Quote:Bush isn't the best prez out there i'll admit but he is doing a good job with the war and @#%$. Saddam had to go. His little game of tell them what they want to hear then violate various agreements filed fromt he UN got old. No one else in the UN had the balls to stand up and agree to do SOMETHING.
Okay, so he did a good job on something he started that he shouldn't have started. Now, how does that make it better...? As for Saddam, there's now plenty proof that he actually didn't have any weapons of mass destruction, and he wasn't building any either. You know, there's these neighbors who lives next to me and sometimes parks their S.U.V. where I am supposed to put my garbage cans. I sure hope someone has the balls to go out there and kill them. That's basically what you are saying, right? And for the record, the only country that initially agreed with the U.S. was Britain... well, their prime minister at least.
Quote:So Saddam is gone. Most of Iraq wanted it that way, but now we're into gorilla warefare. Only the "bulk" of fightings supposedly ended. The people responsible are the varous terrorist networks in the middle east. So we'll have to get rid of all the networks before Iraq truly be free. This means lots of fighting and re-building and Bush said he's gonna see it though.
Oh yeah, and now it's our job to go and "correct" all the political systems around the world. Basically, it's worse than our entering Vietnam to make them a democracy. Saddam wasn't even invading another country to impose his government on them when we entered. And for the record, Iraq wasn't any kind of terrorist capitol of the Middle East. Iran fits that bill more closely. If you actually compare Iraq before we invaded to other countries in the Middle East, they actually had it pretty good. And here you go with grandpa Bush again; he did something he shouldn't have and repeatedly lied to his people in the process. Is it all okay now that he is "seeing it through?"
Quote:Has bush made mistake, yea. He isn't @#%$ perfect. If you look at all the other presidents they too had time where they looked good and bad. I'll agree that he should be concentrating on the US economy a little better as well.
Lots of other presidents look good or bad, but not many look good solely by basically staring them down first. Apparently, most people in Congress are far too scared that Bush will deem them unpatriotic. If the president calls you unpatriotic, you're probably not going to get re-elected. Of course, if nobody questions him, the public will love him. Most presidents look good when they do good things.
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With Bow let us win Kine, with Bow in battle, with
Bow be victory in our hot encounters,
The Bow brings grief and sorrow to the foeman; armed
With Bow may we subdue all regions.
Close to his ear, as fain to speak, she presses, holding
Her well-loved friend in her embraces;
Strained on the bow, she whispers like a woman -- this
Bow-string that preserves us in the Combat.
Re: ...
I don't know about correcting there political systems, but we have to rebuild them after destroying them or they will hate us even more than they already do.
BTW I do know we already have a constitution for them, and that may be going a little overbeard but...
Re: ...
We have also assigned many or most of their officials.
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With Bow let us win Kine, with Bow in battle, with
Bow be victory in our hot encounters,
The Bow brings grief and sorrow to the foeman; armed
With Bow may we subdue all regions.
Close to his ear, as fain to speak, she presses, holding
Her well-loved friend in her embraces;
Strained on the bow, she whispers like a woman -- this
Bow-string that preserves us in the Combat.
The scud missles he fired into Kuwait were illegal, and under the UN guidelines, cause enough to take action. Besides that, the people of Iraq are better off without him. So how is it bad again? Bush did the right thing for the wrong reasons; the action in Iraq itself, however, was completely justified, legally and morally.
Mystere IX Better than a cup of cold sick
(11/21/03 7:21 am) Reply
Re: ...
I don't blame him for the war. Something good came from it and perhaps he'll even respect his responsibility to rebuild the country, so I'm not holding the war itself against him.
But this is no reason to forget that he started it on false pretenses, or his bullying and manipulation of countries who didn't lend their support, or his inflammatory attitude throughout (yet another suicide bombing yesterday - the man's stirred up a fucking hornet's nest).
Sadly, people use the positive side-effect of the war (the "right thing", which tells you nothing about your president's character), as an excuse to forget about the "wrong reasons" (which tell you everything) and to convince themselves Bush is still doing a good job. Those of you who vote, please think harder than that.
Hm
I guess people know that I don't think much of Bush's domestic policy, especially on economic issues and civil liberties, and that I've previously advocated that John Ashcroft be tried for treason (for his attempts to undermine and eliminate the Constitution) and maybe Bush along with him - and that I think less and less of Bush as a man (hard heart with a soft head, is my basic verdict) - BUT I don't mind his foreign policy at all.
Quote:Oh yeah, and now it's our job to go and "correct" all the political systems around the world. Basically, it's worse than our entering Vietnam to make them a democracy. Saddam wasn't even invading another country to impose his government on them when we entered. And for the record, Iraq wasn't any kind of terrorist capitol of the Middle East. Iran fits that bill more closely. If you actually compare Iraq before we invaded to other countries in the Middle East, they actually had it pretty good. And here you go with grandpa Bush again; he did something he shouldn't have and repeatedly lied to his people in the process. Is it all okay now that he is "seeing it through?"
See, I'm the opposite: that's exactly what I believe we should be doing.
It needs to be done, and we're the only ones who have the will and the power to do it. The United Nations has repeatedly shown itself to be more interested in protecting the sovereignty of states (and upholding any "stable" government, regardless of whether it be a democracy or a tyranny, as if there were no difference between the two) than in protecting human rights - and humans in general - from tyrants. We ourselves have a pretty lousy record on human rights (i.e., supporting folks like Saddam in the first place), which is exactly what we need to atone for by helping set the world right.
What's more, we only have a limited window of time to take action: the United States is not going to have its current military super-supremacy forever, and it's important to act now.
A lot of people refuse to see the importance of acting, because they have fallen for the delusional Panglossian Clinton-era Fukuyama gospel of the 90s, which basically holds that the world is now on a permanent and irreversible march towards liberal democracy and permanent peace.
I just don't think it's true: I don't think universal democratization of the planet is an inevitability - rather, I think that the world's general trend of progress towards democratic governments is a fluke that could be reversed at any moment. George Orwell's vision of a totalitarian boot stomping on the human face forever is still very much a possible future for this planet. Totalitarian and authoriarian governments aren't in permanent decline, and democracy is not guaranteed victory anywhere, ever.
Over time, U.S. military dominance will eventually level out, and then simply shift to other nations - very likely only semi-democratic or simply non-democratic nations...and when that time comes, we'll start to realize that it isn't inevitable or certain that democracy will prevail worldwide - and that we were insanely friggin stupid to think that it would.
All you people who take a general attitude of not caring, "it will work out" (I'm thinking of Morpha in particular as an eloquent advocate of complete international inaction)...don't think that it really will work out. We have to act now, while we have power, to ensure the best possible future for democracy - and that really does mean doing what the United Nations will not do, and actually going out there militarily and tackling the tyrants and totalitarians of the world.
In the past, when we have refused to act, we have always paid...no, actually, we haven't always paid, but others have, with their lives. Remember our foolish decision not to simply topple Saddam in Gulf War 1? How many Iraqis have paid the price? More controversially, remember how we wouldn't let ourselves invade Communist China while we still could? Soon, they had nukes, meaning we couldn't invade, ever. How many millions and millions and millions of Chinese died under communist tyranny because of our pathetic inaction?
It's important to do what we can while we still can, because the future victory of democracy is nowhere near as certain as anyone thinks.
Re: Hm
Now if only America would be able to reverse its own dumbed-down society which allowed Bush into office in the first place, and eliminated both the religious/hyper-patriotic sentiments of the right, and the hyper-PC sentiments of the left (particularly that you can't say what's right or wrong for another country, I too would be behind a mission to "fix" other countries' governments; even if America is pretty screwed up right now, it's still based on American ideals which are pretty f'ing good on the grand scale of things), we might be able to get somewhere with the rest of the world...
Quote:"Okay, so he did a good job on something he started that he shouldn't havestarted. Now, how does that make it better...? As for Saddam, there's nowplenty proof that he actually didn't have any weapons of mass destruction,and he wasn't building any either. You know, there's these neighbors wholives next to me and sometimes parks their S.U.V. where I am supposed toput my garbage cans. I sure hope someone has the balls to go out there andkill them. That's basically what you are saying, right? And for the record,the only country that initially agreed with the U.S. was Britain... well,their prime minister at least."
Dude that's not what i'm saying. This goes way past the WMD's right now. Did he lie? Yea. Was it smart? no. Does he owe and explanaion? You bet your ass. When you're dealing with a hostile place like the ME you have to take any leak seriosusly. So when the inspection people went to look (even in the past) he would say, "Ok here's the key." then months down the raod be like, "@#%$ you i'm not letting you down there." This is to the UN not the United States. and he's violated vraious UN treaties before. Why? because NO ONE TAKES ACTION AGINST IT with some kinda penelty. I wish i could have had the UN for my parents.
Quote:"Lots of other presidents look good or bad, but not many look good solelyby basically staring them down first. Apparently, most people in Congressare far too scared that Bush will deem them unpatriotic. If the presidentcalls you unpatriotic, you're probably not going to get re-elected. Of course,if nobody questions him, the public will love him. Most presidents look goodwhen they do good things."
people are shallow and a lot only care about their wallet size. I've lost faith in the senate branch and House of Reps branch since they seem more occipied on their own agenda and only use the people to get re-elected.
the middle paragraph was pretty much covered by snip.
Jim: You ok, Gene?
Gene: Yea. I'll take this over the inside of a spaceship anyday.
Jim: I guess your cherry is officially popped now.
Quote:The scud missles he fired into Kuwait were illegal, and under the UN guidelines, cause enough to take action. Besides that, the people of Iraq are better off without him. So how is it bad again? Bush did the right thing for the wrong reasons; the action in Iraq itself, however, was completely justified, legally and morally.
Look, if you ask me, you shouldn't go invading a country for what it did in the past. We had already invaded Iraq for its invasion of Kuwait. At the time, most of the West liked Iraq, so Iraq thought it could get away with taking some land from its neighbors, the same way Israel got away with it. Does it make it right? Of course not. But it does show irresponsibility on our part for giving them that impression. So we invade them once for an invasion we partly helped to invoke, then ten years later invade them again for what they did back then? I think not.
And the most solid argument against our going and "fixing" other nations is that our stupid little republic isn't perfect; it's filled with corruption and greed. So we are gonna go spread that all over the world? Is that really so bright? No, I think leaving a world full of various different problems is better off than making a world filled with the same problems everywhere.
No, I don't think it's cool that senators are too cowardly to stand up for what they believe in for fear of not being re-elected, but it's still worse to intimidate those people. Really, who's worse, the bully or the wimp?
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With Bow let us win Kine, with Bow in battle, with
Bow be victory in our hot encounters,
The Bow brings grief and sorrow to the foeman; armed
With Bow may we subdue all regions.
Close to his ear, as fain to speak, she presses, holding
Her well-loved friend in her embraces;
Strained on the bow, she whispers like a woman -- this
Bow-string that preserves us in the Combat.
Quote:And the most solid argument against our going and "fixing" other nations is that our stupid little republic isn't perfect; it's filled with corruption and greed.
All government is. As long as there's personal power, there will be corruption. No government can be perfect and waiting around until ours is magically fixed will get us killed.
Quote:So we are gonna go spread that all over the world? Is that really so bright? No, I think leaving a world full of various different problems is better off than making a world filled with the same problems everywhere.
Diverse problems? Some problems are worse than others, dude. Namely mass murder and tyranny. I'd take our political problems over that shite any day. And, like I said before, there will always be problems; they are unavoidable.
Quote:Really, who's worse, the bully or the wimp?
Ethically? The bully. But where reality's concerned, the wimp is the one that gets his ass kicked. Although there's the whole retaliation part. But I don't think that asserting our power when our safety is an issue is generally not bullying. We may overstep our bounds at times, but we don't "bully" for the sake of bullying...
Re: Hm
Who said anything about waiting around for our government to fix itself? I was talking about other governments.
Some are worse than others, yes. But that isn't really what I was talking about, was it? If there will always be problems, why in the world would we want every problem on Earth to be the same? You could never escape them, even if it meant taking on new problems.
Our safety WASN'T an issue. Bush made it an issue, but it was never really threatened by Iraq at all. Yes, Bush didn't bully for the sake of bullying, he bullied to get everyone to like him.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
With Bow let us win Kine, with Bow in battle, with
Bow be victory in our hot encounters,
The Bow brings grief and sorrow to the foeman; armed
With Bow may we subdue all regions.
Close to his ear, as fain to speak, she presses, holding
Her well-loved friend in her embraces;
Strained on the bow, she whispers like a woman -- this
Bow-string that preserves us in the Combat.
i've always thought that the world trade center bombing was known about in advance, but was neglected to go to war against other countries. it started our very big war efforts (AND it WAS proven that there was prior warning LONG before the bombing happened)(however the extent might have been covered up, things don't usually leak out and if they do it's just the tip of the iceburge)
first we went to fight terrorism, whatever it's cool they messed us up now we're gona get them back
now they've got weapons of mass descruction over there, and they are helping them over here. We've basically taken over the middle east and all the oil is ours.
now thats just a war thingy i thought was weird.. duno made sense in my head
2nd- It seems as if bush is making a faciusm (god i wish i could spell i can get the idea but not the letters) he's combining the government, along with the military, along with the industry. that's what faciusm is. he has control of the whole country. last i knew the majority of the house and senate were republicans, he is the president he comands the military, he was already a big business man and changed alot of laws to have the industry favor him. face it, bush is insane.
anyways thats what i picked up on this. someone prove me wrong please because i don't like what it seems he's doing.
i loved it when clinton was in office and we had sex scandals to worry about not wars facing the outcome of the future.. oh well
Splintered piece of glass falls in the seat gets caught
Broken windows, open locks, reminders of the youth we lost
I tried so hard to look away from you
We followed white lines to the sunset
I crash my car everyday the same way
Crumpled paper, crushed tin cans, broken bottles
paper scraps, we're all the same, we're all the same, paper scraps
Quote:And the most solid argument against our going and "fixing" other nations is that our stupid little republic isn't perfect; it's filled with corruption and greed. So we are gonna go spread that all over the world? Is that really so bright? No, I think leaving a world full of various different problems is better off than making a world filled with the same problems everywhere.
That would be true, if these "different problems" were of roughly equal seriousness. However, any non-naive person has to admit that the problems of the United States' system are far, far, far less severe than the problems of a nation living under a tyrannical dictatorship.
Essentially, it's better to have a somewhat corrupt political system (I follow politics closely, and it's really not nearly as corrupt as people like to imagine - and it's considerably less corrupt that it used to be, as a study of history tells us...I'm happy to back that up if you don't believe it) where money carries too much influence...than to have a system where if you speak your mind about a certain issue, and say the wrong thing, you wind up being tortured to death.
A somewhat corrupt democracy is better than a dictatorship where there is an absolute lack of human rights and where the best people are killed violently and the worst rule the roost.
Understanding that the United States has problems is important, and certainly a lot of people fail to do that...but, to have even a basic understanding of the modern world, it's also important to realize that those problems are inifinitely less severe than the problems of many other nations. If you don't believe that, take a closer look at just what life is like under an authoritarian, dictatorial regime that ignores human rights.
So, yes, it would be a better world if everybody had our problems. Ask anyone living under a dictatorship, anywhere - oh wait, you can't, because they're not even allowed to speak freely.
I think you might be taking your freedoms for granted...and simultaneously denying other people in other countries the right to have those same freedoms.
and for Bulldog:
Quote:i've always thought that the world trade center bombing was known about in advance,
yeah, but why base one's opinions on something one has no real proof of?
Quote:2nd- It seems as if bush is making a faciusm (god i wish i could spell i can get the idea but not the letters) he's combining the government, along with the military, along with the industry. that's what faciusm is. he has control of the whole country. last i knew the majority of the house and senate were republicans, he is the president he comands the military, he was already a big business man and changed alot of laws to have the industry favor him. face it, bush is insane.
That's one definition of fascist system, yeah
But, Bush isn't really doing that...as much as I hate him, that's not what he's aiming for.
As for controlling both houses of Congress, it's not exactly a crime to be successful in elections, nor is it the sign of a fascist. As for commanding the military, well, that goes w/ the office, so what is he supposed to do - relinquish control of the military to some Joe on the street? As for "changing laws to have the industry favor him", what are you talking about, exactly? First, there's no single "industry" that acts uniformly, second, if you're talking about people in business, they've always tended to favor him from the start, as they've always tended to favor Republicans, period. As for insanity, look, I don't like his politics, but he's not actually insane.
...
Why do I like Bush? Ultimately, he's a moralist and an idealist. He's attempting to create an ideal world given and using realistic means and circumstances to further his case. Does this mean he's forcing a set of ideals on everyone else? Yes. Should it be done? That's another question, but my answer is to a degree, yes. After all, if we just tolerated any and very action, we'd have a pacifist state that wouldn't raise a finger against the perpetrators of the holocaust. The world needs a certain set of ideals to live by so we eliminate (or at the very least do our best to do so) those absolute evils, whether it be overthrowing a regime that won't allow women to attend funerals with men, beat those who don't adhere to various religious practices, etc, or a regime that kills over a million of its own people, employs torture chambers liberally, etc.
Also, for those who think we had no justification to move into Iraq, let's examine the reasoning, both deontological and consequential:
- Iraq was in direct violation of U.N. resolutions 686 and 688 dictating the need for full compliance prior to Bush Jr. ever taking office. It was also in violation of 1441, and thus defied the "will of the world." Unfortunately, the world was too spineless to actually do anything about it, and disregarded its own laws. Welcome to why I say the world's opinion is worthless.
- Iraq created mobile weapons labs, including drones capable of delivering chemical and biological agents against a civilian population. This was a clear no-no for Iraq to have per terms of the Gulf War armistice.
- Iraq developed missiles whose range exceeded their allowed amount.
- Iraq also had trace amounts (not enough to actually detonate a nuke) of weapons-grade plutonium, uranium, and also the parts necessary to construct nuclear weapons, although all 3 components of this weapon of mass destruction were found in different locations. Nonetheless, refined uranium, plutonium, and the given physical parts needed to deliver the payload are all strictly prohibited.
People still say that we should leave Iraq because the "people don't want us there." Not true. The Feyadeen and Republican Guard certainly don't want us there, but the people in general? They want control of their own country yes, but what they want more than anything is some reliable civil order and their standard of living maintained. If we improve on this, I think the Iraqi people will become less resentful of our failure to immediately deliver on this.
But take this into account. The Iraqi people wanted U.S. intervention pre-Gulf War I and II. They were pissed when we immediately moved out of Iraq after Gulf War I, since Saddam took back control immediately.
So they want us there, and don't want us to leave. But now you're saying they want us gone? The Iraqi people need to make up their minds, and it would seem that although they DO want us there for a transition of power to a stable government, they really want their standard of living restored and improved more than anything else. That is where we have unfortunately failed, and why you have protests.
To Dubya: nice job on the war, but you flubbed the ending.
You advocate a moral/idealistic approach to foreign policy, which I agree with, and you support our intervention in Iraq, which I agree with.
HOWEVER, if you're going to support it the intervention in Iraq, and you believe in an idealistic foreign policy...why not justify that intervention on moral grounds, as I do? (Moral grounds, in this case, would be ending the horrors of the Hussein regime, and our need as a nation to atone for ever having supported such a regime.)
Clearly, the moral grounds for invading Iraq are more compelling than the "WMD" grounds, which really were never that convincing, and quite likely have absolutely no merit whatsoever. Let's not get into an argument over the "WMD" issue, though - I'm just asking why, if you support a moral foreign policy, why don't you base your support for the Iraq intervention on purely moral/idealistic grounds?
I mean, in the scheme of things, WMD, existent or non-existent, are irrelevant and have little to do with morals or idealism - it would be a matter of pragmatic self-defense, at best.
Hm
Hm, I might have misread your post - well, not so much misread it as come at it from the wrong angle.
On a second reading, it looks like you might have been advocating the intervention primarily on the moral grounds that it was necessary to bring the Hussein regime to an end - and then you mentioned the other "WMD" stuff just as an aside, a rebuttal to people arguing that the war was "illegal", as people sometimes do.
Is that the case?
Also, on another note, though, I have to inquire about your take on Bush himself as a moral man who, unlike others, would lift a finger against the perpetrators of the Holocaust: how does that square with his complete and total avoidance of addressing the situation in the Congo - and other similar situations worldwide?
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