Boo Radley
DP Veteran
- Joined
- Dec 20, 2009
- Messages
- 37,066
- Reaction score
- 7,028
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Liberal
C'mon man. It's because you have grown accustomed to shutting down and withdrawing into the 2003 protest. Even President Obama has recognized the path the region is on and even he can't avoid that a democratic Iraq is the focus. But you can? Maybe you haven't thought it through as you think. Hate Bush, hate Rumsfeld, hate the execution they planned, but recognize what's going on at least.
This is very bumper sticker. Fortunately, we have not spread freedom and democracy by gun point. We merely removed the hinderance we used to support. These people freely went to the polls and freely voted. They accomplished something that Arabs have never accomplished in history, despite their well to do it since the beginning of European colonialism. For peopole to dismiss this and default to their bumper srticker protest, they absolute disrespect these people as insignificant. They matter because an entire region is looking at them.
The fact is that Iraq is going to push this region further than was possible before 2003. Are you watchning what is going on in Egypt? Do you think these people would be organizing in their protests for modernization and democracy were it not for the heart land of Islam serving as an example? You have been wrong in your shallow protests and the region is going to prove it. They already are. The protest of Iraq has become simple habit for most. Upon further analysis, the old pundits have become silent and only those too stubborn to admit they were short sighted continue the bumper sticker stage.
Like it or not, but civilizational advancement and true peace has never come without blood shed. And ours depends on this backwards region's ability to emerge from their path into hellish terrorism and religious doctrine. Just what do you think this civilization will turn to when oil runs out if all theyt know is dictators, religious zealism, and oppression? 9/11 was nothing in a region where nuclear weapons are the future.
If you believe invading iraq, war, gun point is the key to spreading freedom and democracy, than that is exactly what you've done. If you believe it would come by any other means, then war is even less neccessary.
When you wreack things, break it up, smash it, people do tend to rebuild. But there is no control into how it would be rebuilt. Palistine had elections. Look who won. Iran went more radical when they were moving toward a more moderate goverance. You are simply misreading the events.
Only to the near sighted and short visioned. Iraq will and is changing the region.
Everything changes. They were changing before we invaded. Hear what I'm saying. Iran went more radical with the invasion. They were changing peacefully before we invaded.
Call it what you want, but it is the reality. Crack open any social history book. ....and Iran, China, and Russia stand for nothing that the majority of the world wants. This is why the majority of the world gravitated towards us. Even today, they may gripe about details, but they damn sure want us here. You should learn a little bit more about what this country has stood for since 1775 and what it has done for this world. People don't seem to realize that 1991 marked the end of thousands of years of oppressive prescription. Empire, Monarchy, Colonialism, Dictatorship, and Communism failed. What was left? And who made the global organizations to encourage "peace?" You should be prouder than what you are displaying.
What they stand for is besides the point. The fact is if you adopt their methods you become more like them. Just as even a comfortable prison is still a prison, an invasion and forced changed even by a democracy is still an invasion and forced change. It is imperialistic and arrogant to think we should impose even good things on the world.
No, I don't believe Obama credits Bush's invasion of Iraq. It's not logical.
Mohsen Sazgara is an Iranian activist and researcher who in August 2003 received a three-month jail sentence for criticizing the regime. Speaking from London, where he is currently receiving medical treatment, he told RFE/RL that he is watching events in Iraq carefully.
"I personally hope that Iraq's [transition to democracy] will be completed successfully so that it can also help our nation," he says. "For sure, neighbors with democratic governments are much better for us than dictators such as Saddam Hussein or backward groups such as the Taliban."
Sazgara -- who faces an additional year in jail when he returns home -- says the recent events in Iraq have the power to encourage many young Iranians to push even harder for democratic change in their country.
"Our young generation in particular has shown -- especially over the past eight years and during the reform movement -- that it has a strong desire for democracy, human rights and civil society, and a strong desire to join the international [community]," Sazgara says. "And when democratic changes take place in our neighboring and brother country Iraq, with its many ties to us, it encourages our youth, and emboldens our young people to ask for change in our current constitution." Iran: Analysts Say Democratic Changes In Iraq May Inspire Similar Trends In Its Neighbor - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty © 2011
For decades, the Arab states have seemed exceptions to the laws of politics and human nature. While liberty expanded in many parts of the globe, these nations were left behind, their "freedom deficit" signaling the political underdevelopment that accompanied many other economic and social maladies. In November 2003, President George W. Bush laid out this question:
"Are the peoples of the Middle East somehow beyond the reach of liberty? Are millions of men and women and children condemned by history or culture to live in despotism? Are they alone never to know freedom and never even to have a choice in the matter?"
Egypt protests show George W. Bush was right about freedom in the Arab world
Even if true, it would still be wrong, imperialistic, immoral. You would be using Iraq, bring death to their people, for something you think might happen.
No MSgt, I don't buy the argument.
If Bush was a war criminal, then Obama is a war criminal.
Albert, aren't you only saying this because you think it is a useful rhetorical device against leftists to call their (at least originally) preferred leader a war criminal, despite the fact that he is mostly (with some significant differences, of course) following the prosecution of the War on Terrorism like his predecessor? You're starting to sound like a leftist, and make me feel like a damned jingoist (though some here think of me in that way anyway).
If anyone wishes to debate me on this point I will ask you to show me the authority under either American or international law which permits the use of flying robots by the Central Intelligence Agency to kill innocent sleeping Pakistani villagers in North Waziristan, South Waziristan and Baluchistan.
But officials from both countries quietly admit that Pakistan's civilian Government has come to recognise the benefits of co-operating with the US drone strikes, as it struggles to contain a Taliban insurgency that has spread from its border lands into the North West Frontier Province and some of its largest cities.
....tacit permission...
I love it when you pretend to be a lawyer. It gives me goose bumps.
The govt. in Pakistan today will not be the govt in Pakistan tomorrow. Since absolutely nothing is in writing everything is deniable. There is no Pakistani politician, officer or factotum who will ever admit giving Americans permission to kill Pakistani nationals on Pakistani soil. Any Pakistani who did admit such a thing would be murdered by his or her countrymen.
So what evidence is there that Pakistan gave America tacit permission? Nothing is in writing. No testimonial evidence will be given by any Pakistani national. The only testimony will be from members of the Obama administration who are presumed to be biased and self-serving. No evidence. No defense. That permits prosecution.
Pakistani military spokesman Akhtar Abbas admitted yesterday that the US was using Shamsi "for logistics", as well as another airbase near Jacobabad, 500km northeast of Karachi, but insisted neither airbase was being used for Predator launches.
Other Pakistani officials said the Government's publicly stated opposition to the drone strikes was "really for the sake of public opinion".
Local journalist Safar Khan said: "We can see the planes flying from the base. The area around the base is a high-security zone and no one is allowed there."
He said the outer perimeter of Shamsi was guarded by Pakistani military, but the airfield itself was under the control of US forces.
It is absolutely logical and it was even forecasted by plenty.
In regards to Iran. Here was one activist. You think he's alone?....
This is what Bush stated....
While you were focusing on the latest IED in Iraq, I watched Iraqis vote and I read about Saudi Arabia allowing low level elections for the first time in history. While you were looking for Iraq to erupt into civil war, I was watching Iraqis vote again and read about the Lebanese crackdown to try to get Hezbollah out of their democracy. While you were looking for failure at every turn, I watched other Arab nations appoint ambassadors into Iraq. I watched the modernist voices in Egypt gain strength and unity against Mubarak. I watched Iranians demand fair elections after knowing they were cheated.
........And then Tunisia happened. ......and then Egypt happened. .....and then.....
Who gives a **** what you want to call it? Despite the purest's notion of things, often, the ends absolutely justifies the means. Nobody cares about two atomic bombs that brought us victory do they? And we didn't bring death. They created death. Decades of pent up rage and oppression has the tendency to erupt when freed. Look what happened to Yugoslavia the moment the Soviets walked away. CENTCOM know this and accounted for it. Rumsfeld knew this and ignored it. In any rate, how much death do you think Egypt is going to go through? This is the process. Nobody created a nation out of perfect bliss.
Because it makes you re-think what you have absolutely taught yourself to hate, which has unwittingly placed you on the side of anti-democracy in the Middle East. "Our" dictator in Iraq was going nowhere without our intervention and without the most significant event in Arab recent history, there would be no dominoes today to watch on CNN and FOX.
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?