Then, what’s your problem with Assad’s chroline gas attacks ?
Would you prefer it if he kill rebels with conventional bombs, which would destroy a few millenia old cities and the whole industrial infrastructure of Syria in the process ?
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[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.[/quote]
Show me where I argued what you say I argued. You won’t find it because it doesn’t exist.
Go ahead, show me where I said the disarmament was ‘mishandled’.
You simply went off on a tangent. I shifted nothing, you simply missed the entire point.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
[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.
[/quote]
Which immediately began to leek.
(Aside: I would give up an entire stockpile of schedule 1 chemical weapons right now for a plate of The Prince of Waterloo’s as-of-this-thread-internationally-recognized Caerphilly & Leek Tortellini, on a Bed of Mixed Leaves & Truffle Oil.)
[quote]pat wrote:
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]
I agree that his men improvised, and found a way to work around the ban. Who would have thought that a murderer would still kill people even after one type of weapon was taken out of his hands.
If Roe vs Wade were overturned tomorrow, and abortion were made illegal in all fifty states and the District of Columbia, would you consider the entire venture a failure if you learned about a back-alley abortion being performed in Compton with a coat hanger, in clear defiance of the law?
[quote]kamui wrote:
Then, what’s your problem with Assad’s chroline gas attacks ?
Would you prefer it if he kill rebels with conventional bombs, which would destroy a few millenia old cities and the whole industrial infrastructure of Syria in the process ?
[/quote]
I didn’t say I liked the guy, nor that I don’t have a problem with his tactics. All I am saying here is that the alternative leadership is potentially worse than Assad himself. We know Assad and know what he will do, we do not know what a terrorist would do should they take over. It’s simply a case of sticking with the enemy you know.
If there is a viable alternative to Assad that are not terrorists, I am all for it. I have a huge problem with Assad, but the opportunity to rid the world of him has passed.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
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]
I agree that his men improvised, and found a way to work around the ban. Who would have thought that a murderer would still kill people even after one type of weapon was taken out of his hands.
If Roe vs Wade were overturned tomorrow, and abortion were made illegal in all fifty states and the District of Columbia, would you consider the entire venture a failure if you learned about a back-alley abortion being performed in Compton with a coat hanger, in clear defiance of the law?
[/quote]
And that’s all I was saying with regards to the chlorine gas use. I didn’t say it was a great weapon, nor comparing it’s effectiveness to mustard, sarin or anything else.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[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.[/quote]
Show me where I argued what you say I argued. You won’t find it because it doesn’t exist.
Go ahead, show me where I said the disarmament was ‘mishandled’.
You simply went off on a tangent. I shifted nothing, you simply missed the entire point.[/quote]
And we have crossed fully into the retroactive goalpost-shifting phase. At least this usually suggests proximity to the sweet, sweet merciful end.
[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]
“Appropriate” and “well-handled” are synonyms here.
That’s all we need to say about that.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
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]
I agree that his men improvised, and found a way to work around the ban. Who would have thought that a murderer would still kill people even after one type of weapon was taken out of his hands.
If Roe vs Wade were overturned tomorrow, and abortion were made illegal in all fifty states and the District of Columbia, would you consider the entire venture a failure if you learned about a back-alley abortion being performed in Compton with a coat hanger, in clear defiance of the law?
[/quote]
And that’s all I was saying with regards to the chlorine gas use. I didn’t say it was a great weapon, nor comparing it’s effectiveness to mustard, sarin or anything else.[/quote]
But what is your answer to his very appropriate and on-target question. Answer the question. Would you consider the people responsible for Roe’s reversal (and, let’s presume, the passage of a national abortion criminalization act) to have failed? Yes or no?
[quote]I didn’t say I liked the guy, nor that I don’t have a problem with his tactics. All I am saying here is that the alternative leadership is potentially worse than Assad himself. We know Assad and know what he will do, we do not know what a terrorist would do should they take over. It’s simply a case of sticking with the enemy you know.
If there is a viable alternative to Assad that are not terrorists, I am all for it. I have a huge problem with Assad, but the opportunity to rid the world of him has passed.[/quote]
I understand that you don’t like the guy.
But it’s not about a viable alternative to Assad. it’s about a viable alternative to Assad’s use of chemical weapons.
You said it yourself : the whole point of chemical weapons is to kill men without destroying the infrastructure in the process.
Why would conventional weapons be better than chemical ones to deal with rebels who control entire towns ?
If those rebels were in an US city right now, do you think your government should bomb it or chlorine-gas it ?
What do you think a western military would do in a Waco x 1000 situation ?
[quote]kamui wrote:
[quote]I didn’t say I liked the guy, nor that I don’t have a problem with his tactics. All I am saying here is that the alternative leadership is potentially worse than Assad himself. We know Assad and know what he will do, we do not know what a terrorist would do should they take over. It’s simply a case of sticking with the enemy you know.
If there is a viable alternative to Assad that are not terrorists, I am all for it. I have a huge problem with Assad, but the opportunity to rid the world of him has passed.[/quote]
I understand that you don’t like the guy.
But it’s not about a viable alternative to Assad. it’s about a viable alternative to Assad’s use of chemical weapons.
You said it yourself : the whole point of chemical weapons is to kill men without destroying the infrastructure in the process.
Why would conventional weapons be better than chemical ones to deal with rebels who control entire towns ?
If those rebels were in an US city right now, do you think your government should bomb it or chlorine-gas it ?
What do you think a western military would do in a Waco x 1000 situation ? [/quote]
We certainly know what Putin would do.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
But what is your answer to his very appropriate and on-target question. Answer the question. Would you consider the people responsible for Roe’s reversal (and, let’s presume, the passage of a national abortion criminalization act) to have failed? Yes or no?[/quote]
Oh goody hypotheticals!
So I am going to say ‘Yes’ of course.
And you are going to comeback with, “People still have abortions illegally, so doesn’t that actually mean it failed? If it succeeded then nobody would have abortions. See what a stupid, fucktwat, idiotic, asshole, cocksucking, nimrod you are!”
To which I will retort, it was a failure of enforcement, in both cases; without calling you a bunch of names.
The difference in these cases is that its much easier to handle one person than millions. Assad did it because he knew nobody is going to do a damn thing about it. He’ll do it again because nobody is going to do a damn thing about it. There are 14 alleged attacks.
Assad 14, World 0.
[EDIT] I misread the question. The answer to whether or not that people that had overturned Roe v. Wade failed, the answer is no, it would not be a failure should they overturn Roe v. Wade.
Edit: Never mind, don’t answer that.
The question of chlorine gas has been addressed dozens of times by every poster who has weighed in. You have not countered, because you cannot. Instead, you have repeated a few rhetorical questions, which amount to exactly no argument whatsoever, about 45 times. It is settled.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
But what is your answer to his very appropriate and on-target question. Answer the question. Would you consider the people responsible for Roe’s reversal (and, let’s presume, the passage of a national abortion criminalization act) to have failed? Yes or no?[/quote]
Oh goody hypotheticals!
So I am going to say ‘Yes’ of course.
[/quote]
Yes, they were failures?[/quote]
Yes, failures. Abysmal ones.
The entire nationwide abortion ban and criminalisation program nullified by a single twist of a coat hanger in the ghetto.
No room for shades of grey in this forum, SMH. You should know that by now.
[quote]pat wrote:
stupid, fucktwat, idiotic, asshole, cocksucking, nimrod
[/quote]
But on the bright side, Nimrod was a mighty hunter.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
No room for shades of grey in this forum, SMH. You should know that by now.[/quote]
As long as there is room for cheese-puns, I will cling to at least a mote of hope.
And, after this thread, a mote is all that is left.
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]smh_23 wrote:
[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.[/quote]
Show me where I argued what you say I argued. You won’t find it because it doesn’t exist.
Go ahead, show me where I said the disarmament was ‘mishandled’.
You simply went off on a tangent. I shifted nothing, you simply missed the entire point.[/quote]
And we have crossed fully into the retroactive goalpost-shifting phase. At least this usually suggests proximity to the sweet, sweet merciful end.
[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]
“Appropriate” and “well-handled” are synonyms here.
That’s all we need to say about that.
[/quote]
That’s not this: “Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?” is it?
U.S. response != Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled
The point isn’t whether he handled or mishandled chemical weapons. Is the response appropriate, which is not the same as debating whether chemical weapons handled or not handled. Can you tell the difference?
Seriously, for crying out loud.
American response to ‘red line’ was issuing a threat if Syria does not disarm. Still with me?
Russia negotiates deal to disarm Syria of chemical weapons and U.S. accepts deal. Following?
Here is where you got lost… Ranting about the chemical disarmament.
I didn’t contest the handling or mishandling the chemical weapons. Was the response appropriate given the situation in Syria? Was it a sufficient response to the last straw ‘red line’.
Was threatening Syria with attacks, where it was largely interpreted that the ‘red line’ was just that.
Now, ‘change in calculous’ is an ambiguous statement, it was largely thought by virtually everybody to be a threat of force.
I don’t believe responding to a crossed line with another line is a huge mistake, because it shows weakness in the form of idle threats. I don’t believe simply disposing of chemical weapons in the context of the larger problem in Syria was too little a demand, especially in light of the violence in a strategically vital region, our asking for Assad to step down, calls to bring more stable less brutal leadership of the country and stopping the influx of terrorists in the region and the conflict beaching the country’ boundary.
Assad is still in power and gaining strength thank to Russia arming the shit out of the Assad regime. The alternative to Assad is no longer viable.
We had a very tiny window in which to not only dispose of his chemical weapons stash, but make headway to stabilize the situation.
Now no where is question the handling or mishandling the disarmament chemical weapons. Nowhere. We had an opportunity to do more than just take away chemical weapons and not doing so compromised the situation further.
The good news is that at least Assad can no longer launch chemical attacks on people… Oh wait?
So where have you seen me say that the chemical weapons disarmament was mishandled? I never stated the chemical weapons disarmament was mishandled anywhere.
How the hell did you get:
“Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?”
from:
“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]Varqanir wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
stupid, fucktwat, idiotic, asshole, cocksucking, nimrod
[/quote]
But on the bright side, Nimrod was a mighty hunter.[/quote]
He was a mighty hunter with an unfortunate name.
[quote]kamui wrote:
[quote]I didn’t say I liked the guy, nor that I don’t have a problem with his tactics. All I am saying here is that the alternative leadership is potentially worse than Assad himself. We know Assad and know what he will do, we do not know what a terrorist would do should they take over. It’s simply a case of sticking with the enemy you know.
If there is a viable alternative to Assad that are not terrorists, I am all for it. I have a huge problem with Assad, but the opportunity to rid the world of him has passed.[/quote]
I understand that you don’t like the guy.
But it’s not about a viable alternative to Assad. it’s about a viable alternative to Assad’s use of chemical weapons.
You said it yourself : the whole point of chemical weapons is to kill men without destroying the infrastructure in the process.
Why would conventional weapons be better than chemical ones to deal with rebels who control entire towns ?
[/quote]
Depends on the objective. If you want to kill a bunch of people without harming the structures, then chemicals would fit that bill. If you just want to win a battle conventional weapons work fine, even better then chemical ones. I don’t think the dead body cares how it got to that state.
[quote]
If those rebels were in an US city right now, do you think your government should bomb it or chlorine-gas it ?
What do you think a western military would do in a Waco x 1000 situation ? [/quote]
In a city battle on my turf, I would prefer small conventional weaponry. I don’t want to die with the rebels.
To Gkhan and Pat,
I am reposting this as it has been ignored multiple times.
The redline did not present an explicit threat of force, but merely a change of “calculus”, which is why the qualifier ambiguous precedes deterrence. Deterrence functions most effectively when it is clearly presented to potential adversaries. However, if such an explicit conditional threat was issued and sagely avoided by the Assad regime, over 1000 tons of military grade chemical weapons would still be in danger of falling into the hands of Islamic extremists. What benefits American and international security more: the removal of a 2,000,000 lbs of military grade chemical weapons from a jihadist beehive, or the preservation of roughly 1,500 Syrian nationals? International relations is a callous endeavor informed by rational egoism, whose ethics are decidedly guided by consequentialism. While the loss of innocent life is nothing short of tragic, to choose the latter would be nothing short of weakness underpinned by naive idealism.
Global politics take place in an anarchic environment, as no overarching authority exists above states to regulate their behavior toward one another, much less toward their own citizens. International law is more accurately described as a loose collection of norms states must individually AGREE to be bound by. They do so to mitigate international conflict, reduce transaction costs of bilateral agreements, and encourage mutually beneficial norms of behavior. International law is often enforced only as far as it benefits the most powerful states in the international political system. Compelling Syria to accede to the CWC and to relinquish one of the largest military grade chemical weapons arsenals in the world is nothing short of a concrete victory for American and international security. 2,000,000 lbs of schedule 1 blister and nerve agent are no longer in danger of being commandeered Islamist extremists.
As far as the use of chlorine gas is concerned, of what tangible consequence is it to American and international security? It is a schedule 3 chemical, and is several hundred to several thousand times less lethal than mustard sulfur, sarin, and VX nerve agent, respectively. Yes, it is despicable that Assad is utilizing chlorine gas as an indiscriminate area weapon, regardless of their efficacy. However, interpersonal ethics cannot be cogently applied to intergroup ethics, especially so in the grand realm of international politics. Again, prudent foreign policy is not guided by emotive morality, but rather by rational egoism. It is a discipline underpinned by the ethics of consequentialism.
[quote]pat wrote:
How the hell did you get:
“Was the Syrian chemical weapon question mishandled, or was it not?”
from:
“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]
Because they are the same question.
The red line [on chemical weapons] and the U.S. response [to the use of chemical weapons] is the “Syrian chemical weapons question.” Whether the response was “appropriate” or not is whether or not it was “mishandled.” Everything we’ve discussed–the cost-benefit ratios of the respective decisions (actually, you didn’t discuss this, despite it’s being the crux of the entire matter), the American threat of force, the specifics of the deal, the desperate chlorine gas argument you clung to in the end–has been a body in orbit around the central specific matter, and the central specific matter has been unambiguous from the first page.
Again, we have now reached the stage in the debate whereat you try to go back and waffle on the goalposts. Which is sufficient proof of the debate’s having come to a decisive end.