quote:Originally posted by The Silverblue Sun: I'm asking you loons to tell me HOW ON EARTH it's not a conflict of interest?????
Can you do that?????
I support Bush, and there are many things he has done I don't like. His administration blocked the break up of Microsoft. That is my biggest problem with him, he does support big business and in the case of MS, I'm really pissed off about it (still... <sigh>).
But honestly, after the leadership of Bill--fire off missiles only when threatened by impeachment--Clinton, I would rather take everything bad with Bush then risk what Kerry might do, or *not* do.
But ultimately, I support Bush because he is a good man and I trust him because of that. I think this is what his opposition hates most about him and tries to paint him as a big fraud and deceiver (how often have I heard that he lied/lies?). Sometimes the people throwing around all the accusations are the ones who are actually guilty.
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I've never caught Bush in a lie, but several high-up members of his administration have been.
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Two things. One: Had Clinton not attacked when he did, he would have been lambasted by the right for being weak and not taking aggressive action. He was in a lose lose situation. And the firing of missiles or dropping of bombs did almost nothing to distract from the impeachment proceedings. Clinton was savvy enough to know it wouldn't detract from that, thus I think his decision to do so was less "wag the dog" and more good sense.
2. If you think his opposition hates Bush most becuase he is a good and honest man, you really don't understand his opposition much at all. I think he might be a good man, at heart, and I certainly don't dislike that about him, but as a President I don't think his good intentions manifest themselves very well. To paraphrase The West Wing, 'The voice of his better angels are being shouted down by his demons.'
I don't trust him at all. He has shown no capacity to learn from his mistakes, as he refuses to admit that he makes them. He hasn't been proven to have lied outright, but there is enough evidence against him, matched with his continually frail defense of his actions to prove to me that he isn't worthy of my trust.
I think it comes down to a Friends style Ross/Rachel "we were on a break" type argument. I guess this is a reference only Friends fans will understand, but it's the first thing that occurred to me. It didn't matter to Rachel whether or not they were on a break, what mattered to her was how she felt about Ross afterwards. Technicalities didn't erase the emotion. Thus, we relate it to Bush. I don't care if it turns out he lied, technically or not, about what he has done. If he hasn't lied, then that means his judgement is so awful he should never make another decision anyway. Which won't be much of a problem for him if he stays on vacation forever.
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posted
I just remember my feelings and thoughts when Clinton sent the bombs was that he was responding to the impeachment, not the terrorists.
Granted, who am I to trust my feelings and thoughts? I am not in much of a possition to judge what *really* happened because the amount of info I have is very limited. But I do trust those feelings and thoughts.
My comments were mainly to explain why I support Bush, not try to sway anyone because I certainly don't have the debate skills or enough information to be able to even put up a case for Bush.
About Bush's judgment. Again, I have seen enough about him to convince me he is a good man. To me a good man is more valuable than an ambitious, skilled, or smart one. Good men will try to do what is best for you. The other types might not. Do I think Bush's judgment is so bad it will do us more harm? No. And there is enough evidence to support that.
I could be wrong. Nothing is certain.
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posted
See, the flaw I find with that theory is that I think there are plenty of good people out there, but I wouldn't vote for half of them, because they aren't qualified. Yes, good men will attempt to do what they think is right, but they might not have the skill or smarts to know if what is right in principle is always best for his citizens in the long run.
It's not as simple as telling a child "the hard choice might be the right choice, and don't take the easy path." It's a great truism to teach children the basics of choosing right from wrong, but global politics and national defense are more complicated than a child deciding whether or not to tell on a friend who stole a candy bar.
Well not always, sometimes they are exactly that easy. But regarding decisions this President has made, most of them have been more complex than that, and have led to unforseen consequences.
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posted
When you are talking of gas prices, is it per gallon or per litre? In Sweden the gas is almost 12 swedish crowns a litre. a dollar is about 7 crowns and a gallon slightly more than 3 litres, if I remember correctly.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: See, the flaw I find with that theory is that I think there are plenty of good people out there, but I wouldn't vote for half of them, because they aren't qualified.
Bush is qualified. As much as I don't want to admit it, Kerry is too. You don't run for office and not be qualified. I suppose it could happen... Either way, if you weren't qualified, it would become obvious after 4 years in office. I suppose if his staff were really skilled, they could cover up the president's lack. But is that what is going on?
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I'd prefer someone who tried to understand what I thought best and allow me to act in that way as much as possible than someone who thought he knew what was best for me and tried to bring that about. Guess which one Bush pretty clearly is?
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posted
I fail to see how Bush is qualified to be president considering the bungling he has done in every department.
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Well, the qualifications for President have never been well-enumerated.
For instance, Bush's lack of ability to run a business well (even after several tries) and being able to do in at least some manner the 3rd most powerful public post in Texas seem little endorsement, but we've had comparably qualified Presidents before.
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But it's a bit interesting that all the vast majority of good guys are Democrats, the majority of bad guys are either Republicans or nakedly ambititious Democrats, and the good guys usually end up with a clean conscience Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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I looked at some pro-biodiesel sites, and it appears that NOx/Hydrocarbon emissions are just as good as conventional gas (although all the comparisons are done with petroleum diesel, not gasoline), but they do some hand waving with CO2, claiming that the CO2 created by biodiesel is okay, because the plants use it up and then we harvest them for biodiesel... But using that rationale, we could just plant more trees and cut down on conventional gasoline's emissions. Or so it appears to me.
posted
There've been plenty of good republicans on West Wing. Ainsley Hayes is probably the best example, and Vinnick, I can't remember the name of the character Matt Perry plays, but him too. Walken was seen as a little loopy, but in the end came off as a good guy. Mostly Congress is demonized on all sides in the West Wing, not just Republicans.
However, I agree there is an obvious pro-democratic tilt to the show, and Sorkin admitted it when he created the show. He said he wanted to create a sort of fantasy shadow government, as if to show how it could have gone if Democrats had been elected into power instead of Republicans. Many of the issues they faced on the show mirrored events being discussed in real life. After he left the show, the people who took over said that the real life election would effect the race between Vinnick and Santos.
As far as Bush being qualified, yes, I think it is extremely possible that he could have been elected twice and still be horribly unqualified, for the very reason that a large number of people vote based purely on the character (goodness, "trustworthiness") of the candidate and not his actual skill or accomplishments. That is precisely how he got elected the first and second time. And if his bungling of both domestic and foriegn affairs isn't proof enough, I don't know what is.
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quote:I think Reader is implying that the hyperbole of "fricken loon" shields the speaker from the scrutiny of an actual open debate.
Yep. When someone uses 45 question marks after an accusation, then all caps in another paragraph, and doesn't cite anything, that person isn't looking for an open debate. He is looking to shout down opposition with inflammatory rhetoric. My arguing skills aren't very good, but I won't argue like that.
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posted
Ah, something which Kerry and many Democrats came out in support of. Do you have any decisions of his you like we can use to differentiate him from others?
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1. In the past when I have tried to actually engage you in open debate you didn't bother making any responses, but instead repeatedly make unsubstantiated claims my favorite possibly being that 40% of Americans were in poverty. Where you pulled that number out of I haven't a clue, but you certainly never bothered to defend your analysis.
2. You repeatedly call people like me a "loon," even after I pointed out that it was foolish to do so.
3. You keep on quoting Jesus.
I'm Jewish
I don't like religion being used in a debate. If you can't back up your points without resorting to the supernatural then they are meaningless in the realm of a debate regarding the policies of a secular nation. In short, Jesus is not a valid source unless the debate involves religion, the Christian Bible, or Jesus.
4. You're clearly not open to anyone's opinion. You're like Cindy Sheehan demanding for the President to tell her why her son died when she's already stated that he died for oil and George Bush's friends.
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quote: Ah, something which Kerry and many Democrats came out in support of.
I thought Kerry's final claim on that subject was that he only voted to authorize the war as a last resort and Bush carried out the war before that was the case and therefore Kerry is actually against the war as it was carried out.
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posted
No, Kerry's claim was that he thought the war was necessary based on the evidence presented him, that he thought it should have been started differently but still started (back when it was being considered), and that given current evidence of numerous administration deceptions he might have reconsidered those positions had he been in Bush's shoes, but he has no way of knowing now.
A remarkably consistent position compared to Bush's habit of opposing or ignoring something politically, not vetoing it (like he doesn't veto anything), then if it becomes popular claiming it as a success of his administration.
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I've got a feeling human wouldn't agree with that interpretation of Kerry's position nor would the majority of people who voted for and against Kerry. I think even most people who voted for Kerry will tell you the platform he ran on was anti-war.
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He ran on an anti-how-the-war-was-currently-being-run platform, certainly.
But he was quite upfront during the campaign about supporting the war, though with large reservations, before it started.
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Neither here nor there, but I think you can quote Jesus without it necessarily being a resorting to using the supernatural. If there were a religion that surrounded Shakespeare, I don't think it would stop people from quoting him. The quote "you cannot serve two masters" may be rooted in religion, but it functions well on its own.
And Kerry's position on the war has been rather consistent. He voted to give Bush the power to use war as a bargaining tool, but Bush never went through all the steps Kerry thought should have been taken before using war as a last resort. As soon as those conditions were broken, Kerry became a vocal opponent of the war and its handling, which I think is consistent, and follows logically. Conservatives called him a flip flopper, whereas Bush is steadfast and resolute. I'd rather a flip flopper that knows when to adapt to a new situation, then a mule who won't change his position no matter how much the situation changes.
For the sake of wonder, why human, do you think the war was necessary?
And I'll settle the whole Exxon conflict of interest thing right now. Is it a conflict of interest? Yes. There, point addressed.
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posted
I included the Jesus thing in my list of reasons, because when people bring religion into a non-religious debate its usually a bad sign regardless of whether the quote independently was appropriate or whether the point expressed is correct in the first place. Besides that was just one out of four listed reasons and those were just the ones I felt like expressing at the time.
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I am convinced the terrorists will kill us if we slack off the fight against them. We had 3 things against Iraq that (to me) justifies the war.
1). Saddam was not on full nation status with us because of the earlier war (which I admit was entirely for Oil reasons--how many times do we step in to stop African nations from stomping on their neighors). He surrendered. I'm not sure of the details, I just know it happened.
2). Saddam wasn't cooperating with the deals of his earlier surrender.
3). Iraq was a petri dish for terrorists. Sure, they weren't *our* terrorists, but it is like the war against terrorism had no where else to go, and because of reason 1 and 2 it was justified. And I do not buy the argument that we are causing more terrorism and death. I once had cockroaches in my house and you do not really know how many there are until you try to get rid of them. And I love this quote:
"When you make decisions for a world where killing is already going on, you ought not to then think that by intervening in the situation it is creating killing. Sometimes intervention is needed to stop the killing." Dr. Ravi Zacharias says concerning the war in Iraq.
I'm also aware that my opinion isn't the only one. I've given up freaking out over people having different opinions than mine. Most of my friends and coworkers disagree with me.
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posted
I'll give you one and two, but not three. Terrorists thrive and multiply in Syria, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, but they didn't thrive in Iraq. Ideologically the terrorists that have plagued America in the past are far removed from Saddam. Other than supporting Palestinian terrorists, which arguably were never a threat to America before, Saddam never allowed or supported Al Qaeda knowingly. Al Qaeda was in fact an enemy of Saddam, as their ideological differences made them opponents rather than allies.
Was he a bad man? Yes. Was he failing to live up to obligations made from the previous war? Yes. Was he actively supporting anti-American terrorists? Possible, but doubtful. Did Iraq pose the biggest threat, terrorism wise, to America in the region? No.
And now we have removed the ideological difference between Iraq and terrorists, making it possible for Al Qaeda and other groups to recruit there. If we really wanted to wage war on terrorism, we would have attacked Syria, or most especially, Saudi Arabia. Iraq was the best military and politically viable target. Factoring in the reality that terrorism wasn't prevelant there before though, I don't think it was sensible at all.
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1) the analogy to us and losing Vietnam after trying to stomp on someone else's region is almost funny.
2) We didn't expect him to. Also, this is a recurring theme in international relations, so its not like we should act all surprised.
3) Not hugely. We managed to find out about a few terrorist training camps, but as far as I know, even nowadays extremely few terrorists are exported from Iraq (nobody who's been known to be involved with any non-Iraq terrorist activity has been Iraqi, that I've seen). That may well change, though. But while Hussein gave some token gifts to families of terrorists to piss us off, and there were occasionally some terrorist camps in regions of Iraq he didn't even control, as pointed out if we wanted to go after the terrorists we had many countries higher on the list.
I even think Iraq needed to be taken on (again, just as John Kerry did, you haven't addressed that the war doesn't even differentiate Bush). But the case for it needed to be constructed on a solid foundation, unlike the stuff the Bush administration fed us (much of which was found to not only be laughable, but known to be either laughable or unreliable well before we invaded), and there needed to be a solid plan including for after the war, unlike the botched job the Bush administration did. They even had a pretty decent blueprint of how to avoid many of these problems, all made specially for them, and not paid attention to (see: The Future of Iraq plan from the State Department, http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_timeline_of_the_2003_invasion_of_iraq_pre-war_planning ).
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quote:I'll give you one and two, but not three. Terrorists thrive and multiply in Syria, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, but they didn't thrive in Iraq.
But you can't attack any of those countries because of the potential to pretty much wage war on every Muslim in the world by so doing.
Syria, Lebanon you CANNOT attack as the US with Israel being your ally in the area. I'll say it again, you CANNOT attack them while having Israel as your ally.
Saudi Arabia you CANNOT attack because that would in fact ignite every Muslim in the world to war against the United States for plainly obvious reasons.
If your aim is to militarily intervene in the Middle East to establish a democracy, you have Iraq and Iran.
You can't invade Iran because the whole country is united in their Hatred of the US and also the UN had at the time NO "ultimatum" resolutions that could even be used from which to base action.
Iraq you can because it was a country under the boot of a dictator the majority of people wanted removed and had attempted to do so in the past. They also had UN Resolutions to use as weight against them that basically said "Do this or else..." and the US determined the "or else" was invasion and removal from power.
I'm not agreeing with the methodology of WHY. But I can see how that target was selected.
And unfortunately our dependency on Foreign Oil has required us as a nation to take an interest in the stability of the region.
I'd much prefer we say screw it, let them kill each other, we'll give guns/money/support/trade to those fighting to establish a democracy akin to ours, but otherwise let's treat the M.E. with a "containment" policy.
Posts: 1533 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Aye, that's the point I was making. The nations we needed to fix, weren't militarily or politically viable to attack, so we picked an almost non-existant evil, made it sound a whole lot worse than it really was, and moved on it.
quote:You can't invade Iran because the whole country is united in their Hatred of the US
This however isn't entirely true. The older crowd in Iran is very anti-US true, especially the old guard and the Mullahs. But the youth of Iran are surprisingly pro-US. We don't hear about it very often, but polling data shows that amount 16-25 year olds, the majority of that age group has a positive view on America, one of the highest in the region. They just can't do anything about it.
I tend to agree with supporting stable democracies, but playing third party nation builder has been disastrous in American history. Nation building in general has proven ineffective when the nation being built isn't asking for the help. Japan and Germany are exceptions to the rule only because we bombed them into the ground, and then helped them rebuild. Also, after the fall of the Empire in Japan, and the fall of Nazism in Germany, they were ready and waiting for democracy and our style of economics (though they both ended up going their own ways).
Iraq will be added to the same list as the Phillipines, and perhaps Cuba, though that never got off the ground, as a list of nations we thoroughly screwed up. I pray we actually learn our lesson this time
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quote:Iraq will be added to the same list as the Phillipines, and perhaps Cuba, though that never got off the ground, as a list of nations we thoroughly screwed up. I pray we actually learn our lesson this time
I hope not, but that may be the case. We should leave if they can't meet the standards we put in place for them to meet in order for us to be there. We should also leave if they ask us to (the popular majority or the President/Prime Minister). We have been VERY open in Iraq in terms of them forming their own government. It may come back to bite us because what we THINK they want may not be what they end up really wanting. They are on the brink of forming a government with Islam as it's backbone (no problem there but what Version of Islam) and a reduced status of women's rights. I'm really torn if we should be pushing them to give women more rights or if we should continue to be so hands off in an "observer/security" type role.
I hope for the Iraqi's sake that they are able to continue to gain some backbone and self initiative towards what they want.
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posted
The version of the draft constitution being floated now is pretty good about women and about Islam's role in the country.
The problem is Federalism. The Kurds and Shiites want autonomy, whereas the Sunnis want one united country with no division into separate states. The Sunnis have the power to undo all of it, regardless of what the other two groups want. But I don't see the Kurds caving on Federalism. They've lived the last 10 years with virtual autonomy, why would they trade that to be ruled by the Sunnis who murdered them 15 years ago?
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