Well first off its great to have a conversation with real people, rather than the nonsense the press on both sides of the pond pumps out. 10 pages in and people, although obviously disagreeing have having differing points of view, have put their points across in a non personal and intelligent way.
However, i feel been called "racist" is very unfair. MrSinatra - i do agree with a lot of what you are saying, but you are clearly very patriotic and see things though rose tinted glasses. You have the same one sided naive views that have caused this to become such a disaster and you have obviously completely fallen for the propaganda out government have bombarded us with. First off, you say i am racist for saying "Arabs are incapable of democracy", which i did not even say. I said that it won't be delivered via a badly conceived military campaign. No matter what the Iraqi citizens say when they are wheeled in front of the camera's from the US public, most don't care about democracy, especially if it means some much pain and death. They dont even know what it is, they just want clean water, heath care, food on their tables and their children to stop dying from stray missiles from the political vacuum the invasion caused. All of these things they had before the invasion. And thats not even accounting for the religious element - the type of Islamic tradition is unfortunately very un-democratic - you would have get some of the most deeply religious people to radically change their religious views too. And all thats before the PR disaster after PR disaster. For example, the troops raced to protect the Oil wells and put much effort into this. However, they made no attempt to protect the hospitals being attacked and robbed. Not just hospitals, but the Baghdad museum was looted and virtually destroyed - with many of the worlds most precious and ancient artefacts were lost forever. Yet the occupying forces did nothing. How does this looks to the average Iraqi? It was clear as day that the Oil was the number 1 priority. You say acknowledging this fact, and countless others, is "obnoxious and vapid". That trust they way it is, our governments have proved this time after time. Reason 1,001 why they want us out yesterday and dont care about democracy much. Then Bush goes as says he invaded Iraq because he was told to by God. Apart from the fact this is clearly a desperate attempt to gain support from the regions far right in the US and UK, it effectively told everyone he had religious motivations. That was a bad thing to say even by Bush's standards - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/oct/07/iraq.usa You say the world is ungrateful for the US's actions. This is simply not true and used as an excuse. Yes, rightly or wrongly, the US has been viewed as arrogant and self serving by some people, but the vast majority of the world has always been very good friends with the US. It's not until the Iraq war (not the previous one where Iraq invaded another country) where even people with the most historically supportive of the US have said this is all wrong this time. Whether this is illegal or not, i strongly believe we have fallen very far from the moral high ground. I completely agree about the UN, complete waste of time. i also agree that if any nation does not want to listen and comply they should probably leave. Will it be a failure in the end? Well what exactly where the goals then? Who can say, the objectives have changed so much. Anything is possible when you keep moving the goal posts. but will Iraq become a lasting and stable democracy? not in our wildest dreams. I felt i had to respond to those very personal and extensively offensive accusations. Lets keep this civil and grown up please. -- autopilot *Lounge :* Squeezebox Classic -> Cambridge Audio Azur 640a -> Mission 701's. *Bedroom :* Squeezebox Receiver -> Trends TA10.1 Class-T -> Kef Cresta 1's *Office :* Softsqueeze -> Logitech Active 5.1's. *Kitchen :* Squeezebox Boom -coming soon- *Roaming : * Squeezebox Controller -> Logitech mm28 portable speakers / Shure E2c's *Controllers :* Squeezebox Controller x 2 + Logitech Harmony one *Server :* SC7.3b (Vista 64) + AlienBBC, iPlayer & MusicIP headless. 'LAST.FM' (http://www.last.fm/user/domrevans/) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ autopilot's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1763 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=54678 _______________________________________________ discuss mailing list discuss@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss
