The Hard Facts!

You could be right! lol

Take Care & Have a Good 'Un!
Patt

Re: Facts Anyone?
Well Brandon, all I've got to say about this particular post is that at least it's nice to know that you are indeed a plain spoken person, & for that, I appreciate it... My reply to you is in the making, as you requested of me...

Have A Good 'Un!
Patt

Brandon: You have exhibited remarkable patience here. I applaud you. I've noticed it's damn near impossible to have a rational debate with someone who refuses to acknowledge the difference between collateral damage and premeditated murder.

I also about fell out of my chair laughing when Pegasus offered: 2 will get you 5 Pistoff was not looking for the answer "yes", let alone a "resounding YES!!!" to all 6 of those questions. 1, 2 at the outside. He was illustrating that not every act attributed to terrorism is in fact terrorism. Sometimes its tough to get warmongers like myself to accept that simple fact. I'd further bet he left the thread in disgust when he saw that the person arguing on his side of the fence didn't get it, but the person on the other side did. I'm still chuckling about it.

Pegasus: If you'll take a little good spirited advice. Try to understand what both your allies and adversaries write before responding. There are some remarkably skilled debaters from both sides of the political fence on this forum but most of the good ones won't suffer laziness. And, Welcome to A2K! :wink:

Bill, Terrorism is Terrorism anyway you want to cut it... I answered his questions yes, because he's right, but on the other hand, how can Terrorism only pertain to "unintentional" to anyone that's being invaded, including the U.S. & many others? (Please correct me if I'm wrong, but were we involved in War w/Afghanistan or Iraq before 09-11-2001?) 1991 yes, we were at War w/Iraq, & over what??? Yep! Oil!
Perhaps I overstated my opinion, but unless I see it pistoff's way, I'm on the plowing end of this debate, which be the way is nothing short of good, but boy howdy, differ w/one or more, & "Katie bar the door"! Thanks for your input here though, it's nice to have my hind-end crawled by someone other than Brandon & pistoff... lol

Have a Great Day!
Patt

And, by the way, I'm a "her" not a "him"... lol

Thanks for the welcome Bill, but sometimes it makes me wonder if I am welcome, but it's nice to find out that 1 is welcomed in a very high profile debated area...

Would you please support your assertion that our motive in Iraq was to obtain some kind of advantage with respect to their oil?

I am especially interested in seeing how that was a factor in '91. Because I thought it was over Kuwait. (which does have oil.)

Sorry about the him/her mix up Patt. Good day to you too.

OIL IS KING
It really is. Without it we get a grinding halt.

World's second largest oil fields exist in Iraq...not so far from the world's greatest oil fields. Anyone suggesting we are in Iraq for anything but the oil there is really, really naive, or else deliberately denying the possibility so that the general population doesn't get suspicious and start sniffing around those wonder moralsuasions like peace and stability...both of which imply smooth, sustained, and affordable oil production for OUR consumption, not the freedom of the Iraqi.

I mean, what else could we possibly want there? Hell, one of the first places they landed was around oil fields. All wars are over resources. This one is no different. They have it. We need it.

It might as well be 2004 BC for all things have changed in 4,000 years.

The warmonger does not risk life and limb for noble purposes. War is bloodletting and killing and pillaging and raping and whatever it takes to get at the goods.

Take any war you want. Even Vietnam had an economic rationale behind containing communism. Rice, rubber and tungsten were in great demand at the time, and Vietnam was loaded up to the hilt with all three. The trouble was, by the time we were definitely losing the war, the need for these commodities was gone thanks to advances in tech.

To understand why any war took place, you need merely look for where the gold is. And oil is black gold. Texas tea.

There is a rationale for this idea that Bush is after oil. He is in the oil industry after all, or has been most of his life.

We just might get some answers here too. A federal judge has ordered Cheney to release secret energy meeting member documents, and I am sure we will find quite a few robber barons in attendance.

I would also like to suggest that in the true spirit and time-honored traditions of debating wisdom, it is not enough to simply state something is erroneous in its logic or conclusions. One needs to prove why the position is wrong.

This of course, is a much more difficult task than simply waving your hand and dismissing something as irelevant - the preferred method of dismissal in this day and age, stemming from an intellectual laziness that sees Cs as As, and calls it a good day.

If we all took the time to do the research to prove or disprove one position or another, we would get down to the heart of the matter and reach real discovery far faster than we ever will with the more popular method of debating nowadays.

All my life I have expected more of my fellow Americans, but as time goes on, I get less and less.

That isn't to say there aren't some real lusty intellects out there that know their stuff and can communicate it to others just as well as they understand it themselves, ( as OC relates ), but really, I offer humble advice meant with the spirit of humbleness and compassion, that most of you really ought to crack open a book once in a while.

I mean really. And I don't mean this particular thread either. Just a general observation based on input that occurred in this thread.

Together we can solve all the problems. A schism, however, only widens.

It's also not enough to simply state something is right without evidence. I challenge your assertion that the invasion of Iraq was motivated by a desire for for oil, and ask you to offer evidence. Simply stating that Iraq has oil is not evidence, and simply stating that anyone who doubts we're there for oil is naive is not evidence. It seems to me that you are guilty of the very thing you are criticizing - offering a theory without evidence.

Umbagog writes:


Don't give up the ship yet. There are still many--admittedly they are sometimes in short supply on these internet forums--who do give thoughtful consideration to how they know what they know and why they believe what they believe. And these slowly and inevitably move closer to the truth than would otherwise be possible. One simply has to forgive (and dismiss) the ignorant in the search for truth and keep pressing for it.

For instance those who can find nothing at all of value or worth in the current president or administration and who have dedicated themselves to painting it as black as possible are among those I consider ignorant or blinded by hate and I don't waste much time worrying about what they say or attempting to educate them. But I feel the same way about those on the right who can find no fault of any kind with policies/decision of the current president or administration and/or nothing to commend in the previous one--their vision can be just as prejudicial and unreasonable.

I happen to think it is foolish and unreasonable to expect a president or any elected official (or anybody) to be a saint with supernatural foreknowledge and vision and incapable of error. And though we don't always elect the best man/woman for the job, I doubt we elect many full time devils either.

I have enormous respect for those of the loyal opposition who can offer logical and reasoned opinions for their point of view and are at least willing to thoughtfully consider an opposing point of view. The rest, well.....it's a free country.

the anyone but Bush crowd still think Clinton was the best thing since slice bread?

well, sliced bread with raisins in it anyways.

So far I have seen a lot of talk that would seem to portray that al Qaeda did not hate the United States of America until George W. Bush was elected into office, and that terrorist attacks were small, isolated incidents. I think I saw someone mention these, but let me just remind you of some attacks which happened during Bill Clinton's two administrations:

1993 - First terrorist attack on the WTC
1996 - Khubar Towers, Dharain, Saudi Arabia
1998 - RPG Attack on the US embassy in Beirut
1998 - US embassies in Kenya, and Tanzania destroyed
2000 - Attack on the USS Cole

Unless I'm mistaken, every one of those attacks was traced to al Qaeda or a group closely related to it.

Let's look at the facts: al Qaeda hates us because we are the United States of America. They do not hate us because we have GWB elected, or like us because we have Bill Clinton elected. Given the chance, they'd kill Americans just the same under either president.

What you saw with 9/11 is what happens when the CIA budget is slashed, the organization is rolled back to staffing levels similar to the mid-70's, and a terrorist organization is allowed to prosper relatively unopposed for the two terms of Clinton and the months that GWB was in office. There is blame on boths ends of the stick here.

Might I throw this in as well...two years after the first WTC attack, the current Democratic front-runner John Kerry, tried to introduce a bill to further decrease the budget to the CIA by 1.5 billion dollars. You'd think the administration would've gotten a clue by then?

Boscoh: Welcome to A2K!
Can you source that last paragraph?

Thanks.

Sure, here's a link I found discussing it:
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comstock200403100835.asp