poor london

[minxnim]

 

[lizard]

yes. I'm proud to see though that they are responding with typical stiff upper lip character.

 

[chupe666]

i saw a bloody faced british guy who described all the havoc in typical smooth, calm british style.

so am i wrong in guessing this has some connection to the olympic announcement?

 

[lizard]

those Parisians are really pissed.

 

[0sm0se]

British political leaders are so much more eloquent, intelligent, and reasonable than American political leaders. I appreciate their calm, collected response as opposed to the fanaticism that was immediately voiced in the US. I think Bush at least avoided the topic of God in his statement subsequent to the bombing, which was nice and considering he had to make it quickly afterwards, maybe it was actually genuine, both the sentiment and the avoidance of religion. Then again, maybe he realizes his audience is the British, not the religious right. On the other hand, I understood why Al-Qaeda would attack America for our overwhelming christian religiosity and our overall cultural conflict in introducing our so-called sinful nature to the countries of the middle east in our decadence and our pursuit of oil, but why England? To reduce support for the US? Why the common people? Why not bomb the G8 if you want to make your impact felt, hurt the leaders? We might vote in our collective republics, both the US and GB, but if they really think they can scare us into voting against policies and leaders that would remove us from their geographic region and political spectrum, they are wrong. They are underestimating our greed for oil and our penchant for vengeance. Maybe I'm nuts, but all terrorist bombings have ever done is make me feel less bad for any civilian casualties that occur in the middle east.

Right now, I can't figure out who I hate more, terrorists for bombing London or our government for being so completely in bed with the petroleum industry that they are willing to sacrifice lives and a period of world peace to get oil instead of diversify thier company and come up with plans for alternate energy sources.

 

[minxnim]

that's like them getting mad at us for killing kids accidentally (or not?) over there and blowing us up (as civilians) oh wait...

 

[Josh Seipp]

i saw a bloody faced british guy who described all the havoc in typical smooth, calm british style.

so am i wrong in guessing this has some connection to the olympic announcement?

I think it probably has to do with the world leaders summit going on in scotland right now

 

[FalseTodd]

but why England?

The other major player in Iraq, and a steadfast and unquestioning supporter of US policies...makes sense to me. Plus the G8 of course

Why not bomb the G8 if you want to make your impact felt, hurt the leaders?

hard target vs. soft target - This way they are upsetting the G8 without having to contend with the massive security the conference must surround itself with

f they really think they can scare us into voting against policies and leaders that would remove us from their geographic region and political spectrum, they are wrong.

Spain.

Maybe I'm nuts, but all terrorist bombings have ever done is make me feel less bad for any civilian casualties that occur in the middle east.

I imagine this is just heat-of-the-moment, but c'mon.

Right now, I can't figure out who I hate more, terrorists for bombing London or our government for being so completely in bed with the petroleum industry that they are willing to sacrifice lives and a period of world peace to get oil instead of diversify thier company and come up with plans for alternate energy sources.

That I can largely agree with

 

[0sm0se]

Tony Blair flew back to London to address the people and is going back in the evening to go on with the G8.

 

[mindspell]

I think the oil company will have no choice but to diversify in a very short period of time because China is totally fucking the oil consumptions forecasts for the next 20 years. And the fact that China is willing to pay for harder to harvest sources (ie, like the Alberta oil sands) that none of the oil companies were willing to invest in.

That said, this attack is just horrible but the British should be very happy that it did not kill more people (because it could have very easily). Even though, and I hate to admit it, the war in Iraq is actually producing a lot of good things (Syria pulling out of Lebanon, the terrorist crack down in Saudi Arabia, at least -some- peace talks in Israel and the pulling from Gaza etc...) it is fueling acts like this to be perpetrated in "freindly" countries. And the audacity of wanting to exterminate terrorism from the planet is one more reason to hate your administration. Exterminating Terrorism is exactly like the war on drugs... lost from the start but it sure enough produces jobs for a lot of people. The only problem is that the US is right now staring at a economic problem bigger than it has ever seen and WILL NOT be able to pay for all that in the long term.

Unless of course people stop shopping at Wal-Mart, which is highly unlikely. Unless people in the US stop buying chinese and south-east asian products the trade deficit will continue to grow and the debt will continue to baloon and at some point will have its credit cut. The US is looking at a dead end right now and unless it is willing to turn the way they do things around it will be the end of a period of dominance that started after the depression.

 

[0sm0se]

I mean that's obvious that they are the other main player in Iraq, we do have their support, both militarily and politically, so in that regard it makes sense but I just don't see how losing England's support would alter any of the US policies in the region. We've gone against them before in international politics, this seems like a situation where they are A) less likely to lose support for involvement in the middle east and B) more likely to build nationalist sentiment and further increase anti-Islamic sentiment in Europe, pushing possibly for more military support.

I wasn't arguing ease, I was arguing influence and affecting those whose minds you are trying to change. Its like protesting in a Texan Church against gay marriage as opposed to protesting in the streets of san Francisco.

Oh I still feel bad, its a question of intent. At least as I understand, it is not our intent to murder civilians as they try to live their lives unlike fundamentalist-terrorist groups.

Also, nice to see we can finally agree on something.

 

[0sm0se]

Mindspell, your point goes right back to something I have been telling people for years, the only way to stop what the government is currently doing is to remove the commercial special interests from the political process and remove their money from the campaign process. We can't have an honest government that does what is best for the nation as a whole when their palms are greased by dirty money straight from the hands of commercial leaders. Its why we have a trade deficit, a war on our hands, a corrupt political system, and a widening income gap. The problem stems from the host of people in DC who can be bought and the astonishingly low prices at which this can be accomplished.

 

[FalseTodd]

Again, though, I think the elections in Spain are illustrative - who can say for sure that the Brits won't say "OK, we've screwed around in that place too long let's pack our bags before something worse happens"

Yeah I hear you on the ease argument - I'm just saying that this is not atypical of the M.O. for this type of thing. It's not surprising. Perhaps not as effective as bombing the meeting itself - but a great deal easier and still with great impact...

And yes of course the intent between Baghdad and the WTC is a huge difference - I'm saying they should not be correlated - one should not affect the other - and by making the comparison it feels to me like saying that our standards should be affected by what the other side does...

 

[mindspell]

I mean that's obvious that they are the other main player in Iraq, we do have their support, both militarily and politically, so in that regard it makes sense but I just don't see how losing England's support would alter any of the US policies in the region. We've gone against them before in international politics, this seems like a situation where they are A) less likely to lose support for involvement in the middle east and B) more likely to build nationalist sentiment and further increase anti-Islamic sentiment in Europe, pushing possibly for more military support.

I have doubts that the US would have gone into Iraq without a western power. Without GB and with the Czech Republic and Poland I don't think this would have much credibility for the Coalition of the Willing. GB was credibility. No doubt that the policy would not have changed but GB was the great enabler in that case.

I really don't know about that anti-Islamic sentiment in Europe....

 

[lizard]

Again, though, I think the elections in Spain are illustrative - who can say for sure that the Brits won't say "OK, we've screwed around in that place too long let's pack our bags before something worse happens"

I think the British character will preclude this from happening...unless they vote in a different party. they didn't cave during the IRA attacks, and no matter how bad things got in WWII they didn't cave in then.

I mean, in the bleakest days of the London Blitz, Churchill was intoning "this is England's finest hour."

 

[0sm0se]

I have to agree with lizard about british resolve, they are more stubborn then we ever could be.

Obviously this modus operandi is easier but attacking our leaders would lend their movement credibility in international circles by pointing out how they above attacking civilians while we are not.

And who brought up the WTC? I was talking about the Tube today, I'm not saying our standards of operation should change i.e. we should stop worrying about killing civilians, I'm just saying at least we have standards of operation. However, I do have to agree with you, we should hold ourselves to higher standards of operating procedure.

And Mindspell, as little respect as the global community has for the average, stupid American in terms of their knowledge of global politics and their capacity to hate anything that is different, as enlightened as Europeans claim to be, more than likely there are Europeans who will be driven to hate Islamic fundamentalists as much as Southern racists if the bombings continue. I'm just gonna point at Serbia, there are roots of anti-Islamic sentiment in Europe itself. It is not outside of the scope of possibility.

 

[mindspell]

I am sure as well 0sm0se, all I am saying is that proximity and some of the Islamist lobby prevent that from becoming mainstream and really doing anything but showing ridicule. I mean, france has 10% of muslims, even more middle-eastern people and have Le Pen who is considered not being much more than a buffoon.

 

[0sm0se]

Granted it won't become mainstream but I'm just saying you are establishing a greater bias through these attacks, even if it is an unspoken one, it will exist nonetheless.

 

[FalseTodd]

You guys are probably correct about the British - Was just saying there is a basis for al qaeda's belief that they can influence policy, and it is not impossible - but in retrospect I would tend to agree with you both

please pardon on the WTC thing - more just meant it as a placeholder for terrorism in general - i did not mean to imply that you were speaking about it - my point was that saying that acts of terrorism make you less concerned about civilian casualties in iraq creates parity between the two - and i am just concerned that this standard could be conflated with or influenced by the tactics of terrorists - the line of thinking is just upsetting to me, even apart from any effects on our policies...

 

[minxnim]

omg like 37 injured and over 700 hurt that's so f'd