goodbye Donald Rumsfeld you absolute cock

[General Zod]

You just don't see them in this here. I only speak of what I'm familiar with.

Understood. I didn't know you're from L.A.

Zod

 

[cthulufhtagn]

That's the point of playing devil's advocate, isn't it?

Most of my questions went unanswered though so I guess I don't play it very well.

i'm not sure what i failed to answer, but i'll go through them one by one if i must, even though your questions are rather loaded in their wording :Smug:

Were not very large portions of the region malcontent?

i don't quite follow you. do you mean were people unhappy under saddam? of course!

saddam was terrible, has anybody questioned that?

Was Saddam not a danger to many people’s happiness and very lives?

he was indeed, to his own country. there is no disputing that.

saddam was terrible, has anybody questioned that?

Should Saddam and his regime not have been removed?

not by the current means, which have utterly failed the iraqi people

the united states' objective in this war was not to free the poor oppressed iraqi people from that awful saddam hussein guy, it was to replace the saddam regime, which had long since ceased to be a useful tool in their middle east scheming, with something friendly to US political and business interests, including oil interests. the hypocrisy, the scheming, the double-talk, all of it just serves to illustrate that these self-serving bastards in washington certainly do not have the interests of the iraqi people at heart.

If one believes they have the power to save and improve lives, should they not attempt to do so?

well yeah, but i question whether this war has exactly made things much better within iraq, and it CERTAINLY hasn't made things more secure for the rest of the world, as the american intelligence community has attested

Whether or not there were other reasons than those stated by the Bush administration, do you really think they would want the kind of death and chaos that persists over there now?

i'm not saying this is all according to the neocons' plan, but it reeks of their shortsightedness in their lip-smacking desperation to launch this war.

Saddam wasn’t about to do anything with every eye around the world on him. But what might have happened once those eyes were redirected?

you ask what he would do with the eyes of the world redirected...that makes no sense at all! where were the eyes of the world before those fascists in the pentagon started their saber-rattling?

not on saddam, as i was implying, if you missed that

And yet, what better option was there?

unfortunately i don't have an answer other than not war. they actually had indications before that this war would be a nightmare [god dammit there was a report, this was on boingboing the other day, i'll try and find it] and, like with the 911 warnings, they brushed them aside and sent in the bombers to rain chaos and destruction on the iraqi people. clearly this is not the way to solve the problem.

if you want to talk about oppressive governments, why don't we start by breaking the *allegiances* we have with so many of them? let's start with saudi arabia, then maybe drop pakistan, then indonesia, then equatorial guinea, then mexico, then....wait....wait...they all have strategic benefits! that's right, how could we ever think about breaking it off with saudi arabia, such good friends of ours? the united states is simply not motivated to intervene on purely humanitarian grounds if there isn't "something in it for us". rwanda? darfur? east timor? virtually all of latin america at one point or another? for fucks sake, we support dictatorships, they are our friends. don't expect the US to suddenly take an interest in "liberating" people unless there is something to gain from it. in this case, oil resources, business opportunities, and a great chance to set up a little puppet government to let us have bases and support whatever we do in the middle east.
this is how governments work.


hope that clears it up a little.


EDIT: here's an old article on the lack of planning http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/9927782.htm

but what's more apparently they did have indications it would turn out this way...

 

[skeptik]

That was 2 hours ago

I'm aware of that.

Even typed, that doesn't seem to work when coming from a guy from New Jersey.

Will fuck off do?

 

[SonOfNun]

Here's a random point that I never see brought up:

Isn't it the responsibility of the Iraqi people to get rid of Saddam if they have problems with him? Why is it because the U.S. likes to meddle in everyone else's business so much, that we now accept it as justified? Oppressive government calls for revolution, especially in a place such as Iraq where so many wrongs were allowed for so long. If the Iraqi people couldn't unite to overthrow Saddam (by any means, assassination, etc.), then they deserve his leadership. It's not the duty of some country on the other side of the world to save the day(even if it was never their intention), it is that of the citizens who live there.

Just an interesting topic to discuss, especially considering that nobody ever holds the people responsible or takes their inactivity in the past or the fact that they've been uniting to fight AGAINST U.S. forces as some sort of sign that maybe they didn't want us intervening and fucking things up further, even if everything wasn't perfect there before. Saddam Iraq > "U.S." Iraq.

 

[Reign in Acai]

It's not that we are meddling. We are over there enforcing U.N policy, have we all forgotten this? Saddumb refused to allow U.N inspectors to do their work. The fact that he did or did not have WMD's is irrelevant.

If the cops come knocking on your door with a search warrant, and you tell them to bug off, they are going to kick the door down.It doesn't matter if you do or do not have a closet full of shotguns, a mattress full of dope, and a drawer full of Boystown weekly mags. Sorry Andrew, I didn't mean to use you as an example.

 

[Thanatopsis123]

Isn't it the responsibility of the Iraqi people to get rid of Saddam if they have problems with him? Why is it because the U.S. likes to meddle in everyone else's business so much, that we now accept it as justified? Oppressive government calls for revolution, especially in a place such as Iraq where so many wrongs were allowed for so long. If the Iraqi people couldn't unite to overthrow Saddam (by any means, assassination, etc.), then they deserve his leadership. It's not the duty of some country on the other side of the world to save the day(even if it was never their intention), it is that of the citizens who live there.

Isn't this just blaming the victim? And how easily do you think it would have been for those that were oppressed to revolt? This isn't the ol' days when a militia could rise up with similar firepower to those in charge. It wouldn't be a small task to unite those under the guise of this nation state we call "Iraq".

Isn't this a bit like watching a friend who's in an abusive relationship and not going to help out when you're pretty sure you can get her out of it? (Even if you have the ulterior motive of getting laid?)

 

[SonOfNun]

Meh, I just believe in personal responsibility. I believe in the ultimate power of the human mind and spirit and I feel that anyone who can't save themselves probably isn't worth saving. Yeah, I'm a selfish prick.

And the Iraq situation is much more complicated than that anyway, I'm just bringing up a talking point. It was never the intention of the U.S. to give humanitarian aid anyway, so it's all hypothetical. If the people can't unite (probably because they don't want to, more than they can't) assassination is pretty simple option, especially with the backing of the world's greatest superpower.

 

[Dick Sirloin]

you goddamn honkies are all the same

 

[Conspicuously Absent]

If the people can't unite (probably because they don't want to, more than they can't) assassination is pretty simple option, especially with the backing of the world's greatest superpower.

They tried that. Thats what Saddam was found guilty for, getting revenge for a failed assasination attempt. Destroying and killing and torturing the entire village that it happened in.

 

[General Zod]

It's not that we are meddling. We are over there enforcing U.N policy, have we all forgotten this?

You can't make the argument that we were "enforcing U.N. policy" when the UN was against our invasion. Kofi Annan has said the following about our invasion, "I have indicated that it was not in conformity with the UN charter from our point of view, and from the charter point of view it was illegal".

It doesn't matter if you do or do not have a closet full of shotguns, a mattress full of dope, and a drawer full of Boystown weekly mags. Sorry Andrew, I didn't mean to use you as an example.

The problem with your analogy is this; we are a sovereign nation and Iraq was a sovereign nation. We have no right to tell them what to do. I'm guessing that if the Chinese tried to tell us what to do we'd have a problem with that.

Zod

 

[Demilich]

The U.S. has shown time and time again that it has little to no respect for the U.N. beyond using it as a tool to serve its own ends. Just like everyfuckingthing else! I can't believe people are dense enough to try to masquerade their nation as one with humanitarian motivations when they're clearly operating on an "oil > yuo!" basis.

 

[Demonspell]

The U.S. has shown time and time again that it has little to no respect for the U.N. beyond using it as a tool to serve its own ends. Just like everyfuckingthing else! I can't believe people are dense enough to try to masquerade their nation as one with humanitarian motivations when they're clearly operating on an "oil > yuo!" basis.

I found it hilarious that as soon as the invasion began, the justification shifted overnight from "he has WMD and is buddies with Osama" to "we're here to liberate the oppressed peoples of Iraq". We only pretend to serve the best interests of the world when it's convenient, that much is certain.

 

[Reign in Acai]

In the end, does anyone actually lose sleep over this?!?! Bombs dropping half a world away doesn't make me bat an eyelash. Self preservation and the pursuit of happiness are my only concerns. Stop pretending that your heart bleeds for the innocent civilians of a third world piss pot, when you really only care about what bar your going to get sloshed at tonight. - Allah

 

[JayKeeley]

Isn't this a bit like watching a friend who's in an abusive relationship and not going to help out when you're pretty sure you can get her out of it?

Hmm. The US and Iraq are not friends.

Good analogy though if you were talking about Israel.

 

[Demilich]

The Iraqi deathtoll isn't my first or only concern here. After all, leave them to develop their own civilization at their own pace and there will be war, injustice and death from within to keep the bodies piling up. My concern here is the overt lying, backdoor tactics of Western politicians, which is nothing new, for sure, but the scale of and motivations for this particular war are pretty mindboggling.

I mean, they may hate our culture, our lifestyle and our ways, but do we have to make ourselves so despicable that they're pretty much right anyways?

 

[JayKeeley]

In the end, does anyone actually lose sleep over this?!?! Bombs dropping half a world away doesn't make me bat an eyelash. Self preservation and the pursuit of happiness are my only concerns. Stop pretending that your heart bleeds for the innocent civilians of a third world piss pot, when you really only care about what bar your going to get sloshed at tonight. - Allah

To be honest, I have to agree with you. Thing is, it's not about Iraqi's dying or living under Saddam, it's the fact that the US and British soldiers we sent in have all died in vain.

 

[Conspicuously Absent]

In the end, does anyone actually lose sleep over this?!?! Bombs dropping half a world away doesn't make me bat an eyelash. Self preservation and the pursuit of happiness are my only concerns. Stop pretending that your heart bleeds for the innocent civilians of a third world piss pot, when you really only care about what bar your going to get sloshed at tonight. - Allah

You sir are an insult to trained chimpanzees everywhere.

however, in response to your comments. Do I Lose sleep? hell no. Think about it all the time? nope. Do I care about the civilians? No. However, the death toll is rather depressing, and the way the Bush/Blair assbanging duo doesn't care if they drive the terrorists into a killing frenzy worries me, and inconveniences me on planes.

That said, the way they blatantly lied, deceived and ignored the international opinion is scary.

The Iraqi deathtoll isn't my first or only concern here. After all, leave them to develop their own civilization at their own pace and there will be war, injustice and death from within to keep the bodies piling up. My concern here is the overt lying, backdoor tactics of Western politicians, which is nothing new, for sure, but the scale of and motivations for this particular war are pretty mindboggling.

.

I mean, they may hate our culture, our lifestyle and our ways, but do we have to make ourselves so despicable that they're pretty much right anyways?

.

To be honest, I have to agree with you. Thing is, it's not about Iraqi's dying or living under Saddam, it's the fact that the US and British soldiers we sent in have all died in vain.

.

 

[M.Lehto]

This thread is everything internet is, great drama!

 

[dorian gray]

That's alot of stuff to read to catch up. I can't do it.
Where's a thread with boobies?

 

[General Zod]

In the end, does anyone actually lose sleep over this?!?!

No... but is that our measuring stick? Do we allow our government to as they please, so long as we get a good eight hours sleep?

Zod