All Hank, all the time.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Spanky
You know perfectly well that there are differentl levels of condemning something. They condemn it but not that strongly. If you were condemnning the Allied targeting of civilian neighborhoods during bombing during WWII, there is a huge difference between saying - under absolutely no circumstances is intentionally bombing civilian targets OK. (vs.) Well, it is wrong, but what do you expect with the way the Nazi were acting and the people are partically responsible for what their government does.

And during WWII, if you were trying to get the British and American government to stop targeting Civilians, the wrong line of reasoning would be to say that they shouldn't do it because of what the Nazis might do. Such a line of reasoning would remind them that the Nazis would probably do it anyway regardless of Allied actoin, and would probably inflame people's desire for retaliation.

If you were trying to get the Allied leaders to stop bombing civilain targets, the time not to do it would be right after a major Nazi bombing campaign. You would keep your mouth shut until a time that passions diminshed a great deal.

Either you take them at their words when they condemn the attacks or you don't. I do. Apparently, you don't. It seems odd to me to scrutinize public statements and then treat them as dishonest, but I can't stop you.

I don't understand at all your analogy to the Nazis. Except maybe for Slave, we should all be able to agree that there is a public diplomacy component to the war on terrorism. Do you take Karen Hughes' job seriously? I do. These people are pointing out that the Anglo-American Middle East policy is undercutting that task.