What opinion do you have on this? Would Clinton have done a better job? Are we 'winning?'

C'mon, tell us how you really feel.

I have a serious problem with making "war" on an abstract idea. Seems the US always gets into trouble with these...

War on Nazi Germany/Imperialist Japan/Iraq? Fine.

War on "Communism," "Terrorism," "Drugs?" Waste of time, energy, and most sadly, lives...

It's easy to see when you win a real war because the bad guys have to be there to sign the peace treaty. But with these "intangible" wars we could be going at it forever. How will we know whether we are winning or losing? Is Mr. bin Laden supposed to show up on the deck of the USS Missouri one day to sign a cease-fire?

The "War os Terrorism" will be exactly like the "War on Drugs."  It will used as an Orwellian "enemy of the state" to further rape our civil rights while simultaneously spending huge sums of our money and acheiving no perceivable results.  

The PA was passed under the "if you aren't a terrorist you don't have to worry" guise.  Just like RICO was passed under the "if you aren't a mobster you don't have to worry" guise.

Anytime you hear, "If you aren't ________ you don't have to worry" you need to worry.

Bush sucks.  Period.  Sure he's pro-gun (kind of).  Too bad he's anti-everything else.  I'm damn glad I didn't vote for him, not that Gore would have been any better (probably worse).  I have to tell you Republicans though, this lesser of two evils thing ain't too much lesser from my perspective.

The war on terror is a joke.  Unfortunately, the joke is on us, joe and jane sixpack.
Everything except nukes seems to be aimed at us.

Bubba?  He would have handled this "crisis" well.  His red face, quivering lip and teary eyes would have dominated the TV.  

He would have gotten the USA PATRIOT act signed, no doubt.  He also would have gotten something else through during the anthrax attacks that would focus on his definition of domestic terror.  And I think he would have said "yes" to arming pilots.  

No troops would have been dropped into Afghanistan, just cruise missiles and air strikes.  After a few weeks of bombing he would have declared "victory" over the Taliban.  Then he would have focused on those evil domestic terrorists.

The LAX shooting would have seen new gun laws, bank on it.  But, Bubba and Algore are nowhere to be seen.  We have "the lesser of the two evils", who will stomp us to death with a nice, soft, fur covered boot.

If Dubya and his ilk had ANY notion to protect this country and uphold the Constitution, they'd be:

1.  Radically changing US foreign policy to bring all the troops home and cut military alliances with all nations.

2.  Declare strict neutrality, but affirm our right of self-defense.

3.  Ending all foreign aid, and doing away with "laws" prohibiting Americans from giving aid.

4.  Vigorous trade with all nations.

5.  Sealing the border (temporarily) until we can get a handle on immigration.  

6.  Uphold their oath of office.  This means enforcing the Bill of Rights in its most liberal and radical interpretation (e.g. - 2d amendment means you can own any weapon you can afford short of nukes, bio, chem).

But this will NEVER happen.  History is not on our side here.  The trend is ALWAYS towards tyranny.  The "war on terror" is the perfect vehicle for the maintenance of a police state. I never thought I'd live to see it, but here it is.

Buy guns
Buy ammo
Get physically fit
Get some training
RESIST!

KaiserS....

I consider your response very well made.

You may have just replied for me.

-----------------

I think Bush has done very very well so far.  There have been some procedural screw-ups, but we're really sort of feeling our way along and we are new at this.  And contrary to what dmaas said, the war on Communism was not a waste of time or lives.  We happened to have WON that war.

Where's Osama?
Why is Bush still playing footsie with the filthy Saudis?
Why make deals with fucks like John Lindh? Why didn't they revoke his citizenship for taking up arms in the Taliban (check page four of your US passport) and turn his dumb ass over to the Northern Alliance?

1.1 billion people beg to differ.

Quite probably dead.  A better question is, "what has Al Quaeda done since the start of the war?"  The answer is nothing.



Because we need the use of our bases there for now.



Because it is damned hard to convict someone of treason.  

China has never been a free country.  Ever.
And they are not expansionist as the Soviets were.

Not to mention he is now our bitch!  Now we can legally "pump" him for info and make him dance in court.

Keving67

Quite probably? Quite probably?

Not good enough for me. Call me Doubting Jarhead. I want to put my bayonet in the wounds.


And this gives you a warm feeling? Keep walking on the sunny side of the street. I'll keep expecting the inevitable.

Seen Daniel Pearl's byline lately? Neither have I.


Our bases there are to defend Saudi Arabia. The Saudis just announced that they will not allow the US to deploy to Iraq from bases in Saudi Arabia. Fuck 'em.


Lindh was never accused of treason. We had him dead to rights on the other charges though, but gave him a deal. How much intel do you really think we're going to get from him? He's a true believer and was never a key player anyway. Fuck 'im.

Ok..

First, I think Bush has done as fine a job as anyone. The 'civil rights infringements' you talk about have happened ALMOST EVERY TIME the US has been in a major military action:

1) In the Civil War, Linclon suspended habeus corpus.

2) In both world wars, we imprisoned citizens of 'enemy' descent w/o warrants, and passed such things as the 'espionage and sedition act', which was the 1900's version of PATRIOT.

3) In Vietnam, we used troops on our own soil to control our communist/hippie/etc anti-war groups.

At the end of the conflict in question, the 'offense' stopped. Our government has (compared to others) handled the liberties it has taken *due to war* very well. Most of the actual *perminant* encroachments have been made during peacetime by (usually liberal) activist politicians, NOT as a result of war.

Any president would have had to take the steps Bush has taken. The difference is what happens from there. Note how Clinton used OKC to push for a crackdown on 'militia' groups? Think of the oppertunities such a president would see in 9/11 - Ban more guns, place more regulations on gun sales/weapons & survival traning facilities, censor the Internet, require all e-mail and encryption keys to be turned over to and archived by the FBI... The list is endless, and Bush has done little to none of it. He has just passed the same kind of feel-good-'till-it's-repealed law that we pass every time we get into a long-term military conflict.

Second, we can't just 'hide in a hole and pull the lid over our heads'. Neutrality only works when you have someone (and that 'someone' is *US* for most neutral countries today) to protect it for you. We depend on certain areas of the world (Taiwan, the M.E., etc...) for too much to just take our ball and go home. Besides, the only reason that things work so well for us is that we are in a position to dictate terms. If we loose that position, then someone else (such as China, or the EU) will gladly take it, and proceed to ram some quite distatsteful stuff down our throats. You eather lead or follow, and we don't want to get the '#2 dog view (i.e. spend our life staring at #1's ...)' of international relations. People will hate us, sure. But that's the price of being #1.

I'm not worried about the US becoming a 'police state' through the war on terror. It didn't happen when we took on Germany (twice), Japan, Communisim, even 1/2 OF OUR OWN COUNTRY! It's not gonna happen because of OBL!

What does worry is that some idiot isolationist will eventually get elected, and we'll forget all about the historical stupidity of isolationisim. We jumped into 2 major wars (WWI/II) unprepared because of our 'neutrality' (US equipment, from planes to tanks to torpedoes was TERRIBLE at the start of WWI because we never thought we'd fight a major war with it, as we were 'neutral'.). Neutrality made Belgium nothing more than a high-speed invasion route from Germany to France. Avoiding foreign entanglements works fine for a  13-state 3rd-world country with no military power to speak of (we beat the British equivalent of our National Guard in 1776, when the real deal showed up, they razed DC (1812) and we only won the war because they got their comms mixed up and had no idea of what was happening.). It does NOT work for the most powerful country in the world, with economic interests on every continent.

One last time: Lead or Follow. There are no other choices.

Bush is doing a fairly decent job with this war.

Whoever said this war is doomed like the war on drugs, I think you have a really good point.

But it would be far worse if we sat around and said "Whoever's behind this will go to jail!" launch a few Tomahawks, and pass a lot of useless laws.  This is probably what would have happened with either Clinton or Gore.

Bush has shown a lot of backbone, especially acting against Afghanistan.  Conventional wisdom was crying how we'd lose just like the Russians and English, how the winters were so terrible, we'd never be able to get them out of their caves, etc.  While Powell urged restraint, Bush went to Putin and got help in the way of Spetsnaz and Uzbek troops to help the northern alliance.  We took Kabul thanks to them in November, when Powell wanted to wait until April, not make things happen too fast.

Now with Iraq, we're seeing the UN, Europe, and liberals cry about how awful the war is, how we're bullies for wanting to take out the tyrant Saddam and no better than he is, and how we need their permission to fight our enemies.  Bush will ignore them, and we'll beat Iraq for good this time and establish a strong American presence in the Gulf that will strike fear into the hearts of the Saudis, Iranians, Syrians, and Palestinians.  They'll realize state sponsorship of terrorism will result in their governments being overthrown, and hopefully end this patronage of terrorism.

The thing that cheeses me off the most about Bush is asking Israel to show restraint against terrorists, and for continuing to deal with Arafat.  But Bush came to his senses regarding Arafat, at least.  The stupid PC security screening is also a big disappointing, but that's in the hands of Clinton appointed "underperformin' " Norman Mineta, who sees profiling terrorists as equivalent to interning Japanese citizens in WWII.

Damn Dave, you teach history? If not you should, you've gotta better understanding of it than a lot of people on this board. I agree isolationism didn't work 60yrs ago when you could actually be somewhat isolated. It's sure as hell not gonna work in todays world. Conflicts aside how can you reap anything from a global economy if your not global. Oh yeah I guess George is doin' a pretty good job overall but I'm all for kickin the illegals the hell out of here.

The Prince Sultan airbase in Saudi Arabia is worthless since they won't allow us to launch attacks to remove the Iraqi dictator lest their own dictatorship be put in the spotlight.

The Saudi Royal Family's reckoning is coming. They can hide behind their oil for only so long - especially if the Krygyzstan-Afghanistan oil pipeline is built and Iraq is liberated. Death to Fahd and Abdullah.

While nobody deserves to die the way Pearl did, only an foolish idiot would walk into a country where Jews are Blood Enemy Number 1. Pearl died an idiot. Let that be an example to these stupid liberal journalists who think they are invincible.

Bush isn't asking the Israelis to show restraint against terrorists, he is asking them to show restraint against civilian casualties, which the Israelis are not doing.  He shouldn't be "asking" the Israelis to do anything, he should be issuing orders to be obeyed, but Bush and his party is so cuddled up in Jewish money that he'll rubber stamp anything Sharon wants. It's called corruption. Oh well. No peace will be forged with Bush, Arafat, and Sharon in office.

So sorry, real life doesn't work like that.



Do whatever gets you through the night.  I try to be a bit more realistic about things though.



So, the fact a Jewish reporter in what is basically a war zone got kidnapped and killed by local radicals means that Al Quaeda has the means to launch another massive terrorist attack?
Wanna explain that logic to me?



I never thought we'd get that much from him anyway.  This just makes things simpler, keeps us from wasting time and political capital on a trial.  Twenty years is pretty damned severe given his age.

Then any president would have been a big disappointment for you and if you think no action has been taken you're either lying to me or to yourself.

Thanks, but I'm a 22yr old college student & long time military history buff... I read enough firsthand accounts about how messed up isolationisim made our armed forces back then, and the effects would be far worse now. And to think, Clinton was on his way down that road untill he realized that a short 'TV war' could distract us from what was going on back home...

As for careers, I'm in the process of applying for USAF OTS, and I'm sure hoping they take me (no, this wasn't motivated by 9/02, I've been planning to do it since 5/99).

I know this response wasn't directed at me, but I'm going to answer anyway.  Most of our presidents have been big disappointments.  We've had a couple who had balls in a good way, a few who had balls in a tyrannical, kill civil liberties way (namely Herr Lincoln and Comrade F. Roosevelt, and now Bushy boy Junior), while the vast majority are a bunch of snivelling pricks.  Bush is a shitbag.  He has lead us leaps down the primrose path to "security" (otherwise known as end of all freedom, embrace your loving commissar).  Make no mistake, Bush is the enemy.    

I think Raven has said it pretty well.  I might add that they have still failed to prosecute one idiot - Colon (exit orfice) Powell.

Historically Al Queers have taken 1 - 3 years between attacks.  Why expect them to change now?  They know the Americans become complacent again in that period and then can be stirred up all over again.

I DO think we must seal the borders until we can effectively control them.  Too easy for more Al Queers to sneak in and bring their crap with them.

Except that you apparently aren't studious enough to have realized that the U.S. was [b]never[/b] truly isolationist.



Which is eerily similar to what is going on [b]right now[/b] with the stock market scandals, and civil liberty violations.



Good luck serving our nation.  I sincerely hope that you will think about history carefully when you are given orders to bomb American civilians in the future.

If he lives to get out...

Even our criminals can be very 'patriotic' about some things... Not that it's right, but it's the truth.



Sorry, but wake up and check your numbers...

How many civillians did we kill in Afghanhisan? Samolia? Iraq? Vietnam? WWII (firebombing Japan and Germany)? The Civil War (read up on Sherman's 'March to the Sea')? Was there even a war we fought where civillians were not killed? Desirable? No. Part of winning the war? Yes. And since the US would act no differently (and probably *more* severely) than Israel if the roles were reversed, we should just shut up, sell them weapons, and hope they win.

War is bad news, people die, and not all of the dead carried guns. Israel has not once *TARGETED* civillians (which is more than one can say for their enemies) in the current conflict, and has gone to great lengths (often putting their troops at risk) to avoid such casualties. [s]Sh*t[/s]Collatteral Damage happens, especially when your targets use the civillian population as human shields! Israel's job is to win the freakin war, and the only way to do that is to hurt the Pals worse than they can hurt Israel. Besides, if living near a terrorist commander becomes hazardous to your life and property, maybe the Pals will rethink who they want to be neighbors with.

Would we have marched into Jenin on foot, or simply unloaded a couple tons of 500lb laser-guided bombs? I, for one, would bet on (and advocate) the LGBs over a land strike.

1) Our people never were completly isolationist, and the President at the time usually found ways around the in-between-wars laws that mandated isolationisim (lend-lease), but the government as an entity (especially between WWI and WWII) was. The "war's over, let's draw it all down to nothing" attitude that has been around since the writing of the constitution (as shown by the founders fears of 'standing armies' and 'international intanglements') has been a thorn in our side from the first day we became a global power.

2) As noted in my previous post, the 'civil liberties violations' are historically normal for our country when at war (or what passes for war these days), and historically [b]go away[/b] when the threat has passed.

As for the stock market scandals, economics will take care of the bad eggs quite well, thank you. It's not Bush's fault that Worldcom, Enron, et al were managed by crooks and/or morons. All of the dysfunctional companies will (like dead leaves) fall off the face of the earth, and we'll come back stronger for it. As for Bush's company, if you're going to rake him over the coals, rake over every firm in the US.

They all did what was considered 'OK' in those days, but is 'suspect' in a post-Enron world. Accounting 'wizardry' was the norm durring the 90's, and we're now seeing that the 'wizards' were really little old men behind curtains. There's more to come (Microsoft will be among the next wave, for failing to report stock options paid in leiu of wages as an expense), but this is how the economy regulates itself. You're for less government? A libertarian? Or just an economic conservative (like me)? Well, this is your system at work. And I, for one, think it's working just fine - it just needs time (which unfortunately, it may not get).

Compare this with a president who committed at least one federal crime (perjury is a crime, no matter what you lie about, or how you excuse it), and paid no attention to national defense untill he saw it as a personal defense, then suddenly loved to engage in militarily inefficient 'TV wars' whenever a scandal came up. Look at Kosovo (let's not take any risks, or make any attempt to get it over fast, 'cause then it wouldn't be pretty TV) vs Afganhistan (all out kill-the-bad-guys). And all this happened BEFORE the issues you mentioned. Bush also promised to 'deal with' Saddam *BEFORE* the issues you mentioned. War with Iraq in 2003 was being discussed in the news well before 9/11, that just added momentum to the bandwagon.

500-800 on Afghanistan. Much much much lower than WWII and Vietnam (where we targeted civillians intentionally). Iraq, Somalia, how can we ever get accurate number there? Saddam and Aedid pulled casualty figures out of their hats.

That's the Israeli party line and just as much bull. Tell me how do you "target" a single individual in a crowded apartment in the middle of the night with a ONE TON BOMB? Answer that one! I can name a dozen similar examples in the last year alone. The Israelis simply do not care about Palestinan casualties - all Arabs are the
enemy in their eyes. You don't understand how the Israelis think. They are backed up by so much UNLIMITED American firepower that don't HAVE to care about civilian casualties. Would you if you were in their position?

Israelis die every day over land, which gives the Israeli government excuses to take more and more Palestinian land for Jewish settlements.

But it's OK for the Israeli army to use Palestinian human shields in their destruction in the West Bank. I see, the liberal perspective - I can do it, but you can't.

Israel will always claim it's in a war. They do not possess the moral high ground to justify their position at this time.

Good point. Why then, does Israel continue to build Jewish settlements closer and closer to Palestinian towns who hate them? The Palestinians aren't moving closer to the Jews!

The US is not in the position of occupying an entire people and their land against their will, so the comparison is not valid.

Yes, yes, yes!!! SELL the weapons, absolutely! I agree 1000% we should SELL Israel the weapons it wants, but we don't. We GIVE them 5 BILLION dollars worth of top-of-the-line American military hardware for their illegitamate purposes.

Just like Arafat! He was even caught doing that by the UN (which isn't exactly pro-Israel), when he claimed there was a massacre of civillians in Jenin.






Simple: You do this when you absolutely, positively, need that guy dead NOW! Let's move that building to Karachi (in Pakistan), change the Hamas goon to Osama, and make it a USAF -- not IAF -- F-16. Would we give the order? Would our pilot take the shot? I would hope so. What else should we do? No commando team on earth could react fast enough (think BHD, going in after Adid) to get this guy with small-arms. So what's left? Air strike!

When civillians live near military targets, they will get killed if the target is hit. That's where most of the 500-800 civillians we killed in Afganhistan bought it, and that's where most of the Pal civillians died too. It's just what happens in war.



No more than we care now. Again, look at how we fight wars. I'm not complaining about US tactics, but rather pointing out that Israel is operating out of [b]our[/b] playbook. We shouldn't complain as long as we do things the same way (and I don't think we should change how we fight).



Of course they die over land! There are 2 things wars are fought over: Land and Money!



First of all, I'm hardly liberal. If I was, I'd be crying about international consensus, and why we can't get along. Second of all, my reference was to the Pal terrorist groups relying on their ability to blend in with the civillian population as a legitimate tactic. Much different than Israel forcing pristoners to clear their own boobytraps.



Israel *IS* in a war. They have been since 1947. In fact, it's a declared war, and Saudi Arabia, Syria, and most of the major arab powers are still formally enemies. As for the pals, they're as much at war with Hamas, et al as we are with Al Queda.




No the pals aren't moving closer. But YOU missed my point here. If they want to live next to their 'revered [s]terrorist[/s]military commander', then it's their fault when his house gets bombed. They new he was on the frag list, if they were so concerned for their lives/property, they wouldn't live near him.

As for the settlements, they have a military use. Israeli citizens all serve in the military at some point in their life, and the vast majority of them are armed. Israel uses these settlements in a manner that is very similar to what the US invisioned for it's 'Fortified Hamlet' program in Vietnam. Armed civillians capable of defending themselves against (or at least reporting) enemy activity.



Actually, we occupy a large number of South Pacific islands that we won in WWII. We also occupy Kabul, parts of Bosina-Hertzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, and... Within 2 years, we will probably be beginning a 5-10yr occupation of Iraq. In most cases, the host-state didn't (won't) exactly invite us. And in all cases, it was either very much in our interests to occupy who we did, or the occupation resulted from someone being dumb enough to pick a fight they could not win. If you start a war and loose, you loose stuff (usually land and possibly freedom (due to occupation)) beacuse of it. The Arabs started several wars, they lost, and they are now reaping the consequences. Anything less would encourage countries to pick fights, knowing that 'We'll just get our existing land back if we loose anyhow, cause the UN will get it for us!'

Israel is faced with a hostile population on their immediate borders. The leaders of said population advocate terrorisim and what would pass for war if they were a sovreign country. Untill this stops, occupation is the only solution. Appeasement does NOT work (see Hitler, just prior to the start of european WWII), it just eggs them on. Untill the creation of Palistine will not result in a declaration of war on it 1 week later due to some act of terrorisim, the Pals are not ready to have a state.

Finally, Israel and Palestine are the same country, with the same historical borders. Which country exists has allways depended on who currently holds the bigger gun. It's just as much Jewish land as it is Palestinian (if you know your history, you'll recognise that originally there were to be 2 states, Israel and Palestine. A treaty was to establish borders for the 2 countries that would take effect when Britian pulled out. [b]But[/b] the Pals refused to sign the treaty (the jews were willing), preferring to use military means to secure borders. So the Brits just said 'screw this', pulled out, and let the 2 sides determine their borders by force. There never was an official set of borders for Israel, just whatever the IDF could take.). There is only one time-honored method to solve this sort of a dispute, and that's to fight untill someone yields. It's in the US's best interest for Israel to win that fight.



Or legitimate purposes, depending on your perspective. Israel is our only true ally over there, they have an excellent (ruthless, but excellent) intelegence service that is very experienced in counterterror and dealing with Arabs. Besides, which of these 2 best coincides with US interests: '[s]Dictator[/s]President Arafat of Palestine' or 'P.M. Sharon of Israel'. Because it may be the case that only one of the 2 countries can exist at a time (We won't know untill the Pals get their own state, and either throw it all away by continuing to attack Israel, or leave Israel alone and be glad they've got a country).

The jury's still out on that one, though I stopped believing the Palestinians on body counts when A) they didn't show the bodies and B) one of the "bodies" that a Palestinian mob was carrying suddenly got up and run away (on live camera!)

The Israeli Army DID use Palestinian human shields there however (there is video and pictures showing this) as they have done in the past.

A man (terrorist) who is sleeping with his children is not an immediate threat to you. The attack was a rediculous misapplication of force.

Our pilot would not take the shot (unless specifically ordered to). They had similar situations in Desert Storm and they did not take the shot.

Unfortunately, in Afghanistan we are freely blowing up any group of people the local warlord militia tells us to.

Even if I could accept that it was correct to order an airstrike on a single terrorist sleeping with his family in a crowded apartment building in the middle of the night (and the IDF knew there were innocents there) the one-ton F-16 jet bomb was not appropriate force. Surely you agree with this? Before this they were firing HellFires at cars and buildings to kill terrorists, while still too much force and killed innocents, they caused far less collateral civilian damage than one-ton iron bombs do.

I understand this, however they continued to build these settlements in the late 1990s and mid 2000 when the Palestinians and Israelis had the most cordial, friendly relations they ever had. The Israelis don't keep building them because of buffers, they do it because they can and because Bush won't confront it. Hell even Clinton put his foot down. What does that tell you?

To whom are you referring?

The US does NOT occupy Kabul. The Northern Alliance occupies Kabul and the ISAF peacekeeping force (of which there are no US troops part of) provides security.

See above. We do not "occupy" any of these countries. US Troops are part of the peacekeeping forces of SFOR, KFOR, etc. They have their own governments, and in the case of Macedonia, their own army.

Given the accuracy of the above statements, you are unable to make that prediction. It's more likely that an ISAF, KFOR, etc type system will be adopted there.

And Israel is reaping the consequences of continued occupation. It's one thing to occupy land from a sovereign country and claim it as their own but it's another entirely to keep an entire population stateless and in perpetual "limbo".

I never advocate "appeasement". Of course you don't appease animals like Hamas or Islamic Jihad (or that cretin, Arafat). You don't give them anything - you simply stop standing in their way in creating their own state.

Let them make their own mistakes and then punish them as you would any other state.

Let them have their state. If terror comes from Palestine and it is state-financed, you declare war on the new state, just like the Arabs did to Israel. This is the only way that Israel can make any claim of being reasonable and fair to the Palestinians.

Says who? Israel has no oil, no exploitable national resources, nothing. Israel has no strategic interest to the United States whatsoever. That's part of the problem. Not that I'd ever want the Arabs to win a war against Israel, but let's be serious about how unimportant Israel really is to the US. We only give them so much support because they have bought most of the House, Senate and President.

But Israel is only our ally when we give them money, and we give them money because they have bought our politicians. I agree that Israel is a bigger ally than any other nation over there (even Egypt, whom we give another 2 billion to) but they are not a "true ally". Britain is our over true military ally, and even they are faltering (liberalism rotting the insides of the country out). Not that we really need anybody else any longer...

Which was decidely not in our interest in the first place.



You have a pretty lax grasp of history for somebody who proclaims "buff" status.  This isn't a "war" in the sense of either WWI or WWII.  This is a "war" in the same sense as the "War on Drugs" and the "War on Crime."  The restrictions on personal liberties that were enacted during these times [b]never[/b] went away.



I was thinking more along the lines of Bush and Cheney's own financial misdealings.  It really surprises me that you guys can get all bent out of shape over White Water, but don't think that insider trading is a big deal.



The "way business is done?"  The activities these folks have been involved in has been very illegal for quite some time.  This all started under Clinton, so it can't truly be blamed on Bush in the traditional sense, but he [i]was[/i] involved in illegal financial activities, which is not something to scoff at and dismiss because it's "just the way business is done."



I understand that the economy will recover.  Frankly, I don't think that the scandals are "to blame" for the economic downturn as this all started in the fall of '99.  Inflated stock prices and stock dumping, combined with a healthy dose of day trading was the culprit, along with a whole shitload of really stupid investors.



Insider trading is a crime.  A felony.  You seem to think I'm apologizing for Clinton.  I made no mention of Clinton in my post.  I'm lambasting Bush for being crooked, not saying that Clinton was a good guy.  This is the essence of the "lesser of two evils" bullshit that Republicans pull. Oh, Bush only violated federal trade laws, he didn't lie under oath like Clinton.  Bad behavior is just that, bad.  Do you get it yet, or is not sinking in?  Violation of civil liberties is bad.  The Patriot Act is far worse than [b]ANYTHING[/b] Clinton inflicted on the American people.  The COTUS and BOR protect all people, everywhere, there is NO stipulation made about being a citizen, or maybe you haven't gotten to that in your study of history.  



Just as involvement in the Balkans was being "discussed" before Clinton's woes.  So what if Bush talked about Iraq before the scandals?  The war is still being used to avoid questions about Halliburton and insider trading.

Even if that were true, does that make it right or constitutional? No way.


He also destroyed the Union as it was envisioned, and increased the power of the federal government.


In both world wars, the federal governments power increased.


LBJ drastically increased the power of the federal government here.


SOME of the infringements went away, mostly the drastic ones. But a lot of them didn't/


True, and most were made by Republicans.


So who is protecting Switzerland? Oh that's right: themselves.

A neutral foreign policy is the ONLY way for peace.


No we don't. We could easily leave the world alone and not feel and harmful effects. In fact, there would be a lot of very GOOD effects.


We are slowly moving to a police state, and that started WAY before the Perpetual Empire-Building Action(aka the war on terrorism)


And what history is that? Peace? Heaven forbid it!


We should have never gotten in those wars in the first place.



That's because Belgium had a crappy defense, not because of neutrality.



We fought the same British Army in 1776 as we did in 1812.


Sure it does. trade leads to peace.


Of course there is: Leave everybody alone, and do your own thing.


I'm waiting for RikWriter to say: When you grow up, you will learn a thing or two. Oh wait, you don't have to: you already know everything and believe in the right things.[rolleyes]

You'll be waiting a long time for that.  Being all grown up, I know the word would be "two."
And why repeat myself?  You'll pull your head out of your ass in your own good time...if you do.

It's going exactly as planned......

Are you actually suggesting we should have done *nothing* after the Japenese attacked Pearl Harbor in an act of aggression? If you note, we didn't enter World War II until that happened and weren't planning on doing so. We were isolationist and they still brought a war to us.

The US can pull out of most if not all of the world if we go in and take care of business once and for all. Knocking down the dictators in the Middle East is a good start.

No, but WWI led to WWII. Had we not gotten involved in WWI, we wouldn't have had to worry about WWII.


They attacked us because FDR maneuvered them into it.

Bullshit.  Japan was acting like a barbarous, expansionist bully, raping and butchering its way through the Far East.  We said if they were going to act that way we weren't going to do business with them, WHICH WE HAD EVERY RIGHT TO DO.  So, like a bully, they tried to intimidate us into cooperating.
But of course in your view, that's "maneuvering them into it."

Our participation in World War I had nothing to do with what happened in World War II, we entered it at the end of WWI and didn''t really make that significant of a contribution to it. Consequently, Woodrow Wilson was unable to sway the Europeans not to punish Germany as badly as it did. Had we been a bigger player of WWI like we were in WWII there would have been no WWII, or at least not the WWII we know - this all assuming Wilson would have put his foot down.

The US had nothing to do with what started World War II - it had started long before the Japenese attacked.

I wouldn''t say he maneuvered them into it. The US simply cut-off the oil to Japan for it''s aggression against its neighbors. They had no business in China, Korea, North Africa, etc in the first place. They chose to attack us because we would no longer feed their war machine. Saddam made the same mistake 12 years ago (almost for the same reasons, too).

Feel free to blame FDR for failing to act when the Japenese warned the US that the attack was coming, though.

 War on poverty, war on drugs, war on terrorism...  Welcome to the next Hundred Years' War.  Our current bogeymen of the day (OBL, Saddam) were both CIA assets in the 80s.  Remember Ms April Glaspie's reply (from Washington) to Saddam in 1991?  We have the best 'enemies' money can buy, and then some.
 Saddam is the problem of the people of Iraq.  If the Iraqis don't want him, they can depose him themselves.  Ditto for the Taliban, or whoever the Bushite fascists demonize next.  I voted for Bush b/c he sure looked like a conservative, esp. when contrasted to Gore.  Bush is a fascist, and fascist governments need a war abroad as well as a controlled population at home.  
 Go find a copy of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, and read the first third of it.  The parallels are chilling.

The only thing that is chilling is the idea that you might actually believe that ludicrous load of claptrap.

Great way to raise the ratings!


Ya gotta be kidding.


I dunno, the objectives keep changing.

You seem to forget our increasing military presence in Asia (particularly China) during the late 30s, the "sale" of weapons to the Nationalists, the threats, etc, etc.  FDR did a lot of manuevering to assure that something would happen to royally piss off the American people and incite war.  The Japs took the bait hook, line, and sinker.

The truly chilling thing is that you excuse Bush's blatantly unconstitutional behavior because he is the "lesser of two evils."  Hitler played a similar role in Germany against the communists.  We all know how well that worked for the Germans.

No, I have forgotten nothing.  I also have not forgotten that you seem to believe in some odd notion of moral equivalence, that Japan somehow had a RIGHT to butcher and rape its way through east Asia and we OTOH had NO right to try and oppose them.  Frankly, your "logic" makes me physically ill.

No, I was right the first time.  The truly chilling thing is that there are actually people such as yourself who believe that bullshit.  Somehow, Bush is evil for trying to fight Al Quaeda, but Japan was perfectly justified in both conquering east Asia AND attacking Pearl Harbor.
Seek professional help...you desperately need it.

[B]BULLSHIT[/B] China isn't as open about their expansionist agenda, as in storm the borders, bomb the shit outta the place and claim it as yours. I guess England just [I]forced[/I] them to take Hong Kong back, Taiwan is just a figment of the "Capitalist pig-dog Western press".:rolleyes: Then there's Tibet and the Dali Lama. Oh and then there's the debate over the "possibly" oil rich Spratly islands. Yeah China isn't expansionalist.

They learned from the Ruskies mistakes.

PONY_DRIVER

Did I state that Japan had the right to do those things?  I don't believe I did.  I also don't believe that I said fighting the Japanese after Pearl Harbor was wrong.  I do think that involving ourselves in something that was not our affair to begin with is very wrong, no matter what is happening.

I find it interesting that you find the blatant imperialism of FDR perfectly excusable and believe that we should have helped the Asians fight the Japanese.  I'm quite willing to bet that you don't feel the same way about the Balkans or Africa.  Horrible things are being done to people there, but I don't see you chomping at the bit to help them.  Same game, different scenery.  In case you didn't know, that would make you a "hypocrite."

[rolleyes]



Bush is evil for enacting legislation that is unconsitutional.  If you could understand what is written instead of foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog when somebody casts down your Sacred Cow, you'd have seen that.  I don't care what he does to al Qeada, but I don't see that it will accomplish anything.  Once you declare "war" on something as nebulous as "terrorism" you have already lost.  The fact that the goals of the "war" change almost weekly says a whole lot about Bush and the "war."

I [b][red]NEVER[/b][/red] once stated that the Japs were righteous for what they did.  I kindly ask you not to accuse me of writing things that I did not.



Seek an education, you desperately need it.

You know Red, denial isn't just a river in Egypt...it's the state you happen to be in.

I do not have to read the previous posts... I will answer the question of the poster.

As well as he handles the war on drugs.(an exercise in futility - a BS moneymaking campaign)

War on terror... heheh, now that IS funny.

They will continue to hit. We will continue to drop bombs.. yada yada. guess what? [b]no solution[/b] for this stuff. That you can bank on.

Oh well, may as well just give up then, huh?
God, I am certainly grateful that people like you weren't around in 1941.  Well, actually I do know that there were people like you even then, but thankfully they didn't have political pull.

Yeah, okay [rolleyes]

I think that anybody who seriously believes that any president is capable of ending world "terrorism" has some denial problems.  I guess the Patriot Act really will go away and since you aren't one of the ________ you don't have to worry, right?  Keep dreamin.'