rewrite that sh!t right and I'll respond, I've been drinking and don't feel like deciphering that.
Yes they do.
Just because they don't tax you to allow you to do it like you do to the dhimmis doesn't mean they respect it.
The majority of people here are Christians neither is yours.
When you say things like "the majority is always right" you deserve to be offended.
The dominant idea on this forum is discussion of view points. Simply because more people believe it does not make it correct.
And since, as you said, the majority is always right that makes you wrong.
You're first mistake was believing in paranormal things.
"Temptation"
Religion in general is deficient in objectivism.
The personification of "God" as an extrinsic, cognizant entity which intercedes, with an exalted purpose, for the facility and direction of mammon, or for the whim of the entity itself (dependent upon the weather), is indicative of the self serving human ego.
Who -- is personification, which leads to a presumption of motivation (why?).
Is the motivation clear?
It seems the only thing that this who can seem to do is eek out signs and muffled grumblings with an expectation that the intuitions of an occasional, selected visionary will relate a message that every one should obey.
What -- is objective, at least with respect to how.
How -- is objective, at least with respect to why.
The proponents of monotheism have some explaining to do.
Is the world comprised of an inordinant number of monads, a substance whose quality is the same, a substance which is infinite in its existence?
To help with the understanding of a monad, consider an irrational number, suppose half of the square root of two 0.707106781186547524400844.......
The size and quality is relatively the same, yet at each moment there is a transition to a similar representation.
The number is without end, infinite, eternal; by virtue, it is being and becoming with some manner of transition.
A consistent quality of a monad would lead to principles of order, conservation would lead to principles of accountability, and the possibility of diversity exists only within the bounds of the monad itself.
Now, number is indifferent, yet any composite of monads will emulate being and becoming with some manner of transition through induction.
And sophistication would imply that affirmation of being and becoming occurs by deduction.
Procreation is a manner of emulating and or affirming being and becoming.
I don’t see how I have misrepresented anything. I would think if I had, then certainly the newspapers I got the info from would have already been sued by the government for libel. One of the reasons we went to war was because Iraq was supposedly linked to AQ, and this report says it ain’t so.
And did I read correctly that you think our intelligence on WMD’s was correct?
It's funny that you mention the no fly zones. The no fly zones were established by the US, UK, and France, and cover about half of Iraq and of course Iraqi aircraft are not allowed to fly in them. They cited UN Resolution 688 as their authority to establish the no fly zones, but it says nothing about them, and the UN Secretary General declared them illegal.
So what you have here are illegally enforced no fly zones over a sovereign country, and you are telling me that Saddam was the aggressor here?
We bombed Iraq pretty much constantly for twelve years, flew some 40,000 sorties, and Saddam is to blame for firing at (and missing every time) our fighter planes?
As for the assassination plot, it’s very iffy whether or not Saddam was behind it. We bombed the Iraqi intelligence headquarters in retaliation, and a report known as the Duelfer report suggests Saddam is likely not to have been behind the plot. Who exactly was being harbored by Saddam?
We had our hand all over that constitution. Paul Bremer, who was the US governor of Iraq wouldn’t let them make Islam THE source of legislation.[/quoe]
Prove it.
He instead allowed them to make it A source of legislation. Furthermore, if spreading democracy was our goal, you sure couldn’t tell it was by our policies after the mission was “accomplished”: washingtonpost.com: Occupation Forces Halt Elections Throughout Iraq
Oh gee we didn't want to allow the elections to go forward only a couple of months after the war had started while Iraq was still in complte anarchy. Well golly gee. :roll:
Already proved Paul Bremer had the last say on what went into it.
You didn't prove that at all, you just claimed it.
Have you ever wondered why they didn’t just amend the old constitution?
"The old Constitution?" Probably because it was a national socialist constitution.
As for the elections, I don’t know, although there were investigations into anomalies.
They were certified as free and fair by international observers.
Plus, they didn’t get to vote for individuals, they had to vote for ethnic groups. That’s just the way the ballot was set up.
No they had to vote for party lists it's not our fault that those parties divided along ethnic lines.
You’re absolutely right, they don’t have to represent the people at all, just like our Congress doesn’t have to listen to us when 80% of us wanted them to vote against the bailout. Maybe the next election will make a difference.
They represent the people but it is not direct democracy which is the entire point of representative democracy, IE the representatives sometimes do what may not be popular but rather what is in the nations best interests.
Unless I’m mistaken, we didn’t have a treaty with anybody in Korea until after the armistice was signed.
The U.N. treaty IE the U.N. charter which the U.S. ratified, once the security council determined that action must be taken for the defense of South Korea the U.S. was bound by a collective defense treaty.
Obviously you and I are going to disagree about whether or not an AUMF is sufficient or that it is okay for Congress to let the president decide when to go to war and for what reason. After studying the history of our Constitution and the debates surrounding it, I have to conclude that the founders never wanted the war making power vested in the executive, whether it was delegated or not.
I guess that would be why they granted an AUMF to Adams for the quasi war against the French.
But even regardless of that, I have to wonder how you or anyone could think that our participation in either Korea or Vietnam had anything to do with defending America.
It was about protecting American interests namely the containment of Communist expansionism.
Both Iraq wars were completely unconstitutional.
Both had AUMF's.
The first one was a UN baby and had nothing to do with the defense of America.
It had an AUMF sir, and once again the U.S. has ratified the U.N. charter.
The second one was in large part a result of the first one, and authorization of the second one relied quite heavily on matters relating to the first one. For Afghanistan I would have preferred using a letter of marque and reprisal instead of invading a whole country.
:roll: ya let's write a letter of marque and reprisal for every single member of AQ who was living in Afghanistan at the time, I mean that would have worked out great except there were thousands of them and probably didn't even know the names of most, whose name were they going to sign on the letter of marque and reprisal? OBL is that it? Are you asserting that if OBL was eliminated that the threat of the global Jihad would be dimished one iota? Bloody genius.
It was a limited engagement that was unconstitutional. We were not attacked and our military wasn’t used to protect Americans. As for the Quasi War, perhaps you didn’t read into it enough, or else you wouldn’t have accused Adams of being imperialist. Our actions against the French were defensive.
So were our actions against Grenada, they were building a run way capable of supporting Soviet heavy bombers and we needed to protect U.S. students who were in danger due to the illegal coup de'ta that had taken place. And do you really think that the founders would have been opposed to the U.S. restoring a fallen democracy that fell within our sphere of influence? I highly doubt it.
Furthermore, John Adams didn’t take any unilateral action whatsoever. Congress passed a series of acts and Adams complied with them.
Congress passed an act granting authorization for the U.S. Navy under Adams to attack French vessels IE the very first AUMF in the history of this republic.
Somehow I don’t think it is constitutional for us to help overthrow the government of another sovereign nation.
Really? And why is that?
You’re right! I almost missed that. Our republic has suffered just like the Roman republic. We, like the Romans, have forgotten how to govern ourselves and have forgotten that the republican form of government was supposed to restrain executive power. Instead, like the Caesar and those after him, we’ve had a string of presidents since at least Lincoln that have seized more and more power for the executive branch, and Congress has sat impotent in the midst of tyranny. Am I to assume that your lack of comment on the definitions I gave means you now understand I have not made up my definition of imperialism?
Not at all. It depends on the pattern of behavior and the predatory nature of it.
We planned and funded the attempted overthrow of the government of a sovereign country. We had no business doing so, and the Constitution doesn’t authorize such a thing.
Fringe? I have to wonder what your definition of fringe is. Probably any site that disagrees with you. The CIA helped the Baathists with a coup in 1963. Back in 1959, Saddam had tried the same thing with five other fellows, but they failed. Saddam fled to Egypt until, you guessed it, the CIA helped get the Baathists into power. Saddam then felt safe to come to Iraq, and he was then set up as the head of the Baathist Intelligence organization. We didn’t appoint him to be leader of Iraq, but we sure did hand it to his party.
Syria : The U.S. pushes 'regime change' at its peril - International Herald Tribune
“My late friend Miles Copeland, a former CIA officer, sketched out in his book "The Game of Nations" the role he played for the CIA in Damascus in 1949, as the United States and the Soviet Union competed for influence. Over coffee in a Cairo hotel room in 1968, Copeland reminisced that while U.S. diplomats were preaching democracy to the Syrians, whom they didn't understand very well, he had manipulated Syrian elections by bribery, giving them a veneer of honesty by importing American voting machines. Copeland and another former CIA operative, Wilbur Eveland, agreed that Colonel Husni Zaim's "pro-Western" coup of March 1949 was CIA work. It initiated a time of great instability and political violence.”
Going to this link should highlight where you should start reading.
Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA ... - Google Book Search
Well, there’s that, but we started our operations over there much earlier than that.
We’ve been occupying the Korean Peninsula for over sixty years. During that time we have armed and funded the South Koreans. We brought Syngman Rhee to South Korea from Hawaii and he acted as temporary president until officially elected in ’48. Rhee proved to be a thorn in our side because he wouldn’t do what we wanted him to do. When General Park took over in ’61 we didn’t directly put him in power. The conditions there at the time were great for a coup, so there were few problems, although it is known that the CIA did help smooth things along.
The extent to which they did that is still classified (JPRI Working Paper No. 20). We also trained Park at Fort Sill, OK for about a year and he came out an artillery commander. The same kind of thing happened with Chun Doo Hwan in ’79 Rogue State: A Guide to the World's ... - Google Book Search
Laos is one of the more widely known cases of US intervention. Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA ... - Google Book Search
CIA activities in Laos - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
We also helped overthrow Miguel Ydigoras http://www.drclas.harvard.edu/revista/articles/view/828
rightwinghour said:The guy that was overthrown even wrote a book about it called “My War With the CIA”.
I didn’t say it was a coup. Remember I said “coups and such”. Our actions there were unconstitutional anyway.
We occupied Haiti from 1915 to 1934.
Also, there’s the Aristide ouster in ’04.
Aristide: 'Marines forced me to leave' - Americas, World - The Independent
I don’t understand how you can say that the Family Jewels would cover all CIA coup operations, when that report only covers material from the 1950’s to the mid 70’s.
And besides that, I find it hard to believe that YOU would believe that the CIA disclosed every bad thing they did during the whole of their existence up to that point, and furthermore that they don’t do any bad things now.
Just how much do you trust the government anyway? I suppose you think the 9/11 Commission Report is forthright and honest, too?
What interests? The Constitution doesn’t allow for our military to be used for such things.
Your second question shows you are still missing the point, that the US employs a different kind of imperialism. You’re still trying to make things conform to old world empire definitions. So just to be sure, do you reject the definitions I provided of imperialism? If you do, please say so and why.
Limited? I have no doubt that the Taliban and AQ were thick as thieves, but how does that refute what I said about the ultimatum? FYI, as early as two days before 9/11 we already had planned to give the Taliban the ultimatum. 9/11 was just extra incentive I guess. As for funding, we gave the Taliban $43 million back in May of ’01.
Sounds entirely possible to me as far as the indictments are concerned, and I already had no doubt it was an AQ operation, that wasn’t at issue. I still think the FBI should list 9/11 as something he’s wanted for, but that’s just me. I’m just wondering how the government was so sure it was OBL before the tapes came out. Although, since we had plans in the works to take action in Afghanistan before 9/11, that may not even matter much.
jin1776,
Before I respond to your most recent posts to me, I think it would be wise for us to discuss some root issues first. I'm seeing the same errors and assumptions over and over again, and they can be boiled down to the following areas:
1. the Constitutional use of the military
2. how much we can trust the State
3. the role of the UN in our foreign policy/use of military['quote]
The Constitution is very clear on the matter:
"This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land . . ."
The UN Charter after ratification by the US became the Supreme Law of the land.
4. the Constitutional powers of the president and the congress regarding war
I believe that the Congress must grant the POTUS the authority to exercise his roll as commander in chief.
Another error you keep making, which is minor now, is that you continually deny America is an empire based on the old world empire definition, when I haven't called America an old world empire.
Which is why you must seek out new definitions of the term created SPECIFICALLY in order to be able to label this republic an empire. There is a reason why the U.S. doesn't comport with any other empire in the history of the world and the answer is very simple WE ARE NOT AN EMPIRE!
You also seek to invalidate the definitions I provided simply by fiat. Since you continue to do this, I see that issue as a dead one. At this point, we can either continue to go back and forth as we have been, or we can knock these issues out one by one and thereby not waste our time so much. We can either do a True Debate for each of these, or we can just do a regular one, your choice.
What ever's clever.
Ya an AUMF is tantamount to a declaration of war, ...
What ever's clever.
Congress gave the president a gun, but it was the Bush administration that pulled the trigger.
Which is why you must seek out new definitions of the term created SPECIFICALLY in order to be able to label this republic an empire. There is a reason why the U.S. doesn't comport with any other empire in the history of the world and the answer is very simple WE ARE NOT AN EMPIRE!
Does that same excuse hold up in a murder case?
In a murder case against whom? Congress? Sure.
I mean if I were to give someone a gun so they could and say "kill this person if you need to" would it not be possible to charge me with murder?
Another long standing Tot position that has been repeatedly debunked, but he keeps repeating it - that the Oct 2002 authorization to use force issued by Congress, at the time leverage was needed to get inspectors back into Iraq, is the same as a declaration of war.
Not by a long shot. The president was authorized to use force only if he determined that diplomacy would not work. The Bush administration made that determination and rushed to war, even though after months of blind inspections of hundres of places where the WMD were supposed to be, the inspectors had found virtually nothing.
Congress gave the president a gun, but it was the Bush administration that pulled the trigger.
Another long standing Tot position that has been repeatedly debunked, but he keeps repeating it - that the Oct 2002 authorization to use force issued by Congress, at the time leverage was needed to get inspectors back into Iraq, is the same as a declaration of war.
Not by a long shot. The president was authorized to use force only if he determined that diplomacy would not work. The Bush administration made that determination and rushed to war, even though after months of blind inspections of hundres of places where the WMD were supposed to be, the inspectors had found virtually nothing.
Congress gave the president a gun, but it was the Bush administration that pulled the trigger.
For the record, I didn't seek out new definitions. I literally did a search and stayed on the first page of results. Also, I agree with you we are not an old world empire, and I have never said we are.
These new definitions of empire don't comport with any empire in history and for a good reason, they were crafted by ideologs with the specific intent of labeling the U.S. as an empire, is it just a coincidence that all empires of the past fall into the traditional definition of empire whereas only the so called U.S. empire falls into the second definition? I think not.
Another of the many Liberal myths that you continue to blather the forum with:
" that the Oct 2002 authorization to use force issued by Congress, at the time leverage was needed to get inspectors back into Iraq, is the same as a declaration of war"
What part of Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq do you not comprehend?
What part of this section do you not get?
Whereas Congress in the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution (Public Law 102-1) has authorized the President "to use United States Armed Forces pursuant to United Nations Security Council Resolution 678 (1990) in order to achieve implementation of Security Council Resolutions 660, 661, 662, 664, 665, 666, 667, 669, 670, 674, and 677";
What part of this section do you not get?
Whereas the Iraq Liberation Act (Public Law 105-338) expressed the sense of Congress that it should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove from power the current Iraqi regime and promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime;
What part of this authorization do you not get?
(a) AUTHORIZATION. The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be necessary and appropriate in order to
(1) defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq; and
(2) enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council Resolutions regarding Iraq.
One of these days you should attempt some intellectual honesty and actually read the damned report so that you can be INFORMED:
Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq
Now to address the continual lies and distortions that "The Bush administration made that determination and rushed to war"
What rush to war?
This issue began in 1998 when During the Clinton Administration, Saddam kicked the UN inspectors out of the country and Clinton nor the UN did nothing; and ended in the invasion of Iraq in March 19, 2003.
This is a timeline of over FIVE years; what rush would you be desperately attempting to suggest? Are you suggesting that five years is too soon to enforce resolutions defied by Saddam for over a decade? Only partisan hacks can suggest such nonsense.
Disarming Saddam-A Chronology of Iraq and UN Weapons Inspections From 2002-2003 | Arms Control Association
In addition, the partisan hacks on this forum suggest that it is wrong to legally depose a despot and institute a democratically elected Government. These same partisan hacks also suggest that this was a worse situation than allowing a despot like Saddam to stay in power.
I'm sorry, but this is beyond turning logic on its head, it is just plain unintelligent.
As for this analogy; "Congress gave the president a gun, but it was the Bush administration that pulled the trigger," once more you would be WRONG.
The UN coalition gave the gun to Saddam and he aimed it at his own head and pulled the trigger. In order to fall for this mythical false analogy, one has to presume that Saddam's defiance was LEGAL and the Coalitions enforcement ILLEGAL; but that would require the willing suspension of disbelief and that is the realm of partisan hacks who continue wanting to defend a rogue regime like Saddam's and impugn the Bush administration for doing the RIGHT thing.
It is quite telling when you see such rabid lapses in common sense and good judgment, but then when it comes to rabid Liberalism, truth, common sense and logic are not part of their vocabulary.
What a bunch of revisionist tripe, if what you say is true then why don't you go ahead and explain to the rest of us why the Congress didn't support the Levin Amendment instead?
That sounds a bit kooky. Actually it sounds alot like a conspiracy theory with no traction. So is it a vast left wing conspiracy to hijack our reference books or what?
Repetive argument Tot.
You raised this ame silly argument here (among serveral other times) where it was debunked.
http://www.debatepolitics.com/archi...us-claim-left-wants-us-lose-3.html#post618431 post #26.
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