Assuming you did it all in one go, in the smallest possible geographic area, that would indeed be difficult to hide.

What exactly was "Shock and Awe?" Wasn't it carpet bombing Bahgdad before the invasion?

UT - take a look at some recent pics of fallujah.

[proclaimation]

Ahem. thump, thump -- this thing on? Testing. One. Two. Three.

feedback screech.

We, the United States of America, slaughtered 100,000* innocent, civilian Iraqi women, children and elderly people in cold blood even though we could easily have avoided killing even one of them.

* Give or take 93,000.

[/proclaimation]

There. I said it.

you missed the 'and took their money'.

Yes, Jag, do take a look at what the Marines and Iraqis will do together to a city after they have moved the civilians to camps.

Baghdad was not carpet-bombed. We even left the lights on until day 5. There has never been a higher incentive not to kill civilians.

That single study is the only one we have at the moment. I, too, would like to see more data. As you have pointed out, we may eventually have it. But as you also pointed out, you are skeptical of Iraqi's doing the count. The final count will probably be done by the Iraqi side, and, thus, dismissed by you.

You have to be kidding me.

Well a lot of them relocated pre-action

We killed 2000 in Fallujah. Here's the powerpoint

A fucking powerpoint presentation? Christ a website would have been easier.
First things first, this document immediately tries to imply that insurgents were a regular fighting force, either they are, then the Geneva convention applies and the US are in violation when it comes to guantanamo, or they aren't, make up your fucking mind, you can't have it both ways. Secondly, since when was a video of how to throw a grenade a fucking atrocity? Thirdly, what is that foreign fighter involvement document? Looks like a grocery store accounts book to me.

Of course, I'm sure whoever wrote this little lump of propaganda is sure that every single death in Fallujah was an insurgent. Of course. No question about it. Damn insurgents, eh? Never mind the Red Cross official estimate that nearly 50% of the toll there was civvies, 800 in fact. That was the lowball end. But lets not let these partisan organisations get in the way of The Truth(tm(, right UT?

Hard to tell though, when they won't even let the red cross in to deliver medical aid. Makes it easy to have nice low death tolls of all insurgents when you can clean up after your boys have been through. We've all seen the videos demonstrating the callous disregard by US troops for life and property why should be assume their death tolls are any more upstanding or accurate?

You know, I think we've come around to my point here: causing a high number of deaths of women and children via coalition air strikes would require both ill intent for the civilians, combined with a massive coverup.

The military must both want to kill people and want to cover it up. Even in Fallujah, this is the only way for a numeracy-literate and war-literate person to come up with a valid explanation for the Lancet number.

I'm sure that our resident world traveler believes that of the US Mil, and I'm not saying they're not capable of it but I do think it would be a stretch. After all there were embeds involved, some of whom documented military activity which some people found questionable. (I suppose Mr. Sites missed the massive civvy killing that would have won him the Pulitzer, but perhaps it was happening the next block over.)

So Jag, what is left for you to figure out in this mystery, is motive, a critical factor in any murder investigation and what I asked for in post #28:

easier to spray a room and shoot anything that moves, including any number of the 50000 civvies that were left in the city than it is to pick out and selectively fire at those firing weapons in your direction.

sorry man, I edited my post after you posted. the bit about the embeds and kevin sites is my answer to your answer

I doubt documenting US war crimes would have got him a pullitzer, it's fairly routine.
There were documented civvy killings (and very well documented killing of wounded POWs or whatever it's legally astute to kill people you shoot these days) in fallujah. I'm not suggesting, as you would like to imply, some kind of mass-scale genocide, merely that many that the US would love to tack down as 'dead insurgents' are most likely poor bastards in the wrong place at the wrong time. I said 800 civvie deaths, lowball, in fallujah, considering the scale of conflict and the number of dead, not to mention the source, you're going to have a real tough time shooting that down.

Were 100,000 killed overall? Maybe, maybe more, maybe less, I don't have a goddamn clue but plenty of innocent people have been killed by US forces, either though inaction, outright murder or accident and there's no escaping that fact.

That is true, I completely agree. Nevertheless, the number 100,000 is the topic of the thread.

UT, the topic goes right back to how you also knew those aluminum tubes were for weapons of mass destruction. You acknowledge error only because you have no alternative. But you still fail to acknowledge a reason why you were wrong. Same reason is why you are now challenging the '98,000 dead Iraqi' number. You just know - facts be damned. Or better still, you still blindly believe what the administration says. The administration says 15,000 dead. Therefore it must be 15,000? History alone says a number from that source cannot be trusted. Why do you still believe what they hype?

If you have a problem with that number, then stop the wild speculation as to why those people died. Again, provide a reasonable study that either has numbers based in logic, or that explains how so many Iraqis (military and civilian) died. I keep asking for this that you don't provide.

That is topic. Does UT, et al believe science or does he believe the administration spin? Those who believe reality verses those who blindly follow spin and myths. Is it 98,000 dead Iraqis due to Americans, or the politically spun 15,000? The first number is based upon facts. The second ... well we don't even know how they got that number. Karl Rove? Same person who hyped an aluminum tube myth?

History alone says numbers from the administration are not credible. Need we cite another recent example? The latest massive cost increases in the administration's prescription drug program? By now, UT, I would have thought you learned that lesson - why you were totally wrong about aluminum tubes. What is the subject? What numbers are to be believed? Those based upon science or those hyped by an administration that often lies? Shrodinger's Cat has demonstrated why the study is so credible. UT - your only response has been, "I don't believe it; facts be damned". Same reasoning used to hype those alumimun tubes.

Don't just acknowledege you were wrong. Address the reason why you were wrong. Same reason is being used to challenge 'America's 98,000 dead Iraqis'.

You really truly believed that a massacre happened in Jenin.

http://cellar.org/showthread.php?t=1324

You never even acknowledged that you were wrong. I bet you still won't. I'm giving you this opportunity.

Thousand? Let's talk about body counts shall we. Let's talk about facts and who believes in what.

UT. I acknowledge my mistakes AND (this is the more important point) acknowledge why I made those mistakes. Big difference. We have two numbers. Lies from an administration of only 15,000 dead. Or numbers based upon what made America great - logic and science - that say 98,000 dead due to America. Which do you promote? You had to acknowledge being wrong on those aluminum tubes. But when do you stop making the same logical errors? If logical, then say America has killed 98,000 Iraqis.

First it goes to credibility. Another example. The administration knew that a drug plan costs far more than $400 billion. So they ordered the expert to not talk to Congress so Congress could not learn about the lie. The expert's numbers said at least $500 billion. Today we learn (after the election) that the administration knew it was at least $700+ billion. Ahhh but Reagan proved deficits don't matter. Lying therefore is justified? No wonder the administration authorized torture of prisoners who were not even guilty. How many lies before George Jr has no credibility? Welcome to the Vietnam syndrome.

George Jr proves he can lie repeatedly and UT (, et al) will believe him ... religiously? When does this Vietnam syndrom stop?

Again the numbers. 98,000 dead as so accurately explained by Shrodinger's Cat verses the 15,000 ... and the administration does not even try to justify those numbers. How can anyone believe the administration? And that is the point. How and why would anyone believe only 15,000 dead when there is no logical reason to do so?

UT completely misses the point. You are taking personal insult. Logical conclusions have no place among silly emotions. The point is about how one draws conclusions. Meanwhile no one is insulted. Again, I keep asking UT, et al to provide just some 'real world' facts to justify a defense of the mental midget president's numbers. I do so repeatedly because he will not provide any such facts. He can't even admit why he was so wrong about those aluminum tubes - a critical self examination. One instead would take insult to this continued demand for facts? A demand so that one does not make same mistakes as with those aluminum tubes. Learn why you were wrong about those aluminum tubes AND about 98,000 killed by America.

Where pray tell is a study anywhere near as responsible as the one published in The Lancet. We are talking here about, for example, why emotion rather than logic created a war that killed 98,000 Iraqis for no good reason. A person properly burned by this lying president would have long ago said, "I don't trust the administration's 15,000 number". Obviously. Aministration provides no supporting facts knowing full well that many in America will still blindly believe. Why then, UT, do you still keep making the same logic mistakes you made with those aluminum tubes?

The next event is fast approaching as I predicted last year. Already the lies and half truths are being put forth to justify another unjustified invasion - in Iran. We know this will happen if only because the administration said up front that it intends to 'fix' the Middle East and put Iran on a list of countries to invade. So when that war goes nuclear, will you stand there screaming that the US launch ICBMs and nuclear bombs on Iran? Are you already justifying that war using the same logic that promoted aluminum tubes for WMDs? When will you confront White House spin using logic - and not blindly believe what they say? That, UT, is the point. Where is the logic that says a 15,000 dead number is accurate? It does not exist - except in White House speculation.

Those who blindly believe a 15,000 number are likely to call for a unilateral attack on Iran. And that one may turn nuclear. It is coming because too many are so blind as to even believe a fictitious 15,000 number. This is not a personal attack on anyone, UT. It is a question of how many times one will believe a lying president - without facts to justify that support. A person using logic says The Lancet's 98,000 dead number is the most likely estimate. A person who advocates a unilateral attack on Iran blindly (and without facts) would typically believe the administration's 15,000 numbers. That is the danger. A danger because things are believed - facts be damned.

Oynxcougar - at what point do we finally declare George Jr as evil. With the invasion of Iran, or with the invasion of N Korea? Is that not the sign of a devil - when logical thinking is replaced by a blind compliance? Only a devil could put up a 15,000 dead number, provide no justification, and people both loyally and unquestionably believe what they are told.

Let me add some clarification here, since few seemed to have bothered to read the original Lancet article. The study looked at the number of civilian deaths as a result of the war. The researchers wanted to compare civilian death rates pre-American invasion and post Saddam. Remember how a big bone of contention has been that Saddam was responsible for many deaths of his own people?

Here's just one example of the factors the researchers looked at: One of the major public health problems in Iraq has been the increase in infant mortality since the US invasion. The authors of the paper address this problem, explaining that increased infant mortality rate is due to the mothers' fear of going to the hospital since the outbreak of the war. This segment of the civilian death toll is NOT due to US soldiers gunning down infants. It IS due to the over-all instability of the country since the US invasion. The US stance has been that we are making life better for the average Iraqi. Going by the data published in the Lancet, we are not.

The Lancet paper was not some anti-American diatribe. It was scientific and impartial. It even made mention of US soldiers coming to the familes of the deceased and apologizing in some instances of inadvertant civilian deaths. The concluding paragraphs of the paper ask a very valid question. The US military claims that "collateral" deaths have been kept to a minimum due to precision weapons and bombing. If the US military has no knowledge of the actual number of civilian deaths, how can it make such a claim?

Please point out the post where you acknowledged there was no Jenin massacre, and explained why you made such a massive error.

I'll make it easier for you. Please point out any post at all where you acknowledged that you made any error at all, and explained why you made that error.

Everyone else can help. Certainly one Cellarite can recall it happening. Anyone?

The Devil? Now who's being illogical?:eyebrow:

Ut and tw remind me of the feud in Asterix in Corsica about his great-great-great-great grandad buying a lame donkey from the other guy's great-great-great-great-grandad. It was very, very serious.

Unfortunately, UT, you fail (or just don't want) to understand the subject. Too often, you promote myopic 'them verses us' conclusions rather than first learn facts. Your insistence that ‘those aluminum tubes were for WMDs’ says you did not first learn facts. Even quoting an accurate post that “not everyone wants democracy” (no matter how many times you insist otherwise) says you are trying to avoid the point.

UT you were wrong to blindly believe what George Jr said about Iraq. You don't have an engineer’s attitude that first demands the irrefutable fact. But then you blindly accept Rush Limbaugh type propaganda as if that were fact. IOW you make multiple reasoning mistakes. If you first demand facts, then you would not have posted repeatedly about aluminum tubes and other WMD propaganda.

Have you learned from that mistake? Apparently not. For example, not one good reason exists to challenge the 98,000 dead number. Schrodinger's Cat has again posted what you did not read before forming opinions. You immediately assumed the Iraqi dead were due to military violence. Again, you just knew – facts be damned. As with aluminum tubes, you failed to learn facts before forming an opinion. A problem that is also widespread in America. Same problem will cause an illegal invasion of Iran.

Ok that is how you came to opinions and still failed to learn from your 'aluminum tube', ‘Saddam is a threat’, et al fiasco. To repeat it again: This discussion is not about you. This is a discussion of how people in America now view the world and form opinions. The point again, UT. It is not only about how you think (which is why you have no reason to feel so insulted). Your posts are cited as but examples. Bury your emotions to comprehend the point of this discussion. People, such as you, who have a problem with The Lancet study (knew it was wrong without even reading the study) also don't learn facts before forming conclusions. You even assumed you knew what The Lancet study was counting. This becomes a serious problem in America when the president is so extremist, dishonest, confrontational, mentally deficient, and aggressive. UT is not the only one who demonstrates this problem. But an aluminum tube myth and ‘Arabs in every closet just waiting to massacre Americans’ is a problem create by “so many who just know – facts be damned”.

Again, there is no insult here of UT. UT’s denial of 98,000 dead Iraqis is a symptom of a much larger and more dangerous problem. Unfortunately, so many Americans are so easily deceived by lies and myths that America threatens to become the so-called ‘great Satan’ - and invade Iran.

The statement today by N Korea is, unfortunately, accurate. American belligerence so threatens world peace that N Korea would be irresponsible to not build nuclear weapons. You tell me how such belligerence makes for a better world. Instability created because too many Americans just know – facts such as The Lancet study be damned.

UT, you did not read the study. You did not understand what deaths were counted. But you just knew it was wrong? That is a problem that extends well beyond how UT forms opinions. That is the point. There is no insult of UT. There is a problem in America that UT repeatedly demonstrates.

Yes, tw, and my questions are not about you. They're about people LIKE you, who are mentally ill. Not YOU. People LIKE you.

People with an "engineer's mind" who somehow come to accept propaganda such as "thousand dead in Jenin", and, having subjected the "fact" to their "engineer's mind", find it to be factual and work from that point as a given.

Not YOU though. Just people LIKE you. You know. Morons.

What questions, UT? I don't see any questions. I see accusations that have no justification - accusations made without any supporting facts or numbers. Where is this question about The Lancet study that says the US caused the death of 98,000 (and probably many more) Iraqis? Instead the study is wrong - and yet you apparently did not read it. Instead you assumed it was about people killed by military violence. And again, where is the question? All I read is your accusations that the study must be wrong.

Are you acknowledging that what Schrodinger's Cat has posted is accurately? Do you better understand the 98,000 dead number since he has noted who gets counted as dead?

That's because you don't read for comprehension. The questions are: 1) Please point out the post where you acknowledged there was no Jenin massacre, 2) please explain why you made such a massive error, or really, any post at all where you acknowledged that you made any error at all.

From the actual study, "Findings", page one:

Yes, most of the deaths were due to military actions, but concern about infant mortality rates was also a vital component of the study:

The paper goes on to discuss this in further sections, so death by violence was NOT the only thing the researchers were looking at.

They also state that violent deaths were mostly due to air strikes, so, once again, this is not some diatribe about evil US soldiers gunning down helpless civilians on the street. It is about the failure of the US military command to use its so-called precision bombing techniques:

The authors practically request that the US military follow up on their preliminary study:

If a couple of University professors with limited funding were able to carry out a study valid enough to be published in a highly respected, peer-reviewed scientific journal; surely, the DOD with its much greater access to funding and materials could do the same and end the controversy one way or the other. Why don't they?

Noone would believe them anyway.

If the cause is different we will need a new motive from you, Jag.

I'm not following you UT. How does saying that DoD death numbers would be viewed with extreme suspicion undermine anything else I've said exactly?

That is what I have found most frustrating about this thread. Americans wouldn't believe an Iraqi count; everyone else wouldn't believe a DOD count, and the one scientific study we have of the problem becomes a quarrel of belief systems. I have sometimes felt as if I'm trying to explain evolution to a fundamentalist who responds to every show of scientific proof with the statement, "I don' care whatcha say. I STILL ain't got no chimpanzee for a great grandaddy!" :eyebrow:

OnyxCougar would be happy to oblige you on that account if the Evolution vs Creationism thread weren't so polluted at the moment. ;)

That's okay, thanks. It sounds like the round I had with a lady who came into my office one year just after we switched over to daylight savings time and wanted to berate "You physicists" for tinkering with the rotation of the earth and the tilt of its axis. I sent her over to my colleagues in the geography department, and none of them would speak to me for months afterward! :D

I don't believe any of them. The DOD and Iraqi counts are tainted with agenda.
The "scientific" count was taken with too many restraints that had to be "accommodated" by changing the parameters of the fly.
Peer reviewed? Sure a bunch of statisticians in their respective ivory towers saying, Oh yeah that's the way to do it. Have any of these peers been to iraq? Do them know how difficult it is to get such information or even get to the locations. They agree that + or - damn near 100% is reasonable?

OK, hows this? What difference does it make? It's done and it can't be changed either way. Coulda/shoulda/woulda doesn't help. How about working on getting it done and getting the hell out of there.

Jag, regarding what's left outstanding here, when called on for a motive earlier you said "easier to spray a room and shoot anything that moves" but now that we've established that it's (possibly) untargeted air strikes, that motive doesn't apply.

Given that the US *does* have the GPS-guided bombs (and even developed a GPS-guided concrete rock to take out a few specific targets that were surrounded by things they didn't want to destroy). Given that we had the targetting ability to leave the lights on until day 5. Why would the US have used untargetted munitions that would likely hit civilians? Has anyone seen video of something untargetted? Is there a reason to kill civilians? Are there any missing neighborhoods?

Actually, I suspect that both occur. Why would air strikes rule out infantry? They're hardly mutually exclusive.

But remember, not according to the study:
Just a paragraph before that it says Q.E.D. if they are not throwing around this word "most", we have untargetted coalition air strikes killing mostly woman and children. Is that even possible? I don't think so.

Most means more than half.

Happy Monkey is correct - most DOES mean more than half. Since the study is talking about civilian deaths, it stands to reason that the group which comprises the majority of the civilian population (women and children under 12) would account for most civilian deaths.

I don't know that the study calls the air strikes "untargeted." It questions if the air strikes are as precise as has been claimed.

Dresden Remembered.
It seems to me that incidents like Dresden and Hiroshima underscore how war changed in the 20th century.

Rape and pillage were the marks of war in Europe. Later however, the destruction of towns seemed to lose in favor of occupation. The fascists bombing of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War seemed to bring back into vogue the terrorizing of civlian populations by the military.

Destoying unarmed merchant ships was always a part of war. In theory, any ship carrying military cargo was an agent of war and a fair target. Apply this theory to cities and you get Guernica, Dresden, and Hiroshima. Extend the concept far enough to say that any economic engine of an enemy is a fair target, and you get the World Trade Center.

The extent to which you are willing to risk your own troops to protect a civilian population is a mark of moral superiority and intelligence. Intelligence in that you are willing to pass on a strategy that might result in short term gains in order to retain 'hearts and minds' and win a long term goal. So sending in a ground unit to take out an anti-aircraft gun next to an orphanage instead of bombing from the air is an attempt to 'win the war' and not just the battle.

So how many women and children were killed by ground units?

(It seems like Jag, Cat, and HM have three different narratives for how we got here.)

Ok I'm hung over like hell but I'll give this a boot because I won't have time for a few days.

HM addressed the issue of mutual exclusivity. The second issue is even simpler. You may be able to drop the bomb in the right place but a: That doesn't mean there's Bad Guys(tm) underneath b: Doesn't mean there isn't civvies as well c: doesn't mean the buildings in all directions for half a block aren't rubble as well. Precision airstrikes are only as good as the intel that guides them and we all know how good US human intel is in the middle east.

As for untargetted munitions, they're cheaper, though the whole JDAM thing reduced that a bit. Secondly, I don't remember talking about bombing raids at all so I'm a tad lost on that one. Which count to believe? There's too much chaos on the ground for *anyone* to do an accurate count even if they wanted to. The best you would do is extrapolate from a combination of all sources.

I also don't get *why* this whole untargetted airstrike thing affects anything I said? I don't put too much stick in this whole 100,000 report, any part of it and that has been clear for a while. The fact it's far easier in an urban combat situation to open fire than wait for the other guy to put one though your chest (or turn out to be a old woman) isn't in any way changed by this report.

(That's the problem with discussing this report in fragments - maybe I should have just cut and pasted the entire damn thing in my OP, but I doubt people would have had the patience to read it all)

Early on, right after the tanks rolled through Baghdad, the Where's Raed Blog described how the insurgents(resistance?) would come into the neighborhood and take over a house. After dark they would launch rockets over the city until they were zeroed in on by what he claimed to be US artillery.
Wonder how many were killed by the rockets and the artillery? :eyebrow:

A battlefield is a very dangerous place for everyone. In the Liberation of Kuwait, with every attack being carefully coordinated and with aircraft routinely demanding confirmation before they attacked, then most American deaths were due to friendly fire. How can this be, UT asks? Welcome to war. Even your own friends can be a very deadly threat. And this assumes death only from violent action.

Numbers say that as many as 30% of smart munitions have failed to strike their target. This can vary significantly for so many reasons including the targeting aircraft under fire, failure of the targeting munitions, bad weather, etc. Sometimes dumb bombs may be used because the 'smart' electronics may not be available to upgrade that dumb bomb. It is a battlefield. Use what you have. There are so many reasons why even smart munitions miss their targets. Technical reasons. Human failure.

Do you point an unloaded weapon at anyone? No. Absolutely not. Even an unloaded weapon can unexpectedly fire. Why does UT expect smart weapons to be any more reliable? Battlefields are very complex. Again, even friendly fire is a major source of death and destruction. Just one of so many reasons why people - military and civilian - die.

It's all over. It's all over.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programme...ma/4217413.stm
I do hope the regulars have the gonads to check in after this post.

I am often wrong. This time I was right. It doesn't matter because we all start with a pretty-much clean slate every time a new thread starts.

Except for tw. The Iraqi Civvy Body Count now becomes his official aluminum tube albatross. How, tw, could you have BEEN so UTTERLY UTTERLY wrong? How could you write paragraph after paragraph backing information that was this bad? I await your self-analysis and the changes you will make in the future. And most importantly I await your apology for being a complete and total ASS through this whole discussion.

:mad2: Christ on a fuckin' stick, it covered the same time frame and the actual number was even outside of the study's incredible margin of sampling error! :mad2:

How does that limited time frame (on or after 2004), using data from a limited source (only hospitals), and only citing deaths due to violence correspond to the time frame of the Lancet published study? Trying to define a tomato using peach standards? You don't even specify a conclusion. Are we to guess what you point is?

Posted are some numbers that tell us nothing useful. Furthermore you assume that Iraqis take all dead bodies to the hospital - which furthermore assumes hospital exist everywhere in Iraq and that Iraqis everywhere can safely travel to hospitals. We know that Americans will not even travel the 5 mile road between Baghdad and the airport. Too dangerous.

Again, the study is about all deaths as a result of American action - not just those created by direct military action. Where are the numbers from 2003 and earlier? Oh. They were destroyed by the looting that Rumsfeld said was not happening.

I don't understand how limited records from hospitals provides us with significant facts? What is the point you are desperately trying to make? Are you saying these limited numbers prove a responsible study from The Lancet is wrong? Are you saying Jack Straw, a British politician with the bias of a flawed agenda, is more honest then something published by The Lancet? If you do, then your logic is only based in emotion (and red angry faces).

Where, pray tell, is your logical conclusion from those numbers? Numbers from a polticially biased source (that also tried to claim those aluminum tubes were for WMDs) must be correct? Jack Straw also claimed those WMD existed. Therefore anything Jack Straw says must be more accurate than what The Lancet publishes.

Somehow the integrity of that source and UT's numerically proven conclusion escapes me. But then I am not trying to justify an illegal and now well proven unjustified war.

Aw hell yer right sorry. :smack:

I find it intriguing that in March of 2003, the Health Ministry was ordered to cease the reporting of civilian casualties. A new head of the ministry was appointed and then fired 10 days later for having had too close a tie with the Saddam regime. There has been great difficulty finding qualified professionals in Iraq who did NOT have a tie with the Saddam regime, since such ties were a requirement for anybody to do much of anything at all in Saddam's Iraq. One can't help but wonder how the Health Ministry has managed to regain credibility in such a relatively short amount of time, and under war conditions, at that.

The Lancet survey measures excess death. The count of the Iraqi Health Ministry measures civilian casualties. A direct count is the most accurate measure, as long as it can be reasonably assumed that most victims would make it to hospitals or morgues. Frankly, I don't know if it is reasonable to make this assumption about victims in the Iraqi conflict or not.

To calculate excess mortality, one needs estimates of death rates before and after. The Lancet study estimates something like 5 per 1000 before and 7.5 per 1000 after.

I will be very interested to see how this story continues to evolve.

One more question. Where do you find some great emoticons?

What, for posting here? Hit the "Go Advanced" button, click on the "More" button at the bottom of the table of smilies.

magnimity in defeat, an enviable trait.

Yeah I blew the dates.

Anybody see any problems now that Hariri is dead?

From Reuters
Guess this means the invasion of Canada is a "GO"!

The perspective of my question was more about who makes these neat little artworks? I am sure the artist who made the original smiley face never in his wildest imagination thought he created a whole new species.

Of course not. Forrest Gump didn't even know he'd invented the smiley face at all!

Hello SC. I've been following this thread half heartedly and honestly dont really agree with much you say or your opinions.

That never stopped me from blasting in from far right field to make some goofy comment though, and when I saw this I just had to say.....

sounds like a damn fine idea to me! :)



slang

Well, now the ***ts hit the fan. Some 6th grade schoolchildren wrote to a soldier. While many of the letters were predictably patriotic, some questioned the war.

Not that I agree with all of the sentiments here, but it sounds like some kids do not want to play sheep and may be engaged in independent thinking. I'll have to remember this reaction whenever conservatives complain about conservatives speech being suppressed on campus. Apparently, some suppression is ok with Fox.

BTW, technically the US has targeted mosques, although it does so only in cases where soldiers come under fire or it suspects the mosque is housing weapons.

Damn that free speech. Damn.