[quote]Gkhan wrote:
Genghis Khan’s Yasa says “Do not urinate into water or ashes” [/quote]
Not urinating in water I understand, but ashes? How else would you put out a campfire?
Horse pee, though, right? Not Mongol pee.
Perhaps they would have gassed a few Chinese, created a few pastures. Four tons of chlorine really doesn’t go that far when you’re gassing Chinese, even in the 13th century.
[quote]pat wrote:
You can buy chlorine gas online, if you have a license.[/quote]
…In America, from American companies. Try some Chinese ones.
Not that it really matters at all. The arguments that we have all made on chlorine gas are clear and correct. You have not touched them. So that’s that.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
The debate that I took up when I entered this thread turned on the answer to this question: Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?
Edited[/quote]
And who asked that question or presented that point? No wonder I could figure out what the fuck you were talking about. That wasn’t the point of contention at all. You built that strawman in your head.
The actual point of debate was whether or not Assad crossed the ‘red line’ and if the U.S. response was appropriate or toothless and meaningless. That’s what I thought we were arguing about, not whether or not they got rid of chemical weapons or whether or not it was mishandled.
You wasted a lot of time spewing details about when, where and how these weapons were disposed of, which are wonderful little factoids, but had little to do with the question on the table. And man did you waste a ton of time and energy doing it.
I am not sure when the argument changed to "Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not? "
Now I assume your answer to the actual question is that getting rid of chemical weapons from Syria was a successful response.
I disagree that it was a successful response because just disarming Assad’s chemical arsenal was not the only stated goal with Syria. The U.S. was calling for Assad’s ouster, free elections and a stoppage of the violence and stability.
While removing the said chemical arsenal is a good thing on it’s own, it had little effect on the overall situation.
So here again was why it was a failure:
The winner in this scenario is Assad and Russia, our consolation prize was that Syria gave up a large stash of dangerous chemicals.
Now getting rid of 2 kagillion metric shit tons of chemical weapons is good, but it fell way short of our intended goal of stabilizing the region.
This is what I was arguing all along, you clearly were rampaging about something altogether different. I never claimed that the removal of chemical weapons was mishandled, at all. The only thing I said about that is that there is no way to verify we have all of it. It may match our estimates, but we don’t know if our estimates are dead spot on accurate, there is no way to know that.
[quote]pat wrote:
The ‘argument’ is far from clear. I don’t know what the hell you are ‘arguing’ for or against.[/quote]
Here is a sentence that is not an exaggeration: Whether they agree with me or not, every other poster involved in this discussion could tell you precisely what my argument is. Which means that your confusion is entirely your own problem.
Except that you really aren’t confused, are you? You made a spectacular fool of yourself dozens of times over the course of this thread. You argued badly and made shit up and then were admonished for having argued badly and made shit up, by multiple posters who are not wont to make such accusations lightly. And now you’re trying to bullshit your way to some desperate amelioration of your defeat. I’m not going to help you do that. My arguments have been put to you dozens of times, and they are available in the backpages of this thread if you are, at long and bitter fucking last, actually curious to know what they are.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
The debate that I took up when I entered this thread turned on the answer to this question: Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?
Edited[/quote]
The actual point of debate was whether or not Assad crossed the ‘red line’ and if the U.S. response was appropriate or toothless and meaningless.
[/quote]
You have crossed into the realm of stupidity. Those are alternate formulations of the same question, for reasons that have been painstakingly provided to you. We have both known all along what we’ve been talking about. Well, I should say that we’ve both known what the topic of the conversation was, because I would be lying through my teeth if I were to say that you’ve known what you’ve been talking about over the course of this thread.
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
We’re not discussing “the whole Syria situation,” we’re discussing a narrow set of events relating to the Ghouta chemical attack, the US response and the outcome. Any serious observer could only see the outcome as a foreign policy success. I’m not going to take some asinine position just because I don’t like Obama.
[/quote]
This is it. I’m just going to re-post this and leave it at that.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
You can buy chlorine gas online, if you have a license.[/quote]
…In America, from American companies. Try some Chinese ones.
[/quote]
Well then that’s illegal importation. You cannot buy it legally without a license. If you do buy some of any significant quantity, it will likely be delivered by a fed.
[quote]
Not that it really matters at all. The arguments that we have all made on chlorine gas are clear and correct. You have not touched them. So that’s that.[/quote]
Yes, that Assad used chlorine gas to poison his people has been established. That it was an illegal act and a breach of the CWC he signed is also well established.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
The ‘argument’ is far from clear. I don’t know what the hell you are ‘arguing’ for or against.[/quote]
Here is a sentence that is not an exaggeration: Whether they agree with me or not, every other poster involved in this discussion could tell you precisely what my argument is. Which means that your confusion is entirely your own problem.
Except that you really aren’t confused, are you? You made a spectacular fool of yourself dozens of times over the course of this thread. You argued badly and made shit up and then were admonished for having argued badly and made shit up, by multiple posters who are not wont to make such accusations lightly. And now you’re trying to bullshit your way to some desperate amelioration of your defeat. I’m not going to help you do that. My arguments have been put to you dozens of times, and they are available in the backpages of this thread if you are, at long and bitter fucking last, actually curious to know what they are.[/quote]
So much for a clear concise answer sans insults.
And yes, you argued the wrong point dozens of times.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
We’re not discussing “the whole Syria situation,” we’re discussing a narrow set of events relating to the Ghouta chemical attack, the US response and the outcome. Any serious observer could only see the outcome as a foreign policy success. I’m not going to take some asinine position just because I don’t like Obama.
[/quote]
This is it. I’m just going to re-post this and leave it at that.[/quote]
You all were arguing that narrow point, I never was, ever. The whole time I was discussing that the removal of these weapons did little to help the Syrian situation, that in fact it bought every ‘bad guy’ enough time to make the situation worse.
That’s been my point all along.
I never said chlorine gas was on the list and they didn’t give it up, I merely said they used chlorine gas to kill people, a clear violation of the CWC they signed.
My contention, all along is that not only did removing the chemicals not help stabilize the situation, it didn’t stop Assad from using chemicals to kill people. Sure, less effective chemicals, but chemicals nonetheless.
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
…or else the man was suffering from schizoid delusions and the mass drowning of the herd of pigs was just a coincidence.[/quote]
Maybe his name really was legion and he was just suffering from Tourette syndrome.[/quote]
And the pigs got tired of listening to him yell, so they committed mass suicide.[/quote]
The larger question, of course, is just what a herd of two thousand pigs was doing in Judea.
Were they intended for consumption by the Romans? Even if so, that’s a lot of pigs living close enough to what was probably the town of Gerasa’s primary water source. Even if the Gentiles of the area weren’t bothered by the stench and the filth of two thousand pigs, wouldn’t the constant deluge of pigshit into the lake cause major health problems?
It was probably bad enough that the Jewish community had to drink, wash and bathe with water polluted (both ritually and literally) by contact with voluminous pigshit, but then along comes this itenerant Nazarene preacher/exorcist who drives the entire herd into the lake. I’m no expert on the laws of kashrut, but it occurs to me that a sudden influx of two thousand demon-possessed swine carcasses probably wouldn’t do much in the way of enhancing the purity of a body of water.
So on the one hand we have the Gentiles of the town screaming about the loss of literally tons of pork, which their Roman patrons were likely none too pleased about, and on the other hand you have the Jewish community, who is justifiably pissed off about the lake being further polluted by a bunch of dead pigs who are also harboring the unclean spirits of a man who lived in a graveyard.
Must have been a tough job, being Jesus.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
The debate that I took up when I entered this thread turned on the answer to this question: Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?
Edited[/quote]
The actual point of debate was whether or not Assad crossed the ‘red line’ and if the U.S. response was appropriate or toothless and meaningless.
[/quote]
You have crossed into the realm of stupidity. Those are alternate formulations of the same question, for reasons that have been painstakingly provided to you. We have both known all along what we’ve been talking about. Well, I should say that we’ve both known what the topic of the conversation was, because I would be lying through my teeth if I were to say that you’ve known what you’ve been talking about over the course of this thread.[/quote]
Show me where this: “Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?” was ever the topic. Go ahead, I’ll wait. Well, I guess it was your topic, it was never what I was talking about.
The only thing I said about the handling of chemical weapons is that we will never know if we got all of them, we just have no way to verify it. That’s the only thing I said about “the handling of chemical weapons”
You’ve been raving like a lunatic over something I never said. I never said the Syrian chemical weapon question was mishandled. Not once, never, nada. I had stated my position many times and not once did I claim that.
So you were arguing this whole time about a point I never made, but I am the stupid one. OK.
Personally, I think this would have gone better if you knew what the topic was.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
We’re not discussing “the whole Syria situation,” we’re discussing a narrow set of events relating to the Ghouta chemical attack, the US response and the outcome. Any serious observer could only see the outcome as a foreign policy success. I’m not going to take some asinine position just because I don’t like Obama.
[/quote]
This is it. I’m just going to re-post this and leave it at that.[/quote]
You all were arguing that narrow point, I never was, ever. The whole time I was discussing that the removal of these weapons did little to help the Syrian situation, that in fact it bought every ‘bad guy’ enough time to make the situation worse.
That’s been my point all along.
I never said chlorine gas was on the list and they didn’t give it up, I merely said they used chlorine gas to kill people, a clear violation of the CWC they signed.
My contention, all along is that not only did removing the chemicals not help stabilize the situation, it didn’t stop Assad from using chemicals to kill people. Sure, less effective chemicals, but chemicals nonetheless.
[/quote]
We have a mob boss and a police commissioner. The police commissioner wants to remove the mob boss from office, but instead of just arresting him, he supports the mob boss’s rivals, who are a bush of punks. When this fails to work, he issues the mob boss an ultimatum: give up your weapons or we’ll raid all of your casinos, whorehouses, and restaurants.
To aid the process, the commissioner publishes a list of all of the weapons the police will be confiscating. The list is extensive: everything from submachine guns, bazookas and pistols to daggers, blackjacks and brass knuckles. The mob boss balks for a while, but when the National Guard shows up, he grudgingly agrees. The weapons all go into a huge pile, which is hauled away by the city sanitation crew. The mob is completely disarmed.
But what’s this? Vinnie and Rocco, two of the mob boss’s lieutenants, were just spotted beating the shit out of old Mr. Tortellini (who didn’t pay his protection money) with a couple of baseball bats. Now, how could the police commissioner possibly have failed to put baseball bats on the list of banned weapons?!
Not only did removing the weapons not help stabilize the situation, it didn’t stop the mob boss from using baseball bats to beat people up. Sure, less effective weapons, but weapons nonetheless.
The police commissioner is obviously a dismal failure, as is his entire gangland policy.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
The debate that I took up when I entered this thread turned on the answer to this question: Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?
Edited[/quote]
The actual point of debate was whether or not Assad crossed the ‘red line’ and if the U.S. response was appropriate or toothless and meaningless.
[/quote]
You have crossed into the realm of stupidity. Those are alternate formulations of the same question, for reasons that have been painstakingly provided to you. We have both known all along what we’ve been talking about. Well, I should say that we’ve both known what the topic of the conversation was, because I would be lying through my teeth if I were to say that you’ve known what you’ve been talking about over the course of this thread.[/quote]
Show me where this: “Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?” was ever the topic.
[/quote]
[quote]pat wrote:
The actual point of debate was whether or not Assad crossed the ‘red line’ and if the U.S. response was appropriate or toothless and meaningless.
[/quote]
Smh’s forumlation: Syrian chemical weapons question misandled or not, i.e. chemical weapons Red line, Ghouta chemical attack, U.S. response as well-handled or mishandled.
Pat’s formulation: chemical weapons Red line, Ghouta chemical attack, U.S. response as well-handled or mishandled.
It’s like clockwork. You lose the debate, and then you go back and try to shift the goalposts. “But I was never arguing that!” Everyone here has understood exactly what has been under discussion since the first page of the thread. You need to stop this.
Thing is, you keep writing all these vapid or facile or outright incorrect points, and they’re all so wrong that nobody wants to take the time to put out the fires you’ve started with your Gish Gallup. To put out the fires again, I should say, because they’ve all been put out many times before. You just happen to be an incorrigible arsonist. Take this for example:
[quote]
My contention, all along is that not only did removing the chemicals not help stabilize the situation[/quote]
A deteriorating war-torn state wherein thousands of jihadist militants are making open war upon a brutal despot is by definition more stable, from an American perspective (the only one that matters to us), when 2,000,000 pounds of schedule 1 nerve and blister agents are removed from its precincts. This is not a controversial point. This is not under contention.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
Mr. Tortellini (who didn’t pay his protection money)[/quote]
Old Mr. Tortellini never was known to go about things Caerphilly.
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
Ok, SexMachine, you have the rep of being one of the most anti-Obama persons on here. Why do you agree that the whole Syria situation was a win for the US when it left Assad in command?
[/quote]
We’re not discussing “the whole Syria situation,” we’re discussing a narrow set of events relating to the Ghouta chemical attack, the US response and the outcome. Any serious observer could only see the outcome as a foreign policy success. I’m not going to take some asinine position just because I don’t like Obama. Get back to me during Elizabeth Warren’s/Hillary’s first term and maybe I’ll give it a go.
I was never involved with just a ‘narrow set of circumstances’ regarding the ghouta attack. If Assad giving up his chemical weapons was the sole and only goal of of our dealings with Syria, then it would have been a success. But that wasn’t the only goal.
If removing chemical weapons was the only goal, then that’s the ‘red line’ that should have been drawn, not demand them after the fact. That’s like demanding a red light at a dangerous intersection only after somebody died.
The reason I said it failed was listed several times, none of which had to do with the disarming of the chemical weapons stash. It’s fine and dandy we got that consolation, but that’s all it was, a consolation. Assad is still in power and getting stronger. The opposition now is offshoots of al qaeda. The war rages on and has spilled over into Iraq.
Removing Assads chemical weapons did nothing to stabilize the situation. And Russia gleefully rearmed Assad, well. Assad didn’t give them up for nothing.
He benefitted.
If our goal was to weaken the regime, it failed. And that’s the point I have been trying to make all along. Assad is slowly winning back Syria and now, that may be the lesser of two evils. Notice we stopped calling for Assad to step down.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
Mr. Tortellini (who didn’t pay his protection money)[/quote]
Old Mr. Tortellini never was known to go about things Caerphilly.[/quote]
Or was he?
I just looked up “Gish Gallop.”
What a wonderful phrase.
“If you can’t persuade 'em with reason, bury 'em in bullshit.”
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
We’re not discussing “the whole Syria situation,” we’re discussing a narrow set of events relating to the Ghouta chemical attack, the US response and the outcome. Any serious observer could only see the outcome as a foreign policy success. I’m not going to take some asinine position just because I don’t like Obama.
[/quote]
This is it. I’m just going to re-post this and leave it at that.[/quote]
You all were arguing that narrow point, I never was, ever. The whole time I was discussing that the removal of these weapons did little to help the Syrian situation, that in fact it bought every ‘bad guy’ enough time to make the situation worse.
That’s been my point all along.
I never said chlorine gas was on the list and they didn’t give it up, I merely said they used chlorine gas to kill people, a clear violation of the CWC they signed.
My contention, all along is that not only did removing the chemicals not help stabilize the situation, it didn’t stop Assad from using chemicals to kill people. Sure, less effective chemicals, but chemicals nonetheless.
[/quote]
We have a mob boss and a police commissioner. The police commissioner wants to remove the mob boss from office, but instead of just arresting him, he supports the mob boss’s rivals, who are a bush of punks. When this fails to work, he issues the mob boss an ultimatum: give up your weapons or we’ll raid all of your casinos, whorehouses, and restaurants.
To aid the process, the commissioner publishes a list of all of the weapons the police will be confiscating. The list is extensive: everything from submachine guns, bazookas and pistols to daggers, blackjacks and brass knuckles. The mob boss balks for a while, but when the National Guard shows up, he grudgingly agrees. The weapons all go into a huge pile, which is hauled away by the city sanitation crew. The mob is completely disarmed.
But what’s this? Vinnie and Rocco, two of the mob boss’s lieutenants, were just spotted beating the shit out of old Mr. Tortellini (who didn’t pay his protection money) with a couple of baseball bats. Now, how could the police commissioner possibly have failed to put baseball bats on the list of banned weapons?!
Not only did removing the weapons not help stabilize the situation, it didn’t stop the mob boss from using baseball bats to beat people up. Sure, less effective weapons, but weapons nonetheless.
The police commissioner is obviously a dismal failure, as is his entire gangland policy.[/quote]
Again, I never said chlorine gas was on the banned list and I never even said it should. All I said was despite the chemical disarmament Assad still found a way to use toxic chemicals to kill people.
The point being, despite not having his most dangerous chemical weapons, Assad is not deterred from using chemicals as weapons to kill people.
Do you disagree this happened?
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
Mr. Tortellini (who didn’t pay his protection money)[/quote]
Old Mr. Tortellini never was known to go about things Caerphilly.[/quote]
Or was he?
http://www.princeofwaterloo.co.uk/menu.html[/quote]
He pissed off the big cheese and got beaned on the noodle.