A disgusting vat of filth that no self-respecting intelligent person would wade into.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Spanky
So you don't think we can succeed. Why don't you just say that? So from your perspective there is nothing we can do so why even discuss different options?

Pelosi this morning claimed that the Democrats have a plan and that the VP knows it. She is lying. They don't have a plan. Like people on this board they don't think success is possible but they don't have the balls to say it.

It would seem that we have very different outlooks. We're trying to get out of the casino with as much money as possible. You seem to figure that if you can't walk away with a million bucks, you might as well leave it all on the table. We define success as walking away with as much as we can. You define success as walking away with a million bucks, as unlikely as that is.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Spanky
So you don't think we can succeed. Why don't you just say that? So from your perspective there is nothing we can do so why even discuss different options?

Pelosi this morning claimed that the Democrats have a plan and that the VP knows it. She is lying. They don't have a plan. Like people on this board they don't think success is possible but they don't have the balls to say it.

Recognize this as a political and economic problem as much as a military one and the focus moves to diplomacy and institution building.

There is a reason the Iraq study group put a massive diplomatic initiative first on their list of action items.

In the meantime, NATO forces in Afghanistan, where we are engaging the Taliban, are below full strength with the Taliban expected to launch a spring offensive.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
It would seem that we have very different outlooks. We're trying to get out of the casino with as much money as possible. You seem to figure that if you can't walk away with a million bucks, you might as well leave it all on the table. We define success as walking away with as much as we can. You define success as walking away with a million bucks, as unlikely as that is.

are you better at the work you get paid for?

you are watching your brother. you've always been jealous of your brother. you hear he is going into the Casino- you tell him not to. he goes anyway. hours later you go in and grab your brother. you tell him "let's leave with whatever you have right now." you have no idea what goes on in the Casino because the very idea of using the Casino has always scared you- even so you feel comfortable pulling your brother out of the Casino with what he has at the moment.

Your brother knows about casinos. he realizes that sometimes you are down a little, but can still come back and end up better. he knows that he didn't walk into the Casino to just leave at a down point- he had a goal in mind.

Spanky is your more thoughtful brother.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
In the meantime, NATO forces in Afghanistan, where we are engaging the Taliban, are below full strength with the Taliban expected to launch a spring offensive.

I asked Ty for info on this a few weeks ago. All he could post was some General thought he could do more with 10000-20000 more troops (wasn't it?) Given those numbers I've never really understood how "troops are tied up in Iraq" means anything in Afghanistan. We can always find 20000 more troops, can't we?

How much "below full strength" is NATO and what are other countries doing about it?

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
I asked Ty for info on this a few weeks ago. All he could post was some General thought he could do more with 10000-20000 more troops (wasn't it?) Given those numbers I've never really understood how "troops are tied up in Iraq" means anything in Afghanistan. We can always find 20000 more troops, can't we?

How much "below full strength" is NATO and what are other countries doing about it?

10% shy, about 3-4,000, which Bush has been unable to convince other countries to make up because of the unpopularity of supporting US military actions.

Unfortunately, the 3-4,000 needed are the same specialists most in demand in Iraq, so commanders in Afghanistan keep going begging.

Of course, we're containing the situation in Afghanistan with many fewer troops even though it is a more populous country with more difficult terrain. The differences, of course, are that there are effective armed governmental and quasi-governmental forces in Afghanistan and a population that generally supports us and opposes the Taliban.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Most of Iraq, other than Bagdad and a few other Sunni strongholds in the Sunni triangle, is absolutely thriving. The Iraq economy is booming. And attacks are down.

All the refugees must be spurring economic growth.

• Iraq is in the throes of the largest refugee crisis in the Middle East since the Palestinian exodus from Israel in 1948, a mass flight out of and within the country that is ravaging basic services and commerce, swamping neighboring nations with nearly 2 million refugees and building intense pressure for emigration to Europe and the United States, according to the United Nations and refugee experts.
  
  The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, which appealed for $60 million in emergency aid last week, believes 1.7 million Iraqis are displaced inside Iraq, whose prewar population was 21 million. About 50,000 Iraqis are fleeing inside Iraq each month, the United Nations said, and 500,000 have been displaced since last February's bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra. These figures are as of January 2007.
  
  The Bush administration and the governments of Jordan and Syria, the nations that accept the bulk of the refugees, have been reluctant to acknowledge the humanitarian crisis, experts said.
  
  "I think everyone at this point is in denial about the human consequences of the war," said Kathleen Newland, director of the Migration Policy Institute, who is familiar with the State Department's views. . . .
  
  Kristele Younes, an advocate at Refugees International, said the refugee problem is growing rapidly.
  
  "At the moment, we're seeing up to 80,000 to 100,000 that are being displaced every month," inside and outside the country, she said. "In Syria alone, there are estimations that there's about 40,000 Iraqis that are coming every month."
  
  Roughly 40 percent of Iraq's middle class is believed to have fled, the U.N. said. Most are fleeing systematic persecution and have no desire to return.
  
  All kinds of people, from university professors to bakers, have been targeted by militias, insurgents and criminals. An estimated 331 school teachers were slain in the first four months of last year, according to Human Rights Watch, and at least 2,000 Iraqi doctors have been killed and 250 kidnapped since the 2003 U.S. invasion. Business owners are especially prone to extortion.
  
  The flight has undermined basic services such as water and sanitation and disrupted commerce, making it increasingly difficult for Iraqi society to function, officials said.

link

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Hank calling Ty a Bible-Belt naif while Spanky is Diamond Jim.

You have a lot of assumptions buried in that post which predetermine your outcome, Hank.

What if, despite his vast knowledge of casinos and gambling, Spanky is: (a) a compulsive gambler, and/or (b) just really bad at it, and has the track record to prove it, and/or (c) has refused to listen to expert advice to improve his playing?

What if, despite his complete inability to even find the bathroom in a casino, other concerned family members have sent Ty in to pull Spanky out, because Spanky has already lost the title to his car, and he took the title of the family house in with him to win his car back?

Not precisely on point, but it makes as much sense as your post.

S_A_M

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
What if, despite his complete inability to even find the bathroom in a casino,

Unpossible. Not with Hank on the team.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Spanky
I watched the Senate Hearings on CSPAN over the weekend with Gates and the Four Star Marine. I have to say, I support the administration, and what they said made sense to me but I couldn't believe how accommodating the Senators were. The freshman senator from Virginia was almost obsequious to the two of them. I was expecting some real fireworks, but I guess next time I need to watch the foreign affairs committee to see some real debate.

Anyway, the argument seemed to be that the Iraqi government was not ready to take charge of Baghdad, but that they would be ready in like six to nine months. In order to give them a fighting chance when they took over, it would be a lot better if Baghdad was more pacified when we turned it over. According to these guys, we could do that if they had those troops. They said they didn't want to pull the troops out of other parts of Iraq because they wanted to keep those places at the status quo, and that status quo was OK for when those places were turned over to the government, but Baghdad needed to be more pacified before we turned it over.

Both these guys said that they (and they also spoke for Patreus) could get the job done in Baghdad with those troops.

Did I miss anything?

They've been saying 6 to 9 months for about 1 year now. I'm not sure whether this is rosy thinking or not, but I don't get too excited about that time table any longer.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by sgtclub
They've been saying 6 to 9 months for about 1 year now. I'm not sure whether this is rosy thinking or not, but I don't get too excited about that time table any longer.

"6 to 9 months" is the reflexive answer policymakers and pundits give when they know the answer is Not Now, But Possibly Later - Some Indeterminate Time Later That I Really Have No Idea About, But This Sounds Far Enough Away to Sound Plausible.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
You have a lot of assumptions buried in that post which predetermine your outcome, Hank.

What if, despite his vast knowledge of casinos and gambling, Spanky is: (a) a compulsive gambler, and/or (b) just really bad at it, and has the track record to prove it, and/or (c) has refused to listen to expert advice to improve his playing?

What if, despite his complete inability to even find the bathroom in a casino, other concerned family members have sent Ty in to pull Spanky out, because Spanky has already lost the title to his car, and he took the title of the family house in with him to win his car back?

Not precisely on point, but it makes as much sense as your post.

S_A_M

It's not a bad example. Remember, the odds always favor the house, so Hank is conceding that Spanky is likely to lose.

[Spanky]

You guys are so out of it it blows me away. Either you are part of the solution or part of the problem. Something has to be done in Iraq. Some sort of decision has to be made. Yet the people on this board, (which is ironicly the same position as the Democrats in Congress) keep saying you can't do this, we shouldn't do this, but they have no alternate plan of action (and can explain the logic of the action).

Anyone can critisize anything. You all sit around and criticize the administration's policies and pat eachother other on the back as if you were accomplishing something a four year old couldn't accomplish.

If you are against the surge, just tell me what you think the United States should do, and why that plan of action would further our interests better than the surge.

As I said, if you don't provide an alternative for the plan, you are endorsing the plan.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
It would seem that we have very different outlooks. We're trying to get out of the casino with as much money as possible. You seem to figure that if you can't walk away with a million bucks, you might as well leave it all on the table. We define success as walking away with as much as we can. You define success as walking away with a million bucks, as unlikely as that is.

How does "walking away with as much money as possible" relate to Iraq? Does that mean leave now so we can lose as little as possible? How do we go about mitigating our damage? What is your plan to minimise our losses?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
You have a lot of assumptions buried in that post which predetermine your outcome, Hank.

What if, despite his vast knowledge of casinos and gambling, Spanky is: (a) a compulsive gambler, and/or (b) just really bad at it, and has the track record to prove it, and/or (c) has refused to listen to expert advice to improve his playing?

What if, despite his complete inability to even find the bathroom in a casino, other concerned family members have sent Ty in to pull Spanky out, because Spanky has already lost the title to his car, and he took the title of the family house in with him to win his car back?

Not precisely on point, but it makes as much sense as your post.

S_A_M

mine was criticizing Ty's analog. Ty said he would want to get with as much as "he" could save, but it misses the point "he" wouldn't have walked in anyway.

you should be cautious about sounding smug about shit with me, because there is a fairly high chance you're whiffing.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
It's not a bad example. Remember, the odds always favor the house, so Hank is conceding that Spanky is likely to lose.

2. With any military option there will always be a cost. Of course there is often a higher cost for "not entering the casino". See Clinton handling of AQ/Afghanistan 1993-2000.