infinitum and made their decision based on the results of that debate? FDR didn’t make his case to the people when he went ahead with lend/lease or the oil embargo with Japan… knowing that they would likely lead to war… indeed if he HAD alot of the electorate would have HOWLED at him getting us involved in another war ‘over there’. The only debate was after the fact… then it was sold to the public with sloganeering “Arsenal of Democracy!”. Where was this informed and lively debate before we bombed Serbia? Bush is nothing new at all, and the vitriol and anger we see at him is merely the mirror image of the kind we saw against Clinton when he was in office, such is partisanship.
That is bigger than your neighborhood you ignorant fellow.
I also have said before that Saddam needed to be dealt with, but the timing and reasons were wrong, ignoring the rest of the world is indeed a game, but many have pointed out how childish that decision was and is, grow ups in charge? Give me a break.
lokij: One time we found the reason for an invation was a bad one -The Dominican Republic, real reason: sugar- the American people did found out and guess what? they voted for the oposition in the next election.
I gotta say, in reading this thread, that I agree. No matter how deserved you (“you” is no one in particular, although I could name names) might think your attacks are, no matter how clever you might think you are, I think the relevant question must be: will calling Scylla a jackbooted Nazi (or whatever) be helpful in the slightest?
I once had a discussion with my girlfriend in which I espoused a viewpoint that is pretty similar to what is being termed here the “Big Dawg” scenario. I said that the “civilized” nations of the world should band together and just straighten out the shit in the world. The obvious question, of course, is, “Who gets to define what the shit is?” My answer to her question was somewhat fast and loose – sometimes, we just know. Genocide in Rwanda? I think we can put a stop to that without even taking sides. Sexual slavery? Hell, any type of slavery? I think a Front Unified for Civility and Kindness could pressure any state engaging in such practices and stop them. Anything that might be a little stickier, like the death penalty or something like that, could be worked out via some democratic system. Dammit, I told my girlfriend, it would work because the fruits would be so fucking SWEET and GOOD. The system would be self-correcting because no one would want to stomp on such unadulterated goodness.
Then again, as I’ve said before, I chose wisely when I chose my screen name.
I think, essentially, what I’m trying to say, Scylla, is that the Big Dawg scenario really cannot work. To prove this, I ask that you engage in a thought experiment: Is there anything the United States could do that would be considered a “terrorist” act? Has anything we’ve done in Iraq been on your list?
Or, to put it even another way, I’ll quote Lisa Simpson as she converses with Homer, head of a new vigilante gang.
Lisa: But dad, don’t you see? If you’re the police, then who will police the police?
[sub]Homer: Iunno. Coast Guard?[/sub]
I think there were AMPLE good reasons to go to war in Iraq all in the US’s interests (whether or not we’re doing WELL over there is another debate altogether) but in this day and age of 10 second (or less) sound bites and shoddy media (plus a woefully ignorant electorate) you can’t sell a complicated and radical change of strategy to preserve US interests in the Mid-east and get anything accomplished.
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I’m going to have to disagree with that. If the case is strong, it can be explained, and it gives the public too little credit for patriotism. I refuse to think we’re really as cynical as a people as our current leadership is. We do know, or eventually find out, when we’re being lied to, and that always makes the leadership situation worse, not better.
WMD, true. Oil, not so sure - you already made the point about Saudi instability, but not by extending it to the effect on the stability of oil prices if there were to be a revolution of any kind there. That makes the availability of another price-stable source pretty attractive to oilmen, doesn’t it?
Possibly so, but that’s a statement of simple hope rather than policy analysis. The lies remain, and the public’s knowledge that he’s a liar will forever cripple Bush’s ability to get the support to do anything more than he already has. **
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Well, it’s not quite the same as before as we now have a couple hundred thousand troops on the ground IN Iraq instead of sitting around watching. We now get to try to engineer a soft fall instead of contain and influence a conflagration. We now try to get some kind of governing system friendly to US interests and acceptable to at least a majority of Iraqis on the ground instead of just waiting to see what shit floats to the top of open civil war. Again, whether we’re doing this WELL is another debate.
Now… you say ‘If the case is strong it can be explained’… this is nonsense. Sure… it CAN be explained,… so can Einstein’s theory of general relativity… or how evolution works… but the fact is that a lot of people aren’t going to get it, aren’t interested in listening… can hear your explanation yet still come to the wrong conclusion (Creationism) and while you wait around to get a clear consensus the world moves on. I said in my previous post, NO US president ever makes it policy to fully explain to the people and get their approval before he makes a military decision… he makes it, then sells it and often it’s sold with a lie or half truth. The choice we get is to put the kind of man we think will make the best decision into office… not make his decisions for him. I personally think his decision to go into Iraq was a sound one and thought it unfortunate that he lied to justify it but I was hardly surprised.
As for oil being the reason for going, if we’d wanted oil we could have done as equally a radical policy change as invading and went back to supporting Saddam (or at least reducing sanctions)… propped up his sons in the future and bought all the sweet sweet oil we wanted. Or we could have just continued propping up the House Saud in the face of Arab outrage. Or we could have just subsidized the hell out of our own oil industry and started drilling here and pour money into the energy companies so they can produce alternative energy sources and went back to insularism. Oil is important but it’s just a commodity, just another factor in the decision… not the only one. I pretend like others to say that the oil in Iraq wasn’t a factor at all, that’s ridiculous… but I don’t think it was the primary one either.
I don’t think the public’s knowledge about Bush’s lie will matter at all. It doesn’t seem to have impacted him much as yet, and he’s managed to get quite a few things done despite his reputation as a liar (wow… politicians lie…the world is turning upside down!) like the prescription drug plan, improving the economy, handling both North Korea and Iran ect. We’ll see… I think he’ll survive and thrive, most liars do in politics.
Beagle, is it possible that squandering the post 9/11 goodwill of the international community, and diverting resources from the real war on terror poses more of a threat then Saddam did.
He needed to be dealt with eventually, but we could have easily kept him in a box for a few more years.
And another time, we annexed a state by force for a pretty similar reason and nothing happened at all. ;> For every one occasion of righteous outrage I can give you a dozen of apathy or even enthusiasm. It’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission at times, as true in war as in anything else I’m afraid.