Muslims and thermonuclear fire *fap fap fap*

[Stuart Mackey]

This thread has led me to the conclusion that the fabled Baghdad Tiger is indeed alive and well and in full throat.
That is all

[Elfdart]

Sure, we could leave the Middle East with little problem for ourselves. But as long
as Big Oil and Big Israel have (as LBJ would say) Uncle Sam's pecker in their pockets,
we're going to be stuck in that Middle Eastern tar baby and we'll be stuck listening to Kast
and the Shepster fap-fap-fapping "Bomb them! Nuke Them! Oh God YES!"

Mr Dart is almost as stupid as Mr. Kast. However, I do belive that Mr Kast takes
the Cake, as it is. And how is paying billions of dollars to Egypt and Israel as
part of a peace deal ending the state of war between those two having Uncle
Sam's pecker in their pockets?

Egypt is really the only Arab state that can actually put up a good fight with
Israel, and by removing her from the equation, we have managed to prevent
an Arab-Israeli war for thirty long years, since the other arab powers are just
too weak, and can only press Israel on a single front.

Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982, numbnuts. So much for keeping the peace. And for the record, I don't think Egypt should have access to the Treasury either. This is a preemptive (Kast would like that! ) rebuttal to your trivia about Egypt having M-1s. So pucker up and kiss my ass.

Neutrality hasn't been tried and found wanting -it hasn't been tried at all!

Funny, I seem to recall four US Laws being passed during the 1930s called
just that.

Again, Proof, bitch

The Neutrality Act of 1935 prohibited American citizens from selling arms to belligerants in
international war. It resulted from Italy's invasion of Ethiopia.

The Neutrality Act of 1937 stated that United States citizens could not sell arms to belligerants in
Civil Wars, including the government side. It resulted from the Spanish Civil War.

Later in 1937, a second Neutrality Act forbade travel by U.S. citizens on ships of belligerents.
This was aimed at the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945).

Proof of what? Other than my point, of course. Notice how I used the term honest neutrality? While Americans were not allowed to help the Spanish Republic (though many did anyway), Texaco, Ford and others openly supported Franco, Hitler and Mussolini in the Spanish Civil War. Is that "honest neutrality"? Maybe to someone who beats his bishop at the thought of a thermonuclear barbecue of millions of innocent people. To sane, rational people it isn't. By the way, I accept your inadvertent concession. Beeeyoooootch!

1) Some Muslims were every bit as fanatical over a hundred years ago. Yet there were no
suicide bombings of Americans during the Chester A. Arthur administration.

Again, you're full of shit

Proof again motherfucker

The Kafir of Nurestan were forcibly converted to Islam in 1896.

Back in 1896, they didn't have clothes made by DuPont, however, they had
sword waving scumfucks.

Proof that you rebutted a point I never made -and that you're ready for the funny farm. The glorious Arthur administration ended in 1885. The events your source described happened 11 years later, and do not mention anything about bombing American citizens.

At this point, MKSheepfucker rambles on about threats made against other European countries. Well that's nice, except (1) they've only attacked the US and our allies who helped invade Iraq and (2) Uncle Sam is the main target for the reasons I listed before.

They're settling old scores, hrm...I think they're still pissed about old Charles Martel
stopping them cold all those years ago; right now, The Great Satan is on the top of
their Hitlist, the Euros are simply #2, instead of #1.

How about they don't like being occupied by the US, American allies or American installed/ backed quislings? You know -things that have gone on in the lifetimes of those who are alive today. Nah! It's revenge for Martel. By that logic, Hitler wasn't really upset over Versailles, the Ratsrepublik (sp?), and other grievances, but the death of Otto the Great and his failure to unite his Reich.

Bin Laden is up front about his grievances, which are:

Wrong.

OBL's real goals

Al-Qa'ida's goal is to "unite all Muslims and to establish a government which follows the rule of the Caliphs."

Al-Qa'ida's goal, therefore, is to overthrow nearly all Muslim governments, which are viewed as corrupt, to drive
Western influence from those countries, and eventually to abolish state boundaries.

You can see the kind of government that OBL wants to inflict on us all in
Afghanistan under the Taliban, before they were destroyed.

This is lamebrained bullshit even by your standards, Sheepfucker. As you and your source point out, Bin Laden's goal is to unite the Muslims under fundamentalist rule and to drive infidel influence out of their New Caliphate. There's nothing about invading North America to make the fine people of Peoria wear burkas. Thanks for providing me with the smoking gun to expose your nonsense in your own post. Any more self-inflicted wounds coming, numbnuts?

Railing about the four greviances is just a convient smokescreen that people like
you use to avoid the cold hard truth that he wants to cut your balls off, and use
YOU as an enuch to guard his harem in the grand new Islamic Khalifa that
he of course, will lead.

No, it's the use of things like logic, reason and common sense. But who needs that bullshit when people like you can grease their palms and leave their copies of Curtis Lemay's diary with the pages stuck together?

They hate us for the reasons I listed above.

Wrong, they hate us because we are infidels, and have strayed a major metric
fuckload from the "true path" of Islam, yet we have had wondrous things
showered onto us, while the Arab world degenerated into a sand pit until the
kafirs discovered oil.

The thinking is, if the Islamic world 'rediscovers' true Islam, as put down in the
Koran, then worldy riches will fall down onto them granted by a kind Allah. Of
course, those pesky Kafirs will have to be destroyed or forcibly converted
first.

If it comes down to incinerating millions or seeing the Islamic Khalifa promoted
by Osama and his ilk spread across the face of the earth like a cancer, I'll incinerate
the cancer before it can spread any further.

And you have the nerve to call them maniacs?

One more thing: You claim that the Muslims were friendly because of the Barbary Wars. The problem is that we are in the years A.D. (or C.E. for you godless heathens ). The higher the number, the more recent the year is. The Sultan of Morocco recognized American independence from Britain in 1787. The FIRST Barbary War started in 1801. So either you don't know what the fuck you're talking about and are heeding the old sage advice: "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit!"; OR the towel-wrappers perfected the art of time travel over 200 years ago -but only used it to backdate a treaty to make you look stupid. If they can do that, do you really want to tangle with them?

[Patrick Degan]

So, because our actions have made the Middle East dangerous, the solution is to repeat those actions on a larger scale, eh?

No, you moron. Because our actions have made the Middle East dangerous, the solution can't help but involve violence.

The Middle East won't change on its own. Look at governments like that of Saudi Arabia. Teetering on the brink. The institutions that most need to be there have no credibility - and, worse, no power, besides. That can't change but by outside intervention.

Except outside intervention is what caused this problem in the first place, tiger-boy, and you either can't or won't explain how repeating this disaster on a larger scale will somehow result in a different outcome beyond simply asserting ad-infinitum that it will.

[Elfdart]

Sure, we could leave the Middle East with little problem for ourselves. But as long as Big Oil and Big Israel have (as LBJ would say) Uncle Sam's pecker in their pockets, we're going to be stuck in that Middle Eastern tar baby and we'll be stuck listening to Kast and the Shepster fap-fap-fapping "Bomb them! Nuke Them! Oh God YES!"

First of all, I’ve said nothing about dropping nuclear weapons on any country in the Middle East, so you can take that strawman and shove it up your ass.

I was referring to you AND MKSheepfucker. Bite me.

Secondly, don’t act as if we haven’t already hashed out the question of “Big Oil” to your distinct disadvantage.

Who is we?

Not only is the United States far from being alone in needing access to Arab oil (see Japan’s position of the ’91 Gulf War), but we’re nowhere near a practical replacement for the black gold at this point in time. The sheer cost of restructuring both our economy and our infrastructure away from oil and toward the brave new world of hydrogen power is simply too great. We’re talking forty or fifty years away, not ten or twenty. Pulling out of the Middle East simply isn’t a practical option. Not to mention that we’d have a bunch of self-destructing shithole to deal with even if we did forsake their biggest export (and, in general, sole source of hard cash).

This Grand peur about the oil is a joke. Of course we're there for the oil. Let's assume for the sake of argument that Iran succeeds in more or less taking over southern Iraq and so on... and ends up controlling a large amount of oil. What then? (At this point the fap-fap-fapping reaches fever pitch!) Will the mullahs let the oil fields sit fallow? Will they refuse to sell it? Will they jack up the price? No, no and probably not. THEY WILL SELL IT! If anything, we'd get a break on the price as OPEC takes a well-deserved plunge down the shitter.

Come now. You’re smarter than this. Or are you next going to tell me that you honestly believe we’ll be safe, if only we forsake national security and economic interests in the name of pleasing everybody?

What national security? We've made enemies of over a billion people because of oil and cretinous military/ imperial pretentions -and the Israeli lobby. Before we started this bullshit we were on friendly-to-indifferent terms with the Muslim world. Now they hate us enough to want to kill themselves and some of us with them.

Long term economic interests are not served by climbing into bed with thug regimes that rob, rape and kill their people -as long as they don't fuck with BP, Conoco or the other oil companies. Sooner or later these regimes get overthrown and the angry citizens of those countries will remember who was on whose side... Payback is a bitch -just like Ann Coulter.

Britain and the US overthrew Mossadegh in Iran because he nationalized BPs assets. Now the mullahs are in charge and BP STILL loses their assets and the money from those is used to blow up American and British citizens. Great.

Some Muslims were every bit as fanatical over a hundred years ago. Yet there were no suicide bombings of Americans during the Chester A. Arthur administration. In fact, Muslim countries were historically friendly to us and among the first to recognize our independence.

Because the United States was barely a speck in anybody’s eye until the mid-nineteenth century, genius. Chester A. Arthur’s United States was largely incapable of stirring resentment among what were then either Ottoman or Persian subjects.

Concession accepted.

If Bin Laden and his kind hate America for sexual license, women's rights and tolerance for minority religions, why aren't bombs going off in Stockholm, Amsterdam, Copenhagen and Oslo? These countries are MUCH more liberal about such issues than we are. Canadians are culturally more or less Americans -only decent and civilized *. And yet Bin Laden hasn't attacked Canada. What gives?

I certainly didn’t say he did.

I was refuting the canards thrown around by know-nothings. You are not a know-nothing. You are a has-no-common-sense.

U.S. occupation of Saudi Arabia

We were invited by the government to station large troop contingents in case of a resurgence of Iraqi power.

U.S. sanctions against Iraq and the subsequent invasion

And you believe the post-Gulf War sanctions regime was unnecessary? Or the Gulf War? Bin Laden’s anger here is directed against America’s ability to shape events without his input – even when those actions were fairly popular.

U.S. support for Israel and the piecemeal ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians

Hatred of the United States in the Middle East goes far beyond our support for Israel. There would still be an al-Qaeda even without an Israel.

I fucking hate cutting and pasting. I'll answer your points here:

Iraq only invaded after Bush the First's ambassador told Hussein that GHWB didn't care about border disputes between Iraq and Kuwait. Would he have done it anyway? Who knows? But for the US government to claim credit for reining in their pet monster is like the owner of those Presa Canarios in San Francisco who killed her neighbor. She claimed with a straight face that even though she encouraged her dogs to be utterly vicious, when they were mauling her neighbor, she THEN pulled them back and should not be blamed for the spilled blood. She shouldn't have started with the fucking dogs in the first place! By your logic, it's OK to play with matches by a gasoline pump -as long as I eventually put out the fire. Rogue 9 also falls into this kind of harebrained thinking: Meddling in WW1 was justified by the Allied victory in WW2. I call "BULLSHIT!" on this line of thought.

[MKSheppard]

I find it funny that Elffart chooses Kast's comments to reply to, and not mine.; they truly do deserve each other.....

[MKSheppard]

I find it funny that Elffart chooses Kast's comments to reply to, and not mine.; they truly do deserve each other.....

My fault, I didn't scroll up

[Elfdart]

I find it funny that Elffart chooses Kast's comments to reply to, and not mine.; they truly do deserve each other.....

My fault, I didn't scroll up

You're inconsiderate as hell. I go to the trouble of flaming you and you skip it.

[Axis Kast]

How do you know? It's never been left alone, so how do you know? Whether it was the Ottomons, the British or the US, some entity has always been fucking around.

And why has it always been so susceptible to being “fucked” with? The Ottoman Empire wasn’t merely the victim of European aggrandizement, but also a victim of its own failure to effectively govern its disparate holdings. The Europeans took advantage of schisms that the Sublime Porte could not itself heal. Those kinds of systemic shortcomings are evident even today. Take Iran, for example, where despite intermittent word of their rising popularity, reform movements have made no headway in the political battle to secure meaningful change. Or Iraq, where Saddam Hussein would surely have remained in power had we not acted, because power had been so effectively centralized in the hands of a particular elite.

Pulling out and leaving well enough alone doesn’t erase the past. The Middle East’s terrible scars cannot be healed if only we don’t look through the curtains as frequently. That none of you seem to be able to grasp this is absolutely frightening.

But it's YOUR FUCKING AROUND which corrupts or invalidates those institutions! Why don't you step back, apologise, invite there sporting teams over, and be nice for a change?

Apologies will only engender questions of weakness. Stepping back will not change governments long proven ineffective, unable or unwilling to stifle trouble.

Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982, numbnuts.

Because it was a hotbed of terrorism. Unable to control its own affairs, Lebanon placed its own soverignty into question.

Proof of what? Other than my point, of course. Notice how I used the term honest neutrality? While Americans were not allowed to help the Spanish Republic (though many did anyway), Texaco, Ford and others openly supported Franco, Hitler and Mussolini in the Spanish Civil War. Is that "honest neutrality"? Maybe to someone who beats his bishop at the thought of a thermonuclear barbecue of millions of innocent people. To sane, rational people it isn't. By the way, I accept your inadvertent concession. Beeeyoooootch!

White-gloved, spotless neutrality is an illusion. You can’t offer a single example of sterling neutrality during the course of the events leading up to the Second World War. Raising a fantastical standard isn’t going to win you any arguments save with yourself.

Except outside intervention is what caused this problem in the first place, tiger-boy, and you either can't or won't explain how repeating this disaster on a larger scale will somehow result in a different outcome beyond simply asserting ad-infinitum that it will.

No you don’t. The only one repeating unfounded arguments is yourself. Such nonsense about turning back the clock and ignoring the fallout of decades of foreign policy and consequences.

Intervention on a larger scale is aimed at producing credible, resourceful government capable of reducing the feelings of hopelessness and emasculation that otherwise thrive in the Arab world, where responsible government has been a glimmer in so many eyes for all of modern history.

The higher the number, the more recent the year is. The Sultan of Morocco recognized American independence from Britain in 1787. The FIRST Barbary War started in 1801. So either you don't know what the fuck you're talking about and are heeding the old sage advice: "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit!"; OR the towel-wrappers perfected the art of time travel over 200 years ago -but only used it to backdate a treaty to make you look stupid. If they can do that, do you really want to tangle with them?

Because it meant he could prey on American shipping in the region without officially engaging a British client or possession. Not to mention that diplomatic recognition does nothing to absolve Morocco of having been a pirate state like its neighbors.

I was referring to you AND MKSheepfucker. Bite me.

And wrongly so.

Who is we?

This whole board. And the conclusion is clear: the American economy cannot be rationally restructured inside the next forty years – even assuming a massive, overriding shift in budget expenditures. It’s simply impractical.

This Grand peur about the oil is a joke. Of course we're there for the oil. Let's assume for the sake of argument that Iran succeeds in more or less taking over southern Iraq and so on... and ends up controlling a large amount of oil. What then? (At this point the fap-fap-fapping reaches fever pitch!) Will the mullahs let the oil fields sit fallow? Will they refuse to sell it? Will they jack up the price? No, no and probably not. THEY WILL SELL IT! If anything, we'd get a break on the price as OPEC takes a well-deserved plunge down the shitter.

What does this have to do with refuting my point that we still need oil?

There are other reasons besides economic concerns surrounding our desire to corral Iran, you realize. Reasons involving the Jerusalem Force, Iran’s status as a vigorous state sponsor of terrorism, and its decidedly hostile stance toward the United States.

What national security? We've made enemies of over a billion people because of oil and cretinous military/ imperial pretentions -and the Israeli lobby. Before we started this bullshit we were on friendly-to-indifferent terms with the Muslim world. Now they hate us enough to want to kill themselves and some of us with them.

Long term economic interests are not served by climbing into bed with thug regimes that rob, rape and kill their people -as long as they don't fuck with BP, Conoco or the other oil companies. Sooner or later these regimes get overthrown and the angry citizens of those countries will remember who was on whose side... Payback is a bitch -just like Ann Coulter.

Britain and the US overthrew Mossadegh in Iran because he nationalized BPs assets. Now the mullahs are in charge and BP STILL loses their assets and the money from those is used to blow up American and British citizens. Great.

Change isn’t coming to Iran. Nobody’s overthrowing anybody there anytime soon. The same is true in Iraq.

Furthermore, I didn’t say our long-term interests were indefinitely served by relying on thugs. I did argue that in the context of the Cold War, thugs were sometimes the best expedient. Today, as in Iraq, we have chosen to attempt to install more accountable government.

But then, the rest of this argument is still about your inability to confront the fact that we can’t salve old wounds by simply admitting we were bad sports in the past, or by negotiating some kind of fiscal solution totally unrelated to the problems at hand.

Concession accepted.

And you seriously advocate we hamstring ourselves in the name of public relations? It’s impossible to ramp ourselves back down to the Chester A. Arthur days without utterly compromising our status in the global community. If you think you’ve proved anything worth proving by reminding us that we used to have little or no clout one hundred years ago, think again.

I fucking hate cutting and pasting. I'll answer your points here:

Iraq only invaded after Bush the First's ambassador told Hussein that GHWB didn't care about border disputes between Iraq and Kuwait. Would he have done it anyway? Who knows? But for the US government to claim credit for reining in their pet monster is like the owner of those Presa Canarios in San Francisco who killed her neighbor. She claimed with a straight face that even though she encouraged her dogs to be utterly vicious, when they were mauling her neighbor, she THEN pulled them back and should not be blamed for the spilled blood. She shouldn't have started with the fucking dogs in the first place! By your logic, it's OK to play with matches by a gasoline pump -as long as I eventually put out the fire. Rogue 9 also falls into this kind of harebrained thinking: Meddling in WW1 was justified by the Allied victory in WW2. I call "BULLSHIT!" on this line of thought.

Gillaspie didn’t “green light” anything. Saddam fully intended to invade Kuwait regardless of the United States. Hence why he rolled so many of the Republican Guard into so sparsely-defended a country, and then prepared to defend beach-heads against a counter-strike he figured would come from the West (including the U.S.). He simply gambled that he’d be able to either (A) play down his actions and thus avoid American ire, or (B) defeat early any attempted landings, and blunt the coalition’s will to fight for the country of another. But don't let that stop you from blaming the U.S. in your classic, self-hating manner. And before you turn out that useless bullshit about only wanting to "better this country through constructive criticism," I think your attempt to malign us for involvement in the Great War more or less speaks for itself about where you stand on everything American.

[frigidmagi]

I think your attempt to malign us for involvement in the Great War more or less speaks for itself about where you stand on everything American.

Has much I has dislike Elfdart, why the hell are you trying to drag another thread into this? Stick to the subject please.

[Patrick Degan]

Except outside intervention is what caused this problem in the first place, tiger-boy, and you either can't or won't explain how repeating this disaster on a larger scale will somehow result in a different outcome beyond simply asserting ad-infinitum that it will.

No you don’t. The only one repeating unfounded arguments is yourself. Such nonsense about turning back the clock and ignoring the fallout of decades of foreign policy and consequences.

Intervention on a larger scale is aimed at producing credible, resourceful government capable of reducing the feelings of hopelessness and emasculation that otherwise thrive in the Arab world, where responsible government has been a glimmer in so many eyes for all of modern history.

Funny, but that's the theory which has gotten us into the mess we're in. And you're still ducking the question, tiger-boy.

[Axis Kast]

Has much I has dislike Elfdart, why the hell are you trying to drag another thread into this? Stick to the subject please.

Because it’s relevant to every argument he enters. Whenever the subject of foreign policy arises, Elfdart is the first to criticize and the last to praise or legitimize the actions of the United States of America in an exercise that now appears to border on mindless discrimination.

Funny, but that's the theory which has gotten us into the mess we're in. And you're still ducking the question, tiger-boy.

And what do you propose then, Deegan? You have yet to explain and justify your position at all. Criticizing my position without providing a counter-point - or even evidence of what you claim is my error - hasn't done you any good. I’m ducking nothing. You're the only one avoiding serious debate here. My point is that the situation in the Middle East has escalated to such a degree that suppressing violent elements with violence is our only option remaining. Yes, it does alienate significant portions of the population and mobilizes more resistance against the United States and its allies in the short term, but the psycho-social and strategic impact of eventually consolidating a functional, representative government in the center of the Arab world (along with a functioning, multi-faceted economy, no less) promises to be a significant step forwarding in bringing the populace to reassess its relationship with desperate terror acts.

You do realize that we've never tried a genuine intervention before? Iraq is by far the least manipulative of the overthrows we've sponsored in the region over the past several decades, and violence will reduce in time as increasing numbers of Iraqis seek to move on with their lives amidst the reconstruction effort. The objective now is to reach that high water mark at which the attractiveness of accepting the change for its positive benefits outweighs the urge to violence. And we can do that by increasing security, improving infrastructure, and, most importantly, handing off much of the more visible, complex, and important work to well-trained Iraqis. Yes, there is opposition to the United States. But the outcome has the potential to be quite positive. We're not looking at what happened in Iran, where the only choice after putting the Shah in was to micro-management from behind the scenes in such a fashion that we were forced to think more about repressing all kinds of dissent virtually indiscriminately.

[Patrick Degan]

Funny, but that's the theory which has gotten us into the mess we're in. And you're still ducking the question, tiger-boy.

And what do you propose then, Deegan? You have yet to explain and justify your position at all. Criticizing my position without providing a counter-point - or even evidence of what you claim is my error - hasn't done you any good. I’m ducking nothing. You're the only one avoiding serious debate here.

Oh really? You're the one who makes the assertion that violence is the only answer and will induce change as fact. When challenged, you repeat that assertion almost word-for-word as if that answers all questions. That is called using the premise of the argument as its proof, which is logically invalid on its face. Note:

The United States will be unable to effective counter terrorism on a long term basis without first assisting – violently, if necessary – in the creation of effective, responsible, centralized governing institutions in the Middle East. It says a lot that, like feudal Europe, the Arab world is still dominated not only spiritually, but also temporally, by religious bodies. Until central control solidifies, getting a handle on chaos there will be virtually impossible.

This is the entire basis of the argument. Apparently, you haven’t yet come to terms with the indisputable fact that our past actions have made the Middle East a dangerous place, and that we have to address the fallout of those actions – terrorism, ineffective government, etc. – despite the appeal of baseless fantasies about letting bygones be bygones.

Because our actions have made the Middle East dangerous, the solution can't help but involve violence. The Middle East won't change on its own. Look at governments like that of Saudi Arabia. Teetering on the brink. The institutions that most need to be there have no credibility - and, worse, no power, besides. That can't change but by outside intervention.

Intervention on a larger scale is aimed at producing credible, resourceful government capable of reducing the feelings of hopelessness and emasculation that otherwise thrive in the Arab world, where responsible government has been a glimmer in so many eyes for all of modern history.

In all of that spew above, there is not one word of exactly how repeating on a larger scale a policy which has yielded nothing but disasterous failure is supposed to eventually lead to success.

And BTW, this contradiction is simply too amusing not to point out:

A) It says a lot that, like feudal Europe, the Arab world is still dominated not only spiritually, but also temporally, by religious bodies. Until central control solidifies, getting a handle on chaos there will be virtually impossible.

B) Those kinds of systemic shortcomings are evident even today. Take Iran, for example, where despite intermittent word of their rising popularity, reform movements have made no headway in the political battle to secure meaningful change. Or Iraq, where Saddam Hussein would surely have remained in power had we not acted, because power had been so effectively centralized in the hands of a particular elite.

My point is that the situation in the Middle East has escalated to such a degree that suppressing violent elements with violence is our only option remaining. Yes, it does alienate significant portions of the population and mobilizes more resistance against the United States and its allies in the short term, but the psycho-social and strategic impact of eventually consolidating a functional, representative government in the center of the Arab world (along with a functioning, multi-faceted economy, no less) promises to be a significant step forwarding in bringing the populace to reassess its relationship with desperate terror acts.

That is not an answer to the question at hand, asshole, but a lengthy regurgitation of your assertion-as-fact, yet again. You just keep saying that violence is the only option left (without ever explaining why) and that it will induce change (without ever explaining how). You ignore that this very course of action is the cause of the present problem and expect that somehow, someway, we can kill enough Muslims to pacify the rest. Well, the ball's still in your court, tiger-boy. Exactly how is this supposed to work? How will this not radicalise the entire Muslim population against the United States? Do you really expect we can terrify a billion people into submission? And how will the examples of repeated brute force induce these billion people to realise the beneficence of Western-style democracy and American-style free enterprise?

You do realize that we've never tried a genuine intervention before? Iraq is by far the least manipulative of the overthrows we've sponsored in the region over the past several decades, and violence will reduce in time as increasing numbers of Iraqis seek to move on with their lives amidst the reconstruction effort. The objective now is to reach that high water mark at which the attractiveness of accepting the change for its positive benefits outweighs the urge to violence. And we can do that by increasing security, improving infrastructure, and, most importantly, handing off much of the more visible, complex, and important work to well-trained Iraqis. Yes, there is opposition to the United States. But the outcome has the potential to be quite positive. We're not looking at what happened in Iran, where the only choice after putting the Shah in was to micro-management from behind the scenes in such a fashion that we were forced to think more about repressing all kinds of dissent virtually indiscriminately.

My my, what big wishful thoughts you have there, grandma. So far, the Iraqi authorities we've installed have been nothing but our puppets, the reconstruction has been handled as nothing more than a huge kickback scheme to American corporations, we've managed to antagonise the population by making every wrong move imaginable, and in the bargain haven't even restored basic services to what was enjoyed under Saddam Hussein and despite this you imagine that we still have credibility as liberators instead of an imperial occupation force.

And frankly, trying to argue that outright conquest and occupation is the least manipulative form of intervention is about the most comical proposition you've yet attempted to float in any thread.

[Darth Wong]

I can't get over the comic value of Axi spewing his usual auto-erotically emphatic long-winded repetitions of his political worldview in a thread that mocks this very behaviour in its title. Obviously, the irony is lost on him.

And I agree with Mr. Degan that the following line is one of the funniest Axi lines ever:

You do realize that we've never tried a genuine intervention before? Iraq is by far the least manipulative of the overthrows we've sponsored in the region over the past several decades

[Axis Kast]

Oh really? You're the one who makes the assertion that violence is the only answer and will induce change as fact. When challenged, you repeat that assertion almost word-for-word as if that answers all questions. That is called using the premise of the argument as its proof, which is logically invalid on its face.

Challenged with what, you fucking moron? All you do is sit around and yell to high Heaven about how if only we left well enough alone, nobody would be angry with us anymore – despite prior promises from terrorist organizations in both Iraq and Afghanistan that they will carry the war back to the United States even if we were to withdraw tomorrow. Change isn’t going to come on its own. Sitting back won’t make any of the leadership in the Middle East change their tone. The kleptocracy is too strong.

In all of that spew above, there is not one word of exactly how repeating on a larger scale a policy which has yielded nothing but disasterous failure is supposed to eventually lead to success.

Because it’s not a repetition, idiot. We’re nation-building, not conducting a mere coup d’etat. American troops have never before occupied a Middle Eastern nation with the express intention of establishing the basis for representative government after the Western style. Comparing our efforts to install Pahlavi or balance the Saud dynasty with the much larger, much more direct activity in Iraq is folly. We left Pahlavi alone to do as he would. But the American presence in Iraq is projected to last at least a decade. The same was largely true when we dealt with Saudi Arabia. We didn’t rebuild the country’s shattered infrastructure and proscribe regime-change; we merely let sleeping dogs lie.

That is not an answer to the question at hand, asshole, but a lengthy regurgitation of your assertion-as-fact, yet again. You just keep saying that violence is the only option left (without ever explaining why) and that it will induce change (without ever explaining how). You ignore that this very course of action is the cause of the present problem and expect that somehow, someway, we can kill enough Muslims to pacify the rest. Well, the ball's still in your court, tiger-boy.

It’s called overthrowing state sponsors of terrorism that are confronted by no other credible threat than direct military force. We’re not talking about indiscriminately dropping bombs, but rather occupying the nation of Iraq and building an administration there from the ground up, to place Iraqis in greater degrees of control over their own affairs as time goes by. Your attempts to strawman this into some form of mindless slaughter simply bespeak your inability to argue the point. This isn’t my being inarticulate – it’s your purposely twisting the words that appear on this screen in an attempt to utterly distort the argument.

And stop with the fucking pet names. You’re way too into this shit. It’s more than a little disturbing.

Exactly how is this supposed to work? How will this not radicalise the entire Muslim population against the United States? Do you really expect we can terrify a billion people into submission? And how will the examples of repeated brute force induce these billion people to realise the beneficence of Western-style democracy and American-style free enterprise?

Nobody said it wouldn’t radicalize the Muslim population in the short term – something you’ve ignored despite my admitting as much at least twice now. Yet the point is that the Muslim population won’t change its opinion or its radicalism even if we were to go away. As long as their governments don’t change, there’s going to be no end to the cycle of violence. That means regime change for Iraq, aggressive containment for Iran, and strong pressure on Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to reform.

As for that “repeated brute force” bullshit, you can take that and shove it up your ass. The occupation of Iraq is about much more than shooting people, much as you’d love to have us believe otherwise solely for the sake of attempting to discredit me.

My my, what big wishful thoughts you have there, grandma. So far, the Iraqi authorities we've installed have been nothing but our puppets, the reconstruction has been handled as nothing more than a huge kickback scheme to American corporations, we've managed to antagonise the population by making every wrong move imaginable, and in the bargain haven't even restored basic services to what was enjoyed under Saddam Hussein and despite this you imagine that we still have credibility as liberators instead of an imperial occupation force.

And frankly, trying to argue that outright conquest and occupation is the least manipulative form of intervention is about the most comical proposition you've yet attempted to float in any thread.

The Iraqi authorities we’ve installed need a secure country before they can properly exercise the authority and make the decisions that will gain them legitimacy. We still haven’t passed phase two. But then, of course, you’re the type to call the whole thing a failure the moment there aren’t immediate results, huh?

As for antagonizing the population, a great deal of that has to do with getting the insurgency under control. Once we do that, we can focus more intensively on public-relations efforts. The same is true of infrastructure reconstruction, which can’t be accomplished until we root out most of the saboteurs.

You honestly think that the occupation of Iraq and our attempt to build a coalition government is more oppressive and more palatable than installing a Shah Pahlavi?

But then, of course you don’t have an answer for any of this. Aside from criticisms, you have no solid plans of your own. None of you do. Wong’s best idea yet has been to propose that we “pay market price” for oil, as if this will somehow erase decades of manipulation, end anger against the occupation, and rectify the huge victimization complex overnight.

I can't get over the comic value of Axi spewing his usual auto-erotically emphatic long-winded repetitions of his political worldview in a thread that mocks this very behaviour in its title. Obviously, the irony is lost on him.

Uh, actually, I never once advocated using a fucking nuclear weapon on anybody in the Middle East, Wong. But please, continue lying.

[MKSheppard]

[Axis Kast]

Even under fire from everyone else, Shep can't but help rush to indulge his unfounded hatreds. Stunning. Absolutely stunning. You really are a piece of work, man.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Even under fire from everyone else, Shep can't but help rush to indulge his unfounded hatreds. Stunning. Absolutely stunning. You really are a piece of work, man.

Backatcha, pal. You're a real piece of work. Heck, I'd take you for a great political satirist if only I didn't know you were being completely serious all the time.

[Morilore]

I have little experience with this, so I'll just point out a few things that caught my eye:

Challenged with what, you fucking moron?

They are ASKING YOU TO EXPLAIN IT, Kast. Connect A, B, and C, instead of just repeating that A will magically lead to C.

You honestly think that the occupation of Iraq and our attempt to build a coalition government is more oppressive and more palatable than installing a Shah Pahlavi?

Um... yes? Think of it this way: say Iraq supported a U.S. coup in one scenario, then say Iraq invaded and conquered the U.S. in another. Which scenario gets Americans more pissed off?

Uh, actually, I never once advocated using a fucking nuclear weapon on anybody in the Middle East, Wong. But please, continue lying.

No, you just advocate invading and conquering things. The reference is metaphorical, dumbass.

[Patrick Degan]

All you do is sit around and yell to high Heaven about how if only we left well enough alone, nobody would be angry with us anymore – despite prior promises from terrorist organizations in both Iraq and Afghanistan that they will carry the war back to the United States even if we were to withdraw tomorrow. Change isn’t going to come on its own. Sitting back won’t make any of the leadership in the Middle East change their tone. The kleptocracy is too strong.

No, fuckwit —you are asked to explain the progression from A to B to C and here you are with yet another regurgitation.

We’re nation-building, not conducting a mere coup d’etat. American troops have never before occupied a Middle Eastern nation with the express intention of establishing the basis for representative government after the Western style. Comparing our efforts to install Pahlavi or balance the Saud dynasty with the much larger, much more direct activity in Iraq is folly. We left Pahlavi alone to do as he would. But the American presence in Iraq is projected to last at least a decade. The same was largely true when we dealt with Saudi Arabia. We didn’t rebuild the country’s shattered infrastructure and proscribe regime-change; we merely let sleeping dogs lie.

That's the sales-pitch. Again, you say nothing of exactly how this miraculous transformation is supposed to take place in the face of the fact that American intervention has resulted in the current disaster and that somehow democracy and Western-style capitalism is going to be successfully imposed at gunpoint, or as I've said, repeating the disaster on a far larger scale. Here's a hint, Axi: the Soviets once upon a time believed that they could "liberate" other nations toward socialism at gunpoint. The results of that experiment have been all too obvious.

That is not an answer to the question at hand, asshole, but a lengthy regurgitation of your assertion-as-fact, yet again. You just keep saying that violence is the only option left (without ever explaining why) and that it will induce change (without ever explaining how). You ignore that this very course of action is the cause of the present problem and expect that somehow, someway, we can kill enough Muslims to pacify the rest. Well, the ball's still in your court, tiger-boy.

It’s called overthrowing state sponsors of terrorism that are confronted by no other credible threat than direct military force. We’re not talking about indiscriminately dropping bombs, but rather occupying the nation of Iraq and building an administration there from the ground up, to place Iraqis in greater degrees of control over their own affairs as time goes by. Your attempts to strawman this into some form of mindless slaughter simply bespeak your inability to argue the point. This isn’t my being inarticulate – it’s your purposely twisting the words that appear on this screen in an attempt to utterly distort the argument.

Except Iraq wasn't sponsoring terrorism aimed at the United States, nor was presenting a terrorist threat or a military threat or any other sort of threat to the United States. And I hate to have to burst your balloon, but our war hasn't been all that clean in Iraq to avoid large numbers of civilian casualties and it's still American bombs being dropped on Muslims. The Muslim world isn't going to care about numbers of people killed, only that their people are the ones being killed to advance American aims against their will. Which means more terrorism aimed at Americans. Which according to your twisted logic inevitably means more wars. The only strawmen, as always, are your own, and ones put up to screen your ongoing retreat from the implications of the bizarre reasoning you indulge.

And stop with the fucking pet names. You’re way too into this shit. It’s more than a little disturbing.

Awww... is tiger-boy starting to get a little rattled in his cage?

Exactly how is this supposed to work? How will this not radicalise the entire Muslim population against the United States? Do you really expect we can terrify a billion people into submission? And how will the examples of repeated brute force induce these billion people to realise the beneficence of Western-style democracy and American-style free enterprise?

Nobody said it wouldn’t radicalize the Muslim population in the short term – something you’ve ignored despite my admitting as much at least twice now. Yet the point is that the Muslim population won’t change its opinion or its radicalism even if we were to go away. As long as their governments don’t change, there’s going to be no end to the cycle of violence. That means regime change for Iraq, aggressive containment for Iran, and strong pressure on Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to reform.

But bombings, wars, and forced regime-changes will bring about this magickal transformation you insist will eventually occur. You pretend that this would only be a short-term phenomenon and that it must melt away with determined American pressure and force. Fine argument as long as it ignores its central problem: that reform is wholly an internal process and one which cannot be forced at gunpoint at any level of intensity.

As for that “repeated brute force” bullshit, you can take that and shove it up your ass. The occupation of Iraq is about much more than shooting people, much as you’d love to have us believe otherwise solely for the sake of attempting to discredit me.

You discredited yourself a long time ago, only you're too stupid and arrogant to notice it. And no matter what the stated intention of our adventure in Iraq might be, the average Muslim-on-the-street is only going to perceive it as American brute force being wielded upon Muslims, in service of a war launched under wholly false pretenses, and for which American corporations so far have been the sole beneficiaries.

The Iraqi authorities we’ve installed need a secure country before they can properly exercise the authority and make the decisions that will gain them legitimacy. We still haven’t passed phase two. But then, of course, you’re the type to call the whole thing a failure the moment there aren’t immediate results, huh?

No, I call it a failure because there've been no results except chaos, misery, and mounting resistance to our alleged beneficence-at-gunpoint.

As for antagonizing the population, a great deal of that has to do with getting the insurgency under control. Once we do that, we can focus more intensively on public-relations efforts. The same is true of infrastructure reconstruction, which can’t be accomplished until we root out most of the saboteurs.

Except PR and a successful occupation effort go hand-in-hand, as does immediate large-scale relief which we failed to deliver. It didn't help that we did nothing to control the wholesale looting which occurred in the country in the days immediately following our takeover, nor that we pulled idiotic stunts like disbanding the army or shutting down a major opposition newspaper, which helped touch off the Fallujah mess, nor that we've structured relief and reconstruction efforts as large-scale kickback schemes to American contractors and imported people to do the work instead of employing Iraqis on a large scale —which would have done much toward fostering good will among the populace. The time for PR efforts was when we established our occupation presence.

You honestly think that the occupation of Iraq and our attempt to build a coalition government is more oppressive and more palatable than installing a Shah Pahlavi?

The Iraqis at this point aren't even under their own oppressors but American troops and American puppets. We've arbitrarily rewritten their laws, sold off Iraqi assets, and largely shut Iraqis out of the decisionmaking and economic life of their own country. What do you call that from your perspective in Bizarro-world?

But then, of course you don’t have an answer for any of this. Aside from criticisms, you have no solid plans of your own. None of you do. Wong’s best idea yet has been to propose that we “pay market price” for oil, as if this will somehow erase decades of manipulation, end anger against the occupation, and rectify the huge victimization complex overnight.

Pretending that the PNAC sales-pitch represents "a solid plan" is even more laughable than your assertion that outright conquest and occupation is not more oppressive and manipulative than merely installing our paid-for thugs on the throne. And the issue isn't what my plan might be but you ducking the challenge to explain how the progression from A to B to C is supposed to work out.

I can't get over the comic value of Axi spewing his usual auto-erotically emphatic long-winded repetitions of his political worldview in a thread that mocks this very behaviour in its title. Obviously, the irony is lost on him.

Uh, actually, I never once advocated using a fucking nuclear weapon on anybody in the Middle East, Wong. But please, continue lying.

Humour. It is a difficult concept.

[Elfdart]

Has much I has dislike Elfdart, why the hell are you trying to drag another thread into this? Stick to the subject please.

Because it’s relevant to every argument he enters. Whenever the subject of foreign policy arises, Elfdart is the first to criticize and the last to praise or legitimize the actions of the United States of America in an exercise that now appears to border on mindless discrimination.

Elfdart cannot legitimize the actions of the United States or anyone else. Their actions are legitimate or illegitimate on their own merits -or lack of merits. He simply calls a spade a spade as he sees it. Why he is writing in the third person right now is a subject for a different post.

The U.S. was brought into The Great War by a stupid, ignorant, vain and paranoid little man named Woodrow Wilson, who assumed the rest of the world envied us our Jim Crow laws (which Wilson introduced to the District of Columbia) and Palmer raids. He planted 100,000 men, tipped the scaled irrevocably in favor of Britain and France and was thus indirectly responsible for the rise of Nazi Germany and Communist Russia. Thomas Fleming's excellent book The Illusion of Victory is a must read on the subject.

Most of our wars, like most wars fought by every country are fought out of greed, vanity, paranoia, bigotry or other base reasons. If someone wants to claim that a particular war (and all the nasty side effects) is necessary, I say the burden of proof is on them to "legitimize" the fucking thing. The Revolution was justified. So was the Civil War and WW2. The invasion of Afghanistan would have been justified if Congress had declared war as the law requires. But the Iraq war and the war you crave with Iran are not. Nice attempt at a straw man, but I'm no pacifist, I just find warmongering in bad taste. Now if you and the Shepster want to beat wardrums with your dicks, be my guest. Just don't be offended when I say "Point that thing somewhwere else!"

[Axis Kast]

They are ASKING YOU TO EXPLAIN IT, Kast. Connect A, B, and C, instead of just repeating that A will magically lead to C.

And I have done so, time in and time out. The invasion will lead to a state of occupation, after the initial steps of which (i.e. those involving making the country’s key population centers more or less stable), we begin to restore infrastructure, develop localized government, and work on establishing a competent national administration.

Um... yes? Think of it this way: say Iraq supported a U.S. coup in one scenario, then say Iraq invaded and conquered the U.S. in another. Which scenario gets Americans more pissed off?

Except that the end result of our invasion and occupation is intended to be a functional state in which the general freedom of person of the average Iraqi is guaranteed under the rule of law, enforced by responsible parties truly accountable to a popular government. The end result of putting Shah Pahlavi in power was a continued string of abuses by SAVAK, largely with American acquiescence.

No, you just advocate invading and conquering things. The reference is metaphorical, dumbass.

Only when there’s a clear need, moron.

That's the sales-pitch. Again, you say nothing of exactly how this miraculous transformation is supposed to take place in the face of the fact that American intervention has resulted in the current disaster and that somehow democracy and Western-style capitalism is going to be successfully imposed at gunpoint, or as I've said, repeating the disaster on a far larger scale. Here's a hint, Axi: the Soviets once upon a time believed that they could "liberate" other nations toward socialism at gunpoint. The results of that experiment have been all too obvious.

In large part because the Socialist system itself was unworkable at its core, moron. The Soviets knew they could never leave once they occupied a neighbor. The same isn’t true in Iraq, where the American presence will inevitably dwindle within five to ten years to a relative handful of advisers, security specialists, and contracts, as well as perhaps one or two larger rapid-response units of regular military forces.

The Soviets entered subject nations and stripped them of all they were worth while largely ignoring the distribution of aid to the general populace. That is not the modus operandi of the Coalition in Iraq.

Except Iraq wasn't sponsoring terrorism aimed at the United States, nor was presenting a terrorist threat or a military threat or any other sort of threat to the United States.

We’ve been over this already. It’s a point of disagreement.

And I hate to have to burst your balloon, but our war hasn't been all that clean in Iraq to avoid large numbers of civilian casualties and it's still American bombs being dropped on Muslims. The Muslim world isn't going to care about numbers of people killed, only that their people are the ones being killed to advance American aims against their will. Which means more terrorism aimed at Americans. Which according to your twisted logic inevitably means more wars. The only strawmen, as always, are your own, and ones put up to screen your ongoing retreat from the implications of the bizarre reasoning you indulge.

We’d be dropping bombs on Muslims regardless of whether we went into Iraq, idiot. And then only largely in punitive raids we’d have to repeat on a regular basis in order to bring corrupt governments to limited action. Here, we’re rooting out the regimes responsible for supporting terror and anti-Americanism.

As for civilian casualties, the United States and other Coalition forces have been remarkably reserved when it comes to inflicting damage against civilian targets.

Awww... is tiger-boy starting to get a little rattled in his cage?

Dude. You people make it sound like you want the fucking cock.

But bombings, wars, and forced regime-changes will bring about this magickal transformation you insist will eventually occur. You pretend that this would only be a short-term phenomenon and that it must melt away with determined American pressure and force. Fine argument as long as it ignores its central problem: that reform is wholly an internal process and one which cannot be forced at gunpoint at any level of intensity.

Then how, exactly, do you propose it be undertaken? By waiting until Saddam, his sons, their sons, and their generals all die? By waiting for regimes that have been largely unchanged in their mode of rule for over one hundred years to suddenly turn over a new left? Perhaps following in the footsteps of your Iranian fantasy? No. We must remove rogue regimes by force, and then use our power constructively to produce states with a chance at material progress.

You discredited yourself a long time ago, only you're too stupid and arrogant to notice it. And no matter what the stated intention of our adventure in Iraq might be, the average Muslim-on-the-street is only going to perceive it as American brute force being wielded upon Muslims, in service of a war launched under wholly false pretenses, and for which American corporations so far have been the sole beneficiaries.

In whose eyes? Yours?

The average Muslim on the street can’t help but resent the War on Terror. But that resentment wouldn’t be any less even if we resigned ourselves only to bombing runs or threats. At least in Iraq, there’s a chance to showcase something positive.

No, I call it a failure because there've been no results except chaos, misery, and mounting resistance to our alleged beneficence-at-gunpoint.

Because we’re still securing the country, nitwit.

Except PR and a successful occupation effort go hand-in-hand, as does immediate large-scale relief which we failed to deliver. It didn't help that we did nothing to control the wholesale looting which occurred in the country in the days immediately following our takeover, nor that we pulled idiotic stunts like disbanding the army or shutting down a major opposition newspaper, which helped touch off the Fallujah mess, nor that we've structured relief and reconstruction efforts as large-scale kickback schemes to American contractors and imported people to do the work instead of employing Iraqis on a large scale —which would have done much toward fostering good will among the populace. The time for PR efforts was when we established our occupation presence.

The looting was a byproduct of having avoided a siege of Baghdad – an outcome of having won the gamble of the Thunder Run without first having pounded Iraq’s capital into submission. It was a trade-off for many hundreds (and potentially thousands) dead, all around.

Disbanding the Army was a stupid move, but that doesn’t delegitimize what we’re attempting to do. In fact, we restructured the Army and are now helping to expand and retrain it.

As for relief and reconstruction, they are underway, whether or not under the auspices of Halliburton. More important than to whom those contracts go is how much good they do on the ground – and, as one reads in the paper daily, more and more of those functions are being handed off to Iraqis under contract.

The Iraqis at this point aren't even under their own oppressors but American troops and American puppets. We've arbitrarily rewritten their laws, sold off Iraqi assets, and largely shut Iraqis out of the decisionmaking and economic life of their own country. What do you call that from your perspective in Bizarro-world?

Actually, the hand-over already occurred. The United States has contracted people to fix the nation’s infrastructure as per martial law, but each day, the power of the Iraqi government to determine its own economic affairs is growing.

Pretending that the PNAC sales-pitch represents "a solid plan" is even more laughable than your assertion that outright conquest and occupation is not more oppressive and manipulative than merely installing our paid-for thugs on the throne. And the issue isn't what my plan might be but you ducking the challenge to explain how the progression from A to B to C is supposed to work out.

You’ve done it for me. You’ve successfully gone from, “Explain yourself!” to, “I see what you want, but I feel like nitpicking about the endgame before halftime.” It’s very clear that you understand exactly what I am advocating, and that you have no actual argument to make, other than to criticize. Of course, unless you actually offer something better, it does nothing to tilt the scales. If you don’t think we should have undertaken an occupation, how exactly do you think we should have rode herd over terrorists and state sponsors of terrorism in the Middle East? Ignore Iran’s overt hostility? Hope they’re playing fair when all the signs are obviously negative? Let Saudi Arabia do as it will, as old wounds simmer without salve and more vitriolic hatred is drilled into the next generation by terrorists the government is unwilling to control without a boot at its rear?

Elfdart cannot legitimize the actions of the United States or anyone else. Their actions are legitimate or illegitimate on their own merits -or lack of merits. He simply calls a spade a spade as he sees it. Why he is writing in the third person right now is a subject for a different post.

The U.S. was brought into The Great War by a stupid, ignorant, vain and paranoid little man named Woodrow Wilson, who assumed the rest of the world envied us our Jim Crow laws (which Wilson introduced to the District of Columbia) and Palmer raids. He planted 100,000 men, tipped the scaled irrevocably in favor of Britain and France and was thus indirectly responsible for the rise of Nazi Germany and Communist Russia. Thomas Fleming's excellent book The Illusion of Victory is a must read on the subject.

You’re poisoning the well. Woodrow Wilson’s abominable opinions on race relations have nothing to do with right or wrong in entering the Great War.

As for the scale, it was always in favor of the Allies. Germany was exhausted anyway, and despite the obvious addition of yet more casualties of their own, Britain and France were going to win, just as Rogue has already pointed out.

Hitler was a product of the failure of Europe to enforce its own impositions following the Great War. And an outgrowth of the freak disaster that was the Great Depression. Communist Russia, on the other hand, was the making of the Czars themselves. Woodrow Wilson had nothing whatsoever to do with fostering the Reds, and in fact attempted to intervene against them, hoping to buy time for less radical elements.

Most of our wars, like most wars fought by every country are fought out of greed, vanity, paranoia, bigotry or other base reasons. If someone wants to claim that a particular war (and all the nasty side effects) is necessary, I say the burden of proof is on them to "legitimize" the fucking thing. The Revolution was justified. So was the Civil War and WW2. The invasion of Afghanistan would have been justified if Congress had declared war as the law requires. But the Iraq war and the war you crave with Iran are not. Nice attempt at a straw man, but I'm no pacifist, I just find warmongering in bad taste. Now if you and the Shepster want to beat wardrums with your dicks, be my guest. Just don't be offended when I say "Point that thing somewhwere else!"

War with Iran would be totally justified. They have supported violent acts targeting American citizens on numerous occasions, and show no sign of so much as attempting to take responsibility for what occurs within their own military hierarchy. But you go ahead and defend the poor, misunderstood Ayatollah.

[aerius]

We should have more war and nuke things because you touch yourself at night.

[Ma Deuce]

*snip* and was thus indirectly responsible for the rise of Nazi Germany and Communist Russia.

In fairness to Wilson, there is no way he could have possibly forseen that...

[Elfdart]

Hitler and Stalin in particular? No. But from George Washington to James Monroe, our smarter presidents knew that foreign interventions were mostly more trouble than they were worth. That's why the Monroe Doctrine called for not only Europe to stop meddling in the Americas, but Uncle Sam not to meddle in Europe. Wilson fucked that up, introduced Jim Crow to DC (the one area of the South that didn't have it), and did his damndest to turn the country into a police state. Kast thinks his bigotry and thuggery are irrelevant. I say they are proof of his arrogance and stupidity and desire to bend others to his wishes -using force if desired. Gee, no wonder Kast defends him!

Like Dubya, Wilson was like a kid with a box of matches running around in a dry forest, lighting matches and tossing them in every direction as he prances along. Like Wilson, Dubya's moronic foreign policy will cause the nation grief for many years even after he is gone.

[MKSheppard]

our smarter presidents knew that foreign interventions were mostly more trouble than they were worth

Which is why we should revive the LeMay Doctrine



We should, when someone pisses us off, send the MIGHTY BOMBER
SWARM to wipe them from the face of the earth. No country, no
problem, and we'll be isolationist!