Does anyone else think it’s slightly questionable that the only news source to break this story is some Scottish newspaper most people have never heard of before?
That’s not to disqualify it pre-emptively, but if no one else picks it up and runs with it, including The Guardian or various papers like the NYT that have been fairly staunchly anti-Iraq, it might just make sense to dismiss this as gobbledygook.
ProfX,
Great post!!!
Please read what I actually write.
Let me summarize: W. and his administration deserve credit from YOU for thwarting/deterring attacks. Since YOU would blame him if an attack occurred, you might as well praise him for preventing one.
Clear?
Great!!!
JeffR
Hedo,
Excellent post.
Right on.
JeffR
Something interesting I have noticed is how some citizens of other countries (Canada and certain European countries chiefly) try to paint this picture of ignorance by the American public as a result of our media. They scream that we are living in darkness because our only media sources are the biased FOX news channel and conservative talk radio(BTW, I won’t try to argue that these sources are slanted…they are but they usually dont lie about it).
They seem to discount a few things. First, what is the percentage of people that have access to the internet in the US? Everyone actually, if you consider that public libraries in every town in the country offer it. So if you want exposure to European or middle eastern news sources, just look on the internet.
Then they scream that we are too lazy to seek out alternative media sources, like the aforementioned internet, and choose to rely only on our broadcast news and our news papers. However, if you read the New York Times it often echoes the sentiments in left-leaning British or French periodicals, the editorial and opinion sections in particular. Ditto for some of the broadcast stations. Perhaps if we got Al Jazira on channel 4 here we would all change our minds…
Ive seen some pretty far left stuff on the opinion pages of my local papers(they’re left leaning for sure, even though they deny it). The argument that we are not exposed to the differing viewpoints of internationalist liberalism is a joke…we are. However, some of us, after reading what they have to say, just shake our heads and say what crap it is and then we get accused of living in darkness.
So I ask the more enlightened “internationalist” members of this board…Where do we go to get the “real” picture of what is going on in the world?
[quote]JeffR wrote:
ProfX,
Great post!!!
Please read what I actually write.
Let me summarize: W. and his administration deserve credit from YOU for thwarting/deterring attacks. Since YOU would blame him if an attack occurred, you might as well praise him for preventing one.
Clear?
Great!!!
JeffR[/quote]
Where have I written that I would blame the president if there is another attack? Does this mean Clinton gets credit for every year there wasn’t an attack under his term?
ProfX,
May I get you on record saying that you wouldn’t blame W. if an Al Qaeda attack happened today?
There were plenty of people in your party who blamed 9/11 on W. It isn’t too far of a stretch to infer from your posts that you are a Democrat. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
You write this: “It has nothing to do with a war in Iraq or Bush being in office.”
Really? No credit at all? Who do you give credit to? Is the fact that we haven’t had an attack due to blind luck?
Come now.
JeffR
Jeff, you just don’t get it do you? Everything bad that happens is the President’s fault. Everything good…well the President has nothing to do with that.
Come on now Jeff shape up!
[quote]JeffR wrote:
ProfX,
May I get you on record saying that you wouldn’t blame W. if an Al Qaeda attack happened today?
There were plenty of people in your party who blamed 9/11 on W. It isn’t too far of a stretch to infer from your posts that you are a Democrat. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
You write this: “It has nothing to do with a war in Iraq or Bush being in office.”
Really? No credit at all? Who do you give credit to? Is the fact that we haven’t had an attack due to blind luck?
Come now.
JeffR [/quote]
I am not a “democrat”
One of the reasons we have not had another direct LARGE attack (granted, you would be extremely foolish to believe there have been no attempts or even near successes that you will never hear about) is the level of security currently seen around the country. Before that last attack, our airports were a weak point. They showed us that in ways none of us will forget. If it was that easy even before 9/11 to just walk up and place a bomb, you can believe that we would have been attacked many more times than just Oklahoma and 9/11. They had to use an entire plane as a bomb because of how difficult it was in the first place. That means, no, Bush is not to be given credit simply because there has not been another large attack and that line of thinking is ridiculous and removes the everyday work of people around the country to prevent it since and long before 9/11.
What seems to give people around the world a negative view of America is not simply the action of “war in Iraq”. It seems to mostly be the arrogant attitude by even many on this site as if no one else in the world matters and, since we as Americans have the greater military power, that we can do what we want when we want and everyone else can kiss our collective asses. The effects of this way of thinking seem to be effecting our trade of international products. It isn’t so much that we can’t do what we want, but the fact that we flaunt that fact as if it is also our goal to make the rest of the world feel worthless. A good leader wouldn’t do that.
The “conservatives” on this site even take it as far as truly believing that the Great Bush is why we have not been attacked again.
Here are some questions:
Why did we invade Iraq?
Please be straight forward with me and don’t tell me it was because we had to remove Saddam right then as soon as possible because we care so much for the poor people of Iraq. The initial reasons we went in and what we were fed by the administration and the media were along the lines of Saddam having direct ties to Osama as well as huge stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.
What is the goal in Iraq now and are we doing great progress towards it? Everything is on track?
Do you think that the numbers and stats that you hear from our media are correct and that over 80% voted democratically?
Did you ignore the fact that many were afraid to leave their houses because of threats on the lives of those who voted?
Do you think that with those threats, that the number seems correct and that this many people still voted and they are on their way to an independant democracy?
If we are attacked again, who is to blame?
Who is to blame for 9/11?
Who is to be given credit for there not being a 9/11 until 9/11?
These are just questions I am pondering. Have a great day, and please, don’t take offense you great noble-hearted conservative you.
Its too bad the American people were too slow to wake up, after the election instead of before it. The next 4 years will be a nightmare…
Prof X,
I’ll offer my opinion on some of those questions:
Why did we attack Iraq?
Because the best evidence we could find, at the time, said they had WMD’s and a rogue state cannot be allowed to exist with WMD’s.
Is it going according to plan? On Track?
Sunstantially yes. The terrorists are putting up a fight but are losing more then they can replace. (think Japanese pilots in WW2.) Wouldn’t place a bet they are going to win this one…would you?
What is going to happen in Iraq now?: They will have a democracy and we will have a base in a very hostile area. A clear message was also sent to the enemy. We can make war on you anywhere and anytime we choose.
Who is responsible for 9/11?
The terrorists!
Who will responsible if another attack occurs:
The terrorists!
Who was responsible for an attack not happening before 9/11?:
The enemy.
We were not prepared. We are better prepared now. There are also a lot less of them who know what they are doing. Lots of new recruits but the real experienced ones are doing some explaining to Allah about their actions.
We can try to blame Bush or give him credit but the bottom line is the terrorists are the ones responsible and we are making them take responsibility for their actions.
I don’t understand their culture and I couldn’t give a fuck what they think about mine. I do know that if we kill as many sworn murderers as we can before they come to the US, we will be safer. They do understand strength and power. We appeared weak in the eyes of the world after Somalia. If OBL knew he was going to lose Afganistan and 70% of his leadership by hitting the WTC he wouldn’t have attacked. If he does the calculation on using a WMD against us I hope he comes to the conclusion that it also will not be worth it. We won’t surrender and the retribution will be many times worse.
Hedo,
You didn’t even respond to every point or question I presented and
[quote]Who was responsible for an attack not happening before 9/11?:
The enemy.
[/quote]
what does this mean?
I didn’t answer all of the questions because I didn’t have an opinion on them. That’s why I said I’ll post answers to “some” of them.
Wasn’t really sure what you were referring to with the voting questions? My guess was Afganistan but was not sure.
My comment on the “enemy” is this: They were responsible for the attack not happening before 9/11. We didn’t anticipate the attack and were not prepared. Now we are better prepared. I don’t think any politician was responsibnle for them.
Hate to tell the doomsday groups but Iraq is not lost. Let me qualify this with I was not on the ground in Iraq so I can only tell you what the guys on the ground told me over the radio and when they passed through my location for R and R. I am in the Air Force and fly missions over Iraq. I just got back from another deployment to the Middle East. The difference between now and the last time I was there is incredible. After we toppled Saddam there was roughly 20% of Bahgdad that had power. Now though, if you didn’t know where you were you could not tell between Bahgdad and any other major city, the whole place is lit up. Obviously this is only at night, during the day it is obvious. During the day you can see the water pipelines being built and the progress being made to try to get some water south of the city. The biggest complaint that I heard from guys on the ground was the length of the deployment. 1 year or more is a brutally long time. Still this has not had a huge effect yet because they released our re-enlistment stats and they are higher in theater than stateside. To be sure there are some people that think it is a hopeless and/or useless cause (even in my unit) but they are in the minority.
Also all the talk about not finding the WMD’s makes me wonder if people realize how big Iraq really is. When you look over the desert there are zero landmarks to get your bearings so there is no doubt in my mind that if you wanted to hide something out there you could, very easily. Plus Saddam was an accomplished smuggler and we gave him about a 2 month head start before the invasion so I believe a lot of that stuff was on it’s way out of the country before we could get in there. They did find some sarin gas and figured it could kill about 1000 people. Is that not mass enough? Or is there a certain number it has to be before it is declared a WMD? I do find it flat out stupid to think that al-Queda had no ties to Iraq. John Edwards said during his VP debate that al-Queda was in at least 60 countries. Do you really believe that Saddam was able to rid his country of all it’s members? That every country in the Middle East had al-Queda except Iraq?Kind of hard to believe.
Lastly, quit bitching about a pre-emptive strike against a country that is not a threat to us. I was in NATO when we did just that in Bosnia/Kosovo. Milosivic had no WMD’s and was not a threat to us. But we decided we need a regime change there. I flew many missions supporting that campaign and I see little difference between the two.
Sorry one more thing, someone wrote about the Presidents military service and the media was all up in arms about him missing a “mandatory” flight physical. First, everything in the military is mandatory, for example,doing the speed limit on base is mandatory, cutting you grass in base housing is mandatory, cutting your hair is mandatory. If by chance something isn’t spelled out as being mandatory you just assume it is. My point being just because it is mandatory doesn’t mean you don’t have some leeway. Second missing a flight physical is no big deal. We have so many requirements to maintain our currency that sometimes things fall through the cracks. A friend of mine had two events scheduled for him on the same day and he missed his phsyical. He just had it rescheduled and was good to go. Before this last deployment my paperwork was lost and I had to do another one before I could deploy, again no big deal.
[quote]JeffR wrote:
Hey JTF,
I am not interested in your nay-saying about Iraq. This is the kind of headline your pals used during the election. I assume to try to discredit the President and his policies. You felt that that would help your candidate.
It didn’t.
You lost.
W. has a mandate to finish the job in Afghanistan and Iraq.
You’d better hope your headline here is wrong.
The most interesting part of this article was the various measures mentioned to improve the Allied effort on the War on Terror. Constructive criticisms devoid of the “doom and gloom” headlines are far more useful to all.
I would like to suggest that headlines like “Iraq is now lost” be replaced by things like “Ways in which the Allied can more effectively combat terror.”
Thanks,
JeffR[/quote]
In regard to ‘finishing’ the job in Afghanistan and Iraq, remember that we lost Vietnam and gained a friend and won in Korea and created a most feared enemy.
I would love to post something encouraging but any constructive criticisms devoid of “doom and gloom” are only wishful thinking at this point. If we had gone in with the the correct amount of troops and protected their infrastructure and secured the city like was told to us in the beginning, I’m sure we would ALL be behind Bush at this point. Also the Iraqi citizens themselves would be fighting back against insurgents and not joining THEM in fighting US.
We went from, our troops getting flowers and Iraq basking in freedom within months, to leveling Fallujah and them not even having clean water and proper sanitation after almost TWO YEARS.
Regardless of the media, common sense says this is a failure in every way, shape and form.
How is this fighting terrorism?! Because we’re in a guerilla war in ONE city in Iraq?..hey, Fallujahs’ under control! Whoops, there goes Baghdad again, damn!
Saddam and his sons have been gone for quite some time now, do YOU feel safer? They keep talking about the next “not if but when” terror attack in the US and use of a dirty bomb while illegal immigrants pour over our own borders…yet nail clippers aboard commercial flights are ‘verboten’. The terrorists are wasting their time and money on all these expensive weapons…if they could just figure out how to get nail clippers past airport security…
Bush keeps saying how much safer we are with Saddam gone at the time letting us know we’re at the mercy of any fanatical Muslim with a butter knife.
Do you think the next country is eagerly waiting for us to invade them so they can have freedom too? I’m sure the Iranian citizens can’t wait…please bomb us so we can have freedom too!
You guys are like ‘Charlie Brown’ and the Bush administration is like ‘Lucy’ with the football. I WISH I could think like you so this would all make perfect sense.
CDM
I wish the media would talk to more guys like you instead of the clowns they interview as supposed experts.
Half of these pukes are professors of mideast studies who couldn’t spell Iraq if you spotted them the I and the Q.
Good job man!
Looks like CDM and Buster from the Bush war criminal post think alike.
Again if somebody disagrees with me they have to bring up Fox News for some reason.
The common sense answer is that the truth is not a matter of opinion. How many people think Steroids are the most dangerous stuff in the world? It causes brain tumors, causes the heart to explode, causes your feet to fall off.
I assume you are here reading this site. Don?t you think the 0.1% of the population that reads this site knows more then the other 99.9%? Being popular doesn?t mean your right. If it does then 14 year old High School cheerleaders are the smartest people on earth.
Uh yeah, it’s brainwashing. Sounds more like you are brainwashed. Much of the American media is against Bush, just like most of the foreign media. Not all of it, but it is.
Anyway why is a different point of view then the American one the right one? I am very careful of the foreign media because so much of it is anti-American. That doesn’t mean they are always wrong, but it also does not mean that the American media is always wrong. But it does not make a media right just because it is not American.
Of course if is readily apparent, especially if you understand the news media. How often do you hear good news from the media? Never. “No news is good news.” Good news does not sell. Did you know that when the economy improves in America, the news reports about the economy drop, but the percent of negative reports about the economy increase dramatically?
With millions of people in Iraq, we hear about the 3 or 4 that got killed by some car bomb. Oh no, terrible situation. Actually most of Iraq is improving, but there are trouble spots. And they are going to continue as long as the election is looming. They cannot let Iraqis decide their own future.
And there we go again. If anybody disagrees with you, it means we are saying you have no freedom of speech. Have you thought you might just be wrong? I don’t see sour grapes, I see people who hate Bush just as much as they ever did. Almost to the point you would think he was Jewish.
[quote]It’s easy to toss words like ‘mandate’ around. But words mean nothing. Look at the number of attacks. Look at the death count. Look at Iraqi and Arab public opinion.
You have your head in the sand. [/quote]
When did I use the word mandate? You are the one with your head in the sand. Sorry if Bush is not licking his finger and figuring out what to do based on how popular it can make him. Hey it worked great for Clinton, and the world loves Clinton. He just had no opinions of his own.
[quote]JustTheFacts wrote:
Looks like CDM and Buster from the Bush war criminal post think alike.[/quote]
Strike that statement…I thought I read the same thing two separate places…my bad.
[quote]Mr. Moose wrote:
The Mage
It’s not about being superior or not. It’s about who’s giving a whole picture of what’s going on in Iraq. We’ll never get to know everything but non-american media tend to show a bit more of the truth/reality! [/quote]
How do you know this? Maybe it is a different truth, or spin. What makes it more true then the American Media? Just because it is foreign? That other side of the fence idea?
I know that the foreign media is different then the American, but why is that better? All the media could be better. A lot of the foreign media does not like America. It is really heard to get accurate information when all of the media is filtering it through political thought.
Of course Americans feel their opinon is right and everybody else is wrong. Everybody feels that their opinion is the right one, and everybody else?s is wrong. That is just they way humans think. It would be beneficial if people actually let the idea that they could be wrong into their thought process. (Yes I do this.)
And why do they do this? Is that reporting, or just attempting to manipulate people through emotion? This is not a new thing. Besides is it actually the deadliest month EVER? Or just in reference to Iraq? I am sure there were deadlier months.
Has anyone read about all the weapons Iraq still had? At least a quarter of what America has, and that is a conservative estimate.
Then while we have only found a little WMD substance there, (yes there has been some,) they still had their programs in place, and ready to go at a seconds notice. They were not lying down by any means. At any time they could simply kick inspectors out, go though months of complaining while building up whatever they wanted, and been a massive danger.
Everyone who keeps talking about the big picture keeps ignoring this fact. If a person has all the chemicals to make meth, and all the equipment to make meth in place. But they have no meth, does that mean they will never make meth? Tell that to the cops.