[quote]lixy wrote:
As far as terrorist states go, that’s as unambiguous as it gets. Then there’s Luis Posada, General Gramajo, Colonel Medrano, Junudullah, and many others.
How many of those countries had genocidal governments?
Would this be a good time to point out to the record of US support to genocidal governments?
And how many have democratic governments thanks to our involvement?
The better question is, how many have dictators because of your involvement?
[/quote]
To reply to this…anyone know how many terrorist organizations the old USSR supported around the world, or how many dictatorships they backed. How about a link or list?
“Luis Posada, General Gramajo, Colonel Medrano, Junudullah, and many others”?
That’s three dicators. Shit, there were more than that in Eastern Europe alone. If we look to the middle east with Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, and Asia with just Vietnam, North Korea that alone beats anything the US has done, not even touching on Africa, with Algeria, Nigeria, Sudan, Ethopia, ect, and South America with Cuba, Grenada Nicaragua, rebels in EL Salvador, ect.
Anyone got a link to a real list?
Any old time readers think Rainjack vs Johhnybravo is humorous for reasons other than the posts themselves?
[quote]johnnybravo30 wrote:
The support of OBL is more than interesting. The Bush Doctrine states that not only terrorist groups must be brought to justice but the governments that support them. Clearly, history is not without a sense of humor.
[/quote]
Does the Bush Doctrine say that governments that supported terrorism thirty years ago during the Cold War should be brought to justice or nations backing islamists today?
There is a difference.
What you are saying is: we should have let the Reds have Afghanistan. If we did, today you’d be bitching about the holocaust there and why we did nothing to stop it.
DrSkeptix I read the review of that book. It states the obvious. The way the west has dealt with Islam is cultural suicide. There is a genuine lack of understanding of Islam in the west.
The biggest mistake has been the relativism that has been applied. All to often we hear that since Christianity has events like the crusades and the inquisition in it’s history it is no different from Islam. Those who say this must not have taken the time to study the lives of the two men who founded those two religions.
Jesus was all about being a holy man.So he completely rejected violence. The crusades, the inquisition, none of that would have had his blessing.
If you read the Koran or the Hadditha you will find that Mohammad was a soldier. Mohammad embraced violence as a reasonable way to do gods work. This is why Islam lends itself so well to militacy.
So when they call the jihadists radicals or extremists they are showing a real lack of knowledge of the history of Islam. These people aren’t radicals they are traditionalists.
In that review Ayaan Hirsi misses an important point that a lot of people are missing. Violence in Islam goes all the way back to the very beginning. It began with Mohammad and continues to this day.
Violence in Christianity goes back to the third century when Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman empire. Before then the religion was totally about peace and pacifism.
Jesus and Mohammad are two completely different role models. For a Christian to act like Jesus they have to reject violence and be compassionate. For a Muslim to act like Mohammad they have to pick up a sword and start ruthlessly killing without any compassion.
Johnny bravo. You are the one who brought up Versailles, and tried to treat me like I’m a simpleton. Most of the conflicts the world has seen since 1920 has been a result of Versailles. A lot of wars could have been headed off at Versailles.
It does nothing to change the fact that there was a time when it was clear that Hitler was going to be a problem but nothing was done when it would have been less costly.
If you feel insulted by my post all I can say is I didn’t know that you are the sensitive type, you are new here after all. If you are going to stick around here you are going to need much thicker skin, like Lixy.
Just like JohnnyBravo’s fabulous theory of - holding back tears - it’s not Hitler’s fault. Big meanies at Versailles made the Nazis do what they did.
If I were a bigger man, this wouldn’t even be worth dignifying with a response.
This is a complete distortion of my post and you know it. The reparations forced upon the Germans provided the soil perfect for rearing an evil seed. Only Hitler was responsible for the actions of Hitler, but I’m waiting patiently for your Houdini act of misinformation that demonstrates how Hitler would have had the opportunity to reign down a holocaust on anything more than the cockroaches in his apartment had the reparations not brought Germany to it’s knees.[/quote]
The great depression brought Germany to its knees.
Blaming the Treaty of Versailles and the reparations is incredibly simplistic.
WWII would have happened anyway unless Germany was razed at the end of WWI.
[quote]Sifu wrote:
Jesus was all about being a holy man.So he completely rejected violence. The crusades, the inquisition, none of that would have had his blessing. [/quote]
And what makes you think a bunch of maniacs flying planes into civilian towers would have had Mohammed’s blessing?
Hadith, not Hadditha. But hey, you’re free to call a Porsche what you will.
In any case, I’m curious what in that compilation struck you as an indiscriminate incitement of violence.
Mohammed did fight in battles, but inscribed on the hilt of his sword were these words: “Forgive him who wrongs you; join him who cuts you off; do good to him who does evil to you, and speak the truth although it be against yourself.”
Granted.
There is a paradox in this logic. One of the central points in Islam (as central in my opinion, as the monotheistic nature of that religion) is that Mohammed is the last prophet. Meaning, the last person on the planet to have a direct (albeit not permanent) communication channel with God (Dubya?).
Because of this, a Muslim can’t possibly claim to be doing the work of God. This is what makes Zawahiri and others extremists. They overlook a central tenet of the religion to advance whatever agenda they have.
Who exactly is missing that? People who can’t be bothered to open a book?
[quote]Violence in Christianity goes back to the third century when Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman empire. Before then the religion was totally about peace and pacifism.
Jesus and Mohammad are two completely different role models. For a Christian to act like Jesus they have to reject violence and be compassionate. [/quote]
Absolutely. In the Quran, Jesus is flawless. He isn’t merely human like Mohammed. There’s that “Holy Spirit” component which complicates things, and which led some Christians to deify Jesus.
This is some severe twisting of historical facts. Mohammed was a warrior, yes, but he didn’t go around killing people in the way you describe. Making such accusations is pointless if you can’t back them up with anything other than your word. We can make this academic if you want to, but then you’ll have to show us where the prophet started “ruthlessly killing without any compassion”. We can take it from there.
That said, some of Mohammed’s words need reviving in these dark times of the Islamic religion: Assist your brother or sister Muslim, whether he be an oppressor or an oppressed. ‘But how shall we do it when someone is an oppressor?’ Muhammad said, ‘Assisting an oppressor is by forbidding and withholding that person from oppression.’
That said, some of Mohammed’s words need reviving in these dark times of the Islamic religion: Assist your brother or sister Muslim, whether he be an oppressor or an oppressed. ‘But how shall we do it when someone is an oppressor?’ Muhammad said, ‘Assisting an oppressor is by forbidding and withholding that person from oppression.’[/quote]
One thing: this says assist your brother and sister “Muslim” it does not tell you what to do if the person oppressing you is a non-muslim. That is open for the militants to interpret any way they please.
Why do terrorists feel they are blessed if they fly a plane into a building? Why do they feel blessed for killing the followers of Christ, Kristna and Moses?
That said, some of Mohammed’s words need reviving in these dark times of the Islamic religion: Assist your brother or sister Muslim, whether he be an oppressor or an oppressed. ‘But how shall we do it when someone is an oppressor?’ Muhammad said, ‘Assisting an oppressor is by forbidding and withholding that person from oppression.’
One thing: this says assist your brother and sister “Muslim” it does not tell you what to do if the person oppressing you is a non-muslim. That is open for the militants to interpret any way they please.
Why do terrorists feel they are blessed if they fly a plane into a building? Why do they feel blessed for killing the followers of Christ, Kristna and Moses? [/quote]
GKhan,
What is absolutley crazy in these threads, is that it is Lixy who conflates Radical Islam (“Islamicism”) with Islam…We in the West see the difference; but it is he who has chosen to defend the one with the other.
If the Fanatacs of Islam were to confront the Fanatics of Reason with this argument, the Reasonable would, of course, say, “Yes, Islam is a religion of peace, sometimes, and there must be good Muslims, somewhere, as there are bad Muslims.”
But that is hardly the point or the problem. It is Radical Islam and its fanatics that is the issue, and unless Islam is the same as Islamicism–as Lixy frames his apologeias–why bother discussing religion? It is not the religion, it is the Fanatic that kills.
So when they call the jihadists radicals or extremists they are showing a real lack of knowledge of the history of Islam. These people aren’t radicals they are traditionalists.
[/quote]
This really is only partly true. The radical side started in the early 20th century with the fall of the Ottoman Empire. One man thought that they were being punished because they were not following the true religion.
The problem comes when you find out that the leaders are actually misquoting the Koran, or only quoting parts of it, or even just making stuff up.
Kids are being raised for the sole purpose of becoming suicide bombers. They do not know what really is in the Koran. They only are raised with the message of hate hate hate. Hate the Jews, and hate America.
I once read that something like over 80% of Muslims cannot read their Koran, or even know what their prayers actually mean.
In a similar vein, the Bible does say to stone men who lay with other men as they would with a woman. Yet if anyone did that today, I would consider them a radical Christian, not mainstream, nor traditional.
The way the Koran is written does make it much easier to lead into this radical thought. But add in some brainwashing and you end up with… well lixy.
I do not need to be told that international law has never and will likely never do an ounce of good for Iraq. Anyone that optimistic is a fool, and that fact is tragic. [/quote]
Apparently you did, based on your posts.
The wrong conclusion on your part - I have no “your guy did it too!” ax to grind with liberals. My point was to show that literally the Clintonian event triggered a precedent in the way we think about the “illegality” of foreign interventions. Good try, though.
As for the “barbarism of the Clinton administration” - I have no interest, and it has nothing to do with the point I raised w/r/t his actions. I am not condemning nor praising his intervention in the Balkans - just noting its effect on arguments for and against “international law”.
The discredited Annan’s opinion on Iraq is irrelevant, given his compromising and corruption - I raised the point to say that even he, this opponent of the Iraq war, recognized the exception I speak of stemming from the sea change related to the Clintonian intervention.
It doesn’t have to be - but it is at the UNSC level.
What the hell are you talking about here? You are rambling incoherently.
Ok, so that discards Russia, most of Europe, and most of the Arab states. What is left? Moldova?
Interestingly, you can’t (or won’t) make a moral distinction in “rogue states”, as if the only taxonomy should be for a state that acts defiant to a non-existing global democracy. That, of course, is not what I mean by “rogue state”, so I am not sure your point is taken.
What makes you arrogantly conclude that those that back force projection don’t seek a better world, but happen to be realists about the danger of the realities in the geopolitical jungle?
I don’t tell you your cause is pointless because your motives are wrong - I am telling you you are dead wrong about how the world works and are actually acting counterproductively toward your ends by choosing naive means.
Correct - and they always will. Trying to build a system around any other assumption is a recipe for disaster.
A pathetic attempt to slur America, not terribly surprising - our democracy works just fine. Our foreign policy - far from perfect, but generally the agent of good - is representative of the people. Abiding by “international law” - what ever that vacuous ambition may be, as no one can agree on what that is - means first and foremost protecting national security and national interests. International law doesn’t preclude this, and there is no “disconnect” between our foreign policy and our people, no matter badly you want it to be there.
As a pure war of aggression as a philosophical matter, that wouldn’t make sense in light of the history of the invasion of Iraq, the consequent sanctions, and the ineffectual enforcement of resolutions. At some point, the resolutions needed teeth in the name of international security - and since the UN machinery was compromised, no one had to wait on the “smoldering ruins” of a classical armed attack before addressing the international security problem of Saddam and Iraq.
Not a good nor particularly good attempt at a naked insult.
Nonsense - and stop the reactionary radicalism. The US takes great pains to minimize casualties, and the argument regarding Iraq’s position in our national security concern has been hashed over and over.
Of course, this is the height of silliness.
Firstly, Saddam was largely a Soviet client. He received less than 2% of his aid from the US. Further, Saddam was a useful buffer against an ascendant and dangerous Iran, and sometimes in foreign policy, your choice is between a bad one and a worse one. The world basically agreed the choice to back Saddam was better than the alternative.
Now, to your “arguments” - they make no sense. We aided the Soviet Union in WWII to the tune of billions in equipment in order to defeat the Nazis. Does it follow that we therefore had no right to engage in the Mexican standoff of the Cold War? We were morally bound not to stand against the USSR because we happened to ally with them when the alternative was much, much worse?
Of course not. Flatly stupid. Once we determined that the USSR represented a threat to our national security, our history of allying with them had no preclusive effect of addressing the threat they posed after the alliance.
Further, even if we assume it was such a bad idea to help Saddam (which I don’t) - isn’t that an error in need to rectifying?
I don’t have much respect for useless Monday-morning quarterbacking that refuses to recognize the realities of the situation. And, as stated, there is no logical or moral argument that somehow forbids the US from eliminating Saddam as a threat to the US because at one point in time, we aided him.
Ridiculous - but it is an “argument” that keeps getting recycled.
By “affair”, I assume you mean Iraq, but that is nonsense, of course.
Like Lixy, you make the perfect the enemy of the good. Wars are nasty, harsh, full of mistakes - moral people recognize the trade-offs, and rational people understand the world as it is given, not as they want it to be.
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
One thing: this says assist your brother and sister “Muslim” it does not tell you what to do if the person oppressing you is a non-muslim. [/quote]
You got it wrong. It’s about what to do when “your brother and sister” are oppressing others.
When they’re oppressing you, common sense applies.
lixy doesn’t care, but back on topic about this ridiculously bad study, here’s an editorial from today’s WSJ:
[i]The Lancet’s Political Hit
January 9, 2008; Page A14
Three weeks before the 2006 elections, the British medical journal Lancet published a bombshell report estimating that casualties in Iraq had exceeded 650,000 since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003. We know that number was wildly exaggerated. The news is that now we know why.
It turns out the Lancet study was funded by anti-Bush partisans and conducted by antiwar activists posing as objective researchers. It also turns out the timing was no accident. You can find the fascinating details in the current issue of National Journal magazine, thanks to reporters Neil Munro and Carl Cannon. And sadly, that may be the only place you’ll find them. While the media were quick to hype the original Lancet report – within a week of its release it had been featured on 25 news shows and in 188 newspaper and magazine articles – something tells us this debunking won’t get the same play.
The Lancet death toll was more than 10 times what had been estimated by the U.S. and Iraqi governments, and even by human rights groups. Asked about the study on the day it was released, President Bush said, “I don’t consider it a credible report.” Neither did the Pentagon and top British authorities. To put the 655,000 number in perspective, consider that fewer Americans died in the Civil War, our bloodiest conflict.
Skeptics at the time (including us) pointed to the Lancet study’s manifold methodological flaws. The high body count was an extrapolation based on a sampling of households and locations that was far too small to render reliable results. What the National Journal adds is that the Lancet study was funded by billionaire George Soros’s Open Society Institute. Mr. Soros is a famous critic of the Iraq campaign and well-known partisan, having spent tens of millions trying to defeat Mr. Bush in 2004.
But “Soros is not the only person associated with the Lancet study who had one eye on the data and the other on the U.S. political calendar,” write Messrs. Munro and Cannon. Two co-authors, Gilbert Burnham and Les Roberts of Johns Hopkins University, told the reporters that they opposed the war from the outset and sent their report to the Lancet on the condition that it be published before the election.
Mr. Roberts, who opposed removing Saddam from power, sought the Democratic nomination for New York’s 24th Congressional District in 2006. Asked why he ran, Mr. Roberts replied, “It was a combination of Iraq and [Hurricane] Katrina.”
Then there is Lancet Editor Richard Horton, “who agreed to rush the study into print, with an expedited peer review process and without seeing the surveyors’ original data,” report Mr. Munro and Mr. Cannon. He has also made no secret of his politics. “At a September 2006 rally in Manchester, England, Horton declared, ‘This axis of Anglo-American imperialism extends its influence through war and conflict, gathering power and wealth as it goes, so millions of people are left to die in poverty and disease,’” they write. See YouTube for more.
We also learn that the key person involved in collecting the Lancet data was Iraqi researcher Riyadh Lafta, who has failed to follow the customary scientific practice of making his data available for inspection by other researchers. Mr. Lafta had been an official in Saddam’s ministry of health when the dictator was attempting to end international sanctions against Iraq. He wrote articles asserting that many Iraqis were dying from cancer and other diseases caused by spent U.S. uranium shells from the Gulf War. According to National Journal, the Lancet studies “of Iraqi war deaths rest on the data provided by Lafta, who operated with little American supervision and has rarely appeared in public or been interviewed about his role.”
In other words, the Lancet study could hardly be more unreliable. Yet it was trumpeted by the political left because it fit a narrative that they wanted to believe. And it wasn’t challenged by much of the press because it told them what they wanted to hear. The truth was irrelevant.[/i]
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
johnnybravo30 wrote:
There is no doubt that you are well versed in the political and systemic challenges that face any meaningful form of international justice. I haven’t heard you acknowledge the causes of this current state. The fundamental problem is that the powerful ignore any established standards.
Correct - and they always will. Trying to build a system around any other assumption is a recipe for disaster.[/quote]
That’s the whole problem, in a nutshell.
If you won’t apply the same standard to everybody, disasters will ensue.
If you won’t apply the same standard to everybody, disasters will ensue.[/quote]
Your problem - among many - is that you want a foolish consistency to take the place of reason. There is no “same standard” - nations are fundamentally different, and they aren’t equal. Trying to pretend otherwise is the exact problem I mentioned - once nation tries to adhere to a high-minded “standard” (however that is defined), another power-seeking nation will use it to its advantage.
It should be pointed out that there is no world government yet.
Therefore as much as the idea of international laws go, truthfully there are none, only agreements with nations.
BB, good information. As I have always said, if you have to lie to support your position, then you need to take a harder look at your position. (5 points to the person who can guess how long before my statement gets twisted.)
Here is a site that is run by ex-muslims. REading my way through this site I can see why the Quran says that apostates should be killed.
They even have a section for you Lixy.
We assert that Islam is not a religion of peace but is founded on war, violence, terrorism, hate and injustice.
We affirm that Islam is a false religion.
We conclude that Islam is responsible for rampant corruption, widespread misrule, implausible tyranny, mindless terrorism, unrelenting violence and pervasive social injustice in the Muslim world
We challenge Muslims to debate on these assertions.
[quote]lixy wrote:
Gkhan wrote:
One thing: this says assist your brother and sister “Muslim” it does not tell you what to do if the person oppressing you is a non-muslim.
You got it wrong. It’s about what to do when “your brother and sister” are oppressing others.
When they’re oppressing you, common sense applies.[/quote]
Fair enough, I thought it was more profound than it was.
Christ said when someone slaps you on the face turn the other cheek, not use common sense and react violently.
There’s the difference between the religions in a nutshell.
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Your problem - among many - is that you want a foolish consistency to take the place of reason. There is no “same standard” - nations are fundamentally different, and they aren’t equal. Trying to pretend otherwise is the exact problem I mentioned - once nation tries to adhere to a high-minded “standard” (however that is defined), another power-seeking nation will use it to its advantage. [/quote]
If you did “onto others what you would have them do to you”, your country wouldn’t go around invading countries, toppling democratically elected governments, etc…
And judging from the number of American people pissed at the war, I’ll say that ethics are not lost. However, and to put it mildly, it is certainly not a prerequisite to entering the political arena.
