Retelling An Old Lie

[sambino510]

Just as a side note to you Flanders, though I agree with many things you say, I would strongly suggest you do not cite Oliver North as a credible source. The man was responsible for the Iran-Contra scheme, which in my mind was one of the most controversial policies our government has ever had. Officially, we were supporting Saddam Hussein and the Iraqis with satellite images and chemical weapons, while secretly we were selling supplies to Iran to fund a radical group in Nicaragua? Whoever spear-headed something that ridiculous deserves no attention or credibility. Anyways, you can obviously cite whoever you like, I just don't think Oliver North is a good source.

Actually, it is a bit more complicated then that.

The sale of weapons to Iran was to buy their influence over the radicals in Lebanon that were holding a great many people hostage. It was a simple quid pro quo arrangement. We sell them weapons, they get the people holding US citizens and Europeans as hostages to let them go.

And because it is illegal to make a profit on a "black op", the funds had to be shuffled to somewhere, so the conflict in Nicaragua was picked as the recipient.

But the goal of the arms deal had nothing to do with either Iran or Iraq, it was to buy their influence. Nothing more.

The scandal began as an operation to free seven American hostages being held by a group with Iranian ties connected to the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution. It was planned that Israel would ship weapons to Iran, and then the United States would resupply Israel and receive the Israeli payment. The Iranian recipients promised to do everything in their power to achieve the release of the U.S. hostages.

Iran?Contra affair - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I also like the lines about this in the movie "The Lord of War", when Nicholas Cage asked the Israeli arms dealer who brokered the agreement how he could justify selling arms to Iraq, then turn right around and sell them to Iran.

Simeon Weisz: I don't think you and I are in the same business. You think I just sell guns, don't you? I don't. I take sides.
Yuri: But in the Iran-Iraq War, you sold guns to both sides.
Simeon Weisz: Did you ever consider that I wanted both sides to lose? Bullets change governments far surer than votes. You're in the wrong place, my young friend; this is no place for amateurs.

I also think that was very much in the interest of the US at the time. As long as Iran and Iraq were at each other's throats, they were not a threat to other countries. A lot of the issues in the region only started to become big problems when their war ended.

Of course it was in the interest of the U.S., that isn't the problem I have with the operation. It just seems inhumane that we would hijack a ten-year war that killed about a million people for our own political interests, arming both sides. Whatever benefit it ended up having for America is irrelevant in my mind. To your point though, I know the main goal for us was the Lebanese angle, but there were numerous Latin American operations which caught our eye at the time.

In terms of your quote from "Lord of War", about influencing governments, it's a good quote but shouldn't be applied as actual policy. We are not fixing the World Series here. This was one of the deadliest wars in human history and we played with both sides like they were toys. The whole thing just seemed like a horrible fiasco to me.

Either way, Oliver North simply doesn't seem like someone I'd trust for reliable information after that whole affair. I don't mean to rail against Fox News (CNN and MSNBC are just as bad, if not worse), but I am a bit amazed how often they have him on as a guest in their talk shows.

All in all, we simply didn't give a damn about a single Iraqi or Iranian citizen. They could kill eachother off with all sorts of chemical weapons for all we cared. As long as our end of the deal was met, it was just business as usual.

 

[sambino510]

The wars in Vietnam from 1945-1975 have almost nothing in common with our Revolutionary War or Civil War.

What the conflicts in Vietnam are most similar are too now are the political/ideological fighting we have now in America. A neo-communist regime under liberal democrats like Obama is trying to bring all of America under its control.

Like Ho Chi Mihn, Obama uses policies of ethnic cleansing to bring about absolute control.
Although Ho Chi Mihn was more brutal, killing and torturing his enemies, the capitalists, Cathholics, Montagnard people, and so on---Obama uses more insidious means against his enemies, Whites, conservatives and Christians.

First, Propaganda. With some 80% of the major media controlled by neo-communists, most Americans have been slowly brainswashed over the years into supporting progressive leaders and policies.

Second, Education. One of the fundamentals of Marxism is government control of all education. Control the youth and control the future.

Third, and most important, Ethnic cleansing. Using large urban areas as powerbases, like Uncle Ho did in Hanoi and other cities in the north, Obama and the neo-communists fill these centers with their political allies, and let them spread out from there. Detroit, Washington DC and Birmingham are all mostly progressive Blacks. Once an area becomes around 20% Black, the White exodus will begin. Larger areas in nation are filled with legal and illegal immigrants from socialist coutries, primarily Hispanics and Chinese. As individual states have their majorities of Whites eliminated, political control nationwide will be realized.

What is wrong with "progression"? Last I checked that's a typical goal of all humanity, to "progress" towards a better future and not just wallow in the failures of the past. Progress is what has built our country into what it is today.

Woah woah now, let's not even put "Barack Obama" and "ethnic cleansing" in the same sentence. Ho Chi Minh and the president are not comparable in any way. You can't just put mass killings in the same category as racial diffusion and say they're both ethnic cleansing. You're giving Obama way, way too much credit; he's an empty suit. You really think they're just filling boats full of "neo-communists" and throwing them into the urban cities of our country? Do you think the average black, Asian, or Hispanic youth even knows what neo-Communism is?

How is Obama controlling education? What did I learn in my time in high school that was so evil and wrong?

I believe you're far too paranoid about the racial minorities dominating the white majority. Even if they do, what is wrong with that? We've dominated them for their entire existence in this country. As a "nation of immigrants", we must accept that the white majority can one day become the minority.

Also, Obama will be out of office in three years. You think he can accomplish the crazy acts you've just mentioned in just a few years time? I doubt it.

What you deem as "progression" isn't the same as what most realists would see it as. I'm not seeing a better future for anyone but the freeloaders. American society reached its zenith in the mid-1960's. After that, it has declined in about every meaningful category.

Education spending went way up over last 60 years, but test scores remain low and dropout rates are no better. Basically, federal educational spending has been a complete waste.

All schools accepting federal aid are under their ultimate control. In many parts of the South, no school can even expand its classroom without the oversight of a federal judge.


http://object.cato.org/sites/cato.o...ato-handbook-policymakers/2009/9/hb111-20.pdf

Much fewer people are working as jobs have left for overseas. Whole areas of the country have had their manufacturing base eliminated. You must not have noticed this, or think this is "building this country." More people on foodstamps. More people on welfare.

Economic security among whites in America on the decline, figures show | The Daily Times | delmarvanow.com

All this has been going on years before Obama took office, but he is the most powerful "progressive" advocate the neo-commies have had in America. My point was to show that Obama is more like Ho Chi Mihn than George Washington.

I don't know what you want America to look like in 50 years. It already is looking like Brazil, with large areas of slums next to more prosporus areas---generally a Brown "diffuse" population. Welfare and Social Security are just Ponzi schemes. They are unstainable, and the debt that keeps them afloat will someday reach its limit. I think America in 100 years will be a violent, poverty-stricken mess. A broken mixture of South Africa, Mexico and SE Asia.

Sorry, I should have been more clear. The problems you have cited are ones i AGREE on. All I'm saying is without "progress", our Constitution would be a bit shorter. Just because there are some radical progressives, or ones whose ideas you don't agree with, doesn't make "progressive" a dirty word. I don't like Obama any more than you do, but what is the opposite of progression, what is the solution if NOT progression? Realism? Realism is the key to stagnation, and not much else.

I'm not saying overloading our policies with unrealistic goals and unmanageable debt is a good idea either, but without a drive to change and to make things better we would never get anywhere. We certainly have a lot of work to do, but there is no doubt that America HAS made some progress in the past fifty years.

 

[Mushroom]

Of course it was in the interest of the U.S., that isn't the problem I have with the operation. It just seems inhumane that we would hijack a ten-year war that killed about a million people for our own political interests, arming both sides. Whatever benefit it ended up having for America is irrelevant in my mind. To your point though, I know the main goal for us was the Lebanese angle, but there were numerous Latin American operations which caught our eye at the time.

We hardly "hijacked" the conflict. In fact, we supported Saddam early on simply because Iran still held the hostages from our embassy at the time. And it was hoped that they would win and force Iran to release them.

Then as the war went on, our support quickly vanished. Saddam started to use chemical weapons, and Iran started to use children to prevent defeat. So we sold weapons so they could at least try to keep from being overrun. Not enough to turn the tide from defeat into victory, but at least hold on.

Are you even aware of what we sold them? Around 2,400 TOW missiles and 400 HAWK missiles (they already owned the systems, but were almost out of missiles). We did not sell them fighters, or tanks, or ballistic missiles (which the Soviets were happily selling to both sides).

And guess what? Pretty much every country in the world was happily selling to both sides. The Soviets, the Chinese, even the French. And they were selling weapons by the shipload.

And you are obsessing on how a handfull of missiles was "inhumane"? Yugoslavia alone sold over $2 billion in arms to Iraq. Almost $2 billion to Iran from the Soviets, Chinese and North Koreans (and over $15 billion to Iraq), and you are continuing on about $500 million?

Talk about a single straw in a hayfield.

 

[sambino510]

Of course it was in the interest of the U.S., that isn't the problem I have with the operation. It just seems inhumane that we would hijack a ten-year war that killed about a million people for our own political interests, arming both sides. Whatever benefit it ended up having for America is irrelevant in my mind. To your point though, I know the main goal for us was the Lebanese angle, but there were numerous Latin American operations which caught our eye at the time.

We hardly "hijacked" the conflict. In fact, we supported Saddam early on simply because Iran still held the hostages from our embassy at the time. And it was hoped that they would win and force Iran to release them.

Then as the war went on, our support quickly vanished. Saddam started to use chemical weapons, and Iran started to use children to prevent defeat. So we sold weapons so they could at least try to keep from being overrun. Not enough to turn the tide from defeat into victory, but at least hold on.

Are you even aware of what we sold them? Around 2,400 TOW missiles and 400 HAWK missiles (they already owned the systems, but were almost out of missiles). We did not sell them fighters, or tanks, or ballistic missiles (which the Soviets were happily selling to both sides).

And guess what? Pretty much every country in the world was happily selling to both sides. The Soviets, the Chinese, even the French. And they were selling weapons by the shipload.

And you are obsessing on how a handfull of missiles was "inhumane"? Yugoslavia alone sold over $2 billion in arms to Iraq. Almost $2 billion to Iran from the Soviets, Chinese and North Koreans (and over $15 billion to Iraq), and you are continuing on about $500 million?

Talk about a single straw in a hayfield.

How is that not hijacking the conflict? We arm certain sides in order to further our personal goals, i.e. freeing the hostages in Lebanon. That sounds to me like we took a war that was about something entirely different and used it to promote our interests.

Even if we were one of the less significant suppliers of weapons, is that how we are going to judge ourselves? Oh, everyone else is doing it, so it's perfectly okay for us to do it too?Do you hold any particular respect for the Soviet Union? China? North Korea? I'd say most people do not, so why would we compare our actions to theirs like they're some shining example to follow?

The amounts and numbers are irrelevant. Whether it's 500 million or 15 billion, the idea is the same; that we were in it for the interests of the U.S., and only the U.S. At least now we pretend like we are fighting in the Middle East to make the citizens' lives better, not just promote our own agenda or the agenda of our allies.

I'm not "obsessing", and if I was, it is not about the inhumanity of the missiles itself. It's about the idea of double-dealing in such a serious conflict.

What you are saying is all true; its just our interpretation that's different. To me, America played with the Iran-Iraq war like it was a business venture, a game, not like it was an extremely deadly conflict that lasted pretty much the entire 1980s and killed hundreds of thousands of people.

 

[Flanders]

That sounds to me like we took a war that was about something entirely different and used it to promote our interests.

To samboni510: Promoting America’s interests is exactly as it should be. That means promoting those interests as Americans define them, not how the UNIC (United Nations/International Community) defines those interests.

America once had two oceans for protection; so there was no reason to interfere in foreign wars, etc. Modern warfare makes it imperative that aggressive enemies with worldwide domination in mind be stopped in their own lands irrespective of their ideology. First it was communism. That sick ideology has been joined by radical Islam.

I'm not "obsessing", and if I was, it is not about the inhumanity of the missiles itself. It's about the idea of double-dealing in such a serious conflict.

To samboni510: There’s nothing wrong with giving missiles to enemies straight up, or under the table —— so long as they use them on each other.

Start with Iran-Contra

Were it not for the Boland Amendment protecting foreign Communists protecting America in every instance could be done openly.

For future reference

More than a century before warplanes and missiles were invented James Madison spoke to today’s “America is always wrong” crowd who are obsessed with disarming America:

How could a readiness for war in time of peace be safely prohibited, unless we could prohibit, in like manner, the preparations and establishments of every hostile nation?

Were Madison alive today I believe he would include “every hostile ideology” in his warning.

Finally, Democrats punished Americans over Iran-Contra because RR fought communism with every tool he could find, while Democrats now block every attempt to punish Muslims who killed our people in Benghazi.

 

[sambino510]

That sounds to me like we took a war that was about something entirely different and used it to promote our interests.

To samboni510: Promoting America’s interests is exactly as it should be. That means promoting those interests as Americans define them, not how the UNIC (United Nations/International Community) defines those interests.

America once had two oceans for protection; so there was no reason to interfere in foreign wars, etc. Modern warfare makes it imperative that aggressive enemies with worldwide domination in mind be stopped in their own lands irrespective of their ideology. First it was communism. That sick ideology has been joined by radical Islam.

I'm not "obsessing", and if I was, it is not about the inhumanity of the missiles itself. It's about the idea of double-dealing in such a serious conflict.

To samboni510: There’s nothing wrong with giving missiles to enemies straight up, or under the table —— so long as they use them on each other.

Start with Iran-Contra

Were it not for the Boland Amendment protecting foreign Communists protecting America in every instance could be done openly.

For future reference

More than a century before warplanes and missiles were invented James Madison spoke to today’s “America is always wrong” crowd who are obsessed with disarming America:

How could a readiness for war in time of peace be safely prohibited, unless we could prohibit, in like manner, the preparations and establishments of every hostile nation?

Were Madison alive today I believe he would include “every hostile ideology” in his warning.

Finally, Democrats punished Americans over Iran-Contra because RR fought communism with every tool he could find, while Democrats now block every attempt to punish Muslims who killed our people in Benghazi.

I'm not part of the "America is always wrong" crowd, but I think the only thing worse than that viewpoint is the one that thinks America is always right; a view that cannot admit mistakes that we have made. We've done many great things, but some pretty horrible things too.

How exactly did Democrats punish people after Iran Contra? How long was Oliver North's prison term? How often does that affair even come up in political discussion today? Besides, Ronald Reagan didn't even know half of what was going on with that program it was Oliver North who spear-headed a lot of it.

How exactly do you want to punish the Muslims that attacked the compound in Benghazi? Line them up against a wall and shoot them? Be-head them? Christopher Stevens knew he was in a volatile region, at a volatile time, and that those dangers come with the job. He was a diplomat, not a trained assassin, and I seriously doubt he would want people to take revenge for his death.

If you place a few dozen soldiers at an embassy, it becomes less a building that is a symbol of cooperation and friendship and more one that looks like a fortress, one that says "I don't trust you." Granted, we maybe SHOULDN'T have trusted them, but in the realm of diplomacy we can only do so much to protect our people without sending the wrong message.

That quote by James Madison is a self-fulfilling prophecy. As we arm ourselves on the basis that other countries are arming themselves, they arm themselves on the basis that we are arming ourselves. If one day we could all just get past our paranoia, sit down in the U.N., or wherever, and make a serious arms reduction treaty, maybe we'd all get along a little better, rather than assuming the worst in other countries' policy. Doubt that'll happen any time soon though.

In terms of our foreign policy, Our foreign interests today seem almost entirely based on protecting our country's national security. However, why does America have so many enemies? Why are we so special as to deserve such grand attention from Al Qaeda, the Taliban, etc. Why wasn't Big Ben bombed instead of the World Trade Center? Do they just hate our freedom? Our liberty? Our way of life?

Or maybe we've been meddling in Middle Eastern affairs for decades, and that frustrated some people. Maybe we have to realize that we can only fight our wars overseas for so long until the battle hits us at home. Maybe we have enemies because we create our enemies with poor policy decisions. I'm tired of hearing from so many politicians that America will just ALWAYS have enemies, no matter what.

I would never condone violence, by any group or country, but people have to look at the reasons that our enemies commit their attacks. All we care about is that they want to kill us, and not WHY they want to kill us. If we stopped creating enemies, then maybe one day we wouldn't have to go around "punishing" them, killing thousands of their people and our own and wasting trillions of dollars in the process.

 

[Wry Catcher]

The US made essentially the same mistake in Korea as it did in Vietnam. A pathalogical obsession with communism blinded it to reality, something even the US defense secretary at the time of Vietnam, Robert McNamara, admitted later in life.

Ho Chi Minh reached out the the US in 1945, and insisted that they could do business and coexist. He was a nationalist first, and a communist second. It is absurd to say that because he was a dictator, and killed people, that the US would abstain from relations. The US has supported whoever seemed to be in their own self-interest, throughout history, no matter their brutality. A million people (including 50,000 Americans) were killed, untold monies spent, and a nation torn apart, because those in Washington had a dim grasp on history and geography, and were obsessed with only one thing: communism.

So too in Korea. The US mishandled the occupation of South Korea in 1945, again due to a dysfunctional focus on communism. They were so afraid of some leftist leaders arising in the south, that they reinstated former Japanese occupation officials into key positions, rather than running the risk of having a "communist" in some government post. Needless to say, the long suffering Koreans rebelled at this action, and there was already a low level insurgency going on in the south in 1950- which gave the north the opening they needed to invade. If only the US could have seen any other colours than "red", endless misery could have been sidestepped.

Thank you for explaining, once again, why the U.S. is the root of all evil in the world.

Straw Man Alert!

Whenever someone has nothing to post but posts anyway expect either a Straw Man, an ad hominem attack or another illogical response. Thanks so much for being predictable and "thinking' within the narrow box of contemporary conservatism.

 

[Flanders]

I'm not part of the "America is always wrong" crowd,

To samboni510: You sure fooled me.

That quote by James Madison is a self-fulfilling prophecy. As we arm ourselves on the basis that other countries are arming themselves, they arm themselves on the basis that we are arming ourselves.

To samboni510: That’s absurd. Aggressive governments will always arm themselves the minute they see weakness in a powerful country.

If one day we could all just get past our paranoia, sit down in the U.N.,

To samboni510: I was wondering when you would tell the truth. You obviously think global government is the answer to war. The fact is: Cross-border wars could easily be abolished without the United Nations. It isn’t done because war is a UN scare tactic. Global government’s hidden goal is to protect every ruling class from revolution. More precisely, protect Communist governments from revolution. Nobody fears revolution more than does a hardcore Communist living in a Communist country.

If hating war is your thing, I have to tell you that ending cross-border wars won’t end killing. In case you haven’t noticed it totalitarian governments in the last century alone slaughtered more people than did all of the wars in the past 500 years. The butchers in a global government will kill with impunity, and kill forever, because there will be nothing to stop them.

or wherever, and make a serious arms reduction treaty, maybe we'd all get along a little better, rather than assuming the worst in other countries' policy.

To samboni510: There you go again. Disarm America.

Doubt that'll happen any time soon though.

To samboni510: Nor should it.

why does America have so many enemies?

To samboni510: America has a lot more friends than enemies. Friends, coupled with SAC bombers, made Soviet Communists behave themselves throughout the Cold War.

If a legitimate poll could be taken in every country today only question need be asked: Who would you side with in another world war: The US, Communist China, or the Islamic world? The poll result would show three totals with the US way ahead. Even without friends America should always maintain the military might required to win any war.

Why are we so special as to deserve such grand attention from Al Qaeda, the Taliban, etc. Why wasn't Big Ben bombed instead of the World Trade Center? Do they just hate our freedom? Our liberty? Our way of life?

To samboni510: America is Islam’s, and Communism’s, chosen enemy because the US Constitution is the most powerful enemy of theocracy. Totalitarians will always hate a free people. Priesthoods of every stripe turn the hatred into fanaticism among the fools who insist a benign totalitarian is possible.

If we stopped creating enemies,

To samboni510: Creating enemies! Do you still claim you are not part of the “America is always wrong” crowd?

 

[numan]

In terms of our foreign policy, Our foreign interests today seem almost entirely based on protecting our country's national security.

"What a country calls its 'vital economic interests' are not the things which enable its citizens to live, but the things which enable it to make war."
---Simone Weil

If we stopped creating enemies, then maybe one day we wouldn't have to go around "punishing" them, killing thousands of their people and our own and wasting trillions of dollars in the process.

The Military-Industrial Complex REQUIRES the US to have enemies, so that War Profiteers can continue to make obscene profits.

.

 

[sambino510]

I'm not part of the "America is always wrong" crowd,

To samboni510: You sure fooled me.

That quote by James Madison is a self-fulfilling prophecy. As we arm ourselves on the basis that other countries are arming themselves, they arm themselves on the basis that we are arming ourselves.

To samboni510: That’s absurd. Aggressive governments will always arm themselves the minute they see weakness in a powerful country.



To samboni510: I was wondering when you would tell the truth. You obviously think global government is the answer to war. The fact is: Cross-border wars could easily be abolished without the United Nations. It isn’t done because war is a UN scare tactic. Global government’s hidden goal is to protect every ruling class from revolution. More precisely, protect Communist governments from revolution. Nobody fears revolution more than does a hardcore Communist living in a Communist country.

If hating war is your thing, I have to tell you that ending cross-border wars won’t end killing. In case you haven’t noticed it totalitarian governments in the last century alone slaughtered more people than did all of the wars in the past 500 years. The butchers in a global government will kill with impunity, and kill forever, because there will be nothing to stop them.



To samboni510: There you go again. Disarm America.



To samboni510: Nor should it.



To samboni510: America has a lot more friends than enemies. Friends, coupled with SAC bombers, made Soviet Communists behave themselves throughout the Cold War.

If a legitimate poll could be taken in every country today only question need be asked: Who would you side with in another world war: The US, Communist China, or the Islamic world? The poll result would show three totals with the US way ahead. Even without friends America should always maintain the military might required to win any war.

Why are we so special as to deserve such grand attention from Al Qaeda, the Taliban, etc. Why wasn't Big Ben bombed instead of the World Trade Center? Do they just hate our freedom? Our liberty? Our way of life?

To samboni510: America is Islam’s, and Communism’s, chosen enemy because the US Constitution is the most powerful enemy of theocracy. Totalitarians will always hate a free people. Priesthoods of every stripe turn the hatred into fanaticism among the fools who insist a benign totalitarian is possible.

If we stopped creating enemies,

To samboni510: Creating enemies! Do you still claim you are not part of the “America is always wrong” crowd?

You speak as if our Constitution is literally the only governing document which is an enemy to theocracy. We are not the only country in the world with such values. I'm sure if someone actually took a second to ask an Al Qaeda member why he hates America, he would not cite the Constitution.

Disarm America? Please. Even if I wanted to do that, the military is so inter-woven into our economy that it could never happen. How many tens of thousands of people would be out of work if our military one day just went away?

But what do you really think would happen if we "disarmed"? China would just start rushing the East Coast like Christmas came early? Russians would take over my home state of California? That sounds pretty unlikely to me.

Even if we did get into a serious war, are people really that afraid that America couldn't win a full out war with one hand tied behind its back? We could cut our stand-by nuclear arsenal in half, to some 750 on constant readiness alert, and I wouldn't feel any less safe at night, and nor should I. It's not the number of nuclear warheads, it's the IDEA of nuclear warheads that is protecting us.

How about our navy? When is the last time we got in a real naval battle with any major country? Do we really need all of those ultra-expensive fleets to fight the Taliban and their AK-47s?

I would be wrong to claim that all our enemies exist because we "created" them. However, our current enemies, to me, have legitimate gripes with us. Not ones which justify their terrorist attacks or other violent actions, but reasonable nonetheless. Osama Bin Laden wanted us out of Saudi Arabia, and was pissed after we abandoned the Mujahadeen fighters following the end of the Cold War. The Tsarnaev brothers, as ridiculous and horrible as their actions were, were motivated by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (so they claim). We can't simply ignore peoples' motives.

Sure, hypothetically, we could get in a war with some country, some day, that can compete with our military might. But forgive me if I fear a poor economic state, and money being funneled into the wrong things, more than I fear nuclear holocaust or total warfare.

I choose respect over fear tactics. If people respected the U.S., and its policies, maybe they wouldn't have a reason to attack us in the first place.

 

[Flanders]

Paul Kengor’s article reminded me that Dr. Benjamin Spock was one of Lenin’s most famous useful idiots if not a sign-carrier at pro-communism demonstrations:

In Dupes, I gave several examples, including Dr. Benjamin Spock, a leftist dupe easily manipulated by American communists. To wit:

In 1968, Spock published an influential screed against the Vietnam War, titled simply, Dr. Spock on Vietnam, and co-authored with Mitchell Zimmerman, a Princeton grad student and anti-war activist. They consistently referred to the Vietcong as “communist patriots,” literally akin to the American revolutionaries.

XXXXX​

According to Spock’s book, these were glorious patriots in North Vietnam, not totalitarian Marxists. These (unelected) modern incarnations of Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin had earned the support of the population: “The motivation for revolution is the same today as it was in 1776: the desire for justice and a better life.”

XXXXX​

. . . untold numbers of American moms who had nursed and reared their babies according to earlier Spock books. Imagine them naively wondering why America was not fighting with, rather than against, Ho Chi Minh and the communists. Why would Uncle Sam be at war with George Washington?

Kengor also cites Barack Taqiyya’s mentor:

. . . Frank Marshall Davis, an actual member of Communist Party USA (card number 47544). This, too, is a subject I know well, having written a book on Davis, The Communist: Frank Marshall Davis, The Untold Story of Barack Obama’s Mentor.

It’s not unfair to say that Davis planted the Ho Chi Minh crap in Barack Taqiyya’s head. It’s illogical to assume that in the era of punks and perverts bedazzling fools Davis was teaching his pupil the rest of communism’s garbage, but somehow failed to teach him the Ho Chi Minh lie.

This final excerpt connects Davis to Saul Alinsky philosophically and by extension to Barack Taqiyya:

Davis averred: “If history teaches us anything, it teaches that any fundamental change advancing society is spearheaded by strong radicals.” These were radicals, presumably, like Jefferson and Jay and Madison and Hamilton and … Lenin and Stalin. “So it was in 1776; so it is today,” summed up Davis. As “this nation’s forefathers in the 18th century” had done, it was time to “force into effect a modern Declaration of Independence.”

Ho Chi Minh, Obama’s Freedom Fighter
By Paul Kengor on 8.7.13 @ 6:08AM
Our president echoes the Party line on Vietnam.

The American Spectator : Ho Chi Minh, Obama?s Freedom Fighter

Alinsky wrote the rules for community organizers. According to Alinsky in his book Rules For Radicals the Communists were everywhere, doing wonderful things, even while the Founding Fathers were writing the Constitution. One line really got to me:

The American Radicals were in the colonies grimly forcing the addition of the Bill of Rights to our Constitution.

Davis also claimed that Communists had a strong influence in founding this country. Both got away with it by substituting the word radical for the word Communist. Put their teachings together with Barack Taqiyya’s words and actions and the conclusion is obvious to me —— his political beliefs were formed by the beliefs of the America-haters who populated his life.

Finally, the media turned community organizing into a noble calling in order to help the biggest America-hater of all get elected. Think about those implications whenever you see anybody in the media fawning all over Barack Taqiyya/Frank Marshall Davis/Saul Alinsky.

 

[eagle7_31]

Ngo Dinh Diem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

pay particular attention to the paragraph entitled "Aftermath'.

 

[Flanders]

Ngo Dinh Diem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

pay particular attention to the paragraph entitled "Aftermath'.

To eagle7_31: What’s your point?

American traitors defeated South Vietnam along with bringing defeat to their own country. Had America won the war militarily nothing a dead Communist dictator said could be used by today’s America-haters.

 

[sambino510]

Ngo Dinh Diem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

pay particular attention to the paragraph entitled "Aftermath'.

That is the story of Diem as has always been told to me. He was, no doubt, a horrible person, treating his subjects like dirt, especially Buddhists. However, he was a strong force of opposition to Ho Chi Minh and Communism as well, so I suppose one could argue that the U.S. would have benefited from backing the regime rather than backing the coup. It all depends on whether you want to judge things from a strategic standpoint or a sort-of humanitarian or moral standpoint. Either way, I don't think we ever had a real grasp on how to deal with the multi-faceted issues that came along with Vietnam, North or South.

 

[Flanders]

The Military-Industrial Complex REQUIRES the US to have enemies, so that War Profiteers can continue to make obscene profits.

To numan: Try to get the full picture after you listen to what Ike said:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y06NSBBRtY]Eisenhower warns us of the military industrial complex. - YouTube[/ame]​

Democrats are doing exactly what Ike warned about —— endangering our liberties. To liberals, the military/industrial complex should serve the UN not the US.

Better you should worry about how far the education/media/entertainment complex has come since Ike left office.

Barack Taqiyya is the poster boy for the education/media/entertainment complex. He is the first child of the parasite class to make it all the way to the White House. Whatever you think about the military/industrial complex the people in the defense industries protect this country; whereas, Barack Taqiyya and the parasites in the education/media/entertainment complex are determined to tear the country down. If they can’t do it militarily, they will do economically. Allow me to elaborate a bit on #51 permalink.

Remember when Barack Taqiyya said this:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKjPI6no5ng&feature=player_embedded]Obama: If You've Got A Business, You Didn't Build That - YouTube[/ame]​

The crap he spouted in the video is directly connected to the education/media/entertainment complex’s ideology. His words are extremely important because he clearly showed a parasite’s thought process. What he said was an attempt to justify Socialists/Communists absorbing a nation’s wealth then taking credit for creating it. Saul Alinsky taught American Communists to go further. They took credit for the original Bill of Rights while they were doing their best to eliminate individual liberties. Note that Barack Taqiyya calls the Rights in the Bill of Rights “Negative Rights.”

Incidentally, in the video Barack Taqiyya said there are a lot hard working people. That is true, but none of them go into government. He deliberately refers to private sector workers and lazy government bums as one entity. He does the same thing with the shrinking private sector middle class and the ever-expanding government middle class. The media in the education/media/entertainment complex lets him get away with it. Were he to separate them in his rhetoric the public might start asking the right questions.

Lazy bums and parasites go into government.

Nobody can say bums in bloated bureaucracies work at all. If that’s not enough proof for you compare the length of time it took to complete public projects from start to finish during the Great Depression to the length of time it takes today’s parasite bums do anything. Private sector Americans worked on public projects in the 1930s then left when the project was finished —— usually in two or three years. Today’s parasites give themselves lifetime tenure simply by making a public project last for decades. If those filthy bums had to build Boulder Dam, or the Golden Gate Bridge, or a major tunnel, it would take them at least fifty years.

I don’t know to relate building something in a public project to the millions of parasite waiting for a seat at the public trough under the Affordable Care Act. I do know this. Parasites will not improve patient care in America. Patients will suffer because lazy bums will be lazy bums no matter the job.

 

[numan]

American traitors defeated South Vietnam along with bringing defeat to their own country. Had America won the war militarily nothing a dead Communist dictator said could be used by today’s America-haters.

Well, at least this posting of yours is blessedly short, and not like your usual turgid, hysterical, excessively long rants which no one would have the patience to read -- however, it is as equally absurd as most of your other efforts.

The USA left Vietnam only after the War had so distorted and ruined the American economy that the government could no longer afford the luxury of shoveling uncounted billions of dollars into the bank accounts of War Profiteers.

.

 

[Auteur]

Ngo Dinh Diem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

pay particular attention to the paragraph entitled "Aftermath'.

To eagle7_31: What’s your point?

American traitors defeated South Vietnam along with bringing defeat to their own country. Had America won the war militarily nothing a dead Communist dictator said could be used by today’s America-haters.

The US lost the war because it went into it with a hazy and inaccurate understanding of the issues of the region, with a lack of understanding of the history and culture of the area, with a near pathological obsession with communism, with a poorly thought out strategy for fighting a guerrilla war, and with the belief that they could simply draft millions of kids to go do the dirty work, and no questions would be asked. But they were. Of course they were. Who wants to have their kid sent home in a plastic bag because he was fighting for.......uh.......what was that again? Dominoes?

That's why the best and the brightest protested, and brought things to an end sooner than if it was left to the crazies in Washington, and in the military. And good for them.

 

[Mushroom]

That's why the best and the brightest protested, and brought things to an end sooner than if it was left to the crazies in Washington, and in the military. And good for them.

No, the best and the brightest went and did their job.

The dirtiest and laziest stayed at home, got high and whined at everything they did not like. Then shouted abuse at those who did their duty when they returned.

That is not what I think of as "best and brightest", this is:

 

[Auteur]

That's why the best and the brightest protested, and brought things to an end sooner than if it was left to the crazies in Washington, and in the military. And good for them.

No, the best and the brightest went and did their job.

The dirtiest and laziest stayed at home, got high and whined at everything they did not like. Then shouted abuse at those who did their duty when they returned.

That is not what I think of as "best and brightest", this is:

In the end Mushroom, it wasn't what you would probably refer to as "hippies" that ended the conflict. It was Mr and Mrs Normal, the average middle class out there that finally began to realize what a tragic mistake it all was. Even Nixon, not exactly your left wing hippy, campaigned on ending the war. And he did so because he read the opinion polls, and support for the war was dropping fast, not just among the "dirty and lazy", but among the great majority of Americans.

As for doing one's job, it is more than ethicially dubious to go the the extreme measures of killing people, unless one is absolutely sure of why this is necessary. This applies to the military as much as civilians. This was why there were so many problems with draftees at the time. Kids were being told all manner of nonsense about communists landing on the beaches of California, of the peasant society of Vietnam seizing one Asian country after another, for some pathological need to make them all communists, and other such geographically and historically challenged drivel. It is not surprising that those that had some understanding of the world tended to resist this venture. It is also not surprising that a lot of protest happened on university campuses, places that tend to attract those who want to learn something about the world, generally speaking. Those that follow orders without question, and are willing to use lethal force without examining and understanding all the issues at hand are not, IMO, the best and the brightest.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

The US made essentially the same mistake in Korea as it did in Vietnam. A pathalogical obsession with communism blinded it to reality, something even the US defense secretary at the time of Vietnam, Robert McNamara, admitted later in life.

Ho Chi Minh reached out the the US in 1945, and insisted that they could do business and coexist. He was a nationalist first, and a communist second. It is absurd to say that because he was a dictator, and killed people, that the US would abstain from relations. The US has supported whoever seemed to be in their own self-interest, throughout history, no matter their brutality. A million people (including 50,000 Americans) were killed, untold monies spent, and a nation torn apart, because those in Washington had a dim grasp on history and geography, and were obsessed with only one thing: communism.

So too in Korea. The US mishandled the occupation of South Korea in 1945, again due to a dysfunctional focus on communism. They were so afraid of some leftist leaders arising in the south, that they reinstated former Japanese occupation officials into key positions, rather than running the risk of having a "communist" in some government post. Needless to say, the long suffering Koreans rebelled at this action, and there was already a low level insurgency going on in the south in 1950- which gave the north the opening they needed to invade. If only the US could have seen any other colours than "red", endless misery could have been sidestepped.

Wrong. In both cases communist aggressors invaded a peaceful neighbor and we tried to help the locals resist being overrun.

South Vietnam was not a "peaceful neighbour" of the north, but an intregal part of the nation of Vietnam. It was artificially divided in order to allow the French less embarrassing exit in '54, just as Americans negoicated a less embarrassing exit in 1973. As for peaceful, I guess that is a matter of degree. The Vietnamese fought French colonialists, then Japanese invaders in 1940, then the French again after WW2, and then the Americans for another decade. They were no doubt getting a little hardened near the end of this process.

America did not intervene to support peace or freedom, but to fight communism. This was made very clear. Even today, Mr Flanders is repeating the idiotic nonsense that Vietnamese communists would be swimming ashore in California, if not stopped sooner (with a little rust on their AK-47s, no doubt). The South Vietnamese leadership was not democratic, and in fact the US has never made any bones about the fact that it would support those who supported US interests, not matter how brutal they were. I think it was FDR that issued the classic line: They may be bastards, but they are our bastards!

Korea, also, was a singular state, divided only for the purpose of disarming the Japanese still there at the end of WW2. It's true that the Soviets armed and supported their favoured man in the north, Kim il Sung, and eventually gave him the green light to invade the south. Stalin was at first apprehensive though, and wavered. But by 1950, the south was already in turmoil, as America could not accept the idea that Koreans were forming worker's collectives, and doing a pretty good job of running their own affairs. This sounded to much like "communism" to them, and so they disbanded them. To rub salt into the wounds, in some cases they re-appointed former Japanese occupyers to administrative positions, due to a lack of such personal on the ground at that time.

Would Stalin have given the go ahead if it were not already the case that some southerners had already taken up arms, and were shooting at Americans? We don't know, but we do know that once again, an astonishing lack of historical knowledge, and cultural sensitivity, and overriding self-interest, were factors in a war that might not have happened.

And yet in Both cases MILLIONS of Southern natives volunteered fought and died for their Southern Countries. Millions more in Vietnam were imprisoned after the South fell. More millions died risking life and limb to flee the supposed beneficial union between North and South.