BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 02:12 PM

No deal.

By the sound of this statement, CarolC, is looks as if you have a strong opinion and, in fact, pretty much have made up your mind about a lot of things. Just because you haven't thought about some things in depth doesn't mean that other people haven't. Don't think for me and I won't tell you how wrong you are.

I do have some very strong opinions (based on information I have been able to find on various issues) about a lot of things, including the legitimacy (or lack of legitimacy) of the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, the real motives behind the Bush administration's invasion and occupation of Iraq, and the astoundingly inept and counterproductive way that the Bush administration as prosecuted the "war", including its flagrant disregard for the human rights of the civilians in Iraq. I even have opinions on how the Bush adminisration ought to do some things if it continues its occupation of Iraq.

But I do not yet have a fully formed opinion on whether or not the US should continue to occupy Iraq.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Susu's Hubby
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 01:53 PM

"The problem with the way DougR has been handling this is that although all of our (those of us who saw this mess coming before it happened) "the sky is falling" predictions have come true, and DougR was wrong, DougR still goes around in the threads mocking people with his worn out refrain of "the sky is falling" whenever we continue to address the very real problems that the decisions being made by the Bush administration are creating."


By the sound of this statement, CarolC, is looks as if you have a strong opinion and, in fact, pretty much have made up your mind about a lot of things. Just because you haven't thought about some things in depth doesn't mean that other people haven't. Don't think for me and I won't tell you how wrong you are.


Deal?


Hubby

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 01:40 PM

Personally, I don't have much of an opinion yet on what the best course of action would be (stay there or pull out). I don't think I have enough information to form a responsible opinion. I don't think you have enough information to form a responsible opinion yet either, Susu's Hubby.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Susu's Hubby
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 01:31 PM

You know, it's real sad when all you wackos are trying to justify the cut and run attitude by blaming everything on one man that lives @ 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Clearly, what DougR and I (as well as a few others) see is a country that is in need of some help and is now asking us to stay there to help. Their former dictatorial leader is in jail, schools are being re-opened, basic utilities are being restored, satellite TV is growing strong where it used to be outlawed. Above all, Iraqis now have the freedom to go where they couldn't and do what they were never allowed to do. This is freedom, people. We have it. Why shouldn't they? By your continued crying, you're really only saying one of two things.

1. We're not happy because of the fact that GWB is the one leading the way of freedom that is being offered to a once-suppressed people and providing the freedom that is everybody's human right.


- or -

2. We're only saying that we want eqality for all because it sounds good. Actually, we really mean that only those that think "progressives" can do it better should be the only ones that really deserve it.


So...which is it? Are you jealous or just out and out racist?



Hubby

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 01:31 PM

On Meet the Press last night, Senator Chuck Hagel was one of the men being interviewed. He is vocal and articulate about the mistaken actions that got us into Iraq. (He is currently on the bueh pooh pooh list.)

Quoted remarks: 'Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality,' said Hagel, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee. 'It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq.'

When he was asked by Andrea Mitchell, the moderator, if his public remarks should not be considered giving aid to the enemy, he said that he took seriously his role as a senator and that he would speak truth as he saw it.

Hagel is a Republican.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Greg F.
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 01:12 PM

ALL RIGHT! We're more than half way there.

Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld & Co. only need to kill 1,076 more and they'll be tied for the number killed in the September 11th attack in NYC.

STAY THE COURSE, guys!

Doug R should be made to explain, in person, to the family of each and every U.S. soldier that has died and/or will die in this clusterfu$k that their son/daughter/husband/etc. died because he -and the administration- couldn't admit that the U.S. made a mistake.

God Help America.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST,CarolC
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 12:39 PM

The problem with the way DougR has been handling this is that although all of our (those of us who saw this mess coming before it happened) "the sky is falling" predictions have come true, and DougR was wrong, DougR still goes around in the threads mocking people with his worn out refrain of "the sky is falling" whenever we continue to address the very real problems that the decisions being made by the Bush administration are creating.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 12:20 PM

I sympathize with Bobert. Although it is not helpful now that we have been flung off the cliff, it is damn hard not to scream "I told you so". Things have played out pretty much exactly the way the pre-war anti-war protestors said they would. And for having said these things, we were ridiculed as unpatriotic to traitorous. Some bastards (Karl Rove, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter.......)continue this ridicule - very publicly. It is beyond me (us?) to understand how those who were dead wrong can continue to look down on those who were spot-on correct, and how those who were dead wrong can continue to have such apparent (though dwindling) popular support. Do you remember Bill O'Reilly proclaiming in the days before the invasion that "if we did not find the stockpiles of W's of MD in Iraq, he would apologize publically, and never again believe anything this administration said"? We seem to be a nation of Bill O'Reillys. Convenient memory loss is epidemic! Yeah, none of this helps us get out of the mess we're in, but I think we are allowed to be pissed off, because if our government had listened to us, we wouldn't be in this in the first place.

Imagine that your kid - despite your warnings - drinks and drives and wrecks the car. Being mad at the kid doesn't fix the car does it? So, you gonna not get mad?

Now, how DO we fix the car?

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: John Hardly
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 10:53 AM

^ like that.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Bobert
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 10:50 AM

The civil war that many of us predicted prior to Bush's pulling the trigger on this war is underway and like all civil wars, which they are not, it won't end until long after the US pulls out... Might of fact, the longer the US stays in Iraq the longer the civil war will last...

Do you know how to spell "quagmire"...

This war has come to play out just like I, as well as others stated before it began...

Worse than that, just as many of us were not buying the PR crap that came out of the hawks mouths prior to the war (which incidently have now been proven to be crap), we're still not buying the PR dribble that the revisionist hawks are spewing these days...

Hey, I'd have a lot more respect for them if they'd just admit why we are in this war in the first place which are quite evident:

1. Oil

2. To bolster the Repubs power grab

3. Oil

4. Oil

5. To bolster the Repubs power grab

6. Oil

7. To blow up stuff so defense contrators/campaign contributors stay nice, fat and happy

8. Oil

9. To bolster the Repubs power grab

and...............

10. Oil

Sickenin'...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: John Hardly
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 10:37 AM

I'm the other way around, gnu. I was never for going in in the first place. The anti war movement has done more to make me wonder if I wasn't, in my initial feelings, wrong. I mostly just find myself hoping for a better outcome for the middle east.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 10:30 AM

last throes of mudcat? It is now officially down more hours of the day than it is up. Time to salvage whatever lyrics and bits of wisdom and wit that's worth saving to one's own computer? Is it just about done?

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: gnu
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 10:29 AM

I was wrong when I supported the attack... maybe that's part of the guilt I felt when I saw those transports heading east.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 05 Jul 05 - 09:09 AM

An important part of making it O.K. is alos admitting it. Big respect to DougR. None to GWB -- still can't admit to even a teensie whoops.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: dianavan
Date: 04 Jul 05 - 11:50 PM

Its O.K. to be wrong as long as you learn something from it.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Ebbie
Date: 04 Jul 05 - 11:20 PM

Sometimes being wrong, Doug, is really not the issue. What the incident should bring to your mind is the inescapable knowledge that you misunderstood your president, that you were wrong in what you believed of him. You were not trying to figure out the logical action to take: You were telling us what you thought the President would do. See the difference?

What was it he said? "fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."   (I hope you understand that better than I do. *G*)

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: DougR
Date: 04 Jul 05 - 04:56 PM

Amos: you post is insulting. Think about it twice indeed. You are among the small group of individuals here on the cat who view themselves as super intelligencia. The great "know alls." If one does not share Amos' view, one is a dummy. Bollocks I say.

TIA: I remember posting that message. Obviously I was wrong. No one, (with the possible exception of Amos)however is ALWAYS right.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Jul 05 - 04:39 PM

Has anyone seen that "Downing street minutes"?

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 10:49 PM

Interesting that DougR, who promised us quite publicly that the US had no intention of attacking Iraq (want me to go find the post and link to it?), is questioning my judgement.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: kendall
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 05:46 PM

Doug, it's THEIR country. They don't want us there! Who the hell wouldn't resist a foreign occupying force?

Mission accomplished... bullshit.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Amos
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 04:59 PM

Aw, damn, gnu -- that is a powerful short tale indeed.

Thank you.


A

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: gnu
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 04:16 PM

I watched around thirty aircraft at high altitude going east yesterday around 6PM Mudcat. I don't know what kind they were, but they were large and slow (I estimated 400 knots), didn't make a lot of noise and there were no contrails (spg?). They were flying mostly in threes, in a vee, with a slight difference in altitude. The vees were about ten to twenty miles apart. Some were in pairs, or by themselves. Definitely not commercial aircraft.

At the time, we were cooking hot dogs and burgers over an open fire in front of my camp, watching various birds fighting. Robins with robins. Canada Jays with Blue Jays. Blackbirds with crows. And the squirrels were chasing and sassing each other constantly. Just a short time before, we watched two rabbits "bull fighting" near the fire pit. Food for thought, I thought.

We raised our cans in a toast to those in the planes as they came into view. Of course, no way they could see us with the naked eye. I felt so guilty for what I was thinking... better you than I. And, it made me wonder, what are they thinking? When I started to cry, I blamed it on the smoke from the wet cedar in the fire.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: dianavan
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 04:00 PM

According to blogs by American Vets, the insurgency is not comprised strictly of outside forces crossing into Iraq. According to soldiers returning home, the insurgency is largely comprised of Iraqi citizens who are fed-up with the occupation of their country. It makes sense that Iraq is now fertile ground for terrorists from all over the Middle East. With the numbers of terrorists swelling and with a battle cry of victory or martyrdom, I'd say the U.S. forces, their private contractors and their allies should face this situation with an honest evaluation.

Stop lying and get out!

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 03:57 PM

I agree, Canadian. Can you imagine any one of us NOT resisting an occupying force?! Guerilla warfare is the only option available against the big guns.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST,Canadian
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 03:44 PM

If the attack was planned, then it was a CF, because the stated objectives do NOT seem to have been accomplished.

1) Hussein is gone
2) WMDs aren't there
3) The establishment of a 'new' Iraqi government seems not to be working

This once again points to the total ineptitude of the

1) American foreign service
2) American intelligence communities

Please tell me it should have come as a surprise that 'insurgents' would attack an occupying force. RIGHT!

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 03:42 PM

Well-said, Van Lingle!

Ebbie, I was hoping this was a thread about the death throes of the patriarchal age of Pisces, i.e. lame-duck shrub et alia losing ground and going down the tubes in the next coupla years! If we believe it, it will come (about!):-)

kat

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 02:00 PM

Well, at least the US didn't plan to attack Iraq. They just did.

We don' nee no steenking plans.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: van lingle
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 11:56 AM

Doug, it seems that the most noteworthy thing this little war has accomplished, after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, is to provide terroists from all over the middle east with a cause and a training ground and staging area in Iraq. Their numbers and resolve seem to be growing steadily, contrary to what Cheney says and if they, the "insurgents", sucessfully deal with us over there they will probably turn their attention to the US mainland. I'd say we're less secure than ever and the only real solution is to withdrawl while reminding the world that we deposed Hussein and allow these people to determine their own future which is something which will happen eventually anyway. Propping up a "Democracy" in that part of the world seems like an entirely futile endeavor. The longer we linger there the more animosity we create. Like Nixon, it's time to declare victory and go home (only with a bit more haste than Tricky Dick). vl

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Amos
Date: 02 Jul 05 - 11:28 AM

DougR has a perspective that explicitly or not is shared by many Americans -- that the conflict between AL Qeda and the US is identical to the clash between militant Muslim jihadists everywhere and "Christianity" -- two huge waves of ill-informed madness locked in a death struggle.

This is a very dramatic picture, enough to rally the herds to battle stations. It reflects the deeply tragic capacity of humankind to go insane at the drop of a prophet.

It depends entirely on a complete failure of imagination on the part of all concerned, a willingness to deny communication and understanding to selected "other" groups, and the will to demonize humans with great alacrity.

The idiocy of it is just as ridiculous as the idiocy of the Inquisition, the babbling psychosis of the Third Reich, and the nuttiness of the Crusades. But millions of folks are being willingly sucked into this drooling nightmare of a world-view without even thinking twice about it.

In our most urgent historical crises, we have often found leaders who were capable of bridging the gap and bringing about some sort of progress by drawing people out of their dramatizations. In the present circumstance this seems a scarce likelihood, given that the leaders of most of those involved are promoting the insanity rather than seeking to cure it.

A

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: dianavan
Date: 02 Jul 05 - 03:37 AM

DougR - What plans do the terrorists have to attack the U.S.?

Seems to me that the U.S. is attacking Iraq and had planned to do this long before 911.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: DougR
Date: 02 Jul 05 - 01:25 AM

Right, Ebbie. Abandon the Iraqis by bringing all of our troops home and leave the population to the terrorists. That will ensure that the terrorists will give up their plans to attack the U. S., right?

And you (and Amos) consider yourselves humanitarians?

TIA: and you consider Jon Stewart a journalist? Sez a lot about your judgement doesn't it?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 01 Jul 05 - 02:28 PM

A few nights ago, Jon Stewart (only remaining "journalist" I trust) had a hilarious video montage of Bush administration and military people predicting the strength and duration of the insurgency. Talk about flip-flops, talk about schizo...scarey as hell, but hilarious.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Ebbie
Date: 01 Jul 05 - 01:39 PM

Can you imagine announcing one's candidacy in that political climate, Amos? A happy outcome over there doesn't seem possible.

But note that apologists assure us that the situation improves daily.

Subject: RE: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Amos
Date: 01 Jul 05 - 01:33 PM

It's a nuts scene. It will take a lot of balls and some nasty confrontations before Iraq learns to govern itself and if it survives without being torn in half or thirds by cult wars it will be lucky.

A

Subject: BS: In Its Last Throes (Political)
From: Ebbie
Date: 01 Jul 05 - 01:28 PM

Cheney says (May 30) that the Iraq insurgency is in its "last throes".
Rumsfeld says (June 26) that insurgencies tend to continue for 2, 4, 10, 12 years.

June 2005 was the deadliest month in Iraq since the invasion.

The Happy News

"More than 1,000 members of the Iraqi security services had died since the transfer of sovereignty one year ago, * the US military said without giving an exact figure.

"At least 1,743 members of the US military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. At least 1,341 died as a result of hostile action. Of those, 75 were killed in June, one of the deadlier months."

* Can you imagine the bravery it takes for an Iraqi to make himself a target? At what point will it get safer?