Iraq Situation is Bullshit
POSTED BY: Succatash
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 10, 2024 22:11
VIEWED: 28270
PAGE 11 of 17
I wish I had the benefit of your first-hand experience. (Notice I didn't want the experience itself, just the benefit!
) I'm sure there's a lot going on that we never get to hear. Was it Bismarck who said that those who like sausage and laws should never see how they're made?
You're correct that discussion will never change how we mere mortals are treated. But in order to be free, we must first free our minds.
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I think that 9-11 has shown that the middle east has already blown up in our face.
Things have changed in the intervening years since Desert Storm, we now have more news outlets, blogs, more analysis and more brains on the job, arguing both sides of the various questions.
The self serving factors don't bother me as much as some, as I have a long time ago figured out that altruism is a con game. The question is whether the consequences are benefitical, or not.
But I don't share the hopelessness you display. The government may be self servicing, but so are the voters that government has to appeal to in order to stay in power. People talking here and there might change enough minds. Even if two opponents in a debate can't convince each other, there is still the audience to those debates that may be swayed one way or the other.
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In three sections
1) the Patriot Act
2) Iraq (again!!!!)
3) economics
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PATRIOT ACT
At what point would you say the government has gone too far?
When it starts secretly roundng up citizens and holding them indefinitely, without charges?
When it starts tracking people through their entire personal lives (medical records, loans, phone calls, emails) without a warrant?
When it creates a financial and legal blacklist that you don't know you're on?
At what point would you say that civil liberties take precedence? Or WOULD you ever get to that point? Does the danger of terrorism justify any and every intrusion?
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IRAQ
Basically what you're saying is that even if we invaded Iraq because of manufactured reasons, we did a good thing, and that to argue gainst the invasion is the same as supporting Saddam.
First of all, I don't like be lied to by the President, Vice-President, National Security Advisor, Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of State. Most of what they told us or implied is demonstrably false, they KNEW it was false, and they broadcast it to create a sense of urgency that didn't exist. WE rushed in on a minimal budget with no international support (in fact we had to detour our troops and materiel around Turkey) because....??? Why??? What was so terribly urgent that we went in half-*ssed and couldn't wait another year until spring rolled around again and conditions would once again be more suitable for invasion? There was something weird about this artifical urgency which had nothing to do with WMD.
Just because I didn't support the invasion doesn't mean that I support Saddam. We've deposed enough governments to have a vast repertoire of actions: subversion, aiding military takeovers, assasination, trade and aid embargoes, assisting neighboring countries, trade agreements ("engagement"), etc. Why does it have to be
"invasion or nothing"? The only answer that I can come up with has to do with that big puddle of oil that Saddam was sitting on.
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ECONOMIC
What ARE you going on about????
You're talking about the "labor theory of value" and I'm talking about the circulation of capital.
The point I was trying to make is that in order to realize a profit, the manufacturer must sell a product. If money inevitably trickles towards the owner, and Joe and Jane Worker can't buy their entire output, who is the manufacturer going to sell to? (We'll have to discuss further what the owner does with the money and why it doesn't create a demand.)
Keynes solved this problem simply by inserting money into economy at the bottom level, where it would create a demand, and accepting a certain amount of inflation as the price to pay for not crashing the economy. The Fed does the whole money-supply dance following this principal.
"As to the Depression, it appears that Roosevelt's policies did not cure the depression, rather deepened it and made it worse." Which policies were those? The "pump priming" that they attempted? How would that make things worse?
AND FINALLY
"And in all this you miss a very important point. The owner is not some absentee landlord."
Yeah. Tell that to Fastow, Lay, and the other corporate crooks who worked so hard cooking the books and risking other people's money!
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double post! oops!
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dang it! happened again!
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Essay questions.
PATRIOT ACT:
You want simple answers to complex questions. There is a common saying here that it is better for 10 guilty men to go free than 1 innocent man get punished. The problem is if even one of those free guilty men kill a 1,000 people, its still a net loss.
This gets into legal theories which I could bore you plenty with, but a key point to bring out is the law is not a goal unto itself, it is a means to an end. Since 9-11, prosecution after the fact was recognized as being insufficient for protecting and defending the lives of the people, and the move has been made toward preventing further terrorist attacks. The shear numbers of deaths that a terrorist cell can create changes the risk/reward equation. And either the legal and political systems adapts to that change, or a lot more people get killed.
Getting information on a possible threat, I don't see a problem with. But then maybe that is because I don't have anything to hide from the government. Taking action against a possible threat, is where it gets dicey, and where we are both concerned. Simple solutions, like Manzinar, are not effective at the goal, but then I don't see any political will in that direction anyway. The reaction in this country toward Muslims after 9-11 was nothing like the reaction toward Japanese Americans after Pearl Harbor, and I see that as a good thing, an improvement.
You run into a problem when you start placing artifical limitation on the right to self defense, and especially if you announce those limits. You give those who want to kill you an advantage. Not a good idea.
As in all of life, you do the best you can, based on the information you have on hand. You are not God, nor ever going to be. You will make mistakes, the trick is to minimize them, to come up with proceedures that reduce the impact of those mistakes. Like I have said before, I don't think we are anywhere near there yet, but I really don't want to defend it too much, because railing against any potential excesses now may prevent them in the future.
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That is not what I am saying. I am saying that you are wrong. Demostrably wrong in fact. I am also pointing out that even if you are right, you are still wrong.
I don't like getting lied to either, and I don't think we were. But I do understand that when you tell the American people, you tell the world and that includes the bad guys. Saddam gets CNN. It is impossible to keep a secret amongst 280 million folks without it leaking out to the rest of the world. Besides which a lot of the stuff I have said was all available before the war.
I do understand that intel is not perfect. Again, we are not Gods, not even if you work for the CIA. If Saddam had fooled the CIA, he also fooled the FSB, MI-6, French and Chinese intel services, et. al. That is why 1441 passed unanamously.
"Just because I didn't support the invasion doesn't mean that I support Saddam." It may not have been your intent, but that is the consequences of any kind of "do nothing" proposition. YOu may have a kind heart, and really care about the Iraqi civilians, more than me perhaps. But teh fact remains that your proposed course of action left him in power longer. The particulars of Saddam's regime left little option other than the military one. It should have been done a lot sooner.
As to the oil factor, you need to talk to TotalFinaELF and LukOil about their opposition to the invasion. The problem with Iraq was as long as Saddam had that oil, economic sanctions were not going to work. He was going to stay in power until he died, and turned it over to his sons. And build his weapons programs and palaces. To the point where he had a sufficient deterence force to prevent just such a military invasion, and possibly do a bit of invading himself.
I find it a bit ironic that you would call for 'deposing' Saddam through other means. As it is folks from your side of the aisle that have constantly complained whenever we've done that in the past, who constantly pull out the
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At no point is there any sort of oversight or mandated judicial review in the Patriot Act, so malicious or overzealous detention is a real possibility. Given what Bush and Aschcroft have done so far, I don't trust them to use the Patriot Act just for anti-terrorism. It's entirely possible that an activist could be identified as an enemy combatant and hustled off to a secret military trial, or more likely as a key witness and detained indefinitely. Somewhere along the line another branch of government needs to be inserted into the process to make sure that people aren't getting railroaded.
THe scary thing is that Ashcroft had written most of the provisions of the Patriot Act BEFORE Sept 11, and immediately afterward passage the Justice Department was giving classes on how the Patriot Act could be stretched to cover other activities. Now Bush and Ashcroft want to extend the act even further. That's putting a great deal of trust in people who so far have been untrustworthy.
Okay, gotta go and wake up the family.
TTUL
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Here's a good article:
Mayors Call for Better Security Funding
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=519&e=10&u=/a
p/20030918/ap_on_re_us/mayors_homeland_security_2
"We're sending $87 billion to Iraq for reconstruction, but we can't even get $4 billion spent in direct funding to our first responders to protect Americans," said Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley.
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This is false. As I understand it, you still need a warrant, from a judge to do any kind of search. You have to show probable cause to that judge. I understand that for certain searches, Ashcroft has been seeking special subpeona powers, but has had little luck getting them.
Almost all, if not all, of the provision of the PATRIOT Act were provisions are powers the government has had for some time in dealing with the Mafia, and other crimes. Roving wiretaps, investigating library records, etc. The only new stuff that is here is the application of these tools for terrorism.
Besides which, what you are saying is directly contradicted by the US Constitution. Amendment 4 in particular. If you have a case, you need to make it to the courts, instead of to me.
But you do touch on something I see quite often here. The key issue is you do not trust Bush and Ashcroft. There is this hatred for the present administration that I honestly don't understand, it goes well beyond normal political competition. You appear to fear that because you are in the political opposition (rather competition, as both your side and Bush's are competiting for the same electorate's "hearts and minds") that you will be disappeared. I don't see that happening. You and the rest of your side are still at it.
This is a case of the very act of making the charge disproves it. I would think that if the administration wanted to silence you, they would have long before now, and you would be able to say the very things you are saying. So your hatred appears misplaced.
[Perhaps this is a case of projection. Is this what we are to expect when your side comes to power? You think that the administration will do the things you would?]
You also have to remember that we are at war. I know that this is something that some folks will disagree with, but I see no other way to describe it. There are folks who want to kill you, just for being you. Folks who cannot be deterred or dissuaded. How do you deter a suicide bomber, someone who already has accepted his own death and destruction as part of the operation?
We are not talking about petty theft, or smuggling bobble headed gesha dolls. We are talking about folks who want to kill and destroy, who see democracy and freedom as a clear and present danger to their entire way of life, and opposed by God's will. (Funny that they keep losing, but then we are not dealing with rational actors here). You think Firefly would have even been aired under their version of Sharia? Guess again.
And if the older legal processes became a hindrance to fighting that war, they no longer served their function and had to be changed. You are still free to rant and rave and charge and file suit, so in that respect nothing has changed. The things that have changed are needed to prevent another 9-11. To prevent another act of death and destruction like that on that day.
Guilt or innocence of a crime has nothing to do with how trials or searches are conducted. It has to do with whether the person did the crime. Trials function as an epistimal process to determine whether the accused is guilty or innocent. We do the best we can, but when the procedures can actually hinder the goal that the process is designed for, they have to be changed.
You don't trust Bush and Ashcroft, fine. I really don't care about your personal feelings one way or the other. But if you want to return to the way things were prior to 9-11, you ain't gonna get there.
For more information see: http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_PATRIOT_Act
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Sorry for the late reply. Life is very complicated and busy right now!
I've re-read a number of your posts, not to argue but to understand. Frankly, I still don't understand, but I'm trying!
I think it all boils down to your identity- who you think you are. You continually draw boundaries. I'm on "their" side. Bush, the military, the wealthy, are on "your" side.
And of course, "you" represent freedom and democracy (and BTW capitalism). And since you are working towards a better world, your cause is just, and your methods are justified. Because of course it's all for the cause of "freedom" and "democracy".
You said that I "hate" Bush. I don't hate Bush- my level of emotion doesn't rise that high- but I don't make the mistake in thinking that his administraion and I share the same motives. There is too much evidence- which I have been pointing out to my colleagues and Senaors since before we invaded Afghanistan- that the Bush administration has been playing the American public. Bush may be too slow to be duplicitous, but Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Wolfowitz, Perle, Abrams et al will certainly be there to tell him what to think, how to feel, and how to convince the public to go along.
You and I have the same goals, believe it or not. I want to see democracy and prosperity around the world. We may argue about the hows and whens but we are aiming in the same direction.
But you have faith. For some reason you really really believe that these guys have America's best interests at heart. This is where you and I disagree. Since faith is unarguable, how do we get there from here?
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