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Strawberry
Supporter
Username: Strawberry
Post Number: 7688
Registered: 10-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:03 am: | 
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These arrests in the UK are certainly bad new for the Democrats. Just two days after the Lieberman loss, Americans are once again reminded that weakness and retreat don't work.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/11/washington/11politics.html?hp&ex=1155355200&en =9ebe45b4547106f4&ei=5094&partner=homepage |
tjohn
Supporter
Username: Tjohn
Post Number: 4662
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:24 am: |
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Why? People look at the British and see what they have accomplished with police work and intelligence. Then, they look at the little Rambos in the White House and see the mess they have gotten us into in Iraq.
The problems of Democratic Party are entirely self-inflicted. The Republicans are in a bad way. The Democrats, being in a worse way, are unable to capitalize on this opportunity. |
Nohero
Supporter
Username: Nohero
Post Number: 5712
Registered: 10-1999
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:27 am: |
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Fighting in Iraq would prevent terrorist plotters based in Britain and Pakistan?
That makes no sense.
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Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2013
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:35 am: |
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"The Democrats, being in a worse way, are unable to capitalize on this opportunity."
How so?
It'd be fair to say that maybe after the midterms. You and Southerner can come here and do your little Superbowl Shuffle, waiving your pom-poms all over the place. But before I call you disingenuous, by what gauge are you basing that statement, tjohn? |
ae35unit
Citizen
Username: Ae35unit
Post Number: 177
Registered: 2-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:39 am: |
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Defeatocrats. If we would have only stayed in Vietnam a few more years…………
Seriously, anyone who can't see that current American policy is making the U.S. and the world less safe is just stupid. Anyone who thinks the degradation of American stature in the world is good for the U.S. is stupid. Anyone who doesn't recognize that New York Time piece as Republican propaganda is not very well read. Anyone who would trade their freedom for safety, especially as brokered by the current administration, is hopeless.
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Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1858
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:40 am: |
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Straw - thanks for posting that very important analysis.
The bottom line if you read for comprehension is that the republicans are going to continue to make the running of the country into an issue of security and the democrats are going to rightly point out that the republicans have done little to nothing to really protect us.
from your article -
Quote:“The war in Iraq had nothing to do with the war against international terrorism, or very little to do with the war on terrorism,” said James Webb, a former Reagan administration official running as a Democratic candidate for Senate in Virginia. “It has distracted our attention, it has pulled our forces in, and we are now in a situation where we have 135,000 on the ground, which affects our ability to do a lot of things that we would be able to do otherwise.”
Basically it says the republicans blew it, but are going to try to continue to convince Americans that they didnt. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 5458
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:40 am: |
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Why do you cons continue to lump Iraq and 9/11 together? You know it's a lie. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 141
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:42 am: |
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Similar sentiment from Slate:
http://www.slate.com/id/2147395/ |
Dave
Supporter
Username: Dave
Post Number: 10440
Registered: 4-1997
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:53 am: |
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Spreading fear is all the Republicans have left, having already abandoned fiscal responsiblity and being a watchdog for increased government intrusion. They are now dependent on ensuring Americans maintain a willing inability to rationally assess risk. The administration has basically become a terrorist signal booster. No more messages about getting on with your lives, chin up, the only fear is fear itself, etc. etc. It's now simply "fear fear fear" and vote Republican. Pathetic and weak. |
ae35unit
Citizen
Username: Ae35unit
Post Number: 178
Registered: 2-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:54 am: |
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Tom- It’s easy, because people who lie, are, say it with me, liars.
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tjohn
Supporter
Username: Tjohn
Post Number: 4663
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 9:56 am: |
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Dear Red Livingston,
I think the Democratic Party is in a state of disorder. As I haven't voted for a Republican in ages, I don't feel any need to justify my view of the Democratic Party.
However, if the adults in the Republican Party can regain control (fiscally responsible, socially hands-off, internationally responsible), I would vote Republican. |
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 3177
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 1:21 pm: |
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Republicans determined to win in November are up against a troublesome trend - growing opposition to President Bush.
An Associated Press-Ipsos poll conducted this week found the president's approval rating has dropped to 33 percent, matching his low in May. His handling of nearly every issue, from the Iraq war to foreign policy, contributed to the president's decline around the nation, even in the Republican-friendly South.
More sobering for the GOP are the number of voters who backed Bush in 2004 who are ready to vote Democratic in the fall's congressional elections - 19 percent. These one-time Bush voters are more likely to be female, self-described moderates, low- to middle-income and from the Northeast and Midwest.
I thought Howard Dean was the end of the Democrats. I thought the flag ammendment was the end of the Democrats. I thought gay marriage was the end of the Democrats. As long as Bush keeps plummeting in popularity, I'd take a wait and see attitude. He is, quite simply, breathtakingly unpopular with his bosses. Only a ragtag army of irregulars and dead-enders don't laugh or groan when they see his absurd face.
The arrest is good for him because it very temporarily takes attention away from the war he started and possibly lost. But that mofo is like a bear trap on his leg.
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Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2014
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 1:41 pm: |
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tjohn: you said the democrats are unable to capitalize, which indicates there's a tangible measure for this statement, i.e. lost elections, stats for weak-minded "democrats" switching parties, or something. Very disingenuous. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 144
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 1:48 pm: |
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Great column today from the former Manhattan AUSA who prosecuted the 1993 WTC bombers:
August 11, 2006, 0:07 a.m.
Connecticut? This is London Calling.
Al Qaeda reminds us to hang on to our patriots.
By Andrew C. McCarthy
We are reading only about 24 arrests today. If we were already in the heralded antiwar world of Ned Lamont and the war-against-the-war crowd, it could be much different. We could just as easily be reading about ten jumbo jets exploded out of the sky. Or 3,000 murdered innocents — mostly American and British citizens.
Reality has once again inconveniently burst the antiwar, anti-security, anti-American balloon, just as the November victory ballrooms were being booked.
Just as central casting was whipping the articles of impeachment into shape. The high crimes and misdemeanors of George W. Bush include: hunting down terrorists, detaining them, interrogating them, penetrating their communications, and following their money.
These damn jihadists just won’t cooperate. Can’t they read the polls?
As British authorities continue trying to round up around 50 — fifty! — mostly homegrown Muslim militants who were attempting to execute over the Atlantic the very plan master terrorists Ramzi Yousef and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed nearly pulled off over the Pacific a dozen years ago, it’s worth reminding the triumphalist antiwar Left of an important point.
As much as they sometimes seem to have in common with jihadists when they speak about America, its government, its military, and its president, the two are drastically different in one crucial particular.
The antiwar Left wants to wield American power. The jihadists want to destroy it … and us. All of us.
The antiwar Left has a conveniently flexible moral compass. Consequently, the Clinton era Echelon program was fine, but Bush’s NSA Terrorist Surveillance Program is an impeachable offense.
Mishandling classified information by a Clinton CIA director was worthy of a pardon, and destroying classified information (and lying to investigators about it) by a former Clinton national-security adviser was worthy of a pass, but leaking the unremarkable fact that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA is the crime of the century.
Bombing Kosovo without U.N. approval was a moral imperative; invading Iraq after over a dozen U.N. resolutions is a violation of international law.
Renditions conducted between 1994 and 2000 were just good national-security sense; renditions conducted between 2001 and 2006 are war crimes.
Indicting Osama bin Laden in 1998 and then doing nothing to capture him while he bombed two American embassies and an American naval destroyer, killing hundreds, was aggressive yet intelligently modulated counterterrorism; allowing Osama bin Laden to evade capture in Tora Bora while killing and capturing hundreds of his operatives and decimating his hierarchy is irresponsibly incompetent.
Wet fingers firmly in the wind, the Left looks you in the eye and tells you that what is depends on what the definition of “is” is, then votes for it before voting against it. The object of the game is power, and they are willing to gamble, even with our lives, to get it or keep it.
Jihadists are very different. When it comes to our national security, they’re not partisan politicizers. They wanted to kill us when Reagan was in charge, when Clinton was in charge, now that Bush is in charge, and tomorrow no matter who is in charge. They want to kill us where Tony Blair is in charge, where Ehud Olmert is in charge, and — no matter how he contorts himself — even where Jacques Chirac is in charge.
They are not foul-weather fiends. Iraq, Lebanon, Israel, Shebaa Farms, Gitmo, flushed Korans, Salman Rushdie, the Crusades, etc., etc., etc…. These are not causes. They are excuses.
Jihadists believe passionately — many of them passionately enough to die for it — that they are commanded by their religion to kill us. They won’t be reasoned, cajoled, moderated, Westernized, modernized or democratized out of their views.
They have to be defeated. They have to be defeated in Iraq — whether or not one agrees that we should have gone there in the first place, and whatever one thinks of how competently the post-Saddam occupation has been managed. They still have to be defeated in Afghanistan. They have to be defeated in Lebanon — and ultimately Iran. They have to be stopped in Sudan. They can’t be allowed to set up new command-and-control beachheads in Pakistan, Somalia, and elsewhere. They have to be monitored throughout the West — including in our own country — because the operatives here are the ones who pose the greatest threat to our safety.
This is a daunting task. It’s a job for adults and patriots, not opportunists and power-mongers.
On Tuesday, Democrats in Connecticut showed the door to Senator Joe Lieberman, a patriotic adult who happens to be a liberal, and ushered in an antiwar Left opportunist who, until about five minutes ago, was a Lieberman supporter.
On Wednesday, al Qaeda reminded us that it will gladly kill opportunists of any political stripe.
The Democrats need to hold on to their patriots. The nation needs to hold on to the Democrats’ patriots.
This is going to be a very long haul.
— Andrew C. McCarthy is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
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Nohero
Supporter
Username: Nohero
Post Number: 5717
Registered: 10-1999
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 1:59 pm: |
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The article starts with a fallacy:
Quote:If we were already in the heralded antiwar world of Ned Lamont and the war-against-the-war crowd, it could be much different. We could just as easily be reading about ten jumbo jets exploded out of the sky. Or 3,000 murdered innocents — mostly American and British citizens.
Criticizing the Iraq war has NOTHING to do with whether one supports protecting ourselves against terrorists. Quite the contrary. |
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 3178
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 2:20 pm: |
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Ask yourself - could the Brits have cracked this ring if they didn't have troops in Iraq. Of course not. That's why the French didn't crack it. Like, duh. |
Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1864
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 2:20 pm: |
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and continues its warped viewpoint in every paragraph. Nothing about that article is correct, true, or untainted by partisan spin. It equates opposition to the war with national security.
Quote:Just as central casting was whipping the articles of impeachment into shape. The high crimes and misdemeanors of George W. Bush include: hunting down terrorists, detaining them, interrogating them, penetrating their communications, and following their money.
It completely mischaracterizes where Bush has broken the law with him actually accomplishing something in terms of keeping us secure. Since he has broken the law with torture of his detainees there is no way that any information gleaned from that torture can be called reliable, nor can it be used against a terrorist in a court of law.
Not one democrat is against hunting down terrorists, arresting them, interrogating them, penetrating their communications or following their money. Its a ridiculous statement and frankly one that is meant to polarize the people in the attempt to maintain power. |
Dave
Supporter
Username: Dave
Post Number: 10455
Registered: 4-1997
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 2:26 pm: |
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Bush needs terrorism to govern. It's that simple.
Without terror, he's just another guy giving handouts to the rich, denying scientific discovery and threatening a woman's right to choose. |
notehead
Supporter
Username: Notehead
Post Number: 3708
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 2:28 pm: |
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The Republican party ought to seriously consider renaming itself The Conflation Party. That is certainly what they seem to be all about these days. |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2015
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 2:29 pm: |
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The Brits proved that it's possible to fight terrorism without bombing the living crap out of Iraqi civilians. I get the feeling that Bush and his people get off on wiping out innocent communities, for starters because they are evil, and because dumbass Southern racist Americans can see the results, dammit! |
Dr. Winston O'Boogie
Citizen
Username: Casey
Post Number: 2346
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 2:48 pm: |
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talk about the Big Lie. Anyone with any sense can see that what cracked this case is the exact opposite of the Bush neocon policies. The plotters were uncovered through law enforcement, intelligence gathering (apparently with warrants), and diplomacy. It conspicuously did NOT involve military invasions or unauthorized eavesdropping. This case solidly confirmed the "lib" position on stopping terrorism, and is a big-time refutation of the Bush method. But the right wing nuts think we're stupid enough to believe this is evidence that their way is correct.
Ignorance is strength. |
Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1866
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:04 pm: |
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The thing is even with incredible intelligence and policing efforts, even with the best diplomacy and the most powerful military, in the end terrorist acts will still be committed.
There is no stopping every criminal act. No stopping every terrorist act. There will probably be times that a plane is crashed due to terrorism, or a subway is bombed or a hotel is bombed. Fighting a war in the middle east can not protect us from the work of fanatics.
The above is not to say that we live in a hopeless world but it is to say realistically no one can do everything. We just have to keep alert and make sure our intelligence and policing communities are alert so that these events can be minimized.
Terrorism is no new phenomena, its been around forever and will always be here. |
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 3181
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:26 pm: |
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Good old fashioned shoe leather broke this case wide open. And classic British sloothing of the foggy moor and country lane variety. I understand the old constable fell asleep in the train shed after tiffen, and the tutor left a bit of binding twine by the deacon's gate. The sealing wax had an unusual red pigment in it, one that comes only from one place...but how did the lorrie driver know it was jasmine, sir, when he hadn't smelt it himself? A vole must have disturbed the tracks that the ashman left in the newmown hay, or we would have found the vacuum flask straightaway... |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2017
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:31 pm: |
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themp: you effing rock, man.  |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 5462
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:43 pm: |
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I've got a question: if there were 50+ people involved in the British plot, how many people in the US were involved in 9/11?
More than the 19 on the planes? A virtual certainty.
So where are the rest of them? For that matter, where's the anthrax mailer? Nearly five years after a deadly terrorist attack was successfully implemented against at least one United States Senator and several major public corporations, the Bush Justice Department has figured out absolutely nothing.
Maybe if they'd attacked Fox, or Trent Lott. |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 1435
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:44 pm: |
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I love this. And the pom poms will be in full effect.
Now you libs can continue your therapy session. Normally, you guys wait until after you lose. I guess you decided to start early. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 145
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:50 pm: |
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'Mass Murder' Foiled
A terror plot is exposed by the policies many American liberals oppose.
Friday, August 11, 2006 12:01 a.m.
Americans went to work yesterday to news of another astonishing terror plot against U.S. airlines, only this time the response was grateful relief. British authorities had busted the "very sophisticated" plan "to commit mass murder" and arrested 20-plus British-Pakistani suspects. As we approach the fifth anniversary of 9/11 without another major attack on U.S. soil, now is the right moment to consider the policies that have protected us--and those in public life who have fought those policies nearly every step of the way.
It's not as if the "Islamic fascists"--to borrow President Bush's description yesterday--haven't been trying to hit us. They took more than 50 lives last year in London with the "7/7" subway bombings. There was the catastrophic attack in Madrid the year before that left nearly 200 dead. But there have also been successes. Some have been publicized, such as a foiled plot to poison Britain's food supply with ricin. But undoubtedly many have not, because authorities don't want to compromise sources and methods, or because the would-be terrorists have been captured or killed before they could carry out their plans.
In this case the diabolical scheme was to smuggle innocent-looking liquid explosive components and detonators onto planes. They could then be assembled onboard and exploded, perhaps over cities for maximum horror. Multiply the passenger load of a 747 by, say, 10 airliners, and this attack could have killed more people than 9/11. We don't yet know how the plot was foiled, but surely part of the explanation was crack surveillance work by British authorities.
"This wasn't supposed to happen today," a U.S. official told the Washington Post of the arrests and terror alert. "It was supposed to happen several days from now. We hear the British lost track of one or two guys. They had to move." Meanwhile, British antiterrorism chief Peter Clarke said at a news conference that the plot was foiled because "a large number of people" had been under surveillance, with police monitoring "spending, travel and communications."
Let's emphasize that again: The plot was foiled because a large number of people were under surveillance concerning their spending, travel and communications. Which leads us to wonder if Scotland Yard would have succeeded if the ACLU or the New York Times had first learned the details of such surveillance programs.
And almost on political cue yesterday, Members of the Congressional Democratic leadership were using the occasion to suggest that the U.S. is actually more vulnerable today despite this antiterror success. Harry Reid, who's bidding to run the Senate as Majority Leader, saw it as one more opportunity to insist that "the Iraq war has diverted our focus and more than $300 billion in resources from the war on terrorism and has created a rallying cry for international terrorists."
Ted Kennedy chimed in that "it is clear that our misguided policies are making America more hated in the world and making the war on terrorism harder to win." Mr. Kennedy somehow overlooked that the foiled plan was nearly identical to the "Bojinka" plot led by Ramzi Yousef and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to blow up airliners over the Pacific Ocean in 1995. Did the Clinton Administration's "misguided policies" invite that plot? And if the Iraq war is a diversion and provocation, just what policies would Senators Reid and Kennedy have us "focus" on?
Surveillance? Hmmm. Democrats and their media allies screamed bloody murder last year when it was leaked that the government was monitoring some communications outside the context of a law known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. FISA wasn't designed for, nor does it forbid, the timely exploitation of what are often anonymous phone numbers, and the calls monitored had at least one overseas connection. But Mr. Reid labeled such surveillance "illegal" and an "NSA domestic spying program." Other Democrats are still saying they will censure, or even impeach, Mr. Bush over the FISA program if they win control of Congress.
This year the attempt to paint Bush Administration policies as a clear and present danger to civil liberties continued when USA Today hyped a story on how some U.S. phone companies were keeping call logs. The obvious reason for such logs is that the government might need them to trace the communications of a captured terror suspect. And then there was the recent brouhaha when the New York Times decided news of a secret, successful and entirely legal program to monitor bank transfers between bad guys was somehow in the "public interest" to expose.
For that matter, we don't recall most advocates of a narrowly "focused" war on terror having many kind words for the Patriot Act, which broke down what in the 1990s was a crippling "wall" of separation between our own intelligence and law-enforcement agencies. Senator Reid was "focused" enough on this issue to brag, prematurely as it turned out, that he had "killed" its reauthorization.
And what about interrogating terror suspects when we capture them? It is elite conventional wisdom these days that techniques no worse than psychological pressure and stress positions constitute "torture." There is also continued angst about the detention of terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, even as Senators and self-styled civil libertarians fight Bush Administration attempts to process them through military tribunals that won't compromise sources and methods.
In short, Democrats who claim to want "focus" on the war on terror have wanted it fought without the intelligence, interrogation and detention tools necessary to win it. And if they cite "cooperation" with our allies as some kind of magical answer, they should be reminded that the British and other European legal systems generally permit far more intrusive surveillance and detention policies than the Bush Administration has ever contemplated. Does anyone think that when the British interrogate those 20 or so suspects this week that they will recoil at harsh or stressful questioning?
Another issue that should be front and center again is ethnic profiling. We'd be shocked if such profiling wasn't a factor in the selection of surveillance targets that resulted in yesterday's arrests. Here in the U.S., the arrests should be a reminder of the dangers posed by a politically correct system of searching 80-year-old airplane passengers with the same vigor as screeners search young men of Muslim origin. There is no civil right to board an airplane without extra hassle, any more than drivers in high-risk demographics have a right to the same insurance rates as a soccer mom.
The real lesson of yesterday's antiterror success in Britain is that the threat remains potent, and that the U.S. government needs to be using every legal tool to defeat it. At home, that includes intelligence and surveillance and data-mining, and abroad it means all of those as well as an aggressive military plan to disrupt and kill terrorists where they live so they are constantly on defense rather than plotting to blow up U.S.-bound airliners.
As the time since 9/11 has passed, many of America's elites have begun to portray U.S. government policies as a greater threat than the terrorists themselves. George Soros and others have said this explicitly, and their political allies in Congress and the media have staged a relentless campaign against the very practices that saved innocent lives this week. We doubt that many Americans who will soon board an airplane agree.
Copyright © 2006 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1867
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 3:55 pm: |
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the republican talking points are becoming clear. The second article you have posted with the exact same twisted message.
Nice to know that Karl Rove is still working. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 146
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:03 pm: |
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What's clear is that even though the Republicans have made many mis-steps, they are at least in the game. The dems are not even playing the same sport. |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2019
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:05 pm: |
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"The dems are not even playing the same sport."
Prove it. What have the democrats done exactly that has made America less safe? |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 1437
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:05 pm: |
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Hoops,
Please tell me you didn't need that to know Karl is still working. Hell, he's been putting in 18 hours day and relaxing with Fitz on his day off.
Surely, you won't be amazed come November will you? |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 147
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:13 pm: |
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“We killed the Patriot Act.” – Harry Reid December 16, 2005 |
Dave
Supporter
Username: Dave
Post Number: 10459
Registered: 4-1997
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:17 pm: |
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Quote:Senator Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, said Congress must set a new ''equilibrium" between national security and personal freedoms. ''Confidence and trust in one's government is the only currency there is in life in a democracy," said Hagel, one of four Republicans to join nearly all Senate Democrats in voting against the extension.
''If citizens do not have confidence and trust in their government -- that their government is protecting their rights, and those that they send to represent them in Washington are protecting their rights -- then there will be a very severe breakdown in society," he said.
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Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 148
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:20 pm: |
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From Ned Lamont's web site:
"Rather than spending hundreds of millions of dollars a day in Iraq, it is time for America to refocus on issues back home: fixing our health care system, upgrading our schools, and rebuilding our aging infrastructure."
How terrifying that must be to our enemies. |
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 3184
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:21 pm: |
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I find it comforting. |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2020
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:24 pm: |
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F-ck health care and schools. F-ck it all. We need to bomb the living crap out of that small village outside Baghdad. Yeah, baby! Bombs away, suckers!!!!
Tap: I'll ask you what I ask all death first right-wing maniacs...how come you are not over there serving? |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 149
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:25 pm: |
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If that's your opinion that's fine. I'm just pointing out, as I did in the other thread, that many of the same people gushing over the Brits' success opposed the PATRIOT Act here. The power that MI5 has to investigate terrorism and coordinate both law enforcement and intelligence action in the UK doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of anything in the PATRIOT Act. |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2021
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:31 pm: |
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Spinal Tap: You and your radical fascist politics are denegrating the name of one of the finest comedies of all time. In the name of everything sacred, I ask you to change your username. Mick Shrimpton is turning over in his grave. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 150
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:32 pm: |
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You know, this is the second or third time someone has questioned why I don’t go to Iraq. As I’ve responded before, I find it amusing how people in Maplewood always assume that their neighbors were never in the armed forces or have never been in harms way. I find their facial reactions to learning that their neighbors were, equally amusing. |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2022
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:34 pm: |
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Were/are you?
I've found maybe 1 in 20 hard right wingers have actually served in the military. Most are chickensh-t hawks too cowardly to face death in the name of Bush. I cannot imagine why. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 5797
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:46 pm: |
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Those Katrina refugees still living with you, RL? |
Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 2023
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:50 pm: |
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They have to because the Republican •••••••• at FEMA, almost a whole freakin' year later, still haven't gotten their heads out of their you-know-what to provide shelter.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/PrintStory.pl?document_id=2003184991&zs ection_id=2002107549&slug=trailers09&date=20060809 |
tjohn
Supporter
Username: Tjohn
Post Number: 4672
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:50 pm: |
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Red Livingstone is in fine form today. |
Dave
Supporter
Username: Dave
Post Number: 10460
Registered: 4-1997
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 4:54 pm: |
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Quote:''The standard should be to put in place measures that will protect civil liberties no matter who holds the power," said Sununu, a leader in efforts to insert more safeguards into the Patriot Act. Speaking on the Senate floor, Sununu paraphrased Benjamin Franklin: ''Those that would give up essential liberty in pursuit of a little temporary security deserve neither liberty nor security."
Another sane Republican. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 151
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 5:52 pm: |
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I'm in Maplewood.
It's unusual you write that because the military, especially the officer corps and special operations forces, is a pretty conservative and Republican institution (SOF guys also tend to be pretty religious). When I was in, I knew very few people who were Democrats or liberals. Or at least that admitted it.
Also, I miswrote - I meant to write that the PATRIOT Act does not begin to scratch MI5's powers. Not the other way around. If you are against the PATRIOT Act and honestly believe that it's wrong, that's fine. Just don't then turn around and gush over the brilliance of the British authorities and rip on our efforts.
I'm taking a sabbatical from MOL. Things are getting too intense for me.
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joel dranove
Citizen
Username: Jdranove
Post Number: 872
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 6:03 pm: |
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Dave:
You have a great sense of humor.
We are not seeking a little temporary security here.
We are at war with a relentless ideological foe, properly named by our pres. as Islamic fascism. Its adherents have all the money and time in the world, and want to kill you (not because of your political beliefs), and me (not because of mine), and all of us, unless we convert to their seventh century religious view of the world: either you are a strict Muslim, or you are dead.
jd |
Factvsfiction
Citizen
Username: Factvsfiction
Post Number: 1380
Registered: 4-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 6:18 pm: |
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There really is too much gobblygook to respond to here. The usual suspects continue to think within their boxes and push their politics. Unfortunately the war being forced on us transcends politics and our own particular social views.
Spinal Tap - Please continue to post here, I enjoy reading them as they are well thought out and appreciated.
Whether you want it to be or not, Iraq is a litmus test for our enemies. It is simplistic and stupid to think you can separate the "war on terror" and our staying in Iraq until the Iraqis can stabilize their situation and take over their own security.
The democratic party still does not have a successful plan to deal with our national security needs and terrorism. I was suprised to recently hear former General Wesley Clark give the usual blather about moral authority, diplomacy, and NATO. The rest of the world will only become ready to do what is necessary when our potential losses will be substantial or a true horror has occured. Bush, the chimp, gets it. Our smarter dems, don't. |
Bob K
Supporter
Username: Bobk
Post Number: 12379
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 6:22 pm: |
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You can't trust Sununu, after all he is Lebanese. Same with Ashid's anti-American testimony last week. These friggin' Lebanese are everywhere.
Joel, hate to break this to you, but I will give you long odds that "our pres." as you put it didn't come up with the term "Islamic fascism". That one is pure Rove.
The war against "terrorism" isn't going well, so now we will fight "fascists". Remember WWII. |
Ender
Citizen
Username: Enderw
Post Number: 93
Registered: 4-2006
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 6:27 pm: |
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I can see why there was so much lib support during the day - all of them are home not working.. |
tulip
Citizen
Username: Braveheart
Post Number: 3822
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 6:56 pm: |
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If you are calling me a lib, you are wrong in your assumption. If I'd not been at work, I would have responded quicker to some of the jabs from dranove. |
anon
Supporter
Username: Anon
Post Number: 2948
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 8:38 pm: |
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fixing our health care system, upgrading our schools, and rebuilding our aging infrastructure."
How terrifying that must be to our enemies.
Frankly, I can't think of a better way to fight America's enemies then by making America stronger. |
Southerner
Citizen
Username: Southerner
Post Number: 1441
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Friday, August 11, 2006 - 8:39 pm: |
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Dear American Friend,
Let me introduce myself. My name is Barrister Tunde Kasume and I represent a prominent Nigerian family in Lagos. Most recently, my clients have uncovered a plot by the criminal Nigerian government to loot their coffers of their amassed fortune. My clients have asked me, Barrister Tunde Kasume, to find a trustworthy American friend who would help out their family in their dire time of need. You being an exemplary American citizen are the type of person we would be willing to compensate handsomely for your help in this matter.
Currently, my clients have put in an undisclosed escrow account the sum of
USD $232,000,000.00. My clients are looking for a willing partner to transfer these monies into an American bank. Once this transfer is complete and the USD$232,000,000.0 is safely in an American bank we would reward you handsomely with a sum of USD$32,000,000.00.
My clients have authorized me, Barrister Tunde Kasume, to arrange this wire transfer. Please help this family in their time of need. Without your assistance, this god fearing Christian Nigerian family could be slaughtered at the hand of the corrupt Nigerian government.
Please respond immediately and you will be blessed with gratitude and rewarded handsomely. I await your response. If you do not respond I, Barrister Tunde Kasume, will have to find another partner in this transaction and reward them with what could be yours, USD$232,000,000.00. |
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