Yasser Arafat dies at age 75

[K e r b e r o s]

Oh, he'd shoot him.

 

[CptStern]

if a little kid with a bomb came up to u yelling allah ackbar, would u hesitate to shoot them?

link me with even one 6 year old suicide bomber

 

[Eg.]

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12499

biotch, also, they mostly just take a bag full of grenades and chuck iit at the isrealis, the arabs know that the soldeirs wont shoot back

 

[CptStern]

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12499

biotch, also, they mostly just take a bag full of grenades and chuck iit at the isrealis, the arabs know that the soldeirs wont shoot back

I asked for 6 year olds. Btw that's not exactly a reputable link. David Horowitz is a right wing nutjob. Any site that's written by the author of books like "Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left" and ...damn it gets better:


The Hate America Left
This book blows the lid off the network of academics, lawyers, fundraisers and professional agitators providing aid and comfort to the enemy.

Hating Whitey
David Horowitz shows that the anti-white racism of the Left remains one of the few taboo subjects in America.

The Politics of Bad Faith
Behind the facade of liberalism the Left has continued to advance its socialist schemes: to redistribute resources according to race, gender, and class and to turn Big Government into Big Brother.


:upstare:

 

[K e r b e r o s]

Awe, CptStern has no outlet for his political discussions, so he has to word it out in a lengthly post that...<drumroll> has no purpose! You get a cookie, MrStern!

Go ahead, enjoy it! That warm, fresh out of the oven feel--with grandma's wholesome baked taste...

... wait a moment? Grandma was in the cookie?!

 

[Eg.]

and another thing, why is everyone comparing taking pics of arabs in a prison to arabs beheadding people, there is no real common ground. the two are sooo radically different

 

[CptStern]

and another thing, why is everyone comparing taking pics of arabs in a prison to arabs beheadding people, there is no real common ground. the two are sooo radically different

that's the least of their crimes

at least beheading is a clean death compared to being terrorized then thrown into a river with your hands tied behind your back

btw the the iraqis who drowned were caught breaking curfew. The last thing they probably heard was the sound of the american soldiers laughter

 

[Eg.]

are we drowning iraqis everyday, airing videos, and yelling ALLAH ACKBAR just before we do? i never said our troops are completely innocent, its just that comparing them to the terrorists (not the mujhadeem, not there name) is completely insane. what are u, non american?

 

[CptStern]

are we drowning iraqis everyday, airing videos, and yelling ALLAH ACKBAR just before we do? i never said our troops are completely innocent, its just that comparing them to the terrorists (not the mujhadeem, not there name) is completely insane. what are u, non american?

there are over 300 cases of reported abuse, and over 1000 estimated that went unreported ..there are over 14,000 iraqi civilians dead, over 30,000 wounded. Their methods may be crude and barbaric but they are nothing compared to the bodycount caused by the US invasion

"what are u, non american"

wtf is that supposed to mean? do only americans see the "truth" or are you the only ones still fooled by this "war"?

 

[Eg.]

really, are u non american, any way, ware has civilian deaths, for gods sakes man, the french are now started to say the cost of their dead was too high in WWII, TO BE LIBERATED FROM THE NAZIS, if people take that attitude, then that nation is a good as dead in 20 years.


i have no problem with a bomb acccidently hit a deli instead of a iraqi tank 20 feet away. there, i said it.

 

[Ecthe|ioN]

Too bad he died before seeing the arrival of piece. At least he put up a good fight.

 

[CptStern]

really, are u non american, any way, ware has civilian deaths, for gods sakes man, the french are now started to say the cost of their dead was too high in WWII, TO BE LIBERATED FROM THE NAZIS, if people take that attitude, then that nation is a good as dead in 20 years.


i have no problem with a bomb acccidently hit a deli instead of a iraqi tank 20 feet away. there, i said it.

7000 accidents seems a bit high dont you think?

 

[Eg.]

not at all.

 

[Absinthe]

7000 accidents seems a bit high dont you think?

It most certainly does when one considers how much the US had been bragging about its accurate and flawless technology right before the war.

 

[The Monkey]

Eg.: What if China(for example) attacked the US, and killed 100 000 civilians, killing children on thier way to school. Would that have been alright?

 

[Eg.]

nuke em.

thats the thing, i care much more about americans more than i do other people. people try to put their ideals and morals when disscussing wars. that doesnt work. the other side doesnt give a damn, and nor do i. its war people, not a debate, be happy that ur on the winning side (even though it would be a cold day in hell before iraq invades the US)

my grandfather was in a concentration camp in WWII, it was bombed by american planes since it was aslo a slave-run munitions plant. he saw a shit load of inncoent people die becasue of american bombs, but didnt give a dman cause as long as he was alive he was happy, as long as the nazis were deing, he was happy

 

[Absinthe]

nuke em.

thats the thing, i care much more about americans more than i do other people. people try to put their ideals and morals when disscussing wars. that doesnt work. the other side doesnt give a damn, and nor do i. its war people, not a debate, be happy that ur on the winning side (even though it would be a cold day in hell before iraq invades the US)

Okay... You see, that kind of argument doesn't work seeing as how the war in Iraq is not retaliatory. It's supposed to be an attempt to "liberate" the Iraqi people.

Your view on this matter is flawed on a very base level.

 

[Eg.]

well if u want to get technical, the germans didnt attack us, the japanese did. so we should never have had anything to do with europe, let hitler go off and kill off as many as possible.

also, during WWII, Roosvelt spoke of "liberation Europe form facism" same thing, different name

 

[Absinthe]

well if u want to get technical, the germans didnt attack us, the japanese did. so we should never have had anything to do with europe, let hitler go off and kill off as many as possible.

also, during WWII, Roosvelt spoke of "liberation Europe form facism" same thing, different name

So would we have "liberated" Europe if we nuked them?

 

[Eg.]

i didnt say nuke europe, oh wait, the nuke was made for that, the abomb was originally made to bomb germany, since they started their nuke program in 1934, and most of the american nuke designers were jewish, nothing against jews, but why would the jews want to nuke germany?

 

[Adrien C]

No, I called you an anti-semite because you have repeataly made degragatory comments towards Jews. Multiple times.

Perhaps, but my statment is still true.

But the reason why they were given a country was because they have been oppressed for 2000 years. Name a single other group of people that have been outlawed, oppressed, and had multiple attempts to systematically kill them in nearly every country they've settled in.

I really can't find a source that says, why have the Jews been allways opressed like this, there must be a reason. Any comments on that one ? I'd like to know

Yes, Israel hasn't done everything "right" with the Palestinians. But consider this. They're finally given a country where they AREN'T oppressed, and they want to keep it. From the moment they formed the nation, they've been under attack.

Wouldn't you do the same if a nation took half of your country ?

And, in the end, I think the whole situation will come down to who wants it more. And, if the past 3 wars have been any indication, it looks like Israel does.

On my opinion, they are not handeling things very well, the International community is making more and more coments about the conflict, I mean, lunching a missile on a crowd is wrong, the UN won't take long to arrive.

 

[Eg.]

ok, lets go over somethings

your sir, are an ignorant bastard

now, they have been opressed on and off for 2k years, beacuse they were there and eveyone likes having a guy tp pick on, there never was a large amount of jews, so they really couldnt fight bacl


the palastinians never had a country, they only called themselves palastinians in the 1970's, before then they were just arabs, they no problems under british rule, but when the jews came in, they were like "OMG WTF!"

the UN does shit, in the 90's they had three seperate conflicts in africa where they did shit and got shot. look what happens in seirria leone,

the government was dealing with rebel forces who were chopping of the limbs of villagers that werent agreeing with them. the government hired a mercenary group of less than a hundred to take on 3k rebels, the mercs stopped the rebels for half a year. less than 80 South African Mercenaries stopped a large rebel army.

the UN got scared that this may cause mroe mercenary groups to arrive, and started spreadong rumors that the mercs were controlled by white people that wanted to retake africa for the crown, yes thats what the UN did.

the mercs were kicked out,the UN sent in 17K in troops, and they UN retreated 4 weeks later, because the security council couldnt decide whether or not to give their own troops the power to shoot back.

do u wnat me to talk about rwanda or the congo?

 

[Absinthe]

i didnt say nuke europe, oh wait, the nuke was made for that, the abomb was originally made to bomb germany, since they started their nuke program in 1934, and most of the american nuke designers were jewish, nothing against jews, but why would the jews want to nuke germany?

Eg, I really can't see any point that you might be making.

You said that you didn't mind if civilians died, so long as the enemy was destroyed. The thing is, the reason we went into Iraq (at least, the only reason we had left after claims of WMD's and Al Qaeda connections turned out to be bogus) was to liberate the people.

Last I checked, you can't liberate people when they're dead.

 

[Adrien C]

ok, lets go over somethings

your sir, are an ignorant bastard

now, they have been opressed on and off for 2k years, beacuse they were there and eveyone likes having a guy tp pick on, there never was a large amount of jews, so they really couldnt fight bacl


the palastinians never had a country, they only called themselves palastinians in the 1970's, before then they were just arabs, they no problems under british rule, but when the jews came in, they were like "OMG WTF!"

the UN does shit, in the 90's they had three seperate conflicts in africa where they did shit and got shot. look what happens in seirria leone,

the government was dealing with rebel forces who were chopping of the limbs of villagers that werent agreeing with them. the government hired a mercenary group of less than a hundred to take on 3k rebels, the mercs stopped the rebels for half a year. less than 80 South African Mercenaries stopped a large rebel army.

the UN got scared that this may cause mroe mercenary groups to arrive, and started spreadong rumors that the mercs were controlled by white people that wanted to retake africa for the crown, yes thats what the UN did.

the mercs were kicked out,the UN sent in 17K in troops, and they UN retreated 4 weeks later, because the security council couldnt decide whether or not to give their own troops the power to shoot back.

do u wnat me to talk about rwanda or the congo?

You obiosly don't know shit why the UN won't intervine, or the US in a matter of fact, and I can't be pissed to tell you why.

 

[Eg.]

You obiosly don't know shit why the UN won't intervine, or the US in a matter of fact, and I can't be pissed to tell you why.

pissed=i dont know what im talking about, my rebuttle sucks

 

[Eg.]

Eg, I really can't see any point that you might be making.

You said that you didn't mind if civilians died, so long as the enemy was destroyed. The thing is, the reason we went into Iraq (at least, the only reason we had left after claims of WMD's and Al Qaeda connections turned out to be bogus) was to liberate the people.

Last I checked, you can't liberate people when they're dead.

bad thought, bad thought, thats what the frenchies are saying now.

damnitt people, would u rather die knowing ur children would be free or would u live know they will grow up in a tryannical regime?

 

[Adrien C]

Oh dear, plase no more.

 

[othello]

Fox just interrupted That 70's show for this bulliten.

Hope power is transitioned smoothy. It doesn't sound like he really prepared for it.

lol, some producer at CBS was fired for interrupting some crime drama (CSI, methinks) to bring this bulletin to everyone. hahaha.

personally i'm glad the old dirty bastard is gone (arafat, not the rapper ). he was a waste of life. oddly enough, the chances for 'peace' in the middle east is increased with his death, though it will never be acheived.

btw Eg., you are absolutely correct. the whole concept of 'the palestinians' is a complete fallicy. they've never had a country. they have no heritage. they have no culture. they have no language. all they have is hate-filled ignorance.

Okay... You see, that kind of argument doesn't work seeing as how the war in Iraq is not retaliatory. It's supposed to be an attempt to "liberate" the Iraqi people.

no it isn't. where the hell did you pull that from?

Your view on this matter is flawed on a very base level.

pot... kettle. kettle... pot.

 

[Mechagodzilla]

bad thought, bad thought, thats what the frenchies are saying now.

Frenchies? Man, you're annoying. Are you trying to come across as a negative american stereotype?

damnitt people, would u rather die knowing ur children would be free or would u live know they will grow up in a tryannical regime?

That's the line of thinking that gives us suicide bombers.

Only in Iraq, the people weren't giving up their lives to fight Saddam. They died because US missiles missed, and gunfights broke out with them in the middle.
You're not saying: "you should die for your ideals."

You're saying: "you should die for my ideals."

I find that reprehensible.

Okay... You see, that kind of argument doesn't work seeing as how the war in Iraq is not retaliatory. It's supposed to be an attempt to "liberate" the Iraqi people.

no it isn't. where the hell did you pull that from?

He pulled it from George W. Bush.

Are you trying to say that he has never mentioned liberating the iraqi people as a motivation?

With the lack of terror ties, the lack of WMDs, and the lack of any threatening action Saddam has taken in the last decade, liberation is the only motive he has left.

So yes, Eg's view is flawed.

 

[Sprafa]

Hey kids, I'm really tired of saying this, so please listen carefully.

Despite the large number of contributors, the greatest burden continues to be borne by a core group of developing countries. The 10 main troop-contributing countries to UN peacekeeping operations as of June 2004 were Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Ghana, India, Ethiopia, South Africa, Uruguay, Jordan and Kenya. About 10 per cent of the troops and civilian police deployed in UN peacekeeping missions come from the European Union and one per cent from the United States.

The largest contributers were from Pakistan (8,652), Bangladesh (8,211) and Nigeria (3,577). The biggest contributer from a western country is Poland with 739 peacekeepers on a 19th place. The USA ranks 26th with 430 peacekeepers. The EU combined have 4,532 peacekeepers.

The head of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, Under-Secretary- General Jean-Marie Guéhenno, has reminded Member States that “the provision of well-equipped,well-trained and disciplined military and police personnel to UN peacekeeping operations is a collective responsibility of Member States. Countries from the South should not and must not be expected to shoulder this burden alone”.

As of May 2004, in addition to military and police personnel, more than 3,400 international civilian personnel, 1,500 UN Volunteers and nearly 6,500 local civilian personnel worked in UN peacekeeping missions.

A total of almost 2000 soldiers, hailing from over 100 countries, have been killed while serving on peacekeeping missions. 30% of the fatalities in the first 55 years of UN peacekeeping occurred in the years 1993-1995.

That it is mostly developing nations that participate in peacekeeping is largely explained by the fact that such countries more readily appear neutral in conflict situations. Soldiers from these countries look far less threatening to a nation than ones from the United States or Russia would. There is also an economic incentive, as countries are reimbursed by the UN at the rate of US$1000 per soldier per month, plus equipment, which can be a significant source of revenue for a developing country.

So, please. the USA can't expect it to work without them perfectly. They are the biggest military power in the World afterall.

 

[Eg.]

but they do nothing, they havent done anything

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3573229.stm

http://www.globalissues.org/Geopolitics/Africa/SierraLeone.asp

hell in Sudan, they decided to sanction them, sudan as u may remember, is going through something called genocide, they want to make a country going through genocide poorer, instead of going in.

the U.N has not doen shit, looka the oil for food scam, the U.N has no power, noo sway, and not enough back bone to stay in Sierria Leone or Rwanda for more than 3 seconds

 

[Mechagodzilla]

hell in Sudan, they decided to sanction them, sudan as u may remember, is going through something called genocide, they want to make a country going through genocide poorer, instead of going in.

the U.N has not doen shit, looka the oil for food scam, the U.N has no power, noo sway, and not enough back bone to stay in Sierria Leone or Rwanda for more than 3 seconds

Of course, you have a solution to this problem, don't you?

Right?

Here's my solution: Have the US and the UN work together.
I know it's a radical idea, but bear with me.
In another thread you were going on about how the US had enough big shiny tanks to impose itself into any diplomatic or military effort.

So why didn't the US do anything to stop the genocide in Sudan?
Why, as a member of the UN, didn't the US petition the UN to take military action, and then send it's own troops?

My guess: it's because the US military was over-extended in a country that the UN told them not to go into, in a fight against weapons that the UN successfully removed ten years earlier.

Was Iraq more immediately important than Sudan somehow?
Their genocides ended ten or twenty years ago, after all. So why the urgent need to invade them?

Clinton demonstrated how the US's intervention is appreciated in times of dire need, like in cases of ongoing genocide. Not in "pre-emptive strikes".
The US acting as it did in Bosnia and the UN acting as it did in Iraq would be a powerful 2X Combo for peace.
And trust me, no-one would have opposed an invasion of Sudan under these circumstances.

The moral? Stay out of Iraq, get your ass to Sudan, and then complain about the UN.

 

[Absinthe]

no it isn't. where the hell did you pull that from?

From your President.

pot... kettle. kettle... pot.

How is my view on this flawed? You can't claim that your mission is to liberate the Iraqis and then simultaneously bomb a city, label the civilian casualties as collateral damage, and then say "Hey, this shit just happens". Well, you could do that. But it undermines the credibility of your just cause for war.

So please, tell me how I'm being hypocritical about this. Just look at what Eg is saying and tell me that I'm somehow misunderstanding something. Otherwise, I just look at this as an attempt to toss sour grapes my way.

 

[othello]

Are you trying to say that he has never mentioned liberating the iraqi people as a motivation?

With the lack of terror ties, the lack of WMDs, and the lack of any threatening action Saddam has taken in the last decade, liberation is the only motive he has left.

absolutely... has bush mentioned liberating the iraqi people? of course. as motivation for the war on terror? absolutely not.

as for your second paragraph, which is completely false, lets see... there were absolute ties between al-qaeda and iraq (whether these ties had anything to do with 9/11 is another story). i mean come on, if you were an islamic radical, would you be constantly defending a country you had absolutely no ties to? :dozey: WMDs have most certainly been found... just not to the extent we were told (which, before you say it, is not to be chalked up to a bush failure or 'lie'). remember that fake story about the missing explosives in iraq 2 weeks before the election? remember how it was infallibly shown that over 400,000 tons of explosives and weapons have been destroyed in 3 years? and that the 'missing explosives' were actually detonators from nuclear weapons, and there were 9 trucks full? the bush-hating chant of 'no WMDs have been found!' is about as ridiculous and easily debunked as 'no more blood for oil, wah wah wah!'

with the slew of reasons to invade iraq, liberation seems to be on the backburner, imo.

You can't claim that your mission is to liberate the Iraqis

no one, to my knowledge, has ever claimed that. the mission all along has been to disarm/remove saddam. "mission accomplished". now, we are facing a resistance and other problems we did not calculate, and it is hindering our ability to, essentially, clean up and move out.

 

[what!?]

I am glad that Arafat is dead. He was a terrorist plain and simple. The PLO is a terrorist organization. I mourn his death as Americans mourned Hitler's in WW2.

The Middle East situation is amazingly simple. Saying it is too complex for the common man to understand is a smokescreen. It is about religion. The arab states want Israel razed to the ground. Israel tries to defend their state, and face criticism from the vaunted "world community."

If your nation suffered the constant sucide bombings on innocent civillians, you would fight back. Hell, if this happened to the U.S.A., "Palenstine" would be a smoking crater.

P.S. The U.N has recently appointed Sudan to the Human Rights commision (fairly old news). The same Sudan that has a genocide going on now. So much for the U.N.

The U.N. members seek power. That is what motivates them. Power for powers sake.

 

[gh0st]

there are over 300 cases of reported abuse, and over 1000 estimated that went unreported ..there are over 14,000 iraqi civilians dead, over 30,000 wounded. Their methods may be crude and barbaric but they are nothing compared to the bodycount caused by the US invasion

"what are u, non american"

wtf is that supposed to mean? do only americans see the "truth" or are you the only ones still fooled by this "war"?

300 cases of reported abuse? how much abuse do you think saddam did... im willing to get it was a couple more than that measly number. 14k iraqis dead? what ever happened to that 100 thousand number? oh thats right, theres no reputable source that indicates the body count, and you wont for some time. all ~120 thousand american and coalition soldiers in iraq are angels :dork: get real, in a city that large, how many murders, rape, etc, do you have? add in the stress of war, of being shot at by insurgents using civilians and hospitals as cover and youve got one tense situation. youve never been in combat stern, unless its with a freakin polar bear. i volunteer at a VA hospital so maybe I have a better view of what its like for soldiers over there, and these counts are MINISCULE to what civ casualties were in vietnam, korea, ww2, ww1, shit even places like colombia.

 

[Ryjalon5k]

you said it

 

[Mechagodzilla]

absolutely... has bush mentioned liberating the iraqi people? of course. as motivation for the war on terror? absolutely not.

So all that stuff about 'freedom on the march" and overthrowing Saddam's oppressive dictatorship, the new democratic elections, and etc. That didn't happen? Just becuase he didn't specifically say: "This is our motive" doesn't mean it wasn't one.

...unless you are saying that Bush never gave a damn about iraqi people, in which case I might be inclined to agree, based on the number of civilian deaths deemed acceptable.

as for your second paragraph, which is completely false, lets see...

That's a rather stout claim, calling what I wrote entirely false. Let's see indeed, whether you have the evidence to back it up.

there were absolute ties between al-qaeda and iraq (whether these ties had anything to do with 9/11 is another story). i mean come on, if you were an islamic radical, would you be constantly defending a country you had absolutely no ties to? :dozey:

I didn't mean that there were no terror ties at all, because it's common knowledge that that is not the case.
However, there were simply no terror links to the extent that was publicised. Saddam had let some Al-Queda train there for a while back in 1995 or something, but that's pretty much the extent of things.
Sure, having any ties to Al-queda is bad, but when Al-queda is operating out of something like 50 countries across the world, with many far more active than Iraq, it makes one wonder what the specific need for a pre-emptive strike in Iraq was.

Speaking of which, terror ties were far surpassed as a motivation by the assertion that Saddam was a clear and present full-blown terrorist threat to the US and western culture as a whole.
Of course, Saddam hadn't even attempted, nor was he planning, anything against any western country since a slapdash assassination attempt on President Bush (the first one) in 1993.

Now, because of the war, there are far more terrorists in Iraq than ever before. Which leads to your point here:
"i mean come on, if you were an islamic radical, would you be constantly defending a country you had absolutely no ties to? :dozey:"

Well, simply put, the terrorists aren't defending Iraq. They're attacking the US.
Al-Queda has one mission: make western culture look bad so that people will see radical islam as preferable.
That was one of the main points behind 9/11, and all that other stuff. It's half making the US look weak, and half making radicals look like powerful martyrs.

So, the Iraqi people, having led a fearful but mostly safe existance under Saddam, are suddenly confronted with the equivalent of over 11 world trade center attacks hitting their neighbourhoods. Obviously, it's a not surprising that huge amounts of them opposed this.

Neutrino had some links he posted a while back that showed the majority of polled iraqis resent the US occupation. So, of course, many of them have turned to rebellion and, consequently, Al-Queda. After all, Al-Queda had said all along that the US was planning to attack the mideast, invade it's countries and kill the muslim people. And the war in Iraq validated everything they said.

So, with Saddam's army mostly gone and the borders ill-defended, terrorists rushed in. Iraq had become the perfect vehicle for recruitment after all. The terrorists were and still are, extremely well-funded and well armed. Their motivation is two things: Look like the real heroes, and make the US appear weak.

And how better to do that than by giving the insurgency aid, cash and supplies, not to mention fighting the US alongside them?

Al-Queda's goal is to make the fighting last as long as it possibly can. to show the mid-east that the US version of peace causes nothing but a warzone the size of a nation.

So no, they aren't defending their ties to Iraq. There's no Iraq left to be tied to.
They are creating ties, and they are doing a very effective job of it.

WMDs have most certainly been found... just not to the extent we were told (which, before you say it, is not to be chalked up to a bush failure or 'lie').

You said it. Like the terrorism, Saddam's clear and present WMD threat was neither clear nor present. Insignifigant best describes what has been found.
What was it again? A few shells that could have at one time contained mustard gas?

Whether it was a lie or not important (although aluminium tubes come to mind).
The official reports have shown it clearly enough. Saddam hasn't had a WMD since 1992. He hasn't even tried to get more since 1998.
Sanctions and routine inspections made him give up on that dream. Hence, recently, the WMD threat Saddam posed was summarized as something to the extent of "Well, he has nothing, but once the sanctions are lifted he might very well have started to procure and maybe re-start the process of building a WMD program, eventually build a weapon, and then give it to some terrorists somewhere."

remember that fake story about the missing explosives in iraq 2 weeks before the election? remember how it was infallibly shown that over 400,000 tons of explosives and weapons have been destroyed in 3 years? and that the 'missing explosives' were actually detonators from nuclear weapons, and there were 9 trucks full?

Eh? You're paraphrasing a fake story as your argument?
And conventional explosives are not WMDs. They're WDs, and not illegal.

And since when were they declared to be nuclear detonators? How would anyone know that they were nuke detonators if they were destroyed/lost? And why is there absolutely no evidence of the 18 trucks worth of nukes that would go with them, let alone a plan to build a single nuke?
And I thought you said that it's fake?

I'm going to have to ask for your fake source here, I'm afraid.

the bush-hating chant of 'no WMDs have been found!' is about as ridiculous and easily debunked as 'no more blood for oil, wah wah wah!'

When have I ever purported to hate Bush? I think he's misguided, yes, but what I really hate is a war that is fundamentally putting my society at risk. Whether it was Kerry, Bush, or Ross friggin' Perot, this war is a pile of blunders and mistakes done in the name of the ideas fundamental to my culture and my country.

And you're for "blood for oil?" Because I hadn't even mentioned that either. Ever, actually.
You're jumping to some sort of conclusion without a harness.
Your first error was the conviction that I am nothing more than some pro-Kerry ultra jerk. What you missed is that, now that the elections are over, I have nocandidate, no partisan agenda to support. I'm only in this out of some hope for some greater good.
That's where we differ.
Your opinions are based on your conviction that I am wrong.
My opinions are based on the conviction that I am right.

I'm not trying to prove you wrong for no reason.
I'm just explaining my point of view to someone who apparently doesn't like me very much for whatever reason.

with the slew of reasons to invade iraq, liberation seems to be on the backburner, imo.

Actually, it's now on the forefront.
How many times do you hear of the spiffy new elections, or the freedom for the Iraqi people?
On the contrary, where is any mention of conclusive WMD evidence, or of Osama and Saddam being bedfellows, despite being ideological opposites?

no one, to my knowledge, has ever claimed that. the mission all along has been to disarm/remove saddam. "mission accomplished".

This just confuses me, because other conservatives I've encountered on the board, like Eg, are adamant that the WMDs and the terror are nothing compared to the moral obligation of rescuing the iraqi people from their oppressive leader.

Although removing all the WMDs was certainly easy, I'm sure. A kid on a big-wheel probably could have removed them all himself. Yes, the mission was announced to be "accomplished". But the criticism for that announcement popped up for a reason:

now, we are facing a resistance and other problems we did not calculate, and it is hindering our ability to, essentially, clean up and move out.

You see, the pretense for the war was that America would go in, kick ass, topple Saddam, find the huge stockpiles of WMDs, and the iraqi people would parade through the streets while democracy fell from the heavens like so much candy.

But then what's this? Resistance? No-one planned for the iraqi people to be unhappy with all the bombing!

So, the mission isn't completed, for one key reason: The iraqi people haven't been liberated yet! Keeping the iraqis from reaching democracy is exactly what the resistance is trying to do. That's why they're called a resistance in the first place.


Also, I just realised that your whole argument against 'massive civilian casualties being a detriment to the process of creating freedom for the iraqi people' is that the US never really cared about creating freedom for iraqis in the first place.
B'oh.

 

[Mechagodzilla]

300 cases of reported abuse? how much abuse do you think saddam did... im willing to get it was a couple more than that measly number. 14k iraqis dead? what ever happened to that 100 thousand number? oh thats right, theres no reputable source that indicates the body count, and you wont for some time.

Right, so it's okay because Saddam did it. To modify the old cliche about peer pressure: If Saddam threw a prisoner off a bridge, would you throw your prisoner off a smaller bridge as well?

Yes, there is no absolute count. But no source I've seen has ever put the numer at lower than 15 000. All estimates are between 15 000 and 250 000 dead.
So Stern's assertion that it is over 14 000 dead is actually a very, very conservative estimate.

all ~120 thousand american and coalition soldiers in iraq are angels :dork: get real, in a city that large, how many murders, rape, etc, do you have?

I lived in Regina, Saskatchewan, which has a population of around 175 000. Every murder made the front page. There were around three a year, if memory serves. Certainly not the 14 000 that makes up the lowest realistic estimate.

Under your theory, that leaves at least 13 997 murders unaccounted for.

add in the stress of war, of being shot at by insurgents using civilians and hospitals as cover and youve got one tense situation. youve never been in combat stern, unless its with a freakin polar bear. i volunteer at a VA hospital so maybe I have a better view of what its like for soldiers over there, and these counts are MINISCULE to what civ casualties were in vietnam, korea, ww2, ww1, shit even places like colombia.

Again, it's a case of "it's okay because someone else did it too. Don't you think things have progressed just a little since 1944?

Ignore the fact that korea, and both world wars were far, far larger in scale, and that in addition to vietnam, they all continued for years longer longer than this conflict has gone so far.

Ignoring the fact that you're justifying at least 13 997 casulaties with the mere argument that they were going to happen anyways.

That brings up eternal the question of why you're in Iraq in the first place. The US brought the combat to Iraq, remember. The Iraqi people did not ask for combat. Polls show that the majority do not appreciate the combat.

The point of the war: to prevent death and stop terrorism.
The result of the war: death and terrorism.

The question is, are these deaths worth it? You're saying they definitely are worth it because they're not so bad. . But what was gained?

What required that the war be rushed, and that this death must result? Half of you say it was to protect the US. Half of you say it was to liberate the oppressed people. Which is it? Which is worth up to 250 000 dead?

Also, I think I read somewhere that Stern actually was in the military at some point. So I'd bite my tongue, nursey.

 

[CptStern]

ARGGGHHHH!!!! STERN in the military!!! nein, nyet, no, jamas, nunca, no ****ing way jose

can you imagine me in the army?

Sgt Hardass: Stern drop and give me 50

Stern: well according to the laws that govern humane treatment of soldiers I refuse on the grounds that it is demoralizing and inhumane

Sgt Hardass: yer a liberal commie arent you?