Take it as a compliment, Gorblimey: Mr. Lechero hasn’t come up with a cogent argument in his life. He just points out that you’re a liberal and therefore you’re wrong. Very simple, and it makes “thinking” so easy.
Well Vlad..........at least I understand the difference between “volume” and “serving”
But don’t worry, I understand you not admiting you are a moron.......I wouldn’t either if I were you
Why is everyone so terrified of an Iraqi civil war? And if there is an Iraqi civil war, does that automatically mean we have no interests at stake?
No, an Iraqi civil war means that the stakes for an American victory will be even higher than they are now.
Cyril - 25 December 2006 11:23 AM
When we first became aware of the threat from religious extremist terrorism, smart people knew immediately that this was a problem that only Islam itself could solve; it was a fight within Islam for that religion’s future. Of course we could help, here and there, but the main effort of changing minds had to come from Muslims who had some grasp of modernity and were not all ate up with group identity. It turns out that there are not enough modern Muslims to stand up to the extremists - exploiters of religion to gain power, really - but we may get our civil war after all, thanks to the brilliant policy of George Idiot Chimp Bushitler.
First, you will win few converts to your opinions here if you engage in Huffington-like name-calling. I, for one, do not appreciate the President being called an idiot or a chimp, let alone compared to Hitler. First of all, it’s intellectually dishonest and secondly, it distracts from the debate. That said…
I’m a pretty smart cookie and I came to a different conclusion after 9/11: moderate Muslims are part of the problem, not the solution. They have done little since to change my opinion.
According to Islam’s own figures, between 1-5% of all Muslims are engaged in terrorism; I’d say that there should be plenty of Muslims available to stand up to the extremists. But they don’t, do they? No, instead, they make excuses for their terrorist co-religionists, attempting to blame the West for the crimes of Islam.
Here in Toledo, the Muslims leaders of the local Kind Hearts charity are accused of funding mid-eastern terrorists. The reaction of our Muslim community? Outrage that the government would dare charge Kind Hearts, calls for tolerance, and excuses for the accused. I’m supposed to expect them to confront and destroy radical Islam? I don’t think so.
Cyril - 25 December 2006 11:23 AM
Muslim Shia and Sunni may soon be wading in each others blood. This is regrettable from a humanist POV, but it may also be necessary to defeat the extremists and for the Islamic world to move into the right century. If Muslims need to slaughter each other for the next couple of decades, does that bother anyone here?
It bothers me a great deal since Saudi Arabia is already making noises about entering into the fray on the side of the Sunnis. Liberal Democrats have been braying since the beginning of the invasion that it was all about oil, and yes it was, although not in the small-minded way they thought. One of the goals of the War against Orthodox Islam is to break the power of the oil cartel that has black-mailed the West for almost a century. Imagine the effect on world oil prices if Iraq becomes a proxy battlefield between Shi’te Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia. How high do you think the cost of oil could go under those conditions? It could well make last year’s gas prices seem like a bargain basement fire sale. Are you okay with that?
Cyril - 25 December 2006 11:23 AM
Westerners learned not to fight over religion after...what? A hundred years of doing it? Things move faster in the modern world, though the fight itself might even be bloodier thanks to better armaments. The point is that these people still think they can murder over religion. THEY have to learn better.
How would you propose they learn that lesson and what do you propose we do while they’re learning it? Sit back and wait for the next attack?
Cyril - 25 December 2006 11:23 AM
You folks probably need some Christmas good cheer, so here it is...WE CAN NOT LOSE THIS WAR. What I mean is this war breaks for US regardless of how it ends. Our long term interests are served regardless of the Iraqi end state...or even an end state where there is no Iraq.
I disagree. A total withdrawal of the United States from Iraq would be disasterous for our foreign policy, our military, and our national interests.
Cyril - 25 December 2006 11:23 AM
Why? How can this possibly be? Some will snarl when they read this, but the reason is very simple: We have done the right thing, and that right thing starts at the very top. George Idiot Chimp Bushitler has led without a hint of cynicism or calculation, and those executing his policy have likewise followed. That is why we can hold our heads up anywhere and say that we, with help from our friends, and in the face of howls from the ‘world community,’ have tried our very best to help other people who desperately needed our help. That is the bottom line for this war. That is our victory, and we have it already. It is something so old (like me), and simple (again), that we sometimes forget it in our modern self confusion: Doing the right thing is always the best idea...ALWAYS.
In other words, declare victory, go home, and wait for the next attack. That’s worked out so well for us in the past in Lebanon, Somalia, Kuwait, as demonstrated by those two still-gaping holes in downtown Manhattan.
Cyril - 25 December 2006 11:23 AM
Merry Christmas to you all, and to our soldiers and Marines, God’s blessings
Having trouble with the puter while doing a comprehensive reply...I am not sure I am going to persist. While I try, suggest you go back and read my post again, this time after some deep breathing. I think you will see two things: First, we are not very far apart. Don’t let terms like Idiot Chimp Bushitler throw you, especially when I use it in a sentence praising him as a straight shooter who has done the right thing and put us into a war that we can not lose. Obviously, I am using the term against those who use it as their only means of argument - it is mockery of Huffington types, not Bush. It shows contempt for their meager “efforts.” Second, you seem to be making counters to arguments I never made. I do not think I am nearly so vague that you have to tell me what I am saying.
I hope to get my puter straightened out for a decent reply, but if not, see you around.
The following quote was posted in a box up above:
“Imagine: If GW Bush was in jail, sentenced to death. His children were killed. An Al Queda or Islamic government was in place in Washington, with an occupying Muslim Army, and patriots were forced to use crude attacks which killed Americans far more than the Muslim soldiers.
Then the US would be losing. Since the facts are exactly the opposite, we are winning.”
This is an astonishing quote, just as American as Apple Pie, and deserves to be considered. Let’s go back in history a ways, to when British troops had just chased the president out of the White House, and burned it, burned the capitol, shelled Baltimore. When British armies more or less roamed our borders at will, and their navy imposed a fairly complete blockade. Were we losing? Sure looked like it, particularly when Wellington got done with Napolean at Waterloo, and was ready to turn the world’s largest army and navy against us.
But instead they signed a peace agreement, and the war was over. At the time it was considered a draw, and since then the War of 1812 has been touted as a victory. Who am I to argue.
My take is that the reasons that Wellington and his legions did not descend on America are political and economic. The Britisih people were tired of the war, and the British Exchequer was sorely depleted by the long wars against France.
Certainly the Arabs understand that from their history. For a while the Christian Crusaders were formidable invaders, the armies unbeatable. But slowly the Arabs got better, and the Crusaders got tired. Then the Arabs got a great leader, Saladin, and the Crusaders were driven out. This took place over hundreds of years. The Arabs conquered large parts of Spain, and held on for generations of men, but then they got tired, and the Spanish got stronger, and Spain went back to being Christian, with the Alhambra and Flamenco left over to remind us of those old days.
In 1940 The German army was camped on the shore of the English Channel, and their bombers raided London at will, while Otto Prien actually took his submarine right into Scapa Flow and sank the British battleship “Royal Oak” Were the British defeated at that point? Not hardly.
Two years later all of Russia west of Moscow was in German hands, except for Leningrad, where they survived by cannabalism. The Russian army had lost every battle, and probably a million men. More casualties than the United States has suffered in all the wars it has ever fought, including both sides of the Civil War. Had the Germans won? You bet. They’d won every battle of the war so far. Had the Russians lost? Somebody forgot to tell them that they had succumbed to Shock and Awe.
You are defeated when you quit fighting, or preparing to fight. For further information, read up on the tribes of Israel in Exodus. The tribes were in captivity; Pharoah was riding high.
A few generations later the Romans thought that the Israelite Zealots at Massada were a bunch of suicidal nutcases. But who’s running Palestine these days, and who’s at home making spaghetti?
The point of all this is that a quote like: “Then the US would be losing. Since the facts are exactly the opposite, we are winning.” displays a profound lack of understanding. Our troops are in tactical stasis, while the economy supporting the army is running red ink in rivers, and the people who get to vote have just delivered a vote of “no confidence” in the The Decider who decided to look for Osama Bin Laden three countries over from where he was, and still is.
The Iraqis fighting against us may seem like suicidal nutcases, but they haven’t quit fighting. My guess is that they never will. They’ve got generations to wait for us to run out of money or just get sick of the constant drip-drip-drip of bodybags.
The democrats response to terrorism is much like a football game. They are quite content to play defense in the red zone and hope the other team does not “score”. Real patriots see the need to play offense and take the ball into their territory and score on them before they score on us and keep them on the defense and no time or tools to go on the offense.
Don’t we all love a good sports analogy. It makes it all so simple. There’s the home team over here, and the bad guys over there, and the first string, and the benchwarmers, and the cuddly little cheerleaders, god bless’em, and that good old daddy of a coach callin’ the plays, and the refs and the umpires keepin’ score,
The things that the war in Iraq has in common with NFL football is that they’re both on TV, and they both are sponsored by major oil companies. Beyond that, one is a game, and the other is history rolling out before our eyes.
are we a strong horse, or a weak donkey who leaves at the first sniff of frustration.
I suspect Osama Bin Laden knows John Kerry better than Kerry knows himself.
Perhaps the point is too obtuse or unpleasant for American liberals to fathom. To persevere stoically is to “win”...it proves Bin Laden wrong and at some point even jihadism must suffer disenchantment.
But as even the ISG points out, to quit is to prove to the jihadists Bin Laden was right and the more American blood, the more important the concessions. It will whet their appetaite, nit satiate it.
In a sense there are guarantees in geopolitics. Sticking around may not guarantee a win for us, but it denies a win for them. Leaving guarantees a loss for us and a win for them.
And this is not football and there were no gasoline ads on last night’s game anyway
In October 2002, when Senator Kerry voted to grant President Bush the authority to make war to remove Saddam Hussein from power, he declared that “Iraq has chemical and biological weapons†and even claimed that most elements of Iraq’s chemical and biological weapons programs were “larger and more advanced than they were before the Gulf War.†Furthermore, Kerry asserted that Iraq was “attempting to develop nuclear weapons,†backing up this accusation by claiming that “all U.S. intelligence experts agree†with such an assessment. He also stated that “Iraq is developing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) capable of delivering chemical and biological warfare agents, which could threaten Iraq’s neighbors as well as American forces in the Persian Gulf.â€
In an interview on Meet the Press with Tim Russert on January 11, 2004, here is what John Kerry had to say about the Iraq War:
MR. RUSSERT: You said this about Howard Dean, and this is, I think, at the core of your candidacy against Howard Dean. “...those who believe we are not safer with [Saddam Hussein’s] capture don’t have the judgment to be President - or the credibility to be elected President.†As we speak this Sunday morning, Senator, do you believe that Howard Dean does not have the judgment to be president or the credibility to be elected president?
SEN. KERRY: I think the judgment of a nominee who doesn’t understand that having Saddam Hussein captured will make it extraordinarily difficult to be able to beat an incumbent wartime president who captured Saddam Hussein. And let me tell you why, Tim. Saddam Hussein took us to war once before. In that war, young Americans were killed. He went to war in order to take over the oil fields. It wasn’t just an invasion of Kuwait. He was heading for the oil fields of Saudi Arabia. And that would have had a profound effect on the security of the United States. This is a man who has used weapons of mass destruction, unlike other people on this Earth today, not only against other people but against his own people. This is a man who tried to assassinate a former president of the United States, a man who lobbed 36 missiles into Israel in order to destabilize the Middle East, a man who is so capable of miscalculation that he even brought this war on himself. This is a man who, if he was left uncaptured, would have continued to be able to organize the Ba’athists. He would have continued to terrorize the people, just in their minds, because of 30 years of terror in Iraq.
MR. RUSSERT: But, Senator…
SEN. KERRY: There isn’t a soldier there, Tim, who doesn’t understand that the capture of Saddam Hussein helps to reduce the capacity for the insurrection, for the insurgency, and helps move forward. We are safer with the capture of a man who wanted to build weapons of mass destruction and who, actually, had them and used them at one point in time.
After reading the above and reflecting on Kerry’s current ramblings, it should be clear that this is a man with no integrity, no principles and no consistency. Why should anyone with a brain care what he has to say? The fact that the media does not treat him as a laughing stock is evidence of just how corrupt journalism has become in America. In spite of President Bush’s failings in the conduct of the Iraq War, America should be grateful this clown did not become President.
Ironman:
What does John Kerry have to do with this? He’s a defeated presidential candidate from two years ago who has quite low ratings among Democrats. He’s one of one hundred senators, and neither his policy views or seat has changed. So why would Osama Bin Laden concern himself with what John Kerry does or doesn’t think? We know how he’s going to vote, just as we know how Trent Lott will.
If Bin Laden is concerned with American politics, he’s probably wondering how the legislative center, from, say, Snowe and Collins to Webb and Inouye, are going to vote. Those are the legislator’s that Bush will have to win over to get support for his “surge and stay the course” approach. Is that going to happen? Dunno. My guess is that the administration’s officials are going to receive much more, and much sharper, questioning from the various committees than they’ve faced to date. That’s the difference between having Carl Levin, versus John Warner, wielding the Chairman’s gavel.
But mainly I don’t guess Osama Bin Laden is concentrating on American politics. It seems that he’s embarked on a lifelong jihad against the western powers that he sees as having subverted the muslim world. It doesn’t seem to matter whether it’s soviets in Afghanistan, Serbs in Bosnia, or Americans in the middle east. I also don’t think it makes much sense to be too focused on Bin Laden. I don’t think that militant Islam is like North Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh. It’s a diffuse movement, spread across continents, following different threads of leadership. If we were to kill Bin Laden tomorrow I doubt it would have much effect on their movement. He’d become a martyr, and his place would be taken. Anymore than capturing Saddam doesn’t seem to have had any positive effect on the situatiion in Iraq.
To use the old favorite sports analogy, think of Bin Laden as being a fusion of Howard Cosell and Wellington Mara, and Al Qaeda as being like the old glory days Packers, except with maybe Mick Tingelhoff instead of Jim Ringo, and with the Cowboys Cheerleaders wearing chadors, and Zirkhawi acting a lot like Terrel Owens doing the play-by-play after getting popped for steroids, or maybe having OD’d on Vicodin. You see what I mean?
seo, to say that last post was incoherent was an understatement.
I would suggest that no team has ever won a football game when it decided to leave in the third quarter. At least the way the game is played in my neck of the woods. Perhaps they have more esoteric and holistic rules in your region.
Check with Kerry, he is familiar with “Lambert Field”
The closest thing to a reason that I can come up with for your being unable to comprehend my previous box is that: a) you’re thought processes aren’t up to it, or b) you are talking about football, and I’m talking about global politics.
I don’t think the reason is a), because you seem to be quite a smart guy. The last paragraph of my post was meant as no more than a joke, unless you happened to be a real Green Bay afficionado who was familiar with the political leanings of the Packers offensive linemen of the ‘60’s. If you don’t count yourself among that group, you certainly shouldn’t take it ill.
My main point is that what’s going on between the islamic world and the industrialized west can’t be explicated with analogies to a game played within fixed rules, on a proscribed playing field, with a set number of players, within an agreed time frame. What do you mean you talk about quitting after the third quarter? Do you mean that after 100 years of occupying Jerusalem the Christian Crusaders should have blown the whistle and declared victory? Are you saying that in 1976, after 20 years of operating Iran’s oilfields however we liked, with the Shah doing our bidding, spending whatever money we let him keep out of the oil revenues back to us for new jet airplanes, should we have blown the whistle and said “we win!”?
That’s what Hitler wanted in 1942. He wanted the whole world to be so totally blown away by his remarkable blitzkrieg successes on all fronts (Calais to the west, Skarsvag to the north, Moscow to the East, Tobruk to the South) that all the world’s powers would agree to stop the fight right there, allow him his conquests as they stood at that moment, and proceed forward with the third reich admitted to the inner circle of great powers.
But the western leaders didn’t agree to his time rules, and said “let’s keep the clock running for a few more years on the thousand year reich.” And next thing you know, it all comes apart at Stalingrad and El Alamein.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Bin Laden wouldn’t have liked to stop the game on September 12, just as the Japanese would have liked to stop the game in 1942, after the capitulation of Singapore, hong kong, Corregidor,and Borneo. But the western powers refused to let the game end there, and asked for extra innings named Halhin Gol, Midway, Guadalcanal.
I hope that the lines above are comprehensible. Please forgive me if I can’t help but like the idea of Cowgirls kicking and jiving in their chadors, and the vision of Howard Cosell come back to life. Don’t we all miss him, wicked bad?
The point is that global power is not a football game. Any attempt to describe it in terms of a football game misses the point of global power, and misses the interest of football.
My only other opinion on this matter is that I think the Colts don’t have a chance. Defense is critical in the playoffs. The Patriots are in decline, the Bears? aren’t yet. If i had to bet FOR any one team right now, it might be for the Eagles.
