Sept. 11 and the War on Terror: Bullshit or Patriotism?

[Kaine]

I happened to be reading a web page that was talking about Sept. 11. I've noticed that in a LOT of opinions, people are either unbelievably patriotic or the believe that America is a genocidal dictatorship and that we are commiting huge amounts of atrocities.

I want to see what you all think of America...are we doing the right thing and should more of it be done, or are we completely wrong and should stop it right now?

I believe that we are doing the right thing, at least as much as we can, and that America is not the Great White Satan that we are made out to be.
I look at life not with the thought that all is peachy, but that the world is filled with living hells and America is doing what it needs to do to survive.

I couldn't give a rats ass about the "atrocities" we are committing in other countries, because every other country in the world is doing the same. We are just pointed at because we are the most successful nation in the world.

It's like Darwinism in the world, only the strong survive. We were attacked, and in order to survive, we attacked back.

Anyway, I want your thoughts and feeling about what happened and what you think.

[Forty-six & Two]

In my opinion every official/leader/decision-maker in this case are completly bonkers. So if I had to answer the poll correct id need another option.

[-=Felix=-]

Its simple really...

America was attacked. America got its ass kicked. We found retribution by attacking afghanistan and declaring war on terror. Did it do anything to help us? No.

Why you ask?

Because Americans are still afraid to do things in public, i.e. 4th of July?
In Conneticut, there were two rapid response teams posted at Camp Roland to negate any sort of terrorist activity at the millstone nuclear power plant. 10 to 1 says similar things happened across the country.

Why are Americans scared? Because Connie Chung and all these other media personalities are on virtually every form of media telling americans that they should be; and giving vivid reasons to support their arguments.

"How easy is it to smuggle a Nuclear bomb into New York? Find out at 9!"
"Do you think America's military protects its stockpiled weapons, you'd be suprised, more at 11!"
"Anonymous E-mail threatens massive attack on such and such a date, will this effect you?! More at 10"

Personally, I think the 'War on Terror' is a giant crock of shit with which Dubya and various media whores exert control.

I don't know. Those are just my simple opinions.

[Sirgalahadwizard]

The suicide bombings in israel can be stopped:
*Kill Yassar Arafat.
*Kill all of Yassar Arafat's friends and family.
*Kill anyone on the spot who rises up in the name of "palestinian liberation".
*Send in undercover agents to expose the groups responsible for making and aqquiring bomb materials (and setting up the bombings in the first place).

Then, the israelis wont have to "occupy" palestinian towns - at least, until the bombings start again.

I tell you, the statute/law that prohibits the united states military from conducting assassinations of political officials DEFINATLY needs to be repealed. That way, we can kill Saddam Hussein, we can kill Yassar Arafat, and any other fucker who takes their place.

[Haplo]

Fuck it. Nuke the place, and allow the nuclear heat to fuse the silicon in the sand to make Afghanistan one very large glass bowl.

[Constipated BladeRunner]

Its simple really...

America was attacked. America got its ass kicked. We found retribution by attacking afghanistan and declaring war on terror. Did it do anything to help us? No.

Why you ask?

Because Americans are still afraid to do things in public, i.e. 4th of July?
In Conneticut, there were two rapid response teams posted at Camp Roland to negate any sort of terrorist activity at the millstone nuclear power plant. 10 to 1 says similar things happened across the country.

Why are Americans scared? Because Connie Chung and all these other media personalities are on virtually every form of media telling americans that they should be; and giving vivid reasons to support their arguments.

"How easy is it to smuggle a Nuclear bomb into New York? Find out at 9!"
"Do you think America's military proctects its stockpiled weapons, you'd be suprised, more at 11!"
"Anonymous E-mail threatens massive attack on such and such a date, will this effect you?! More at 10"

Personally, I think the 'War on Terror' is a giant crock of shit with which Dubya and various media whores exert control.

I don't know. Those are just my simple opinions.

You didnt have half you friend disintergrated in a matter of minutes.
Asshole. European ignorant asshole.

[Constipated BladeRunner]

Fuck it. Nuke the place, and allow the nuclear heat to fuse the silicon in the sand to make Afghanistan one very large glass bowl.

We dont need to bomb the middle east- its already hell and can bareley sustain human life.

[Sirgalahadwizard]

Y'know, I'd be all for the use of nuclear (actually, im more for the big ones - thermonuclear), except for the fallout they give off.

When you blow one up, it kills all people above ground within ten miles and everyone in bomb shelters within a mile, and ignites fires up to 30 miles away (and can blow houses down up to 40 miles away)... but it also sends up an enormous cloud much larger than a thunderstorm thunderhead, at much higher altitudes, which is highly radioactive with nuclear biproducts.

Whoever is downwind gets a bad case of the ghoul if you know what I mean...

If however, you can make the bombs cleaner - through antimatter or fine-tuning of nuclear explosions... I'll be all for their use - for "bunker buster" bombs and just about everything else under the sun.

Unfortunatly we wouldnt be able to make any big ones (megaton range) without getting alot of countries onto our back... so we'd actually have to come up with some way to shoot down ICBMs that other contries (like china and russia) could shoot at us first. Personally, I think either a intercepting nuclear blast or a particle beam would do the trick.

[Jack_Deth]

Anymore I could careless, I used to think the "war on terrorism" was a good idea.

I don't really have an oppinion on it right now.

All I know is that... I can't wait for Iraqi anti-aircraft fire to light up the sky and show the American people that they aren't going without a worthy fight, and they WILL be able to find reverse on the Soviet tank. That will be one hell of a light show.

One thing I do hate is the ignorant fucks that says, we should just NUKE the whole middle east... those people are the type of people that make me wish the Germans would have won the great war.

[Sirgalahadwizard]

I think we should kill everyone in the middle east - they been fighting over shit for the last 3000 years, they'll be the doom of us all.

I am not against them for their religion or their culture, im against them for the ways they interpret them. Ooodles of human rights violations, (lemme see, genital mutilation, female subjugation, jihad, need I go on?) a really bad regeneration ethic (have as many kids as you can!), and the strict interpretation of religious dogma (ie, it's the truth, and if you dont believe in it you should die), really push me over the edge with em.

Actually, just about everyone on the asian continent should just up and f-ing die as far as im concerned (the russians and orientals are okay, but the indians, afghanies, irannies, iraqis, the saudi's and all the people from all the smaller countries around there could just go away).

I really hope the oil runs out over there pretty soon, im kinda sick of having to depend on them for their oil. After that runs out, they're screwed.

I dont care if this makes me look unethical... but there's no "easy" solution to the southwestern asia problem, and I tend to take a clear-cut approach to these kinda things.

[-=Felix=-]

You didnt have half you friend disintergrated in a matter of minutes.
Asshole. European ignorant asshole.

I sincerely doubt you did either. And if it will make you feel any better, my National Guard unit was called up to provide exterior security for the site...
Either way, what right do you have to judge my opinion?

[Constipated BladeRunner]

1 Best Friends Father
2 Dad's Buisness Parter for 30 years
I know it dosnt sound like much, but it destroyed 3,000 peoples lives, let alone that of the widows and the amount of ground obliterated.
I am curious, what would (france?) be without the U.S? Modern man is a machine of war and the pursuit of "progress" everthing else is just for a short amount of time.

[OnTheBounce]

I couldn't give a rats ass about the "atrocities" we are committing in other countries, because every other country in the world is doing the same.

Bet you've never seen any of this shit w/your own eyes, either. Back in '91 I saw little Iraqi kids lying on the side of the road where shrapnel from American bombs had killed them. Were they enemies of the state, or just "collateral damage"?

We are just pointed at because we are the most successful nation in the world.

Most successful in what sense? At dropping bombs on wedding parties?

It's like Darwinism in the world, only the strong survive.

You know, I bet good ol' Chuck Darwin rolls in his grave every time someone who has never so much as cracked one of his books uses his name in vain. You will note that "strong" in this sense is used only to denote any characteristic which allows an organism to procreate. It doesn't mean muscle-bound, sloped-foreheaded Neanderthal armed w/the latest gadgetry useful in laying his fellow man low.

Since you like Darwin so much, though, let me introduce you to one of his friends: Thomas Henry Huxley, father of Aldous and often referred to as "Darwin's Bulldog". When various people queried him about what effect Darwin's thinking would have if it were accepted and religious control of human ethics were eschewed he said that, "Civilization is Man's protest against Nature." In other words, no matter what the Natural World is like, we are civilized humans and do not have to live a dog-eat-dog existance.

Anyway, I want your thoughts and feeling about what happened and what you think.

I think it's unfair that the US gets all of the blame for what multinationals do, but by and large the American people are greedy and crass. It really cracks me up that an allegedly X-ian nation should be so stingy w/its wealth.

Now don't go on about how much foreign aid we pour into people's coffers. That shit just goes toward enriching the elites of the countries that receive it and it always comes at a price: the country in question always has to modernize along neo-liberal economic lines and the interest on those loans is crippling, to boot.

But when people show up and they are fed up w/the US enough to tear down the twin ziggurats dedicated to the gods of greed and exploitation, should the US really wonder why?

OTB

[Constipated BladeRunner]

Its called menetic evolution- the survival of the stronger cultureal system.
Take the cold war for example- the U.S vs USSR- who won? The US. Take polytheisim against monotheisim- who won? Monotheisim. While piking on other countries just because they are weak is far beyond any kind of moral, or for that matter sane, person.
With current technology, or for a greater example, pre millineal Desert Storm, it is impossible to have no civilian casualties, but what do you suggest we do?
I consider myself a pacifist and a socalist, but for another time in human history, not today.

[OnTheBounce]

First, let me say that I am not attacking you or your family/friends. Don't take this personally.

...but it destroyed 3,000 peoples lives, let alone that of the widows and the amount of ground obliterated.

Compare that number to the number of civilian deaths attributed to various US bombing campaigns both past and present and you'll see that the totals are quite lopsided. The shocking thing to the American people is mainly that the last time someone bombed the US was WWII and most people didn't even know about the balloon-mounted incendiary bombs falling in the Pacific Northwest. The last time US soil was invaded was during the War of 1812 when the English burned Washington, D. C. to include the White House in retribution for what had been done to Quebec. So Americans are fairly well insulated from things that are commonplace in other places in the world, like bombs and bodies raining down all over the street.

I am curious, what would (france?) be without the U.S?

A better question would be, "What would the US be w/o France?" While it's fashionable in the US to bash France for having to be bailed out during both World Wars...or - more precisely - bailed out during one and reestablished after its fall during the next, the US would not have been able to throw off the yoke of English colonialism were it not for several other nations. France is the key among those, but the Spanish and Dutch were also there to stick to England.

OTB

[Haplo]

We dont need to bomb the middle east- its already hell and can bareley sustain human life.

I know that. I was being sarcastic to Felix. Sorry if you thought I really meant it.

Bet you've never seen any of this shit w/your own eyes, either. Back in '91 I saw little Iraqi kids lying on the side of the road where shrapnel from American bombs had killed them. Were they enemies of the state, or just "collateral damage"?

I have seen it OTB. I've been in the hopitals and seen children with missing legs, arms, mothers... I wish there was something more that I could have done for them, but the damage was already done. I don't know what to tell you, except that I try to keep those pictures out of my dreams. As for why, I don't know either. But those children were not born to die that young, I know that.

[Constipated BladeRunner]

WW2- Dresden was wrose than both the atomic bombs combined, but there where count- Dresden killied 130,000.
Compare that to the holocaust- somewhere between 6-20 million. You cannot compare this.
Vietnam- It was attempting to stop communisim, or at least soviet-esque communisim- that has killied more people than almost every other movement in human history- plese note that I am not defending Vietnam- south was fascist.
Kuwait, and the entire desert storm situation, the oil aspect is massive, but there is also the issue of growing fanatiscism and a stronger Iraq, which for all humanitarian purposes would be aweful.
Afganistan? A government that opeanly condones terrorisim? From a strictly humanitarian is aweful. We had every right to move in for the benefit of all humanity.
WW1- Dont even get me started.

[OnTheBounce]

Its called menetic evolution- the survival of the stronger cultureal system.

I've heard of Herbert Spencer's "Social Darwinism" and a whole bunch of other things, but not this "menetic evolution". I even marched over to the shelf and hefted my OED to check it out. Nothing there, either. But that's okay, because it doesn't matter what you call it, the thinking behind it is still flawed, and I'll show you why below.

Take the cold war for example- the U.S vs USSR- who won? The US.

The USSR lost because it tried to beat the US at its own game rather than forcing the US to play its own game.

Take paganisim against monotheisim- who won? Monotheisim.

Paganism and Monotheism aren't mutually exclusive, for one. "Pagan" means "not Christian", so a Muslim - who is a monotheist, just as a Sikh is - is just as much of a pagan as a Hindu who has a couple of million deities in his pantheon is.

Also, I'm not quite sure what's convinced you that any one religion has "won" anything. Last I checked there are more people in China and India that are praying to a multitude of deities than there are people belonging to the "Western Big Three" (Xianity, Judaism, and Islam) in the world. I suppose you're only thinking of the West, though.

Now, why is the idea that if someone/something "wins" that it is stronger false? Because strenghts are not absolute. In other words, a certain quality that is an asset in a certain situation becomes a liablity in another situation.

Take for example the M1A1 Abrams. It did excellent execution in the Gulf, but when it came to sending them off to Serbia they couldn't get there very quickly because of the lack of bridges that would support their 70+ tons. So what was an asset in one situation became a liablity that hindered their deployment in another. So all of that excellent armor, gunpower and tactical mobility had to limp along, meandering from bridge to bridge whereas lighter, air-droppable vehicles would have been there within 24 hours.

With current technology...it is impossible to have no civilian casualties, but what do you suggest we do?

Not according to the press releases. By golly gee whiz them US bombs are so accurate they can hit anything anywhere, right? Bullshit! Even back during Desert Storm we saw the US military running around, trying very hard not to break its own neck during the commision of autofelatio because it was all about, "one bomb, one kill". The Gov't Accounting Office released a study back in '93 that revealed that Smart Bombs were not nearly as effective as had been touted in the media. Rather than one bomb/target the average was 2.5. (Where did the other 1.5 bombs fall?) Conventional bombs averaged 4.5 bombs/target, but - and this says a lot about the study - still managed to do the job for fewer dollars.

What do I suggest we do? Stop buying SUVs...use renewable resources...start treating other nations w/respect rather than cheap labor pools...the list goes on and on, but wagging our collective Finger of High Morality about the lose of "our" own civilians while sending "our boys" over the sea to do the same to other people isn't exactly a viable solution.

OTB

[Bulldog]

What do I suggest we do? Stop buying SUVs...use renewable resources...start treating other nations w/respect rather than cheap labor pools...the list goes on and on, but wagging our collective Finger of High Morality about the lose of "our" own civilians while sending "our boys" over the sea to do the same to other people isn't exactly a viable solution.

America's too insulated to change, I think Sept.11 was the perfect example of this. With no immediate threats or consequences, what's to stop some soccer mom from buying an SUV and slapping this on it:

[-=Felix=-]

I know that. I was being sarcastic to Felix. Sorry if you thought I really meant it.

Sarcastic to me? how so? I don't even think our involvement in Afghanistan was justified. It didn't accomplish anything... pardon... All it did was increase the level of anger/hatred aimed at us by the Arab world.

People, nothing we can do or say can prevent what has already happened. It was terrible, and its now being milked for all its worth by the media and the American government. So whats the point in discussing it further? All that will follow are more heated posts by person(s) who have no idea what they're talking about.