Iraq

[Anonymous]

Why are we even debating the merits of the Iraq invasion/occupation? This was obviously a horrible decision and anyone who tries to justify it at this point is a total retard, just like the people who don’t belive there is a housing bubble.

[PerryChase]

Yes, deadzone, the invasion of Iraq should be classified and put away as a catastrophe and the people who got us in should be held accountable (i.e. gotten rid of).

Now, what do you need to do to mitigate the problem? That’s what should be debated.

Can we trust the people who got us into the quagmire to fix it? I think not.

What can the American people do? What we normally do when things go awry — vote those responsible out of office.

[CardiffBaseball]

The problem is in the lesser of two evils. Yes we can throw the bums out but at what cost? More tax and spend “progressive” policies?

This quick list of what I attribute to the left always veers me back, to the right.

– Affirmative action
– No parental notification for abortion
– Weak on foreign policy, defense spending
– Govt. Health Insurance
– Human Beings are the cause of Global Warming, particularly Americans
– Americans are the cause of all violence in the world
– Americans are the cause of every world evil
– Poor peoples here and around the world should be judged through a lens of compassion for the plight of their situation (i.e. gang bangers getting light sentences) rather than any through the results of any shameful crimes they might have committed.

The last one might be better said, that the lib wants to “understand” what it is about our culture that caused a person to act barbaric. Instead, I don’t care how poor or destitute you are, you rape someone, you go away a long time, you kill someone, you should be put to death. Save the dime-store psycho-babble for Dr. Phil.

[PD]

We haven’t won in Iraq because our policy has been “niced up” in an attempt to appease people like PerryChase and the liberal press (who love to bash the US and delight in showing video to that effect). You can’t fight nice. Our policy has been an attempt to walk the fence. We won WWII because we fought hard and harsh and threw everything we had at it until we won. The same thing is required here but most Americans do not have the stomach for it. We have become a nation of quitters because the emasculated left demanded what I call the Eunich's Policy Toward Warfare.

Did you know that Men’s testosterone levels are down in the U.S?

[blahblahblah]

PD, I don’t think it’s so simple. What you’re seeing in Iraq is an example of how fragile societies really are. It is probably true that 95% of the Iraqis, maybe even more are ordinary people that just want to work, earn money, and raise their families in peace. The problem is that the remaining 5% or so can cause a LOT of trouble. It doesn’t take many people to plant an IED or shoot at our soldiers, and when we return fire, they just run into apartment buildings. The Iraqi families there can’t do anything because these guys will just as soon shoot them, too. And if you’re on patrol and you start taking fire from a building, you’ve got to return it and believe it, our guys are. If we’ve lost 3000 guys and injured no telling how many more, trust me, there are a lot of dead and f***ed-up Iraqis out there. The US has the best military in the world bar none and I’d bet money that we’re taking out 10 of them for every one of ours. I’d like to see how many 500 and 2000-pounders we’ve dropped over there; I’m sure it’s a lot, I know they’re running a lot of sorties.

That argument about the liberal media losing the war for us is the same tired old chestnut my Dad endlessly repeated about Vietnam while he watched old John Wayne movies on TV, beer in hand. Of course, he got married and had kids to avoid serving. I should be thankful I guess, ’cause otherwise I wouldn’t even be here!

The lesson we should learn from Iraq and Vietnam is that one-party governments are bad things that should be avoided. The democrats gave us an unwinnable war and massive entitlement programs for the poor in the 60s. The republicans have given us another unwinnable war and massive entitlement programs for the rich in the 00s. We’d be better off in a good old-fashioned gridlock situation in Washington where they’re all busy investigating each other for BJs and misuse of government funds. I’m still convinced that’s why the country did so well after the repubs got control of the congress in 1994…

[PerryChase]

Some time ago, I went to a seminar where Norman Swartzkoff was the speaker. He said that Vietnam might have been avoided had the leadership listened to complaints. His point was that good leaders don’t bury their heads in the sand but instead listen to what’s going on out there.

Who gave us welfare reform? Clinton!

[PerryChase]

Interesting article on testosterone. My hunch that testosterone is declining in men is because of the processed food we eat. That processed food packaged in plastic has estrogen (and other unknown hormonal) type effect causing people to get fat (retain water, develop female type breasts, store more fat, etc…)

If you look at European teenagers, they look younger than American kids. But obesity and premature aging is now becoming prevalent in Europe also.

[socalarm]

i agree violence emanating from the mid-east is an intrinsic problem, not extrinsic. i also disagree with knee-jerk empathy for ‘oppressed’ people. it’s a problem that needs to be confronted very clearly.
i’m in agreement on the what and why.
the disagreement i expressed is in the how. like the casual comparison to empire. it’s so lazy to say you can whack a few more of them and solve the problem like a well-oiled empire. that really helped the french in algeria.
you can only win if you define a problem correctly. so jg, why don’t you state the problem and explain how this current strategy is a good answer?

[Anonymous]

CB and PD, when you guys run for office, count me in for a nice big contribution!

Concho, lots of good points. But, I don’t think divided government is the answer. We have huge problems to tackle — Iraq (win it), illegal immigration (stop it), taxes (lower ’em), gov’t spending (lower it) — that >50% of Americans agree with. George Bush and the current batch of Republicans are just blowing it. We just need a return to those core Republican (or Southern Democrat, even) values.

Liberal Democrats like Speaker Nancy or President Hillary won’t give us those four things. Though I’m a hardcore Republican, I fully acknowledge that a conservative Democrat like Joe Lieberman could give us these things.

[CardiffBaseball]

Just as an FYI, I was certainly raised a conservative democrat. I was from a Union (UAW) family, and was most certainly influenced from the center. However in time, the party drifted, and I shifted. I still look at Tucker Carlson type conservatives as country-club republicans, though I should be past those types of infantile thoughts.

My Ohio congressmen was a conservative dem, but now of course he is sitting in jail (Traficant). In that district which was 90% democrat, you had to register dem so that in primaries you could ensure that the socialist was representing your party. It’s hard to believe one can move from Ohio to California, and go from a Democrat district to a Republican, but we certainly did.

[Anonymous]

socalalarm: "…take away rich and you will take away safe…"

Nah.

California — rich and poorly-behaved:

Median household income of $54K

Violent crime rate of 526/100,000

West Virginia — poor and well-behaved:

Median household income of $33K (61% of CA)

Violent crime rate of 273/100,000 (52% of CA)

It appears that the poorer you become, the better behaved you become.

Poor behavior has nothing to do with lack of wealth and has everything to do with culture.  I'd say the interesting question is why some folks have successful cultures and others don't.

http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/ADPGeoSearchByListServlet?ds_name=ACS_2005_EST_G00_&_lang=en&_ts=180028686977

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/offenses/standard_links/state.html

[socalarm]

jg, i agree it has a lot to do with culture. i could add to that argument. rich arab countries, despite their wealth, have the majority of radical terrorists.
my point was in a different context.
say there was no power or water in san diego for a few weeks and highways were blocked. no cops around. how long do you think this civilized veneer would last before looting and armed vigilantism took over ?
it’s commendable our culture has invested in a social infrastructure, unlike a banana republic. but it doesn’t take very long for any group of people to descend to barbaric behaviour.
mentioning empire as a force for good is like saying the cure for inner city problems is reenslaving blacks.

[Anonymous]

PD, that’s not surprising, that testosterone levels were down in the study. After all, the study subjects were from Massachusetts, home of ‘Cut and run Kerry.’

Hey, maybe that explains why he voted for the war before he voted against it; big reduction in hormone levels between votes!

[Wiley]

A couple thoughts…

Both Dems and Republicans increase government. Always. So whats the difference?

You only need to persuade 1% of the vote when the country is divided down the middle.

Didn’t democracy take hold in Palastine? Gotta love that one.

[zk]

“We haven’t won in Iraq because our policy has been “niced up” in an attempt to appease people like PerryChase and the liberal press.”

PD, certainly you must be a more intelligent person than that quote indicates.

1). Our policy is set by congress and the Bush administration. You know as well as I do that neither the republicans who control congress nor the bush administration give the tiniest bit of a damn about the liberal press nor about people like PerryChase.

2). And even if congress did “nice up” our policies too much for your taste, it’s their fault, not the liberal press’ or PerryChase’s.

3). We’re losing the war in Iraq because the bush administration, and rumsfeld in particular, have displayed phenomenal incompetence in waging the war. They should have know better what to expect (W could’ve asked his father. His father knew, and he wrote about the very thing that’s actually happening right now long before W invaded Iraq), they should have been better prepared for that, and they should’ve abandoned rumsfelds failed policies years ago. The only reason you don’t see where the fault lies is that you refuse to.

Your quote is a perfect example of the republican mantra of “blame everything on everybody except us.” Only now that they’ve screwed the entire country (1. let thousands of Americans die and blown trillions of dollars on a war that got us… I don’t know what, you tell me 2.spent wild amounts of money domestically, much of it on pork, much more than any democratic administration ever has 3. borrowed trillions that our children will have to pay back), only now are some republican voters starting to say, maybe we should be doing things a bit differently. But the politicians are mostly still sticking to their “it’s not our fault” guns.

I don’t know, maybe it’s human nature to want to blame somebody else. It’s too bad we can’t expect more from our elected leaders.

[Author]

Posts