Clinton brings it

[mrnoodle]

Originally posted by richlevy
But at the time Bush was in the Guard, it was a way to serve with no risk.

I have been made aware of this by several people now. I was speaking from the vantage point of someone who has several friends in the National Guard now who are in Iraq. lol interesting sidenote - there is a for sale sign on what used to be their unit HQ. Maybe that's how we're funding this....

That because 'people' don't singlehandedly start wars and overrun countries.

Doesn't translate. If he was still in the Guard, then it would be valid. But this was 30 years ago. To me, it's on about the same level of importance as his alleged drug use. Maybe he did, maybe he didn't, but it's nothing that really matters today. (I actually defended the Slickmeister on that, too - all the ancient history stuff is just dumb)

But it does speak to character...silver and bronze starts...are given for actions 'above and beyond' doing what you are told. I cannot even imagine Bush in the same situation as Kerry was in performing on the same level as Kerry.

Battlefield character is a different thing from personal character. Lots of people in combat situations would fall on a grenade for their buddies, but have no problem raping the locals or shooting little kids.

..lack of planning, supply, organization, etc.

I've heard no evidence of this. What I've heard from one Lt. who got to come home for his wife's childbirth is that you couldn't imagine the squalor until you witnessed it yourself, and that they had already improved the people's lives 100 fold. Some of them were getting electricity for the first time in years. He said he couldn't believe how filtered the media (both conservative and liberal) messages were. Iraq outside the palace walls was essentially a sewage dump before we got there. This was only one man's viewpoint, of course.

However, his policies ignored the reality that enough monopolies and oligopolies existed that regulation was necessary for a fair market. The burnout at the end of the 80's was partly due to the market realizing that there were long term consequences to the short term gains.

A brief google search yielded a bunch of stuff on this, most notably that prior to 1982, we were in recession about 1/3 of the time. Since then, we've been in recession (I'll be generous, since I don't have the exact data) maybe 9 months out of 250. That's about 4 percent of the time. And Reagan is mostly responsible for it. I'll stay with my original comment.

You also can't bomb everyplace they might be or invade every country where you think they may be hiding. Bush is basically pointing his finger at almost every country in the middle east. But he's treating North Korea with kid gloves because they have nuclear weapons. This lesson is not lost on any country. GWB has done more to promote nuclear proliferation than Dr. Strangelove.

The lesson, if any, is evident in Libya's sudden cooperative spirit. They know we mean business. Of course we're not going to pick nits with Korea. Diplomacy still has a chance there, whereas in Iraq, diplomacy was doomed to fail because of the administration. Not to mention the strategic clusterfuck that would result from trying to fight a 2-theater war with a military gutted by the previous administration. But that aside, Bush has shown every willingness to negotiate. He just has limits. That's strength, not hawkishness.

Damn, you people keep each other on your toes, don't you?

[Happy Monkey]

Originally posted by mrnoodle
Battlefield character is a different thing from personal character. Lots of people in combat situations would fall on a grenade for their buddies, but have no problem raping the locals or shooting little kids.

But Kerry didn't. In fact, what he did do was serve out his time, and then testify before Congress about the fact that that was happening.

Damn, you people keep each other on your toes, don't you?

That's the idea.

[Pie]

Originally posted by mrnoodle

The lesson, if any, is evident in Libya's sudden cooperative spirit. They know we mean business.

To quote from President Clinton's speech cited on the first page of this thread:

"Just recently, President Bush and Tony Blair announced that they had reached an accord with Muammar Qaddafi, even. I never thought I'd live to see that.

And, in fairness to him, Mr. Qaddafi's been hawking this deal for two or three years now, as a lot of you know. And I applaud the President and Prime Minister Blair for doing it. They had to see the situation with new eyes." - WJC

This "cooperative spirit" is nothing new. Bush just decided now would be a good time to take him up on it -- now that he needs something to show for his hundreds of lives lost and billions of dollars spent.


- Pie

[warch]

Clinton always impressed me with his mind. Whatever else you think, he is a very smart man. Smartness as an asset. Smartness, as something you look for in a leader. Never felt that way about Reagan, and certainly not about the Bushes.

[Torrere]

Originally posted by mrnoodle
Not to mention the strategic clusterfuck that would result from trying to fight a 2-theater war with a military gutted by the previous administration.

Afghanistan.
Iraq.

[mrnoodle]

Originally posted by Torrere
Afghanistan.
Iraq.

Supply lines going in same direction.
Special forces in one, 2 divisions of infantry in the other.
Both considered Middle Eastern theater of operations.

[tw]

Originally posted by mrnoodle
A brief google search yielded a bunch of stuff on this, most notably that prior to 1982, we were in recession about 1/3 of the time. Since then, we've been in recession (I'll be generous, since I don't have the exact data) maybe 9 months out of 250. That's about 4 percent of the time. And Reagan is mostly responsible for it.

Prior to Reagan, recession was traceable to real world events such as:
1) massive spending on military well beyond what we could afford and well beyond what was being spent in other times on the cold war - a war in Vietnam; while government outrightly lied about costs,
2) a spike in energy prices to the highest in the history of mankind combined with a decline in US domestic production and a massive increase in domestic consumption,
3) a sharp reduction of innovation in America as cost controllers took control of most major companies; recession preceeded by, for example, the Science and Technology index in libraries started getting thinner in years preceeding that recession.

Reagan did nothing to make the economy work. Politicians can only create bad economies. Politicians cannot fix an economy. What fixed mid - 1980 America? One could say that Reagan did nothing - permitting the economy to fix itself. But then oil prices went from highest in the history of mankind to the lowest in only two years. Reagan then profited for something he did not do. Oil prices came down so far so fast as to create an economic recovery. Then something else happened. All this computer technology that had been stifled by myopic American companies suddenly took root in companies not dominated by MBA mentalities. Ashton Tate, Lotus, Intel, Microsoft, Compaq, DEC, etc all rescued or introduced early 1970 innovations that had sat stifled by companies such as AT&T, IBM, & Xerox. Reagan only happened to be president when these many companies also developed whole new business concepts - open industry standards, venture capitalists, cooperative competition, etc. Reagan did not invent any of this. He only prospered by accidentally being in office at the right time.

The lesson, if any, is evident in Libya's sudden cooperative spirit. They know we mean business. Of course we're not going to pick nits with Korea. Diplomacy still has a chance there, whereas in Iraq, diplomacy was doomed to fail because of the administration.

The Libyan situation had been in negotiation long before anyone called for an unjustified attack on Iraq. Negotiations so fruitful that, for example, the first world leader to condemn the WTC attack - Kadaffi of Libya. Like all good and careful negotiations, it took some years to agree and verify what would be necessary to open Libya's entire operation. More was at stake than just admitting to the weapons. It was a very complicated deal that also included TWA 800 and many other events. Did an invasion of Iraq close the deal? Maybe. But the deal had been started during Clinton's time and was clearly going to be completed before George Jr admitted he wanted to attack Iraq.

Diplomacy was working quite nicely in N Korea until someone created a stupid "Axis of Evil" doctrine. That declaration simply made it impossible for reformers in N Korea (including Kim Jung Il) to continue negotiations. However most Americans with preconceived ideas (called hardliners or extremists) never will understand conflict of reformers verses hardliners that is ongoing both in Iran and N Korea. Hardliners see everything in black and white. They see nations as only good or evil. They see everyone inside an 'evil' nation as monolithic. Both nations are chock full of gray shades. That "axis of evil" doctrine only undermined reformers in both Iran and N Korea - making diplomacy difficult.

Those same hardliners were promoting the same 'good and evil' concepts about China only ten plus years ago as a major battle there was also being waged between reformers and hardliners. Today people forget the Buchanan speeches about how we would go to war with China (which George Jr almost did anyway) and why the Cold War really was not over. Good thing that George Sr rather than Buchanan types were in the White House.

[Undertoad]

Negotiations so fruitful that, for example, the first world leader to condemn the WTC attack - Kadaffi of Libya.

And the second Arafat, who wasted no time getting a photo op giving blood for the cause.

It takes some pretty hard spinning not to find Libya to be a success of the Iraqi approach. Even ex-Presidents and foreign leaders are trying to spin it differently. But when Quaddafi said "I saw what the Americans did in Iraq, and I was scared." That's kinda difficult to spin.