Al-Qaida in Iraq "the only thing acceptable is a conversion or the sword."

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: Pabster
They can blame their dictators for those unduly conditions. That isn't our fault.

Those are pretty much the conditions in Iraq right now and we've been running the country for 3+ years now. Not to mention 10 years of US sanctions, no-fly zones, and decades of financial support to the region's biggest dictators.

When does it become our fault?

Or are you a charter member of the "Blame America LAST" club?

Of course our foreign policies have had an impact in the ME region. Only an idiot would dismiss that fact. Are we responsible for everything that goes wrong there? Of course not, but let's be realistic about this.

 

[palehorse]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Or are you a charter member of the "Blame America LAST" club?

as opposed to your high-ranking membership in the Blame America for Everything Club?

 

[DealMonkey]

What did I just say, retard?

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Are we responsible for everything that goes wrong there? Of course not, but let's be realistic about this.

 

[palehorse]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
What did I just say, retard?

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Are we responsible for everything that goes wrong there? Of course not, but let's be realistic about this.

i dont CARE what you said. I have never seen you blame anyone EXCEPT bush and America... for anything!

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

Final preparations have been made for the American Hiroshima, a major attack on the U. S.

Yawn, like no one saw that coming...

 

[Pabster]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Those are pretty much the conditions in Iraq right now and we've been running the country for 3+ years now. Not to mention 10 years of US sanctions, no-fly zones, and decades of financial support to the region's biggest dictators.

Don't fool yourself. Conditions ARE better there. Are some areas worse? Of course. But I'm talking about the big picture. Perhaps you need to quit watching the mainstream nightly news and open your eyes.

As for the "decades of financial support" -- leads right back to my point. We gave them plenty of support, but they (Saddam in particular) used it for weapons purchases and to finance a life of exorbitant luxury for themselves, while their people starved to death in atrocious living conditions.

When does it become our fault?

It doesn't.

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: palehorse74

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
What did I just say, retard?

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Are we responsible for everything that goes wrong there? Of course not, but let's be realistic about this.

i dont CARE what you said. I have never seen you blame anyone EXCEPT bush and America... for anything!

Oh I see, instead of actually reading/comprehending my words, you've completely slipped into some fantasy world where whatever you say goes? Pffft, that's the stupidest response I've seen in a long while...

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: Pabster

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Those are pretty much the conditions in Iraq right now and we've been running the country for 3+ years now. Not to mention 10 years of US sanctions, no-fly zones, and decades of financial support to the region's biggest dictators.

Don't fool yourself. Conditions ARE better there. Are some areas worse? Of course. But I'm talking about the big picture. Perhaps you need to quit watching the mainstream nightly news and open your eyes.

As for the "decades of financial support" -- leads right back to my point. We gave them plenty of support, but they (Saddam in particular) used it for weapons purchases and to finance a life of exorbitant luxury for themselves, while their people starved to death in atrocious living conditions.

When does it become our fault?

It doesn't.

Yet another "insightful" reply. So when you poke the hornet's nest with a stick and they fly out and sting your ass, you blame some 3rd party? Or blame the hornets? But never blame yourself? Ahhh, as I said earlier, you're just a charter member of the "Blame America Last" club. Well played, sir.

:laugh:

 

[Harvey]

Originally posted by: Pabster

When does it become our fault?

It doesn't.

To paraphrase one of your favorite Presidents, it depends on the meaning of what "IT" is. If you want to discuss WTF we're doing in Iraq in the first place, it is most definitely the fault if the Bushwhackos and those who supported them in mounting a war based entirely on lies. It most definitely is not the fault of those of us who were intelligent enough to understand the warnings of those who warned them before they started their war. That was the unilateral work and direct responsibility of the lying, messianic, meglomaniac Bushwhacko administration. :|

They lied to the American public and the world about why they launched a useless, elective war that has killed tens of thousands of people, and they spent us into trillions of dollars of debt that will remain a burden on our society for generations to come. They did so while offering continuously shifting alleged reasons for this actions:

• There was no yellow cake uraniium in Niger.
  
• There were no aluminum tubes capable of being used in centrifuges process nuclear material.
  
• There were no facilities for making nerve gas or biological weapons.
  
• There were no long range rockets.
  
• There were no WMD's.

They ignored any information from competent internal sources that ran counter to their ambitions:

• They ignored all warnings about the possiblity of an attack like 9/11, despite explicit warnings from people like Richard Clark, former terrorisim advisor to Presidents Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton. Richard Clark also warned Bush that Saddam probably was not tied to 9/11.
  
  The Bush administration didn't want to hear that so they did what any good exec would do -- They fired him.
  
• They claimed their pre-war planning included plenty of troops to handle foreseeable problems in the aftermath of their invasion, despite warnings from Army Chief of Staff, Eric Shinseki that they would need around 300,000 - 400,000 troops to do the job.
  
  The Bush administration didn't want to hear that so they did what any good exec would do -- They fired him.

In his memoirs, A World Transformed (1998), written with Brent Scowcroft, on pp. 489 - 490, George H.W. Bush wrote:

Trying to eliminate Saddam, extending the ground war into an occupation of Iraq, would have violated our guideline about not changing objectives in midstream, engaging in "mission creep," and would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. Apprehending him was probably impossible. We had been unable to find Noriega in Panama, which we knew intimately. We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting it in anger and other allies pulling out as well. Under those circumstances, there was no viable "exit strategy" we could see, violating another of our principles. Furthermore, we had been self-consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-Cold War world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations' mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land. It would have been a dramatically different--and perhaps barren--outcome.

If only his idiot son could read!

 

[Pabster]

Originally posted by: Harvey
To paraphrase one of your favorite Presidents, it depends on the meaning of what "IT" is. If you want to discuss WTF we're doing in Iraq in the first place, it is most definitely the fault if the Bushwhackos and those who supported them in mounting a war based entirely on lies. It most definitely is not the fault of those of us who were intelligent enough to understand the warnings of those who warned them before they started their war. That was the unilateral work and direct responsibility of the lying, messianic, meglomaniac Bushwhacko administration. :|

Right, Harvey. As if the U.S. were alone in presenting what was believed to be credible intelligence to support all of the things you have in your "list"... When you say "lies" you are implying that we were all misled purposely which just isn't true, no matter how much you want to believe it is.

They lied to the American public and the world about why they launched a useless, elective war that has killed tens of thousands of people, and they spent us into trillions of dollars of debt that will remain a burden on our society for generations to come. They did so while offering continuously shifting alleged reasons for this actions:

• There was no yellow cake uraniium in Niger.

• 
  
  So once again, I need to get you on the record here. Was Saddam a threat? And is the world better off with him in a prison cell?

 

[Pens1566]

The whole "is the world a better place" argument is a strawman. And no, he wasn't a threat to us. He was basically the mayor of baghdad in 2003.

 

[Pabster]

Originally posted by: Pens1566
The whole "is the world a better place" argument is a strawman. And no, he wasn't a threat to us. He was basically the mayor of baghdad in 2003.

Having your head buried in the sand won't change the facts.

 

[Pens1566]

Originally posted by: Pabster

Originally posted by: Pens1566
The whole "is the world a better place" argument is a strawman. And no, he wasn't a threat to us. He was basically the mayor of baghdad in 2003.

Having your head buried in the sand won't change the facts.

Way to address the post.

 

[Harvey]

Originally posted by: Pabster
Right, Harvey. As if the U.S. were alone in presenting what was believed to be credible intelligence to support all of the things you have in your "list"... When you say "lies" you are implying that we were all misled purposely which just isn't true, no matter how much you want to believe it is.

I agree that the U.S. wasn't alone in presenting credible intelligence, but only because what was presented was neither credible nor intelligent, and the Bushwhackos knew it! Do I have to repeat my entire previous post to make that clear to you, or are you just in so much denial that, even after the fact, when every one of the their lame excuses for going to war have been thoroughly discredited, and we know they wer warned by the CIA and foreign intelligence services that their "evidence" wasn't credible, you still can't bring yourself out your state of denial. :roll:

So once again, I need to get you on the record here. Was Saddam a threat?

Not to anyone outside of Iraq. He had zero WMD's and zero means to deliver any he even thought he had, and the "no fly zone" kept him in a box. He was still a minor tyrant to the Iraqi people, but it wasn't anything that came close to any of the Bushwhacko's "justifications" for invading Iraq. All Bush succeeded in doing was shredding any semblance of American credibility in the world.

And is the world better off with him in a prison cell?

As if it matters, relative to what it's cost -- over 2,600 "official" U.S. combat deaths, and more if you count those killed during "non combat" events, plus tens of thousands of wounded, many probably facing a lifetime of disablity and pain, plus tens of thousands more dead innocent civilians.

Originally posted by: Pabster
Having your head buried in the sand won't change the facts.

Read your own words, and learn something. Having your head buried between your gluteal cheeks won't change the facts, either. :thumbsdown: :frown: :thumbsdown:

 

[Craig234]

Pabster, there's too much tripe to respond to now, but to pick one dropping:

"Right, Harvey. As if the U.S. were alone in presenting what was believed to be credible intelligence to support all of the things you have in your "list"... When you say "lies" you are implying that we were all misled purposely which just isn't true, no matter how much you want to believe it is. "

The US was solely responsible for the decision to invade Iraq. Whatever other nations believed, they were willing to let the inspectors finish their jobs - the inspectors who told the UN they'd found no WMD and could complete the inspections within a few months.

If the US had not invaded, there would have been no invasion by any other country.

As for 'lies' versus 'errors', there is huge documentation that the administration went out of its way to reach the conclusion it wanted by blocking and threatening anyone saying something different, creating special teams to bypass the processes set up to get to the truth so they could use shortcuts to their desired answer.

You had Cheney saying not that there was evidence, but that there was *no doubt*. You had the administration saying that he had 'reconstituted nuclear weapons programs' which posed a threat of a 'mushroom cloud' if we waited the few months for the inspectors to finish. You had them intentionally blocking counter-evidence and exaggerating.

It's not unreasonable to call what they did lying. Remember, as completely wrong as Colin Powell's UN speech on WMD turned out to be, that was the *second* version, because the first was even far more careless in its use of known falsehoods, and Powell refused to use it. That first version reflects more than innocent errors.

You can not say that this administration made a good faith effort to find the truth and inform the American people of the truth. They set out to push a message, right or wrong, to force a war policy - as the British memo noted, setting the facts around the policy. You are on the side of lying if you defend the behavior.

 

[Harvey]

Originally posted by: Craig234
You can not say that this administration made a good faith effort to find the truth and inform the American people of the truth. They set out to push a message, right or wrong, to force a war policy - as the British memo noted, setting the facts around the policy. You are on the side of lying if you defend the behavior.

QFT! :thumbsup:

 

[ProfJohn]

It really is a shame that Bush had to add the WMD and Iraq al-Qaeda link to terror on his reasons for going to war. If he would have only stuck to the fact that Saddam had directed genocide, ethnic cleansing and other gross violations of the Geneva Conventions Harvey here would have supported him, like he supported Clinton for going to war in Bosnia for the same reasons.

Of course Bush actually had the permission of congress and went to the UN before getting involved while Clinton just took unilateral action on his own, never talked to congress, never went to the UN, but we know how much of a warmonger Clinton was.

Originally posted by: Harvey
You seem to have lost your bearings (or was that your marbles) somewhere in this story. The U.S. went into the Balkins as part of NATO coalition, not a unilateral U.S. operation, and they went after Slobodan Milosovic, who was directing genocide, ethnic cleansing and other gross violations of the Geneva Conventions in operations against Croatia and Bosnia and Bosnia. There's more than enough evidence of Milosovic's crimes to know that going after him was justified. Ask the Albanians, Bosnians and Croats who survived it.

Repeat after me "There's more than enough evidence of Saddam's crimes to know that going after him was justified. "

 

[judasmachine]

And they were mad at the pope for saying that?


I am tiring of these people. We need to root them out and take them to trial, or send in a competent force of spies and special forces to destroy them. This wholesale invasion stuff isn't working at all, in fact it appears to be making it worse. I suggest we give the SEALS, Green Berets, DELTA, whoever the permission to take these people out when they find them, if they can't take them alive and bring them to trial.

just my ever more frustrated .02.

 

[Craig234]

ProfJohn, that's a very distorted telling of history. You leave out the big issues.

Here's a few pieces you omitted: immediately after Saddam was gassing Kurds, the Reagan administration *rewarded* him for it with improved relations, sending Rumsfeld as an envoy.

Of course, the stated reason was not the use of the gas - we 'officially' slapped his wrist - but the fact was that immediately after, we rewarded him with improved relations.

You claim it would be easy to cite Saddam's bad behavior gassing Kurds to justify invading in 2003 - not so much: given our earlier rewarding of it, given the Gulf War, and given that Saddam had long given up doing so and the Kurds were living autonomously in the north, there was no war justification.

Two more facts: the US committed a war crime with the invasion by violating our pledge to follow the United Nations charter; and some Americans are unable to face that. It's little different than Germans who could just not face what their country had done in WWII, or Japanese who just can't face what they did to China.

But denying the facts doesn't make them go away.

Ironically, Bush's war had the potential for actually doing something visionary and moral, had it been done competently instead of filled with Rumsfeldian fetishes for low resources, right-wing think tank fantasy policies, a priority for rewarding cronies and sending right-wing kids with no experience but applications to right-wing think tanks to run things.

Instead, he's given a bad name to American spreading democracy by force for perhaps decades to come, around the world, making him a historic enemy of democracy akin to Neville Chamberlein giving a bad name to peace negotiations.

 

[Pens1566]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Of course Bush actually had the permission of congress and went to the UN before getting involved while Clinton just took unilateral action on his own, never talked to congress, never went to the UN, but we know how much of a warmonger Clinton was.

Wow. Just wow.

Bush did try to get a UN resolution to authorize an invasion, but it never went to a vote because it was pulled by the US. China, France, and Russia would have vetoed it. He DID NOT have UN approval for the invasion.

Clinton in Bosnia was part of a UN Force, with UN approval. He didn't have to "go to the UN' (whatever that means) because it was a UN effort in the first place.

I hope you're not a history professor.

 

[Pabster]

Originally posted by: Craig234
Two more facts: the US committed a war crime with the invasion by violating our pledge to follow the United Nations charter; and some Americans are unable to face that. It's little different than Germans who could just not face what their country had done in WWII, or Japanese who just can't face what they did to China.

Another BAF member with war crimes accusations

We don't need to seek UN approval to defend and protect this country. And god willing, we never will.

 

[palehorse]

Originally posted by: Pabster
We don't need to seek UN approval to defend and protect this country. And god willing, we never will.

QFT and bolded for emphasis!

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

Originally posted by: Pabster

Originally posted by: Craig234
Two more facts: the US committed a war crime with the invasion by violating our pledge to follow the United Nations charter; and some Americans are unable to face that. It's little different than Germans who could just not face what their country had done in WWII, or Japanese who just can't face what they did to China.

Another BAF member with war crimes accusations

We don't need to seek UN approval to defend and protect this country. And god willing, we never will.

Because Saddam was a great big threat to the US, with his huge arsenal of WMDs!

Not to mention that he was extremely good friends with Bin Laden, who offered the Saudis to use Al Qaida to drive Saddam out of Kuwait.

 

[ProfJohn]

Originally posted by: Pens1566

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Of course Bush actually had the permission of congress and went to the UN before getting involved while Clinton just took unilateral action on his own, never talked to congress, never went to the UN, but we know how much of a warmonger Clinton was.

Wow. Just wow.

Bush did try to get a UN resolution to authorize an invasion, but it never went to a vote because it was pulled by the US. China, France, and Russia would have vetoed it. He DID NOT have UN approval for the invasion.

Clinton in Bosnia was part of a UN Force, with UN approval. He didn't have to "go to the UN' (whatever that means) because it was a UN effort in the first place.

I hope you're not a history professor.

Wrong, Clinton never went to the UN over Bosnia, it was a NATO force. Please post me a link showing Clinton getting any kind of permission from the UN for what he did in Bosnia.

I will give you points for your Bush and UN comment. We never got a direct OK to use force from the UN. We did however get some resolutions with vague wording about actions etc. The President and other say that wording was justification, others say it is not.

However, when Saddam violated the UN cease fire from 1991? we had the right to "resume" the war so to speak, and I believe that was one of their arguments.

In March, military forces from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), headed by the United States, began launching missiles and bombs on military installations in Kosovo and Serbia. This action was not approved by the U.N. Security Council, and strongly opposed by Russia and China. NATO air strikes devastated Serbia, and many key targets were destroyed beyond repair.

BTW: I have seen the congressional resolution passed after the fact in Bosnia that said what Clinton did was ok under the war powers act etc, emphasis on AFTER THE FACT though.

 

[Pens1566]

My mistake on the UN/NATO confusion. So, it looks like neither had UN backing then. Cool. Care to update your still incorrect sig to reflect that fact?