Iraq, again

Erased what who said?

@Yanny:

I would not have believed it, if I had not seen it in a certain documentary. Israel did give the PA the authority it needed and the funding it needed. Yasser Arafat’s Fatah and PA are direct affiliates and sponsers of the terrorist group the Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigade. They fund bombs and other weapons for these terrorists.

And for 5 years, the PA and Israel cooperated and life was good. However, starting with the second uprising (led by Hamas and not Arafat) the Israelis began to destroy everything the PA had managed to achieve over the last 5 years.

They are taxed by the PA, which in it’s current state feeds directly into the hands of the Israeli Government. Tariffs apply to the Palestinians, which also feeds directly to the Israeli Government. So do all tolls. Those are taxes.

Notice that all of Israel’s attempt to stop terrorism in the occupied territories are responses to terrorist attacks by the Palestinians.

Theres a different between stopping terrorism and attacking for revenge. We’ve seen it over the past 5 years, suicide bombers kill 15 Israelis, the Israelis bulldoze 3 blocks of homes in response.

That’s hardly cold blooded murder when you are caught in the cross-fire.

It is cold blooded murder to fire a missle into a residential area, killing 1 terrorist and 26 innocents. It is cold blooded murder to fire a bomb at a car in the street, killing 1 terrorist and almost a dozen people just driving by. In the US, had a commander ordered those attacks, he/she’d be put in jail, possible given the death penalty.

Also, Israel announces weapons checks in advance to the Palestinians so they can prepare and the offiical IDF policy is to politely search the houses of Palestinians. Now you might say, “But I saw how they messed up their hosues on CNN (or some other channel)!”

It was an Israeli news agency, who were tagging along with the IDF soldiers as many agencies do. However, the IDF usually requires that they edit the film to get rid of anything they don’t want in. This video, obtained by CNN, is the only footage ever to come out unedited. They were cruel, and committed warcrimes in that house (looting, destroying private property without cause).

Did it ever occur to you that the Palestinians might do that to win public support?

The only Palestinians involved were getting their house destroyed.

BTW, I harldy call the Mexican War buying California, Arizona and New Mexico. The Americans under President Polk fought a war for the Mexican possessions to expand Manifest Destiny.

We bought New Mexico-California-Arizona from spain, the Mexican war consisted of a border dispute where, and the result was Texas’s border was extended to the Rio Grande river. There was barely a single person living in the arid desert. Mexico agreed to give us this small territory, barely 40 Miles farther south than the borders already were, when we won the war.

The PA did not cooperate with Israel. There were still a few terrorist attacks during the 5 years after the Oslo Accords, but Prime Minister Netanyahu told Arafat that he would be retaliated agaisnt if he would not control the terrorists and at that time Arafat did actually crack down on terrorism and succeded. Might I add he had much less infrastructure than he did today. The IDF does not take out parts of film, once again you have proven your lack of knowledge on the subject. CNN uses unrelated footage and witness accounts from unreliable sources for their information and like what the New York Times did, they take a picture and display it as somethign it really is not. As for firing missiles, many of those hit terorist meetings, thoguh you are right that there are some civilians. But keep in mind that the fighting in the West Bank and Gaza is similar to that in Stalingrad in World War 2. ISrael cannot use pinpoint aerial bombings or modern warfare because that would destroy the area completely.

BTW, the soldiers that do open fire when they are not allowed are court martialled and jailed. The Palestinians that are in the way are well aware in advance that an oepration is taking place, they simply choose to remain outside for martyrdom. They do not oppose terrorism because it works.

The Mexican-War was more than just a border dispute over Texas. The US did not buy those areas, it invaded them and it also invaded Mexico City and Vera Cruz but in the end only took California, New Mexico and Arizona from the Mexicans rather than the whole country as some wanted.

cystic are you calling ME a high and stupid hippie who equates the use and show of force with baby killing?? or are you talking about the president. I’m no hippie (I would have nuked college campuses in the 60’s and sent the unruly youth’s to concentration camps - had any of them survived) but that’s just me. and I’m no baby killer either. i wouldn’t even kill the child of my worst enemy- kids are innocent.
and as far as my political beliefs being extreme- I agree that they are radical. as are yours to me. but that’s what I find so great about this country ( even though you aren’t part of it, the internet places you here) - we can argue, we can vent, we can see that we have irreconcillable differences- respect each other’s opinion (which can’t be swayed) and move on - without having the country erupt into civil war.
YANNI- OH so that’s what happened, I read the kids posting and the warning, and I said to myself - “geez, I dont see anything wrong here- i’ve been calling out commies for two weeks now”. thanks for clearing that up.

@alamein:

cystic are you calling ME a high and stupid hippie who equates the use and show of force with baby killing?? or are you talking about the president. I’m no hippie (I would have nuked college campuses in the 60’s and sent the unruly youth’s to concentration camps - had any of them survived) but that’s just me. and I’m no baby killer either. i wouldn’t even kill the child of my worst enemy- kids are innocent.
and as far as my political beliefs being extreme- I agree that they are radical. as are yours to me. but that’s what I find so great about this country ( even though you aren’t part of it, the internet places you here) - we can argue, we can vent, we can see that we have irreconcillable differences- respect each other’s opinion (which can’t be swayed) and move on - without having the country erupt into civil war.

no no - my point was simply that although i think that it is necessary to approach this issue more rationally, that does not put me on the left side of the political spectrum. I have the necessary brain power to recognise that you are of the war-monger camp with little hippy in you as well. My original point was actually to increase the debate with regards to the following:

I think the whole debate that the country’s going thru over Iraq is a result of how stupid we really are. for example- had bush not procrastinated and just started bombing Iraq- or even invaded, people may have grumbled but accepted it. but now that it’s been on the tele and the radio for months, people are just tired of seeing it. I personally don’t feel the anti war people are really anti war, they just want it off the tv. they are not used to waiting- they want things right now- and since it’s not a “right now” kind of thing they become opinionated and complain.

and i think that if we all chased peace in the way this forum is going, israel would have no state, germany should be given polland (prussia), china should get back tiawan, s. korea should be returned to the north, alaska to the inuits (I know I misspelled it) the south west returned to the apache, mexico to the myans, chille the incans, europe to the early chro magnons, and we should clone the mamoths to restore their population as well.
I personally think, we will attack iraq and uncover all the proof you need. and then your opinions will be swayed in much the same manner as those americans who oppossed WW2. not that you are wrong mind you, some people just look at facts differently. as a veteran I’m already pre disposed towards saddam. it will take less of an argument to convince me. now if we wre going into china- I have many chinese friends- it would take more than the sufferings of the tibetten monks to turn me against them. besides you guys seem to be more inclined towards traditional news outlets for info- CNN MSNBC ABC , I listen to neal boortz, rush and hannity for my news.

OH, I don’t get to watch fox news much, but on the radio last week sean hannity had a guest on that was a former weapons inspector. he was part of the four man decision making team that chose the inspection sites (I wish I could remember his name), he said that on the hannity and colmes show he would bring out more proof that the french government actually compromised the sites by relaying them ahead of time to the Iraqies. to do their job he had to originally developed two lists, one which would be shared ahead of time with the french, and another real inspection site list- just to do his job effectively. and then when that ruse wore off they had to go with three lists, and allow the french attache’ to “find” the second list.
I think he’s supposed to be on this week. and I wouldn’t be suprised to find a simular thing going on now. back then the french did it for a government contract of some sort.
and does anyone remember the germans shipping weapons material to the Iraqies under the pretext of farming equipment??
those are facts, and that’s why I believe the president more than our european “allies”, they have a vested interest in the dictator.

and unfortunately strongbad - no one does seem to care about the khurds. we could have taken out saddam in 91. but to keep that region stable we would have had to keep troops there for years, and invested millions to create a stable western style government that would not be overthrown by fundamentalists the moment we left.
at the time this was not too apealling as our forces were in the process of a massive reduction in strength - to cut the budjet. so the cia decided to incite the khurds to topple saddam, because they hated each other (like osama and saddam and us) saddam’s army was not allowed to use airpower against the khurds- so he merely eradicated their populance with chemical weapons. those who could, fled to turkey. if we had taken action then, you could justify it. but waiting ten years to seek justice seems a bit like lawyering for a fight.

ah cystic you flatter me. :oops:

my point in saying that was that the government has far more information than we do. they should act swiftly and decisively - and in the best interests of the majority. if they did this, regardless of what they do, people would respect this leadership and comply un questionably. but like the jungle- if you act indecisivley or hesitate your enemies can rally and your cause is thwarted. think of a couple lions attacking one of those huge water bison. if they attack, before the herd can organise, they only lament the loss of a herd member. but if the lion is spotted, the herd will not only protect itself - but run off the lions with force.

and we are animals after all.

There are alternatives to firing a missle into a crowd. In the US, its likely the same objective would of been solved with a Helicopter strike, or a raid on foot. Israel is the only “civilized” country in the world which would fire off missles so carelessly. In some cases, they didn’t even have good enough intelligence to hit the right building, resulting in scores of innocent deaths.

I think you’re wrong. It wouldn’t happen in America today because we’re not attacked by terrorists on a daily or weekly basis. But if suicide bombings became a regular occurence in this country, then watch out–becuase Americans would support any measure to take out terrorists. You can’t compare Israel to us in terms of how they’re expected to respond, we’re in entirely different situations.

@alamein:

and i think that if we all chased peace in the way this forum is going, israel would have no state, germany should be given polland (prussia), china should get back tiawan, s. korea should be returned to the north, alaska to the inuits (I know I misspelled it) the south west returned to the apache, mexico to the myans, chille the incans, europe to the early chro magnons, and we should clone the mamoths to restore their population as well.

this is an argument of weakness. If you have no leg to stand on, you make your opponant appear to be legless by twisting their arguments to ridiculous conclusions, except you are augmenting this weakness by invoking the sliding slope fallacy. This is all i have to address your first point.

I personally think, we will attack iraq and uncover all the proof you need. and then your opinions will be swayed in much the same manner as those americans who oppossed WW2. not that you are wrong mind you, some people just look at facts differently. as a veteran I’m already pre disposed towards saddam. it will take less of an argument to convince me. now if we wre going into china- I have many chinese friends- it would take more than the sufferings of the tibetten monks to turn me against them. besides you guys seem to be more inclined towards traditional news outlets for info- CNN MSNBC ABC , I listen to neal boortz, rush and hannity for my news.

ahh yes. The ever vigilent reporting of Rush. I read the NYT, and i am naturally afflicted with the more Canadian perspective of the CBC and its more conservative colleagues at globel as well as CTV.
Personally i’d rather “uncover” the proof without the use of war. Naturally as a non-veteran i would prefer a more peaceful solution?? (Field Marshall - any thoughts here, although i am grossly aware of your take).

OH, I don’t get to watch fox news much, but on the radio last week sean hannity had a guest on that was a former weapons inspector. he was part of the four man decision making team that chose the inspection sites (I wish I could remember his name), he said that on the hannity and colmes show he would bring out more proof that the french government actually compromised the sites by relaying them ahead of time to the Iraqies. to do their job he had to originally developed two lists, one which would be shared ahead of time with the french, and another real inspection site list- just to do his job effectively. and then when that ruse wore off they had to go with three lists, and allow the french attache’ to “find” the second list.

ahhh yes. excellent proof that Saddam is hiding weapons. Time to send in the troops and blast those Iraqui’s to kingdom come. (of course the Iraqui army won’t fight an invasion of thier homeland, as i keep hearing from conservative views that there would be little fighting in a ground invasion, despite the fact that the Iraqui’s hate the US more than they hate Saddam - which they do, by the way).

I think he’s supposed to be on this week. and I wouldn’t be suprised to find a simular thing going on now. back then the french did it for a government contract of some sort.
and does anyone remember the germans shipping weapons material to the Iraqies under the pretext of farming equipment??
those are facts, and that’s why I believe the president more than our european “allies”, they have a vested interest in the dictator.

and Bush does not have an eco/political reason to attack Iraq??? If Bush was a lawyer from CT there would be very little activity in Iraq, even if the CIA did actually dig up any evidence at all of the possibility of WMD i suspect.

and unfortunately strongbad - no one does seem to care about the khurds. we could have taken out saddam in 91. but to keep that region stable we would have had to keep troops there for years, and invested millions to create a stable western style government that would not be overthrown by fundamentalists the moment we left.

naturally we at the left do not care about the Khurds either. :roll:

at the time this was not too apealling as our forces were in the process of a massive reduction in strength - to cut the budjet. so the cia decided to incite the khurds to topple saddam, because they hated each other (like osama and saddam and us) saddam’s army was not allowed to use airpower against the khurds- so he merely eradicated their populance with chemical weapons. those who could, fled to turkey. if we had taken action then, you could justify it. but waiting ten years to seek justice seems a bit like lawyering for a fight.

evil actions by Saddam, pointless actions by the US.

cystic- I realize swinging the argument like that may seem pretty ludicrous to you, but it seemed only the next logical step in the way I’m seeing the arguments. EXAGGERATED yeah, but were do you stop? if you say that isreal should return the lands it captured, and that the US should return the lands of manifest destiny, where do you stop? why don’t we feel bad for killing off the native populations of the americas and give them back their land? they have every right to conduct terrorist attacks against us according to the arguments put forth. we killed them almost for sport. the israeli’s aren’t doing that. why should they be confined to reservations on the crappiest parts of their nation- far from their anscestral homes, and be made to feel thankful for government handouts. OH that’s right, we beat them into submission- unlike israel is doing.
I don’t think it’s ludicrous. just a gross exaggeration of how I think some of you think. at least isreal doesn’t have a football team called the “jerusalem stinking palestinians”.

@alamein:

cystic- I realize swinging the argument like that may seem pretty ludicrous to you, but it seemed only the next logical step in the way I’m seeing the arguments. EXAGGERATED yeah, but were do you stop? if you say that isreal should return the lands it captured, and that the US should return the lands of manifest destiny, where do you stop? why don’t we feel bad for killing off the native populations of the americas and give them back their land? they have every right to conduct terrorist attacks against us according to the arguments put forth. we killed them almost for sport. the israeli’s aren’t doing that. why should they be confined to reservations on the crappiest parts of their nation- far from their anscestral homes, and be made to feel thankful for government handouts. OH that’s right, we beat them into submission- unlike israel is doing.
I don’t think it’s ludicrous. just a gross exaggeration of how I think some of you think. at least isreal doesn’t have a football team called the “jerusalem stinking palestinians”.

Quite a difference between attacking a sovereign country not apparently doing anything aggressive 10 years after attempting to annex a territory formerly part of it as opposed to allowing a force such as 1939 Germany annex and obliterate every country within reach. I don’t see the connection here.
Also i’m completely missing the connection between laying seige to a people on the other side of the planet for oil interests and the British and American treatments/wrongs inflicted upon native American and Canadians.
It’s kind of worrying, in a way, this whole manifest destiny. If America successfully annexed Canada in 1812, i suppose that is something i would have to live with. Interestingly many of us here would welcome Quebec’s departure from confederation given certain conditions.

Theres a difference between News and Debate shows. Sean Hannity and Rush are debaters, they don’t give you facts. I don’t go to Donahue for news. I go to the newspaper.

The newspaper? They’ve got just as big an agenda to push as the other two guys. Only theirs is usually slanted left.

You want uninhibited news?…go to the internet.

cystic- right, I kind of left the iraq string and was commenting about the isreali vs palestinian thing yanni and emu god had going there. sorry if my normal nonsensical babble became even more of a mess there.
besides what do we need canada for, we’ve already stolen most of your hockey teams and all the best players (only using this to lighten the mood). :lol:

I believe the inspector did indeed refer to the french man as a “french government attache”… does his radio show have transcripts? in either case the point was that the weapons inspection/destruction program was compromised and was there fore ineffective in finding and removing these weapons which we knew to exist.

hey guys I finally found the spell checker. know I can spell my english almost as well as you foreigners! :wink:

@Deviant:Scripter:

The newspaper? They’ve got just as big an agenda to push as the other two guys. Only theirs is usually slanted left.

yeah, many of the big newspapers are clearly slanted to the left, such as the washington post. thats why my parents get the washington times… it actually tells you the news, it doesn’t just trash conservatives

I found this essay, while not very good, is something you guys might find interesting:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/next/134624183_next-prowar02.html