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and are you suggesting that their elections somehow have eliminated the centuries long hatred of sunni for shiite? what do the elections have to do with your totally unfounded assertion that Al Qaeda will come in and terrorize an otherwise democracy loving peaceful people?They have control over their nation. Did you miss the elections.
I think that even today, the "foreign fighters" make up a miniscule portion of the combatants. The carnage in Iraq is overwhelmingly because sunnis and shiites are killing one another.... al qaeda is a bit player, but the administration needs to keep the illusion that they are the driving force behind the insurgency so that they can always make the 9/11 connection and tap into the american wellspring of fear and revenge.
Through previous threads, you and I have found that we basically agree on this, but posts like the above is still a spot of contention for me. I watch the news and what not, and for whatever reason I guess I'm just not seeing what you're seeing. I'm not seeing the administration banging an incessant drum to the chant "Iraq = 9/11", or some such.
It isn't difficult to see that there was very little or no link between the events of 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. I think the point could be easily sold that making the decision to invade Iraq in the grand scheme of our true enemy was not the best chpice. The problem is the salesmen as far as I'm concerned. Moore, Mahr, Pelosi, Murtha can make all the sense in the world on that point, but their politcal/rhetorical emotion towards anything Bush always gets in their way and overshadows everything to the point that their shpeals alway come down to more about "we just gotta get Bush", then any logic or illogic in invading Iraq.
if you agree with me that Al Qaeda is NOT the driving force behind anything happening in Iraq and they are, at best a marginal player.... then why does Cheney say that Pelosi and Murtha's plans would "validate the Al Qaeda strategy"??? I will TELL you why...because the words "Al Qaeda" automatically conjure up planes flying into the world trade center. It is how the administration keeps the flock in line....in order to hold on to their crumbling margin of support, the adminstration needs to continue to tap into whatever is left of the tappable wellspring of anger, fear and revenge that still resonates and reverberates when America remembers what happened to us on that day..
Perhaps the group he labeled was incorrect, but it is still a reasonable, and obvious point. Group A is fighting Group B over control of X. Group A broadcasts that we are gonna stay here till Y date at which point we're leaving regardless of whether we've gained control of X or not. Assume for a second, maineman, that you are Group B and the above is true of Group A. What is your most obvious course of action? The answer should be pretty obvious. I think that's really all Cheney is saying.
bullshit....he didn't "incorrectly label" anyone. He specifically used Al Qaeda for its evocative powers. that is my point.
this thing in Iraq is a civil war.... sunnis and shiites have been at each other for a millenium.... For centuries, the ruthless Ottomans kept them in check.... then a series of british installed tyrannical leaders kept them in check...then Saddam kept them in check.... then we fucked up and got rid of Saddam...now radical islamists are present in Iraq where before they were afraid to show their face, now sunnis and shiites are slaughtering each other and will continue to do so until they have a bellyful of carnage and can stomach no more.... we are hated by both sides.... and are targets for both sides...AND TO WHAT END? Do you honestly think we will be able to stop sunnis and shiites from wanting to kill one another? Don't you understand that the fable of a multicultural jeffersonian democracy springing up on the banks of the Euphrates is just that - a fucking FABLE? Sunnis and shiites will NEVER get together for a giant group hug and sing Kumbaya together no matter how long we stay, how many trillions of dollars we flush away that we could SO much better use to actually make us safer and islamic extremism less threatening... no matter how many thousand more Americans die.
I laid out my case as to why this administration conflated Iraq and Al Qaeda and 9/11. Why would you think that rationale no longer is valid? Do you honestly think that Cheny MISSPOKE and did not really MEAN to say Al Qaeda????? If that IS the case, why hasn't he issued a retraction?
[and my point is that it IS happening...and the only thing Americans are doing is adding to the body count by being targets for both sides. And this war IS leading us to the edge of the precipice that overhangs Hell. I really and truly believe that.
I think Pelosi is too quick to defend the patriotism that no one has mentioned.
The fact is her plan will help Al Qaida. Everyone who has have a brain realizes it. One doesnt have to mention her patriotism to point out the stupidity of her actions.
Implicit in any criticism of those opposed to the failed policies of the Bush Administration in Iraq is the assumption that the opponents of the Bush administration are "unpatriotic". This assumption was given full voice by John Ashcroft in testimony before Congress. Since then, it has been the subtext of any criticism of those opposed to Administration policies on a broader range of policies than just the war in Iraq.
Your assumption that any plan that fails to condone or seeks to curtail certain policies of this Administration are cut from the same cloth, and just as baseless.
No...you are an example of the people that he used to fool, but doesn't fool any longer. Your wisdom and vision is to be applauded. And I sincerely mean that. A majority of people in America now believe as you and I do, that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and that it is a mistake.... but Team Bush seems, for whatever reason, hellbent on this war...and the only way they can rally what little support they have left in America is by playing to the anger and fear
no...I disagree... none of those wars had the possibility of fanatics getting their hands on nuclear weapons. If this battle were being fought a hundred years ago, it would be small potatoes.... but with the destructive power of nuclear weapons proliferating around the globe, with the demise of the soviet union and the subsequent loss of control of their nuclear arsenal, this war has the potential to be the grand daddy of them all. There is a great fictional book by Collins and Lapierre entitled the Fifth Horseman....I recommend it. Basically, arabs bring a satchel nuke into NYC in a cargo ship and place it in a warehouse and demand that America lean on Israel to return all the occupied territories or they will detonate it. The book is nearly 30 years old...but NYC is no safer from that sort of event today than it was then. If AQ gets a nuke... and there are plenty of them out there to be had...and they bring it into NYC, it will kill MILLIONS of Americans in an instant. When I think of how much defensive capability we could have engineered into our ports of entry and our air traffic systems with the money that we have literally flushed down the toilet in Iraq, it makes me nauseous. I am not being dramatic in the least. Bush has ignited what may very well turn into the firestorm that consumes this planet
Couple clarifications need to be made here: 1)At no point was i "fooled" by this argument. 2) I wasn't fooled because the above was not given as the major reason for this invasion. Again the major reasons that we were given was that Saddam was an imminent threat because he "had" WMDs and had violated several U.N. resolutions. That was the selling point given to the American people, not that Saddam had played an integral roll in 9/11, though it is true it was suggested. The only big question in hinesight is why, just a hair over a year since 9/11 , did we decide this was our most pressing issue? Another theory I have is that the reason we were given is truly what the administration believed. It certainly added up. Saddam had violated numerous U.N. resolutions which would logically lead anyone to wonder what he was hiding. Was there also intelligence that indicated Saddam wasn't really that much of a threat? Probably. But I think that's one if those decisions you would rather take action on and be wrong, than be right and not have taken any.
I see a bit of a flaw in that argument in this. What if we hadn't invaded Iraq? What if we had found, before we invaded, that Iraq simply wasn't a big enough threat to have to deal with right now? That doesn't change the fact that 9/11 happened and thus doesn't change that we were attacked by Al Queada first and before Iraq was ever in the cards. What it seems your saying is that somehow going into Iraq somehow stirred up a hornets nest. yet you also say the Al Queda aspect of it was small potatoes. Well, if that's true then Al Queda's animosity toward would not be any different right now than if we hadn't invaded Iraq. Without Iraq we would still be in this conflict with terrorists. Being in Iraq hasn't expanded Al Queda's ability to gather these, well, WMDs, that you claim make this the threat of all threats. That would be the case whether or not we had invaded Iraq wouldn't it?
Terrorism has been on the increase since the 1970's, nothing new there. Your assumption that Iraq is the cause of it is unlikely. It seems more reasonable to assume that while there may have been a more rapid increase of smaller scale-IED's; suicide bombings; there has been a drastic increase of prevention of major scale attacks. Again though, I'd hesitate to assume that the cause is involvement militarily in Iraq or Afghanistan, more likely a more realistic response from countries where the attacks were planned....
<blockquote> - The rate of terrorism fatalities for the 59 month period following 11 September 2001 is 250 percent that of the 44.5 month period preceding and including the 9/11 attacks. This figure has been adjusted to account for the different length of the two periods and it implies an increase in average monthly fatalities of 150 percent. (Only in January 1998 did the database begin to include both national and international terrorism incidents.)
- The rate of terrorist incidents for the post-9/11 period is 268 percent that of the period prior to and including 11 September 2001. This implies a 167 percent increase in what might be called the average monthly rate of incidents.
- A fair portion of the increased activity is related to the war in Iraq -- but not all. Removing Iraq from the picture shows an increase in the average monthly rate of terrorism fatalities of more than 10 percent for the post-9/11 period. The increase in the rate of incidents not counting Iraq is 75 percent. - <a href=http://www.comw.org/pda/0609bm38.html>War & consequences: Global terrorism has increased since 9/11 attacks </a></blockquote>
To libs they actually believe the following:
1) Those who have helped us (elected officials, police, military, translators, ect) will not be killed
2) the terrorists will not have an entire country as a base of operations
3) The terrorists will not have the wealth from oil sales to finance their world wide attacks
4) The terrorists will not see the pull out as a sign of weakness which would drive them to come after us again on US soil
The Dems see the loss in Iraq as a loss for Pres Bush and not the US. They only want to humble the President and try to take over the role as Commander in Chief.
By retreating from Iraq, the terrorists will be emboldened, and they will follow the us and fight us here on US soil.
Will the Dems take responsibility, or will they blame Pres Bush?
Terrorism has been on the increase since the 1970's, nothing new there. Your assumption that Iraq is the cause of it is unlikely. It seems more reasonable to assume that while there may have been a more rapid increase of smaller scale-IED's; suicide bombings; there has been a drastic increase of prevention of major scale attacks. Again though, I'd hesitate to assume that the cause is involvement militarily in Iraq or Afghanistan, more likely a more realistic response from countries where the attacks were planned.
