In article ,
Dave Hinz wrote:

I did some mass snipping to whittle this exchange to a more
reasonable size. I'm honestly trying to keep anything that's important,
but I apologize in advance if I've screwed up.

Nah, I'm only blaming him for tossing more fuel on the fire.

You just aid we picked the fight. Right up there, where it starts
the line with .

Can you not separate an analogy from the concept it's trying to
illustrate?
But I can comfortable say that Bush did pick the fight in Iraq.

OK, then explain to me how invading Iraq, killing lots and lots of
civilians, (and some insurgents who may or may not be local) and
installing a government that appears to be completely powerless is gonna
"not give someone an opening" to attack the US. Because I don't see it.

Well, so far it seems to have worked, so I guess it doesn't matter if
you're "seeing it" or not.

Define "work" as you're applying it here. I see a whole lot of dead
people on both sides, and a huge monetary expense to the US. In
exchange for, as you said, not a perfect guarantee the US won't be
attacked again.

I mean, here we are over here, in North America, and there our army is,
on the other side of the planet. How does that make sense?

Are you pretending our _entire_ army is over there? Seriously?

No, but enough of it to make any major response over here impossible.
Besides people, equipment is deployed over in Iraq, including hardware
that had been mothballed. We don't even have a good "plan C" if
something goes ape**** over here.

Oh well, at least you got off the hugging thing.

And yet, you're still pretending that if we're just nice to 'em they'll
reciprocate by being nice to us. It's still dangerously naiive.

Some will, some won't. People tend to give as good as they get--be
mean to people, and they'll be mean back. Be nice to people and they'll
be nice back. Not 100%, but pretty high.

Do we know each other from a.g.d. by the way?

Yup. (:

I mean, if what he's doing is effective then there should at least
be a slowdown in the increase, but that isn't what's happening.

Where was that followup to 9/11/01 that OBL threatened us with again?
I keep not seeing it.

Ask Tony Blair.

I wasn't aware that he lives in this country.

I'm not restricting the conversation to the US alone. My complaint
is with Bush's war on terror, which is supposedly worldwide. To quote
me: "Then how do you explain that terrorism all over the world is on
the rise since Bush began 'responding strongly'?" Message ID is
if you'd
like to check the context of that remark.
What I'm trying to get at is that you keep falling back on the "we
haven't been attacked again" defense of this war. First, correlation
isn't causation. Second, what defense will you use if we do get
attacked over here? If your only justification for this war is that we
haven't been attacked yet, then as soon as we do get attacked again your
entire justification is gone. At that point I suppose you could
redefine it as "It isn't as bad this time" or "it took X years for it to
happen again," but those are ****-poor results for $1.25billion a week,
plus thousands of casualties. So I would like to know if you've got any
other justification for this activity in Iraq?

OK, Mr. Hugbot. http://research.lifeboat.com/worldterror.htm

Mr. Hugbot. I kinda like that.

Go websearch for "Perry Bible Fellowship." That's where I got the
name from. Funny as hell.
BTW, you also got your support for my "unsupportably weak
generality." You're welcome.

Were they born evil?

Nature vs. nurture? Who knows. Centuries of hate has a habit of
changing cultures.

That's not an answer. "Who knows?" is a weak argument to support a
war. So is the corollary: "Just in case."

It doesn't matter if they were born evil or not. The reason is
irrelevant. The fact is, they want to kill us, and will do so given the
opportunity. If we show weakness (which you think is "kindness" or
whatever your words were), they'll take that opening. Just as they did
repeatedly when Clinton failed to respond positively following the
incidents working up to 9/11/01.

Well, yeah, the reason they hate us does matter. They didn't just
jump off a spaceship one day--something here on Earth turned some people
into terrorists. Until we fix that something it's highly unlikely we'll
be able to kill enough terrorists to eliminate terrorism. A dripping
faucet can fill the biggest bucket, as one fortune cookie told me.

OK, I blame all the people who voted for it. And all of the goons
who voted for them and plan to keep on voting for them.

So would that include yourself? How did your representatives vote? You
do know, I assume?

Yup, I know how he voted. I also know that I did not vote for him
when he ran for office. But if I had voted for him I would not plan to
keep voting for him.

Now that we've got the blaming out of the way, how does all of this
blaming make Iraq not a ****up? A ****up which the republicans in the
White House are planning and leading.

Well, let's see. Their woodchipper-people-shredding dictator and his
sons are out of power and/or dead, the infrastructure is being rebuilt,
most of the country is safe. Hm, maybe there's more going on over there
that's good, that we're not hearing much about. A couple friends of
mine have come back from over there, and tell me that it's a different
country than the press shows. Lots of good progress, and they're both
****ed that the press isn't giving them any mention for the progress.

Cool, glad to hear it. But it seems the attacks and bombings in Iraq
are increasing instead of decreasing, which is not a positive trend.
Our military is losing people and machinery faster than they can be
replaced--another bad trend. Every pivot point we've heard about:
taking Baghdad, killing Saddam's sons, catching Saddam, government
handover, and the elections; they have all been played up before they
took place as a turning point after which things would show a marked
improvement. But that's never happened--after each event all trends in
Iraq remained the same as they were before.
Either the leaders are bull****ting us on a regular basis, or they
don't know what they're doing. Both scenarios fit my definition of
"****up." What also fits my definition is the

Because your people also voted for it, so don't just blame my people.

I don't own or control them--they are not "mine." But to use your
language: "Your people" have the authority to end it, but they don't.

They were working on the same intel as "my people".

But now they have all-new intel that tells them that the old intel
was utter horse ****, but they don't change their plans one bit. How is
that acceptable?

In fact it's plainly obvious at this point that "your people" lied their
asses off to get "my people" to consent to this cluster****.

Gunner _JUST_ quoted Kerry, Clinton, Albright, and all those folks
regarding Iraq. Do I need to dig 'em out, or can we stipulate that
"your people" also agreed that he had the stuff and was a danger? Oh,
and those quotes predate the W administration. So much for _that_ plan.

Gunner's in my killfile, so I don't see anything he posts anymore.
Anyway, the vote itself does not predate the W administration. That
vote would be the point at which "my people" consented.

So, yeah,
I'll keep on blaming "your people" until they either fix what they broke
or lose power--whichever comes first.

Both sides voted for it, but you blame the other side. Got it.

Yeah, because one side gives orders to the military. Orders that I
think are completely counterproductive and stupid. The other side only
gets to bitch about it.

Yes, that _IS_ what I was saying. Democrats also voted for it. I can
roll out all the quotes from Clinton, Clinton, Kerry, and all those, if
you'd like, regarding OBL, SH, and so on. But, you've seen 'em already.

And you are correct, sir, I've seen 'em all. It's amazing how many
republicans in the workplace love their copy machines.

OK, evasion noted. What about those quotes, specifically?

Ya know, I'll bet that Gunner's list you referred to is almost a
carbon copy of the lists I've been accosted with at work.
And what is this evasion you speak of. I even said you were correct!
Yes, I've seen the quotes, and yes, they said exactly what all of those
quotes say they said. What in the holy hell do you think I'm evading?
Are we not speaking the same language?

Anyway, I know
now, and I knew then that Democrats also voted for the war. I was right
there, yelling at the TV when it happened on C-Span. But I just can't
seem to figure out how any of that is supposed to turn a ****up into a
nota****up.

But you're happy to criticize, even though you have nothing constructive
to contribute. Got it.

Huh? Do you not remember what you called "hugging" earlier?

Take it up with your congresscritters then.

They're not the ones replying to me--you are. It seems odd that you
would butt into a conversation and then suggest that I leave.

Butt into? Bite me. What have your congresscritters responded to you
with? You _have_ contacted them, right? Mine are pretty damn
responsive, even though I disagree with 1.5 of the 3 of them.

Amazing. It must be the bane of being a liberal in Texas. I only
get the standard: "Thank you for your comments. The representative's
views on this issue a bla bla bla. Please send a check." This is
the same state, after all, that gave us the chicken **** president who
screens his audiences because he fears hecklers. No surprise then that
the congressmen (and women) feel they can also ignore their opponents.

Well, I know you're trying to be a snot, but his job is to run the damn
country, not govern based on polls like the last guy did.

Well, I know you're trying to be a snot, but his job is to run the
damn country somewhere other than into the ground.

My point is that we voted for someone based on their pre-election
statements. Changing policy at the whim of polls is _not_ what they're
elected to do. Clinton didn't care; he just bounced around on whatever
topics he thought would increase his poll numbers.

Clinton is not in office. Clinton no longer has any control over
what happens. Therefore Clinton has basically jack **** to do with
anything going on in Iraq, regardless of what his position is, was, or
was supposed to be.
Can you respond without invoking "Clinton?"

What "stuff" are the terrorists trying to take? AFAIR some want us
out of the Middle East, and a few want us all dead. But the vast
majority would probably be pretty satisfied with an end to bombings in
their cities, which I figure is an easily achievable goal. It would
save us money on bombs and funerals to boot.

You're being intentionally dense. If someone threatens you, the best
way to deal with that threat is to provide an effective defense, not as
you'd suggest, to try to reason with them.

So who would you say is being the bully in Iraq?

I bet you're the type that, if faced with a mugger, would rather "give
the man your wallet and hope he doesn't hurt you much", rather than to
arm yourself with a legally concealed weapon. Am I wrong?

Yup, you're wrong. The last guy that tried to mug me left with a
broken elbow, broken wrist, and a few missing teeth. I still have his
knife.

If you haven't studied history, I'm not going to try to fix that here.
Sorry, but if you have no understanding of what's happened in the last
thousand years or so, that might explain why you think you can reason
with those people. Yes, I said "those people".

Suit yourself.

Which "He" are you referring to in the above?

Context makes it quite obvious that "He" applies to Clinton. Need I
diagram the sentences for you?

Yes, get to it.

And how does one go
about emboldening a group that's currently taking on the US military
with homemade bombs?

By showing weakness. Do pay attention.

So what would be the next level of "bold" after throwing grenades at
an oncoming tank?

How do you embolden a guy who's willing to take on
a mission that requires his own violent death? Seems like those folks
are riding the upper reaches of boldness already.

Apparently they are not currently bold enough to attack the US on US
soil again.

Yeah, they're being less bold by attacking hardened military targets
in the middle of a ****ing war zone. 'Cause if I had the option: fight
with trained, armed, and ****ed-off marines vs. evade mall security,
it's the marines every time!
Or were you being intentionally dense to get back at me?

And then people like you would call them "puppets of the Bush regime" or
something. Yes, that's already happening.

No, people like me wouldn't. That's why I'm not. Those people who
are calling them puppets aren't like me.

OK, fair enough. Then why do you pretend the population who is helping
us, isn't?

What are you referring to?

See what I mean?

Nope. Could you quote some relevant text instead of acting like a
pud? Hell, just paraphrase it.

Well then, let's get independant of their resources and they can just
kill each other instead of us. I'm fine with that.

Me too! Yay! Agreement!

Far as I'm concerned, we should tell 'em "Look. We helped SH, he got
out of hand, and we came in and took him out. We gave you a reasonably
good guy this time. Keep his ass in line, or we'll wander through
_again_ with our forces, take _him_ out, and repeat as needed. Get your
**** together and we won't have to keep doing this, but if the next guy
makes noises like this last guy, we're taking him out. Now behave."

Hopefully that makes my point of view clear. Given that it's not
going to happen any time soon, the next best thing is to whack the
troublemakers hard and repeatedly until they either change (ha!) or die.
The alternative is to not take them out, and they'll take us out.

Umm, I'm really not at all convinced Saddam was any danger to us in
any realistic way. Maybe a pain in the ass, but certainly no danger.
OTOH, the guys who have been successfully killing our soldiers are
extremely dangerous, and they weren't around before this war. As far as
I'm concerned none of this should have happened at all.
Now that it has happened, maybe your idea would be best, but what
Bush is doing right now is a mistake. And we all get to pay for it.

--
B.B. --I am not a goat! thegoat4 at airmail dot net
http://web2.airmail.net/thegoat4/