Politics: Onward from New Hampshire

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
Fuck them all, just as they fuck us.

I agree. They all suck. Everyone (but us).

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by bilmore
Some jokes just shouldn't be butchered.

Unless, of course, that's the schtick.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
I agree. They all suck. Everyone (but us).

this is ironic, right? Because really, as we know from your day after 9/11, day after 3/11, you really think we suck, and everyone else is braver/smarter etc.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
It's not. Constantly repeating it is, and putting forth flimsy and discredited evidence for the case, won't make it so.

Or, stated another way, if it was part of the war on terror, it was a tactical error in that war, an error based on both falacious assumptions and bad intelligence.

You believe that. Unfortunately, the terrorists do not. See Madrid and the press release from AQ since.

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy I believe the decision to wage war in Iraq is one that will, in the long run, worsen terror, mainly for two very clear reasons: (i) we sacrificed the anti-terror coalition that was put together in Afghanistan; the war represents a massive failure of diplomacy

Who did we sacrafice? Put another way, who is with us in Afghanistan and not Iraq? France? Germany? The left continues to believe that we have multilateral support there but not in Iraq. This is just bullshit. In both places, we have minimal support from other countries, with the exception of the UK and more recently Pakistan, mainly because most of our "allies" are EU countries that have no real military due to the fact that we protected their asses for 50 years.

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy we don't have a clear, well understood exit strategy; in the absence of an exit strategy, there is no one but us to deal with Iraqi dissension and strife, so instead of leaving an Iraq with fundamental internal conflicts to work out (shi'ite, sunni, Kurdish), we leave an Iraq with both internal conflicts and external conflicts to work out.

Where was our exit strategy in Eastern Europe in the mid to late 1990s? Whatever happend to the troops will be home by Christmas? Straw argument.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Unless, of course, that's the schtick.

I will weigh in on Bilmore's behalf this time.

It is one of the great G.B. Shaw quotes of all time, and any schtick that tries to play with it can only do damage.

Bilmore, good to see you quoting socialistic vegetarian types. Getting back to your roots?

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
this is ironic, right? Because really, as we know from your day after 9/11, day after 3/11, you really think we suck, and everyone else is braver/smarter etc.

Still the reading comprehension issues.

Where did I ever question our reaction to 9/11?

It is interesting that when I defend the fact that someone reacted differently that we did, you read it as a criticism of us. It was not.

Is this, somehow, at the root of some of the open disdain for the Spanish demonstrations? That they did something we didn't do?

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
I believe it is at least reasonably arguable (although not susceptible of empirical proof-- certainly not in the short term) that the U.S. invasion of Iraq "may have worsened terror" (which is what Blix said) by (a) inspiring either more persons to support or become terrorists who would not otherwise have done so, or (b) inspiring terrorist strikes which would not otherwise have occurred.

S_A_M

This argument a based entirely on the following faulty assumptions.

1. If we do not take aggressive actions against the terrorists, they will not attack us.

2. We are somehow to blame for being attacked.

[Diane_Keaton]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
Gibson did reasonably well at keeping close to particular gospel passages,

Damn. I bought a bootleg DVD of the movie and so the subtitles are cut off. Does anyone here speak Aramaic?????

(So far the only word I understand is "Adonai" -- the sole word I understand at Seder too).

Diane
(Oh....and Elohim)

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
Damn. I bought a bootleg DVD of the movie and so the subtitles are cut off. Does anyone here speak Aramaic?????

That would be like buying Dark Side of the Moon with no audio. Ouch.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
I believe it is at least reasonably arguable (although not susceptible of empirical proof-- certainly not in the short term) that the U.S. invasion of Iraq "may have worsened terror" (which is what Blix said) by (a) inspiring either more persons to support or become terrorists who would not otherwise have done so, or (b) inspiring terrorist strikes which would not otherwise have occurred.

Psssst. Sam.

My bees story wasn't really about bees.

[robustpuppy]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
I will weigh in on Bilmore's behalf this time.

It is one of the great G.B. Shaw quotes of all time, and any schtick that tries to play with it can only do damage.

Swiffer. The very fact that (you are willing to opine that) it is "one of the great . . . quotes of all time" both makes it less susceptible to "damage" and renders fringey's fucking with it all the more effective and amusing.

[bilmore]

Some things you just don't want to hear:

http://www.newsday.com/business/ny-b...-top-headlines

(One of the Bush campaign's items for sale (a sweater) was made in Burma, a country from which Bush has banned imports.)

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sgtclub
This argument a based entirely on the following faulty assumptions.

1. If we do not take aggressive actions against the terrorists, they will not attack us.

2. We are somehow to blame for being attacked.

I don't see that at all. Club, you think it was a good idea to invade Iraq to "drain the swamp" -- to make it into a democracy to promote political change in the Middle East and thereby remove the conditions that foster terrorism. If you think this, you must admit the possibility that turning Iraq into something else could make things worse. For all of Hussein's financial support for Palestinian terrorists, his regime was not supporting terrorism in the way that the Taliban were. And there are a lot of other countries in the Middle East sending money to the Palestinians.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by robustpuppy
Swiffer. The very fact that (you are willing to opine that) it is "one of the great . . . quotes of all time" both makes it less susceptible to "damage" and renders fringey's fucking with it all the more effective and amusing.

Yeah, and that Shakespeare guy was a dud. If you want truly good wordcrafting, you need to watch reality TV.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by sgtclub
This argument a based entirely on the following faulty assumptions.

1. If we do not take aggressive actions against the terrorists, they will not attack us.

2. We are somehow to blame for being attacked.

No, my argument is neither based on those assumptions, nor does it include those assumptions. I don't see how you could say that it does.



(a) The question is not "whether" we should or should not take aggressive actions against terrorists. The question many people raise, which you seem unwilling to limit the discussion to, is whether this was the _right_ aggressive action to take. However, I wasn't even raising that question.

Bilmore's homey analogy is right on point -- and describes the likely result if it all works out eventually. One could envision modifying that analogy if things go wrong (other insects coming to aid the bees or avenge them); or the hose being left on too long and flooding the basement; or a leak in the pipe severely damaging the house and/or the foundation, etc.


(b) The fact that your second point introduces the concept of "blame", which is entirely absent from any statement by me or any quoted statement by Blix in this string, suggests that you're responding from a whole range of emotions rather than addressing what's been said.

S_A_M