Posted on 04/11/2011 9:44:28 AM PDT by library user
I am a reborn Paleocon and agree with McCarthy. Fortress America is sounding pretty good right about now.
What Afghanistan needs from us is about 50 planeloads of napalm on their Poppy fields.
Sure, we can care and pray for Afghanistan. But, using Gov’t to fix and solve problems is at the root of the issue.
Tha's wheh the hehwin come from.
Better by the day. We can't borrow enough money from China to be world policeman. In fact world policeman should be the first policeman to be laid off.
Actually Fortress America is as stupid as it always was.
How did this moron come to believe that this intervention was for the Afghani people? Never was, never will be.
Never wrestle a pig. You both get filthy and the pig likes it.
This is beginning to sum up Afghanistan, and most of the “Third World.” If they cross us, butcher them until they understand their mistake, then go home. If we want something they have, buy it at market price; if we need to secure the supply, colonize and to heck with the locals. Trying to help them is stupid; it just creates a dependency. Even trying to get them to help themselves is mostly futile. How many nations can anyone name where foreign assistance actually produced any forward progress?
If people want to spend private money to help them, fine. Otherwise, stop wasting coerced taxpayer dollars on these holes.
We didn’t learn a thing from Charlie Wilson’s War. Either go old Testiment on them or get out.
I guess I don't get the vitriol seeping out here. He makes that clear point that we should give a damn, but that sympathy is not a clear prescription for policy. To paraphrase Bismarck, Afghanistan is not worth the bones of one paratrooper. That does not mean that we must necessarily be callous to their suffering and their plight.
Why do we keep fighting long protracted wars in places where the natives don’t give a damn? It took 4 years, and alot of American blood before the Iraqi people started to take responsibility for their own country. Hell, at least they did it. We have been in Afghanistan for 10 years and the Afghans can barely tie their own shoes. We spent 15 years in Vietnam with very little support from the ARVN.
We went into all three countries with a purpose, and ended up getting bogged down because we over reached with our goals, or our politicians tied the hands of our warriors.
I believe Afghanistan is a hopeless cause.
The people do not want to join the rest of the world in the 21st century, and they damn sure aren’t interested in helping themselves.
On the other hand I have hope for Iraq. They have stepped up to the plate and put their own asses on the line. But there is a huge elephant in Iran lurking in the room. It will be interesting to see how we(the US and Iraq) deal with that.
I’d prefer that DC was the target. We need a major housecleaning and DC is where to start.
It’s about an oil pipeline, isn’t it?
I am willing to include Afghanistan in my evening prayers under the words “world’s poor”. That’s as far as I’ll go. My cash is reserved strictly for America’s needy.
Peter W. should put on his sackcloth and ashes and hop the next plane to Kabul to enlighten and uplift that beknighted people.
I see a problem with proclaiming humanitarian rights as the, and not a, reason to be in Afghanistan, because of the way in which our humanitarian involvement has been defined for this country. Eleanor Roosevelt defined U.S. criteria for war on international humanitarian issues within commitment to U.N. collective security. She wrote that equal and inalienable rights for the human family encompass rights to life, liberty and security of person. John Kennedy reinforced this commitment saying, “We shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” Finally, Ronald Reagan said we cannot escape our destiny as the last best hope of afflicted mankind. All described a universal commitment to natural rights, and all Presidents should answer for deviations from that principle. Those principles do not fit because Afghanistan becomes, as George Orwell said in “Animal Farm”, more equal than the Congo, Sudan, Rwanda, and Uganda.
However, accomplishing Afghan stability means thwarting efforts to turn a nuclear Pakistan into a feral state. Such a country would then fuel the ambitions of Islamic regimes determined to wage a War of Terror regionally and internationally.
Afghan stability also encourages the actions of African, Oriental and Asian Islamic countries which bring victory in the Global War on Terror. Their actions can frustrate plans, break alliances, and fracture Islamic jihadist organizations into ever less effective units. Without cities, countries or armies bin Laden, and successor sociopath prophets live out unnaturally shortened lives as pariahs.
THAT, sir, is pure bullshit.
If Eleanor Roosevelt liked it, its probably a really, really bad idea. Ditto for JFK. Even Saint Ronnie can be wrong sometimes.
Afghanistan has never been stable by any definition we understand. Its a tribal society and their people lack both the ability and inclination to govern themselves outside of that frame work. If you want stability in Afghanistan, you’re going to need a sociopath to run it, because he’s going to have to crush a lot of people to make the central government work. Iraq works (sort of) because we had Saddam to prepare the way.
Yes, we should be callous to their suffering and their plight. They created most of their problems. They seem to be refusing to take responsibility or ownership of them. IF they won’t help themselves, we sure as hell shouldn’t be wasting time helping them.
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