> If we were doing the same things in Iraq that we did in Vietnam (which you > obviously think is an appropriate analogy), you'd be right. However, we > are not doing the same things.
I'll direct you to the writing of David Hackworth on that one. Oh, and William Lind over on Lew Rockwell > I know you want a number. But a number isn' t appropriate, here. > Progress or lack thereof is the determining factor. Progress toward > self-determination and self-government is what makes the difference. > Should FDR have thrown in the towel after 5,000 casualties? 10,000? That > wouldn't have gotten him past Pearl Harbor, Bataan and Corregidor! Saddam was an Iraqi problem, not an American one. Toppling him is worth 0 American lives. WWII is not a good Analogy either - if anything it's worse than Viet Nam - Japan Attacked the US (Arguably after provocation from and with foreknowledge by FDR) Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. It had no WMDs and no weapons systems that could attack the United States. If he was such a threat why didn't Iran and Saudi Arabia join the attack? Why were Turks 98% against the war? They hated Saddam but apparently they saw no threat from the guy. The Kurds hated him and saw a threat but Saddam's use of Chemical weapons against these people raised at best lukewarm words and no actions from the U.S. and Tacit approval from the Turks. There was no relationship between Saddam and Osama no matter how many times the pop-conservatives repeat it (That's the Big Lie as seen on the History Channel) Osama actually petitioned the Saudi Arabian Government to be allowed to lead a campaign against Saddam in 1990. 9/11 wasn't about Iraq and Iraq was not involved. So attacking Iraq in 2003 using 9/11 as an excuse makes no sense. It's the Chewbacca defense. It just makes no sense. > If you think the January 30 elections in Iraq are going to be a sham, did > you also think the same of the Afghan elections before they were held? I *don't care*. Afghanistan Democracy or lack thereof is an Afghanistan question, not worth a single American life. Al Qaeda and fanatical Fundamentalist Muslim terror groups are who attacked us. Killing them is what our military should be doing. Installing puppet governments got us into this mess. I doubt installing Puppet governments is going to get us out. So I suppose based on that statement no, I don't have a lot of faith in the Afghanistan Elections. Nor the Jan 30 Iraqi ones. This shows that > more and more Sunnis are deciding that their best bet for achieving their > goals will lie in the political not military realm. I hope you're right about that. I can't help but think learning the names of some of these folks and actually talking with them before the invasion might have been a little smarter. And here's something to consider for you - November was the bloodiest month in quite some time with more attacks and more American Casualties - no "Insurgent" or guerilla army can operate for long with out the support of the native population. If Guerilla and "Insurgent" activity is picking up then thats evidence right there that they are getting more support from everyday Iraqis >>IMHO Their democracy or lack thereof isn't our problem and isn't worth >>spending American lives on. > > When their society can generate young men who want to fly airplanes into > our buildings, it becomes our problem. Then why aren't we Bombing Saudi Arabia? The Hijackers were mostly Saudis! > Actually, the evidence points to greater foreign involvement and > resources. Again, there's no way they could operate without support from the Iraqi people. > Can I take this as a prediction? Jay P. Hailey has predicted that Iraq > will split up into three separate states without a central government as > soon as the American forces leave? Sure. Yeah. I'll go for that. That or a failed state > I'm sure they've also noticed who is sending in all he car bombs, etc. > that have killed far more civilians. You sound really certain about that. How can we get any good information about how Iraqis are thinking? Anything that support my POV that they hate us, you'll write off as Biased Liberal propaganda Anything that supports your POV that the Iraq war is working I might well write off as Conservative Denial. Where can we find some information that doesn't have an agenda behind it? I am not sure it's out there. I am not sure ANYONE WANTS agenda free information. > Oh, the troops keep finding them. Found some more in Fallujah last week. > (Of course, I defy anyone to point me to a speech or major public > pronouncement made before the war where the administration claimed that > Iraq HAD WMDs. Oh, easy. http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/02/20030205-1.html Transcript of Collin Powell in front of the UN Security council. He says Weapons many times, and speaks of Weapons and weapons programs as seperate items. http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/10/20021007-8.html In Bushes' Speech transcribed here he says it bluntly that Iraq has WMDs under control of Saddam. http://www.lewrockwell.com/cummings/cummings22.html Here's an article detailing some of the lies, but you could write that one off as "Opinionizing" if you wanted... http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Nov2002/n11142002_200211141.html There we go, US Department of Defense Website transcript, Donald Rumsfeld says it straight. I'd advise you to take everything Rush Limbaugh and his fleet of Pop-Conservative clone mouth pieces say with a grain of salt. They lie like rugs. O'Reilly, Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter even (Sadly) G. Gordon Liddy They lie and have no, none, nada, zip nothing in the way of principles. > The claim was always that Iraq had WMD programs and materiels which had > not been sufficiently accounted for and destroyed.) Yeah but The inspectors, including Scott Ritter, a US Marine and Long term inspector said they weren't there, something he maintains to this day. The CIA was also uncertain. Who was certain and why won't they admit they were wrong? > As for the terrorist ties, from Ansar al Islam causing trouble for the > Kurds in the north to Abu Nidal, and al Zarqawi in Baghdad, to $25,000 > payments to the families of Palestinian "suicide bombers" in the West Bank > and Gaza, these, and more, were all documented before the war, and were > confirmed after. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansar_al-Islam Seems it was confirmed in a negative sense > You don't know that. You are simply parroting the liberal press line. Do > you really think that Condoleeza Rice (who supposedly tutored him on > foreign policy during the 2000 campaign) is suddenly going to turn into a > mushy "yes-woman?" C'mon, you really believe that? Hell, Yes. She's the one who backed a way bthat has killed 1200 americans with a mystical mushroom cloud that wasn't coming. She's been in favor of the war since the beginning no matter how bad an idea it was. So to call her a Yes Woman to Bush may not be appropriate but she toes the Neo-Con line pretty well and never seems to tell them no. > It's one thing to get rid of people who are giving you contrary points of > view. It's another to get rid of people who have given you consistently > bad advice "You break it, You Bought It" was bad advice? As if? > and who are consistently leaking things to the press in a way that damages > your agenda. If that agenda is stupid and leads to unwarranted death and enhances the power of our enemies.... Yeah, I think that's not too bad a thing. > I'm hoping that Dr. Rice will do the honors. Yeah, but Rumsfeld also had a habit of not listening to experience people. General Anthony Zinni for example, or even Collin Powell who were advising that the war in Iraq would be longer, bloodier and more difficult than his optimistic projections. So is Condi Rice goign to say "Speak Truth to Power" or is she going to say "Confirm my preconceptions" ? I am betting on the latter and this is not a good thing. >>Iraq is a disaster for the United States. The idea of benevolent hegemony >>is the most egregious and vile miscarriage of American policy ever. > > 911 was a disaster. Iraq is on its way to being a victory--costly, messy, > yes. But a victory, non-the-less. Above you accused me of parroting the Liberal media Well here it sounds to me just exactly like you're parroting Whitehouse Talking points and Pop-Conservative drivel. >>American needs to worry about being free inside our own borders. Not >>about >>this "National Greatness" fascism. > > You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Jay! The fascists and Nazis invaded > countries so they could loot them and run them. The US invaded to > establish democracy where none existed before and has sacrificed blood and > treasure to do so. You're smart enough to know the difference. I am Ashamed of my country for invading other countries and lying about why they're doing it. And you ought to be ashamed for falling for the lies. > So, are you now making another prediction? That there will NOT be an > election in Iraq? That Bush was just talking about elections there to be > able to get re-elected himself? > > Lowell C. Savage I am making a prediction - The pro-Amewrican Candidate will win the election and this will be followed by more violence and chaos. Basically it will be more of the same while the U.S. tries to prop up a ruler the Iraqis don't want and don't trust (See the Diem regime in Viet Nam) Or - an Anti-American Candidate will win the election. Following which the U.S. government will sadly announce that the election was too tainted and corrupted by terrorists and corruption and the result must be discarded until "order and safety are more assured". There's only about eight weeks and we'll see what happens. -- Jay P Hailey ~Meow!~ MSNIM - jayphailey ; AIM -jayphailey03; ICQ - 37959005 HTTP://jayphailey.8m.com "The vulgar fictions of a demented Irishman." - Louis _______________________________________________ Libnw mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] List info and subscriber options: http://immosys.com/mailman/listinfo/libnw Archives: http://immosys.com/mailman//pipermail/libnw
