Beyond the Vietnam Syndrome

As usual Norm Solomon has acutely assessed the Iraq War. Well done.

Now if only he had assessed the 2004 campaign in such a way. He advocating voting for John Kerry rather than Ralph Nader, the lesser of two evils syndrome and the result was a Bush victory nevertheless. To paraphrase Mr. Solomon, an early casualty of elections is conscious. And to paraphrase Voltaire, Anyone who has the power to believe absurdities has the power to make you vote for the wrong guy.

Kerry’s answer to Iraq was not much different than Bush’s and Johnson’s (Viet Nam), “more troops.” The only two candidates in the 2004 election that did not advocate immediate withdrawal were Kerry and Bush. Maybe Mr. Solomon will return to supporting a third party or independent candidate in 2008, because we are allready facing a rerun of 2004, two candidates who advocate the same thing. We will probably still be in Iraq and Hillary Clinton (egads, please no) will have a position similar to the Republican candidate. We must try to avoid this if we can.

We probably will lose with that alternate candidate, but the actual winner may have to notice the mass support the other candidate received, if we band together and create something to notice. The first casuality in so many things is conscious, we need to vote our conscious, vote for what we believe in, not vote strategically.

It is imperative that we start looking for that person that will gain support or Iraq might go on for many years to come. A third way must begin now.

Jon B -

Great idea, Jon boy! Vote your conscious.

I guess you could either vote your conscious or you can vote… gee, I guess you *can* vote your subconscious.  This could explain why we have the neocons running the show.  They require that we be in a semi-lucid dream state so we can successfully carry those two opposing beliefs.

As security continues to deteriorate and attacks increase in Iraq, the administration claims that this is proof of progress… you know, last throes, etc.  ZZzzzzZ “Oh, yeah, they are practically defeated.”

This white is black and black is white talk reminds me of a time before the war. As I watched bulldozers demolish Al Samud missiles on television, the administration told me that this was merely proof that Saddam had more weapons that he wasn’t telling us about. ZZZzZZz “yeah, that sounds like Saddam - destroying missiles as American troops mass on his border… sneaky guy huh?”

It is increasingly difficult to imagine what the end of this conflict is going to look like. Is someone supposed to surrender or something?  If we keep this up maybe Osama will finally turn himself in and we can bring the soldiers home.

The dead-enders Washington by and large have only one solution to offer on the problem of the Iraq war - more failure.  More money, more soldiers, more time.  It is like watching a 5-year-old with a pair of Chinese finger cuffs.  Just pull harder… that ought to work.

What the hey?

What IS the gentleman talking about?  He rambles.  He roams.  He quotes Orwell to no purpose: a quote in search of relevance.  He quotes Voltaire to cross-purposes: after the ongoing war and genocide of the Saddam years, he thinks Jeffersonian democracy is instantaneous and automatic?  He fails to attribute one of the better quotes from history: “In war, truth is the first casualty.” – Aeschylus, d. 456 BC.

For all Solomon’s rambling, and roaming, and misquoting, and malquoting, he does not produce much; apparently he wants us to have a conscience, and use it.  But I think Solomon is wasting his time.  This is a Liberal site, and the leftists are not known for a conscience, much less good sense.  There were over two million dead in Saddam’s various aggressive wars and mass executions.  If the Liberals did not exhibit any conscience at the time, nor at any time since, what makes you think they will suddenly develop a conscience now?  I think Jon B has the right idea; he has obliviously developed a conscious, and let it go at that.

I’m not really sure I understand the implication of the statement “leftists are not known for a conscience much less good sense.”

By comparison, the neocons must be clearly distinguishing themselves as those with clean consciences and good sense abound.

It really is a wonderful quote that scorp mentions, but rather than be upset about it, he seems to celebrate the fact that the truth was butchered so we could have this war.

I would be ashamed, but since I have no conscience, I guess I’ll just have to live with being angry.

American corporations and the American government profited from much of Saddam’s brutality and tolerated it when it suited us. (conscience anyone?) The only ones complaining about Saddam in the 80’s were liberals.  Everyone else was selling him arms.

Today, we use the fact that 9-11 happened to the United States in order to justify our violent agression.  It was surely a non-sequitur to the people of Iraq as it was to me, but then I am not known for having any sense.

This was supposed to be a cakewalk with chocolates and rose petals.  I didn’t believe that any more than you could tell me that if Mexico invaded Texas, they’d be greeted with free margaritas.  But who can trust a non-sensical liberal.

More attacks means that victory is at hand?  The longer we stay, the more things will improve?  The only way to honor the fallen is to stay on this lousy course?  If you believe any of that scorp, then no wonder you think liberals have no conscience or sense.  What you perceive, appears to be the photo negative of reality.

PS: *now* you tell us that we shouldn’t have expected democracy overnight!  Sheesh.  Get the wax out of your ears.  Rumsfeld wasn’t the first to mention that you know.

Bring the troops home NOW!

History will record the spring of 2004 as a time when the Bush administration was not forthcoming about the outlook for American troop deployments in Iraq. Such duplicity has continued.

You bet it’s continued. And now it is the DLC Demoplicans setting the US up for a draft so they can send more troops to Iraq and “fight the war right”.

President George H. W. Bush

“It’s a proud day for America—and, by God, we’ve kicked the Vietnam syndrome once and for all.”

Says so much, paints a perfect picture of what is wrong with America right now.

HUBRIS. PARANOIA. DELUSIONAL. WRONG. BUSH.

Glad to see you’re sticking to the script scorp.

How’s your ego?

Ready for another hiding, cretin.

Forgot

ARROGANCE,

though that is more implied thinks Rabbit.

If we’ve supposedly gotten past the “Vietnam Syndrome”, I’m about ready for the country to get past the “Vietnam Protest Compensation Syndrome”, i.e. the heartfelt need to back US military action, whatever the justification, as a way of making up for the insults and lack of welcome Vietnam vets experienced at the hands of some protestors. Sort of a psychological cancelling out of those embarrassing and ugly moments of history, to make one’s patriotic stance vividly apparent even when the reasons a particular war is said to be necessary turn out to be bogus. Like now.

Much better to get a clear picture of exactly why the nation and its citizens ought to undertake war, and then to judge one’s support or opposition. If only we could count on that kind of clarity, without the need for any more psychological back-fill after the facts are finally revealed (to the extent that they are truly revealed, which is another and very long topic to address).

scorp,

Yeah,yeah.If someone disagrees with you,then they make no sense.Proof that Jack Barnes’ ideals will never die.

As one who’s not had his memory gelded by Fox News,might I remind my right-wing spouters that before the war began the left said we should look before we leap and not to bite off more than we can chew.Result?We were called traitors.Apparently,for all of the right’s simple-minded,aphoristic thinking,those two sayings slipped their collective mind or have little weight when they’re supporitng the team for"The Big Win”.This is one case where the left should be upset they were correct.Ah,Cassandra,we know how you feel.

Now we’re in a war from which we can’t figure out how to withdraw without losing face.Two out of three Americans are opposed to the war and Bush’s handling of it,despite what the right-wing spin machine says.As well,the self-absorbed,whiny,pompous boomer generation has done to their children exactly what they protested during the sixties.Furthermore,the boomers have insured a political and socioeconomic rift in this country for another fifty years.THANKS!Is there anything else you’d like to wreck?

Let’s not call this"Vietnam Syndrome”,let’s call it"robotic patriotism"syndrome.

By the way,how many boomers who burned their draft card and wore peace symbols during the sixties and seventies voted for Bush?I really want to know.

As a generation x-er,all I can say to the baby boomers is:grow old and die so more responsible people can undo the mess of your ignorant narcissism!

But,there is one good thing about the BU ll SH it team.It finally isolates the authority-figure craving populace who’ll follow anyone who gives structure to their pathetic, directionless lives.We can now identify them and,in the spirit of Bill Engvall,say"You voted for Bush?Here’s your sign!

ONWARD,RIGHT-WING LEMMINGS!
MARCHING OFF THE CLIFF!

Oh one last thing.In light of the right-wingers who keep comparing this war to our revolution,keep in mind that the Iraqi’s view us as the REDCOATS!

ww -

“ ... before the war began the left said we should look before we leap and not to bite off more than we can chew.  Result?  We were called traitors.”

You have an extremely selective memory.  Have you never heard of the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998.  The Act was passed by both houses of Congress and signed into law by President Clinton.  The vote in the Senate was by acclimation (unanimous) and was near unanimous in the House.  From that date, it was a matter of USA law that regime change in Iraq be effected, and that Saddam be removed from power.  This was before President Bush and 09/11, of course. 

Since the left strongly supported President Clinton over the issue of eliminating Saddam, I do not understand what has changed.  Why were there no anti-war demonstrations when Clinton declared that Saddam was going to be removed from power?  Do America’s interests change because President Bush was elected?  Do practitioners of genocide become less dangerous when the Republicans are in office?

Then the Iraq War Resolution was passed by strong bipartisan majorities in both Houses of Congress.  I honestly don’t recall anyone being called a traitor at the time, but I distinctly remember thinking that the anti-war types were crazy.

The way to defeat fanatics (Nazis, Japanese militarists, jihadists, homicidal totalitarians) is to defeat them.  Nothing else works.  Anything else is a waste of time and resources, besides being hazardous and suicidal.

The efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq have actually been quite low-cost affairs, with a tremendous payoff.  There is even greater payoff potential in the future as we bring democracy and free-market economics to the benighted nations of the Middle East.  Now if only we could do something about the benighted Liberals that pollute our politics.

scorp

You’ve completely misunderstood me. You apparently don’t know that Solomon was a Nader supporter in 2000, but switched to Kerry to get rid of Bush. Many progressives did the same thing and actively campaigned other progressives to leave Nader in 2004, Solomon did this in print. I was castigating him for it, and he did at the time get criticized by progressives who wouldn’t have anything to do with Kerry. But many jumped on the “vote Kerry and beat Bush” bandwagon. I was noting to Solomon that screwing your conscious in 2004 didn’t work.

You missed that I agreed with Solomon 100% on the Iraq War article. I’ve been against the Iraq War since the first rumblings of attacking Iraq back in 2002. I have not been wrong on any prediction I’ve made regarding Iraq so far. I knew there were no WMDs, I knew it would be no cakewalk, I knew blah, blah, I’m sick of reiterating all the lies I knew the Bush crew were telling. I figured out very early, if they say something the opposite is the truth. War is peace is exactly what is going on.

I’m moving far left day by day, Bush lie by Bush lie. I’m practically an anarchist at this point, screw the government, screw corporations. And screw much of our population as well. I’ve heard some of the most awful things out of people’s mouths since Katrina.

I’m so sick of racists and their new code phrase for denigrating African-Americans, THOSE people, as in THOSE people should have fled New Orleans. THOSE people didn’t want to leave. A nation filled with ignorant rascist is NOT A GREAT COUNTRY!

A Bush supporter at this point in time is nothing but a criminal in my mind, a traitor to America as Germans that supported Hitler while he scorched the world. I equate Bush as Hitler-lite or maybe like Nero who fiddled while Rome burned. On Tuesday, Bush played golf while New Orleans drowned.  So how do we defeat Bush the fanatic?

And scorp...you keep thinking this is Democrat land, not so. This is far left land. We don’t consider Clinton or most of his policies as ours. Don’t keep wondering why we supported him on something like Saddam (your above posting) and not Bush. We here for the most part (not everyone) didn’t support either Bush or Clinton or Gore or any other standard lieing politician. We may vote for a Democrat for president, but then we go for the mouthwash to get rid of the bad taste. For us it is hard to vote at all because we see the whole political system as corrupt beyond repair.

Yes scorp,

I had heard in 1998 about ILA. It was seen at the time as nothing more than an idle threat. The type of thing the U.S. has done repeatedly through history toward many nations and then never acted. 

Have you heard of the Glass-Steagal Act? That was repealed in 1998 as well. I protested to my representatives. That act seperated banks and investment houses to prevent Wall Street highjinx. It didn’t take more than about a year for the Wall Strret corruption to build to be revealed in 2001.

The point I’m making is that Congress passes crap all the time that affect us greatly or doesn’t mean anything and further we don’t always notice and we can’t do anything about it anyway. Every appropreation bill out of Congress is a pork orgy, we know it and can’t do anything anyway.

And Washington politics is now like the media. A slew of information and actions that no human can totally keep track of or analyize quickly enough to even conjure up an effective opposition. And that doesn’t include state and local politics. Sometimes nothing comes of the changes they wrought, sometimes it screws us good.

I considered (at that time) the 1998 declaration as akin to our concern about China human rights abuses, all talk no action. In fact Bush like Clinton has held China’s hand tighter, the free trade free-for-all trumps other concerns.

Progressives get screwed on every issue these days, we just want to win one issue, the Iraq War. But we will never win. Bush will end the war when he wants to, when it is politically good for Republicans and corporations. He doesn’t give one damn iota for Iraqi freedom. If the Shi’ites end up running a theocracy it won’t matter as long as American companies benefit and have control in Iraq’s oil economy. Free trade by way of a gun.

And scorp “Do America’s interests change because President Bush was elected?  Do practitioners of genocide become less dangerous when the Republicans are in office?”

After watching Bush this week, he in fact practices genocide in our country to Americans.

Your quote....The efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq have actually been quite low-cost affairs, with a tremendous payoff.

Not a mention of the dead, it seems to be about money (low-cost, payoff, you use the words of economy) to you. It doesn’t matter to you that our smart bombs land on weddings for instance. Or that friendly fire kills our own but to be propagandized as heroic (Pat Tillman case). You think in only one way, big picture rule the world philosophy. Human tragedy means nothing to you, it’s just collateral damage even if they are Americans. The true lie of compassionate conservatism, it doesn’t exist.

Low Cost Affair?  That is acutely absurd.  In Atlantic Monthly, a couple issues back there was discussion about how we would fight China if such a need ever arose.

I couldn’t help thinking that through privatization we have effectively made warfare so incredibly expensive for us that it costs us a billion a week or so to fight a country of only 25 million inhabitants with an utterly depleted army and no navy or airforce.

The tremendous pay-off you laud seems to be limited at this time to military contractors and private security firms.  I haven’t noticed any relief on oil prices.  Meanwhile the opportunity costs are outrageous.  How many domestic programs would be scuttled if they had a 200 - 300 Billion price tag?  Meanwhile, we are apparently willing to accept an Iraq constitution that allows for a fractured country with Sharia law at its heart.

The administration has been incompetent every step of the way - Grossly overstating the threat that Iraq posed and tragically underestimating every potential hurdle after the fall of Baghdad.  Surely the decision to stay the course is founded in the same demented logic that got us started on this path.  Why should the next claim be any more believable than the last?

Our presence in Iraq is dominated by the task of providing for *our own* security.  The sooner we are out, the sooner we stop losing.  If, as you so brilliantly put it, “The way to defeat fanatics is to defeat them...” I would humbly suggest that creating new fanatics ought not be a part of that plan.

scorp.. Are you kidding about not being called traitors?

I was personally told that by a screaming, spitting (literally, spit was flying out of his mouth) lunatic. I was also told by others that I should move out of the country. You apparently don’t remember you righties burning Dixie chick albums because of opinions expressed by one band member. (How odd though, you should hear the groups I listen to, you’d probably do more than burn their albums.)

I did indeed email my representatives telling them not to vote for the Iraq War Resolution. But the majority won in Congress, not neccesarily in the country. Polls showed that by the eve of war, it was just about even steven for/against the war. Protesting was working here and around the world, which is why Bush couldn’t wait another French 30 days to let inspectors continue doing their job. In 30 days Bush might have had polls running against him, thus starting his war later would have been going against popular opinion, and thus today we could have been adding that Bush went against the people’s wishes. 

I want to mention another thing about the French. They warned our intelligence agencies that we’d better take a good look at who was taking flight instructions in own country. They had given us information about people with Al Qaeda ties learning to fly on American soil. We didn’t listen to the French then, and Bush wouldn’t listen to them on such a simple idea, wait 30 days for more inspections. Oh, yeah, the French are evil to the rightwing spitters.

But funny thing, the guy who renamed cooked potatoes as freedom fries is on our side now. A miracle! A rightwinger who actually can rethink a position and realize the original position was a mistake and then actively attempt to rectify the mistake, that’s a true conscious.

Viet Nam syndrome? Well back then many supporters of that war reversed themselves and became opponents of that conflict. People who are able to think clearly can keep gathering information and when their original position becomes overwhelmed by a preponderance of evidence that doesn’t support that original position can actually understand that change is the only right thing to do.

I respect people that don’t agree with me that are willing to put their minds into the oppositions thoughts and come away with new perspectives to think about rather than to dismiss the idea without any thought. And when they do change their mind, I don’t feel vindication, I feel an amount of respect for that person.

Preponderance of evidence means much to me. The Bush crime family lies have been piling up like shell casing evidence at a murder spree. I’ve long given up benefit of doubt concerning the Bushies. And when people lie they are covering up something. A multitude of lies means a whole lot to cover up. The American jury (the people) are coming to this conclusion. Except for the Bush true believers who won’t even do their duty and enter the jury box and examine the case, they are blinded by the white teeth of the defendant’s lawyer.

Scorp wrote: “The way to defeat fanatics (Nazis, Japanese militarists, jihadists, homicidal totalitarians) is to defeat them.  Nothing else works.  Anything else is a waste of time and resources, besides being hazardous and suicidal.”

This is logically hazy.  Let’s put aside for a moment the comment “the way to defeat fanatics is to defeat them” as if we knew what that meant; to proffer all the fanatics listed as equivalent is inaccurate and misleading.

Nazis, Japanese militarists, and homicidal totalitarians were/are all fairly similiar in motivation - absolute secular power, here on earth, with as many natural resources as can be obtained.  Their aggressions must be stopped, and their leaders must be removed from power by any means necessary.  (In a related story, read Robert Ardrey’s The Territorial Imperative for similar actions by aggressive alpha chimpanzees.)

Jihadists are a rag-tag group of religious fundamentalist leaders and their misguided followers.  Because they have been educated by these religious leaders - who responded to their naturally inquisitive nature (we humans are nothing if not curious) with myths and emotionally-charged vitriol, they will indeed stop at nothing, while alive, to destroy all perceived evil (i.e., us).  But that’s incidental; they are impoverished and uneducated...a more accurate term might be ‘barbarian’.  They really can’t be stopped - see Rome.  However, the Romans never bothered to protect and educated those barbaric corners of the world.  They just took shit from them and killed them. 

Back to Scorp’s circular statement...I still disagree.  The way to defeat them is to not defeat them.  Aum.

Jon B -

“I considered (at that time) the 1998 (ILA) declaration as akin to our concern about China human rights abuses, all talk no action.”

Cynical, aren’t we.

Stated reasons given in the Iraq Liberation Act; Iraq took the following actions:

·Aggressive war against Iran, using chemical weapon and missiles against cities.

·The Anfal, mass slaughter of Kurdish civilians, estimates range up to 180,000 dead, including the Halabja massacre of 5000 women and children by poison gas.

·Aggressive war against Kuwait.

·Signed cease-fire after Kuwait war, promising to end aggressive wars, cease terrorizing the Iraqi people, and surrender WMD.  Saddam did not abide by any of the terms of the cease-fire, in spite of seventeen UN Resolutions over a thirteen-year period.

·Attempted to assassinate former President Bush.

·Continued terrorizing Iraqi people, including mass murder of civilians.

·Threatened Kuwait with renewed warfare. 

·Ended WMD inspections and ejected weapons inspectors.

The missing weapons are still not accounted for.  And you thought this was some kind of joke?

“Progressives get screwed on every issue these days, we just want to win one issue, the Iraq War.”

You know, of course, that President Bush, in his capacity as President and Commander-in-Chief, determined that the only way to end terrorism and to bring peace and democracy to the Middle East was to end terrorism and to bring peace and democracy to the Middle East.  Theocracy had failed.  Totalitarianism had failed.  Arab Nationalism had failed.  Jihadists had failed but were threatening our own country. 

But peace and democracy were doable.  Look at Germany and Japan; now those were real terrorists.  And the Congress agreed strongly with President Bush.  What do you have against peace and democracy for Arabs and Middle Easterners?  Are you racist, condemning them to terrorism and death when most of the world is moving toward democracy and prosperity?

“But we will never win.”

You surely must realize that if you “won”, that would condemn millions of people in the Middle East to continued terrorism and death, and leave all the failed states in the region in the hands of totalitarian despots.  If you think the terrorists are bad now, how many would flock to the Jihadist banner if they seriously thought that bin Laden might take over the world, as he has promised to do?

You can’t win by being negative all the time.  You can’t win by pretending that President Bush is a liar, and by pronouncing other slurs on him and his administration of mostly good people.  You can’t win by only attempting to destroy, and never trying to build.  You lose, and you do it to yourself.

I feel I must come to the defense of my liberal colleagues to show scorp the error of his ways.

First, the Iraqi Liberation Act did indeed make it a matter of policy that the U.S. government would support the removal of Saddam Hussein from power. What it DIDN"T say was HOW that would be done. Therefore, it is not clear that military intervention would be the logical extension of this piece of legislation. The U.S. could have supported exile groups, as we have done with Iran, or repealed the economic sanctions, which only solidified Saddam’s power because it made the Iraqi people entirely dependent upon the Baathist government for their necessities.

Second, Israel is in violation of 69 U.N. resolutions, four times as many as Iraq cerca 2003. Should we invade that country as well? In addition, how many times has the U.S./U.K./Israeli axis either vetoed resolutions passed by the General Assembly they didn’t like, or abstain from voting in the matter altogether? The answer is WAY more than 17 my friend.

Third, the U.S. condemned the Iraqi people to terrorism and death the moment it invaded. If only the White House had listened to Richard Clarke, who was quite prescient in his prediction of how the Islamic terror network would affected by the invasion. There was no Islamic extremist network of any power under Saddam in Iraq that was killing innocent people BEFORE WE INVADED. You may argue about state-sanctioned terrorism, but that was never a threat to U.S. national security. Neither Iran or Kuwait felt threatened by Iraq prior to the invasion. So if these countries were not in danger, why would the U.S. be? In addition, the vast majority of Saddam’s atrocities occured with the tacit approval of the Reagan-Bush I administrations. never a finger was lifted to scold Saddam or tell him the U.S. did not approve of what he was doing. Clearly, the change in U.S. policy toward that country was influenced by factors OTHER than his human rights record.

Finally, you make the false argument that democracy and capitalism go hand-in-hand. Not true at all. Look at China. Look at Indonesia. These countries have private sectors but are ruled by iron-fisted regimes who do not blink at the notion of killing a member of their country. In fact, the temptations of capitalism can readily thwart democracy. The rise of the corporation as an entity entitled to the same constitutional rights as a single citizen has drowned out the voices of the populace as corporations by and large run the U.S. government and political system. In fact, the fact that the U.S. IMPOSED radical free market reforms on the Iraqi people without their consent is an example of undemocratic behavior. The Iraqi people by a large measure want control over their own resources want the right to organize, but that is anathema to the designs the U.S. goverment had in mind for that country. If the U.S. truly respected Iraqi democracy, it would not have imposed the 100 Economic Orders that violated international law and the will of the Iraqi populace. To do such a thing presupposes as a matter of natural law that laissez-faire capitalism is the only way to go. WRONG!!

scorp’s astounding insight and elegant turn of phrase are certainly worth noting.

He has only to blow raspberries out his nose and the structured factually based opinions of others just crumble before his incomparable wit and wisdom. 

Rabbit finds scorp scary, know what I mean fellow thinkers?

Rabbit has said all he wants on this subject above. One sentence can sum up America, it’s problems and why. Thanks to Peadaphile, Father Bush, he set the stage, bred with a monkey and voila.

No, rabbit just can’t. He must risk the ire of scorp.

scorp says:  “President and Commander-in-Chief, determined that the only way to end terrorism and to bring peace and democracy to the Middle East was to end terrorism and to bring peace and democracy to the Middle East.”

scorp are you sure Dubya isn’t writing your speeches?

Maybe you write his?

There is something about the lucidity and logic of these words that so reminds Rabbit of Potus.

BTW scorp, Rabbit not any shade of Liberal. Bet you can’t guess what Rabbit is. When he tells you he not a Repug either, you will surely be stumped.

What else is there after all, eh, scorpy?

scorp the most frustrating part of talking to someone like you is the following. The more one gets into it the more apparent your intellect, lucidity and knowledge.

As we who would happily engage in an equal debate realise more and more how impossible a dream that is. With nothing offered by you which warrants more than ridicule we are forced to seek amusement by taunting you in creative ways.

Some of the wit and remarks people like you inspire is priceless.

The frustrating part is that like telling a great adult joke to a child, you mostly don’t get it.

scorp...I’ll address a few things in the few minutes I have right now.

>>>Cynical, aren’t we.<<<

ABSOLUTELY, when it comes to my government, and corporations I might add.

>>>·Aggressive war against Iran, using chemical weapon and missiles against cities.<<<

So, we supported Iraq in that war. We helped Hussein procure weapons and gave Saddam sensitive satelite photo layouts of Iran. Then turn around and cite that war as a reason to remove him from power? Yes, cynical.

>>>The Anfal, mass slaughter of Kurdish civilians, estimates range up to 180,000 dead, including the Halabja massacre of 5000 women and children by poison gas.<<<

Which despite being known about Pappy Bush sent Rumsfeld over to meet with Saddam and shake his hand and give him a gift of silver spurs. Shows we really gave a damn. Back then it was progressives that made a stink about that Kurdish gassings. Yes, cynical.

>>>Aggressive war against Kuwait.<<<

Google April Gillespie, who was our ambassador to Iraq back then. As Saddam built up his military on the border of Kuwait, Gillespie met with him. In my local paper prior to the war her quotes were printed. Most analysis considered her words to Saddam as possibly a green light to attack and at worst only a yellow light. It should also be noted that the “throwing babies out of incubators” turned out to be outright lies. Yes, cynical.

>>>Signed cease-fire after Kuwait war, promising to end aggressive wars, cease terrorizing the Iraqi people, and surrender WMD.  Saddam did not abide by any of the terms of the cease-fire, in spite of seventeen UN Resolutions over a thirteen-year period.<<<

Pappy Bush publicly encouraged the Kurds and Shi’ites to revolt against Saddam and then sat back and watched them get annililated. It was only after the Kurds were backed into Turkey (who didn’t like that) that relief aid was forthcoming (in light of Katrina, sounds familiar). Iraq didn’t attack neighbors after that and inspectors were dismantling his WMDs. Yes, cynical.

>>>Ended WMD inspections and ejected weapons inspectors.

Clinton REMOVED the inspectors in preperation of bombing. Yes, cynical.

>>>The missing weapons are still not accounted for.  And you thought this was some kind of joke?<<<

Because they were destroyed. They are not there. Every study subsequent to the Iraq War concluded this, what planet are you on? No, it’s not a joke to me. But as you see in the above actions of my government that I’ve cited, I can’t trust them for the truth. Yes, cynical.

When Pappy Bush, Clinton, and now Baby Bush used lies to justify, yes cynical.

When none of them stated forthrightly the real reason they gave a rats ass about Iraq, the oil, yes cynical.

<<<Look at Germany and Japan; now those were real terrorists.<<<

Ah, the new reason for the Iraq War, it’s World War II. Unlike Japan and Germany, Iraq never attacked the United States and by 2002 had become no threat to its neighbors. Both Condeleeza Rice and Colin Powell stated this in 2001, no threat is what they said.

>>>What do you have against peace and democracy for Arabs and Middle Easterners?<<<

I have nothing against it, but they will have to get our encouragement in ways not instigated by bombs and guns. Name a war that WE started that resulted in a viable democracy.

Afghanistan has become a rerun of the Soviet occupation, are we even still looking for Bin Laden? We, just like them are now defenders of a puppet regime. We won’t win, because the new situation is “nation building” that has nothing to do with real democracy.

We won’t win in Iraq because Bush keeps changing the terms of winning. The War on Terrorism is a joke. Do you actually believe we are going to wipe every terrorist off the face of the earth? That’s an open ended reason to war forever into the future.

>>>bin Laden might take over the world, as he has promised to do?<<<

Can you show me his quote? Have you read “Imperial Hubris?” The CIA author has studied Bin Laden statements and taking over the world is not among his political statements. He does want western influence out of the Middle East.

>>>You can’t win by pretending that President Bush is a liar.

He is a liar, read the many books documenting his systematic lies about nearly every issue.

Gotta go, time has run out.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating scorp. Iraq is a larger threat now than it was before we invaded - we failed in our objective and there is no sensible rationale for continuing.  Meanwhile, we have every reason to expect that an incremental boost in our own brutality will only bring more failure.  Some people refuse to see it, but then, some people still feel that Vietnam was a good idea and that if we had simply nuked the jungle, the world would be a better place today.

The nearsighted presidential urge to oust Saddam by violent aggression has cost us far more than he was ever worth.  Most importantly, it has cost us the stability we sought in the first place.  Furthermore, we all pretty much look like asses now.  How much is that worth? 

Are you ready to level more cities?  Perhaps we should nuke the desert if that’s what it takes to win.  I’ve heard plenty more vile suggestions from the right wingers around here. It is amazing.

Liberal,

1st) You are right.

2nd) Israel is considered part of the Mid-East and the mid-east wants Israel to die.  So the other Arab countries in the region continue to try and pass sanctions against them.  Meanwhile never condeming any attacks on Israel.

3rd) Saddam was a danger because throughout the ‘90s he continued to hide weapons.  So after 9/11, EVERYONE, thought he might still have said WMDs.  (remember Rabbit hindsight is always 20/20) So Bush did what he did because he did not want another attack.  Maybe if France, Germany, Russia and China stood up to
Saddam we would not be in this mess.

final) Iraq should have control of their resources. But to use China as an example of capitalism not needed democracy, where those in power are the ones that will make the money.  That is not the case here.  I have the same power as the next guy.

Nice to see the Rabbit is not bringing much to the table.  Oh, thats right his voice is to pure for our ears.

One final thought:
We are not a democrasy; we are a Representive Republic, our congress is a democracy.
Democracy = Two wolfs and a lamb deciding what is for dinner.

You are wrong think4yourself. Only Iran refuses to acknowledge the existence of Israel. All other countries recognize it as a legitimate state. Saddam Hussein pledged to leave Kuwait in 1990 if Israel would leave the West Bank and Gaza, another illegal occupation, but the U.S. would have none of it. In fact, Saudi Arabia has had a proposal out there for years that if Israel would return to its pre-1967 borders, then it would no longer support Hamas and other militant groups.

Finally, the U.N. accounted for 95% of Iraq’s WMDs. Some kind of hiding job by Saddam Hussein’s government! When they returned in 2002, the inspectors could not find any reconstituted weapons programs. As the Duelfer Report concluded, Iraq had destroyed its weapons programs VOLUNTARILY in 1991!

think4yourself must be one of the over 40% of Americans that think they are or will be in the second percentile of income earners in this country.

He surely doesn’t know anything about China’s economic system, but he can say with confidence that those with the power make the money.  He then goes on to make the outrageous claim that it doesn’t work that way here.

And will someone tell me why is it so hard to admit that Saddam was no threat to us?  This tenacity is one of the more pathological traits from the right wing.  What exactly would it mean to your worldview if you were not allowed to make up scenarios based on items that were never found?  It has already taken far too long a time, but finally most people agree “Yep, we zigged when we should have zagged.”

You know, it is human nature to rationalize the stupid things we do, but it isn’t very helpful down the road. It provides no framework for future learning.

Jon B

Ref:  Posted by Jon B on September 6, 2005 at 9:26 PM

OK, we are agreed that you are cynical.  You did not expect the USA to follow its own laws regarding one of the most odious terrorists and genocidal despots in the world, and you have no objections to Saddam’s aggressive wars and mass murder of civilians.  I expect that you have no serious objection to the 100 million who died in the worldwide communist terror, but six or eight million victims of the nazis are not acceptable.  And then, this previous quote from you:

“After watching Bush this week, he in fact practices genocide in our country to Americans.”

Wow, a hurricane kills several hundred or several thousand people, and Bush becomes a regular Hitler, or Stalin, or Mao, or Pol Pot, whatever.  That is cynical all right.  Dumb, but cynical.

All the justifications for ILA 1998 were signed off by President Clinton, all US Senators, and all but 38 of the Congressmen.  And you find the whole exercise cynical?  Maybe you are just a whining misfit.

Speaking of the missing WMD, you say:

“Because they were destroyed. They are not there.”

How do you know they were destroyed?  What if they were moved to Syria or the Beka’a Valley?  What if they were given to bin Laden?  I have read every single one of the seventeen UN Resolutions and the Armistice terms that ended the Gulf I hostilities.  Saddam solemnly undertook to follow the Armistice terms, and one of the requirements was that prohibited weapons were not to be moved or destroyed except under UN supervision, for obvious reasons.  The fact that there are many tons of documented material gone missing is a violation of the Armistice terms, and of itself justifies corrective actions.

The oil?  Oh, yes the oil, as in ‘NO WAR FOR OIL’.  You know, of course, that the control of Iraq’s oil was the first thing turned over to the new Iraqi government, and that oil production and revenues have been in Iraqi government hands since May 2004.  It certainly is not in the control of the US government, else we wouldn’t be paying $3 or $4 a gallon for gasoline.  But then, the price of oil is determined by the law of supply and demand, not by Liberal fantasy.

THINKY says:  2nd) Israel is considered part of the Mid-East and the mid-east wants Israel to die. 

Thanks Thinky, we knew that first bit. Let Rabbit explain the second bit for you. The “mid-east” as you quaintly minimalise it, is a region. As such it is innanimate. It wants nothing unless you subcribe to Gaia belief. If you mean the assembled peoples of the Middle East, then Rabbit assures you that in fact most of them want Israel to stop being so wicked, treat people a bit more nicely and settle down with the threats of attack and anhialation the ZIONISTS heap on the remainder of the Middle East. As it is the vicious Zionists, imprison dissenters and torture them, indiscriminately as well as targeted. They wantonly destroy the property and lives of a people who are as entitled to live on the land they have occupied in peace with even modern zionists ancestors. The majority of the Middle East is being incredibly patient about things under the circumstances Rabbit would say. Perhaps they are just a superior race. It certainly seems they have something which you lack. Don’t give the Dittohead mantra which suggests they are somehow at fault for lacking all the benefits of the society you have which is built upon the backs of about 75% of the world’s people, you represent, we, yes Rabbit joins you here, represent 5% of the population.

Rabbit dares you to claim you are somehow superior to the “suckers” who make it all possible for you.

Thinky:  after the enemies of So the other Arab countries in the region continue to try and pass sanctions against them. 

What’s this, the Sherrif of Sanction-ville where any and all sanctions will be sought on behalf of Israel, if not itself, for any imagined reason, while breaking any sanctions made by others.  DITTOHEAD......

Thinky:  Meanwhile never condeming any attacks on Israel.

Many of the Middle Eastern people, their leaders too have condemned quite a few real terrorist attacks against not only the USA but Israel too. You just don’t notice it because you are usually so busy making your own attacks on many of the same countries under false flags and actually cheering them.

You r-sholes actually shot missiles at the Libyans for your own actions over Lockerbie. That “Conspiracy” is no longer a theory. Just ask rabbit, Ditto head, you get the link.

Police and CIA admit they planted the detonator circuit and further lied about Libya being the only country which had such det controllers.

more…

Thinky:  3rd) Saddam was a danger because throughout the ‘90s he continued to hide weapons. 

Weapons he’d gotten largely off US. So after 9/11, EVERYONE, thought he might still have said WMDs.

No Dittohead, you and some people like you were programmed at the time to think 9/11 was somehow related to Saddam and Iraq, but not even by your accustomed stretches of truth could “everybody” touch it.

Thinky:  (remember Rabbit hindsight is always 20/20)

No Thinky that is just another empty slogan. Define it? If it were true don’t you thinkl people like you who can see perfectly 20/20 that everything bush has done and said has been a lie you still believe everything he says now. If you have 20/20 vision of anything in hindsight, lets try a test, Thinky.

Can Thinky see that Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Ladin bad enemies.?

Didn’t have the same ideas or plans.?

Total opposite in fact.?

Main thing they had in common, up until a decade ago, was that they were two of USA’s best allies in the Muslim dominated world.
Perhaps we can concede that hindsight can help in interpreting current events for some people, for others hindsight is just a sacred word of defence.

Thinky:  So Bush did what he did because he did not want another attack.

Rabbit has already noted your Bushisms, sure you not his speech writer?

Thinky:  Maybe if France, Germany, Russia and China stood up to Saddam we would not be in this mess.

Maybe if people like you did not sell their rights to think for themselves, we would not be in the mess we are not only in, but being consumed by, while you Jerkoff to the music.

Thinky:  final) Iraq should have control of their resources.

No kidding?

But to use China as an example of capitalism not needed democracy, where those in power are the ones that will make the money. That is not the case here.  I have the same power as the next guy.

What the hell do you no about China, could you even find it on a map you cretin? I am an Australian, my Brother is in China doing business on a monthly basis and so are others including Chinese who live here or in China and own or run businesses here and in China. Nobody I know even ever met a Communist Party memeber. When he visits as he does now, they play golf, get drunk, and get ladies up to their rooms as a courtesy.

Thinky you don’t know when you are beat, but what Dittohead did, it isn’t part of the program. You as an individual have similar power to 90% of Americans, which if you do nothing to exercise it, is close to zero.

The remaining 10% have all the power you dream you somehow have a stake in.

If you want to see how much power you possess, then continue to watch the events unfold as one of your sweetest daughters is raped and pillaged.

Poor, Poor New Orleans.

Rabbit knows it is still too subtle for you to see the comaparison with your own lot. That is only because you are not as poor nor as Black suspects Rabbit.

Thinky:  Nice to see the Rabbit is not bringing much to the table.  Oh, thats right his voice is to pure for our ears.

Too pure for your ears, do you have any Thinky? Anyone who stops trying to get the better of Rabbit long enough to listen to his gentle logic, soon hears. Rabbit has seven personal e-mails this week from People who thank Rabbit for helping them over recovery or even curing their Dittoheadedness.

How’s your score, Thinky?

Thinky:  One final thought:  (ooooh?)
We are not a democrasy; we are a Representive Republic, our congress is a democracy.
Democracy = Two wolfs and a lamb deciding what is for dinner.

That is clearly a slogan people, it has that same format, but what does it mean?

Thinky has left us this final thought, so he must feel it’s worth our time. Can anybody help explain to Rabbit what it means.

Weird analogy, strange images, disturbing, mysterious and dark. Maybe Rabbit is biased, but fears the wolves’ intentions probably bad for lamb unless lamb is a good cook, and stocked larder there is.

Lamb is served folks. Enjoy.

Scorp:

1) The price of oil is effectively set by a cartel.  The law of supply and demand is actually a conservative fantasy where even things that have inelastic demand such as open heart surgery and life-saving medications obey all the rules.

2) “Corrective” actions would have been refreshing.  What is the antonym of corrective action?  Whatever that word is, I guess that’s how I would characterize what we are doing now.

3) Would *you* care to prove for all of us that *you* do not have WMD?  If we don’t find any, I could simply assert that because we can’t find them, you must have moved them.  Rediculous, huh?  Proving a negative is hard isn’t it?

So long as you continue to assert something that is not true, then my denial only proves to you that I am lying.  What energy it must take to sustain that.

So much Energy has gone into sustaining such an assertion, that there is insufficient left to save Americans from a medium size national disaster.

Scorp,
Selective memory?
Please,I do not recall the right-wing calling for invasion of Iraq in 1998.Also,elimination takes many forms,the most expensive of which is a full-scale invasion.

One thing I do recall of 1998 is the right-wing howling like the wolves they are that we impeach Clinton for lying about an affair.I also recall that in 1998 anything he did of military significance including the attack upon Sudan was called a “wag the dog” to divert attention from the republican inquisition.Had Clinton attempted to invade Iraq to eliminate Hussein,the right-wing would have called him a warmonger and stood on the grounds of patriotic dissent in lambastng him.

Republicans wanted a war in 2003 because it would be fought and negotiated on their terms,because,then,it suited their financial intersets.Please tell me republicans would’ve supported Gore if he had invaded Iraq.They would have also protested the folly of that decision and questioned Gore’s ability to be a “wartime” president.

One difference between the right and the left:the right likes to pretend that their B.S. doesn’t stink.

GrayArea -

“The price of oil is effectively set by a cartel.  The law of supply and demand is actually a conservative fantasy ... “

GrayArea, you need some GrayMatter.  You have made yourself famous, even if you are eighteen bricks short in your hod.

Scorp presumes too much…

>>>and you have no objections to Saddam’s aggressive wars and mass murder of civilians.<<<

Where did I write that? I do object just as I object to America’s aggressive wars and Russia/Soviet Union aggressive wars, I object to all aggressive wars. I believe that a Department of Defense should stand for what those words say, defense, not offense. If we are attacked than by all means play your defense. The United States has started more wars in the last several decades than probably all other countries combined. Grenada, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Viet Nam, Iraq War, Afghanistan War (Bin Laden was not the leader of that country) Cuba (Bay of Pigs), Haiti, Somalia, and that’s just quick off the top of my head, there are others.

I particularily object to the aggressive wars the United States starts because this is my country. I believe we have no business pointing our finger at other nations until we can say we are not agressive. The old “do as I say, not as I do” syndrome. Until we have a policy of permanent non-aggression, how can I as a citizen of an aggressive country criticize other nations?

I object to the new Bush Doctrine, pre-emptive action. As if Bush has some crystal ball and knows which nation will attack us. First, it gives every nation in the world the right to attack anyone they want because they drum up some lie (WMDs seems to be a popular lie to use). On a micro scale, it gives me the right to shoot you between the eyes because I perceive you are going to be aggressive towards me, never mind whether you are or not. It requires some sort of ESP of the aggressor to be pre-emptive. The Bush Doctrine is a claim of a nation to be both prophet and vigilante at the same time.

I can’t strees how much this may blowback thoughout the world someday. We have established a new standard to be emulated (if I can use that word) by other nations. “See, the United States did it, we can too.”

Now I’m not so spiritual that I can be like Jesus and turn the other cheek when attacked, I do believe that we should defend ourselves when attacked.

Thought you were against name calling scorpy, is that all you got left?

You have carried on such a structured and effective debate until now, it is a pity to see you lose any ground due to a “momentary lapse of reason”.

GrayArea says:  “The price of oil is effectively set by a cartel.  The law of supply and demand is actually a conservative fantasy ... “

Rabbit says:  GrayArea’s statement may be debatable but doesn’t seem obviously so to Rabbit, at a glance.

Scorpy says:  GrayArea, you need some GrayMatter.  You have made yourself famous, even if you are eighteen bricks short in your hod.

Rabbit says:  You did it again, just when Rabbit wanted to try and show what a goose you are, you did it before I could.  Was that your idea of a refutation?  Scorpy, what are you doing this for, you remind Rabbit of some poor sad massochist. Are you really Bush’s speech writer? Why are you letting us do this to you. You are even stabbing yourself with both hands now and jamming your own thumbs in the door. Don’t please blame compassionate and gentle souls like Rabbit and others here for your pain. You are far more cruel to yourself than even Rabbit can be to you, which is something of an achievement sure, but is it anything to be proud of, scorpy? Really?

Scorp...How do you know they were destroyed (WMDs)?  What if they were moved to Syria or the Beka’a Valley?  What if they were given to bin Laden?

Ah, the old prove a negative arguement. You missed a few possibilities. What if aliens took them? Or maybe God has them stashed in purgatory. Maybe the remaining Baathist have them wrapped in condoms stuck up their ass.

I don’t know anymore than you do. But I have to rely on weapons inspectors both before and after (I use this term loosely) the Iraq War. Weapons Inspector David Kaye, a Bush appointee came back and said “We were wrong.” Those were his words, would you have me believe that a Bush buddy saying they were wrong, is actually a lie? I’m to believe you over a Bushite on an issue that would have greatly helped Bush if Kaye had instead said, “We found them!”

Give them to Bin Laden shows your ignorance of differing Arab thought. Saddam was a secularist, an abomination to Bin Laden, just as I (a secularist) am an abomination to Jerry Farwell. Bin Laden hated Saddam and using simple logic, it would be suicide to give your enemy your weapons.

How about these facts. Bin Laden offered to Saudi Arabia the use of his fighters (mujadeen) to defend that country after Saddam moved against Kuwait. He was turned down and part of his anger toward both Saudi Arabia and the US extends to that period, because SA allowed non-muslims into the kingdom (the protector of the ultimate holy site, Mecca).

He also hates SA because he believes the royal family is corrupt (they are) and are only Muslims in talk, not walk. He sees the royal family as evil hypocrites because members of the royal family will head off to Monaco for gambling and womanizing, just as a Christian fundementalists would be angry if Billy Graham was found to be living the lust life in Vegas. See religious fundementalists are not so different are they?

But I’m getting tired of teaching you things that if you stopped listening to Limbaugh and broadened your reading, you might understand for yourself. I highly suggest “Imperial Hubris” for you, written by Anonymous (ex-CIA Michael Scheuer). He argues our biggest blunder against Bin Laden is that we didn’t move fast enough and hit hard enough in Afghanistan (something you might agree with), but since we didn’t we are losing the war on terrorism. He has studied every word of Bin Laden and I believe he has a good grasp on what Bin Laden is all about.

Or try “Forbidden Truth, US-Taliban Secret Oil Diplomacy and the Failed Hunt for Bin Laden”, but you probably wouldn’t believe it. That the Bushies were negotiating with the Taliban (pre-9/11) for them to turn over Bin Laden in exchange for an oil pipeline through Afghanistan funded by American oil companies. And just for your pleasure, Clinton did the same until women’s rights groups here in America pressured Clinton to back off. Both Clinton and GW Bush considered the Taliban as a needed stable government for oil concerns. Saudi Arabia was as well involved.

The truth you refuse to acknowledge is that the US (both parties) will deal with the most awful governments in the world if petrodollars are at stake. And then you buy into their public proclamations hook, line and sinker.

And to think progressives are the evil ones for suggesting we give up our oil dependency. That doing all that we can to promote the use of alternatives to lessen oil addiction, we are evil. To have higher CAFE standards so that we don’t have to give a crap about the Middle East, we are evil.

scorp....Wow, a hurricane kills several hundred or several thousand people, and Bush becomes a regular Hitler, or Stalin, or Mao, or Pol Pot, whatever.  That is cynical all right.  Dumb, but cynical.

Murder is murder. Bush publicly said he was transferring money for levee enhancement in New Orleans (and other public works in the country) to the Iraq War. This was a White House budget cut for the Republican Congress to rubber stamp, despite the protestations of nearly every politician in the state (both parties, bi-partisan) AND the Corp of Engineers.

Is a drunk driver a killer if they run down a pedestrian, particularily if warned beforehand by friends not to drive? I believe so, maybe you don’t. I equate his lust for killing Iraqis over protecting Louisianians (sp?) as blatant disregard for American lives.

And the fact that Bush golfed and birthday partied on Tuesday, leads me to believe he had no interest in massing a response, many people died that day and the next and the next. But sure I was a little over the top. It was to piss you off, because I sometimes like to mess with rightwing ideologues. 

>>>You did not expect the USA to follow its own laws...”

No! We fail to follow plenty of laws. Hardly anyone but the most dim would disagree with me on that.

Even 18 bricks short in my hod.

Scorp
Some have already answered you about oil, I will add some other observations. The “Iraqi government” is still a temporary group “guided” by the United States in the Green Zone living under laws that we wrote. Can anyone say puppet? The Neocon hope was to be an OPEC member by proxy through Iraq, so far that hasn’t really been the case. Why? Because Iraq has been pumping LESS oil than before the war. So, you are right for the wrong reason, we as yet don’t really control the oil, because we can’t keep it flowing.

The Iraq economy is completely dependent on American decisions. Who is the biggest employer in Iraq today? A combination of our government and our corporations. The best paying jobs are for the Iraq security forces that we are trying to create, and that we the taxpayers of America are paying for. We also pay for the contracting corporations like Halliburton that in turn hires Iraqis for various low level jobs.

We are subsidizing their oil economy, because we have to keep fixing the pipelines that keep getting blown up, not to mention armed protection of pumps and pipelines. And Halliburton and other American contractors could care less if the pipelines get blown up because they get to take more tax dollars to refix them. A merry-go-round of fix, take our tax money, fix, etc. It’s the perfect corruption, all legal you see and no one to blame except insurgents. 

Oh, and that leads us to another Bush lie or more accurately a broken promise that probably was never meant to be kept. “We will pay for the war with Iraqi oil.” Hmmm. When is that suppose to start? But that statement by Bush seems a polar opposite of another statement. “Iraq’s oil will be for the people of Iraq.” Hmmm. Did we ask the Iraqis if they were willing to give up their oil to pay for the war? And if they had said yes long ago, do they still agree with that? And how long will this supposed arrangement be agreeable to them?

Polling in Iraq show that most Iraqis suspect our motives about oil and that is the main reason they want us out. Most of that provisional Iraqi government campaigned on the issue of getting Americans out of Iraq. Of course, these were politicians, who knows what they really were planning behind their promises. It has also been found out that we did plenty to try to influence the election (see Seymore Hersh).

The price of oil is regulated by numerous influences, or was. There is an ever ongoing effort by oil companies and oil producing nations to create an equilibrium price. If the price rises too high then consumers will begin to seek other sources of energy, cry for windfall taxes on oil companies (as is happening as I write) and/or possibly revolt against the powers that be. If prices are too low, then the obvious is that those nations and companies lose profits and worse for them if too low, cause monetary losses.

I used “or was” because of peak oil. As peak oil becomes more influencial on supply, the nations and companies begin to lose control over equilibrium and prices rise, thereby causing the above. My belief is that peak oil is here or just about to be. So supply/demand will become more influencial in the next decade and beyond.

Notice that oil is one of the few products/commodities that has “price gouging” simply because it is so damn important to our economy and political power structure. Not many complain when some Chinese plastic doo-dad goes up in price, it’s not important enough to keep buying. Chinese plastic doo-dads do have a standard supply/demand curve, oil does not.

scorp

We fight wars over oil, not Chinese plastic doo-dads. The War on Terror is really just a name for Oil War. And Bush in that speech on Tuesday in San Diego said as much. He said that “we must protect Iraq’s vast oil fields from terrorist extremists”. War on Terror/Oil War, it’s becoming one and the same. And we are protecting those oil fields for whom? Mostly oil corporations and the political power structure to keep that equilibrium price so that we won’t get mad if/when prices rise.

So the amount of money we’ve spent on Iraq could have simply been rebated back to American gasoline consumers (taxpayers) and we might have had lower prices (or we could have fixed the NO levees), if we hadn’t gone to war.

Follow the money. Tax Americans for Iraq War to protect the oil fields and in the recent energy bill, oil company subsidies (oh how Republicans lie about advocating free-markets, subsides are antithetical government involvement in the market), oil prices have been rising all year, so we also pay at the pump as well, thus corporate profits. And I’ve only touched on the absurdity of where the money goes. There is no “true” price of gasoline in America, because after all that shifting of tax money we’ve lost all sense of the true price. It’s artificial and has little to do with free-market.

After all the headspinning number crunching, we pay at this point three bucks a gallon for gasoline because that’s what we will pay without screaming bloody murder. But bloody murder is approaching. This year, maybe next, but soon.

And I’m betting the day will come that scorp screams too. And he will wonder many whys. Why is a war in Iraq really so important? Why is tax money flying all over the place and is clouding the true price of gasoline? Why does Bush have such close ties to the oil industry? Why is the economy taking a beating, (soon scorp)? Why am I getting mad at people who waste gasoline? Why am I sudsidizing the oil corporations while they reap record profits even as the price of gasoline goes up? Double taxation it is, a Republican hate.

But I have no idea who scorp is. Maybe he is an oil company exec, laughing at me as he builds another mansion.

Rabbit,
Here is what I think.

Can Thinky see that Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Ladin bad enemies.?

They were until the mid ‘90s, when they realized they had the same enemy.

Didn’t have the same ideas or plans.?

In the summer of 2004 Putin (president of Russia) said Russian intelligence felt Saddam was trying to attack the US with WMDs.
Links:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53096-2004Jun18.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3819057.stm

http://archive.sptimes.ru/archive/times/979/news/n_12787.htm

Total opposite in fact.?

Opposite in the sense Saddam was a secularist.  I would also say Saddam is/was not a jihadist. 

And I know what the reports say about not finding the WMDs, but the all say Saddam was playing a cat-and-mouse game.  The first UN inspector found and destroyed weapons that Saddam was trying to hide.  Saddam did not destroy them voluntarily.  The inspector, Scott Ritter, changed his story when someone connected to Saddam gave him half a million dollars for a documentary. 
PBS has a great documentary on this subject with Ritter, before he got PAID.  Think Oil-For-Food scandal.
Saddam was playing a game.  His bad.

My point on democracy is democracy is thrown around like it is a good thing.  I was pointing out that a democracy is similar to a lynch mob, so we should not be striving for democracy anywhere.  America is based on the rule of law with a representative republic.

Think

What could have *Bush* have done to prevent this disaster? Has anyone (besides me) bothered to see which levees were actually slated for improvement (not the ones that broke)? Anyone (including me) try to estimate how much it would have costed to provide New Orleans with levees that could withstand a category 5 hurricane?

Isn’t the city mayor the first line of defense in a storm like this? Why did he not order an evacuation? The governor?

Lastly i hope that gas goes to $5/gallon. More even. We need to break the addition that ties us to the barbarians in the Middle East, at least until they enter the 20th century. We won’t do that until the pain overcomes the inertia of doing nothing. Necessity breeds innovation. . .

War as such is intrinsically wrong.It belongs to pre-history when man’s brain was very similar to reptiles’ and its main interests were territory, hierarchy, ritual and deceit. Just take hold of any historybook and the motives for war have always been the same. So, unless we switch to the humane brain, refuse to resign our freedom of conscience and learn to close our ears to war speeches we will continue reediting the same circle which costs precious lives for no other purpose than greed, arrogance and blindness on the part of a few in detriment of the many.
Bi-partidism is a joke. While you continue to blame republicans or democrats for events, you will be misled. Only a very strong and determined opposition to sending your children to war can put a stop to this madness. The whole world should be joining efforts to restore nature, erradicate corruption, and consider mankind as one. Men in power are just that, men, not gods and the power they hold has been given them by the commons, it’s not theirs.
While I was reading some of the comments above, I had the feeling I was listening to children fighting over a football match, and I was surprised at not finding anyone saying war is wrong, no matter what pack of lies try to make you think it is right. In the last 50 years USA seems to have had all kind of excuses to start wars in different parts of the world and continues to adopt a position of superiority above the rest which is not based on true facts: your society is not a model of anything, you have problems as everyone else and pardon me, Scorp, but I don’t believe you when you try to sell us your concern about Iraki people having to put up with Saddam while you have so many wrong-doings to correct around you.
Local politics is just a distraction, a way to have you busy fighting among yurselves while the rules of the game are being set in very small and closed circles of which we have no idea. To see the whole picture we must cease having small interests and a good excercise is to try for one moment to put yourself in somebody elses’s shoes. That is called empathy and it has a very powerful effect.

We could have easily had $5/gallon before now.  The additional tax revenue might have actually paid for, among other things, more R&D;.  Now we get to wean ourselves the hard way - with an obscene number of SUV’s in our driveways.

Nobody expected Bush to *prevent* the disaster, though a closer look at policy would be nice. What we really needed him to do was to respond to it quickly and decisively.  Brownie’s idea of sending homeland security employees down there with two days to report and a mission to “convey a positive image of disaster relief operations to government officials” is certainly counter-productive.

How about the call to send 1000 *real* fire-fighters to the disaster area to hand out fliers promoting the disaster relief effort?  Why not send actors for fliers and photo-ops and let actual emergency workers do what they were trained to do?

We don’t have the personnel for an investigation, but we have spare emergency workers for press conferences and pr?  What a joke and a waste of resources.  It is pathetic.

Maria,

War is not the answer,
EXCEPT for ending Nazism, Totalitarianism, Slavery……….

GrayArea…

There have been police and firefighters from other states and FEMA is preventing many from getting involved. Today I saw on CNN they interviewed firefighters from Illinois waiting for days on the campus of LSU in Baton Rouge for FEMA to give them somthing to do.

FEMA also ordered the Red Cross not to enter New Orleans last week, which is why we haven’t seen them in any of the TV coverage. Although the Red Cross has been heavily involved in the different shelters such as the Astrodome in Houston.

“Let’s not play the blame game”, the new talking point by the losers making mistakes. It is past time to begin an investigation. Ask any investigator, whether an arson investigator, crime scene or accident scene investigator, a prosecuter, etc. whether waiting until the incident keeps getting colder is a good idea if the truth is what you are after. The answer would be a resounding, no! Ask the investigators if they had moved faster on Enron whether they might have had a chance to beat the paper shredding. Memories fade over time, the time is now.

And I certainly agree Bush should have reacted quicker. On Tuesday as New Orleans filled with water, Bush did these important things. Golfed, attended a birthday party and retired back to the ranch for evening 29 of his vacation. Bush golfed while Norlins drowned, sounds like Nero.

Thinky, for god’s sake get a new handle. Whatever it takes. Just do it. It is like talking to someone called arm or something and is distracting to an inventive and correlative mind. Which is a Rabbit’s BTW. Keeps wanting to do bad Rabbit things with Puns and Stuff which Rabbits do, bit like Hobbits except still around.

Rabbit is working late and has a workshop job half hour or so but returns.

Didn’t have the same ideas or plans.?

In the summer of 2004 Putin (president of Russia) said Russian intelligence felt Saddam was trying to attack the US with WMDs.
Links:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53096-2004Jun n18.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3819057.stm

http://archive.sptimes.ru/archive/times/979/news/n_12787.htm

Total opposite in fact.?

Opposite in the sense Saddam was a secularist.  I would also say Saddam is/was not a jihadist. 

And I know what the reports say about not finding the WMDs, but the all say Saddam was playing a cat-and-mouse game.  The first UN inspector found and destroyed weapons that Saddam was trying to hide.  Saddam did not destroy them voluntarily.  The inspector, Scott Ritter, changed his story when someone connected to Saddam gave him half a million dollars for a documentary. 
PBS has a great documentary on this subject with Ritter, before he got PAID.  Think Oil-For-Food scandal.
Saddam was playing a game.  His bad.

My point on democracy is democracy is thrown around like it is a good thing.  I was pointing out that a democracy is similar to a lynch mob, so we should not be striving for democracy anywhere.  America is based on the rule of law with a representative republic.

Whoops, daft Wabbit.

Wolf asks:
What could have *Bush* have done to prevent this disaster?

----Apart from not cut the budget for the emergency services and repairs by 65% despite plenty of warnings? Besides fail to do any of the many fundamental things, in his tenure as president, which would normally fall to the expected lot of a leader of a even a small Island nation like Fiji, or a country like Cuba, which accoring to most Americans in need of their enlightened ways?  Or by failing to not finish off his body along with his mind with alcohol and unwholsome drugs and ways, when he had a chance?

“Has anyone (besides me) bothered to see which levees were actually slated for improvement (not the ones that broke)? Anyone (including me) try to estimate how much it would have costed to provide New Orleans with levees that could withstand a category 5 hurricane?”

---No Wolf, Rabbit thinks you are indeed the first to have breached the lofty summit from which you proudly survey your territory. All that which you have conquered.  Well done, Rabbit salutes you.

“Isn’t the city mayor the first line of defense in a storm like this? Why did he not order an evacuation? The governor?”

----Perhaps as the first line of defence he was far too busy standing guard against the weatherists to have had time to order an evacuation?

“Lastly i hope that gas goes to $5/gallon.”

---- Yes the OIL companies who are making record profits while manipulating falsely prices and gouging the last of the worlds cash reserves, could really use the extra 500% profits. That should see things up and running dandy in no time, Wolf.

“More even. We need to break the addition that ties us to the barbarians in the Middle East”

----(Rabbit has noticed the way people start to make up their own Bushishs lately. Anybody else? Isn’t that in there somewhere in 1984? Don’t people end up coining their own Newthink slogans after a while, even reducing the burden by that much on Big Brother?).

“We need to break the addition that ties us to the barbarians in the Middle East”

That Wolf is pure genius. You have in a sentence bridged the gap between all of us. It is the truth, it is a fact, and Rabbit can prove it for you, if you would like.  But that will follow.

First Rabbit wants to tell you that the following true words also are why the Iraq war like all such wars is doomed before it started.
..  “Necessity breeds innovation. . .”

You said it. More necessity also breeds more innovation too.

“at least until they enter the 20th century.”

-----They are in the 21st century, so are you.
So is Rabbit.

“We won’t do that until the pain overcomes the inertia of doing nothing.”

-----Won’t do what? Get off your arse because your bum is sore from sitting still so long, or taking what is happening to you from behind for so long, Doggie?

Wolf

Rabbit missed a one of the details of your nuanced views.

Wolf asks the very relevant question:

“Isn’t the city mayor the first line of defense in a storm like this? Why did he not order an evacuation? The governor?”

----Perhaps as the first line of defence he was far too busy standing guard against the weatherists to have had time to order an evacuation? The governor was probably the ‘second’line of defence.

There you go Wolf, does that help?

“Just take hold of any historybook and the motives for war have always been the same”

They have, but only in the sense everybody was fighting for their ideals. They were either doing this because they knew their ideals were being threatened by the only force which can truly gain by doing so. Tyrrany. Or they have as is nowadays the case for many people surrendered the care of their ideals to third parties who have not got honourable intentions.

Religions who live off the chaos they cause, like the parasites all religions become. A creed is enough. One creed for one planet, there is no room for more on such a tiny and fragile little lump of dirt and trees and grass and many strange and wonderful creatures. We not only have as much in common as you already know good Maria, but more besides. We all, from the little things to the big animals like goats and cows, people and horses, have the same ideals. define these, recognise certain irrevocable truths are the same for everyone and antthing which comes into conflict with that we discard as based on falsehood some where along the way.

Governments which is rulers for hire as we all know, gain from controlling our opinions and feeding us guff about our ideals as defined by them in tandem with religions. The two are and have always been an unholy alliance. Sometimes out in the open, sometimes in the shadows, always feeding each other and keeping each others’ rotting festering corpses alive long past the expiration dates on their labels.

The time has come to apply that which we all know is in us.

To properly do this will castrate the churches, all of them, the tyrants, all of them, in one simple step. Off with the blinfold for everyone, our universal dream.
But you had better wise up and listen people, Rabbit thinks that is Vogon Constructor Fleets, he is seeing.

The idea is shorter than the Bible. Even shorter than the Desiderata. It is almost but not quite yet the sentence which will stop the world thinks Rabbit.

Maria, please, since you are a wise soul who speaks beautiful gentle words of Nature. research Rabbit a bit. He is running loose about the place, but you can find him enough on this thread to see Rabbit.

our message the same.

Ghost Rabbit, thank you for your kind words. I agree fully with what you say about religions and governments, the problem is that apart from a little corner at In These Times, we don’t have a chance of being heard above all the noise mass media, corporations and all those who profit from this rotten system are constantly pouring over citizens. They aim at people’s minds from the very start, you would be surprised to find out all the rubbish small children are subject to. I will try to follow your track, it won’t be hard because I love rabbits’ personality. Lots of carrots.

Not every other creature on this planet has the same desire to shortcircuit the process to meeting god by swimming out to sea and burning the island behind them.

So if you all want to go having an Armageddon or Whatever you think those big peaceful slabs of stone are telling you to do, how about you all just jump into the bloody Ocean, swim out to Sea, follow that last lot of lemmings. they swore they saw God calling them out to the this time and they are off.

------PLEASE...^^… PEOPLE IF YOU ARE GOING TO DO THIS, DON’T TORCH THE ISLAND. SOME OF US HEATHENS, RABBITS AND OTHERS WOULD LIKE TO STAY BEHIND IF YOU DON’T MIND. WE’LL TAKE A CHANCE, YOUR GODS WON’T BE VERY HAPPY WITH US.

--Rabbit, expects they will probably be staying back here too, in which case the Rabbits, Babies and his friends babies, will be here to keep your gods company over the long millenia until you lot are round to pay us a visit again.

---Sincereley Rabbit

Maria, all is not as grim as it seems.

---working on that very problem very hard right this minute. That is Rabbit work, ‘something beyond the ken a’ ye we folk’ so take heart and be of good cheer. Let us take back our planet in the name of all Earth. The time is short, Rabbit has never told a deliberate lie and is not prone top exageration. just others take longer to see shiny things than Rabbits sometimes, and it just so happens to be Rabbit’s turn to kick it of this time. what you expecting a chicken.(Sorry Rooster) rabbit is deadly serious and if anybody is going to challenge Rabbit they had better do some research. he has not come here to debate further with people, it is none of gonig to stop what Rabbit see’s too, too clearly

Label me a nut and you will be eaten alive by a groundswell of opinion, if not now then over time. it is approaching and Rabbit, who has remarkably useful ears, can hear a terrible rumble and roar and Rabbit like all living animals know what that means. The only creature on the planet capable of hearing that sound and would yet stand and gossip idly or at most debate or send out scouts to see if it was maybe God, or just the wind. The only creature is you, man. All other creatures heard that sound before you were born and never forgot. This sound is the one we all only know is bigger than earthquakes, it is slower more unpredictable until the final moments.

Animals didn’t die, virtually no wild animals found drowned from after Boxing Day Tsunami. that is normal after Earth quakes and the like. Why is that?  Things humans with all your plastic silly gadgets can barely grasp are like daily conversation for most other species in their own peculiar way.

What about whales, and dolphins, there are specific grievances and they seem most convinced you are capable of communication, most animals think of humans as similar to a .. Human...^^… sorry Rabbit is stumped for a human word on that one, your own will have to do for now. Don’t make Rabbit have to rename you as a species. That is often left to Rabbit. He is very fair and holds no grudges to speak of.There is that small matter of Enslaving my forefathers and bringing them to Australia, then declaring them responsible and waging eternal war with Rabbit ever since.

In Australia, Rabbit is considered a Terrorist, more or less. Rabbit is not at fault that he is in Australia. If Rabbit is a Terrorist, then tell Rabbit how many humans have Rabbit’s killed? One foolish pre-emptive attack by an over eager and very angry Rabbit, led to no worse than the downfall of the US President, Carter.

--Young and foolish Rabbit, and how much use was that. One Rabbit, who, while he survived, had to go to the extreme act of risking his life, the Daddy of his little children and Mrs Rabbit. Scared himself half to death and probably scared Jimmy a bit at the time. Pesky Rabbits. Just bagged himself a President and a pretty smallish one at that.

Tip toe little Rabbit, past the Dragon’s lair.
Did it hear him say it, will it chase him here?

Just a little smell for now, to stir him when he wakes, bring him from his dark hole,...where rabbit knows he hides

Not the silly Colonel Shill but darkness deep inside...^^,,,

Maria, Rabbits also like Locut and Mango leaves, especially dry. Hibiscus Flowers, especially fermeted a bit in the sun. Wizums (Sultana, but why have another name so close to Banana when they are also so good. Grapes, Strawberry flowers and the green leaves on top of the fat useless red bit. Watermelon and lupins. And about seven grapes. Thankyou.

Yellow Gummi Snakes, Nutra grain. A Biscuit and Warm Herb Tea.

Yoh! Hoist up the Jon B sail!
Have at em rabbit
You is murderin da bums.

Unfortunately, the poor misbegotten mooncalfs that you are dealing with, have not even the self-awareness to comprehend how totally you have devastated them and their churlish arguments.

Unfortunately you are dealing with people who are incomplete.

They have not the capacity to perceive anything that contradicts or confronts the ideology that they worship. They simply continue on, licking the hooves of the golden calf that stands before their blinkered eye. 

It is as if they have been lobotomized and had the very “Keystone” of their humanity removed.
The capacity for enlightenment and compassion is just not there! 

They are known as “sociopaths.” They totally lack the function of empathy.

They have only their twisted self serving Ideology, which is motivated by their deep unconscious fears.  Sometimes that fear surfaces. Then they get even more ugly. Their warts and tumors become visible. They are then able to justify and rationalize the spending of our treasure in order to commit murder upon innocents.

We are going for Two Hundred thousand Iraqi’s now.  How many of that number where terrorists? 
Or like Madeline Albright has said, when questioned about the deaths of tens and tens of thousands of Iraqi youth as a result of the sanctions they imposed.  “It is a price we are willing to pay.” They are totally unable to realize the disgusting implications of such statements and policies.

They are people who are lacking. They are hollow.
A vile sub species, and a gross throw back.
No amount of reasoned, logical, or factual, argument will ever sway them.
They are carved in stone. And to that extent they are dead as dirt.

They wrap their amoral views, programs, and decisions in fine words.
Words that mean only one thing to them. “Profit”.
Words like; God, Country, or Freedom.

They project all of their copious personal unconscious hate and self-loathing upon the “other,” and thereby become worse than the foulest of things that they hate and fear. 

Their diseased pathology is fed, and spread by those that manipulate and handle them.  Spread by a dominated media, maliciously controlled propaganda and vapid diversion.

They are trained to wallow in the excrement of the lies upon which they are fed.  They flail about in their own spreading malignancies.

Any sane person would have been swayed, or at leased softened a bit by your cogent argument.

But they appear to be beyond hope.  They do not even realize how bare and naked they have been stripped.  And how ugly that nakedness appears.

They blithely continue on, licking the cloven hooves of the golden calf.

Eadora, Rabbit thinks that they are actually yet capable of advancement, in truth Think and WTH have quickly begun to think and write more cogently, Rabbit feels an enlightenment may be underway.

Incredibly Scorp has proven to be a man with eyes and not a total dittohead. He has posted in the China thread, and shown that with the right information he can form the right opinion. He was still deluded about the role played by USA in things, but there is light at the end of the tunnel feels Rabbit.

BTW the Ramjet is still lurking at the DU thread trying to spin anybody who pops up. People have been e-mailing Rabbit about him, and Natalie with the company she works for is worth a little speculation.

It’s either last chance for love and unity Eadora, or it’s going to be a fight to the finish with whoever is left.

Either way Rabbit is in it for the end run, but first things first.

Peace before war or what is the point.

The end result of War is not peace so much as exhaustion.

TOLD YOU SO. DITTOHEADS!

Britsh soldiers dressed as Iraqis caught murdering Iraqi Policemen.

http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/story.asp?j=156436186&p=y5643689z