flipper wrote:
On Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:41:12 +0100, richard
wrote:

flipper wrote:
On Tue, 01 Sep 2009 19:37:21 +0100, richard
wrote:


flipper wrote:

On Tue, 01 Sep 2009 15:55:04 +0100, richard
wrote:



Jim Thompson wrote:


http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/op...-54816897.html

...Jim Thompson

Jim,

The previous administration initiated the waste of trillions of
dollars on the invasion of Iraq.


The cost of the Iraq war, from beginning all the way to now,
hasn't yet reached the amount Obama and the Democrats in Congress
spent in just one 'stimulus' of bribes bill that they didn't even
allow anyone to read before passing.




Your taxes up in smoke.

Each administration has its own way of blowing your cash.

**** the lot of them - but Obama's way is arguably more benign.


The destruction of liberty is never 'benign'.

Two wrongs don't make a right


I couldn't agree more so why is it you appear to be making that kind
of argument?



- but what was the Patriot act if it wasn't the destruction of
liberty ?


Just exactly which 'liberty' did you loose? The 'liberty' to chat
'in private' with Al Qaida in Pakistan or the 'liberty' to plan a
bombing in secret?

The word you intend is "lose". "Loose" is associated with a screw.

Thank you for locating a typo.

I suppose a "two wrongs" argument is just too tempting a fallacy for
you to pass up because despite you, yourself, saying it you still
couldn't resist speaking entirely of your perceived 'Bush flaws' with
not one word about the problem at hand.

The situation is that the state now has greater powers to snoop on
the citizens.
Wholly innocent people come under suspicion and are subject to
investigation and arrest.

That's a decent recitation of the left's bugaboo strawman talking
points

No, that's two unassailable facts.


but, as I already said, I've not found a single everyday
average Joe who could put his finger on anything in his life the
Patriot Act affected

Completely irrelevant. We are not talking about who you know.


and I doubt the vast majority of people, save a
few terrorists, would have been able to tell it even existed if not
for the left crying wolf.

Plenty of announcements from the gov.t made in all media - why lie?



Now, you can cry wolf again but it won't alter the fact that I've
still not found any average, everyday, Joes it affected.

It has affected every American citizen.



So you tell me, Does crying wolf make wolves appear?


The "terrorists" have succeeded.

Utter nonsense. That's like saying "Hitler succeeded" because the
Americans engaged in a war against him. And, along with the Allies,
won it, btw.

Next thing you know the loony left will be saying the US decoding
Japan's encrypted communications during WWII violated Tojo's 'privacy
rights'.

Made-up crap.



The population is cowed. People suspect one and other more.

Don't presume everyone else is afflicted with your own paranoid
delusions. I wasn't 'cowed' nor do I know anyone who was, other than a
few fools who took the left seriously and those few couldn't put a
finger on anything either.

Please do understand, again, we are not talking about who you know.




Your taxes go to pay for this heightened "security".

Your taxes went to pay for WWII too.

Does 9/11 ring a bell?

Yep. Thanks, republicans!



A whole range of people get arbitrary powers.

Nobody got 'arbitrary powers'.

Made-up crap.




Perhaps not the patriot act, but I had a laser pointer confiscated
from me at an airport. A woman beside me had a "snowstorm"
confiscated for fear that the liquid was explosive. I am not allowed
to take photos in railway stations etc etc.

Since you seem to be aware that's "not the patriot act" why do you go
ahead and create strawman arguments that have nothing to do with the
patriot act?


People are more paranoid and uptight.

You think having giant craters filled with dead bodies where the two
largest skyscrapers in NY used to stand might have had something to do
with that?

People were a tad "more paranoid and uptight" after Pearl Harbor too
but that's a normal reaction to discovering there's a whole gaggle of
fanatics hell bent on killing your ass.

Playing stupid.




The perception is that the Americans routinely torture foreign
nationals.

A false 'perception' created and promulgated by our supposed 'friends'
on the loony left.

An unassailable fact.




All this is what Bush visited on the American people

No, you've recounted a litany of paranoid delusions visited by the
loony left on the American people and, as I said, I doubt anyone,
besides a few terrorists, would have known the patriot act even
existed if not for the left hysterically screaming a litany of
paranoid delusions.

Made-up crap.



so, in that sense, it is a relief that he has been replaced by
someone with
more humane values.

I don't find socialism and fascism 'benign' nor does it become
'benign' because the perpetrator spouts pleasant sounding 'goals' as
the excuse.

And yet, you defend it at every opportunity. lol