We all know that Israel is being defensive.....not offensive, no matter how aggressive their defense is.

*checks thread for previous germane posts by townie hoodie*

NONE FOUND! (sirens wail)

TROLL ALERT! TAKE COVER!

Don't try indulging in ignorant caricature -- I end up bending the people who try it over a picket fence and sandbagging them. They end up being made fools of. It is not, after all, necessary to be a communist to "disagree" with us, but it's extremely likely that communists/socialists will do that, because our libertarian sort of social order is a standing reproach to their markedly poorer and visibly inferior approach to just plain life, let alone prosperity. It is routine for communists to rail against the best capitalist example, and it is equally routine for communists to desire that we be defeated. Has tw at any time evinced a desire that we, the democracy, win? AFAIK he hasn't. Tw's behavior is remarkably consistent in this regard.


This is a reasonably fair question, but I am surprised you don't see the connection. Socialism is -- what? -- communism dilute? Both are collectivist, right? Is there even any particular line with distinctively pure socialism on one side, and a pure communism on the other? It is also my experience that totalitarianisms are more alike than they are different. They exist to oppress; the good thing about democracies is that they aren't in the oppression business. Add secure property rights to a democratic social order and you've got something no totalitarian society can match: mighty wealth, nurtured in a society congenial to it, which is not seen under the rule of an oppressor. In Israel/Lebanon we have a battle between the socialist Ba'ath ruling party of Syria and the oppressive regime of mullahs in Iran on one side and the most successful and established democracy anywhere in the Middle East on the other.

Capitalized to demonstrate your inability to recognize a devoted communist, you mean, Ibbie. Sorry, not impressed. Your education has a huge hole in it. For the proof of tw's communist views, you need only to do two easy things -- okay, fairly easy: recall every communist propaganda trope you've ever heard or heard of, even if you have to research them first, and see if you can find them in what tw writes. If he's not a communist, he does an incredibly precise imitation of one. Communist takes on world history pop up in his historical comments all the time -- he's a mess on Vietnam, being visibly happy our cause was lost. At first I thought tw was simply irrational, but when he invoked that popular communist boogeyman Pinochet -- as a boogeyman -- there was my first clue. Then I saw all the other left/communist stuff sprinkled through his posts and the lightbulb came on. I've remarked in the thread you refer to that he makes no denial to any effect of my findings -- he knows he's a communist too, and his last shreds of personal integrity cause him to tacitly admit that. You can't have personal integrity and communism at the same time -- either it will drive you nuts or the other communists will shoot you.

Communism has no understanding of human nature or of economics, as its record of grandiose failure shows. It was the work of a crank, and it produced, apparently inherently, only waste. Communism itself being without worth, what does that make the communists?

It makes them something to avoid, or better, to destroy. Absent any other brand of totalitarianism, the anti-Communist is in my experience the pro-Human. I urge all of us to be pro-Human. Some, alas, will not respond to this call, perhaps because they imagine me to be anti-human or something.

You can dislike things the US has done without being communist.
You can misunderstand human nature without being communist.
You can agree with things that commies have said without being communist.
You can think that democracies are not automatically right without being communist.
In fact, you can easily do all of those without being communist.

Show me where tw has ever said anything about wanting socialism, communism, totalitarianism, or anything of the sort. You logic is along the lines of 'He runs fast, has a big wang, is strong, wears baggy clothes, and wears hats, so he must be black!' It's nothing but stereotypes and incomplete assumptions.

And I thought McCarthy was dead for years...

UG wrote: I am finding it hard to know just where to begin on this one. It does say a lot though doesn't it?

There can be no democracy without communism anyway. Everything needs a paradox; an equal and opposite force. It's one of the principal laws of physics. What makes communism so evil anyway? (can't wait for this)

*Hands Aliantha a hardhat and tucks in behind the sandbags, damp ciggie hanging from lips*

Well this should be entertaining.

(Incidentally and appropos of nothing: is that Aliantha as in the berry?)

Yeah...big Stephen Donaldson fan here. ;) Being a lefty, I spend a lot of time in fantasy land. :)

note: I do realize the definition of paradox is not 'an equal and opposite force', so don't bother correcting me. It'd be fairly easy to argue that communism is a paradox of democracy though.

ps. That note wasn't for your benefit Dana. ;)

Ahhh.....The Land:) I spent many happy hours there:P well, alright not exactly happy.....more tense as fuck and often harrowing, but hey not all fantasies are fun :)
(Have you read Runes of the Earth by the way?)

Note to any new readers: None of the above is actually true.

I think that's a very interesting strategy UG is employing there. I can see how in a battle of intellects, being bent over a fence and sandbagged must be the ultimate riposte. Gosh, they must feel so silly. Egg in their faces really.

Dana, you say that Israel should 'do like hzblh wants' and do a prisoner exchange. why on earth should Israel do what hzblh wants? Your crying foul because Israel didn't respond "correctly" to these thugs? then you ask for a fair fight. I say don't pick on someone who can squash you.

Why is it that if someone is big and burly they are called upon to show restraint when provoked? "Look, I know that little guy keeps hitting you and hitting you and spitting on you, but, you're so big...just take it, ok? Let him do whatever he wants to you coz you are big and rich. Let him piss on you if he wants, ok?" Rubbish.

That's the new theory - and it may be right, that if Israel allowed the attacks to go on and did nothing about it, they would eventually be seen as the highly moral actor.

To get there, all a culture needs to do is to collectively reach a Gandhi-esque level of moral development in over 50% of its population, before it reaches a level of learned helplessness in same, by thoroughly accepting the occasional citizen killed by potshot or lobbed missile as somehow a good thing.

All the while the team doing the lobbing grows exponentially in strength.

Look, the Palestinians have a reasonable cause, even if they do not always follow a reasonable path to get there. Hezbollah, however, does not. I would like to see them all dead, in big dic fashion, instead of just the 25% who were offed in the last month. But I realize this may not be able to be accomplished and may have an unreasonable level of "blowback" amongst people who actually like the highly violent, islamofascist, thugs who assassinate anyone who disagrees with them. (Not only opposition leaders, but TV commentators who disagree with them.)

And so the current action may not actually be a good idea, but I don't know, which is why I must be content to let history be the judge.