god bless america

It couldn't be helped, they were standing on our oil.

Imagine there is a runaway train that is heading toward a Y fork in the tracks. You are standing next to a switch that diverts the train from track A to track B. On track A, 10 people are tied to the tracks. On track B, two people are tied to the tracks.

Do you pull the switch?

I sell popcorn to everyone else who's watching.

benny

sorry, I couldn't tell from the post

are these images of Kurdish gassing victims, Shiite dissidents, or the children of those deemed politically unreliable by the regime?

please clarify.

-sm

     Damn it, Juju! Stop using logic while people are showing that the US is evil! With no intent other than to kill children! I mean c'mon, when have you seen the US do anything other than that?
     But don't worry guy's, the soldiers will be coming home before long. So those of you that seem to believe our soldiers intentialy kill defenseless children probably need to get to work preping safeguards for your own kids. Better get busy.

Don't these people get hot in all that clothing in the heat over there? Just curious.

Slang I think they're use to it, kind of like people around here wandering around in short sleeve shirts when it's 40 degrees outside. Plus it provides protection from blowing sand.

Then again maybe I'm completely wrong could be they all are sweating like horses underneath all that cloth

I'm sure whatever children are left will make nice clothing and shoes for me...at a good price to boot!

Originally posted by sycamore
I'm sure whatever children are left will make nice clothing and shoes for me...at a good price to boot!

And at the same time raising their standard of living tenfold by actually having *a job*?

Absolutely! That $10 a week will go a long way in New Iraq.

I found myself wondering ... who staffs the Quiki-Marts in Iraq? Do they hire Americans??

With all the jobs that should be available in New Iraq, shit...I'll go.

but Unemployment must be huge right now! You will have to compete with so many people to get those jobs. Also (I'm assuming that you don't know the language) not knowing the language will be a great hindrance to getting a job in Iraq.

There might be some military-supported job you could get.

Ah, but they'll want good Americans with college degrees to come over and help out for a bit...and they'll probably pay a premium.

Think of it this way, Torr...they'll pay Americans phat money to train Iraqis to do it for peanuts.

Come on Sheppsie! We gotta get in on this rebuilding thing...we could sell Iraqis webhosting! We could control the .iq domain! I've got a good marketing concept in the works!

It'll be great...we'll be rich!!!

If we'd been smarter, we'd have been there for the last five years selling bomb shelters...

Syc, I'd like dibs on 'your.iq' and 'my.iq', simply for the myriad vhosts. I could make a fortune selling shells with the hostmask of, say, 'omg.fear.my.iq'.

It can be arranged...

(You see what I mean, UT?! Kabillions!)

Originally posted by smoothmoniker
benny

sorry, I couldn't tell from the post

are these images of Kurdish gassing victims, Shiite dissidents, or the children of those deemed politically unreliable by the regime?

please clarify.

-sm

Probably not, but I don't think deaths must be payback with another deaths, because contrary we'll never stop fighting. Don't you think so?

Originally posted by slang
Don't these people get hot in all that clothing in the heat over there? Just curious.

Slang, Is that all you are wondering about watching these images? :eek:

IT IS NOTE THAT IN YOUR COUNTRY CENSURE YOU THE INFORMATION.

Those photos are of the slaughter that it has made your country makes some days in Iraq.

Not you shame you?

http://asesinos.pakito.net

<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/23.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/24.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/25.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/26.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/27.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/28.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/42.jpg">

People don't seem to like seeing the other side of the war around here. You want CNN and the war looks like a bloody video game, very PG. You watch Al Jazeera and war is hell, i think i know which is closer to the truth. Both are obviously seriously biased but neither is better than the other.

Thanks by showing that in your country also there is someone that thinks.

I think where most people here have an issue is that we've seen this before. We know this is going to happen. It sucks, no one wants it (except for Saddam and his followers, presumably, because it makes us look worse to the international community) - yet it's going to happen anyway. It simply cannot be avoided.

I agree that it's shitty, but there's a lot untold here. People always scrutinize U.S. media, so I ask you - where is your proof that this is the result of U.S. bombing? How do you know that Saddam's forces didn't fire a missile into an apartment complex to help turn international opinion against the war?

How many of these people hated Saddam and would gladly give their lives over again so that their family could live in a free country?

We'll never know, of course, but you present this as propaganda without even asking some relatively important questions.

In the end, it doesn't change a thing; they're dead, quite probably by U.S. weapons, and that's quite shitty. Tell me again, how many Iraqis have Saddam and his cronies killed?

What simple are!
Always the same absurd arguments.

Originally posted by bennyhill
Always the same absurd arguments.

Like yours have changed any.

Let me rephrase, then. Why are you so obviously against the freedom of an oppressed people?

Do you have any new pictures to post? I saw all these like... ten days ago.

Also, in the interest of balance, could you do me a favor and post some pictures of Iraqis tortured by Saddam's henchmen?

<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/a.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/b.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/c.jpg">
<img src="http://asesinos.pakito.net/images/d.jpg">

ETC.

And you?

Originally posted by dave

Like yours have changed any.

Let me rephrase, then. Why are you so obviously against the freedom of an oppressed people?

oppressed people?

how you would call your to this massacre?
Release?

you do nots have libertad...ni of thought.

http://www.cellar.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3160

http://www.cellar.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3105

One need not look very far to see that many Iraqis welcome the Army.

I've been reading multiple news sources, and I'm not pro-war by any means. But how can you argue against giving people freedom?

I can't sit here and tell you it's a bad thing, because it's not. Killing and dying and war all are bad things, but freedom is not. I don't see how you can be so vehemently opposed to freedom.

Please, don't mistake! Say no to U.S. murders doesn't amount to say yes to Saddam's murders! That's enough with that!.

We are not against the freedom of Iraqi (or whatever) opressed people. That's all that we are in the conviction we could have avoided these deaths, we had to look for alternative ways to set that opressed people free.

I read a very interesting Spanish interview to Hans Blix. I would like to translate it to you, but it is so long and my Englis is so bad, and it take a lot of time to me, but if I can I will translate it and post it. Maybe Dave could help me with that... ;)

*shrugs* I'm not supporting benny really, all i'm saying is i'm sick of seeing UT post page after page of hapy smiling Iraqis and none of this which i think suggests a certain desire to ignore the human cost of the war - some the entire US media seems to be guilty of. It's all very well to say you need to break a few eggs to make an omlette but it's much easier to say when you don't have to live with a lifetime of anguish or look these people in the eye and be reminded just how fucking horrible war actually is, it's not a conincidence that the hawks in this administration have never been soliders and the one big dove, powell is a military man. Noone hates war more than soldier.

Rucita - whereas you demonstrate an ability or willingness to listen to all sides and attempt to form a logical argument, bennyhill has proven that he/she is not willing to do that.

War is a terrible thing. Everyone knows that. What bennyhill and others are trying to do is create extremists. Extremists on any side are dangerous. A moderate voice is necessary.

Yes Dave, I agree with you: a moderate voice is necessary. All type of extremist is dangerous, that's precisaly why I think war can bring us all much more terrorism. Violence create only more violence, because there will be always someone who wont be persuade about the "goodness", about the right side (if there is some right side) of a war. In my opinion war has been, and it's being an extremist act.

So, for example: Ali is a few years old boy who has lost his father and mother and also his arms in this war. He is laying in a stretcher watching around him and just wondering why. We can just say "well, this is the war" and watch to other side, but we can also think that there are too many posibility for that boy to grow up and became a new suicide terrorist. This is only one exemple. There are a lot of stories like this one in all wars.

Let's see, kurdish are fighting Iraq because a lot of them were killed with mustard gas in 1988. So they are right now paying back. Then what can we wait from iraqi people to do next?

See, that's the problem. "Payback" leads to extremism.

Unfortunately, it's become clear to me over the past few years that the United States is damned if it does and damned if it doesn't.

I don't know what it's like to be Spanish, but there must be some people that will give you a hard time just because of the country you're from. Well, it's the same here, except it's pretty much everyone giving us a hard time. I went to Canada a few years ago to visit a friend and pretty much every Canadian I ran in to except for her and one of her friends had this big thing about me being a "yankee" and "from the States". One of them was bitching about American TV and being tired of seeing a McDonalds on every corner (the funny part being, of course, that he and a friend had stopped our whole crowd so he could get a burger at McDonalds just a night before). So Canadians are tired of their "culture" being "overrun", when we're pretty much the same people with the same tastes.

Then we go to France and they think we're unsophisticated cowboys. Not all of them, obviously, but enough of the ones I've run into. I know many Brits that look down their nose at us. Everyone in Pakistan seems to believe it's a war against Islam.

Everyone wants different things and we can't make all of them happy all the time. Many people were against the war, but when we get to Iraq, what do we see? Villages waving and smiling and giving our soldiers kisses. And then we have some of Saddam's people beating a man because they saw him laughing with a British soldier - and then, and you will agree with me that this is absolutely atrocious - forcing him to watch as they soaked his son with gasoline and set him on fire.

The United States, whether we like it or not, is the most visible country in the world. We're doing something right, because we have thousands of people immigrating here every here and millions more who would kill to. But because we're so visible and because we're so open, we draw constant fire from the peanut gallery.

I really don't think there's anything we can do about it. So we try to do our best and hope that history proves us right.

War is a terrible thing. Everyone knows that.

Bullshit, i don't think people have the slightest clue, its one reason they react so badly to being shown pictures of it. There is a big difference between 'knowing it' and and watching flacette rip though someone in front of them, or watch one of thier mates have his head blown off, or having their children killed by misguided bombs. It tends to make people squeamish, it tends to make them question their own support of wars and people don't like that happening.

No, they react so badly to seeing pictures of it because WHO WANTS TO SEE PICTURES OF THAT?

Oh sure, it's disgusting when you're eating your brekky, but for the sake of this argument, it's not disgusting, it's that people don't know war is bad. Bullshit yourself.

Originally posted by jaguar
*shrugs* I'm not supporting benny really, all i'm saying is i'm sick of seeing UT post page after page of hapy smiling Iraqis and none of this which i think suggests a certain desire to ignore the human cost of the war - some the entire US media seems to be guilty of. It's all very well to say you need to break a few eggs to make an omlette but it's much easier to say when you don't have to live with a lifetime of anguish or look these people in the eye and be reminded just how fucking horrible war actually is, it's not a conincidence that the hawks in this administration have never been soliders and the one big dove, powell is a military man. Noone hates war more than soldier.

Your you consider moderated the behavior of your country?

Your you consider moderated the behavior of your country?

Huh? Sorry something was lost in the translation there.

Dave the point is the media should be showing this stuff, not happy, smiling newly-liberated Iraqis but pictures of dead, mostly dead and rather pissed off Iraqis too, it's called getting the whole picture. They're *not* very nice images at all, but it is utterly essential people see just how fucking horrible war actually is, not just the CNN/Videogame bullshit that makes it all look so clean and neat.

pardon, this is the question:

Do you consider moderated the behavior of your country?

...

The war has not been as you the have presented in your media.

War is never a good thing, but sometimes the end results are, I think this may be one of those times. Smiling Iraqis waving at our soldier give me hope.

Been watching CNN lately? They don't make it look clean and neat. We're reminded pretty constantly of the ugly side of war. They just don't act like there's nothing good to come from it, 'cause there will be. But yes, of course, it's me who's watching the biased news sources.

Just remember dave we are ignorant americans who are spoon fed only the good stuff.

I agree with BennyHill and his pal...let's just ask Saddam to leave Iraq. That'll solve the problem.

What? He doesn't *want* to leave? You say he enjoys the torture, rape and murder his 'government' conducts on its own people? He'd like to just go on doing that as long as possible, please?

Well, okay...fine. We're sorry. Go ahead, Saddam. We should just mind our own business.

“BELIEVE ME, I have waited for this moment for 35 years,” said Majid Mohammed, an electrical engineer. “You must bring these words to the American people. Thank you, thank you very, very much.”

Bennyhill, I would like to see some pictures of the 2,000,000 people Saddam has killed.

Do you have any of those images?

I see some of them in the books that people are looking at in the torture chambers and prisons. They keep the personal records of the people they have killed. Do you have some of those pictures please?

O.K. then go on, war in the rest of dictatory regimes. Go ahead guys! And we'll see the consequences :(

Consequences: lots of dead Americans, lots of dead enemy soldiers, plenty of dead civilians and a lot of free people.

War definitely sucks. But saying that it's never just or that no good ever comes from it is completely false. Hello, Nazis?

Originally posted by Rucita
O.K. then go on, war in the rest of dictatory regimes. Go ahead guys! And we'll see the consequences :(

OK. Would you like Syria and Lebanon to be next (as they fear), or should we go the other way and take Iran? Syria is probably a worse dictatorship, but Iran's working on a nuclear program. I suppose we could take a breather and do Yemen, but there doesn't seem to be so much benefit to that.

Forget about North Korea; we're trying to goad Kim Il Jong into attacking China and kill two birds with one stone.

I hope you were just "joking"

Rucita, no offense meant here, but you seen pretty much incapable of humor in relation to any of this.

I might suggest that you would do more to enlighten your fellow man by the application of good humor to a nasty situation that you really aren't empowered to change in any significant way.

Many of us here are ambivalent about the situation in Iraq. We see the necessity for the actions our government has taken, but we abhor wars because, well, they are abhorrent. Injured children do not make anyone here proud nor happy. Ruined lives are not a good thing, but they are an *unavoidable* thing when a despot refuses to leave power quietly.

No one here is trying to justify, rationalize or moralize the hideous suffering inflicted on the innocents in Iraq, but I would suggest that you point the finger of blame at the reason we are there, and not at the fact that we are doing what really, really needs to be done.

If Saddam's own people had overthrown him, many would have suffered, and much more so than they are suffering at the hands of our military. We are at least *trying* to minimize civilian casualties. Saddam's forces aren't even doing that. They weren't even trying to minimize civilian casualties when there was no war.

War sucks, we all known it. Now, can we discuss the need for the action and not the results? Or at least, can we discuss the possible long term benefits instead of the immediate carnage?

There was going to be carnage no matter what happened or who perpetrated it. I suggest that, in the long run, we may very well be saving lives in Iraq.

Originally posted by Undertoad
Bennyhill, I would like to see some pictures of the 2,000,000 people Saddam has killed.

Do you have any of those images?

I see some of them in the books that people are looking at in the torture chambers and prisons. They keep the personal records of the people they have killed. Do you have some of those pictures please?

the violence justifies the violence?
the death justifies more death?

The U.S. do not liberate, have other interest in Iraq.

That's fine, my second Spanish friend. Time will show us whether the US is going to be a conqueror, or whether it will give the country back to the Iraqis, as it says it will.

Time will show us whether there are any chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons in Iraq.

Bennyhill, if the US does give the country back, and if the weapons are there, will you apologize for your accusations?

Because I promise you, if the US does not give the country back, and if no weapons are found, I will apologize to you -- and I will work to change the US government.

But if the US does the right thing, for the right reasons, and STILL you criticize, then your words are simple anti-Americanism, simple prejudice.

Be in agreement with you.
Seems me a reasonable posture.

:beer:

To diplomacy!

Originally posted by Elspode
If we'd been smarter, we'd have been there for the last five years selling bomb shelters...

Germany beat us to that.

Do you consider moderated the behavior of your country?

Moderated i don't think is really the word. I should probably point out i'm Australian not American(the difference is minimal, we just have wierder animals and marginally ebtter accents). My countries actions are.....well if you go though it's Howard has done what is in the National Interest, he's sent our SpecOps guys off for another jaunt and in exchange we get massive trade concessions, seems a pretty good deal to me. Morally? It's good to free Iraquis but as i said in another thread, the ideas behind this war and the motivations of the US administration shit me up the wall.

I've watched some CNN here, it seems pretty PG rated to me.

Originally posted by Undertoad
That's fine, my second Spanish friend. Time will show us whether the US is going to be a conqueror, or whether it will give the country back to the Iraqis, as it says it will.
...
Because I promise you, if the US does not give the country back, and if no weapons are found, I will apologize to you -- and I will work to change the US government.

So as long as we give Iraq back to the Iraqis in 50 years, then that is acceptable? Remember, we promised to leave after the liberation of Kuwait. An empty promise that resulted in Osama bin Laden. We promised to liberate Philippines after driving the Spanish out - ending up killing many tens of thousands in the resulting Civil War. We promised to not be the world's policeman yet became just that. Even worse, we are now a proactive world policeman.

But back to the simple question. We will give Iraq back to the Iraqis in one year - and completely leave? Our history traditionally says otherwise. We were not going to maintain military forces in German, Italy, and Japan - and look what happened.

America is not building something like ten major military bases from Rumania to Turkmenistan for no reason at all. Those new bases would only be necessary if preemption is America's new "proactive policeman" foreign policy (which begs another question - "Who's next?").

In short, I believe Undertoad's promise to be both moot and supplanted by future events. Events will make that promise null and void - as above histories repeatedly demonstrate.

Originally posted by Elspode

War sucks, we all known it. Now, can we discuss the need for the action and not the results? Or at least, can we discuss the possible long term benefits instead of the immediate carnage?

Of course that's the "quid" of the question. The Gulf War I was horrible too, sucks too (none's saying other thing) All wars sucks, yes. But I have some questions about it:

1.- We yet knew in 1991 Saddam was a dictator, and its regime was killing a lot of inocent people in Iraq... Taken your reasons, if we declared war to Iraq in 1991, and didn't stop in Kuwait border, then we have avoided a thousand lifes. Then why dind't we act into Iraq at that time?

2.- Rigth now in Cuba, Castro is condemning to inocent people to go prision, only because they don't think like him (well, I now it's no so simple, but this is the way I can explain in my bad English). Then, why we don't atack Cuba?

3.- Like Cuba there are a lot of dictatorship all around the world: Arabia Saudi, China (country which regime killed more than 1,000 persons in 2000), Pakistan, Sierra Leona, etc... Are we declaring war to them? Are we going to do it?

Off it, I'm interessting to knwo what do you think about Spanish President, José María Aznar.

Originally posted by Rucita
1.- We yet knew in 1991 Saddam was a dictator, and its regime was killing a lot of inocent people in Iraq... Taken your reasons, if we declared war to Iraq in 1991, and didn't stop in Kuwait border, then we have avoided a thousand lifes. Then why dind't we act into Iraq at that time?

From what former President Bush has said, at the time, Iraq was not the main concern--liberating Kuwait was the main concern. And once that was done, that was it.

I share your sentiments about the other countries, which is one of the reasons why I do not support this war.

Off it, I'm interessting to knwo what do you think about Spanish President, José María Aznar.

Truth be told, I knew nothing of him until recently. Actually, I don't know much about Spain at all. I mean, I know some stuff (ETA, Catalonia, the Spanish conquests in North America, a little about Franco), but beyond that, not much.

I always find it amazing...people in other lands know quite a bit about the US, but we don't know much about those other lands. I'm working on it though...

1. In 1991, we *did* know that Saddam was a turd. However, we were afraid that if we took him out, Udai would take power. As we all know, Udai is far too reckless. So that's why.

2. We've tried to take Cuba. Castro has someone "up there" that likes him. We've tried to kill him like, what, 15 times?

3. (It's actually "Saudi Arabia" in English, and "Sierra Leone".) Honestly, I doubt we'll ever approach these issues. China is far too large a country and has a capable army with nukes. So they're pretty safe. Saudi Arabia is pretty good as an international neighbor, and as such, we tend not to police them much. Same with Pakistan, plus they're helping out with the "war on terror" so... I dunno about Sierra Leone, because I've been to busy with other stuff to pay attention to what's going on there, other than knowing that people are getting their hands chopped off.

I think the following about Spanish President José María Aznar: is María a common guy's name in Spain? Because it sure as hell isn't here in the States.

"1. In 1991, we *did* know that Saddam was a turd. However, we were afraid that if we took him out, Udai would take power. As we all know, Udai is far too reckless. So that's why."

Are you talking abuot Uday, Saddam's son?

"2. We've tried to take Cuba. Castro has someone "up there" that likes him. We've tried to kill him like, what, 15 times?"

O.K., but you don't declare war to Cuba, do you?

"3. (It's actually "Saudi Arabia" in English, and "Sierra Leone".) Honestly, I doubt we'll ever approach these issues. China is far too large a country and has a capable army with nukes. So they're pretty safe. Saudi Arabia is pretty good as an international neighbor, and as such, we tend not to police them much. Same with Pakistan, plus they're helping out with the "war on terror" so... I dunno about Sierra Leone, because I've been to busy with other stuff to pay attention to what's going on there, other than knowing that people are getting their hands chopped off."

I could think that what you are trying to explain with that reason is that the war in Iraq has been possible because Iraq doesn't really mean a threat to the world, otherway you never declared war...

"María" is a woman's name, but "José María" is a common man's name" By the way "Aznar" is not pronounce like "Anzha" as your President did... it was a bit ridiculous and we in Spain joke about that: now we name our President like "Anzha"

But go on, please, talking about our President. I'm really interessting about our president's imagge out of Spain.

We haven't declared war for like sixty years. There are just "armed conflicts" now.

I am talking about Udai, Uday, however you like to spell it. Since Arabic doesn't use a roman alphabet, there's no real "correct" way. Kinda like Osama/Usama. But that's the reason we didn't take Saddam in 1991.

As far as my image of Spain goes... people like you give it to me. I don't give much weight to elected representatives because I don't feel like they generally are an accurate representation of the population. Anyway, of Spain, I think "they really got cheated at the World Cup". I think "I will go there some day." I have good impressions of Spain. Honestly, the Spanish that I know and have met haven't seemed, to me, as arrogant as the English, French or even Canadians that I know, which, to me, says that you have less of an inferiority complex. (Note: I'm not saying all English, French or Canadians have an inferiority complex and are therefore snotty assholes - just that a large percentage of the ones I've dealt with have been.)

Honestly, that's about it, really. I missed my chance to go there back in high school, but I'll make up for it one of these days.

If I remember correctly we signed a treaty with Russia promising not to attack Cuba if they removed their missiles back in 1962.

Noam Chomsky , University Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, founder of the modern science of linguistics and political activist, is a powerhouse of anti-imperialist activism in the United States today. On March 21, a crowded and typical - and uniquely Chomskyan - day of political protest and scientific academic research, he spoke from his office for half an hour to V. K. Ramachandran on the current attack on Iraq.

V. K. Ramachandran :Does the present aggression on Iraq represent a continuation of United States' international policy in recent years or a qualitatively new stage in that policy?

Noam Chomsky : It represents a significantly new phase. It is not without precedent, but significantly new nevertheless.

This should be seen as a trial run. Iraq is seen as an extremely easy and totally defenceless target. It is assumed, probably correctly, that the society will collapse, that the soldiers will go in and that the U.S. will be in control, and will establish the regime of its choice and military bases. They will then go on to the harder cases that will follow. The next case could be the Andean region, it could be Iran, it could be others.

The trial run is to try and establish what the U.S. calls a "new norm" in international relations. The new norm is "preventive war" (notice that new norms are established only by the United States). So, for example, when India invaded East Pakistan to terminate horrendous massacres, it did not establish a new norm of humanitarian intervention, because India is the wrong country, and besides, the U.S. was strenuously opposed to that action.

This is not pre-emptive war; there is a crucial difference. Pre-emptive war has a meaning, it means that, for example, if planes are flying across the Atlantic to bomb the United States, the United States is permitted to shoot them down even before they bomb and may be permitted to attack the air bases from which they came. Pre-emptive war is a response to ongoing or imminent attack.

The doctrine of preventive war is totally different; it holds that the United States - alone, since nobody else has this right - has the right to attack any country that it claims to be a potential challenge to it. So if the United States claims, on whatever grounds, that someone may sometime threaten it, then it can attack them.

The doctrine of preventive war was announced explicitly in the National Strategy Report last September. It sent shudders around the world, including through the U.S. establishment, where, I might say, opposition to the war is unusually high. The National Strategy Report said, in effect, that the U.S. will rule the world by force, which is the dimension - the only dimension - in which it is supreme. Furthermore, it will do so for the indefinite future, because if any potential challenge arises to U.S. domination, the U.S. will destroy it before it becomes a challenge.

This is the first exercise of that doctrine. If it succeeds on these terms, as it presumably will, because the target is so defenceless, then international lawyers and Western intellectuals and others will begin to talk about a new norm in international affairs. It is important to establish such a norm if you expect to rule the world by force for the foreseeable future.

This is not without precedent, but it is extremely unusual. I shall mention one precedent, just to show how narrow the spectrum is. In 1963, Dean Acheson, who was a much respected elder statesman and senior Adviser of the Kennedy Administration, gave an important talk to the American Society of International Law, in which he justified the U. S. attacks against Cuba. The attack by the Kennedy Administration on Cuba was large-scale international terrorism and economic warfare. The timing was interesting - it was right after the Missile Crisis, when the world was very close to a terminal nuclear war. In his speech, Acheson said that "no legal issue arises when the United States responds to challenges to its position, prestige or authority", or words approximating that.

That is also a statement of the Bush doctrine. Although Acheson was an important figure, what he said had not been official government policy in the post-War period. It now stands as official policy and this is the first illustration of it. It is intended to provide a precedent for the future.

Such "norms" are established only when a Western power does something, not when others do. That is part of the deep racism of Western culture, going back through centuries of imperialism and so deep that it is unconscious.

So I think this war is an important new step, and is intended to be.

Ramachandran :Is it also a new phase in that the U. S. has not been able to carry others with it?

Chomsky : That is not new. In the case of the Vietnam War, for example, the United States did not even try to get international support. Nevertheless, you are right in that this is unusual. This is a case in which the United States was compelled for political reasons to try to force the world to accept its position and was not able to, which is quite unusual. Usually, the world succumbs.

Ramachandran :So does it represent a "failure of diplomacy" or a redefinition of diplomacy itself?

Chomsky : I wouldn't call it diplomacy at all - it's a failure of coercion.

Compare it with the first Gulf War. In the first Gulf War, the U.S. coerced the Security Council into accepting its position, although much of the world opposed it. NATO went along, and the one country in the Security Council that did not - Yemen - was immediately and severely punished.

In any legal system that you take seriously, coerced judgments are considered invalid, but in the international affairs conducted by the powerful, coerced judgments are fine - they are called diplomacy.

What is interesting about this case is that the coercion did not work. There were countries - in fact, most of them - who stubbornly maintained the position of the vast majority of their populations.

The most dramatic case is Turkey. Turkey is a vulnerable country, vulnerable to U.S. punishment and inducements. Nevertheless, the new government, I think to everyone's surprise, did maintain the position of about 90 per cent of its population. Turkey is bitterly condemned for that here, just as France and Germany are bitterly condemned because they took the position of the overwhelming majority of their populations. The countries that are praised are countries like Italy and Spain, whose leaders agreed to follow orders from Washington over the opposition of maybe 90 per cent of their populations.

That is another new step. I cannot think of another case where hatred and contempt for democracy have so openly been proclaimed, not just by the government, but also by liberal commentators and others. There is now a whole literature trying to explain why France, Germany, the so-called "old Europe", and Turkey and others are trying to undermine the United States. It is inconceivable to the pundits that they are doing so because they take democracy seriously and they think that when the overwhelming majority of a population has an opinion, a government ought to follow it.

That is real contempt for democracy, just as what has happened at the United Nations is total contempt for the international system. In fact there are now calls - from The Wall Street Journal ,people in Government and others - to disband the United Nations.

Fear of the United States around the world is extraordinary. It is so extreme that it is even being discussed in the mainstream media. The cover story of the upcoming issue of Newsweek is about why the world is so afraid of the United States. The Post had a cover story about this a few weeks ago.

Of course this is considered to be the world's fault, that there is something wrong with the world with which we have to deal somehow, but also something that has to be recognised.

Ramachandran :The idea that Iraq represents any kind of clear and present danger is, of course, without any substance at all.

Chomsky : Nobody pays any attention to that accusation, except, interestingly, the population of the United States.

In the last few months, there has been a spectacular achievement of government-media propaganda, very visible in the polls. The international polls show that support for the war is higher in the United States than in other countries. That is, however, quite misleading, because if you look a little closer, you find that the United States is also different in another respect from the rest of the world. Since September 2002, the United States is the only country in the world where 60 per cent of the population believes that Iraq is an imminent threat - something that people do not believe even in Kuwait or Iran.

Furthermore, about 50 per cent of the population now believes that Iraq was responsible for the attack on the World Trade Centre. This has happened since September 2002. In fact, after the September 11 attack, the figure was about 3 per cent. Government-media propaganda has managed to raise that to about 50 per cent. Now if people genuinely believe that Iraq has carried out major terrorist attacks against the United States and is planning to do so again, well, in that case people will support the war.

This has happened, as I said, after September 2002. September 2002 is when the government-media campaign began and also when the mid-term election campaign began. The Bush Administration would have been smashed in the election if social and economic issues had been in the forefront, but it managed to suppress those issues in favour of security issues - and people huddle under the umbrella of power.

This is exactly the way the country was run in the 1980s. Remember that these are almost the same people as in the Reagan and the senior Bush Administrations. Right through the 1980s they carried out domestic policies that were harmful to the population and which, as we know from extensive polls, the people opposed. But they managed to maintain control by frightening the people. So the Nicaraguan Army was two days' march from Texas and about to conquer the United States, and the airbase in Granada was one from which the Russians would bomb us. It was one thing after another, every year, every one of them ludicrous. The Reagan Administration actually declared a national Emergency in 1985 because of the threat to the security of the United States posed by the Government of Nicaragua.

If somebody were watching this from Mars, they would not know whether to laugh or to cry.

They are doing exactly the same thing now, and will probably do something similar for the presidential campaign. There will have to be a new dragon to slay, because if the Administration lets domestic issues prevail, it is in deep trouble.

Ramachandran :You have written that this war of aggression has dangerous consequences with respect to international terrorism and the threat of nuclear war.

Chomsky : I cannot claim any originality for that opinion. I am just quoting the CIA and other intelligence agencies and virtually every specialist in international affairs and terrorism. Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy , the study by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the high-level Hart-Rudman Commission on terrorist threats to the United States all agree that it is likely to increase terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

The reason is simple: partly for revenge, but partly just for self-defence.

There is no other way to protect oneself from U.S. attack. In fact, the United States is making the point very clearly, and is teaching the world an extremely ugly lesson.

Compare North Korea and Iraq. Iraq is defenceless and weak; in fact, the weakest regime in the region. While there is a horrible monster running it, it does not pose a threat to anyone else. North Korea, on the other hand, does pose a threat. North Korea, however, is not attacked for a very simple reason: it has a deterrent. It has a massed artillery aimed at Seoul, and if the United States attacks it, it can wipe out a large part of South Korea.

So the United States is telling the countries of the world: if you are defenceless, we are going to attack you when we want, but if you have a deterrent, we will back off, because we only attack defenceless targets. In other words, it is telling countries that they had better develop a terrorist network and weapons of mass destruction or some other credible deterrent; if not, they are vulnerable to "preventive war".

For that reason alone, this war is likely to lead to the proliferation of both terrorism and weapons of mass destruction.

Ramachandran :How do you think the U.S. will manage the human - and humanitarian - consequences of the war?

Chomsky : No one knows, of course. That is why honest and decent people do not resort to violence - because one simply does not know.

The aid agencies and medical groups that work in Iraq have pointed out that the consequences can be very severe. Everyone hopes not, but it could affect up to millions of people. To undertake violence when there is even such a possibility is criminal.

There is already - that is, even before the war - a humanitarian catastrophe. By conservative estimates, ten years of sanctions have killed hundreds of thousands of people. If there were any honesty, the U.S. would pay reparations just for the sanctions.

The situation is similar to the bombing of Afghanistan, of which you and I spoke when the bombing there was in its early stages. It was obvious the United States was never going to investigate the consequences.

Ramachandran :Or invest the kind of money that was needed.

Chomsky : Oh no. First, the question is not asked, so no one has an idea of what the consequences of the bombing were for most of the country. Then almost nothing comes in. Finally, it is out of the news, and no one remembers it any more.

In Iraq, the United States will make a show of humanitarian reconstruction and will put in a regime that it will call democratic, which means that it follows Washington's orders. Then it will forget about what happens later, and will go on to the next one.

Ramachandran :How have the media lived up to their propaganda-model reputation this time?

Chomsky : Right now it is cheerleading for the home team. Look at CNN, which is disgusting - and it is the same everywhere. That is to be expected in wartime; the media are worshipful of power.

More interesting is what happened in the build-up to war. The fact that government-media propaganda was able to convince the people that Iraq is an imminent threat and that Iraq was responsible for September 11 is a spectacular achievement and, as I said, was accomplished in about four months. If you ask people in the media about this, they will say, "Well, we never said that," and it is true, they did not. There was never a statement that Iraq is going to invade the United States or that it carried out the World Trade Centre attack. It was just insinuated, hint after hint, until they finally got people to believe it.

Ramachandran :Look at the resistance, though. Despite the propaganda, despite the denigration of the United Nations, they haven't quite carried the day.

Chomsky : You never know. The United Nations is in a very hazardous position.

The United States might move to dismantle it. I don't really expect that, but at least to diminish it, because when it isn't following orders, of what use is it?

Ramachandran :Noam, you have seen movements of resistance to imperialism over a long period - Vietnam, Central America, Gulf War I. What are your impressions of the character, sweep and depth of the present resistance to U.S. aggression? We take great heart in the extraordinary mobilisations all over the world.

Chomsky : Oh, that is correct; there is just nothing like it. Opposition throughout the world is enormous and unprecedented, and the same is true of the United States. Yesterday, for example, I was in demonstrations in downtown Boston, right around the Boston Common. It is not the first time I have been there. The first time I participated in a demonstration there at which I was to speak was in October 1965. That was four years after the United States had started bombing South Vietnam. Half of South Vietnam had been destroyed and the war had been extended to North Vietnam. We could not have a demonstration because it was physically attacked, mostly by students, with the support of the liberal press and radio, who denounced these people who were daring to protest against an American war.

On this occasion, however, there was a massive protest before the war was launched officially and once again on the day it was launched - with no counter-demonstrators. That is a radical difference. And if it were not for the fear factor that I mentioned, there would be much more opposition.

The government knows that it cannot carry out long-term aggression and destruction as in Vietnam because the population will not tolerate it.

There is only one way to fight a war now. First of all, pick a much weaker enemy, one that is defenceless. Then build it up in the propaganda system as either about to commit aggression or as an imminent threat. Next, you need a lightning victory. An important leaked document of the first Bush Administration in 1989 described how the U.S. would have to fight war. It said that the U.S. had to fight much weaker enemies, and that victory must be rapid and decisive, as public support will quickly erode. It is no longer like the 1960s, when a war could be fought for years with no opposition at all.

In many ways, the activism of the 1960s and subsequent years has simply made a lot of the world, including this country, much more civilised in many domains.

Yeah, you're totally not being considerate with our time. Plus, this forum is for things that you say. Proper ettiquette is to just provide a link.

Oh, pleeeeeaseeee, Dave, read it!

Already pointed to and answered in this thread:

http://cellar.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3124

We are as much interested in getting to know you as a person as we are your arguments. Therefore, there is no point in reading an extremely long post written by someone who isn't even here.

And in the end, Chomsky is, after all, a dissident. He tends to disagree with much of popular opinion, governmental policy, etc. He is a useful individual in our society of free-thinkers because he is the small voice crying in the wilderness, urging us to have a conscience.

However, none of that, nor his Linguistics skills, necessarily make him a statesman or military strategist. His opinion is no better founded nor more valid than mine, or yours, or anyone else's.

Originally posted by Rucita
Oh, pleeeeeaseeee, Dave, read it!

As a rule, I don't read anything that I have to scroll 3 times or more. I run at 1600x1200 resolution on my monitor and that still was over three screen lengths. It's not just too long; it's way too long.

If you had written it, I'd probably read it. Like juju said, I'm interested in knowing you. But I've read enough Chomsky to know that I'm not interested in knowing him.

Originally posted by bennyhill
Noam Chomsky , University Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, founder of the modern science of linguistics and political activist, is a powerhouse of anti-imperialist activism in the United States today.

No, he's not anti-imperialist. He's anti-American. Anything the US does or doesn't do, he's against it and he'll have a whole book full of the US's nasty motives for doing it. Anything bad done to the US, he'll have another book of why the US deserved twice as bad.

Originally posted by dave

As a rule, I don't read anything that I have to scroll 3 times or more. I run at 1600x1200 resolution on my monitor and that still was over three screen lengths. It's not just too long; it's way too long.

If you had written it, I'd probably read it. Like juju said, I'm interested in knowing you. But I've read enough Chomsky to know that I'm not interested in knowing him.

Chomsky...ummm, isn't american?

Is a traitor?

Je, je, je :3eye:

Why Iraq and not Saudi Arabia, Cuba, North Korea, Canada, Iran, or Detroit?

I think there are two reasons.

1) We believed there was a high probability that the interests of Saddam intersected with those of the millitant Islamic terrorists who have demonstrated the intent and ability to do harm to our people. We believed it in our national security interest to preempt Saddam's ability to deliver horrible and powerful weapons to these people, increasing their ability to commit acts of violence against us.

2) Perhaps the unstated, but more important reason. Having demonstrated our resolve regarding Iraq, I believe it is the fervent hope of this nation that we will not have to demonstrate it again. Perhaps the formerly isolated dictators in other regions of the world will recognize the necessity of policing their own nations, severing their ties with millitant terrorist organizations, and disarming themselves in accordance with UN resolutions. When we say that our diplomatic intent has teeth, they will know that it is so.

Perhaps the best justification for taking up arms against Iraq will be it's potency in obviating the need for armed conflict in a dozen other places across the world.

-sm

Originally posted by bennyhill
Je, je, je

In English, the 'J' is pronounced differently. Therefore, it is "Heh heh heh".

Originally posted by dave
is María a common guy's name in Spain? Because it sure as hell isn't here in the States.

I think it's a euro-thing Dave ... you run across it in Germany from time to time too ... Rainer Maria Rilke (whose poetry you should check out if you have a chance ... fantastic. Don't read it in translation) and Klaus Maria Brandauer, the actor. And darnit, wasn't the "All Quiet on the Western Front" guy another one? (quick search on amazon) ... yah, Erich Maria Remarque.

Originally posted by juju

In English, the 'J' is pronounced differently. Therefore, it is "Heh heh heh".

I laugh in Spanish!

:)

Originally posted by Undertoad
:beer:

To diplomacy!

I'd agree with you there, but I read a very nice article which argues that the current administration has pretty much gutted the State Department in favor of the Pentagon. After all, for the right people, war is much more profitable than peace.

For my next president, I want a social moderate and fiscal conservative, either someone who actually thinks first before applying force, or someone who has really seen a real war from ground level.

Bush, IMHO, is the worst of both worlds. Since he wore a uniform at some point, he believes that he has military experience, but has never been in the fire. At least Gore, while not front-line, had the guts to get close to it.

I either want a competent civilian who knows he is a civilian, thinks like a civilian, and can 'win the peace', or a real warrior who can delegate and manage competent civilians.

The first person I know of who used the phrase 'military industrial complex' was Eisenhower. Stacked up against a President like Eisenhower, who fought in the toughest war mankind has ever known, and who found the concentration camps maintained by the country of his ancestors, who warned against the use of war when diplomacy becomes merely difficult, Bush comes up a little short.

Even 40 years later, Eisenhower's warning is right on time.

Military-Industrial Complex Speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Public Papers of the Presidents, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1960, p. 1035- 1040

My fellow Americans:

Three days from now, after half a century in the service of our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office as, in traditional and solemn ceremony, the authority of the Presidency is vested in my successor.

This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen.

Like every other citizen, I wish the new President, and all who will labor with him, Godspeed. I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all.

Our people expect their President and the Congress to find essential agreement on issues of great moment, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of the Nation.

My own relations with the Congress, which began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to West Point, have since ranged to the intimate during the war and immediate post-war period, and, finally, to the mutually interdependent during these past eight years.

In this final relationship, the Congress and the Administration have, on most vital issues, cooperated well, to serve the national good rather than mere partisanship, and so have assured that the business of the Nation should go forward. So, my official relationship with the Congress ends in a feeling, on my part, of gratitude that we have been able to do so much together.

II.

We now stand ten years past the midpoint of a century that has witnessed four major wars among great nations. Three of these involved our own country. Despite these holocausts America is today the strongest, the most influential and most productive nation in the world. Understandably proud of this pre-eminence, we yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.

III.

Throughout America's adventure in free government, our basic purposes have been to keep the peace; to foster progress in human achievement, and to enhance liberty, dignity and integrity among people and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free and religious people. Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us grievous hurt both at home and abroad.

Progress toward these noble goals is persistently threatened by the conflict now engulfing the world. It commands our whole attention, absorbs our very beings. We face a hostile ideology -- global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method. Unhappily the danger is poses promises to be of indefinite duration. To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so much the emotional and transitory sacrifices of crisis, but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely, and without complaint the burdens of a prolonged and complex struggle -- with liberty the stake. Only thus shall we remain, despite every provocation, on our charted course toward permanent peace and human betterment.

Crises there will continue to be. In meeting them, whether foreign or domestic, great or small, there is a recurring temptation to feel that some spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties. A huge increase in newer elements of our defense; development of unrealistic programs to cure every ill in agriculture; a dramatic expansion in basic and applied research -- these and many other possibilities, each possibly promising in itself, may be suggested as the only way to the road we wish to travel.

But each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs -- balance between the private and the public economy, balance between cost and hoped for advantage -- balance between the clearly necessary and the comfortably desirable; balance between our essential requirements as a nation and the duties imposed by the nation upon the individual; balance between actions of the moment and the national welfare of the future. Good judgment seeks balance and progress; lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration.

The record of many decades stands as proof that our people and their government have, in the main, understood these truths and have responded to them well, in the face of stress and threat. But threats, new in kind or degree, constantly arise. I mention two only.

IV.

A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction.

Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present

and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientifictechnological elite.

It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.

V.

Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government -- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.

VI.

Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.

Such a confederation must be one of equals. The weakest must come to the conference table with the same confidence as do we, protected as we are by our moral, economic, and military strength. That table, though scarred by many past frustrations, cannot be abandoned for the certain agony of the battlefield.

Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative. Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose. Because this need is so sharp and apparent I confess that I lay down my official responsibilities in this field with a definite sense of disappointment. As one who has witnessed the horror and the lingering sadness of war -- as one who knows that another war could utterly destroy this civilization which has been so slowly and painfully built over thousands of years -- I wish I could say tonight that a lasting peace is in sight.

Happily, I can say that war has been avoided. Steady progress toward our ultimate goal has been made. But, so much remains to be done. As a private citizen, I shall never cease to do what little I can to help the world advance along that road.

VII.

So -- in this my last good night to you as your President -- I thank you for the many opportunities you have given me for public service in war and peace. I trust that in that service you find some things worthy; as for the rest of it, I know you will find ways to improve performance in the future.

You and I -- my fellow citizens -- need to be strong in our faith that all nations, under God, will reach the goal of peace with justice. May we be ever unswerving in devotion to principle, confident but humble with power, diligent in pursuit of the Nation's great goals.

To all the peoples of the world, I once more give expression to America's prayerful and continuing aspiration:

We pray that peoples of all faiths, all races, all nations, may have their great human needs satisfied; that those now denied opportunity shall come to enjoy it to the full; that all who yearn for freedom may experience its spiritual blessings; that those who have freedom will understand, also, its heavy responsibilities; that all who are insensitive to the needs of others will learn charity; that the scourges of poverty, disease and ignorance will be made to disappear from the earth, and that, in the goodness of time, all peoples will come to live together in a peace guaranteed by the binding force of mutual respect and love.

Hey, cleaning that plane in the Texas National Guard was important!

Hmmm...I could tolerate a president such as you specified. Keep the social issues on the same levels for the moment while we trim up the deficit.

Now Siria?

Bush go to the sh-it!

Originally posted by bennyhill
Bush go to the sh-it!

I have no idea what this means, but I think I'm gonna start using it in everyday conversation

sm: "have you seen the remote?"

roomate: "for the TV?"

sm: yes for the TV, dumbass

roomate: Oh, I ebayed it for extra spending cash

sm: Bush go to the Sh-it! what'd you do that for?

-sm

     Thanks SM, I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one that didn't get it.

Originally posted by smoothmoniker
roomate: "for the TV?"
sm: yes for the TV, dumbass

Thats *really* funny! I'm shortening the new phrase though.

Bush-ee-it

This is quicker and easier to say.

Bush-ee-it, I hate filing tax forms! :)

smoothmoniker wrote:
I have no idea what this means, but I think I'm gonna start using it in everyday conversation

sm: "have you seen the remote?"

roomate: "for the TV?"

sm: yes for the TV, dumbass

roomate: Oh, I ebayed it for extra spending cash

sm: Bush go to the Sh-it! what'd you do that for?

-sm

i wonder when "ebayed' will go int he dictionary as a verb
:worried:

Along with photoshoped. :D