I don't take part in those arguments. They bore the hell out of me.
Posted on 05/20/2005 1:26:39 PM PDT by KidGlock
CHRONICLES EXTRA | EVENTS | HOME
Wednesday, May 18, 2005
A Reputation in Tatters
George W. Bush and his gang of neocon warmongers have destroyed America’s reputation. It is likely to stay destroyed, because at this point the only way to restore America’s reputation would be to impeach and convict President Bush for intentionally deceiving Congress and the American people in order to start a war of aggression against a country that posed no threat to the United States.
America can redeem itself only by holding Bush accountable.
As intent as Republicans were to impeach President Bill Clinton for lying about a sexual affair, they have a blind eye for President Bush’s far more serious lies. Bush’s lies have caused the deaths of tens of thousands of people, injured and maimed tens of thousands more, devastated a country, destroyed America’s reputation, caused 1 billion Muslims to hate America, ruined our alliances with Europe, created a police state at home, and squandered $300 billion dollars and counting.
America’s reputation is so damaged that not even our puppets can stand the heat. Anti-American riots, which have left Afghan cities and towns in flames and hospitals overflowing with casualties, have forced Bush’s Afghan puppet, “President” Hamid Karzai, to assert his independence from his U.S. overlords. In a belated act of sovereignty, Karzai asserted authority over heavy-handed U.S. troops whose brutal and stupid ways sparked the devastating riots. Karzai demanded control of U.S. military activities in Afghanistan and called for the return of the Afghan detainees who are being held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
Abundant evidence now exists in the public domain to convict George W. Bush of the crime of the century. The secret British government memo (dated July 23, 2002, and available here), leaked to the Sunday Times (which printed it on May 1, 2005), reports that Bush wanted “to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. . . . But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran. . . . The (United Kingdom) attorney general said that the desire for regime change was not a legal base for military action. There were three possible legal bases: self-defense, humanitarian intervention or UNSC (U.N. Security Council) authorization. The first and second could not be the base in this case. Relying on UNSCR 1205 of three years ago would be difficult.”
This memo is the mother of all smoking guns. Why isn’t Bush in the dock?
Has American democracy failed at home?
COPYRIGHT 2005 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
If you want an even earlier comparison, there's Illium, or Troy as it was known to the Greeks.
For over a thousand years these folks used to collect a tax from all who passed through the Bosporus. If you didn't pay they might kill you, or seize your cargo. Recent thought is that there was an heavy trade in breeding age women that took place around the Black Sea and Eastern Mediterranean at the time. In that light Helen was "seized cargo".
The Greeks apparantly decided to not pay their taxes.
Homer follows up on this tale quite well.
There you go again, blaming Paul Craig Robert's obvious mental meltdown on Condoleeza Rice.
Indeed!
You left out the Federal Reserve Bank.
Amen! Probably left out a lot actually. :)
Sorry, I posted to myself on that last one. :) But, it was to you saying that I probably left out a lot. :)
Do you believe that authoritarian statism is more excusable if the executive declares himself a "conservative" while implementing it? I tend to focus more on the effect than on what claims a person may make.
I don't think the august group you mentioned should be associated with the Paul Craig Roberts' article.
"'splain to us why the Bush administration took off after a toothless, secular, despot of a ruined semi-nation instead of pursuing bin Laden or extinguishing the Wahhabi root of the terrorist plague.
You Bush-bot apologists make me puke!"
That you suffer a disconnect in geo-political reality is a right you have. You merely prove my point of your shared elitist point of view with the far left, because you spew it, makes it so.
It appears ignorance and skewed perceptions of reality are not simply the purview of the fringe left. The full scope of that reality, from the spineless UN's inaction to the Oil for Food Scandal (bribery) to self-interest of 'supposed allies', would take far more time than I care to expend in educating one who cannot express themselves beyond vitriolic rhetorical talking points. Your pusillanimous talking points of 'going after the Wahabbi (or Wahhabbi - both spellings are accepted) sect', without any sound reason of how that could be done, is further evidence of your ideological entrenchemnt. How would you make such a frontal assault ? How would you avoid negative ramifications and fallout ?
While I defend your right to regurgitate your vituperative talking points, I conclude you actually have no syllogistic defense of your position.
Well, there's plenty of room for disagreement amongst us FR types (unlike the Moonbat League over at DU). I'm just getting weary of people who ought to know better abandoning the War on Terror. Right now- like it or not- the US has to take the lead in this thing, and Iraq is Ground Zero. Mr. Buchanan is so blinded by his hatred of Jews that he can't see that we're winning, and that Israel (for all its faults as a quasi-Socialist state) is our true friend. My Libertarian friends are likewise blinded, but by fear rather than hatred. That's ironic, given their nominal adherence to Reason, but there you are.
A tin foil hat is not required to be a pragmatist, as opposed to an ideologue. Ranting and demonization are the purview of ideologues, left and right.
The reality is that Bush is NOT a culture warrior. His drug prescription expansion of Medicare being one of his biggest failings, in my opinion, but when measured against the proposals of the democrats and Kerry, it was 'almost' benign. His progressive indexing of SS benefits is another Marxist idea, but, if he gets personal accounts included in reform, that progressive indexing will fade as more people take advantage of personal accounts and fewer opt for the current system. If he can get some movement toward personal health savings accounts, it will have an impact on help declining a socialistic healthcare system.
When evaluating policies, sometimes you have to look beyond the here and now. The crux being, future lawmakers may make adverse decisions and rulings that will negate or eliminate the trends that could have turned these initially bad policies into good results and become entrenched drags on society.
By all means, everyone should speak out on perceived injustices or bad policies, but they should make their case on reasoned grounds and not on heated rhetoric.
I don't take part in those arguments. They bore the hell out of me.
ROTFLMPO --- the funniest thing is that this dope seems to be serious!
Paul Craig Roberts can bite my shiny metal ass.
When evaluating policies, sometimes you have to look beyond the here and now.
That's exactly my point. I believe you have to look at overarching principles and not violate them to deal with individual issues. In other words, we can't claim to want smaller government--then spend more. We can't claim to value individual rights--then step in if someone does what we don't like. We can't claim to support local control--and announce yet another Federal initative (for education or whatever). While I like President Bush far more than Kerry, he doesn't seem to understand conservatism.
So you can ask questions but not answer them.
How telling.
Take your baiting style elsewhere.
I was actually referring to the author of this piece.
I take it you disagree with me?
It appears ignorance and skewed perceptions of reality are not simply the purview of the fringe left. The full scope of that reality, from the spineless UN's inaction to the Oil for Food Scandal (bribery) to self-interest of 'supposed allies', would take far more time than I care to expend in educating one who cannot express themselves beyond vitriolic rhetorical talking points.
When and if you finish venting your spleen, do you actually have anything at all to counter my argument? That blurb obviously belongs in some other thread.
Your pusillanimous talking points of 'going after the Wahabbi (or Wahhabbi - both spellings are accepted) sect', without any sound reason of how that could be done, is further evidence of your ideological entrenchemnt.
You have a real knack for stuffing a handful of six bit words into a pointless sentence or paragraph.
I would simply, to get back to the real world, ask you where the root of the problem lies, if not with the Wahabbis?
How would you make such a frontal assault ? How would you avoid negative ramifications and fallout ?
Those of course were the same questions that confronted the responsible parties in the GWB administration before their pointless adventure in Iraq. Now we are months and months, billions and billions, and thousands of brave young bodies deeper into fruitless nonsense.
And the ROOT remains untouched, unrecognized, and stronger than ever. To make matters worse, their recruiting efforts are enhanced, ours are diminished.
While I defend your right to regurgitate your vituperative talking points, I conclude you actually have no syllogistic defense of your position.
My reply is simply .... "back at yuh"!
[[That's exactly my point. I believe you have to look at overarching principles and not violate them to deal with individual issues. In other words, we can't claim to want smaller government--then spend more. We can't claim to value individual rights--then step in if someone does what we don't like. We can't claim to support local control--and announce yet another Federal initative (for education or whatever). While I like President Bush far more than Kerry, he doesn't seem to understand conservatism.]]
Principles are exactly what obfuscate an issue. Who defines those principles and how they are applied ? Principles do not deal with the reality of the here and now. A vote based on principle, while allowing claim to some moral high ground, can actually make the situation in reality worse. Voting for a minor party for principled reason, while it is everyone's right, does nothing. Pragmatism requires that one evaluate the odds of winning and most effective way to keep things closer to your principles. If you vote on principle, without regard for who wins, you risk that another candidate will be elected whose agenda is even worse than the one who might have won if votes were based on strict adherence to principle.
Sadly, at times, this two party system relegates making the evaluation of the lesser of two evils. In saying that, I do not believe Bush is evil. In fact, if you look at much of his policy agenda, it is the first time this country has an opportunity to restructure government away from the socialist path of the New Deal and Great Society of FDR and LBJ. Is Bush's approach perfect or ideal ? Certainly not, but it is far better than anything that Kerry and the democrats would have offered.
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