What good do you see in it all?

[Undertoad]

So, Jane, you figure Hussein was a better deal for them, or what?

[jane_says]

First cite: asking for clarification. It was a question. It's called mirroring. I gave him a synopsis of the way I understood what he said, and asked for clarification. Absolutely not putting anything in anyone's mouth.


Second cite: Hey, he REFUSED to say wht information we should have gleaned from the post, saying only that HE understood, and he was NOT going to explain it. I gave my opinion of his Angelica Pickles-style debate. I charaterized his attitude as I saw it. I'm still looking for that ring, BTW.

Thanks for the fun, guys. You've kept me occupied for a couple of hours, but now I'm off for lunch. For real debating fun, go to straightdope.com.

[jaguar]

Well we'll agree to disagree on the probability of that little scenario. As for the likelihood of Saddam being overthrowable, after a number of attempts that had been bloodily put down, is it any surprise? You don't really make that much sense, you seem to be saying theoretically it was possible but everyone was too scared. Doesn't that mean, in practical terms it just plain wasn't going to happen? Considering how many attempts had failed and the perceived apathy of the outside world is it any surprise it didn't happen? I prefer not to talk in absolutes and you would notice I said ''close to" impossible, not impossible, but impossible outside exceptional and unlikely circumstances that were unlikely to occur in the near (Saddam's lifetime) future without external influence of the kind your husband would be involved in applying.

I base my opinion on journos I've spoken to who were in Baghdad and managed to speak to those that were willing to express their discontent. I'm obviously not aware where your husband was but I doubt he was in such a situation and I can't think what he would be doing in any major city that he would be allowed to talk about frankly.

First of all, Jane don't worry about it. LJ loves to fan the flames sometimes, but he's an alright kind of guy (we all have our little idiosyncrancies). SM and UT come from the right side of the board, but even they can sometimes see reason. We all have fun pulling one another's tails. Don't take any of it too seriously, and stick around. We can always use another intelligent liberal around here.

Now back to my analogy with the Chinese. Western culture, religion, and political systems are as foreign to the Arab world as Chinese thought would be to us. Let's say in our little hypothetical future scenario that the Chinese came in with hearts of purest gold - no ulterior motive for their intervention. How many of us would really believe this? I know I would be hugely skeptical of their motives. Why? Because historically the Chinese have never been friends with the West. Because they DO have a very different system of government than ours. And that's just for starters.

The Western and Arab world have been at loggerheads every since the Crusades if not before. We have different systems of belief. Our cultures are very different, as are our systems of governance. Of course any Arab nation is going to be at best suspicious of us and skeptical of our motive.

I am skeptical of our motive. We don't intervene in the internal affairs of other third world countries where something as valuable as petroleum is not at stake. I hate to be a broken record, but once again "It's the oil, dummy!" No wonder that the people of Iraq do not greet us with open arms. And we have made their lives worse, not better. At least under Saddam they had electricity. Now they are most likely to see electricity when they're being tortured with it.

[Undertoad]

So to complete the analogy Mar, if it was your neighborhood without electricity after crushing the Bush regime, and the strange Chinese had taken the task of repairing it, but had not completed it because hardliner Bush loyalists were bombing their facilities and pipelines...

...you personally would fault the Chinese then?

Originally Posted by Undertoad

So to complete the analogy Mar, if it was your neighborhood without electricity after crushing the Bush regime, and the strange Chinese had taken the task of repairing it, but had not completed it because hardliner Bush loyalists were bombing their facilities and pipelines...

...you personally would fault the Chinese then?

Most likely as a patriotic American, me and my little band of guerillas would be out there doing our best to disrupt the Chinese forces. To make the scenario even more realistic, lets say that a group of Western terrorists for some reason of their own had set off bombs in a major Chinese city, killing thousands of Chinese just weeks or months before the Chinese decided to come to our aid out of the pure goodness of their hearts. Let's say further that prior to this Chinese intervention the Chinese leadership had made a number of statements which seemed to imply that the US was giving sanctuary to the terrorists. When the Chinese army sets foot on US soil to "free" me, my every hair is standing on end and I feel that my country is going from the frying pan to the fire.

Oh yeah, and don't forget the Chinese have banned any American who worked under the former Bush dictatorship from having anything to do with repairing the power supplies. This, in effect, gets rid of all our skilled people because they had no choice but to work under the Bush dictatorship, like it or not.

[Undertoad]

So Mar, whenever you found them repairing the electricity, you would capture and behead the Chinese?

Have you read the long lists of what the Americans have done over there, or do you really believe it's just one big Abu Ghraib?

[jaguar]

French revolution didn't involve outside help. The Russian one had minimal meddling, the Vietnamese fought off the french without little or no help. That's off the top of my head.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by jaguar

The Russian one had minimal meddling,

I thought "we" (as in US Banks and financiers including JP Morgan) paid for it for the most part.

Originally Posted by wolf

I thought "we" (as in US Banks and financiers including JP Morgan) paid for it for the most part.

The Russian revolution was funded by JP Morgan?!? Damn capitalist warmongers! I knew you couldn't trust 'em!

[Undertoad]

Wag the Dog?

[jaguar]

Which revolution? There's all sorts of bit an pieces in there, you'll have to be specific. I should have in the first place.

[wolf]

Quite a bit of it ... playing both sides against the middle, IIRC, but for the most part I was referring to the October Revolution.