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-- Are you Patrioitc or a Benedict Arnold, this is what Republicans call American.
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Originally posted by BadBadNeil So the Iraqi insurgents who are setting off carbombs and other explosive devices in the city, killing more innocent iraqis than Americans have in the entire war, are they seen as martyrs as well? Is their cause just?

Obviously to other insurgents they are martyrs. Is their cause just in our eyes? No. In theirs? Yes. In their eyes, they are freeing their country from occupation troops and a puppet government. Luckily, modern America has never felt the force of an occupation army. I know what it's like to be living in an occupied land. I'm not, in any way, condoning what is going on in Iraq, but people have to understand why these insurgents are doing the things they do.

Great analogy, Yoepus. I'm beginning to think that Kerry's campaign will become a self-fulfilling prophecy, and vice versa.

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Originally posted by Shakka Great analogy, Yoepus. I'm beginning to think that Kerry's campaign will become a self-fulfilling prophecy, and vice versa.

Ya tnx. It just gets annoying people arguing about it, because this early on, it can be anyones game. Lefties (and righties) think to forget the score can change.

I won't critize the soldiers in Iraq, or the general of the troops anyworse than I would critize a coach or players of a team I am rooting for. I wish some people would show the same type of thinking with the troops as they do their favorite sports team.

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Originally posted by Yoepus At this point of the game its not a truth, its an opinion. Its as if team USA and team Iraq were on the basketball court and at the end of the first quarter Iraq was up 10 points. Kerry is saying Iraq is winning, there is no way in hell that team USA can win, its a catastrophe, might as well stop playing now before you get humilitated further. While Bush is saying its just the first quarter, Iraq has a good team, nobody thought this game would be easy. Give it sometime, have confidence in our players. Team USA is better, they'll win. ... Now if you were a player on Team USA, who would you prefer as a coach?

So we should wait until the situation is undeniably and indisputably an unmitigated disaster before we declare that things are going to deteriorate to become an unmitigated disaster? Hmmm sorry that doesn't fly with me. Kerry isn't saying there's no way the US can win so elect him and watch the catastrophy unfold under his watch as your basketball analogy implies. He's saying elect me, because the guy handling right now is incompetant and I can do better such that the situation doesn't unfold to becoming a catastrophy.

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Originally posted by Shakka Great analogy, Yoepus.

Are you kidding? If the basketball story should be an analogy, you would have to modify it somewhat like this:

"Two teams are playing, one of them the US national team, the other officially being Iraqi, but persistent rumours insists that players from all over the middle east are playing on it. The US team has a coach, George, who's good at agitating the Iraqi players by playing stupid and occasionally simply by being rude or arrogant to them. Most of the audience, however, believes that the real coaching power lies with a thin guy with glasses, Donald, sitting behind George.
The US team used to have fans all over the world, and even had people bringing water to the US players during breaks and rubbing the players shoulders when they hurt. In the past couple of years, however, Donald and George have regularly spat on the foreign fans, and nowadays only a few die-hard fans remain. Some US fans have found the behaviour of George and Donald a bit too much, and have raised the question as to whether the two ought to be replaced. The larger part of the audience did not take too kindly to this, though, and generally countered the criticism by accusing the sceptics of secretly being fans of the Iraqis. Naturally, this behaviour has eliminated most of the criticism of George and Donald, and the sceptics have either left the building or sits quietly in their seats mumbling to themselves.
On the court the US players are at their best behaviour although a series of incidents, where Iraqi players were forced into humiliating situations, have tarnished the image of the US player. Some say that the incidents were instigated by Donald, but George said that it wasn't so.
Unlike the US team, the Iraqi team has no coach, but a bunch of bearded men in the audience sometimes shout orders at the players, and they seem to be carried out. It is hard to tell, though, since the Iraqi team has no official member list. Oftentimes Iraqi fans will jump onto the court and score a few points before retreating to their seats. Likewise, at times an Iraqi player will declare himself to simply be a fan and then sit down in an available seat. Oddly, this happens mostly when the US is on the offensive.
Even though the meta game is highly unusual, it is really nothing compared to the weird rules of the basketball game itself: Whenever the US team scores a point, a number of Iraqi players disintegrates, but a bunch of the Iraqi audience immediately take the place of the lost ones. Whenever an Iraqi scores a goal, some random individual in the US audience dies. This is immediately followed by crying and whining from the audience members near the deceased.
These whiners often ask George why the match continues. George mostly ignores them, but sometimes he replies that continuation of the match is very important. Very important indeed. You see, the end goal is to make the Iraqis happy. When asked whether this basketball match really was the best way to make the Iraqis happy, George gets hazy and turns to Donald. Donald just smiles his secret smile..."

I contend that Kerry is right on point to accuse both Bush and Allawi of embellishing the Iraqi situation a bit. I would take it a step further and state that they are both lying through their teeth. The fucking absurdity of it all is becoming a little too obvious, and it's funny how the mainstream media has FINALLY begun to pick this up lately:

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Violence in Iraq Belies Claims of Calm, Data Show By Rajiv Chandrasekaran Washington Post Foreign Service Sunday, September 26, 2004; Page A01 BAGHDAD, Sept. 25 -- Less than four months before planned national elections in Iraq, attacks against U.S. troops, Iraqi security forces and private contractors number in the dozens each day and have spread to parts of the country that had been relatively peaceful, according to statistics compiled by a private security firm working for the U.S. government. Attacks over the past two weeks have killed more than 250 Iraqis and 29 U.S. military personnel, according to figures released by Iraq's Health Ministry and the Pentagon. A sampling of daily reports produced during that period by Kroll Security International for the U.S. Agency for International Development shows that such attacks typically number about 70 each day. In contrast, 40 to 50 hostile incidents occurred daily during the weeks preceding the handover of political authority to an interim Iraqi government on June 28, according to military officials. Reports covering seven days in a recent 10-day period depict a nation racked by all manner of insurgent violence, from complex ambushes involving 30 guerrillas north of Baghdad on Monday to children tossing molotov cocktails at a U.S. Army patrol in the capital's Sadr City slum on Wednesday. On maps included in the reports, red circles denoting attacks surround nearly every major city in central, western and northern Iraq, except for Kurdish-controlled areas in the far north. Cities in the Shiite Muslim-dominated south, including several that had undergone a period of relative calm in recent months, also have been hit with near-daily attacks. In number and scope, the attacks compiled in the Kroll reports suggest a broad and intensifying campaign of insurgent violence that contrasts sharply with assessments by Bush administration officials and Iraq's interim prime minister that the instability is contained to small pockets of the country. Speaking with President Bush at the White House on Thursday, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said the security situation in Iraq was "good for elections to be held tomorrow" in 15 of the country's 18 provinces. Elections for a national assembly are scheduled for January. Allawi told Washington Post reporters and editors on Friday that "for now the only place which is not really that safe is Fallujah, downtown Fallujah. The rest, there are varying degrees. Some -- most -- of the provinces are really quite safe." The Kroll reports are based on nonclassified data provided by U.S.-led military forces, the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, private security companies working in Iraq and nongovernmental organizations. The reports, which Kroll has refused to distribute to journalists, were provided to The Post by a person on the list to receive them. They cover the period of Sept. 13 through Sept. 22 -- but do not include Sept. 15, 18 or 19, for which reports were not available. To many natives and foreigners living in Iraq, the portrait of progress that Allawi painted during his trip to Washington does not depict reality. After his speech to a joint meeting of Congress on Thursday, Allawi described Baghdad as "very good and safe." In fact, during the period for which security reports were available, the number of attacks in the capital averaged 22 a day. On Wednesday, there were 28 separate hostile incidents in Baghdad, including five rocket-propelled grenade attacks, six roadside bombings and a suicide bombing in which a car exploded at a National Guard recruiting station, killing at least 11 people and wounding more than 50. "People are very naive if they think Baghdad is safe," said Falah Ahmed, 26, a cigarette vendor in center city. A nearby tailor, Hisham Nuaimi, 52, said Allawi "is either deceiving himself or the Americans." "What do you call a city with a car bomb every day?" he said. "Is this the security they are achieving?" At the same time, however, the city retains an air of normalcy. Motorists clog the roads during rush hour. Markets bustle with shoppers. Restaurants fill up with lunchtime customers. In his remarks Thursday, Allawi did not specify the three provinces he deemed insecure, nor did he specify what he meant when he contended that violence in those provinces had been limited to "certain pockets." But since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Baghdad and three of the country's largest and most populous provinces -- Anbar in the west, Salahuddin to the north and Babil to the south -- have been the principal hotbeds of insurgent violence. And according to the Kroll reports, recent violence appears to have been widespread rather than limited. On Wednesday, for instance, attacks in Salahuddin province occurred in Taji, Balad, Tikrit, Samarra, Baiji, Thuliyah and Dujayl -- the seven largest population centers in the area. Moreover, the security reports indicate that a majority of the hostile acts committed against U.S. and Iraqi security forces over the past two weeks have occurred outside those three provinces. For example, the cities of Amarah in the southern province of Maysan and Samawah in Muthanna province, also in the south, had long been relatively free of violence but are now experiencing frequent attacks, the reports indicate. There also has been an unusual spike in the number of attacks to the north of the capital. More attacks have been reported in the northern cities of Mosul, Samarra and Tikrit over the past two weeks than in Fallujah and Ramadi, two areas of frequent fighting in Anbar. Military officials contend, however, that does not mean the restive areas west of Baghdad -- the area known as the Sunni Triangle -- are no longer insurgent strongholds. The likely explanation, the officials said, is that U.S. Marines stationed in Anbar have sharply reduced their patrolling, making them less vulnerable to roadside attacks. But that strategy, officials say, has allowed insurgent cells to expand in the province. "There are fewer attacks here because we're out on the road less," an officer at the Marine headquarters near Fallujah said on condition of anonymity. "But you shouldn't conclude from that that things are any safer." As news reports have detailed over the past several months, the insurgents' campaign of violence is not limited to U.S. and Iraqi security forces. Iraqi civilians working for the interim government have been killed and kidnapped. So, too, have Iraqis who work as interpreters and truck drivers for the U.S. military. Foreign civilians, even aid workers and fellow Arabs, are regarded as fair game by the insurgents. The security situation has grown so dire that many of the few remaining nongovernmental aid organizations left in Iraq are making plans to withdraw. The United Nations, which was supposed to help organize the national elections, has just 30 employees in the country, all of whom are quartered in the U.S.-controlled, fortified Green Zone. Foreign journalists, who used to roam the country, are now largely restricted by safety concerns to Baghdad hotels surrounded with concrete walls and barbed wire. With insurgents targeting not just U.S. troops but seemingly everyone in the country -- Iraqi security forces, Iraqis working for the interim government, foreign contractors, journalists, aid workers and others -- it is difficult for even ordinary Iraqis to ignore the threat. "When we leave home, we never know if we're going to return home alive or not," said Mohammed Kadhim, a taxi driver. � 2004 The Washington Post Company http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy...004Sep25_2.html

Colin Powell joins Kerry in the "unpatriotic Benedict Arnold who emboldens terrorists" club:

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Powell: Situation in Iraq 'Getting Worse' Mon Sep 27, 8:16 AM ET Add White House - AP Cabinet & State to My Yahoo! By LAURA MECKLER, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) sees the situation in Iraq (news - web sites) "getting worse" as planned elections approach, and the top U.S. military commander for Iraq says he expects more violence ahead. Their comments Sunday followed a week in which President Bush (news - web sites) and Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi spoke optimistically about the situation despite the beheadings of two more Americans and the deaths of dozens of people in car bombings. In its latest report, the military said four Marines died in separate incidents Friday, adding to a toll that has topped 1,000 since the U.S.-led invasion. Powell said the insurgency is only becoming more violent as planned January elections near. "It's getting worse," he said on ABC's "This Week." "They are determined to disrupt the election. They do not want the Iraqi people to vote for their own leaders in a free, democratic election." Army Gen. John Abizaid, commander of U.S. troops in the Middle East, warned that voting may not be possible in parts of Iraq where the violence is too intense. "I don't think we'll ever achieve perfection and when we look for perfection in a combat zone we're going to be sadly disappointed," he said on NBC's "Meet the Press." Abizaid compared the situation in Iraq to the disputed U.S. presidential election in 2000 that put George W. Bush in the White House following a protracted Florida ballot fight that ended up in the Supreme Court. "I don't think Iraq will have a perfect election. And if I recall, looking back at our own election four years ago, it wasn't perfect either," he said. The goal in Iraq is to have successful voting in the "vast majority of the country," said Abizaid, who leads the U.S. Central Command. "We're going to have to fight our way all the way through elections," he said, "and there'll be a lot of violence between now and then." Abizaid spoke of a major offensive before the election, with U.S. and Iraqi forces doing "whatever's necessary to bring areas in Iraq under Iraqi control." Powell offered a road map to the coming offensive. He said the military likely will tackle the Sunni Triangle cities of Ramadi and Samarra before attempting to restore order in nearby Fallujah, which he called "the tough one." "We don't like the situation in Fallujah," Powell said on CNN's "Late Edition." "The other ones, I think, are more manageable," he added. "Ramadi and Samarra, I think we'll get those back under control, and then we'll have to deal with Fallujah." Powell said planning is under way for an Iraqi conference, possibly next month in Jordan or Egypt, of the world's leading industrialized nations and regional powers, including Iran and Syria. "This was a way to reach out to Iraq's immediate neighbors and persuade them that this is the time to help Iraq, so that the region can become stable," he said. Including the Group of Eight economic powers, Powell said, "adds a little bit more oomph to the conference" and brings in nations that could contribute "more in the way of resources." U.S. officials have expressed conflicting opinions about whether security will enable all Iraqis to vote in January. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told Congress on Friday that the elections must be held throughout the country, including areas gripped by violence. But Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that if insurgents prevent Iraqis from voting in some areas, a partial vote would be better than none at all. Asked about Rumsfeld's comments, Powell repeated the State Department's assertion that all Iraqis must have the chance to vote if the election is to be credible. "You know, there will be polling stations that are shot at," he said. "There will be insurgents who will still be out there who will try to keep people from voting." "But I think what we have to keep shooting for and what is achievable is to give everybody the opportunity to vote in the upcoming election, to make the election fully credible, and something that will stand the test of the international community's examination."

Why do Kerry and Powell hate America and freedom???

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