Let us review: This is how the Obama Administration is responsible for the threat that is ISIS

[Geaux4it]

Any of you who think American soldiers should now go to Iraq and die in place of the Iraqis who ran away in the face of ISIS,

sign up.

I would if I could, but I put my service in year ago. I paid my dues. What say you?

-Geaux

 

[TemplarKormac]

.

This disaster dates back to 2003, when we invaded Iraq and took out Saddam, who provided a strategic counter-balance to Iran and a firewall against organized terror.

An invasion, as it turns out, that has cost us over a trillion dollars of borrowed money, over 4,000 young American lives, and many more thousands lost American limbs and minds.

So, probably not really a bargain to this point.

.

How did Saddam become a counterweight to organized terrorism? He was a terrorist too, by all definitions of the word. He committed systematic genocide of his opposition and of innocent people. Used those chemical weapons we found to intimidate people into submission, The man was a murderer and the Iraqis hailed his demise. I would hardly call that a disaster my friend.

I agree, he was a psychotic monster.

But he had enough control over his "country" that he would have gone after and slaughtered any group like this with no mercy, using his military. That's what despots do, that's how they become and remain despots.

That's the big picture, the one we ignored. We don't like a guy, so we invade a sovereign country and take him out. This is what happens when we think we can decide who the winners and losers are.

.

The control he had over his country was stolen. The power he had was of intimidation and of murderous intent. When people plead for our help, do we abandon them? A nation isn't sovereign when a dictator takes away the freedoms of his own people. For a nation to be sovereign the people need to be free as well. Despots prevent national sovereignty by oppressing their people. No freedom, no sovereignty.

It's not a matter of us 'not liking a guy' its a matter of showing the world that we actually support personal liberties and freedom anywhere in the world. What good is it if we don't stand behind our principles?

Torture Chambers
The New Yorker’s Dexter Filkins, who wrote the best book on Iraq (“The Forever War”), recently recalled a visit, shortly after the invasion, to one of Saddam’s torture chambers, a place called Al Hakemiya. He met a man there who identified himself as Al-Musawi. The two visited a room where Al-Musawi’s “arms had been nearly torn from their sockets.” He had been hung from the ceiling and electrocuted.

“Today, in 2013 -- a decade later -- it’s not fashionable to suggest that the American invasion of Iraq served any useful purpose,” Filkins continued. “But what are we to make of Iraqis like Al-Musawi? Or of torture chambers like Al Hakemiya? Where do we place them in our memories? And, more important, how should they shape our judgment of the war we waged?”

His suggestion: “Ask the Iraqis -- that is, if anyone, in this moment of American navel-gazing, can be bothered to do so.”

I took Filkins’s charge to heart, and asked another graduate of Saddam’s torture chambers, a man named Barham Salih, what he thought of the invasion, 10 years on.

Today, Salih is the chairman of the board of the American University of Iraq in Sulaimani, which provides a liberal education in a place not previously known for such a phenomenon. In recent years, Salih has served as both the deputy prime minister of Iraq and as prime minister of the Kurdish regional government. He was in the camp of people who argued that Saddam’s decision to commit genocide against Iraqi Kurds (sometimes with chemical weapons) in the late 1980s made his removal a moral imperative.

I asked him if he thought the invasion was worth it.

“From the perspective of the Kurdish people -- and I dare say the majority of the Iraqi people -- it was worth it,” he said. “War is never a good option, but given our history and the brutality of Saddam’s regime, it may have been the only other option to end the genocidal campaign waged by Saddam against the Kurds and other communities in Iraq.”

Here is where his answer became a lament. “I must admit, however, that 10 years on, Iraq’s transition is, to say the least, characterized by unrealized expectations, both for Iraqis and for our American liberators. Iraq is not the friendly democracy that the U.S. had hoped for, and it is far from the secure, inclusive democracy that Iraqis deserved and aspired to.”

‘Inherent Danger’
He went on to blame Iraqis, rather than Americans, for the failures of the past decade. “Much can be said about U.S. missteps and miscalculations in this process, but there is no denying that Iraqi political leadership bears prime responsibility for squandering a unique opportunity to deliver to their people. This has been nothing short of a drastic failure of leadership on our part! The Kurdistan region offers hope that all is not lost in Iraq.”

I asked Salih to answer the argument that the Kurds -- who make up almost 20 percent of Iraq’s population -- were, by 2003, mainly living in relative safety in a region protected by an American-enforced no-fly zone. In other words, the invasion wasn’t a humanitarian necessity at that moment.

“All Iraqis lived under a regime that had complete disdain for human life,” he said. “Executions and killings continued at will. Thousands of Iraqis were being sent to the mass graves. The Kurds were never safe as they knew that Saddam could at any time decide to reconquer the no-fly zone.”

He went on, “Saddam was a menace to the Kurds, to the other Iraqi communities, and an inherent danger to the region. He was, from our perspective in this part of the world, a grave and mortal danger that we could never be safe from while he was still around.”

Was the Iraq Invasion Worthwhile Ask an Iraqi - Bloomberg View

This is not worth the price we have paid, not even close. And there are other evil regimes around the world too. Should we go after North Korea next?

I've sat in too many goddamn airports watching young boys pushing their legless soldier Dad down the corridor in a wheelchair. This was/is not worth it.

It's not our planet, and we failed to consider the big picture.

.

The world is the bigger picture. We live in it too. If nobody stops to attempt to bring order to chaos, it will wind up consuming them as well.

And being the son of a soldier dad who fought in Iraq, I would beg to differ. The people who enlist in the military understand the risks they are taking, and so did my dad. So I wonder, what would happen if you told a soldier that his blood, sweat, tears or the loss of his/her buddies or a limb isn't/wasn't worth it? More often than not, I guarantee he will say it was.

 

[TemplarKormac]

Hey Joe, why send our troops to fight Ebola, but not a war? How does that reasoning work out?

I'm not Joe, but curbing and curing Ebola, "saves the world"....

Fighting and beating ISIS just opens the hole for another group just like them....

Because it is not the 'people' in the region beating them, there will never be a winner on 'the good side".....

I don't think my husband or father should die for this never ending cause...if you feel they should be sent to their possible DEATHS for this, then it is YOU that has a problem....and you can go over there with all of your arm chair hawks, and all of your stocked up guns and ammo that the 2nd amendment gave you, and fight ISIS yourselves, ''mano e mano".

Read my above response to Mac. I am not an armchair hawk. My father was fighting in wars when I was in diapers. What I know I learned from him. He was an O-3 before he was honorably discharged from the Army. And for all of that bluster, miss, Democrats have no clue what it is to fight in a war. I myself have been given first hand accounts by people who served in WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq (Desert Storm).

Your husband/father knew what they were getting themselves into. What would you have done? Stopped them from making that decision? Who are you to tell them not to?

 

[Care4all]

SWISH.... right over your head....TK

 

[JoeB131]

Hey Joe, why send our troops to fight Ebola, but not a war? How does that reasoning work out?

You mean why send medical corps experts to provide assistance when assistance was REQUESTED and WELCOME.

I think the question answers itself, Couch-Boy.

 

[JoeB131]

Read my above response to Mac. I am not an armchair hawk. My father was fighting in wars when I was in diapers. What I know I learned from him. He was an O-3 before he was honorably discharged from the Army.

Okay, that's all nice, but YOU haven't done anything, and you don't get credit for others service.

 

[TemplarKormac]

SWISH.... right over your head....TK

So what point were you trying to make, then? You call me an 'armchair hawk' and the suggest I need to go over there and fight? Perhaps you shouldn't resort to making snide remarks, miss. If you had a point, I'm sure it flew over your head too.

 

[zeke]

.

This disaster dates back to 2003, when we invaded Iraq and took out Saddam, who provided a strategic counter-balance to Iran and a firewall against organized terror.

An invasion, as it turns out, that has cost us over a trillion dollars of borrowed money, over 4,000 young American lives, and many more thousands lost American limbs and minds.

So, probably not really a bargain to this point.

.

How did Saddam become a counterweight to organized terrorism? He was a terrorist too, by all definitions of the word. He committed systematic genocide of his opposition and of innocent people. Used those chemical weapons we found to intimidate people into submission, The man was a murderer and the Iraqis hailed his demise. I would hardly call that a disaster my friend.

I agree, he was a psychotic monster.

But he had enough control over his "country" that he would have gone after and slaughtered any group like this with no mercy, using his military. That's what despots do, that's how they become and remain despots.

That's the big picture, the one we ignored. We don't like a guy, so we invade a sovereign country and take him out. This is what happens when we think we can decide who the winners and losers are.

.

The control he had over his country was stolen. The power he had was of intimidation and of murderous intent. When people plead for our help, do we abandon them? A nation isn't sovereign when a dictator takes away the freedoms of his own people. For a nation to be sovereign the people need to be free as well. Despots prevent national sovereignty by oppressing their people. No freedom, no sovereignty.

It's not a matter of us 'not liking a guy' its a matter of showing the world that we actually support personal liberties and freedom anywhere in the world. What good is it if we don't stand behind our principles?

Torture Chambers
The New Yorker’s Dexter Filkins, who wrote the best book on Iraq (“The Forever War”), recently recalled a visit, shortly after the invasion, to one of Saddam’s torture chambers, a place called Al Hakemiya. He met a man there who identified himself as Al-Musawi. The two visited a room where Al-Musawi’s “arms had been nearly torn from their sockets.” He had been hung from the ceiling and electrocuted.

“Today, in 2013 -- a decade later -- it’s not fashionable to suggest that the American invasion of Iraq served any useful purpose,” Filkins continued. “But what are we to make of Iraqis like Al-Musawi? Or of torture chambers like Al Hakemiya? Where do we place them in our memories? And, more important, how should they shape our judgment of the war we waged?”

His suggestion: “Ask the Iraqis -- that is, if anyone, in this moment of American navel-gazing, can be bothered to do so.”

I took Filkins’s charge to heart, and asked another graduate of Saddam’s torture chambers, a man named Barham Salih, what he thought of the invasion, 10 years on.

Today, Salih is the chairman of the board of the American University of Iraq in Sulaimani, which provides a liberal education in a place not previously known for such a phenomenon. In recent years, Salih has served as both the deputy prime minister of Iraq and as prime minister of the Kurdish regional government. He was in the camp of people who argued that Saddam’s decision to commit genocide against Iraqi Kurds (sometimes with chemical weapons) in the late 1980s made his removal a moral imperative.

I asked him if he thought the invasion was worth it.

“From the perspective of the Kurdish people -- and I dare say the majority of the Iraqi people -- it was worth it,” he said. “War is never a good option, but given our history and the brutality of Saddam’s regime, it may have been the only other option to end the genocidal campaign waged by Saddam against the Kurds and other communities in Iraq.”

Here is where his answer became a lament. “I must admit, however, that 10 years on, Iraq’s transition is, to say the least, characterized by unrealized expectations, both for Iraqis and for our American liberators. Iraq is not the friendly democracy that the U.S. had hoped for, and it is far from the secure, inclusive democracy that Iraqis deserved and aspired to.”

‘Inherent Danger’
He went on to blame Iraqis, rather than Americans, for the failures of the past decade. “Much can be said about U.S. missteps and miscalculations in this process, but there is no denying that Iraqi political leadership bears prime responsibility for squandering a unique opportunity to deliver to their people. This has been nothing short of a drastic failure of leadership on our part! The Kurdistan region offers hope that all is not lost in Iraq.”

I asked Salih to answer the argument that the Kurds -- who make up almost 20 percent of Iraq’s population -- were, by 2003, mainly living in relative safety in a region protected by an American-enforced no-fly zone. In other words, the invasion wasn’t a humanitarian necessity at that moment.

“All Iraqis lived under a regime that had complete disdain for human life,” he said. “Executions and killings continued at will. Thousands of Iraqis were being sent to the mass graves. The Kurds were never safe as they knew that Saddam could at any time decide to reconquer the no-fly zone.”

He went on, “Saddam was a menace to the Kurds, to the other Iraqi communities, and an inherent danger to the region. He was, from our perspective in this part of the world, a grave and mortal danger that we could never be safe from while he was still around.”

Was the Iraq Invasion Worthwhile Ask an Iraqi - Bloomberg View

Temple. Pretty cool to be that big war supporter when YOUR fucking pussy ass is sitting in Moms basement. Isn't it. Or does this lead us back to the reason you can't serve in the military. The military doesn't want idiots.

And where is this countries "principal" of invading sovereign nations that didn't attack u?.Is that a "new" right wing principal? If so, it sucks.

 

[TemplarKormac]

Hey Joe, why send our troops to fight Ebola, but not a war? How does that reasoning work out?

You mean why send medical corps experts to provide assistance when assistance was REQUESTED and WELCOME.

I think the question answers itself, Couch-Boy.

"Experts." That's the thing, none of these 'experts' know a thing about how to combat Ebola. So it's rather a pointless endeavor isn't it, JoeBlow?

 

[TemplarKormac]

.

This disaster dates back to 2003, when we invaded Iraq and took out Saddam, who provided a strategic counter-balance to Iran and a firewall against organized terror.

An invasion, as it turns out, that has cost us over a trillion dollars of borrowed money, over 4,000 young American lives, and many more thousands lost American limbs and minds.

So, probably not really a bargain to this point.

.

How did Saddam become a counterweight to organized terrorism? He was a terrorist too, by all definitions of the word. He committed systematic genocide of his opposition and of innocent people. Used those chemical weapons we found to intimidate people into submission, The man was a murderer and the Iraqis hailed his demise. I would hardly call that a disaster my friend.

I agree, he was a psychotic monster.

But he had enough control over his "country" that he would have gone after and slaughtered any group like this with no mercy, using his military. That's what despots do, that's how they become and remain despots.

That's the big picture, the one we ignored. We don't like a guy, so we invade a sovereign country and take him out. This is what happens when we think we can decide who the winners and losers are.

.

The control he had over his country was stolen. The power he had was of intimidation and of murderous intent. When people plead for our help, do we abandon them? A nation isn't sovereign when a dictator takes away the freedoms of his own people. For a nation to be sovereign the people need to be free as well. Despots prevent national sovereignty by oppressing their people. No freedom, no sovereignty.

It's not a matter of us 'not liking a guy' its a matter of showing the world that we actually support personal liberties and freedom anywhere in the world. What good is it if we don't stand behind our principles?

Torture Chambers
The New Yorker’s Dexter Filkins, who wrote the best book on Iraq (“The Forever War”), recently recalled a visit, shortly after the invasion, to one of Saddam’s torture chambers, a place called Al Hakemiya. He met a man there who identified himself as Al-Musawi. The two visited a room where Al-Musawi’s “arms had been nearly torn from their sockets.” He had been hung from the ceiling and electrocuted.

“Today, in 2013 -- a decade later -- it’s not fashionable to suggest that the American invasion of Iraq served any useful purpose,” Filkins continued. “But what are we to make of Iraqis like Al-Musawi? Or of torture chambers like Al Hakemiya? Where do we place them in our memories? And, more important, how should they shape our judgment of the war we waged?”

His suggestion: “Ask the Iraqis -- that is, if anyone, in this moment of American navel-gazing, can be bothered to do so.”

I took Filkins’s charge to heart, and asked another graduate of Saddam’s torture chambers, a man named Barham Salih, what he thought of the invasion, 10 years on.

Today, Salih is the chairman of the board of the American University of Iraq in Sulaimani, which provides a liberal education in a place not previously known for such a phenomenon. In recent years, Salih has served as both the deputy prime minister of Iraq and as prime minister of the Kurdish regional government. He was in the camp of people who argued that Saddam’s decision to commit genocide against Iraqi Kurds (sometimes with chemical weapons) in the late 1980s made his removal a moral imperative.

I asked him if he thought the invasion was worth it.

“From the perspective of the Kurdish people -- and I dare say the majority of the Iraqi people -- it was worth it,” he said. “War is never a good option, but given our history and the brutality of Saddam’s regime, it may have been the only other option to end the genocidal campaign waged by Saddam against the Kurds and other communities in Iraq.”

Here is where his answer became a lament. “I must admit, however, that 10 years on, Iraq’s transition is, to say the least, characterized by unrealized expectations, both for Iraqis and for our American liberators. Iraq is not the friendly democracy that the U.S. had hoped for, and it is far from the secure, inclusive democracy that Iraqis deserved and aspired to.”

‘Inherent Danger’
He went on to blame Iraqis, rather than Americans, for the failures of the past decade. “Much can be said about U.S. missteps and miscalculations in this process, but there is no denying that Iraqi political leadership bears prime responsibility for squandering a unique opportunity to deliver to their people. This has been nothing short of a drastic failure of leadership on our part! The Kurdistan region offers hope that all is not lost in Iraq.”

I asked Salih to answer the argument that the Kurds -- who make up almost 20 percent of Iraq’s population -- were, by 2003, mainly living in relative safety in a region protected by an American-enforced no-fly zone. In other words, the invasion wasn’t a humanitarian necessity at that moment.

“All Iraqis lived under a regime that had complete disdain for human life,” he said. “Executions and killings continued at will. Thousands of Iraqis were being sent to the mass graves. The Kurds were never safe as they knew that Saddam could at any time decide to reconquer the no-fly zone.”

He went on, “Saddam was a menace to the Kurds, to the other Iraqi communities, and an inherent danger to the region. He was, from our perspective in this part of the world, a grave and mortal danger that we could never be safe from while he was still around.”

Was the Iraq Invasion Worthwhile Ask an Iraqi - Bloomberg View

Temple. Pretty cool to be that big war supporter when YOUR fucking pussy ass is sitting in Moms basement. Isn't it. Or does this lead us back to the reason you can't serve in the military. The military doesn't want idiots.

And where is this countries "principal" of invading sovereign nations that didn't attack u?.Is that a "new" right wing principal? If so, it sucks.

"The military doesn't want idiots."

And just how would you know that? Did you find out firsthand?

"And where is this country's "principle" of invading sovereign nations that didn't attack you? Is that a "new" right wing principle?

"Freedom, and Justice for All." Not a right wing principle at all. No nation is sovereign when the people are not free. It's as simple as that.

 

[JoeB131]

[]

"Experts." That's the thing, none of these 'experts' know a thing about how to combat Ebola. So it's rather a pointless endeavor isn't it, JoeBlow?

Not really. The do know how to contain it, treat it, and prevent it from spreading.

 

[TemplarKormac]

Read my above response to Mac. I am not an armchair hawk. My father was fighting in wars when I was in diapers. What I know I learned from him. He was an O-3 before he was honorably discharged from the Army.

Okay, that's all nice, but YOU haven't done anything, and you don't get credit for others service.

Was there anything intelligent you wanted to say? And where was I claiming credit for anything?

 

[TemplarKormac]

[]

"Experts." That's the thing, none of these 'experts' know a thing about how to combat Ebola. So it's rather a pointless endeavor isn't it, JoeBlow?

Not really. The do know how to contain it, treat it, and prevent it from spreading.

Last time I looked, Joe, it was still spreading.

WHO 10 000 new Ebola cases per week could be seen - Yahoo News

 

[JoeB131]

[

"The military doesn't want idiots."

And just how would you know that? Did you find out firsthand?

"And where is this country's "principle" of invading sovereign nations that didn't attack you? Is that a "new" right wing principle?

"Freedom, and Justice for All." Not a right wing principle at all. No nation is sovereign when the people are not free. It's as simple as that.

Horseshit. People have fought to the death for some of the worst regimes in History.

We spent all of World War II waiting for the "Good Germans' to turn on Hitler, but they fought for him to the last old man and little boy.

Fact is, the Iraqis didn't want us "liberating" them from Saddam. Saddam kept the lights on and the trains running on time.

 

[JoeB131]

Read my above response to Mac. I am not an armchair hawk. My father was fighting in wars when I was in diapers. What I know I learned from him. He was an O-3 before he was honorably discharged from the Army.

Okay, that's all nice, but YOU haven't done anything, and you don't get credit for others service.

Was there anything intelligent you wanted to say? And where was I claiming credit for anything?

When you tried to claim you weren't an Airchair hawk because your dad was an O-3.

 

[Camp]

Hey Joe, why send our troops to fight Ebola, but not a war? How does that reasoning work out?

You mean why send medical corps experts to provide assistance when assistance was REQUESTED and WELCOME.

I think the question answers itself, Couch-Boy.

"Experts." That's the thing, none of these 'experts' know a thing about how to combat Ebola. So it's rather a pointless endeavor isn't it, JoeBlow?

We know how to handle ebola. Seems they needed some teaching in Texas where they turned a guy away who came in sick and told him he had just arrived from ebola land. Than they couldn't figure out that they needed to disinfect the place his was living and dispose of his contaminated clothing, bed sheets, etc.

 

[TemplarKormac]

Hey Joe, why send our troops to fight Ebola, but not a war? How does that reasoning work out?

You mean why send medical corps experts to provide assistance when assistance was REQUESTED and WELCOME.

I think the question answers itself, Couch-Boy.

"Experts." That's the thing, none of these 'experts' know a thing about how to combat Ebola. So it's rather a pointless endeavor isn't it, JoeBlow?

We know how to handle ebola. Seems they needed some teaching in Texas where they turned a guy away who came in sick and told him he had just arrived from ebola land. Than they couldn't figure out that they needed to disinfect the place his was living and dispose of his contaminated clothing, bed sheets, etc.

Seems like you believe anything people tell you. I doubt you have links backing that up

The guy lied to the Liberians about not having Ebola. He willfully put the lives of many people in danger.

Dallas County prosecutor considering criminal charges against Ebola patient in Texas - The Washington Post

 

[TemplarKormac]

We know how to handle ebola.

No you don't.

 

[Camp]

We know how to handle ebola.

No you don't.

Yes we do. You are a person who doesn't even know the guy with ebola was turned away from the hospital with a 103 degree fever after telling the hospital he had just arrived from West Africa and the Texas authorities delayed decontaminating his living space and clothing. Why would anyone think you know anything about Ebola and how to control it? You don't know the basics. Must be listening to the doomsday prophets and Republicans running for elected office using fear to garner votes.

 

[JoeB131]

We know how to handle ebola.

No you don't.

Yes we do. You are a person who doesn't even know the guy with ebola was turned away from the hospital with a 103 degree fever after telling the hospital he had just arrived from West Africa and the Texas authorities delayed decontaminating his living space and clothing. Why would anyone think you know anything about Ebola and how to control it? You don't know the basics. Must be listening to the doomsday prophets and Republicans running for elected office using fear to garner votes.

Runs with Scissors thinks that Ebola-ridden ISIS terrorists are just waiting to blow themselves up and cover him with their entrails if he walks outside the house for the first time in years.