The News Thread
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Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
My turn to ask for stats now. Seems unlikely Obama has killed more people through drone strikes than were killed over the entire course of the Iraq/Afghanistan wars.
CiG
Harbinger of Metal
Not over the entire conflicts, over dubbya's time in the conflicts.
Let me restate it more clearly.
Obama has killed more people in the middle east with drone strikes alone, than dubbya did overall during his time as president.
You can't say over the entire course because Obama continued the wars during his presidency.
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
Arguably you could still attribute the death toll to Bush as he initiated the conflicts (and Obama was left with them to deal with), but notwithstanding, I highly doubt that's accurate. Did some quick googling and the Lancet Study suggests that 654,965 people were killed in Iraq alone by 2006. There are all sorts of factors that influence figures like that, though, including documented vs estimated, and direct kills vs death from secondary effects. The numbers I've heard thrown about for drone collateral damage are also wildly varying.
CiG
Harbinger of Metal
That number includes friendly losses, I'm not talking about that.
I'll try and post sources later, I'm not able to right now.
But no, you can't blame what happens under Obama on dubbya. That's the kind of pathetic dickriding apologetics I'm talking about.
I'll try and post sources later, I'm not able to right now.
But no, you can't blame what happens under Obama on dubbya. That's the kind of pathetic dickriding apologetics I'm talking about.
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
Actually the Lancet surveys were limited to the Iraqi mortality rate, although American casualties were comparatively so low that it wouldn't have made much of a difference anyway.
As to Obama, his policy was pretty much to get troops out of both countries as fast as possible, which is generally what conservatives end up criticizing him for. Not necessarily with him there either - just because the war was a bad idea in the first place doesn't mean rapidly pulling out is going to improve the situation.
rms
Active Member
Drones have improved dramatically under Obamas tenure so the argument is kind of dumb anyways. Any President outside of maybe a Sanders or Warren will use lethal drone force on suspected terrorists for the considerable future
CiG
Harbinger of Metal
The significant point is that Obama ran on change, on ending the conflict and stopping the killing. Nobody would care if he hadn't promised to end the death, he'd have been just another neocon.
Instead he's a hypocrite.
Instead he's a hypocrite.
rms
Active Member
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
Yeah, he is a hypocrite, but no more so than any other president. Drone strikes seem like a pragmatic solution to eliminating terrorists with minimal commitment of resources and loss of American life, which is what Obama likes about them. What is generally underestimated, though, is just how much the psychological toll of living under the threat of sudden and arbitrary death causes people in the Middle East to hate Americans and turn to terrorism as a reaction.
I'm probably just as critical of Obama as you are in many ways, the only difference being that I admit I'd be hard pressed to come up with any better solutions than the ones he's currently implementing. It's a bit of a no win situation.
CiG
Harbinger of Metal
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
True, but still significantly lower than they would have been if Obama had committed to continuing the ground war, or had initiated new ones.
The best solution would probably be to commit special forces teams to take out important targets. If the Americans feel so strongly about subduing terrorism, they should put their lives on the line to prove it. It's the unfairness of the technological advantage which is part of the reason anti-American sentiment is so rabid.
CiG
Harbinger of Metal
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
How many terrorist manifestos have you been reading recently? Anyway, you can see my point here. Living under the constant terror of death from above is just as scary as living in terror of being suicide bombed or gunned down in a shopping center. More so if you consider how much more likely it is.
Not arguing that the objective of drone strikes is terrify, but it comes to one and the same.
CiG
Harbinger of Metal
My point was never that Obama was worse than dubbya, merely just as bad yet less criticised by rabid anti-dubbya types.
So you're proving my point in the end, because not many people on the left say shit about him but are happy to destroy dubbya.
I say destroy them both.
So you're proving my point in the end, because not many people on the left say shit about him but are happy to destroy dubbya.
I say destroy them both.
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
I'm trying to make my position clearer by saying that I also disagree with many of Obama's policies. The real point you should be taking from this, though, is that many of the things Obama is criticized for (pulling out of Iraq and Afghanistan too quickly, meddling/not meddling in cases of increasing destabilisation, drone strikes to forestall future terrorist attacks) may well not have been necessary if if it weren't for Dubbya's interventions in the first place.
The main difference between the two, it seems to me, is that with Dubbya it's pretty easy to say what he should have done differently - i.e. not go to war. With Obama things get a little greyer.
Dak
mentat
Hillary's campaign manager is peddling a conspiracy theory about Russia hacking the DNC to help Donald Trump. lol.
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/24/politics/robby-mook-russia-dnc-emails-trump/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/24/politics/robby-mook-russia-dnc-emails-trump/index.html
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TechnicalBarbarity
Poser Disposer
What? Did you just say Obama pulled out of Afghanistan?
Please go read up on the whole Obama-Afghanistan thing and come back. Like i said, just buying into any bullshit that you're fed without even knowing what's what is not a cool thing to do bro.
Internally Deformed
Farseer of the Paranormal Abysm
What? Did you just say Obama pulled out of Afghanistan?
True, just looked into this and you're right. The total number of troops Obama has committed overseas and gone down over the course of his administration, but the Afghanistan troop numbers went up dramatically:
Good catch. I wouldn't interpret that as evidence of my brainwashing, though, it's just me being wrong about something.
TechnicalBarbarity
Poser Disposer
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