Btw, Scylla, thanks for the straightforward response. Here we are again.
Oh, and btw, I wasn’t aware that you had admitted that Bush had been lying. Sorry about that. I’d love to see a link, but I won’t insist. I must say that I find it odd that it doesn’t seem to bother you more than it does, but perhaps I’m misunderstanding your degree of disillusionment with Bush? I mean, I know you don’t like him much anymore because of how much spending he has done, but is it also possible that you don’t like him because he lied to the American public and the world?
:dubious: We agree on something, smug viewpoints and attitudes like this one need to be ridiculed.
That would always make me doubt on their pronouncements from then on, but somehow after all that we should still trust Mr. “I officially pass the buck” Bush?
Like when Bush identified in 2005 the democracies in Lebanon and Palestine as prime examples of democracy on the march in the ME thanks to the Iraq war? Bush then sitting on his tush and effectually dropping support for Lebanon shows a different lesson to the Islamic people that are not fanatics.
I agree that it is not exactly encouraging. But you’ve reached the point of being hopeless, and I haven’t. I think it will take quite a while for this government to find its feet, and I agree that it’s entirely possible that they won’t. But I also think there’s a chance that, if we help to keep the lid on, they will. It’s going to take a long time if it happens at all. But I still think that it could happen, and not just in the “and I could walk out the front door and immediately be struck by lightning” sense of the word “could.” I guess that’s the point at which we differ. Fair enough.
Believe me when I say my optimism has absolutely zero basis in the current administration. It’s only with sufficient change in our own government that we are able to win back some international credibility that I think this is remotely possible. Unfortunately, there’s simply no way we’re going to be able to get rid of the current administration prior to early 2009, and of course, there’s no guarantee at this point that we will elect someone who can win greater credibility. After all, we re-elected Bush. This doesn’t give me a lot of faith in the American electorate. Just some hope that maybe we can manage to pull it off. I guess it’s because I find the alternative so horrifying that I am grasping at what may appear to you and others to be straws.
I’m sure somebody will trot it out, or you can search. “thanksgiving” would be a good term to try to find them.
No. The lie really doesn’t bother me that much. I think if he had known Saddam didn’t have WMDs and said he did, it would really bother me. What he did though was state he knew for a fact something he only actually beleived to be true. It’s still a lie, and it bothers me, but not terribly.
It’s mostly the Social conservatism that really gets me.
The Al Queda types are betting we continue to support party over country because it divides our attention from the real fight and strengthens their resolve. And they know that your intentional obtuseness as to the point Cheney conveyed - the logical disconnect and fallacies he used in the above quote fully aware of how it would be interpreted - shows the bias in your objectivity and the state your party is in today.
It’s quite good. Woodward had strong access, and is no Conservative. He is fair though, and I think he’s done an excellent job documenting the rationale.
One of the things that got me was the containment strategy and no-fly zone enforcement, and how that was an untenable position, and how the threat of Iraq related to our inability to do anything else in the Mideast.
Basically, Saddam shot at every one of our flights to enforce the no fly zone, and he was getting better at it. If he ever managed to shoot down one our planes the recovery entailed an impromptu full invasion of Iraq.
Actually, it does, at least to me. I’m a lot more understanding of people who have come around to see the shit we’ve caused, as opposed to attempting to justify what we’re doing at this late stage.
I’m personally of mixed feelings as to the next step we should take. While I do think we owe it to Iraq to help them fix the shit we broke, I don’t know if us being there actually accomplishes that.
I think a multi-step approach would probably be the best method to regain at least some of our credibility in the world. Something along the lines of:
[ul][li]Release everyone from Gitmo except for the fivish people or so against whom we have actual evidence that they are terrorists. Pay them shitloads of money, offer them and their families citizenship, work with whatever country they’d like to live in, or whatever else it takes for them to have decent lives from this point forward. Apologize publicly, humbly, and ask for forgiveness.[/li][li]Make it clear that we will not tolerate torture. Have the AG state unequivocally that he was wrong, and that there is no room for torture under our banner.[/li][li]Stop sending mixed messages about what is and isn’t okay under our watch, and make sure that the chain of command is very very clear about what we consider acceptable behavior. Punish the shit out of anyone, no matter how many stars they have on their shoulders, who doesn’t follow these rules.[/li][li]Replace Rumsfeld. Ideally with someone who wasn’t so fond of this war in the first place.[/li][li]Get the U.N involved yesterday. It would probably be better if we let the Iraq government ask for us to leave and be replaced with U.N. troops, and let us accept that. That allows the Iraqi people to at least think they have ownership of the situation.[/li][li]Take the money we would have spent had we stayed there and dedicate it all to the rebuilding efforts of both Iraq and Afghanistan. We still haven’t cleaned up that mess, and we actually did have popular support for it. Let’s finish the jobs we started in both places. Get the basic utilities up and running throughout Iraq as fast as humanly possible, at least to the state they were in before we invaded.[/li][li]Keep our grubby hands off of Iraq’s oil. Don’t just let them nationalize it, help them to do so.[/li][li]Work to repair our relationship with Iran. I don’t expect us to be friends anytime soon, but we can at least stop comparing penis sizes.[/li][li]Figure out how to help the Kurds, even if we have to tell Turkey to back the fuck off.[/li][li]Make sure that no one doubts that we have no issues with the Muslim religion. Denounce pundits who denigrate it at every opportunity.[/li][/ul]We basically have three differing populations that we have to keep happy. Make sure we do our best to accomodate all three, without playing favorites with the majority group. We don’t need them all to love us, we just need for them to not hate us.
Admittedly, my ideas aren’t as fleshed out as I’d like for them to be, but since I didn’t want the war, I don’t feel that I’m the guy who’s responsible for the exit plan.
Gee, I guess we’re headed towards “fib” now. Kind of like telling your wife that the dress she’s trying on, the one that costs $400, telling her that it makes her butt look big. Perfectly understandable. Or would be, perhaps, if his actions didn’t result in such an enthusiastic harvest of corpses. And our best and brightest exiled to a fever swamp of futile sacrifice.
Say is that the book that talks about how GeeDubya stuck his head in Condi Rice’s door and said “Fuck Saddam! We’re taking him out!” You know, about a week before he went on TV and swore up and down that he would exhaust all options for peace?
Oooopsy! Just another of his adorable widdle fibs.
[Mom]
Hey guys, make nice on Scylla. He willingly entered a thread in which he knew that he would represent the seriously minority viewpoint and has offered himself up to a fair amount of abuse because he really believes that this is/was the right thing to do, and because he wants to have a non-asshole representing his viewpoint. He didn’t need to do that, and he’s not doing it because he wants to go swinging his dick around. He did it because he wants his viewpoint to be represented fairly. There’s nothing wrong with that. I truly believe that he is every bit as dedicated to “doing the right thing” as we liberals are; the disagreement is in how to do it.
Scylla isn’t an idiot, and he doesn’t just blindly play follow the leader. He has the beliefs he has because he has thought them through and come to these conclusions. I disagree with him in virtually every respect, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible for him not to be willfully blind or to want the right thing. (I don’t give that same credit to the administration as a whole, although I’m sure there are members of it at some level who are intelligent, thoughtful, and well meaning as well.) It’s possible to look at the same information with intelligence, thoughtfulness and good intentions, and still come to a different assessment of the situation.
Scylla, it might be more helpful to your own case if you weren’t quite so flippant in dismissing some things you disagree with too.
[/Mom]
You may now continue with your regularly scheduled mutual sniping, or join forces in shitting on me for acting like a mother instead, whichever you find more entertaining.
Uh mom? Aren’t you ignoring he told many here and the Democrats that they are the biggest asset of Al qaeda and dupes? Asuming thoughtfulness and good intentions when he is poisoning the well is not “looking to represent a point of view fairly”.
Yes, but those are telling us that he thinks we’re being deceived, not that he thinks we’re dishonest or amoral or complete assholes. It’s not quite the same thing. That being said, it was not the smartest thing Scylla could have done to advance his argument, and it was phrased very badly to do so. But DO notice that he does not suggest that we WANT Al Quaeda to win, or even that we’re stupid - just deceived.
Scylla, I’m begging you, dude. Don’t make an ass out of me here by being a jerk, OK? We liberals have also thought it through, and have based our conclusions on our thinking and the facts we have available. We’re no stupider than you; we just disagree. When you start bringing in the idea that we’re the (possibly willing) tools of Al Quaeda, you don’t win any points; you just really piss people off.
And besides, how does this differ from the 100 times a day that we, quite rightly IMO, say that Bush and the Iraq invasions are the best recruiting tool Al Qaeda ever had?
We agree on something, smug viewpoints and attitudes like this one need to be ridiculed.
Aren’t you ignoring he told many here and the Democrats that they are the biggest asset of Al qaeda and dupes? Asuming thoughtfulness and good intentions when he is poisoning the well is not “looking to represent a point of view fairly”.