thee protests and thine whatnot

[goatschool]

does anyone have any real idea about how big or not big these things are supposed to be this WE?

 

[goatschool]

fuck this thread title. fuck fuck, fuck it.

fuck fuck, fuck it.

fuck fuck, fuck off.

(lyrics for future mp3s)

 

[xfer]

i dunno, but they were being billed in Boston as "Bring Home the Troops Now", so I was confused as to which side they were supposed to be on. because that seems like an incredibly Republican/right-wing/pro-Bush thing to fight for.

 

[goatschool]

this looks stupid. i'm too cynical. maybe this is just for college kids.

meanwhile watch that asteroid actually hit the planet tonight.

 

[xfer]

i think it's secretly put on by the GOP and they're trying to rope in the stupider parts of the left-wing to discredit us as a whole.

 

[Demonspell]

http://news.yahoo.com/fc?tmpl=fc&cid=34&in=world&cat=antiwar_movement

 

[minxnim]

why is 'bring home the troops now' bush-ist i'm confused

 

[xfer]

because it's what Bush and the right-wingers are striving for. they want to hightail it out of Iraq as soon as possible, whether the country's stable or not. they apparently like making a mess but not cleaning it up; Bush was elected while campaigning AGAINST "nation-building" and "wasting" American money and lives in peacekeeping capacities overseas.

if the troops aren't withdrawn by the election, i think it could cost Bush as many as ten points. he's well aware of that.

Bush has set a June 30th pullout date for the troops in order to have them safely out of Iraq by the time the heavy campaigning begins. they're cutting corners and rushing things in a desperate attempt to stick to that date. pulling out the troops by June 30th will be seen as a huge Bush success; pulling them out before June 30th will wreck any chance Iraq has of surviving the power transfer; pulling them out later than June 30th is something Bush wants to avoid at ALL COSTS.

i want the troops to stay until Nov.7th. i think there were plenty of arguments against the war and even afterward i think there were plenty of arguments in favor of pulling out the troops and replacing them with UN troops, but at this point, with 3 months until the scheduled transfer anyway and an election in 6 months? i think it's extremely hard to defend that action as other than "exactly what Bush hopes and dreams for".

 

[minxnim]

i just want my foster brother to not get killed

 

[mindspell]

I think it was too late from day one of the war to be asking for UN help for the reconstruction and all. After the blatant disregard to the UN's processes it was a given that the rebuilding process would fall on the shoulders of the coalition. Now everybody in the said coalition is trying to get out of there as soon as possible, and it already began. It just seems now that Iraq will in much worse shape than it was under Saddam (although a bit more human-rights friendly )

 

[xfer]

wellll if it helps my point any more, i think that all of us--especially your foster brother--will have a much lower chance of getting killed over the next 5 years or so if Bush doesn't get re-elected.

 

[minxnim]

this doesn't really make me feel any better right now though.

 

[xfer]

eh, i think Iraq's going to turn out a lot better than it was under Saddam, except for the totalitarian-state-controls aspects (for example, there is something like zero crime in China because of state terror, but i think that when/if China makes the transition to glorious democracy you can't really criticize the sharp increase in crime as "evidence things were better under the Communists!").

we just need to pour a LOT of money into it, and get a lot of countries to send peacekeepers. once the handover to Iraqis occurs and UN troops move in, as long as the US doesn't stop dumping money and time into the country, i think things will continue to improve.

 

[xfer]

focus your hatred on Bush! he must be defeated!

 

[mindspell]

eh, i think Iraq's going to turn out a lot better than it was under Saddam, except for the totalitarian-state-controls aspects (for example, there is something like zero crime in China because of state terror, but i think that when/if China makes the transition to glorious democracy you can't really criticize the sharp increase in crime as "evidence things were better under the Communists!").

I am not saying otherwise, I just said that NOW it is in much worse shape, and it appears that it still will be in very bad shape in short-mid term. Long term, there is a distinct possibility that it will get better than it was.

we just need to pour a LOT of money into it, and get a lot of countries to send peacekeepers. once the handover to Iraqis occurs and UN troops move in, as long as the US doesn't stop dumping money and time into the country, i think things will continue to improve.

I think Bush would cut the lines of support as soon as he can. He thinks he has done his job, let them sort it out now... sigh...

 

[minxnim]

of course you'd feel differently if there were an active draft going on....

 

[xfer]

who me? not really. i have virtually no chance of being drafted into the military (i'm too old, and i would fall under Conscientious Objector status anyway), so i would still have about as much chance of being forced to blow up Iraqi babies if there was a draft that i do today.

 

[minxnim]

but maybe then you'd actually know someone who was.

 

[xfer]

i have friends in iraq right now--although my closest friend-in-iraq just cycled back here for a few months.

another guy called our house from iraq and was really sad because the iraqis blew up his humvee (after he got out). he was like "i was really starting to like it and feel like it was mine, too."

 

[xfer]

actually that's unfair--i think it was foreign fighters, not iraqis, who blew it up. hard to say.