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A nation of sheep breeds a government of wolves -
Honestly Darin, would like Parin to have her hand on the switch.
DouggieComment
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Bill, I am so tired of this silliness. NEVER has Obama done anything to indicate that he will try to "please" our enemies. He simply feels that there is nothing to be lost in talking with them. But the right continues to obfuscate this point by attempting the false equivalence of talking as being a manifestation of weakness.
And as I pointed out earlier, even the current tough guy administration has made considerable progress by talking. Again, I point to the Anbar Awakening and the North Korean nuclear programs.
But the right just keep hammering away at the idea that anything less than all out military confrontation is a sign of weakness. As has been said, there is no reason to have peace talks with your allies and friends. But this "nuke 'em all" mentality is not one that will work, especially since our enemies are no longer based as a single nation but rather are loose groups that cross national borders.Don't get me started
Comment
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A nation of sheep breeds a government of wolvesComment
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I suppose just another dillusional right-wing attempt to make an association that doesn't exist???
http://article.nationalreview.com/pr...WRhZGJmMTAyOGY
If the American Electorate had all the information on the candidates, they would probably make a wise choice. Obviously they don't, therefore, they won't.
The media, for whatever reason, has made its choice whom to annoint as leader of the most powerful country on the planet, and they will continue to pummel the mind-numbed robots that are their viewers, with the information THEY deem "newsworthy" and will continue to withhold the information THEY deem "unimportant".
Propaganda is as much what you DON'T say as compared to what you DO say.
Get your spoons out boys and girls, there more coming out of your screens tonight at 6:00 and 11:00.A nation of sheep breeds a government of wolvesComment
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History Lesson, Part 1
Most of you are not old enough to remember that nearly every family in America was grossly affected by WWII. Most of you do not remember the rationing of meat, shoes, gasoline, and sugar. No tires for our automobiles and a speed limit of 35 miles an hour on the road. Not to mention, no new automobiles. Read this and think about how we would react to being taken over by foreigners in 2007.
This is an EXCELLENT essay by Raymond S. Kraft. Well thought out and presented.
Historical Significance
Sixty-three years ago, Nazi Germany had overrun almost all of Europe and hammered England to the verge of bankruptcy and defeat. The Nazis had sunk more than 400 British ships in their convoys between England and America taking food and war materials.
At that time, the US was in an isolationist, pacifist mood, and most Americans wanted nothing to do with the European or the Asian war.
Then along came Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and in outrage Congress unanimously declared war on Japan, and the following day on Germany, who had not yet attacked us. It was a dicey thing. We had few allies.
France was not an ally, as the Vichy government of France quickly aligned itself with its German occupiers. Germany was certainly not an ally, as Hitler was intent on setting up a Thousand Year Reich in Europe. Japan was not an ally, as it was well on its way to owning and controlling all of Asia.
Together, Japan and Germany had long-range plans of invading Canada and Mexico, as launching pads to get into the United States over our northern and southern borders, after they finished gaining control of Asia and Europe.
America's only allies then were England, Ireland, Scotland, Canada, Australia, and Russia. That was about it. All of Europe, from Norway to Italy (except Russia in the East) was already under the Nazi heel.
The US was certainly not prepared for war. The US had drastically downgraded most of its military forces after WW I because of the depression, so that at the outbreak of WW II, Army units were training with broomsticks because they didn't have guns, and cars with "tank" painted on the doors because they didn't have real tanks. A huge chunk of our Navy had just been sunk or damaged at Pearl Harbor.
Britain had already gone bankrupt, saved only by the donation of $600 million in gold bullion in the Bank of England (that was actually the property of Belgium) given by Belgium to England to carry on the war when Belgium was overrun by Hitler (a little known fact).
Actually, Belgium surrendered on one day, because it was unable to oppose the German invasion, and the Germans bombed Brussels into rubble the next day just to prove they could.
Britain had already been holding out for two years in the face of staggering losses and the near decimation of its Royal Air Force in the Battle of Britain, and was saved from being overrun by Germany only because Hitler made the mistake of thinking the Brits were a relatively minor threat that could be dealt with later. Hitler first turned his attention to Russia, in the late summer of 1940 at a time when England was on the verge of collapse.
Ironically, Russia saved America 's butt by putting up a desperate fight for two years, until the US got geared up to begin hammering away at Germany.
Russia lost something like 24,000,000 people in the sieges of Stalingrad and Moscow alone . . . 90% of them from cold and starvation, mostly civilians, but also more than a 1,000,000 soldiers.
Had Russia surrendered, Hitler would have been able to focus his entire war effort against the Brits, then America If that had happened; the Nazis could possibly have won the war.
All of this has been brought out to illustrate that turning points in history are often dicey things. Now, we find ourselves at another one of those key moments in history.
There is a very dangerous minority in Islam that either has, or wants, and may soon have, the ability to deliver small nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons, almost anywhere in the world.
The Jihadis, the militant Muslims, are basically Nazis in Kaffiyahs -- they believe that Islam, a radically conservative form of Wahhabi Islam, should own and control the Middle East first, then Europe, then the world . To them, all who do not bow to their will of thinking should be killed, enslaved, or subjugated. They want to finish the Holocaust, destroy Israel, and purge the world of Jews. This is their mantra. (goal)
There is also a civil war raging in the Middle East -- for the most part not a hot war, but a war of ideas. Islam is having its Inquisition and its Reformation, but it is not yet known which side will win -- the Inquisitors, or the Reformationists.
If the Inquisition wins, then the Wahhabis, the Jihadis, will control the Middle East, the OPEC oil, and the US, European, and Asian economies.
The techno-industrial economies will be at the mercy of OPEC -- not an OPEC dominated by the educated, rational Saudis of today, but an OPEC dominated by the Jihadis. Do you want gas in your car? Do you want heating oil next winter? Do you want the dollar to be worth anything? You had better hope the Jihad, the Muslim Inquisition, loses, and the Islamic Reformation wins.
If the Reformation movement wins, that is, the moderate Muslims who believe that Islam can respect and tolerate other religions, live in peace with the rest of the world, and move out of the 10th century into the 21st, then the troubles in the Middle East will eventually fade away. A moderate and prosperous Middle East will emerge
we have to help the Reformation win, and to do that we have to fight the Inquisition, i.e., the Wahhabi movement, the Jihad, Al Qaeda and the Islamic terrorist movements . We have to do it somewhere. We cannot do it everywhere at once. We have created a focal point for the battle at a time and place of our choosing . . . . . . . . In Iraq. Not in New York, not in London, or Paris or Berlin, but in Iraq, where we are doing two important things.
(1) We deposed Saddam Hussein. Whether Saddam Hussein was directly involved in the 9/11 terrorist attack or not, it is undisputed that Saddam has been actively supporting the terrorist movement for decades Saddam is a terrorist! Saddam is, or was, a weapon of mass destruction, responsible for the deaths of probably more than a 1,000,000 Iraqis and 2,000,000 Iranians.
(2) We created a battle, a confrontation, and a flash point; with Islamic terrorism in Iraq, We have focused the battle. We are killing bad people, and the ones we get there we will not have to get here. We also have a good shot at creating a democratic, peaceful Iraq, which will be a catalyst for democratic change in the rest of the Middle East, and an outpost for a stabilizing American military presence in the Middle East for as long as it is needed.
WW II, the war with the Japanese and German Nazis, really began with a "whimper" in 1928. It did not begin with Pearl Harbor. It began with the Japanese invasion of China. It was a war for fourteen years before the US joined it. It officially ended in 1945 -- a 17 year war -- and was followed by another decade of US occupation in Germany and Japan to get those countries reconstructed and running on their own a gain . . . a 27 year war.
WW II cost the United States an amount equal to approximately a full year's GDP -- adjusted for inflation, equal to about $12 trillion dollars. WW II cost America more than 400,000 soldiers killed in action and nearly 100,000 still missing in action.
The Iraq war has, so far, cost the United States about $160,000,000,000, which is roughly what the 9/11 terrorist attack cost New York It has also cost about 3,000 American lives, which is roughly the same as the 3,000 lives that the Jihad killed (within the United States) in the 9/11 terrorist attack.
The cost of not fighting and winning WW II would have been unimaginably greater -- a world dominated by Japanese Imperialism and German Nazism.
This is not a 60-Minutes TV show, or a 2-hour movie in which everything comes out okay. The real world is not like that. It is messy, uncertain, and sometimes bloody and ugly it always has been, and probably always will be.
The bottom line is that we will have to deal with Islamic terrorism until we defeat it, whenever that is. It will not go away if we ignore it.
If the US can create a reasonably democratic and stable Iraq, then we have an ally, like England, in the Middle East, a platform, from which we can work to help modernize and moderate the Middle East. The history of the world is the clash between the forces of relative civility and civilization, and the barbarians clamoring at the gates to conquer the world.
The Iraq War is merely another battle in this ancient and never ending war. Now, for the first time ever, the barbarians are about to get nuclear weapons. Unless some body prevents them from getting them.A nation of sheep breeds a government of wolvesComment
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History Lesson, Part 2
This was too long to put in one post. This is a continuation of the above post:
We have four options:
1. We can defeat the Jihad now, before it gets nuclear weapons.
2. We can fight the Jihad later, after it gets nuclear weapons (which may be as early as next year, if Iran's progress on nuclear weapons is what Iran claims it is).
3. We can surrender to the Jihad and accept its dominance in the Middle East now; in Europe in the next few years or decades, and ultimately in America.
OR
4. We can stand down now, and pick up the fight later when the Jihad is more widespread and better armed, perhaps after the Jihad has dominated France and Germany and possibly most of the rest of Europe. It will, of course, be more dangerous, more expensive, and much bloodier.
If you oppose this war, I hope you like the idea that your children, or grandchildren, may live in an Islamic America under the Mullahs and the Sharia, an America that resembles Iran today.
The history of the world is the history of civilization clashes, cultural clashes. All wars are about ideas, ideas about what society and civilization should be like, and the most determined always win.
Those who are willing to be the most ruthless always win. The pacifists always lose, because the anti-pacifists kill them.
Remember, perspective is every thing, and America’s schools teach too little history for perspective to be clear, especially in the young American mind.
The Cold War lasted from about 1947 at least until the Berlin Wall came down in 1989. Forty-two years.
Europe spent the first half of the 19th century fighting Napoleon, and from 1870 to 1945 fighting Germany!
World War II began in 1928, lasted 17 years, plus a ten year occupation and the US still have troops in Germany and Japan. World War II resulted in the death of more than 50,000,000 people, maybe more than 100,000,000 people, depending on which estimates you accept.
The US has taken more than 2,000 killed in action in Iraq The US took more than 4,000 killed in action on the morning of June 6, 1944, the first day of the Normandy Invasion to rid Europe of Nazi Imperialism.
In WW II, the US averaged 2,000 KIA a week -- for four years. Most of the individual battles of WW II lost more Americans than the entire Iraq war has done so far.
The stakes are at least as high . . . A world dominated by representative governments with civil rights, human rights, and personal freedoms. . Or a world dominated by a radical Islamic Wahhabi movement, by the Jihad, under the Mullahs and the Sharia (Islamic law).
It's difficult to understand why the average American does not grasp this They favor human rights, civil rights, liberty and freedom, but evidently not for Iraqis.
"Peace Activists" always seem to demonstrate here in America, where it is safe.
Why don't we see Peace Activist demonstrating in Iran, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, North Korea, in the places that really need peace activism the most? I will tell you! They would be killed!
The liberal mentality is supposed to favor human rights, civil rights, democracy, multiculturalism, diversity, etc, but if the Jihad wins, wherever the Jihad wins, it is the end of civil rights, human rights, democracy, multiculturalism, diversity, etc.
Americans who oppose the liberation of Iraq are coming down on the side of their own worst enemy.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~
Raymond S. Kraft is a writer living in Northern California that has studied the Middle Eastern culture and religion. You can find more writings by Raymond Craft here: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...=Google+SearchA nation of sheep breeds a government of wolvesComment
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all very interesting points of view, but no clarity.
DouggieComment
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Darin E. Jordan - Renton, WA
"Self-proclaimed skill-less leader in the hobby."Comment
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I'll say it again... WHAT are this guys intentions? For those of you who didn't bother to listen to the words that BO used in 2001, here are some highlights in regards to the Warren Court and the Civil Rights movements successes and failures: (again, for those of you so inclined: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3DrrwtqPt0 )
Keep this in mind.... the Supreme Court positions are all NON-ELECTECD positions.... The heart of the Constitution is that we ELECT our officials who make law and represent us...Originally posted by Barrack Obama, 2001
Here, BO is clearly showing his belief and also his intention that the Supreme Court should act a lot more broadly in our government...
Also... when we discuss BO's "Patriotism" or suggest that he is "Anti-American" in any way... re-read the words in red above... The Constitution is the HEART of this country... the charter under which we all agree to live... and yet, here he is clearly and consisely saying that it is the JOB of the Supreme Court to "break free" from it's "contraints"...
I thought the job of the Supreme Courts was to UPHOLD the contraints??
This, combined with EVERYTHING else we KNOW about this man and his past, is very troubling to me.
McCain isn't a perfect candidate by any means, but he's American and WILL uphold this countries foundation. As they say, NO one will stand up and fight for this country like someone who HAS stood up to fight for this country.
I'd say, he has a hell of a lot more invested that BO does...Last edited by Darin Jordan; 10-27-2008, 07:08 PM.Darin E. Jordan - Renton, WA
"Self-proclaimed skill-less leader in the hobby."Comment
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It was something that I thought was applicable to Bill's thinking I have a "nuke-em all" attitude. You can't nuke-em all for the exact reason Bill states. They have no country, no political boundaries; rather it is an idea with followers. Very dangerous followers.
So after you nuke most of the offending areas, you have to go in an kill the remaining fanatics one at a time with artillery and small arms fire.
A nation of sheep breeds a government of wolvesComment
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You have misread (or heard) what he said. He was stating what the Warren court did and that they did not go beyond what the Founding Fathers wanted done by a Supreme Court. You guys have twisted this into he wants a radical court which will ignore the Constitution.Warren court was not all that radical... It didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers on the constitution.
And as far as spreading the wealth, I guess this was OK:
And I absolutely defy any of you to tell me that had Obama uttered the exact same phrase that you would not be pounding home the "He's a Socialist" point.Just last month, in an interview with Philip Gourevitch of the New Yorker, Palin explained the windfall profits tax that she imposed on the oil industry in Alaska as a mechanism for ensuring that Alaskans “share in the wealth” generated by oil companies:
And Alaska—we’re set up, unlike other states in the union, where it’s collectively Alaskans own the resources. So we share in the wealth when the development of these resources occurs. … It’s to maximize benefits for Alaskans, not an individual company, not some multinational somewhere, but for Alaskans.
In fact, Alaska’s Clear and Equitable Share (ACES) program, which manages the redistribution of oil wealth in Alaska, brings in so much money that the state needs no income or sales tax. In addition, this year ACES will provide every Alaskan with a check for an estimated $3,200.
As Hendrick Hertzberg notes, “Perhaps there is some meaningful distinction between spreading the wealth and sharing it…but finding it would require the analytic skills of Karl the Marxist.”
She "shares" the wealth. He "spreads" it. She states very clearly that the resources are owned "collectively". All the buzzwords are there, all that is different is who is saying them, and that is what matters more right now to the right.
Obama is proposing the same thing. Tax big companies more, spread that wealth to the rest of us.Don't get me startedComment
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And this strategy is really working well in both Iraq and Afghanistan isn't it??
What we in the West fail to recognize is that through their eyes we look the same to them as they look to us through our eyes. They feel we want to kill them all, much as Bill has said, and they feel they are protecting their way of life. But since we "know" that our God is on our side against them and their God, then we must be right.
Don't get me startedComment
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NO I did not... you listen to that entire thing in context and it's entirely clear what he is talking about... He prefaced that part with "Where it failed"... Where the WARREN COURT FAILED... No twisting necessary...
Bill... there is a HECK of a big difference between sharing resources, and taking from one man's/woman's hard work to give to another who may or may not be working as hard... My hard work, inginuity, talent, etc... is NOT a "resource" for the government to distribute...She "shares" the wealth. He "spreads" it. She states very clearly that the resources are owned "collectively".
That is, quite frankly, and rediculous comparison you are making there... PUT it all together, man... They've taken from you and me to disperse as they see fit... What has that gotten us?? A mortage crises... state owned banking system... soon to be state-owned car manufactures... Are any of us better off with this HUGE, BLOATED government, some of the HIGHEST business taxes in the World, etc...???Darin E. Jordan - Renton, WA
"Self-proclaimed skill-less leader in the hobby."Comment
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You are right about one thing, the right has taken from me and you and given it to the rich. Now Obama wants to reverse that and somehow you are against it?? Once again I marvel at the ability of the right to get the very people who are harmed by their policies to defend them.
Darin, do you make over $250K in taxable income per year? If not then you will NOT see your taxes go up. If you make more than $250K but less than $6.3 MILLION then your taxes will go up, and the more you make the more they will go up. IF you make more than $6.3 million, they will go way up. So why is it that you are such an ardent defender of the rich??Don't get me startedComment
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