I sure as shit didn't say that. Don't get sloppy.Nailbomb said:Same with you, only you're claiming the opposite will happen.
Voiceofreason: If we pull back, they'll be free to choose their own government.
I sure as shit didn't say that. Don't get sloppy.Nailbomb said:Same with you, only you're claiming the opposite will happen.
Voiceofreason: If we pull back, they'll be free to choose their own government.
Actually, you did. You said "If that's true, let someone else foot the bill," and when shiggy argued about what they'd be "free to do", you countered with "They'll be free to choose the Islamic State religion." Remember: separation of church and state is an American thing.voiceofreason said:I sure as shit didn't say that. Don't get sloppy.
Yep, the hotels on wheels, so to speak. Dunno why he picked it.FlipTheState said:Is that something for old folks, or rich old folks? Is that RV as in Recreational Vehicle? As in big oversized mobile homes that old people drive around in their retirement?
Why on earth would he give a speech there?
Of course I didn't mean it. They point is we need to get out of there and stop killing those people. It serves no purpose....Nailbomb said:Actually, you did. You said "If that's true, let someone else foot the bill," .
The point is not how many people we kill, it is that we are there killing people for no reason, just the sick dreams of this Texas mental case.FlipTheState said:I got to blow stuff up, shoot people, get blown up, and get shot at....so it wasn't TOTALLY useless![]()
Seriously, we're not harming as many 'innocent' Iraqis as you are all being told. True, it IS happening, and I'm not trying to justify it. I just don't think it's as bad as some very politically-oriented lobbyists and activists are trying to make it seem.
Yeah I know...I'm just giving you a hard time :beerchug:voiceofreason said:The point is not how many people we kill, it is that we are there killing people for no reason, just the sick dreams of this Texas mental case.
FlipTheState said:I got to blow stuff up, shoot people, get blown up, and get shot at....so it wasn't TOTALLY useless![]()
Seriously, we're not harming as many 'innocent' Iraqis as you are all being told. True, it IS happening, and I'm not trying to justify it. I just don't think it's as bad as some very politically-oriented lobbyists and activists are trying to make it seem.
shiggy1016 said:You forgot media. Sex and violence sell. Blame a good portion of the overexageration shit on the media.
You are exactly right, that is exactly what war is, this is why we are saying you Americans shouldn't have invaded in the first place. Most of the dead haven't been directly killed by the Americans, but they probably wouldn't have died if there had been no invasion, and ergo no insurrection/breakdown of order.FlipTheState said:Actually...you know what I'm fucking sick of? Hearing that "We're just killing innocent civilians"....
Nobody complained this much when these "innocent civilians" drove their cars up to U.S. checkpoints and blew the living fuck out of us. Nobody noticed when these "innocent civilians" blew up other "innocent civilians" at two bus stations and then bombed the shit out of the hospital where the wounded were going. How many of the recent bombings haven't involved any Americans? Quite a few. How's that for innocent?
I didn't notice anyone protesting the fact that these "innocent people" were sending kids out into crowds to throw rocks and dummy grenades at American troops in an effort to get us to shoot them so they could film it and us it against us... (yes this happened)... I didn't hear any outbursts of protest when a helicopter carrying 32 Marines suspiciously crashed near a known hostile town.
At the risk of sounding like a right-wing asshole, that's what war IS...that's what armed conflict is...people dying. It doesn't matter if it was right or wrong or bullshit in the first place...it happens. It happens every day here in the U.S., but you don't see near the outcry or media coverage or activist interest as you do for this thing in Iraq. People die every day...from lung cancer, from drunk drivers, from dehydration, from hunger, from gunshot wounds, from suicide, from hurricanes...well, you get the idea.
Sometimes I think you people believe that we have the Mai Lai Massacre going on over there...which makes me laugh, because maybe that's the extent of your experience with armed conflict...a decades-old 'war' that showed the worst of Americas youth.
Ok, I'm fully aware of the implications of just leaving, I am aware it would be bad, but they have to do something! I was really just thinking aloud, (or whatever it is on the internet).FlipTheState said:I'm tired of arguing the same point over and over again. My stance from the beginning has been that we never should have gone...but coulda/shoulda/woulda...none of it matters now.
You can't validate my point on one hand by saying that yes I'm right, that's what war is on one hand, but then on the other hand validate my other point that we never should have gone in the first place...and hope to then argue against me.
There are huge gaping holes in your logic...in the interests of time and my frustration, I won't respond point by point. I'll simply assume that you're intelligent enough to see the holes and acknowledge them. I'm not trying to argue that we should have gone to Iraq... but you also HAVE to know that we truly can't just sky the fuck out in the middle of something we started. If you really can't imagine the kind of impact that civil war in an Arab and Muslim country will have on the world around them, I've made some serious misjudgements about your intellect. That's what I mean when I say: Right, Wrong, or Indifferent...that's the way it is.
And...you can't logically draw a line between whether or not I enjoyed my time in Iraq - knowing people wanted me dead - and whether or not we should have been sent...it's two entirely different issues. No, we shouldn't have gone...but you know what? People shooting at us is often what draws some of us.
I think Hemmingway said it best.
And don't let this joker try to confuse the subject by saying that we have been trying to "perfect democracy". How do you prefect an ideal like democracy? You don't, if it got better it would be something else (i.e. Marxism > Facism > Communism). The whole idea is to substitute a weak dictorial government that holds the key to a load of oil, with a strongish democratic government. One that we can to a lesser extent control. The reasons may not be right, but the ends for us justify that. Actually shiggy is kinda right, just that first sentence is a pickle.shiggy1016 said:After 2 1/4 centuries of "perfecting" democracy we still don't have it perfect even in this country. This will not be a simple process. It even took quite a while after the colonies gained their independece for them to come up with the idea of creating a national government (at first we had the Articles of Confederation- a modern day legislative branch with no executive to back it up, or judicial to ensure consistancy). We simply cannot pull out of Iraq now. To do so would simply cause the country to fall back into anarchy, and thousands of Iraqi lives would be lost.
Another thing, think about the number of troops we have lost thus far. There have been more than 5x that number lost to homicide during the same stretch of time. Although we have lost a lot of men and women their numbers really aren't as high as the media would have you believe. They put their lives on the line for us, and that makes their deaths sell more commercials and ads. Don't let the media fool you.
Agreed. Yes, something must be done...but it's a fine balancing act between doing the right thing and doing the right thing...no matter what has been done up to this point.canadian_pov said:Ok, I'm fully aware of the implications of just leaving, I am aware it would be bad, but they have to do something! I was really just thinking aloud, (or whatever it is on the internet).
But I believe no one should ever be sent into harm's way for a bad reason, military or not, people are people, and they shouldn't be treated as expendable. Wouldn't you agree?
True, the media is a business. True, consumers ultimately control what makes money and what doesn't. The FCC cannot change that, nor is that what it was set up to accomplish.lcoon80 said:Tell you FCC your fed up with this bull S###. Only you can change it, yes i work in the media so get off you a## and change it. We only do what makes us money, if it doesn't make money we won't do it. And what makes money, or what doesn't make money is ALWAYS influenced by you. I SAID IT!! You control the media, if they arn't doing something you like DON'T WATCH IT! if you watch you let them win, it's as simple as that.