BS: Got WMDs?

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jun 03 - 03:58 PM

Of course just because people think that Blair and Bush were telling porkies, that wouldn't necessarily mean they oppose the war. And there could well be some people who don't think they were lying who were and are against the war.

They are different questions.

I get irritated at the assumption that it's ok to adjust our beliefs about matters of truth and falsity to match the way we'd like the facts to turn out. It seems to happen in issue after issue - for a classic example, the vote-counting issue in the US Presidential election.

True enough human beings have a tendency to do that kind of thing, but it shouldn't be shrugged off as inevitable. Honest people try to resist that kind of temptation.

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: Gareth
Date: 24 Jun 03 - 07:33 PM

What Kevin McGrath is edging around is that in an oppinion poll published in todays Gaurdian, 48% of the GBP (Great British Public) consider, despite the efforts of the vocal minority, think that the Miliotarey Action against Saddam Hussain was justified.

Kevin - a simple question.

How would you have disposed of Saddam Hussain and his regime ?

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jun 03 - 08:11 PM

I'm not edging around it - in fact that was precisely what I had in mind when I suggested that the fact someone thinks that the war was justified wouldn't require that they think that Bush and Blair weren't lying.

Those poll results put together seem to indicate that this is actually a rather common point of view. Most people probably assume that professional politicians in general are liars anyway. As implied in such aphorisms as "An honest politician is one who, when he is bought, will stay bought."

As for Saddam's regime - if containment was a good policy last year and the year before that, it was a better policy this year; if an invasion to get rid of him was a good policy this year, it would have been just as good a policy years ago, and no worse next year.

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Jun 03 - 08:57 PM

I don't fiddle around worrying about a weasel in the henhouse when there's a berserk Tyrannosaurus Rex rampaging in the garden, Gareth. What we should be asking ourselves is how to dispose of George Bush and his regime. They are a threat to the whole World. Saddam wasn't. He couldn't even defeat Iran with large scale American supplies of high tech weaponry. I doubt that he could have defeated any nextdoor neighbour except for tiny Kuwait. America, however, has the power to seriously threaten any nation...and frequently uses it.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Jun 03 - 06:00 AM

Pedantic drift - I believe the current thinking is that Tyrannosaurus Rex wasn't up to much as a predator, and wasn't equipped to go tackling anything sizeable that was still alive and kicking. It's reckoned it was a scavanger, mostly going round chomping up dead or dying dinosaurs.

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: TIA
Date: 25 Jun 03 - 07:17 AM

Gareth (and other war supporters) - How much time did you spend worying about the poor oppressed Iraqi people in say...1997, or maybe 1999? This is a serious question - not rhetorical nor sarcastic. Perhaps I have misjudged the war supporters, and they have actually been fellow human rights advocates for years. I may be laboring under a mistaken impression because I have not recognized our local war supporters as people who have been active in local human rights groups.

If (as the polls seem to indicate), there are huge numbers of Brits and Americans who are concerned about the world's oppressed peoples, I hope they are putting their money and efforts where their mouths are - that would be great news to the people of the Congo, Burma, Liberia, and many others who continue to suffer oppression.

My only fear is that this neo-human-rights movement may see war as the only solution to oppression.

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Jun 03 - 07:23 AM

How much time did you spend worying about the poor oppressed Iraqi people in say...1997, or maybe 1999?

I suspect that in the case of Gareth the answer to that question might be "quite a lot".

It's not as simple as some people seem to think. There are people on both sides in this question who care a lot about human rights, and people who couldn't give a toss. (I mean "on both sides" in the big world, rather than the Mudcat, where I think there's generally a shared concern for human rughts, even when we might disagree about what thta implies when it comes to policies.)

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: TIA
Date: 25 Jun 03 - 03:42 PM

If McGrath is correct, Gareth is far less "on the other side" than I may have believed. Sorry.

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: Gareth
Date: 25 Jun 03 - 07:12 PM

Ooooh! Kevin. I am so embarresed at your comments.

I must appologise to those that thought that my past and documented history was pure war mongering, I mean, there was I in the 1970's calling for Sanctions against South Africa, and boycoting South African products, before it became fashionable to do so.

Ooops, and my past membership of the Connolly Society, was of course a pure example of my support of English Imperialism.

Oh, and my boycott of Chilean Produce post 1973 was intended to show my support for the dictatorship. Actually I think I may have posted on the 'Cat over the Pinochett affair suggesting that Pinochet, should be returned to Chile, in a wooden box

I also made my self very unpopular in loeftish circles in the early 1990's suggesting that Allied forces should have driven on to Bagdhad, using tactical nukes to get Saddam if neccessary. I suspect over the last few years the loss of life would have been less than has actually occured.

I must confess to a disregard for the mantra's of the left, but I have one incurable fault. I believe in the art of the possible, and what is morrally right, can not be legally wrong.

Which makes me a maverick / War Monger / pro capital punishment etc ? - Well so be it - I sleep easy.

Gareth
Ho ! Ho ! Ho Chi Min !
We will fight, and we will win !!

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: Teribus
Date: 26 Jun 03 - 06:48 AM

Kevin, you say that:

"As for Saddam's regime - if containment was a good policy last year and the year before that, it was a better policy this year;"

That statement is only true when looked at from Saddam Hussein's point of view. There was no such thing as a policy of containment. Containment was what some thought the failure to impliment UN Resolutions combined with the restraints imposed by UN Sanctions could achieve. That thinking was wrong on two counts:

1. It was hopelessly optimistic taking into account both the man and regime he led.

2. The sanctions were as effective as a collander and at some point they would have had to have been lifted. The result for the future could only have got worse not better.

Subject: RE: BS: Got WMDs?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 26 Jun 03 - 02:35 PM

ARGH!!! McGrath, you have insulted all Tyrannosaurs with that vile assertion, and I DEMAND an apology!!! SCAVENGERS??? How dare you?!!

Ooooo...you are gonna pay dearly for this one.

- LH