US Presidential Election 2004 III

Politics International Politics
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The truth is that for some people (see Charles Krauthammer et al) no matter what the facts were, no matter what Iraq said or did, they were going to invade Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein because they had decided long before he was a mortal enemy of Israel.

It’s also true that for the vast majority of us, that wasn’t the case. For us it was about weapons of mass destruction and the mortal threat they posed to us and our nation after 9/11.

The Krauthammerites knew this and hyped weapons of mass destruction in order to achieve their true goal of eliminating Saddam as a threat to Israel.

Even with all the hype, exaggerations and outright lies about stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq though, the Friends of Israel barely got what they wanted – an invasion and endless occupation of Iraq.

Without the threat of weapons of mass destruction in Saddam’s hands, they never would have gotten their invasion and that should be clear to anyone who’s being intellectually honest.

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Thread split due to length.

Rascal
Moderator IP Forum

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Krauthammer is a singularly sour man – as he works on his columns, basically think Gary Oldman in the “Hanibal” movie. Unethical sleaze, too.

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Spook:

Er should we really be reading the Jews are responsible in your statement? Who fooled Bush? Who fooled the CIA? Who fooled Congress? Who fooled the intelligence agencies of every other country in the world? the Jews?

We have made the world a better place and Iraq will be better off because Saddam is gone. That does not mean that it will be perfect but at least Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are much happier and safer. Also, did you notice the recent news that I posted. The US has freed up a whole aircraft carrier group which will be moved to North Asia. It is no longer needed to contain Saddam or protect the Persian Gulf. Now, what was it that you were saying again about failing to deal with the threat from North Korea by focusing too much attention on Iraq?

Quite the contrary, we have freed up vast naval and air force resources that were needed to contain Saddam and enforce the no fly zones. Now, let’s deal with Iran and Syria and move to contain or take out North Korea in time.

Interesting that for all the demand by other nations including Germany and France to have a say in what happened in Iraq, I do not hear either clamoring for international multilateral led efforts against North Korea. They all want the US to take care of the problem and neither is willing to help to do so. Curious?

Perhaps this is because France has not negotiated any ridiculously onesided agreements to exploit the largest oil fields in Iraq in North Korea? What do you think?

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And your goal is to defend ‘W’ to the nth degree, not think rationally. Fair?

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Interesting, Fred, that you equate “Israel” with “the Jews”… thus, in your logic, any blame given to the Israelis for any policies persued by the Israeli government is an attack on the jewish people? Just trying to see what is going on in your mind when you post that sort of stuff.

William F. Buckley wrote a very good book on anti-semitism, and I urge you to think through these issues further before posting. Look forward to your response.

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Spook wrote:

[quote]The truth is that for some people (see Charles Krauthammer et al) no matter what the facts were, no matter what Iraq said or did, they were going to invade Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein because they had decided long before he was a mortal enemy of Israel.

It’s also true that for the vast majority of us, that wasn’t the case. For us it was about weapons of mass destruction and the mortal threat they posed to us and our nation after 9/11.

The Krauthammerites knew this and hyped weapons of mass destruction in order to achieve their true goal of eliminating Saddam as a threat to Israel.

Even with all the hype, exaggerations and outright lies about stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq though, the Friends of Israel barely got what they wanted – an invasion and endless occupation of Iraq. [/quote]

Fred wrote:

[quote]Spook:

Er should we really be reading the Jews are responsible in your statement? Who fooled Bush? Who fooled the CIA? Who fooled Congress? Who fooled the intelligence agencies of every other country in the world? the Jews? [/quote]

MFGR wrote:

So Krauthammer is a Jew and by nature of Spook’s post a “friend of Israel.” What then is Spook inferring if not that the Jews are behind this and are therefore to blame.

MFGR: Your continued efforts to misquote and distort people’s quotes has only resulted in your loss of credibility.

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Fred, there are people are considered “friends of China” but aren’t considered Jewish, Confucian, Daoist or atheist. There are plenty of “friends of Israel,” who happen to be stridently Christian. You were the one who first raised the issue of religion. What’s the deal?

I asked that you think about this issue just a bit before posting, but obviously you have not. I urge you to think some more, read, reflect, etc.

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Why should anybody believe what the Bush administration says about education?

[quote=“New York Times”][color=red]
Nation’s Charter Schools Lagging Behind, U.S. Test Scores Reveal
[/color]

WASHINGTON, Aug. 16 - The first national comparison of test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools shows charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools.

The findings, buried in mountains of data the Education Department released without public announcement, dealt a blow to supporters of the charter school movement, including the Bush administration.

…Charters are expected to grow exponentially under the new federal education law, No Child Left Behind, which holds out conversion to charter schools as one solution for chronically failing traditional schools.

…The results, based on the 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly known as the nation’s report card, were unearthed from online data by researchers at the American Federation of Teachers, which provided them to The New York Times. The organization has historically supported charter schools but has produced research in recent years raising doubts about the expansion of charter schools.

…Federal officials said they did not intend to hide the performance of charter schools, and denied any political motivation for failing to publicly disclose that the data were available. “I guess that was poor publicity on our part,” said Robert Lerner, the federal commissioner for education statistics. Mr. Lerner said further analysis was needed to put the data in its proper context.[/quote]

Uh, sure. :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

And we Americans already know that any news coming from the Bush administration always needs a ‘special context.’

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[color=black]There is really a qualitative difference between Bush and

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I deeply and sincerely abhor anti-Semitism. To automatically equate criticism of the politics of American supporters of Israel with anti-Semitism though is nothing more than demagoguery calculated to chill debate.

The criticism that I made, in its generic form, is:

‘U.S. supporters of country X used bogus arguments about a threat to the U.S. to enlist the U.S. in eliminating a mortal threat to country X.’

Of the 192 countries on earth besides the U.S., this relatively middling criticism could freely be made about 191 of them.

Only one country on earth is considered immune to this criticism and criticisms of almost any sort. The truth or falsity of the criticisms never even make it to the table.

In a country in which free speech and open, free-wheeling debate are supposed to be enshrined values – in an age in which events in the Middle East are so crucial to its present and future well-being – can the U.S. afford to have such a:

[color=blue]Main Entry: sacred cow
Function: noun
Etymology: from the veneration of the cow by Hindus
: one that is often unreasonably immune from criticism or opposition[/color]

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I know the answer to that one. I know the answer to that one!! I used to work in the public school system said Fred Smith raising his hand.

Could it be that basically all of the charter schools were formed in bad areas with poor education, dysfunctional families, etc? And that this is one of the only areas or ways that teachers unions would allow such schools to be set up? Really? Did I get that right? And so to compare this with the average of ALL public schools in the US would be like an unfair comparison and a trick really (perhaps a study organized by the teacher’s unions) to cut support for charter schools and vouchers? Really? Did I get that right too? Afuckingmazing. How did I do that?

As to Spook:

Hmmm will take your comments with caution but your inordinate interest in Israel and its ability to influence American politics is noted, though open to question given that no one from Israel has been to the White House as many times as Arafat was under Clinton (the leader who visited the White House the most times in fact was Arafat) and given the strong influence of Prince Bandar from Saudi Arabia…so when I hear you linking Iraq (which was not just a concern to Israel but also to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the whole Gulf), then I will assume that your interest in Israel has something a bit more anti-Semitic to it than just pointing out unfair or excessive influences.

Why is no one from your political views slamming Arafat for his inordinate influence on Clinton and look at how the PLO has European leaders dancing around like a bunch of trained circus bears. What about the Saudis and all that oil money? hmmm?

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Fred,

One answer and two questions:

I’m not a supporter of the PLO or any other foreign political organization or country. I consider Arafat and the PLO to be corrupt and quasi-terrorist.

My turn:

Are you a strong supporter of Israel?

Can two masters be served equally?

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Strong supporter of Israel? Are you asking me the Prussian whether I am Jewish? There are many paths to salvation I suppose. :wink:

Yes, I am a very big supporter of Israel and the No. 1 reason is that it is a democracy that respects human rights and caving in to Muslim and Arab demands is not the solution. Getting Arab and Muslim governments to become more like Israel is.

Glad to hear that you are not anti-Semitic even though THEY do seem to control so much don’t they? :wink:

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[quote=“ajlan”][color=black]There is really a qualitative difference between Bush and

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TainanCowboy, please don’t just paste entire articles, instead highlight the relevant / important parts and provide a link.

Thanks,
Rascal
Moderator IP Forum

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Not bad reason to do so… we all like real democracies.

Really? How so??

How about caving in on some Palestinian human rights? That might be a nice start. Perhaps Israel could stop creating ghettos through their arbitrary carving up of the Palestinian areas with walls.

Getting Israel’s neighbors to be more democratic would be nice… getting them to emulate Israel’s lack of tolerance for others would probably even be a huge step up for the Saudis.

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Tolerance? You want to compare tolerance?

How many Jews live in the Middle East outside of Israel? How many were expelled from their homes with nothing? How many Arabs live in Israel? They even vote in the Parliament. Not the same. Difficult situations mean difficult decisions but my sympathy is with the Israelis. The Palestinians could have had 97% of the West Bank with the last 3% to be negotiated under the Wye Accords. Arafat gambled he could get more, he lost, the country loses. After all Hitler gambled, Germany lost Pomerania, Silesia, Prussia. This happens. Wanna give all that back to Germany? If not, stop bleating on about the poor Palestinians. They had their chance.

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So, Fred, you think it is good for U.S. policy to support the Israeli’s continuing beat-down of the Palestinians? They’ve “had their chance” and, thus, have to submit to whatever Israel wants to do to them?

Please define for us what “human rights” means. You say Israel respects human rights, so let’s hear how you define them.

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[color=blue]Re-elect George Bush? Fuggedaboutit. It’s over.[/color]

"Further north in Pennsylvania - a so-called swing state, where candidates are desperate to woo undecided voters - there’s a deeply conservative institution: the First Troop Philadelphia City Cavalry.

Bill Buchanan, a leading member and card-carrying Republican, sighed when he told me George W Bush would not be getting his vote this time.

The reason? Iraq.

Bill said: “To risk nearly 1,000 American lives and so many casualties, there has to be a pressing reason. There was not.”

He went on: "When I joined the military, I was taught to shoot back at the guy shooting at me.

“His name was Osama Bin Laden. We’ve stopped shooting at him and started shooting at someone who was not shooting at us. It doesn’t make sense.”

Bill runs a bed-and-breakfast house in Philadelphia. One of his other guests, William Coleman, came down one morning and sat at the communal dining table wearing a Manchester United shirt.

He’d made a two-hour plane journey from New Orleans to see his beloved English soccer team play a summer friendly against Celtic.

He’s one of those fans far away - an American who developed a passion for a team just from watching them on television.

William fought in the Vietnam War and he is another Republican who says there is no way he’ll vote for George Bush this time.

He told me that, when he was brought up in the 1950s, he was always taught that Germany had been utterly wrong to start a pre-emptive war.

But now America has done exactly that, and has alienated most of its allies as a result.

William Coleman is a thoughtful, kind-faced man who speaks slowly and carefully, and he believes he speaks for many when he says:

"As commander-in-chief, the president has a responsibility not to use the military in an irresponsible manner.

“I think that in this case, in Iraq, George W Bush has subjected the military to unnecessary danger.”

William Coleman, like several of the uneasy Republicans I met, told me he will grit his teeth and vote for that other Vietnam War veteran, John Kerry.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/3562470.stm