So much for Hope & Change... by AURaptor

Sadly, the "article" makes its points.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Friday, October 8, 2010 12:39 PM

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
Sadly, the "article" makes its points.

The laughing Chrisisall

What's crazy is that, the uptick in drone attacks has been VERY effective, and is one of the few areas ( yes, there are some )for which I actually applaud Obama.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

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Friday, October 8, 2010 12:42 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
What's crazy is that, the uptick in drone attacks has been VERY effective, and is one of the few areas ( yes, there are some )for which I actually applaud Obama.

I don't.
Best thing I can say for Obama at the moment is he makes great speeches.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:06 PM

America loves a winner!

Chris,

I get that it rubs you the wrong way, but targeting very very bad folks who have killed and are planning to kill a lot more .... it speaks to them in a language they understand and respect.

They probably don't like it all that much, but at least the message gets through.

And I'm OK with that. Regardless if Bush or Obama does the 'talking'.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:08 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
What's crazy is that, the uptick in drone attacks has been VERY effective, and is one of the few areas ( yes, there are some )for which I actually applaud Obama.

I don't.
Best thing I can say for Obama at the moment is he makes great speeches.

The laughing Chrisisall

Can the Teleprompter...what do you got? Nothing.

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:12 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
I get that it rubs you the wrong way

Killin' creeps I got no problem with- it's the collateral damage... makes us look bad, besides being messed up.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:20 PM

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
I get that it rubs you the wrong way
Killin' creeps I got no problem with- it's the collateral damage... makes us look bad, besides being messed up.

Well, there is that. And I do agree, 100%.

But when it comes down to it... a few civillians die, along w/ a bunch of bad guys - OR - 20,50, 300 civillians get blown up by the bad guys. Bad guys go on living, to plan even more deaths.

Ugly scenario, either way.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:21 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:

Ugly scenario, either way.

Common ground. Weird.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:24 PM

WHOZIT

I'd rather talk about Hope & Crosby, they were funny, and would never be fired by CNN.

Those arn't boobs, they're lies! - Stewie Griffin

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Friday, October 8, 2010 1:43 PM

I find this troubling:
"sometimes the CIA will not carry out a strike if there are indications that civilians are at risk."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35149384/ns/world_news-south_and_central_a
sia/
"SOMETIMES????"

Obama needs to be briefed & debriefed by #2 in the Village, if ya ask me. He clearly lets things run on too much faith.

The laughing Chrisisall

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Friday, October 8, 2010 2:00 PM

Once again I find myself agreeing with whozit...The rest? Not so much.

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Friday, October 8, 2010 2:11 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by kaneman:
The rest? Not so much.

Trite phrases like that would get you fired at CNN.

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Friday, October 8, 2010 4:21 PM

DREAMTROVE

Nothing trite would ever get you fired from CNN.

Quote:

Best thing I can say for Obama at the moment is he makes great speeches.

I am forced to concur.

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
Chris,

I get that it rubs you the wrong way, but targeting very very bad folks who have killed and are planning to kill a lot more .... it speaks to them in a language they understand and respect.

They probably don't like it all that much, but at least the message gets through.

And I'm OK with that. Regardless if Bush or Obama does the 'talking'.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

Rap,

What divine hand gave us, or our leaders, the insight to decide who were the bad people of the earth which needed deleting for existence?

Seriously. Are there evil people in the muslim world? Sure. How many of them are working for the enemy, and how many for us? and are you sure? Are you sure of what good and evil are?

Stop and think put down you talking point memo for a moment, and seriously gnaw it over. If someone came to your country, say communist China, and started bombing towns, rounding up people that had been determined were "bad guys" by the Communist Party elite, and executing massive numbers of citizens (Yes, I know we don't, directly, but by massive bombing, we do, and I have to be realistic, the communist Chinese govt. would do this) then what would you do?

Assume that they effectively took out every legitimate US authority and replaced it with their own puppet regime (remember, Karzai is still president, even though he only won 23% of the vote, because we blocked precincts, a fact admitted by both the military and the administration, ergo, he is a puppet regime)

Here are your options:

1. You could collaborate with the Chinese Communists in the subjugation of your state of Georgia, even though you knew with certainty that if successful it would mean tens of thousands of deaths, and ultimately the imposition of the power of the puppet govt. to impose an ideology diametrically opposed to what you and your fellow Georgians most likely believe.

2. You could seek support from traditional allies outside the US (UK, Israel, maybe even Russia?) recognizing that this would allow these countries possible undue influence in your country under the logic that this influence would be preferable to a total communist take over (the obvious parallel here would be for Afghans seeking help by allying themselves with Iran, Pakistan or China.. or sometimes, ironically, also Russia.)

3. You could take up arms against the invasion, and gather or join a small band of rebels, knowing full well that the invading army would label you as "Enemy combatants" "insurgents" or even "terrorists" (Or the Chinese Communist equivalent of "Enemies of the State")

4. Sit back and let the invasion roll in, in hopes that you were not caught in the cross fire, racked up as collateral damage, and just resign yourself to being the puppet state to provide third world labor for a the new growing international colonial empire of a possible world communist dictatorship.

5. Flee in terror, knowingly leaving your nation to fall to tyranny, and move on to become a lowlife refugee, in whatever country happened to have the most liberal immigration policy towards Americans, which, quite Ironically, might very well be Mexico, esp. if in this hypothetical, Canada has made a deal with China to not accept Americans in exchange for not being attacked in the war.

So, which option would you choose? And is it really that different? And once you see these options, for any nation, or any citizen who, at least in their own perception is being invaded by a foreign power, esp. one that they might see as imperialist or oppressive, then can you calmly sit back and call them "evil" simply because they did not choose 1, 4, or 5.

Chris,

I'd put this to you to.

Also, yeah, you should probably give Caprica a chance. It's decent SF. It's probably on a level with Sarah Connor Chronicles or something, better than the vast majority of stuff out there, not Firefly or anything on that order.

I think it takes 3 or more geniuses to make a work of genius. Like the beatles or monty python. I think Caprica has two, so it's not garbage. It's sometimes discombobulated.

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Friday, October 8, 2010 4:44 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:

http://www.worldcantwait.net/index.php/features-mainmenu-220/take-acti
on/6476-welcome-rolling-stone-readers

Not a real good way to endear yourself to the American public, of any race, creed, or political view. Posting Obama's pic as a mug shot....wow.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

What's cute is that you only think Obama's pic is as a mug shot. You kinda missed that whole Bush-as-mug-shot thing.

Go figure...

The modern definition of "socialist" is anyone who's winning an argument against a tea-bagger.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, September 24, 2010
I hate Obama's America. You're damn right about that.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 1:43 AM

America loves a winner!

Quote:
What's cute is that you only think Obama's pic is as a mug shot. You kinda missed that whole Bush-as-mug-shot thing.

Go figure...

Am I really going to have to waste my time in explaining to you the significance of portraying our 1st black President as a common thug, with his face on a wanted poster ?

I think it's in exceedingly poor taste. Bush ? It's SOP for the Peacenik gang to portray anyone to the Left of Lenin and Stalin as having committed 'crimes against humanity' - man, what a laugh THAT is....but to do so w/ the Chosen One... that's heresy !

DT -

You gave an exceedingly long winded post for what I consider a very simple and straight forward problem.

It doesn't take a team of precogs to figure out the cast of bad folks over there. Drones taking out nests of al-Qaeda head men saves 1000's of lives and billions of dollars.

I got no problem with it, in the least.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 2:48 AM

KWICKO

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
Quote:
What's cute is that you only think Obama's pic is as a mug shot. You kinda missed that whole Bush-as-mug-shot thing.

Go figure...

Am I really going to have to waste my time in explaining to you the significance of portraying our 1st black President as a common thug, with his face on a wanted poster ?

I think it's in exceedingly poor taste. Bush ? It's SOP for the Peacenik gang to portray anyone to the Left of Lenin and Stalin as having committed 'crimes against humanity' - man, what a laugh THAT is....but to do so w/ the Chosen One... that's heresy !

So you're officially IN FAVOR of double standards, then. You have no problem with someone portraying a white guy as a criminal, but you flinch when they portray a black guy as a criminal for the exact same acts, huh?

Like it says, "Crimes are crimes".

The modern definition of "socialist" is anyone who's winning an argument against a tea-bagger.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, September 24, 2010
I hate Obama's America. You're damn right about that.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 2:56 AM

America loves a winner!

While I applaud the intellectual honesty and consistency from the Peaceniks, a trait so rarely seen with the Left, the stereotypical treatment of portraying a black man as a criminal... I find distasteful.

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 3:55 AM

DREAMTROVE

Quote:

It doesn't take a team of precogs to figure out the cast of bad folks over there. Drones taking out nests of al-Qaeda head men saves 1000's of lives and billions of dollars.

And by extension you believe that WWF matches are fair fights?

You dodged the question

I'm pretty sure that drone attacks take out random individuals belonging to a culture that poses no threat to us. No one has yet even suggested that the US was attacked by a bunch of guys from Afganistan, or that it ever would be. And rightly so. They would be morons for doing so. Of course, now, we're giving them plenty of reason. But who are on which side, sure, that's easy, but who are "bad guys"? that's very difficult. Our military seems to keep changing its mind on this issue. We have now, at one point or another, supported every single side in afganistan, and we seem to add or subtract one every 6-18 months. Obama has decided that Pashtun tribal leaders are a threat to America (greatest threat on this Earth, I think he said.) That's just utter nonsense. But this wasn't the inaccuracy I was talking about. It's hard to tell an exploding bomb who to kill. Say someone bombed your house, while you were at work, and killed your wife, kids and neighbors. I assure you that their govt. would tell their people that it was a successful hit, and that they killed (for the sake of the argument, let's assume there are two kids) three insurgents, and that (let's say five neighbors) were collateral damage. Add to this logical scenario that 2 of the five neighbors died in the hospital, and one was just visiting from out of town and didn't live their, that the enemy govt. would discount them from it's official civilian casualty figures, and claim only 2 civilians as collateral damage.

But even given all of this
a) we have absolutely nothing that indicates that we hit the anti-us insurgents
b) if we do, it's random luck, and very sloppy, since we are statistically likely to hit a hundred times as many random afghans, and you know very well that our own internal military reports affirm that this is what happens
c) who cares if there are insurgents? I mean, these are people who oppose the US. In afghanistan. They oppose the US in afghanistan. Hell, 80% of europeans and 70% of the american people oppose the US presence in afghanistan. I guess we're all insurgents.

So, Please, Shut off the propaganda machine for a sec and answer the gorram question:

If some imperialist power invaded your country to kill your people, take your resources and prop up their puppet regime, and even admitted that one of their main mission objectives was to use Georgia as a place to build military bases to invade Alabama, then what would you do?

I gave 5 simple options of logical options. Let me make it easier for you and add a sixth:

f) way too much of a fracking coward to choose a course of action or answer a question.

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 4:43 AM

Man DT, what has got you all fired up today?

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 5:20 AM

STORYMARK

Too bad Rappy wasn't capable of such an attitude when his Duba-holiness was in office.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 6:39 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

The poster is valid, however it portrays them. Crimes and crimes and Obama continuing Bush's original crimes is only SLIGHTLY less bad than Bush originating them. There is no excuse for either.

DT isn't ranting or fired up, he speaks for many of us. I'm not a "peacenik", but I'm against invasions and wars of conquest, and don't believe any excuse justifies what we are doing and have done. DT pretty much covers the issue succinctly.

We have many, many "bad guys" on our side--all sides do in situations such as this. To claim that only those committing outright terrorism are the "bad guys" is disingenuous, especially in the face of Abu Grabe, Gitmo and so many, many other things we KNOW...there are tons we don't hear about, there's no question of that, and they may never come to light. Give people power and justification (or even just power) and they will abuse it. Our military is abusing it.

It's not just "a few civillians die, along w/ a bunch of bad guys" at all; it's many, many civilians for a few bad guys--when we get any at all. Ask Afghans, they'll tell you; it's part of what's turned them against us. Just because the military control of the media and censorship doesn't let us know about them doesn't mean they exist.

If anyone thinks our country's collusion with drug farmers, gigantic payoffs to people we want to support us, and quiet support of other "bad guys" is okay because we're told it's in the name of "America" to do whatever is convenient to further our wars, they're willfully blind and feeding the very acts done in our name. Every war and every continuation of war is portrayed as good guys v. bad guys; it's what works but it has no actual validity.

Hippie Operative Nikovich Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
Contracted Agent of Veritas Oilspillus, code name “Nike”,
signing off

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 6:40 AM

HKCAVALIER

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
I find this troubling:
"sometimes the CIA will not carry out a strike if there are indications that civilians are at risk."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35149384/ns/world_news-south_and_central_a
sia/
"SOMETIMES????"

Obama needs to be briefed & debriefed by #2 in the Village, if ya ask me. He clearly lets things run on too much faith.

Chris, I find it really interesting that these drone attacks bring this out in you. I'm sorry, but isn't this what simply goes on in war? Isn't that why war is FUNDAMENTALLY a bad, bad idea--the king of bad ideas? Just as torture is specifically ill-suited to the gathering of useful information, war is utterly disqualified as a means to protect innocents?

I can't seem to find the quote right now, but wasn't it A History of Bombing that gave us the statistic: 19th century warfare = 80% military casualties/20% civilian; 20th century warfare = 20% military casualties/80% civilian? War, as it is currently, as we speak, actually fought, is largely about killing civilians. The best way to force a nation to surrender is to terrorize the civilian population. 'Course, Afghanistan isn't at war with us and there is no government upon whom to force a surrender (unless you count the Pakistani government???), but modern warfare is modern warfare, drone or no drone.

I think the reason folk find drone attacks so disturbing is not the civilian casualties, which, in terms of civilian casualties, are nothing special, but the fact that we put none of our own in harm's way to carry them out. It strikes at folks' deepest sense of morality and fair play. When we kill thousands upon thousands of theirs, we at least have to lose a dozen or so of ours to make it "okay." I think the willingness of soldiers to risk their lives for the ideal du jour puts a lot of folks minds at ease about the violence of war.

But drone attacks are just the ultimate expression of a game the U.S. has been playing since the beginning (the War of Independence, being the proverbial exception): unequal warfare. We've gotten so used to it that now we've come to expect it. Americans loved "Shock & Awe" and were shocked to find out that the mission hadn't actually been accomplished. Wars are supposed to take a couple weeks and our enemies are supposed to just let us own them from then on. It's the natural order of things. But even in such a deranged psychological landscape, drone attacks apparently go too far, revealing way more about modern warfare than we are comfortable seeing.

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 8:03 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Indeed, HKCav.

Fighting for peace makes about as much sense as screwing for virginity, dunnit ?

War is not a protective measure, it's not a condom - it's a rape, always was, always will be.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 9:30 AM

KWICKO

As noted before, often, the U.S. policy towards Muslims seems to be this:

If there are 35 innocent people in a building with one *suspected* al Qaeda operative, then 36 people are going to die that day. And no evidence need ever be shown.

Al Qaeda is determined to kill as many innocents as possible, we're told, and they don't really care who they kill. And it seems that the United States is fully dedicated to helping them carry out that mission.

Such policies don't *prevent* another 9/11 attack; they guarantee one.

The modern definition of "socialist" is anyone who's winning an argument against a tea-bagger.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, September 24, 2010
I hate Obama's America. You're damn right about that.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 9:33 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Well SAID, Cav, and right on the money. Now watch some come screaming in with rationalizations, illogic and nationalistic fervor...

Hippie Operative Nikovich Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
Contracted Agent of Veritas Oilspillus, code name “Nike”,
signing off

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Saturday, October 9, 2010 1:18 PM

Obama should be arrested for war crimes.

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Sunday, October 10, 2010 2:27 AM

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by Storymark:
Too bad Rappy wasn't capable of such an attitude when his Duba-holiness was in office.

Exactly which attitude would that be ?

"The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal."

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Sunday, October 10, 2010 2:51 AM