Who watched the debate?

[mr_gyptian]

Any comparrison between WWII and the current war in Iraq is absurd. If I remember correctly, Kerry didn't mention anything about us declaring war on Germany after Pearl Harbor, we declared war on Japan. We never declared war on Germany in WWII, Germany declared war on us after we did to Japan. I cannot see how anyone can possibly think that the war in Iraq has anything to do with terrorism, there was no connection, there were no terrorists in Iraq under Hussien, and he was absolutely no threat whatsoever to the United States of America, never has been, never would have been/will be.

The world is a much, much more dangerous place after the war in Iraq, Iraq has become a breeding ground and safe haven for terrorists that did not exsist 3 years ago. Anyone who says that America and the world are safer without Saddam around has their heads up their asses. Ok, so maybe Kuwait and Israel are a bit safer, who cares. It isn't our job to protect those nations and police the planet. Making some Jews and Kuwait [slightly] safer is no way shape or form worth 1100+ American lives (and counting) and hundreds of billions of dollars. The war in Iraq was wrong for America and the world, and George W. Bush is so horribly wrong for this country and the world that it isn't even funny. The man needs to go, plain and simple.

And _gyptian, Germany was trying to develop Nuclear Weapons, or as you beloved moron-in-chief says "nucular" weapons. Germany and Japan were a threat to humanity and the entire world, Saddam posed little threat to anyone.

This was before your time and I was still but a young lad, but look up Leon Klinghoffer(sic).

There were terrorists in Iraq, namely Abu Abbas and Abu Nidal. You can read the 9/11 commission report. Iraq did have connections with Al Qaeda, but those connections did not lead up to 9/11. This is the disconnect. You do not believe that we should go after all terrorists regardless of their involvement in 9/11. I do. People like you were offended by W's, "You're either with us or against us..." speach.

The reason I brought up WWII is that, once again freedom is faced with a challenge. Do we let Islamofascism reign and fester in the Middle East or do we affect change. I support change in the Middle East.

glade, if you don't see terrorism as a threat to us that is fine. I hope you never have to experience it.

I spent a month in Tower 2 for training. My bond rep at Morgan Stanley died that day. My mutual fund rep barely escaped. The kid whose desk was in front of mine hauled ass down 61 floors and escaped.

Glade your arguments are always sound. Keep it up. High school must bore the shit out of you.

[shamrockpow]

There is a huge difference between preemptive war and PREVENTIVE war. In 1967 Israel attacked first, but that was a preemptive war b/c Egypt and Syria had troops massed on the border for an invasion. Preventive war seeks to stamp out a threat before it can seriously challenge you. This is much closer to what the Bush administration had in mind for Iraq. The problem with this thinking (as well as the very IDEALIST/LIBERAL thinking that bringing democracy to Iraq will eliminate any future threat) is that it could have been applied to a number of other places.

Its easy to act the tough guy once, but you face a number of issues after throwing the first punch:
1. You announce that we need to stop countries before they acquire WMDs. This encourages countries like NK to speed production of nuclear weapons, hoping they will be a detterrant against invasion.
2. Once somebody else slugs you back (and that is whats happening in Iraq) you lose some of that tough guy reputation.
3. You simply can't fight every battle. Iran now says that if the US or Israel seeks to bomb their nuclear facilities they will preemptively respond by attacking American forces in the Gulf stationed within range of their defenses. Probably they're full of shit, but any sane person can recognize there is no way to deal with even ONE more threat militarily, let alone leaving us resources to accomplish "good" in the world (like in Darfur).

Go back a few years and you'll see a lot of people (like me) who thought Saddam probably could be a long-term threat, but needed to see a better plan in place b/f going to war. And yes, a better plan would have included at least 2x as many troops, more Arabic speakers, well-defined prewar objectives, better funding sources, and a dozens of other points that should have been raised. I remember a professor of mine (who was Turkish, but had lived in Jordan for much of his life) who AGREED that a democracy in Iraq would be a great thing for the Arab world and the US saying that he thought the chances of the US succeeding with help were less than 25% and once they faced complete worldwide opposition, more like one in ten.

One of the Bush administrations favorite defenses is "well, we;re human and people make mistakes." The thing is that most people have to be held accountable for their mistakes, especially if they were mistakes that their opposition said had a high probability of happening. Bush and co. refuse to sack up and take responsibility and that alone is what bothers me more than anything else about those people.

Here's what Kenneth Pollack had to say about the issue (and he was always one of the people pushing to remove Saddam:
"Some defenders of the Administration have reportedly countered that all it did was make the best possible case for war, playing a role similar to that of a defense attorney who is charged with presenting the best possible case for a client (even if the client is guilty). That is a false analogy. A defense attorney is responsible for presenting only one side of a dispute. The President is responsible for serving the entire nation. Only the Administration has access to all the information available to various agencies of the U.S. government—and withholding or downplaying some of that information for its own purposes is a betrayal of that responsibility."

[mr_gyptian]

You're right, W is a hack compared to FDR. He is nowhere near bold enough to try and pack the supreme court to achieve his domestic agenda. Some of you would say W did things like what the Pendergasts did in Missouri for FDR. But W certainly didn't pick his VP for his ability to win FL. FDR said many times over that he wouldn't commit troops to Europe. But Pearl Harbor changed that. and then he attacked Germany? I guess the first six sovereign nations didn't stack up as a cause for war.

I'm not questioning why we went to war against Germany. I do however take issue with why we waited until June 6, 1944 to confront Germany. 6 million jews might also question our delay...if they could.

[mr_gyptian]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/02/in...gin&oref=login

I can't remember who asked, but the 260,000 per year dying in Iraq under Hussein originally came from a WaPo article I read in the fall of 2002. I can't find it.

you can go to the WHO web site to check figures. 5000 children per month were dying under Hussein.

Reuters(it makes me sick to use this source) claims 1.4 million perished under Hussein's rule. They blame our sanctions. The link above details that fallacy. The UN Oil for Food scandal is going to cost Kofi his job very soon.

[mr_gyptian]

Sham,

read Mr. Pollack's book which came out in the fall of 2002. Few people supported an Iraq war more than he did.

as far as slugging back. we could raze these cities like Samarra or Falluja, but we did not. Or maybe we should and be be blamed like Israel for a "Jenin Massacre". A massacre that was not.

[SLCFreshies]

You're right, W is a hack compared to FDR. He is nowhere near bold enough to try and pack the supreme court to achieve his domestic agenda. Some of you would say W did things like what the Pendergasts did in Missouri for FDR. But W certainly didn't pick his VP for his ability to win FL. FDR said many times over that he wouldn't commit troops to Europe. But Pearl Harbor changed that. and then he attacked Germany? I guess the first six sovereign nations didn't stack up as a cause for war.

I'm not questioning why we went to war against Germany. I do however take issue with why we waited until June 6, 1944 to confront Germany. 6 million jews might also question our delay...if they could.

Do you HONESTLY think GWB is on par with FDR? Are you kidding me? You're alluding that you do, so please clearly state for all of us that you think GWB is a better president than FDR. Or else stop with the insinuations.

Was FDR perfect? No. No one is perfect. Your beloved W said before the 2000 election that he did not want America to go "nation building," and what the fuck are we doing now in Iraq and Afghanistan? And GWB isn't packing the federal courts with his buddies, some of whom don't even have law licenses? If those are your litmus tests for presidential excellence, GWB fails on all accounts too. But to compare a true leader, like FDR, to a witless hack, like GWB, who cannot convince half the country and all of the world what he is doing on the war on terror is right, is blasphemy.

And although you are not "questioning" why we went to war in Germany, you made the assertion that Germany had nothing to do with Japan and Pearl Harbor, an assertion that was untrue. There was nowhere NEAR the operational cooperation between Iraq and al-Qaeda that there was among the Axis powers. Plus, you still haven't explained why it we NEEDED to deal with Iraq NOW and why we couldn't have waited until AFTER we cleaned up Afghanistan and caught Osama. Instead you shirked the subject and made your usual irrelevant, glib remarks.

[shamrockpow]

1.4 million perished under Hussein's rule? Since 1979? And does that include the 300,000 Iraqis that died in the Iran-Iraq war? Does it include the 500,000 Iranians? 260,000 is worse than fuzzy math, it's just plain wrong. But I guess if you heard it "somewhere" than go ahead and use it. Deceiving people is something that our president sets an example with.

And yes, I did read the book ("he was always one of the people pushing to remove Saddam"). Pollack and the CIA's analysis shows how difficult these situations can be. Where should the standard or "burden of proof" be? And even if proven to said standard: how to act? My main problem is that even if Saddam did meet that standard, Bush and co. acted in a really shady way to start the war, didn't get the kind of support that any reasonable analysis said we would need, and didn't listen to the advice given by their own planners as far as post-war ops are concerned b/c there were too many unknowns.

PS: Blurred, you're slipping. How could the US create WW3 by going into Pakistan when Ronald Reagan already won that war???

[shamrockpow]

as far as slugging back. we could raze these cities like Samarra or Falluja, but we did not. Or maybe we should and be be blamed like Israel for a "Jenin Massacre". A massacre that was not.

I was reffering to getting slugged after throwing the first punch (the 1000+ dead, plus 150+ private contractors, plus 1000s of injured/maimed). But you raise an interesting point: we've gotten ourselves involved in a war where we're afraid to fully push our greatest advantage (military might) b/c of political reprecussions - sound familiar? Guess GWB really is determined to repudiate everything his father did, including "kicking the Vietnam syndrome once and for all."

[natty dread]

speaking of facts. again, Kerry apparently pronounced each and every word correctly. again, facts become hard.
John Kerry on Thursday evening:

I wasn't talking about thursday night dood, I was talking about BE's reference to my post as propaganda and his inability to refute the facts I listed in my post that contradict the perception that Bush is a "good guy." Maybe you should take a stab at it.

[mr_gyptian]

FDR was trying to pack the Supreme Court, not appointing judges to the federal judiciary. big difference.

We waited five years to take out Saddam. It was 1998 under Clinton that regime change in Iraq became our national policy. I thought you'd know that.

George Tenet said the WMD's were a slam dunk. There wasn't an inteligence agency in the world that did not believe Iraq had them.

Also, our reasoning for going into Iraq was not just WMD. Kerry said the other day that Bush had 23 different reasons. It was meant as a slight. Some people would call it building a case. But read this testimony given by an Iraqi woman to the British House of Commons last week. To the Iraqi's it was not about WMD's.

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3567029

If I had the time to mine the WaPo's fucking website for the 260,000 figure I would. But the 1.4 million figure can be found on Google and the time period is from the Gulf War ceasefire until 2002. 5000 kids a month starving alone is reason enough for intervention. Mind you these kids weren't hungry, they were dying. That is my litmus. maybe you have more stringent requirements.

Natty, I took you out of context. my apologies.

Sham, I actually think that what we did was a stroke of brilliance. There are quite a few pundits that think W blinked. What is happening in Falluja and Samarra is now the citizenry are tired of what these terrorists/insurgents are doing to them. We along with Iraqi police and soldiers retook Samarra yesterday. We didn't have to raze the city to do it.

Who is to say it's the right or perfect way. It's fucking war, right and perfect aren't really attainable. Look how many things went wrong on D-Day and how many died. However, it was deemed a resounding success. not a quagmire. There isn't a scorecard or a playbook.

Colin Powell always talking about not entering into a war without a defined exit strategy is bullshit. No one can ever tell what the hell is going to go on if and when the last shot is fired. It is impossible. You do the best you can per the situation. that is it.

It's a huge question how do you leave a war?

Do you leave right away and charge the offending nation reparations, i.e. Versailles?

Or do you stay and copy the Marshall Plan(it took more than five years)?

I'll take the latter. There is obviously more skin in the latter, but Germany's never going to be called imperialist again.

[lemon boy]

ooooh mr_g

you give me the shivers tossing stuff around like that.

copying the marshall plan? copying it is at best wolfie's mastabatory fantasy.

yes, I am just beating you up on simplistic definitional stuff

[hot_sauce]

ok my lazy ass will just copy and paste a couple of thoughts I posted on another forum:

as an unbiased observer it seemed like Kerry was getting stomped at certain times (disregarding the fact that everything Bush was saying was false, which doesn't seem to matter cause no one will call him on it, including Kerry). Bush had the timing lights down and managed to end on a strong final statement often. Also it seems Bush's speaking skills have improved somewhat- ok so he's no master of the English language, but he can think on his feet and I really don't think he's as dumb as we all tend to give him credit for.

With careful scrutiny I was able to discern two actual, real, concrete policy differences. As Kerry stated he feels nuclear proliferation is the greatest threat facing America, and for some odd reason he feels that the U.S. starting programs to develop new "bunker busting" nukes which would be intended for actual use (as opposed to the ones intended just to fuck up the environment and make defense contractors rich) sends the wrong message to the world when we are telling other countries that they have to disarm or that since they don't already have nuclear weapons they have no right to develop them. He said he would end Bush's program immediately. hmmm... I can't remember the second one right now, but I swear there was one.

[mr_gyptian]

LB, I was just giving examples. Obviously there are plenty of different ways.

But not two such markedly different approaches to the same country.

I honestly think I'll be old and gray before we are ever out of the Middle east. I suffer no illusions about exit strategies.

what gave you the shivers, my generally sunny disposition?

[hot_sauce]

Some follow up after a night to sleep on it:

since this was the debate on Iraq and foreign policy I noticed there were a few things missing from the discussion (besides other candidates)

at least several of the people who called in to cnn after the debates complained about the questions, and some said they were softball questions. I have to wonder who is this Jim Lehrer that he gets to choose all the questions and whether there should be a 30 sec follow-up rebuttal, and doesn't that in a way, make him more influential than the candidates themselves? I mean this guy has to have an opinion and he's gonna go vote and pick between one of these two candidates so how can you have a panel of 1 asking the questions and expect that to be fair and informative to the voters. But one question I thought was very direct and to the point (and worth hearing the answer to, since I hadn't heard it before) was this:

"What is your position on the whole concept of preemptive war?
Kerry:

The president always has the right, and always has had the right, for preemptive strike. That was a great doctrine throughout the Cold War. And it was always one of the things we argued about with respect to arms control.

No president, through all of American history, has ever ceded, and nor would I, the right to preempt in any way necessary to protect the United States of America (by which I mean the profit margins of our multinational corporations operating in poor third world countries<-- Ok so that's not really part of the quote).

But if and when you do it, Jim, you have to do it in a way that passes the test, that passes the global test where your countrymen, your people understand fully why you're doing what you're doing and you can prove to the world that you did it for legitimate reasons.

Here we have our own secretary of state who has had to apologize to the world for the presentation he made to the United Nations.

I mean, we can remember when President Kennedy in the Cuban missile crisis sent his secretary of state to Paris to meet with DeGaulle. And in the middle of the discussion, to tell them about the missiles in Cuba, he said, "Here, let me show you the photos." And DeGaulle waved them off and said, "No, no, no, no. The word of the president of the United States is good enough for me."

How many leaders in the world today would respond to us, as a result of what we've done, in that way? So what is at test here is the credibility of the United States of America and how we lead the world. And Iran and Iraq are now more dangerous -- Iran and North Korea are now more dangerous.

Now, whether preemption is ultimately what has to happen, I don't know yet. But I'll tell you this: As president, I'll never take my eye off that ball. I've been fighting for proliferation the entire time -- anti-proliferation the entire time I've been in the Congress. And we've watched this president actually turn away from some of the treaties that were on the table.

You don't help yourself with other nations when you turn away from the global warming treaty, for instance, or when you refuse to deal at length with the United Nations.

You have to earn that respect. And I think we have a lot of earning back to do.

So we know clearly where he stands, but an even more interesting follow up question would be: "Does the right to engage in pre-emptive attacks belong to every country or is it only the United States that has the special right to engage in pre-emptive war? Or maybe just the United States and a few others like, say Great Britain and Israel too. Would the same countries that have the right to have nuclear weapons be the only ones with the right to pre-emptive war?"

Hypothetically speaking, since the Bush administration has made its position very clear on not wanting to allow the democratically elected president of Venezuala, Hugo Chavez, to finish his term (coming damn close to getting him executed in the failed US backed coup of 2002, and continuing with various efforts to this day). Should Chavez have started dropping bombs on the white house and pentagon?... but wait, what if Venezuala had so called "smart bombs", but they somehow went astray and blew up all the n****rs in the ghettos of S.E. DC instead, and managed to take out our major water treatment facilities too? Would that make any difference? What if in the process of the attack our cities and countryside, were strewn with debris from ammo made from Uranium-238 nuclear waste that is deadly toxic both as a heavy metal (i.e. lead, mercury) and due to radiation that would remain toxic for a few million (or is it billion? or does it matter?) years. What if there were a multi-billion dollar aid package to rebuild America that all went to Venezualan corporations while our hospitals, struggling to deal with drastic increases in childhood leukemia, gross birth defects and the other kinds of epidemics that can occur when the entire infrastructure of a country is destroyed, were left in ruins without access to clean water or basic medical supplies) This is all hypothetical of course, nothing like that could ever happen among the nations of the "civilized world"

What about Haiti? Should the democratically elected president Aristide have launched a pre-emptive attack on the U.S. to try to save his country from the successful Bush Administration backed coup?

Next, as we heard approximately 17 times from Bush, Saddam Hussein (WMD's or not) was a "grave threat" and the world is safer now that we're on the job of "promoting democracy" and "spreading freedom".

Now we all know Kerry is much smarter than Bush and he must have some smart people working on his campaign too. Did it not occur to any of them that Kerry could ask what "imminent threat" Haiti- the poorest nation in the western hemisphere- posed to the United States of America? What "grave danger" did president Hugo Chavez pose to the nation whose military budget makes up something like 48% of combined worldwide defense expenditures? It didn't occur to Kerry (or anyone in his camp) to ask what Bush was doing to "spread freedom" and "promote democracy" in other parts of the world? I find that hard to believe... yeah I know all the media attention is on Iraq and nobody gives a fuck about Haiti anyway, but this was the Foreign Policy debate

Lastly, we went through the entire debate on Iraq and not once did anyone mention the words Abu Gharib or Torture. How many times did Bush insist that invading Iraq has made us safer? It didn't occur to anyone to ask how we were made safer by rounding up a huge array of people in a country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks and trying to get some (non-existent) information out by torturing them, having a huge scandal come out that could only encourage much wider spread support for the claims of religious zealots that America is the "Great Satan", then saying oops we'll release a bunch of the ones who aren't actually suspected of anything so they can go home and tell all their friends and families how they were treated, and in the meantime continue doing the same thing in other prisons throughout Iraq as well as Cuba. To quote the CIA's own expert on Islam who was sent down to Guantanamo to try and find out why no good intelligence was coming out of there: "anyone here who was not a member of Al Qaeda is now"

I mean, maybe Kerry didn't want to go on the offensive on this and sound too critical of the U.S. troops (or private mercenaries), but Bush was the one who tried to dis Kerry for suggesting that the U.S. should join the International Criminal Court (ooh, ooh, maybe that was the second real concrete policy difference I couldn't remember earlier, although Kerry didn't say that, Bush said Kerry said it) where "unnacountable lawyers and judges could prosecute our people for war crimes" At that point it didn't occur to the intelligent Kerry to ask "Why this undue paranoia about U.S. citizens being prosecuted for war crimes?". I for one am sure that it couldn't have anything to do with internal memos from Bush Administration lawyers to the White House and Department of Defense stating that, the president could legally disregard both domestic and international law and order the torture of detainees since the power to set aside the law is "inherent in the President". <-- ah hah! now I'm beginning to understand what "promoting democracy" and "spreading freedom" is all about and I'm even getting misty eyed remembering the good ole days of democracy in 1940's Germany and Russia and I hold high hopes that we'll get to see that kind of strength and resolve develop further in our own democracy during the next 4 years. Viva Bush! Interestinly enough these same memos made clear that the U.S. Anti-Torture Statute did not apply to prisoners in Guantanamo since the law only applies to U.S. citizens operating in other countries and Guantanamo is part of the United States... and as has been clearly stated by the administration all along the detainees in Guantanamo have absolutely none of the legal rights garanteed under our justice system because Guantanamo is not on U.S. soil. <--- it's this type of simple straightforward reasoning that the unqualified and unnacountable lawyers of the international criminal court probably wouldn't understand, but that's why we have to show the world who's boss: "I just think trying to be popular, kind of, in the global sense, if it's not in our best interest (by which I mean the profit margins of our multinational corporations operating in poor third world countries<-- Ok so that's not really part of the quote) makes no sense." -Bush

hah, I didn't get involved in this non-skiing-related-political thread until page 6, and the thread was already at the top of page 1... it's not my fault I swear!

[hot_sauce]

What did you think?


You already know I despise Bush's policies, but I never miss a chance to hear what he or those who support him have to say. I guess I am a masochist(sp?). But I wonder who else follows both sides of the debate, and then forms an opinion.


1) Did you watch the debate?

2) Did it affect your opinion of the candidates in any way, shape or form?

3) Do you get your news from a variety of sources?

4) Would you rather have 24 inches of 4% density snow or 10% density snow?

now to the original questions

Yes, every minute, and I'm glad I did even though I was considering saying fuck-it I know what these guys are about already

Barely, the good cop, bad cop analogy still holds very well

everything from the O'Reilly factor (although I feel guilty about boosting his ratings by one tv) to Democracy Now! (oddly enough Amy Goodman doesn't tell people to shut up, cut thier mic off, scream at them, and delete or edit away their segment of the show when she doesn't like the point they make... oh so bland, creating a need to rely on the important information presented to make the show interesting) to the Project for a New American Century official report to www.gregpalast.com. Gotta know your friends and your enemies. Even caught 20/20 which I haven't seen in a while last night- fascinating story on Neil Bush, family business (and what family values means to the Bush Clan in real world terms). Let's just say it shouldn't take over 5 seconds to answer a simple yes or no question, or to recall whether the random person that showed up at your hotel room door in Hong Kong, with whom you proceeded to have sex, was or was not a woman<-- you gotta save those I don't recalls for when they're really needed silly . And it shouldn't take half a minute to state what services you provide for a company you "co-chair" that pays you millions before you say "uh, er, miscellaneous consulting services... like uh, the other co-chairman would call me sometimes and ask for advice), and a piece on how substantively the format of the debates has changed over the past few election cycles (remember Ross Perot in the '92 debates and again in the '96... oh wait nevermind). Overall though, the internet offers much better options for substantive reporting than TV. When you get both sides of the story you should be able to sort the truth out for yourself or at least sort out your own opinions from an informed perspective... people who fear even hearing the other side of an issue argued must subconsciously know that their side is weak.

Depends on the existing base

[SLCFreshies]

George Tenet said the WMD's were a slam dunk. There wasn't an inteligence agency in the world that did not believe Iraq had them.

Hmm, how about our OWN intelligence agency was not so sure that they had them. Everybody thinks reading intelligence is like reading a book. But if you come in with preconceived notions or come in with an agenda, you are obviously going to skew your intelligence analysis to come to the results that you seek. Don't take my word for it. Take the word of the Senate Intelligence Committee and read the following article. And this is not the only indication of this happening. MANY accounts have shown that this administration was OBVIOUSLY stovepiping intelligence, bypassing the usual intelligence analysis, and putting forth half-truths as "fact" that Saddam was reconstituting his WMD program. Why? Because they wanted to go into Iraq no matter what. It was NEVER about truth. it was about doing what was necessary to convince the American public and the world that we had to go into Iraq NOW--even if that meant HIDING the truth.

How the White House Embraced Disputed Iraqi Arms Intelligence.

And George Tenet and slam dunk? Isn't this the same guy running the CIA during one of the largest failures in intelligence history, 9/11? This is a guy you'd listen to about "slam dunks?"

[hot_sauce]

Hmm, how about our OWN intelligence agency was not so sure that they had them. Everybody thinks reading intelligence is like reading a book. But if you come in with preconceived notions or come in with an agenda, you are obviously going to skew your intelligence analysis to come to the results that you seek. Don't take my word for it. Take the word of the Senate Intelligence Committee and read the following article. And this is not the only indication of this happening. MANY accounts have shown that this administration was OBVIOUSLY stovepiping intelligence, bypassing the usual intelligence analysis, and putting forth half-truths as "fact" that Saddam was reconstituting his WMD program. Why? Because they wanted to go into Iraq no matter what. It was NEVER about truth. it was about doing what was necessary to convince the American public and the world that we had to go into Iraq NOW--even if that meant HIDING the truth.

How the White House Embraced Disputed Iraqi Arms Intelligence.

And George Tenet and slam dunk? Isn't this the same guy running the CIA during one of the largest failures in intelligence history, 9/11? This is a guy you'd listen to about "slam dunks?"

Slam dunk, but who set the rim to a height of 1 ft. You could call it an "intelligence failure", but before you toss around the word failure you have to consider what the goal was... as Bush said "mission accomplished"

[shamrockpow]

If I had the time to mine the WaPo's fucking website for the 260,000 figure I would. But the 1.4 million figure can be found on Google and the time period is from the Gulf War ceasefire until 2002. 5000 kids a month starving alone is reason enough for intervention. Mind you these kids weren't hungry, they were dying. That is my litmus. maybe you have more stringent requirements.

I'm glad you're revealing yourself as a true humanitarian. Maybe we have more in common than I thought. Anyways, it passes my litmus test for intervention, but not for war. By your logic we should be fighting wars to install new governments and "save children" in: Somalia, Tanzania, the Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopa, Bolivia, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Yemen, North Korea, Kenya, Nepal, and about 40 other countries where just as many kids are dying of hunger and preventable diseases as in Iraq.

All your "litmus test" proves is that sanctions hurt the people more than the leadership in undemocratic nations. This has been obvious for 30+ years to more Keynesian-leaning pragmatic liberals (see Cuba and Castro, Fidel). The main reason all those kids were dying is b/c Iraq was cut off from a global free market system that allowed individuals to profit. Obviously Saddam had been stealing money from his people since he came to power, but he never had to starve the populace to that extent until we tried to starve him. Of course, one could argue that sanctions would be a stronger means of attack if every developed country wasn't trying to find some way to cheat or make a rule change to keep the oil flowing, but that's a seperate arguement alltogether.

I'm all for saving kids, but if that's the goal then we should worry more about how much we loan out in foreign development at favorable interest rates and how to better distribute the money we do give. Oil for food was such a big failure b/c there was always some middle man. Now let's say, instead of spending $15b on foreign non-military aid (.14% of GDP: last among developed nations and up from .10% in Clinton's last year) as we did in 2003, we take just half of the $120 billion that Iraq has already cost and direct it to help poor, suffering children. $60 billion dollars and 100,000 available American troops could probably build a lot of roads, hospitals, etc. Think that we might be able to do a little more good for those 2 billion suffering people rather than focusing just on Iraq? Lift the sanctions on Saddam, but keep the inspections strong and the no-fly zone tight. Then take the other $60 billion - give half of it back to the American people (as tax cuts, which we already are doing - so really just to reduce our yearly deficit) and pledge $10 billion to infrastructure development in Central America (which should help us in the long-run) and $20 billion to a worldwide Democracy fund where we educate nations about democracy and how to reduce corruption. We might have actually been able to make a huge difference in this world. This war was not about helping kids, it was about an international relations experiment on whether we could build a democracy in the heart of the Arab world, while at the same time taking out Saddam, making some money for our buddies, rallying more wartime fervor around GWB, making Israel and the US safer maybe, and then if it does happen that we're helping those poor Iraqi children too, well we'll feel good about that.

Of course, it's a lot easier to convince the American people that Saddam was tied to 9/11 and a crazed lunatic ready to attack the US, than it is to convince them that lives everywhere else should be just as valuable as our own. It's just not something Americans want to hear about or pay for right now. Sure we have it good, but giving back? Not so fast.

Kind of dumb, but it reminds me of that line in "Scent of a Woman" where Pacino is talking about doing the right thing:
"Now I've come to the crossroads in my life. I always knew what the right path was. Without exception, I knew. But I never took it. You know why? It was too damn hard."

If Bush really wanted to help people, he has (or at least had) more power to do that than any man in history. Access to US gov't funds, agencies, and military. Control of both houses of congress. A friendly supreme court. 90% approval ratings. World sympathy over a viscious terrorist attack. He could write his own ticket - if he had asked for $100 billion to help make America loved rather than hated around the world, I honestly think he would have had a shot. Think about some of the other opportunities he had, even after we went to war in Afghanistan. Then think about what the world looks like today and tell me the Iraq war was our most pressing concern.

It just makes me sad that someone who claims to walk so closely on the path to finding Jesus would turn away from love, when love seems to be what his lord teaches OVER and OVER and OVER through his actions. Guess all that religion is just as much rhetorical bullshit as the rest of his image.