quote:

Originally posted by Q5echo for the greater good. for securing definative knowledge. to take him and his heirs out of the greater Middle East peace equation. We did it for this. President's Remarks at the United Nations General Assembly September 12, 2002 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/rele...20020912-1.html If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will immediately and unconditionally forswear, disclose, and remove or destroy all weapons of mass destruction, long-range missiles, and all related material. If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will immediately end all support for terrorism and act to suppress it, as all states are required to do by U.N. Security Council resolutions. If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will cease persecution of its civilian population, including Shi'a, Sunnis, Kurds, Turkomans, and others, again as required by Security Council resolutions. If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will release or account for all Gulf War personnel whose fate is still unknown. It will return the remains of any who are deceased, return stolen property, accept liability for losses resulting from the invasion of Kuwait, and fully cooperate with international efforts to resolve these issues, as required by Security Council resolutions. If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will immediately end all illicit trade outside the oil-for-food program. It will accept U.N. administration of funds from that program, to ensure that the money is used fairly and promptly for the benefit of the Iraqi people. the greater good has not yet been achieved, but eventually opus, you will have to come to terms with this.

I never thought you'd attempt to take a more Utopian stance. I'll leave that can of worms for another time.

Since you're apt to be in repeat mode, I will do the same - I'm all in favor of ridding eeeevil on our planet, and I'm even in favor of doing so preemptively and unilaterally if necessary. This was never my argument. However, this WAS my argument:

quote:

Look, I’m not angered by the mere fact that we invaded Iraq and removed Saddam – of course we’re all better off by his removal. I AM angered on our methodology and expressed rationale in doing so - I AM angered by the circumvention and embellishment of intelligence to bolster a case for war to the public, press, and Congress, I AM angered by us taking our eye off of the piece of shit that actually DID attack us on our soil in order to prepare for war elsewhere, I AM angered by the fact that there was no clear reason why we rushed out UN inspectors and kept them from finishing their job (with all our guns pointed at Saddam’s head), and I AM angered by our Administration and Pentagon’s arrogance and negligence in creating a viable post-war plan. If you still do not understand my position at this point, I really don’t know what else to say.

If the argument was "for the greater good", so be it - that should have been our central premise in the first place. If it was for humanitarian reasons, so be it, that should have been our central or secondary premise in the first place.

You know as well as I that this simply wasn't the case - the central premise was because of an embellished threat, as the first line in your quote simply states. I resent that a great deal, despite the fact that the ends may or may not justify the means. I fucking hate being misled by anyone, let alone my own government. I resent the fact that we failed to capture the man who actually attacked us on our soil, and what's worse we seemingly gave up trying. I resent the fact that, even IF all evidence was sound and the means of invading Iraq was justifiable, we had no viable post-war plan. Our Administrative leaders in the Pentagon and Defense Dept. scoffed at such plans, and that is utterly sickening and incompetent.

I fear you will never come to terms with this, because you continue to justify to yourself that the ends will ALWAYS justify the means, regardless of what was told or how it was accomplished. I could never hold such an illogical position on any political matter, no matter which party I tend to sway towards.

___________________
Whence September dusk grows crisper still,
with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

i think its funny that you conservative guys never rebut opus arguments here! hmm why can that be

believe me, i already know you're mad that you feel mislead going to war with Iraq. in my opinion, the truth about liberating Iraq has always been there for the world to see i.e. the greater good for long term Middle East peace. most people saw it, including the nations that didn't want to do it, despite what the world thought about the presence of WMD's (and yes, the world thought he had them. it didn't take someone like Chalabi to convince anyone). truth be told, this administration honestly thought they were there in one form or another, but that was secondary to the "greater good" that being isolating Iran and Syria by taking and pacifying Afghanistan and Iraq. the "geater good" was unacheivable without that. my reasoning is not some revisionist pipedream in support for the war in Iraq when we couldn't find stockpiles of WMD's. i saw from the outset for what it actually was.

quote:

Originally posted by St_Andrew i think its funny that you conservative guys never rebut opus arguments here! hmm why can that be

you were saying? genius

quote:

Originally posted by Q5echo for the greater good. for securing definative knowledge. to take him and his heirs out of the greater Middle East peace equation.

Before this war Bush claimed that getting rid of Saddam would "deprive terrorist networks of a wealthy patron that pays for terrorist training, and offers rewards to families of suicide bombers,"... "Without this outside support for terrorism, Palestinians who are working for reform and long for democracy will be in a better position to choose new leaders." The logic works fine when you ignore the millions of dollars flowing in from oil producing states, cheifly the Saudis. You can read on that here + reasearch other articles.

http://www.time.com/time/world/arti...l#Anchor-4top45

As for your new reason for war in Iraq being "For the greater good..." Lord child are you kidding me?

Back in the late 90's Republicans were screaming at Clinton over the War in Kosovo being uneccesary.

Quotes from Floors of Congress:
May 4, 1999: Rep. Tom Delay (R-TX): "We have a President who I don't trust, who has proven my reasons for not trusting him: Had no plan. We have a civil war that was falsely described as a humanitarian problem, when in comparison to other places, it was nothing."

May 4, 1999: Senator Trent Lott (R-MS): "I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning. I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."

They seethed and complained while the troops were in harm's way and then voted to reduce war funds to $0. Luckily the Kosovo President gave up, signed a peace accord, and now sits arrested in The Hague for mass murder among other things. This was a war where we had many allies (including the Russians who blocked us in the UN). If I'm correct we lost less than 6 US soldiers in the whole war.

Fast forward to today's situation. You really mean to tell me that the Saddam's (nonexistent) links to Al-Queda weren't the point? The 500 (nonexistent)tons of fresh Anthrax, 38,000 (nonexistent) liters of fresh Botulinum toxin and 550 (nonexistent) fresh shells of VX/Nerve gas had nothing to do with it?

We sacrificed over $200 Billion dollars, got 8,956 people wounded and lost 1,217 soldiers, not because of an immenint threat to our National Security but "for the greater good"? I'll admit I'm furious because we buried the first Macon resident lost in the Iraq war LAST WEEKEND JUST OUTSIDE MY NEIGHBORHOOD. His 1yo son will only know his dad as a photo, an empty pair of shoes, and a grave site. Sadly 100's of kids are now in the same situation.

If a President Kerry or Gore had brought us to today's situation, not for an immediate National Security threat & changed the reasoning over and over till they stuck with "For The Greater Good" you'd be outside the White House right now with a lit torch.

Last edited by BigManwithaPlan on Nov-19-2004 at 04:15

quote:

Originally posted by BigManwithaPlan Before this war Bush claimed that getting rid of Saddam would "deprive terrorist networks of a wealthy patron that pays for terrorist training, and offers rewards to families of suicide bombers,"... "Without this outside support for terrorism, Palestinians who are working for reform and long for democracy will be in a better position to choose new leaders." The logic works fine when you ignore the millions of dollars flowing in from oil producing states, cheifly the Saudis. You can read on that here + reasearch other articles. http://www.time.com/time/world/arti...l#Anchor-4top45 As for your new reason for war in Iraq being "For the greater good..." Lord child are you kidding me? Back in the late 90's Republicans were screaming at Clinton over the War in Kosovo being uneccesary. Quotes from Floors of Congress: May 4, 1999: Rep. Tom Delay (R-TX): "We have a President who I don't trust, who has proven my reasons for not trusting him: Had no plan. We have a civil war that was falsely described as a humanitarian problem, when in comparison to other places, it was nothing." May 4, 1999: Senator Trent Lott (R-MS): "I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning. I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area." They seethed and complained while the troops were in harm's way and then voted to reduce war funds to $0. Luckily the Kosovo President gave up, signed a peace accord, and now sits arrested in The Hague for mass murder among other things. This was a war where we had many allies (including the Russians who blocked us in the UN). If I'm correct we lost less than 6 US soldiers in the whole war. Fast forward to today's situation. You really mean to tell me that the Saddam's (nonexistent) links to Al-Queda weren't the point? The 500 (nonexistent)tons of fresh Anthrax, 38,000 (nonexistent) liters of fresh Botulinum toxin and 550 (nonexistent) fresh shells of VX/Nerve gas had nothing to do with it? We sacrificed over $200 Billion dollars, got 8,956 people wounded and lost 1,217 soldiers, not because of an immenint threat to our National Security but "for the greater good"? I'll admit I'm furious because we buried the first Macon resident lost in the Iraq war LAST WEEKEND JUST OUTSIDE MY NEIGHBORHOOD. His 1yo son will only know his dad as a photo, an empty pair of shoes, and a grave site. Sadly 100's of kids are now in the same situation. If a President Kerry or Gore had brought us to today's situation, not for an immediate National Security threat but "For The Greater Good" you'd be outside the White House right now with a lit torch.

Kosovo Iraq apples oranges

to make Iraq what it needs to be for the future of the region. needed to be done. that sucks for those that have lost. impossible express my condolences in words, but we're gonna try to make this right. there are millions and millions of not just Americans or American soldiers, but Muslems as well, that believe what is being done is right. regardless of your anti-war beliefs or hatred for my president. those that think it is right are the ones making the most sacrifices for "the greater good". all i have to do to affirm my belief is think about those sacrifices first before i try to take anything away from their efforts.

quote:

If a President Kerry or Gore had brought us to today's situation, not for an immediate National Security threat but "For The Greater Good" you'd be outside the White House right now with a lit torch.

thats nice. what do you think i would be screaming as my the clothes melted to my skin?

quote:

Originally posted by BigManwithaPlan Fast forward to today's situation. You really mean to tell me that the Saddam's (nonexistent) links to Al-Queda weren't the point? The 500 (nonexistent)tons of fresh Anthrax, 38,000 (nonexistent) liters of fresh Botulinum toxin and 550 (nonexistent) fresh shells of VX/Nerve gas had nothing to do with it?

when did i say all those things and more didn't have anything to do with it?

if you mean when said the words "secondary" i meant it's use in it's most liberal extent. maybe i should have used "laterally"

I accept what you're saying RE: use of language. As for the amounts I picked those out of Colin Powell's speech to the UN, President Bush's State of The Union speech and other pre-war news reports.

or Tony Blair last week?

"When the Americans say we want to extend democracy to these countries, or extend democracy and human rights throughout the Middle East in the Greater Middle East Initiative, people say, well, that is part of the neoconservative agenda. Actually, if you put it in different language, it is a progressive agenda."

quote:

believe me, i already know you're mad that you feel mislead going to war with Iraq. in my opinion, the truth about liberating Iraq has always been there for the world to see i.e. the greater good for long term Middle East peace. most people saw it, including the nations that didn't want to do it, despite what the world thought about the presence of WMD's (and yes, the world thought he had them. it didn't take someone like Chalabi to convince anyone). truth be told, this administration honestly thought they were there in one form or another, but that was secondary to the "greater good" that being isolating Iran and Syria by taking and pacifying Afghanistan and Iraq. the "geater good" was unacheivable without that. my reasoning is not some revisionist pipedream in support for the war in Iraq when we couldn't find stockpiles of WMD's. i saw from the outset for what it actually was.

Well you’re certainly not the only one who recognized the true motives of this war – many Progressives and Independents also saw this as well. Christ, the PNAC 2000 document pretty much outlines this strategy verbatim:

http://www.newamericancentury.org/R...casDefenses.pdf

The difference between you and I, however, is that this philosophy doesn’t mesh very well with a great many individuals, including a number of true Republicans who can’t stand the neoconservative philosophy. But more specifically, my problems with such a philosophy of global hegemony in regards to our movement in Iraq and towards the Middle East are two-fold, the first we have already discussed:

1. Our Administration did everything they could to keep this philosophy under wraps. How so, you ask? Simple, examine the timeline of rationale for going to war-

a) Primary reason was always to disarm Saddam
-Since you yourself had attempted to defend this rationale but eventually had to concede to the ACTUAL reason (point c below), no more need be said here.

b) When primary reason slowly became suspect, Secondary reason became the primary reason: remove this evil dictator from power
-Though it's easy to combine these two, keep in mind that our Administration DID NOT do so - examine your Bush statement to the UN link as evidence
-The talk of finding and disarming WMD slowly dissapated and gave way to the humanitarian crisis taking place in late Spring - early Summer
-This was when Rummy started referring to the Iraqi people welcoming us with "open arms"

c) Though the Secondary rationale remained in the picture (as it should), the Tertiary reason slowly started to emerge from the Administration, which you and I agreed was the true primary rationale: global hegemony, or if you wanna play nice – “spread of democracy to the region”. If this was the true rationale, fine, so be it. I reiterate my problem with this, however –
-Why wasn’t this listed as the primary reason to begin with? Of course the most obvious answer that most agree with is because it NEVER would have been enough to win over Congress or the public. And that begs the question – why? Why wouldn’t that have won over Congress or the public? Perhaps because such a philosophy would not have outweighed the costs of war? And I’m not just speaking financial costs – political relations, killed individuals both military and especially innocents also play into the equation. I need not tell you this, at least I hope I wouldn’t. Bottom line is this simply wouldn’t have been enough.

-And that leads us to the crux of the problem – what did our Administration decide to do instead in order to win over Congress and the public? I believe we already discussed this: make it a threat to us, a REAL threat. So what better threat to have then the two most threatening possibilities?:
I. WMD pointed at our heads
II. Al Qaeda has ties to Saddam, and are one in the same

And what was the result of such threats?

Utter bullshit.

So if you still do not have a problem with our Administration as a result of bringing false threats and trumped up evidence in order to bolster their case for war, and to HIDE their actual motivation because they KNEW it would never sell in the first place, seriously Q5, I really don’t know what else to say at this point. If you honestly believe that such ends justify either blatantly lying or misleading Congress and the Public, and to top it all off have a piss-poor post-war plan, as well as take our eye off the true killer, the true genocidal maniac who truly attacked us, I simply don’t know how I or anyone else could get past such illogical bullshit.

Oh yeah, my second problem:

2. Who gave us the fucking right to play this “global cops” role in the first place? Who gave us the fucking moral right to invade countries, damn the supposed reasons, and spread our version of democracy in the first place? Who gave us the fucking right to pick and choose our allies and enemies in such a region where they are pretty much one in the same in terms of evil dictators and brutal bastards to their own people? Ever heard of that guy in Uzbekistan? Boiling his dissenters ‘till their brains fucking pop out of their skulls? How the fuck is he any different than Saddam? Oh, right –

HE WANTS TO DO BUSINESS WITH US!

So we slide him a nice little check of a cool coupla hundred million or so ($625 million wasn’t it?), have him agree to a pipeline, and all is kosher with that fucked up dictator, right?

If we are going to play such a role, the hypocrisy needed to be left on the porch before we walked in. That includes invasion of ALL evil dictatorships including Syria, N. Korea, Iran, yes Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan, and a slew of other countries too. We must carry this philosophy to its logical conclusion if we want to remain justified and valid to such a global role.

If it isn’t obvious from that aspect alone just how patently illogical we are, again I don’t know what else to say.

Second point – what are the consequences of such actions and have we looked past our arrogance to fully examine them?

Uh, no. One of the biggest rationales for our global spread of democracy of course is the necessity to stamp out global terrorism, i.e. Al Qaeda. This is a good goal to want to achieve, and EVERYONE shares the sentiment here – however people disagree as to what approach is the best means of stomping out global terrorism. Should we invade a country that harbored few terrorists at that time in order to set up shop (i.e. military bases) and put pressure on the neighboring countries that harbor terrorists? Well that seems to be the philosophy our Administration is following here, but the consequences are pretty clear:

a) A country that did not harbor Al Qaeda terrorists and their recruits are now flocking in as a result:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3746205.stm
http://www.anotheramerica.org/terrorist_recruitment.htm

And what’s worse, as a result of our arrogance, we have done exactly the opposite of what we wanted to achieve – global terrorism and recruitment is on the rise:

reorganized itself in Pakistan:
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/20107/

throughout the Philippines:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004...ain645089.shtml

And Experts believe new bases have been established in Yemen, Somalia, the Bangladesh-Myanmar border, and the Pankisi Valley between Georgia and Chechnya
http://csmonitor.com/2003/0521/p01s02-usgn.html

Of course Colin Powell had to correct himself and admit that terrorism was actually on the rise, instead of stating it has decreased:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004...ain614786.shtml

b) How “welcome” were those Iraqi “arms”? Again I think we know the obvious. The majority of Iraqis want us to get the hell out. Now whether or not that’s doable is not what I’m referring to (of course I think we need to stay and finish), it’s the Iraqi sentiment I am referring to. The surveys that have come out have clearly shown that the Iraqi citizens don’t want anything to do with our style and version of “democracy”. Can we honestly blame them, especially considering the destruction our battles towards those insurgents have brought, as well as the fact that these people have never known what a democracy is? Could it be that our version of democracy is not the only viable type of government for ALL regions across the globe? And speaking of insurgents:

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article...rticle_id=10233

I think it’s clear that given the fact that only 24 of the 1,000 or so caught Fallujah insurgents were foreign, what more need be said about the Iraqi sentiment and recruiting abilities of the insurgent movement?

c) For the sake of brevity as well as a sake of the obvious, how ‘bout our foreign relations with this entire mess? Thumbs up? Riiiiight.

Bottom line on point 2 – it’s backfiring in our fucking faces, and will continue to backfire so long as we continue to have our idealistic arrogance supercede reality. I cannot support a President or a political philosophy that cannot understand this point, nor can I understand anyone who support it either.

___________________
Whence September dusk grows crisper still,
with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

quote:

Originally posted by Q5echo or Tony Blair last week? "When the Americans say we want to extend democracy to these countries, or extend democracy and human rights throughout the Middle East in the Greater Middle East Initiative, people say, well, that is part of the neoconservative agenda. Actually, if you put it in different language, it is a progressive agenda."

Tony Blair, whether willingly or unwillingly is unknown at this point, is confusing the Progressive foreign policy with that of the Neocon foreign policy. I have yet to see any modern day Progressive that would believe an invasion into a dangerous region with the idealistic but unrealistic hope to spread democracy would be in line with a more Utopian global society. However, keep in mind that the neoconservative philosophy was ACTUALLY from the Democratic Party back in the 60's, and has slowly moved toward the Republican foreign (global hegemony) and domestic (increased governmental spending with no end in sight) agenda. There are a few Democrats that may be considered in line with the neocon philosophy, but it has been in ties with the Republican agenda primarily for it's current foreign policy and unmitigated military spending spree (of course it's currently justified with the present war needs).

But to couple the neocon agenda of global hegemony with the spread of humanitarianism is patently false and contradictory with our current actions. If this were the case, many MANY more countries are in need of our spread of democracy over Iraq, some I listed in my previous post. But the two areas that would certainly supercede Iraq if such a rationale existed in the neocon philosophy would be the Congo and Sudan.

And where's our asses in those areas?

___________________
Whence September dusk grows crisper still,
with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...