Did Bush Smoke Marijuana? (the answer is in the ...answer!) - Page 5

What's so good about the naming of Tomohawks and Apache instruments of warfare about. You managed to have systematicaly slaughtered and eliminated those indigidgenous people from the the face of the earth in an act of ethnic cleansing. Now you use their names as a form of questionable hypocritical bravura. It's about time someone stood up against this malusage and derogatory aspect. The puffs seem to have a lobby.

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The media is a self perpetuating publicity stunt.

Good Lord Byrne, be sensible, it was a special dress, no doubt she went to the frock shop with an open cheque for a new wardrobe.

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The media is a self perpetuating publicity stunt.

I look at it this way. According to the morality of the age, what the US did back then was perfectly justified. At least, as justified as the UK's policies in Africa during the 1870's were. The conventional wisdom of the time was that the Native Americans were savages (and yes, they were), and that we were the more civilized people who needed the land more than they did,,and we had the means to take it. Survival of the fittest, right? If however, we felt back then as we did now, and we had a president like,,,,,,George W. Bush,,,who pursued the same policy of slaughtering people for resources,,then I would object. Thankfully the Native Americans have survived, and their people, words and customs have been integrated into our own, to some degree. I am thankful enough for that. I would hate for them to have disappeared altogether. I always wonder though, what would have it been like if the Native Americans had similar technologies when they and the Europeans first met?

The Lancet (which is the British Medical Journal), has estimated that 100,000
Iraqi's have died at the hands of coalition forces.

Of course, the US has refused all enquiries as to the figure for the
death toll of Iraqi civilians during the US invasion/occupation of Iraq.

Er, Bush and his goverment ignored intelligence warning of a terrorist attack on the USA mainland throughout Summer 2001.

What about the perverted acts carried out by your fellow personnel - WHOSE
SALARIES ARE PAID FOR OUT OF YOUR TAX DOLLARS ?
Lynndie England and Charles Graner - they were the perverts in Abu Ghuraib.
Was their actions consensual ?

people do tend to forget - especially you.

I would say that the majority of Americans knew full well that George Bush was going to find a way to start a war with Iraq, and honestly, I think 9-11 was it. Call me a conspiracy nut, but our administration would not have behaved the way they did unless they wanted something like it to happen. It would have taken a major blow to the US to stir up Americans enough to be complicit in the decision to invade. Ever since, Bush and his cronies have been touting themselves as protectors and avengers, and every single terrorist alert warning has been timed to coincide with the election primaries, conventions, and debates...You don't do that unless you find the events of 2001 as fortunate as mana from heaven. In my personal opinion, I don't believe that there has been a credible terrorist threat to the US since 9/11, and that the rest of it has been nothing but a smokescreen to fuel anti-arab fervor.

The Bush goverment knew that there were attacks threatened on mainland USA in the summer of 2001.
The 9/11 victims families believe this to be the case and the intelligence agencies have stated that they told the Bush goverment of this threat.
Bush ignored the 6th August memo - he ignored it.

The decision to go to war was taken : Paul O Neill says so in his book (his was in the Bush cabinet and he said that the issue was tabled in February 2001).
Richard Clarke said the same - that the decision to invade Iraq was taken
before 9/11.

The real terrorist is within.

And, I beleive, this is why conservatives never wonder why bush has not admitted to one mistake/blunder or question him & his CEO cronies on decisions based solely on the upper 1% of our population deriving any benefit thereof. They (the conservatives) would have nowhere to go because as everyone on this side of the pond knows, the Repub's have God on their side

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I'm completely in favor of the separation of Church and State. My idea is that these two institutions screw us up enough on their own, so both of them together is certain death.
George Carlin
US comedian and actor (1937 - )

I agree, war was already a foregone conclusion about 2 seconds after (or before, i'm not exactly sure) he took the oath. They simply needed to "manufacture" errr... I mean "find" evidence to support their forgone conclusion. Now things aren't looking so good-e.g.-army enlistments are dwindling, no? I would have to think awhile due to equipment shortages/stop-loss programmes, primarily guerilla (urban) warfare before i signed on the dotted line. My heart goes out to those who enlisted before King George was coronated. He can do no wrong. If things don't look up soon, he might have to resort to the 3rd rail of the Republican Party-drafting rich kids into the military.

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I'm completely in favor of the separation of Church and State. My idea is that these two institutions screw us up enough on their own, so both of them together is certain death.
George Carlin
US comedian and actor (1937 - )

The question is, HOW is Bush going to go about dealing with Iran? My guess is that he uses the preemptive strike option against an Iranian nuclear site. The Iranians, knowing no better, sign their own death warrants. They strike back with some sort of terrorist or direct attack against US Military forces or the US mainland, and it will probably involve WMD or a dirty bomb. Voila! The US now has full license to eradicate Iran from the face of the Earth. A draft will no longer be negatively viewed, and the unsuspecting American public is fooled into following George straight into Hell.

I would suspect miltary strikes on strategic targets. Keep in mind, there is a sizable amount of the younger population, over there, who support revolution &/or reforms so they're welfare must be taken into acct.

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I'm completely in favor of the separation of Church and State. My idea is that these two institutions screw us up enough on their own, so both of them together is certain death.
George Carlin
US comedian and actor (1937 - )

The real question about Iran is whether the US can afford to deal with them. The war in Iraq has bankrupted the US ecomomy and it is 1/4 of the size of Iran. Bush goes to congress and asks for X-$billion and they hand it to him. He cares not for the American people nor the economy. Mr Limerickman has pointed out in very clear terms the dire state of the US ecomony which has been an effect (directly or indirectly) of the war in Iraq.

The Iraq war has been the most unpopular war in the history of the US, more so that the Vietman war. World support for the US is at all time low. The US' major allies will be hard pushed to support a war in Iran on a moral ground. The US stirs up conspiracy after conspiracy to get its own population on board and no one knows the real truth. Americans jump on the war train with Bush under the false flag of freedom, liberation and democracy and it becomes unstoppable.

What damage is this doing to the US ecomomically, politically and diplomatically?

I don't think Bush will go near Iran.
To be honest, I think the US realises that in invading Iraq, they've been struggling and they now realise that they cannot "impose democracy".

Sure, they'll point to free elections and say that they've done the job in Iraq.
But can anyone really say that Iraq is a fully functioning democratic society ?
The infrastructure of the country is decimated, it's hospitals are in pieces.
The election in Iraq merely emphasised that three major ethnic groups live
in Iraq.
Civil war isn't beyond Iraq, as we now stand.
None of those ethnic groups want anything to do with the USA.

With respect, I think that you have completely missed my point.

So back to your posting, I am not commenting on what the general consensus of thinking was in the 1870's, whether this was in America or Africa.
They, the Indians were killed for their resources and holdings, very similar to Bush and Iraq today.
Anyway, as for the Brits. we don't start calling our weapons Zulu, Hutu, Tutsis, or any Swahili names, and I don't think that we did stuff like the Trail of Tears, and other such displacements.

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The media is a self perpetuating publicity stunt.

I agree with you that we will not go near Iran militarily (well at least no nearer than Iraq ). In fact, it is mostly media speculation that has stirred up that whole hornet's nest anyway. Sure, our leaders in the U.S. (and elsewhere by the way) have said aggressive things about Iran's nuclear capabilities. Does anybody in this forum really think everything will be "dandy" if countries like Iran have nuclear weapons? Can you really blame someone for standing up in the international community and saying, "this is really not a good idea, we need to convince them (Iran) not to do this"? Admittedly it is unfortunate that there are some nations in the world today "allowed" to have nuclear weapons and some that are not "allowed." I'm sure most of you would agree with me that it would be great if nobody had any of it, or if the technology didn't exist. But here we are in this predicament anyway. The fact that the world would be safer if Iran did not have nuclear weapons could hardly be disputed. That being the case, some nations do not have the luxury of sitting back and letting others be the "bad guy" and say something (and then belittle them for it while thinking to themselves "yeah, you're right, it's not a good idea for them to have nukes").

That reminds me, I grow a little weary of UK people in this forum ignoring the fact that their own country has been in Iraq militarily from the start, and continues to be there today. Your leader has said the same things as ours. You have your own versions of our despicable Abu Guraib stories. We all have things that should continue and we all have major problems to fix.

Somebody's response will surely be "yeah, the US is worried about Iran having nukes just like the US knew there were WMDs in Iraq. WMD's this WMD's that, blah, blah." The whole WMD is obviously a huge disappointment, and I mentioned in another post that I don't pretend to be privy to knowledge allowing me to pass judgement on the whole thing. But that doesn't have anything to do with expressing the thought that it's not a good thing for Iran to have nukes.

I do not believe that we will go to Iran militarily, but I also understand that no president, regardless of party or track record, will EVER say that military options are completely off the table for anything. Has Tony Blair ever said that? How about Putin?

Even if you believe Bush is a war-mongerer who has no concern for US people or economy but loves to send people to war, you can still relax. Regardless of economics or politics, we can't go into Iran right now because it's not physically possible. Our military is barely treading water with its current obligations. Don't forget that we still have large presences in Korea, South America, Iraq, Afghanistan, Balkans, Africa, Phillipines, Indonesia, etc. Our foreign policy does not match our military capability.

BUT, if for some reason in the future military action is legitimately required for some related reason and all in the international community agree that it is, then perhaps some other nation could pick up the peacekeeping and stability ops that we pull 24/7 around the globe so that we can go do the dirty work again. We won't even complain - we recognize that it's our responsibility.

Some day in future generations or decades or centuries, the balance of power will shift away from the U.S., and oh how nice it will be for my descendants to sit around and lament all the decisions that some other major power has made - even if we are their ally and we reap all the same benefits. Quite a luxury sometimes when compared to the burden of responsibility.

Feel free to pick apart my grammar or typos if you would like. It really won't bother me. I have to throw that in because there is always somebody who enjoys making that a central point in a debate.

Didn't mean to write that long. Sorry mates...