Posted on 07/25/2006 9:54:05 AM PDT by SirLinksalot
It's Disproportionate. . .
By Eugene Robinson
[SNIP]
But even if you set aside the president's embarrassing open-mike performance at the Group of Eight summit, which is hard to do, events of the past week show that this administration actually thinks it knows what it's doing. Bush and his folks haven't just blundered around and created this dangerous mess, they've done it on purpose. And they intend to make it worse.
[SNIP]
Bush's endorsement of the violence that Israel is inflicting on Lebanon -- a sustained bombing campaign that has killed hundreds of civilians and can only be seen as collective punishment -- is truly astonishing. Of course Israel has the right to defend itself against Hezbollah's rocket attacks. But how can this utterly disproportionate, seemingly indiscriminate carnage be anything but counterproductive?
Destroying the Beirut airport, blasting communications towers into oblivion and cleansing southern Lebanon of its civilian population are not measures the world will see as an attack on Hezbollah terrorists. The Israeli campaign is so intense and widespread that it is creating more terrorists than it kills. Proportionate military action might have enhanced Israel's security, but video footage of grandmothers weeping amid the rubble of their homes and bloodied children lying in hospital beds won't make Israel more secure. Hezbollah's stature in the Arab world is growing, and its patrons in Damascus and Tehran must be smugly satisfied.
The role of any American president and secretary of state should have been to move quickly to bring hostilities to an end. Instead, Bush all but egged the Israelis on, and Condoleezza Rice went so far as to reject the idea of a cease-fire. Belatedly, she has flown to the region with no real credibility as an honest broker.
[SNIP]
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I attribute the Left's response to partisan politics (Bush-hating) alone. If a Dem President were were supporting Israel in the exact same manner Bush currently is most libs would be hailing his "steadfast support of an American ally." It's ALL politics.
Apparently, eugene robinson wears tampons.
For it to be proportional, Israel would need to indiscriminately lob rockets into Lebanon with no regard for differentiating between civilian and military targets.
If I were over there and had to choose between being in Beirut or Haifa, I think I'd feel safer in Beirut.
How stupid. Proportionate response would mean wars would never end.
Thank you American Leftist for reminding us why you all are so completely unfit for ANY measure of political power. Be hard to find a more stupid, hysterical WRONG take on the situation. Just another gutless Appeaser. Another enabler of the mass murders who has innocent blood on his hands via his propagandizing for evil.
No, "disproportionate" means "not enough Jews are dying."
What is "disproportionate" is the whining of the gasbags at the Washington Post. If only a missle were pointed their way!
Actually, I think the Leftards are so filled with naked Jew hatred that they would be angry if Clinton had actually helped Israel.
Considering Hezbollah's stated goal is to slaughter every Jew and wipe Israel off the map, what exactly would be the "proportionate response?" As long as any members of Hezbollah (or their family members) are still alive, looks to me as if Israel hasn't come anywhere near it yet.
And not the "supersized ones" either!
There are still rockets falling on Israel today. I'd say this supports that Israel is not doing enough. Disproportionate? Right and Tel Aviv is "occupied".
You don't tug on Superman's cape
You don't spit into the wind
You don't pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger
And you fight a war to win, da do da do...
You got it.
It's supposed to be "disproportionate!"
If you continue to use "proportionate" responses in a war, you ensure that you're fighting a war of attrition, and the side who cares less about their own losses will eventually win the war, and it can be drawn out for decades. You increase the loss of life on both sides.
War is a terrible thing, which is why you only fight it to end it quickly, by using overwhelming force and violence.
Mark
It is a nation versus free lance thingie. If there are some rogue elements in a nation, one does not take on the nation. I don't know enough of the facts, but my very tentative view is that the response was disproportionate. I don't know why Isreal strayed farther north than the range of the rockets, and why some of the targets seem to range beyond known rogue targets.
The simple truth that thousands of rockets are falling on major Israeli cities - while the leader of Hezbolla is promising even further and more sophisticated bombing- proves not only that the Israeli response is not disproportionate but that Israel has been negligent is not putting a stop to this threat preemptively even in the absence of the Arab invasion.
You want to revise your long time plan of Israel hiding behind fences- shutting out the barbarians.
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