Attack in London Today

Ticomaya wrote:

I would grow weary pointing out similarly "objective" comments in other MSM.

You're welcome to. It would be nice to see some actual substantiation to the "liberal media" thing.

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woiyo wrote:

patiodog wrote:
woiyo wrote:
"We are reaping now what we've sown for more than half a century of short-sighted and greedy interference in the nations of southwest Asia."

"The remark, I would assume, refers to how the US funded/supplied the group Osama was part of, back when it was still fighting Najibullah in Afghanistan."

What a load of "huey". These types of comments lend jusitification to the actions of these cowards, as if we deserved it.

So do you deny that the U.S. gov't supported bin Laden in the 1980s? Or that we supported Hussein at one time? Or that we've been long involved in supporting the House of Saud?

I don't deny any of that. At that time, this govt felt is was the correct thing to do. Just as we allied with Russia in WW2.

Yet, it appears you use this ancient history as justification for the cowardly actions of the Islamic extremests today. By your twisted logic, maybe the East German citizens should start blowing things up in Russia.
Do you deny that the history of U.S. involvement in the region is not one that has fostered a movement toward democracy?

This is my first post on the subject -- how could you take it upon yourself to assume I justify anything? How could you ascribe any adjective to my logic whatsoever?

What would be folly, though, would be to never look up from the immediate skirmish to wonder why current events might have come about -- what we may have done or failed to do that might have forestalled the urge to violence among our enemies and the subsequent need for retaliation? To just go about and say, "Well, what we did was in the past" is asinine. History, don't know, doomed to repeat -- that tired old cliche comes to mind.

It amazes me that you can so easily equate admitting one's own (or, rather, one's government's own) failures with support for one's enemies.

If I raise a dog that rips my arm off, he's going to get put down. AND I'm going to raise the next dog differently.

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Yup. Understand AND fight. Shouldnt be so hard, no?

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nimh wrote:

Ticomaya wrote:
I would grow weary pointing out similarly "objective" comments in other MSM.

You're welcome to. It would be nice to see some actual substantiation to the "liberal media" thing.

One need only pay attention. I'll try and remember to point these out for you when I come across them ...

You know, for some people, this is a full-time job ... The 2004 Dishonor Awards .....

Quote:

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Patiodog - You are avoiding the question so I will ask it in the form of a question.

You state that as a result of the "things in the past", it is justification for the actions of the terrorists. Is that Correct??

If we retailiate to defend ourrselves, are we at fault for doing so??

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I went through about four of those, Tico, and though I thought some were distasteful I think you missed my point in my post above.

That point would be about separating opinion in reporting.

This is journalism 101. You are free to cover various opinions, but you have to mark them as being opinion - and in the run of the story itself, it has no place.

Ie, "this and this and such and so happened" <- no place for opinionated take. "Some say / Mr. X-and-Y asserts / the Organisation for Whatever claims that ...etc" <-- whatever opinion you got.

To mix them up is not up to journalistic standard, and is one of my largest beefs with Foxnews.com, Newsmax, etc.

There's no reason to have much beef with opinions being aired in an article or broadcast in itself. One should hope for a full, relatively equitable range of opinion of course - and we can discuss forever which station has the more equitable range, because our scales of reference are so different. But as long as an opinion is brought as clearly opinion - yeah. You have a talk show - people bring different opinions, takes, some of 'em disagreeable. You invite commentators - they're bringing their personal opinion. Thats a given, and the viewer knows it.

I think that the ever increasing dominance and reliance on such commentators, guest analysts etc is bad for journalism exactly because they bring mere opinion, and can hypothesize and opine as they feel fit, without having to meet the standards of provability a straight news story's reporter needs to follow in order for his employer not to be sued. A columnist or commentator can say anything he damn well wants. I think its bad there's so much of them - but on the other hand you do at least you know theirs are just opinions. What's important here is maintinaing a firewall between that and the straight reporting - "yesterday, this and that happened".

In the quote I reacted to, on the other hand, the opinion ("convoluted") was inserted into the objective, anonymous voice. Thats wrong.

Its a basic violation of journalistic standards, and its a disease infesting news reporting from the blogosphere, from talk radio, from Fox TV, from all such folks who apparently feel they need not bother with such old-fashioned conventions like separating opinion from reporting. But its the death of reliable reporting: it turns everything into opinion. Very postmodern, sure, but ...

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Setanta wrote:

Brandon9000 wrote:
What if they use biological or nuclear weapons someday? Might you not wish you had been a little proactive?

This is so idiotically absurd, that it would be side-splittingly funny, coming from Mr. "OMG They're going to saw my head off as I scream"--were it not so tragically stupid.

I'm going to ask you to pin that down a little more. The person to whom I was responding recommended only reacting to individual attacks. I pointed out the possibility of WMD attacks occurring someday as an argument for not functioning solely in reactive mode.

If you disagree, then you must necessarily believe that the person to whom I was reacting was correct and that we ought to function solely in reactive mode. How is my assertion that we should not stupid? Don't react to five things I didn't say. What, specifically, is your disagreement with my assertion in this case? Do you believe that no terrorist will ever obtain WMD?

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All I am saying is that the Iraq war was not part of the war terrorism and obviously did nothing to stop it. Iraq was not a breeding ground for terrorism before the war and obviously it is not the only place terrorist are working at now. So in terms of our saftey the Iraq war did not make us any safer and I am not sure staying there will make us any safer either as they can just go elsewhere to create havoc and terror.

In fact the Iraq war seems to have just created more terrorist than before and making them more deadly and determined because they are not acting in just one big group but rather a bunch of little groups all doing their own thing for their own reasons.

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woiyo wrote:

Patiodog - You are avoiding the question so I will ask it in the form of a question.

You state that as a result of the "things in the past", it is justification for the actions of the terrorists.

No he didnt.

Explanation ... justification.

Two different words.

Mean different things.

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nimh wrote:

I went through about four of those, Tico, and though I thought some were distasteful I think you missed my point in my post above.

Actually, no, I didn't ... but I did say I'd keep my eyes open for similar objective analysis from the leftist MSM.

Quote:

To mix them up is not up to journalistic standard, and is one of my largest beefs with Foxnews.com, Newsmax, etc.

And my point, as you know, is that your beef should also be with other media as well. You ever visit timeswatch.org?

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Brandon:

Don't you think that our proliferation and continued research on the topic of WMD's is counterproductive and dangerous to terrorists getting WMD's?

It is like being pro-life and pro-death penalty in my mind.

TTF

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churchofME
In response to the bombings you wrote:

churchofME wrote:

Can we move away from the hard war/soft war arguement and move on to the more relevant issue. That is to say, the liberal, apologist, PC brigade are the ones who have left us so open and vulnerable to attack.
The serial underfunding of our intelligence services and armed forces over the past decade and the constant pandering to rabble rousing maniacs just because they come from and 'ethnic group' or are a 'minority'. It is just too much!

Fundermentalist leaders are allowed to preach hatred and intolerance to crowds of admirers on the streets of britain(Abu Hamza). At the same time a little old lady in Coventry is arrested because she collects porcelin pigs and displays them in her window which just happens to be on a street that leads to a mosque.

I responded by saying that attacking (and I mean verbally - ie In your post) British minorities, is a knee-jerk reaction that can only aid the terrorist. That divide and Rule is a game played by both sides.
I simply wanted to point out that Mr Blair has reminded us of the reflection these bombings may have on the law-abiding British Muslim Community.
In his speech he said,

"When they try to divide our people or weaken our resolve, we will not be divided and our resolve will hold firm."
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4659953.stm

Your response to this was:

churchofME wrote:

Do you really believe that Abu Hamsa and his ilk should be left alone?
Are you one of those liberal, apologists who pander to the evil beasts who plan and commit these crimes?
Just because I'm not an apologist it doesn't mean I'm a gunho neocon

I'll take your word for it, mate.
And can only repeat, what I've already said. Pandering can come in different forms and reacting to terrorists activity with indiscriminate anger, could be seen as 'pandering' to their desire to put fear into us all.
If we allow their hatred to make us hate... then we shall become them.

Maybe true division is not between those with different coloured skins or different religions, but between those that hate and those that do not.

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thethinkfactory wrote:

Brandon:

Don't you think that our proliferation and continued research on the topic of WMD's is counterproductive and dangerous to terrorists getting WMD's?

It is like being pro-life and pro-death penalty in my mind.

TTF

It's not counterproductive to M.A.D., which still functions will the major world powers if not with the smaller, less stable, less risk averse ones. It is true, certainly, that the more countries which have WMD, the greater the chance for them to somehow, someday fall into the hands of terrorists. I believe that reduction of nuclear weapons by all countries would be a good thing, but I would consider it foolish in the extreme for us to disarm unilaterally, or for that matter totally. Since you admit the theoretical possibility of terrorists striking with WMD, how much effort do you think the danger warrants from us? Presumably the calculation as to how far we ought to go to avoid the danger would take into account the possible effects of such a strike on a population center.

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Found out a couple hours ago we had a 2 employess in our UK office that missed the trains due to a cancelled meeting.

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I hear you Brandon. I don't think any side was total disssarmament - but to proliferate and to develop new weapons that are more dangerous seems a bit hypocritical to say the least.

I think it makes sense to downsize our old ungodly large weapons that are outdates and a huge drain to our economy (11 billion annually).

I think that when muck slinging starts to go on we tend to think binarily. Like the democrats say that Republicans want NO public education and the Republicans want TOTAL dissarmament.

We all seem to want so much of the same - I do not understand why we can't get more done.

TTF

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woiyo wrote:

Patiodog - You are avoiding the question so I will ask it in the form of a question.

You state that as a result of the "things in the past", it is justification for the actions of the terrorists. Is that Correct??

If we retailiate to defend ourrselves, are we at fault for doing so??

Show me where I make such a statement. Please do not read between the lines. I do not write between the lines, except for the sake of humor -- and there is nothing funny about this subject.

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thethinkfactory wrote:

I hear you Brandon. I don't think any side was total disssarmament - but to proliferate and to develop new weapons that are more dangerous seems a bit hypocritical to say the least.

Perhaps in the sense that we advocate non-proliferation, but not because of our position that highly dangerous dictators ought not to have WMD.

thethinkfactory wrote:

I think it makes sense to downsize our old ungodly large weapons that are outdates and a huge drain to our economy (11 billion annually).

I am far less concerned about us disarming than I am about the fact that more and less stable countries are acquiring WMD every year. Sooner or later, we are going to have a WMD event in some population center and hundreds of thousands of people will be dead.

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"It is not caving in to the bees to stop poking a stick into their hive."

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dyslexia wrote:

"It is not caving in to the bees to stop poking a stick into their hive."

Some of these groups have declared that Muslims have a duty to kill Americans wherever they find them. In his manifesto, Osama bin Laden states that one of his primary demands of us is that we convert to Islam. Your implication that 9/11, embassy bombings, etc. were warranted by our actions is highly misguided. When people say that they want to kill you and destroy your civilization, it is very foolish to suggest that those who fight back are responsible.

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Quote:

Your implication that 9/11, embassy bombings, etc. were warranted by our actions

Just freakin amazing.

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Attack in London Today

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