Return to Politics

[Anomaly]

Originally posted by The Transformed Man
Oh, puuulease, not another "War for oil" thread. I'm sorry, but this position is sooooo lame.

I suggest you become more informed about oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, oil, and of course, oil

[Anomaly]

Originally posted by Lt.Khrys Antos
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember someone posting on this forum quite a long time ago that it didn't matter who got the most votes in a district, its the electoral school which chooses the winner. I could be mistaken though.

You are indeed correct. However, instead of a RE-VOTE because of election problems and sketchy activities on both sides, it was taken to COURT and the COURT appointed Bush.

But I take back the statements that you don't elect dictators - Hitler won in a democratic election. Suckers.

[First of Two]

Well, from Yahoo we can see a few folks in the media and the "intelligencia" making a rather weak attempt to tie the two issues together, but no one actually providing hard data.

Transformed Man trumps you every time.

[First of Two]

Originally posted by Anomaly
You are indeed correct. However, instead of a RE-VOTE because of election problems and sketchy activities on both sides, it was taken to COURT and the COURT appointed Bush.

Not quite. The court decided the case, which was about Florida election law. It just so happened that under the terms of the LAW, Bush won.

[Anomaly]

I appreciate your attempts to troll me, First of Two.

Scream into the silence.

Scream into it.

[Dan Stack]

Anomaly, to be honest, you've really lost me there.

Bush is not a dictator. He was elected in accordance with the laws of the United States, both Federal and of the several States.

One does not" do-over" an election or have a re-vote. The date of the presidential election is mandated in federal and state laws.

Assuming you refer to Florida... The vote came out very close. So close that there was disagreement as to how the law should be followed in tallying it.

When people come to a disagreement as to how the law is to be followed, they go to court where judges interpret the law. And if the decision of a judge is not accepted by one party there is an appeals process. With the ultimate authority, one which both Gore and Bush recognized, as being in the US Supreme Court.


I find the "Bush is illegitimate" and "Bush is a dictator" argument to be, quite frankly, tiring. I've had problems with lots of US Presidents, all of them legally elected, Bush among them.

Bush was elected. He is not a dictator. QED.


Whether an elected president is a good president or not is a matter for debate, and often one for the history books to decide.

[mactavish]

Okay, okay. There are valid points from all sides. Let's try and remain civil.

And for those of you keeping score, I love my country. I said as much in my initial post. I am a patriot and will support any decision that the American people deem necessary.

I would like to know, however, why the hawks on this site feel that the United States needs to go to war with Iraq. Why? Give me a concrete reason or two.

Try to refrain from the whole "he's a bad man who murders his own people" argument. Lots of leaders from a variety of nations do the same thing, many of whom the United States counts as friendlies and allies.

I don't understand why there is a rush for war now. He [Hussein] has been out of compliance with the UN for over a decade. Why now?

Oh, and one more thing... don't ever attack my patriotism. I served my country and did the best job that I knew how. I would do the same again if I was called on to defend my country. I disagree with the [perceived upcoming] declaration of war against a tin pot dictator under the guise of sparing the poor people from his horrible rule. I cherish the rights afforded me by the Constitution, but I would never hide behind them when I think that there is something unacceptable going on in my government.

The United States should not act as the world's police force, judge, jury and/or executioner. Nations should look out for their own interests, not those of others, particularly those that are as derisive toward the US as Iraq. I know its a cold, heartless thing to say, but I have little sympathy for many people suffering outside of the United States. For years and years the Western world has tried to bring its values to other parts of the world. Regardless of how its brought, be it economically, diplomatically, forcefully, or what have you, there are some places that it just doesn't catch on. That is simply the way it is. Ousting the Baath party in Iraq and replacing it with a US-friendly regime will not solve the problems in that country in the long term.

Why didn't the US turn its back on Germany or Japan after the Second World War? Because it was interested in establishing peace. Were there economic interests at stake too? Hell yes. When the US goes to war in Iraq, the only viable outcome involves a US-led military government, rebuilding their national infrastructure, and [re]educatiing the people. That will cost billions of dollars that I would rather see spent in the States.

Let me give you a scenario:

The US goes to war in Iraq in February/March 2003. After a short war, the American military captures/kills the Iraqi leadership and declares victory. They place a high-ranking military officer in charge of the country (just like Germany and Japan after WW2), and then funnel billions of US tax dollars to rebuild the country.

Who comes next? Who will the juggernaut that is the American military be unleashed on next? North Korea? Iran? Who? When does it end? Does it end when the majority of the world falls in line with the American hegemony and the US spends the majority of its tax dollars policing the world while the nations we've "saved" build their economic base, forgoing military spending in favor of domestic programs? Why spend money on defense when the US is the world's sherriff?

I'm sorry, but the goal of an Iraqi war will never be as simple as "oust the dictator and bring peace and prosperity to the people." Economics dictate otherwise. The US leadership is not starting a war with Iraq to save the world, and no argument presented thus far had led me to believe otherwise. It is simply foolhardy to believe that a conservative right-wing Republican president would ever spend the obscene amount of money that Iraqi war would cost without the assurance that there would be a big payoff when it was over.

It simply makes more sense to me, instead of spending more on the military than the next six largest militaries in the world combined, to address domestic issues instead. Our economy is in the toilet, the population is restless, and it seems that the majority of these problems could be dealt with using the defense budget increase for something other than defense.

This whole issue is so polarizing that it just makes me physically ill to think about it too much.

mactavish out.

[Dan Stack]

Mactavish, while I disagree with many of your points, one thing you said did strike a cord with me - in addition to serving your country, for which I thank you.

I was listening to Imus morning show and Pat Buchanan was the guest, whom I agree with maybe once a year. I guess today was the day to agree with him. He said, paraphrasing - "what danger does Iraq pose? They are contained. If they are making weapons they know if they sell them on the black market or give them to terrorists there's a high likelyhood we'd find out and if so they know their country would be forfeit".

I'm not 100% I agree with the assumption that Iraq is not a danger to US interest, but if I accept that (I am debating that with myself) I cannot fault the conclusion.

Mind you, I did vote for Bush (after voting for McCain in the primary), so you do need to be careful how much you trust me.

[Anomaly]

Originally posted by Dan Stack
One does not" do-over" an election or have a re-vote. The date of the presidential election is mandated in federal and state laws.

In cases where the vote is too close to count? You have run-offs. Which is handled within the law just fine. This was the first presidential election to be decided by a court and not the people. What a terrible, terrible precedent to set.

I find the "Bush is illegitimate" and "Bush is a dictator" argument to be, quite frankly, tiring.

That is your opinion. And I would defend your right to have that opinion with my life. But I will always disagree with it - I am of the opinion that Bush is fascist in bent, and is a dictator at heart. He is power mad and doesn't care who (or what) he steps on to get it.

Let's take this direct quote from Bush:

"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." --George W. Bush, 12.18.00 CNN TRANSCRIPT

And like I pointed out with the Hitler example - you can be elected and be a power-mad tyrant too.

Let's see, here's some things that Tyrants do:

Operate under a shroud of secrecy.

Criminalize Dissent.

They spy on their citizens.

They search without warrant.

They arrest without cause.

They detain without cause.

They deny the right to defense.

If it walks like a dictatorship, it quacks like a dictatorship and swims like a dictatorship...

[Dan Stack]

It should be noted that I'm not referring to the style of Bush's presidency, more the way it was obtained.

I acutally like the idea of runoff elections - though to be practical in a national election, in my opinion, would need to be instant runoffs (i.e. you list your 1st choice, 2nd choice, etc.). However, Florida law for the 2000 election gave no allowance for a runoff election. And changing the rules mid-stream is, at least in my opinion, a horrible idea, and in such a case would have tainted the winner with illegitimacy. The problem is if the candidates had known there was a runoff coming they would have handled themselves differently. Gore, for example, would not have needed to worry as much about avoiding Nader defections. He would know anyone who voted for Nader would almost certainly vote for him in a runoff. Knowing that would certainly have changed the way he campaigned.

As for Bush as a dictator after assuming power. I'm pretty certain he's not alone in jokingly (and I will assume such) wishing for dicatorial powers - for some reason I think it was Kennedy who made a similar quote.

Don't get me wrong - I strongly dislike the way Bush has handled domestic issues. I don't like much of what he and Ashcroft have done in the realm of law as it applies to citizens - heck, the one area I think such a tough stance is reasonable,that being illegal immigration, Bush has been a softie on, hoping for an amnesty program.

I keep praying the Democrats will nominate someone I could stomach voting for. I'd vote for Leiberman in a second - I was a Connecticut resident for almost 20 years and believe he'd make an excellent president - he's what I think a Democrat should be - not someone who sees a victim behind every corner, but someone more of the mold of Kennedy - wanting to grant equal opportunity to all, protect the rights of Americans, and have a strong defense. As a Massachusetts resident for the past six+ years I would have voted for Kerry, but since entering the ring he's gotten seriously weird. So we'll see. I'm that annoying independent voter. Scorned and looked down upon most of the time, but when an election comes around I'm suddenly in the most important group in the country, as I refuse to be taken for granted by any party. Heck, I've even voted Libertarian back in the '98 senate race.

[The Transformed Man]

Well where to start.... First off I know there are many who on this board who oppose the war, and I don't doubt the scincerity or patriotism of some who oppose war for one minute.

Anyway, here are my reasons for my support of the war, and no I wont use the "he's an evil dictator" arguement:

1) The man has WMD, continues to deny he has them, has provided no proof that he has eliminated them, and based on very strong intelligence reports Saddam continues to build them. So the questions then are raised:

a) If you support the UN (or even the notion of a united body of nations) why would you continue to let the man defy UN resolutions, and at what point are you going to say enough is enough and actually enforce those resolutions? If you continue to let him flagrantly defy the "will of the world" what is the point of this organization? If there are no consequences to his actions why did the UN even meet for these resolutions? If you don't act you're only going to embolden agressive actions by other dictators who see that world has no spine to enforce their own "rules."

b) The man is a major threat to Middle East stability, his usefulness as a shield to hold back the spread radical Islamic governments is over (Iran-Iraq war era). He has ties to terrorists...

Sorry, but the Al-Qaeda connection is just now starting to be revealed (the US has waited in order to protect sources) and the U.S. is still sitting on a ton of info that will further indict Saddam and expose his alliance with Al-Qaeda. As the next two weeks unfold expect more intelligence tying Saddam and Al-Qaeda to be revealed... that's been the administration's end game all along as they were anticipating these late moves by Saddam (Okaying U-2 flights, Iraqi Congress passing legislation outlawing WMD... that's a good one).

And please, will some U.S. news source start picking up the story carried in the New York Times and the London Observer about Salman Pak. Salman Pak was one of Iraq's main biological weapons facilities. Later, during inspections Iraq claimed it was an anti-terror training facility for Iraqi special forces. Oh, it's a training facility alright...

A number of defectors from Iraq's intelligence services have identified Salman Pak as a terrorist training ground. Training activities include, espionage, sabotage, and assasination techniques, and the whopper of all whoppers... The camp boasts an airplane fuselage (likely a Boeing 707) used in simulated hijackings.... and yes Virginia, two defectors have led intelligence agents to believe some of these terrorist trained were Al-Qaeda.

Frankly, I want this "problem" solved now... Not later, I don't want my kids inheriting our generation's "issues". I don't want to watch on the news as Al-Qaeda boasts of their latest biological attack on the U.S., all thanks to your freindly neighborhood Saddam Insane.

Please the man has WMD, the man has affiliations with Al-Qaeda. Do the math. To make my point...the words of Mr Spock "I speak from pure logic. If I let go of a hammer on a planet that has a positive gravity, I need not see it fall to know that it has in fact fallen."

c) Beyond that, Saddam is a menace to Israel... hardly a week goes by in the Iraqi press where Saddam does not threaten the existence of Israel... and yes, the man still has some 6-9 SCUD missles left... Just imagine the lovely toxins spewed over Tel Aviv or Jerusalem.

2) His removal from power will stabalize the region and give us one more ally in the region... how that's bad I don't know. Who knows, in a few years, after free elections, maybe you'll start seeing some positive changes in the region, like free election in Iran, heck Saudi Arabia is now talking (hey, at least they're talking) about moving to a democratic form of government.

Just a few observations... maybe I'll come up with some more later on.

Yancy

PS BTW, I had a real problem with one of your statements:

"It is simply foolhardy to believe that a conservative right-wing Republican president would ever spend the obscene amount of money that Iraqi war would cost without the assurance that there would be a big payoff when it was over."

That's a pretty blanket statement. Oh, no it has absolutely nothing to do with our nation's security at all. And those bad right-wing Republicans only go to war for money, right? Yeah, those "liberal left-wing Democrat" president's only go to war for justified reasons? (Oops forgot Bill's "wag the dog" missle attack on that Sudanese aspirin factory)

[Ramage]

Y'know, Dan, I have voted for almost every political party available, barring Natural Law and whatever the Ross Perot ex-Party is being dubbed this week.

I am not fond of Bush as President. I wonder about the absolute legitimacy of his claim, but any way you slice it the country was (and remains) very, VERY closely divided politically. The major parties are each attempting to energize their core constituencies at the expense of moderation, thus the Repbulicans are leaning hard to the right, the Democrats to the left, and there are few left to represent the guy-on-the-streets. This leads in turn to lower voter turnout, as we have seen for several rounds of elections here.

This probably leads to my largest complaint with President Bush. He is acting as if A) he got a MUCH larger percentage of the vote and B) he is allowed to have a hardcore right-wing agenda, even if this satisfies a very small part of the overall US population.

Now I'm not sure that a Gore presidency would be that much different on that count; admittedly I probably would have been more accepting of Gore's path than Bush's, but I think that this board has shown the overall polarization of political feelings, but here in the USA and abroad.

In many ways I think this polarization is a good exemplar for the rise of terrorism in recent times. With such polarization, with such absolute belief in a narrow vision and without the willingness to compromise a lot of groups are spinning out of control.

Politics is the art of compromise.

I wish dearly that this art were practiced more frequently.

[REG]

Originally posted by Anomaly

But see? We've got one of those at home. We need to figure out what to do with HIM first. Cause if it will make him a dollar on an oil drum? He'll gas Kurds too.

If you're a US citizen and you want to vote him out, then vote him out. Pick the presidential candidate that you think is right for the US for this current political climate in two years.

If you're not a US citizen, then do me a favor, don't use the smear campaign tactics. As a voter, I'm sick of hearing a lot of bad things and not too much what a good thing a candidate can do for us.

Regardless, if we don't do anything, Saddam will still be around in two years.

You know, I'm in favor of not going to war. Why? No, not because I think it is wrong. It is right.

I'm in favor of NOT going to war because humanity deserve crap like the Saddam. But hey, we're not in Iraq so why should we care? It's time that the US stop being nice to the international community. Pull our military from foreign bases and into our soil. Set up an Isolationism Policy or take a Oath of Neutrality like the Swiss. Let the rest of the world fix the problems themselves. After all, you seem to be getting a better handle on it.

Oh, yeah. One more thing. Raise the rent of UN buildings.

Funny, I did not vote for Bush because I lean toward Democrats (even if the best democratic candidate is more boring than France), but I may vote for Bush in the upcoming election, unless the Democrat candidate can be a viable wartime president.

[Capt.Hunter]

A good point was raised a while back. The US seems to be leaning towards ignoring long-term allies and forming ad-hoc "coalitions of the willing" for future foreign interventions. Can I just ask - was it not an ad-hoc alliance that made the US and Saddam such good buddies back in the 80's? Back then, Saddam was a "stabilizing influence". A "staunch ally" and a buffer against the threat from Iran. The US gave him lots of weapons because he was such a good ally.

Who's vetting the "willing" in these new ad-hoc coalitions? It didn't even take a change of government before Iraq went from being an ally to a threat...

[mactavish]

It's time that the US stop being nice to the international community. Pull our military from foreign bases and into our soil. Set up an Isolationism Policy or take a Oath of Neutrality like the Swiss. Let the rest of the world fix the problems themselves.

This is EXACTLY what I said last year, and I still agree with it. The rest of the world is either indifferent, envious or hateful towards the United States. The few nations that have shown unwavering support (i.e. the United Kingdom, Australia, etc.) should remain allies. Forget the rest of the ungrateful miscreants throughout the world.

I am not a believer in fighting other peoples' battles. I am a believer in defending the interests of my nation. The US military is for defense against foreign aggression, not the surgical removal of irritating dictators that the presidents doesn't like.

Yancy suggested that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, and I have two comments on that. I have seen no concrete proof of that. I know that Mr. Hussein had chemical and possibly biological agents, and I am also aware that he used them on his own populace. So what? Was it cruel and utterly reprehensible? The act of a truly evil man? Yes on both counts. That's too bad. However, he has not used them recently, nor has he shown that he has any, despite what Mr. Powell has claimed.

Further, so what if he does have them? So what if he uses them on Kuwatis or Saudis or Turks? Does that have a direct impact on my country? Its evil, certainly, but unless Americans die I say that its the problem of whichever nation is attacked, not mine.

I think that all foreign aid should be funneled into domestic issues and that America needs to solve America's problems rather than playing corrections officer to the world's lunatics and miscreants (other than those in the States).

mactavish out.