I really wasn’t getting that deep with my analogy, I just grabbed prostitution off the top of my head, any crime probably would have worked. The reason I used another crime (Rolex watches) is because he was brutally abusing the people of Iraq, plenty of reason for Clinton to invade Serbia. So he wasn’t crimeless, it wasn’t like we were invading Kuwait.

There was quite a lot of evidence of UN bribery scandal, the Bush administration chose not to make too big of a deal of it so as to not drive a further wedge between us. This was probably a good choice, not one I would have made, but that is probably why I’m not in public office. Sadam had, as I’ve stated, enough yellow cake to make between 1 and 6 bombs the size of the nukes we dropped on Japan at the end of the war.

Lastly, I think the 600,000 figure is totally ridiculous, the government is somewhat tight lipped about the enemy body count, not wanting to be compared to Viet Nam. From reports of battles in Iraq I have heard, it seems we have are killing the enemy at about a 10 to 1 ratio, this would be on a historical par with the Pacific theater in WWII and the Vietnam war. This would mean we have killed around 35,000 enemy, and I would think it would be reasonable to think we may have killed as many as 3000 civilians as collateral damage. How many civilians the enemy has targeted or killed as collateral damage, I don’t know. But I don’t think it is any where near 600k. I’ve heard similar figures from more reputable and sane sources.

I would agree that sometimes you can be vindicated for taking an action even when the original reasons for your actions are wrong. But if the original reasons are based on forgeries and fraud, you are still guilty of forgery and fraud.

In your analogy, what did the “knockoff Rolex watches” refer to? In other words, what crimes of Saddam were discovered in place of the WMD after the invasion?

You also allude to security council members taking bribes. I presume you are referring to the UN Oil bribes scandal? I followed it close enough to realize that by all appearances it was a Republican (Rovian? Boltonian?) smear campaign to discredit the UN, and the one part that I did follow closely (the slanderous and politically motivated attacks on George Galloway) has resulted in the complete vindication of Galloway. It’s only purpose was to discredit the UN, slander Galloway and disrupt his effectiveness in championing the rights of the downtrodden for quite a while. Don’t want to debate that, just wanted to voice my objection to the US attacks on the UN being brought into the fray.

You stated, “I don’t know why Sadam didn’t let the inspectors do their jobs,” We probably wouldn’t agree on which of many explanations are most plausible but we should at least understand the range of possibilities. I will be bold and declare that the main reason (after ten years of sanctions and being bullied by the Americans and much of the world and perhaps even a feeling of betrayal about what he perceived as a US okay for him to invade Kuwait) for messing with the UN inspectors was mostly an issue of pride.

Also, isn’t it a stretch to compare prostitution with the manufacture of WMD’s? To make prostitution in your analogy house you assume ample supplies of supple young women; but, to make WMD you need the materials to develop the WMD which the UN sanctions prevented from being supplied. The analogy falls flat there. It would fit better if you had said that the Madam was suspected of operating a house of ill repute using critical ill old ladies from a leper colony. And that my friend is pathetic.

Analogy or not, what’s wrong with this picture? Everything. We are discussing the merits of monstrous weapons to dispose of a single man, or a single regime, without even considering the colossal and horrendous impact on the lives of millions of people that result from such actions (internal British Giovernment documents have recently been leaked that support the Lancet’s (?) estimate of 655,000 Iraqi deaths up to 2006 resulting from the 2003 invasion, 605,000 or so from violent causes).

Thinking that all out war is justified to depose a regime belongs in the distant past history of humankind, not in what are supposed to be more enlightened times.

A few years back a Republican running for governor in Colorado refused to debate the Democrat because he said the Democrat was a ‘masterdebater’, I voted Democrat that year.

The New Pearl Harbor, a devastating book with detailed footnotes which systematically presents a powerful account questioning the official story of 9/11.

Following the publication of the government’s 9/11 Commission Report, Prof. Griffin published a second compelling book, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, which convincingly deconstructs the official story presented in the report. He shows, among many other things, that the executive director of the Commission was strongly biased in support of the secrecy desired by the White House. Prof. Griffins’ two books have sold over 100,000 copies both in the US and abroad. They have been translated into several languages, and have convinced many key people of the need for a truly independent investigation into that fateful day.

This is also a good place to start learning about the 911 issue (less entertaining but higher quality info than Loose Change):

http://www.wanttoknow.info/911information#911summaries

May peace be with you.

I’ll look into “Blink” as well (I just finished “tipping point”, which was not nearly as good as Freakonomics)

Once upon a time (for all good fairy tales start in this manner), there was a sleazy brutal Madam who happened to sit on a prime piece of real estate with significant quantities of black gold beneath her property. This Madam (Iraq) was in a blood feud with the crazy religious nutjob Madam (Iran) across the street and this feud had left millions dead. The cop (the US) had played both sides to get what he wanted. The cop and his pals gave intell, money and arms, both conventional and WMD to the crazy Iraqi Madam, while also selling the crazy Iranian Madam arms to retrieve some Johns who had been held hostage when the crazy Madam deposed the previous owner, a slightly less crazy, but equally brutal Madam (the Shah) installed by the cop and his ninja friend (the CIA).

Well one day (long after the two battered Madams made a uneasy truce) the Iraqi Madam decides she is going to forcibly annex the smaller whore house to the south (Kuwait) and does so. This whore house also sits on a huge deposit of oil and is run by a disreputable Madam as well (ok, not as brutal as the other two madams, but damn close). Another enormous whore house to the south (Saudi Arabia) fears that their property is next and calls the cop (who has visited the Saudi Madam many times for, um, er, tea?) and pleads for help. Seeing as how the cop depends upon the Madams to fuel the gloabl economy with cheap whoopie (oil), the cop leaps to the defense of the Saudi Madam. The cop uses his hoarded wealth of influence and global power to cobble together a broad coalition of neighbors that promptly throws the Iraqi Madam out of the Kuwaiti Madam’s house and gives her a sound beating (unfortunately leaving her most hardened criminal hookers alive - the Rethuglican Guard). The Madam is nearly toppled by her own people/hookers, but the cop does nothing to intervene while the Iraqi Madam brutally suppresses this rebellion. The cop rationalizes that if the Iraqi Madam falls, then the Iranian Madam will emerge triumphant.

The world community imposes severe sanctions, imposes inspections, and destroys the vast majority of the Madam’s secret arsenal of hairspray, emery boards and other WMDs, none of which every took a single cop’s life or even threatened their friends friends (shout out to the totally innocent and completely blameless Israelis). The crazy Iraqi Madam pretended to have lots of this stuff to aggravate her watchers and actively planned on making more of these things when she got a chance. Note that the cop has about 6000 vans stuffed with WMDs but hasn’t used them since he subdued the crazy imperialist Geishas 50 years before the time of our story. The world imposes a no hooker zone in the north and south and the Iraqis there go about trying to get on with their lives. The Madam can still drive through their towns, but is reduced to a shadow of her former viciousness (but still plenty crazy).

Fast forward 10 years or so. The Iraqi Madam is much the worse for the intervening time. While she lends token financial support for crazy terrorist Madams in Palestine, her ability to threaten others is a neighborhood joke. Her adoption of Islam while continuing to a be a toothless Madam is also a laughable sop to other crazy hookers/Madams. Unfortunately an even crazier set of a splinter group (that the cops actually helped out in the 80s fighting a corrupt and domineering rent-a-cop who we’ll call the Soviets) launches a suicide hooker attack on the cop’s biggest city and their military industrial complex HQ. The attack is an amazing, unprecedented, highly suspicious success. All the normal defenses somehow did not work and the hookers manage to kill 3000 cops. Note that 30,000 cops die in their cars every year - cars fueled by the Madam’s #1 export product.

This makes the cop very very angry. And the rest of the world very very sad and angry as well. The cop gathers his best SWAT team and proceeds to remove the crazy Madam who harbored the crazy splinter group and soundly defeats them. Unfortunately the cop seems to think the better of putting an end to the craziest of these Madams career, and lets Osama slink off to the border between the Afghan Madam’s dilapidated hut and the crowded house of ill repute next door (Pakistan and the surprisingly reasonable Madam who seized power there a few years back). The cop makes a truce with the Pakistani Madam and then promptly forgets about the whole thing. Even tho these are the creeps who killed 3000 cops and the top cop (w) vowed to hunt down and kill.

Instead the top cop pulls out of Afghanistan and decides it is time to seize the opportunity (new pearl harbor anyone?) and settle scores with the Iraqi Madam (incidentally seizing her property and considerable oil wealth). The cop goes back over his files and trumps up all the hearsay, fabrications and downright lies he has ever heard (many of them easily googled as outright fibs) and justifies ignoring the health inspectors who claim with pretty unimpeachable certainty that the Madam is a toothless old bag after we have had our way with her for over a decade. Ignoring the pleas of the neighbors (google the coalition from GW1 vs GW2, w’s coalition of the willing [and easily bribed] is a sad joke), the cop gathers some friends and a few thugs and breaks into the Madam’s house and smashes it to pieces. The Iraqi Madam is eventually lynched on a Shiite holy day by a bunch of vigilante hookers. No WMDs are ever found.

The justification for the break in changes with the wind, but finally settles on a liberation and democratization of the Madam’s hookers (who are split into three camps, the Kurds, who loves servicing the cop and his friends, the Sunnis, who hate the cop and want him out of their house of ill repute, and the Shiites, who hate the cop almost as much as the Iranian Madam next door [who cleverly plays all these groups off one another]). Meanwhile the Osama Madam survives, plans additional criminal acts but hasn’t been able to do much more than become a rallying point for additional crazies stirred up by the cop’s heavy handed smashing of everything in his path toward global hegemony (and ‘peace’).

Fast forward four or five years. More than 3000 of the cop’s loyal soldiers have been killed in Iraq, with tens of thousands wounded. The cop is revealed to be a mendacious twit, clearly a sock puppet for the powerful oil and gas industry (not to mention the billions in graft to ‘defense’ contractors - or the billions in lost/misplaced Iraq reconstruction/war fighting moneys). The cop refuses to face reality and despite the downward plunge in the cop and his nation’s fortunes, stubbornly sticks to his guns (guns and more guns). No WMDs are ever found. Afghanistan is increasingly lawless and the former Madam and her cohorts are back on the scene (because they never really left). Globally, terrorism is up nearly 7X, but the cop refuses to look reality in the eye and say “ooops”

No WMDs are ever found. Heck of a job, bushie!

gosh this was fun!
thanks for the amusing analogy shcb

and I will add my prayers that TV’s operation goes well (just as I did the last time)

shcb - You are right that jbc has made some fine posts recently. And it wasn’t a parting shot to say that what affects the US affects Canada, I agree that is a fact.

The motivation of all my posts is for a less violent world for my children and to offer friendly advice to a few Americans here who do not seem to recognize how far they and their country have strayed from the golden path set by their founding fathers. That was foolish of me because one can`t make another hear if they are not ready to listen (jbc is right about that.)

As a rule the result of violence is more violence, despite shcb high school story about the jocks setting the bully straight. Overt or threatened violence usually begets violence, whether as an immediate reprisal or a latent simmering resentment or hatred that rears up years later in more bloodshed.

Ghandi was successful for a reason, and showed the world a better way (not that he was a saint or that India didn`t have massive problems after the British.) Too bad so few have followed.

What I learned here at LIES is that there is a long path for me ahead to embody the teachings of Lao Tse or Sun Tzu. That alone made it all worthwhile.

TV, I applaud your coolness in the discussion and wish you the best.

Countryboy, try not to get into anymore trouble eh.

Hey this has been a blast but I think you all are right, you would have to one masochistic SOB to come to this thread fresh and read the whole thing. Poor Jbc has been putting some good posts out there about the US attorney firings and we have been ignoring them. You will be happy to know I am not all that passionate about this subject and if you don’t mind having an old country boy join you, I promise to try (I sound like a politician now) and not be so damn long winded. I will also try and not steer the subject off course. I will however respond if you guys take a turn to the left. I did purposely steer this one because I felt a little robbed with my discussion with Ymatt on the Dick Cheney’s honor. I can at least let you know what is being said on conservative talk radio since I’m sure you hate listening to Rush as much as I hate listening to Air America.

A few parting shots.

Knarley, in one of your last posts, you said this discussion wasn’t about your country. Your country has always been a good friend and a trusted ally, sure we have our disagreements, but we are proud to have you as neighbors. What happens in Amerika affects Canada.

Thanks again for having me, if I get to be too much trouble ask and I will leave, I don’t want to be where I’m not wanted.

Let’s keep TV and the John Edwards family in our thoughts and prayers.

Short Haired Country Boy

It’s a truism of these online debates that pretty much no one’s mind is ever changed. The participants like to believe that there are lots of lurkers hanging on every word, and deciding how to live their lives on the basis of what they read, but I think that’s actually much more the exception than the rule.

just wondering do you know if anyone else is reading this thread besides you, me, NL, shcb ekidinu p-ethan and tv? I’m thinking it is not worth my time, as I’m not getting paid for this & it’s not my country we’re talking about here anyway.