Who's the LEAST evil of the Democratic candidates?

Oh, and I also enjoy telling people to shut up.

Discuss.

I dont usually go around telling people to shut up but "I dont vote" is a HUGE button of mine.

I know MJ, I was just keeping everything light hartead to keep this from becoming a flamewar

Misnomer, explain to me the point of voting when none of the canidates are somone who I wish to be incharge of my government.

Lets ignore for the moment such aspects as the electoral collage and other reasons that my vote dosn't count.

Explain to me, please, how voting is linked to complaining, and how not engaging in the former means that you can't do the latter?

Now, maybe if, in choosing not to vote, one were simultaneously freed from their obligations to live according to the law, then you can logically claim that one, upon not voting, has no further say in the wheelings and dealings of a democratic system they have withdrawn from.

That, obviously, is not the case. Whether you vote or not, you are subject to the laws and the whims of those who are elected, which is to say, your freedoms are still restricted by the powers-that-be, so, I say, bitch all you want. Would you argue that those living subject to an authoritarian regime have no right to voice their opinions or to object to how they're governed? Of course not. It's public discourse, divorced and independent from the specific mechanism through which we elect our representatives.

And the way we manage the electoral college in this country is problematic. Since most states are winner-takes-all states, and the number of electoral votes themselves are partially tied to the number of Senators each state has (which is two regardless of population), the electoral college as it is currently designed does not ensure the "one man, one vote" ideal in any meaningful way; indeed, it makes it easier to win with less of the vote, as we've so famously seen in our recent history. Besides which, it significantly curtails the development of third parties, which means that we have even less power to make our specific concerns heard in Washington.

Now, if everyone who is disinclined to vote would only go out there and build the grassroots community networks we need to overpower the big-money politics which has dominated our system -- then we might be getting somewhere.

If someone who wasn't into voting did this then yes, they should feel free complain away.

Someone who doesnt like the status quo yet does nothing to change it *should* in my opinion NOT complain because they didn't take any steps to do anything about the state of affairs they are complaining about.

Its like a person who complains about how miserable they are at their job. If you hate it, either take measures to try and improve the situation or quit. If you don't want to do either of those things, but would rather just complain about it year after year then NO. I don't want to hear it. This is where I am inclined to tell someone to just shut up already.

I'd also like to point out that people aren't often of the inclination to listen to me so there you have it.

What you're assuming, Misnomer, is that the public discourse itself has no meaningful role to play in democracy. The opposite, actually, is true. We only get to vote for our president once every four years, our senators every six, and then we get to vote on members of the house every two. Our more local elections happen more frequently, but still, our voting is only a snapshot of political opinions among the electorate at a specific time; we spend the rest of our time debating the issues.

Who's to say that complaining itself isn't in its own way an attempt to change the way things are? That you won't convince other people to change their minds? That you won't bring up new issues that no one has ever taken seriously before?

While voting is central to the way our republic works, to pretend that it is the only action of any substance in the process is to ignore a great deal of what happens between the elections, a great deal of relevant substance. I would argue, indeed, that it is more important for a person to voice their opinion publicly than it is to vote, at least with respect to their opinion, because if just one person votes with one opinion, only one vote in favor is cast, but if that one person influences ten others to agree, that's ten other votes that the opinion wouldn't have had before.

This isn't to say that voting is unimportant. It just doesn't behoove anyone to shut out the thoughts of people based on whether they have faith in the way the electoral system works. Let's judge the opinions on their merits and leave the one's voting habits in the polls, where they belong.

As for people complaining about their jobs all year without trying to do anything about it... yeah, that gets on my nerves too.

Phineas, you're clearly part of the crowd who's decided Bush is an immoral/evil/etc man so there's no point in putting up a defense. We could just as easily call the anti-Bush information out there propaganda, but there isn't really a point since everyone has their mind made up already.

The Kerry idiocy isn't based on just one vote, obviously. Kerry IS weak on terror, what is he going to do, go to the UN? I think that's been done (and failed) enough... Or maybe he'd like to "swat flies" and blow up another asprin factory.

The Bush administration hasn't shifted reasons (for Iraq I assume you mean), there has always been more than one. If the media wants to focus on the one which has turned out to be a weak one, oh well. ...This is such a tired argument I don't even have the energy to talk about it anymore.

Can't believe the "Washington Post" is pro-Bush though, that's kind of funny.

LOL, oh oh, i'm lovin it....

I agree too as a republican that Lieberman is a wonderful democrat and I would have thought long and hard before voting Bush if Lieberman had been the candidate.

JV

Yes, very much so, the nation is evenly divided between democrat and republican right now and will be voting party lines more so than in elections of late. the independant group as shrunk to a mere 7% the lowest level in at least 10 years.

JV

you forgot the other flipflop, he voted for the Patriot Act, and now says it is unconstitutional, hmmm should have thought of that when he voted for it eh?

He has voted against CIA spending throughout his career but now says the CIA is underfunded.

About the 87 billion thing, i believe that is where the hilarious quote "I voted for it before I voted against it" quote comes from.

He voted for the war but once it became unpopular within his base he is now against it.

He has proven at least in my mind beyond a reasonable doubt that everything he does is based on political ambition and not deeply held beliefs.

JV

Thank you, JV. That's actually partially what I was looking for, was more evidence as to why Kerry's a flip-flopper. Every where I seemed to look, the people who claimed he flip-flops all the time only cited the vote on $87B. Now, of course, I have to look and find the evidence which backs up what you're saying about him.

As to whether I believe Bush is a stubborn moron, etc., thus making me impervious to reason... Well, please don't believe that, Garaod. I don't happen to hate him, or to think he's evil. I just think he's a bad president, and he's given me plenty of reasons to think so.

And yes, he has shifted numerous times on the war in Iraq. Remember the whole notion of "pre-emptive war?" We were justified in going into Iraq to oust Saddam -- this was our position when Powell went to the UN -- because he had WMDs that he might threaten to use against us. Powell's presentation was intended to provide the evidence that the administration had to that effect.

But now that we've gone in and kicked him out, it's no longer the WMDs that we had to worry about, but WMD-related programs. But those, suddenly, are no longer the issue. It's all about liberating the Iraqi people, right? It's about getting rid of the tyrant.

Which is fine and all -- I'm sure we're not the only ones who wanted him out (which would include the Iraqi people themselves and his neighboring Arab countries) -- except that "removing a tyrant and liberating his people" no longer is a justification for pre-emptive war. We've slid into another justification altogether. And if our main goal was to get rid of a tyrant, our circumventing the UN is no longer justified. Our only reason for circumventing the UN when it didn't support our position was that we needed to protect ourselves from Saddam's potential for mass destruction.

Do you see what I'm getting at? The justification for war with Iraq wasn't motivated by a multitude of reasons that were in effect simultaneously, but by a multitude of reasons which were mutually conflicting on various counts, each of which were brought forward to suit the current political climate.

And Bush has flip-flopped since we began the occupation, as well. There was a time when Bush claimed we would stay in Iraq as long as necessary to establish democracy -- but that's proven unwieldy politically. They realized that maintaining an indefinite military presence in Iraq during an election year would be a potential liability. So now they're all about handing over power on June 30.

You know, for what it's worth, I was for Bush in 2000. I thought Gore was a regular old windbag, and it seemed to me that Bush was right and reasonable. And it isn't Bush that I see as the problem, here in 2004 -- I believe it's the people he's chosen to surround himself with, people who have fed him their own particular version of world history and current politics, who are shaping this administration's policy into a weird contortion of base-pleasing hand-outs. I don't "hate" Bush out of some weird desire to seem counter-culture. He's simply lost my trust. I don't want to see what he can do with another four years.

And JV -- I think you're absolutely right about Kerry. His beliefs are only as deep as politically necessary. But are deeply-held political beliefs really what we want in a president? Do we really want someone in office who will stick to their guns even if evidence comes in which might suggest a change in course?

I cannot think of a single president who's not claimed one thing at one time and then shifted course during their terms. Even Bush has done this. Castigating Kerry for doing so, especially in comparison to the sitting president, is meaningless and buys into this myth that only Bush will be "strong on terror," which is something we (conveniently) have no way to discern on our own -- we can only depend on Cheney, speaking to some FOXNews pundit, to tell us that there's more work to be done and the terrorist threat hasn't passed and yada yada yada...

Great Message,

but Bush's reasons for war do not concern me, I have said from day 1 that I support the war because I do not believe that in this day and age people should be mass murdered.

Simple as that.

As to him flip flopping? No I really don't think so, he had to sell the WMD charge to the UN, only thing he could try and get through there.

I also think that saying if it was a humanitarian effort that going without the UN is wrong is false too. The UN does not have a monopoly on doing whats right (in fact they usually never do it). The major problem with the UN is you have people with motives. France and Germany already had the oil contracts with Iraq and this is why they did not want to go to war. Hell even Kofi Annon is now being investigated for corruption in the Oil for Food Program. Why is the fate of the world in the hands of an organization proven time and time again to be very biased to their own needs?

JV

well since this time around and this day in age, issues are not the problem any longer. and goverment is what defines evil.

so this is how im going to go with this vote.

Definitly going to vote for bush because that other guy is uglier than the monster that has been in my closet for hundreds of years.

and i don't want some ulgy guy representing me on a foriegn affair.

yuick.

Invade Iraq...

1) WMDs - No 100% positives on finding these in Iraq (personally I wonder if any ended up in Syria or some other hiding place), although there is new evidence of his intent and capability in this area (relating to chemical and biological weapons, Iraq did have the facilities suitable to production, it had plans to improve, expand, and even build new facilities). This is according to the director of the new Iraq Survey Group (who took over for David Kay.) Also don't forget that in Sept. 2002 even Democrats were talking about Saddam's WMDs and saying that action needed to be taken.

2) Ties to terror - terrorists took refuge there, World Trade Center '93 bomber took refuge in Iraq (there's also strong evidence that he was in the Iraqi Secret Service), the first bombs dropped in the war were dropped on terror camps in the north (many of these fled to Iran, and are coming back now), Saddam supported suicide bombers in Israel and Hamas, the Bush administration never claimed Saddam was related to 9/11 however it looks like he had many ties to terrorists.

3) Give the UN some credibility - what was it, 17 resolutions, or something like that, which Saddam ignored? Extensive missile programs in direct violation of the sanctions against Iraq (making and hiding these missiles)...not WMDs, but if he's lying about that, what else is he lying about? Saddam lies alot, you can't trust a liar.

4) Humanitarian reasons - lowest priority, but was also mentioned in Bush speeches... mass graves, human shredders, rape rooms, etc. Not much needs to be said about this.

5) To change the face of the Middle East - "plant the seed of Democracy"...of course this one needs more than a year to see if it works, this is the long term goal. Libya has stopped toying with WMDs, Iran has let inspectors in, Pakistan is assisting us much more than they have in the past, Saudi Arabia is tougher on terror, Iran recently said they'd stop building centrifuges, etc.

Even if some of these are discounted entirely (I suppose it's possible that some (not all) may be proved wrong or that new supporting evidence could appear), but it seems like there was more than just "9/11" to prompt an invasion of Iraq to me.

Sorry for hijack of the thread but it's kinda veering already...

Yes, there seems to be evidence that Saddam had the intent to produce those weapons. Whether it had the facilities necessary is debatable -- one man's pharmaceutical factory is another man's biological weapons lab. I can't say that I've encountered any big news about factories that were specifically used to produce anthrax or mustard gas or what have you, but I might have missed it.

However, the existence of intent to produce WMDs -- without the WMDs themselves -- was not a sufficient justification for the way we went to war with Saddam. I'm not suggesting we should have taken a wait-and-see attitude -- I think it can be well argued that Saddam's history demonstrated that he should not be allowed to develop those weapons or to stockpile them. What I am suggesting is that, without the weapons themselves, the threat to our nation was not yet sufficient to justify our just about unilateral invasion of Iraq. If all he had were plans and convertible facilities, the inspection paradigm would have been sufficient to stop him from producing the weapons he couldn't be allowed to have.

This, of course, was exactly what France and much of the rest of the world thought would be the more logical course of action. And there was evidence that Saddam had opened up to an unprecedented degree in cooperating with the inspection crews. True, Blix wasn't exactly the most critical point man you'd like, but it seemed to be working incrementally.

But then we had our trumped-up intelligence as to how Saddam had these weapons -- or, as reported in the UK, that he could bring them to use in 45 minutes -- and was willing to use them. This is the *only* reason that people in this country felt it necessary to invade without broad international support -- it was cast as a matter of pre-emptive self-defense.

Now that we know that it wasn't justifiably in our own defense, revisionists are trying to make it seem as though we only wanted to stop him from planning further developments, that a pre-emptive strike was justified and necessary even before the weapons themselves existed. But the revisionists are wrong, they are lying -- we ought to remember how we felt back then. We believed, and we were *told*, that those weapons existed.

It's a bit like those police shootings where the police shoot up some poor guy because the guy makes a sudden movement or is holding something that looks like a gun. Once the guy is dead, the police discover he's unarmed. We, the public, look on and question the police officers' motives and biases and we ask, "How can we make it so that this doesn't happen again?" while people like Condi Rice say, "Well, he shouldn't have looked like he had a gun if he didn't want to get shot."


Undisputable were Saddam's payments to the families of suicide bombers, as an example. So to say that Saddam wasn't at least a supporter of terrorists would be a lie.

The question, however, is whether Saddam supported al-Qaida, and it was repeatedly claimed that he did. Indeed, after 9/11, this was the first claim our administration made in the way of justification of an Iraq invasion, and was thus the first discarded when the evidence proved insufficient.

Pointing to a time when a terrorist stayed in a hospital in Baghdad or that there was a camp with some ties to al-Qaida in territory not under Saddam's control is not sufficient; it doesn't prove Saddam was in league with al-Qaida. Further, to suggest that Saddam even had any interest in supporting al-Qaida is to suggest the absurd, since Saddam and bin Laden weren't exactly best buds.

And you might argue, "Well, no statesperson should support terrorism," and you'd be right, however our current "war on terror" is not a war on terror in all its forms -- if it were, we'd be doing more to stop the terrorists in Colombia, Chechnya, and even Israel -- but against a specific type of terrorism directed against the US, as perpetrated most famously by al-Qaida. Invading Iraq did nothing to throw al-Qaida off its balance. It did not strike at al-Qaida's core.

Invading Iraq had only peripheral potential benefits for fighting terror. It 1) stopped Saddam's support for the region's anti-Israel groups, and 2) deposed a tyrant who may have directed hatred against him toward the United States. It was, as such, not insignificant in the "war on terror," but it can't be argued that it was a central goal in our long-term attempt to track down al-Qaida.


I don't think anyone was saying that we should just trust Saddam to be nice. Most people agreed that something should have been done after having done nothing since 1998, and we got a lot of support to do so, actually, before we began to beat the war drums and prepared to abandon the UN entirely.

Though to argue that we are "giving the UN credibility" by invading Iraq even after failing to pass a resolution authorizing force is to commit a strange doublespeak. Technically speaking, it would have been giving the UN credibility if we had abided by the failed resolution and found a peaceful alternative. But then we weren't trying to give the UN any credibility anyway. The only thing we were giving credibility to was our threats to use force.

As for the resolutions -- yes, Iraq's violation history is significant -- but Iraq isn't the only country to violate UN resolutions. Israel has, as well, and we might speculate it would have violated many more if it were not for the US's veto, but no one's arguing we invade Israel to enforce the resolutions.

As it is, the UN has no real authority to sanction except through the militaries of constituent members, which really just means some people get the pass to use violence and some don't. I'd like to think that the UN could be reformed to more effectively govern international relations, starting off by getting rid of Security Council vetoes altogether, but realistically speaking I think the UN will always remain a bit of a figurehead taking up some prime real estate in Manhattan.


You'll have to forgive me, as I don't own a TV and thus miss many of Bush's addresses. With things like the State of the Union, I'll read transcripts, but not regular old PR-type stuff.

I can't deny the mass graves, myself. They're there, unfortunately. I'd be most curious to learn whether they were created before the first Iraq war or after, however. If they occurred before, then the massacres such graves hold would have occurred while Iraq was one of our "allies." Which I wouldn't argue implicates us in the deaths, but rather should teach us a lesson about how we choose our allies for the future.

And you're right when you say they were the "lowest priority" before the drum beats for war began, but they've quickly become our only priority. The liberation of the Iraqi people has become our central goal in invading Iraq, seeing as how we've failed to find the WMDs that were so threatening and the terrorist threat in Iraq, such as it is, is too complex to call it "al-Qaida."


You're right, it will take more than a year to work. But we shouldn't pretend like this has been done that frequently in history.

You might cite the success of Japan and Germany after WWII as what's possible, but don't forget that democracy, usually, is only the product of years of struggle and internal debate and politicking. No one liberated the US. No one liberated France. No one liberated the vast number of liberal democracies that currently are trying to shape Iraq now into one in their image. I personally believe that any effective democracy in Iraq will have a face and a flavor all its own, and that our attempts to shape it to suit our long-term (by, for example, protecting the rights of women) and short-term (by, for example, restricting the freedom of expression) goals will only be met by resistance and eventually revolution as the Iraqis either are given or take for themselves the ability to shape their government.

In other words, we need to be as hands-off as possible in Iraq, and I don't think we are at this point. Obviously they need our help to stop the re-emergence of, say, the Baathists, or any other autocratically-minded group, and we should remain until they no longer need us in that respect, but they should be given as much freedom as we can, so that the words and ideas can begin to flow and begin to form a national identity.

As for whether the seed of democracy is "spreading," well, I guess if that's the way you want to see it. I welcome the news of neighboring nations who are putting down their guns in the interest of peace, but let's make no mistake about the fact that they're only doing so because we've threatened the use of force. Right now, in this country, I guess we don't care too much that we're bullying these people around, but it's not like Iran and Libya are enthused about abandoning their only hopes for self-protection against the US.

Actually, if you'd like to look at Iran more closely, the recent resurgence of the conservatives there marks the end of a remarkable opportunity in Iran we had to really help the reformers there gain ground. The reformers had captured a large number of seats in the Parliament and had elected a reformist President -- Mohammad Khatami.

These reformers, while still Islamist, were hoping to curb the powers of the hard-liners so as to help effect more broad reforms of Iranian society. But while they were struggling to do so, the US did nothing. Clinton did very little, and Bush called Iran part of the "axis of evil," notwithstanding the significant differences between Saddam's regime and Kim Jong Il's regime and Iran's. So rather than constructively encouraging the reformers, we've chosen to antagonize the hard-liners, empowering them, until ultimately we threaten to use force to unseat them violently.

We might as well be talking about Iraq and the Kurds and Shiites under Saddam, because we did the same thing with them.

So while I agree that humanity can only benefit from the progress of freedom and democracy across the globe, it cannot be argued that Bush is a visionary in this respect or even that he knows what he's doing. He is not, and he does not. His personal convictions -- appealing to the masses because of their simplicity and stubbornness -- will lead us only into more conflicts and will only exacerbate the terrorists.



Indeed, there was.


An... interesting... choice of words, considering the topic.

Erm, I belive if Liberman got a good look at all aspects of second life it would be on his hit list along with all the other games that arent rated Disney...

I know it's loaded...

Someone wise once said that desire for political office should be an automatic disqualification. That's why I said "least evil."

I might have voted for Bush, but that would mean keeping Asscroft in place. You try to take all our freedoms away, try to ban pornography, etc., you're not getting my vote. The man's just not capable of acting in the best interests of America. I do like aspects of Bush's fiscal policy but... man... whoever wins comes as a package deal. You have to put up with the cabinet and other appointees that person wants to set up, not just them.

I don't like fundamentalists in general, that's another thing Bush and friends have going against them. Many things that they do are going to be filtered through the Bible first.

Oh boy prepare for flaming. Dont you guys know all political conversations on any type of forum end in flames?

Look... I'm more likely to vote conservative or moderate than liberal, but that doesn't mean I have to like all conservatives and moderates. Fact of the matter is this guy is a fundie, and so are some of his closest advisors. I don't think they can be trusted to act in the best interests of the nation.

Wow that's alot of response, I don't want to take long here so I'll try to be less verbose than usual...

WMDs - I think it's a better idea to get rid of someone like Saddam before he's able to create or get WMDs. Waiting and waiting until he's a threat is just the wrong thing to do. I'm not sure what you mean by "the threat to our nation was not yet sufficient", it seems like just a change of words to me.

With the 45-minute-attack thing, yes apparently that was wrong (the whole world was wrong about WMDs, yet only the Bush administration and maybe Tony Blair gets the blame for some reason) but we weren't just afraid that Saddam was going to throw stuff onto the tip of an ICBM and launch it. We were also afraid that he was going to sell the stuff to terrorists. Friends or not with Bin Laden (this fact probably doesn't even matter), Saddam definitely had the will to sell. Maybe the sanctions were the only thing really holding him back, but keeping Iraq cut off from the world forever isn't an option and the UN sanctions weren't exactly perfect.

Ties to terror - I don't think it really matters that Saddam directly supported al-Qaida, leaving them alone is bad enough, and support of other terrorists is bad enough. Obviously we can't go after ALL terrorism in the world (although I'm sure we're doing our best), but we've prioritized the Islamic fundamentalist terror. Sure it's a little selfish since they're the ones targeting us, but should the US really be expected to get involved with Chechnya, for example?

Give the UN some credibility - There are times that the use of force is the only way. The US gave the UN plenty of chances to "join in", but they didn't want to do this. Israel is always brought up when Iraq's violations are pointed out... but this is a different topic and I don't think it makes the Iraqi violations moot. Israel may deserve some critisism, but I see a difference with Israel, Israel's tactics, Israel's motivations and Iraq, Saddam's tactics, and Saddam's motivations. So while I may not agree with everything Israel does, Saddam's violations should definitely be high high priority.

Humanitarian reasons - Obviously I don't think this is now our only priority...

To change the face of the Middle East - I don't think anybody's pretending that it's been done often. Actually nothing quite like this has ever been done. But the only other option is to take the UN/Clinton (not that I blame Clinton) approach and continue to "swat flies". I think this is basically our WWIII, and rather than Britain being the one trying to wake up the world to this new threat, the United States has taken on the role of Britain.

We've given Iraq a "blueprint" for a successful Democracy...and yes, it is designed to be compatible with Mideast culture, but not without making sure the important elements are there. I think woman's rights in the new Iraq are VERY important and cannot be ignored. By limiting women's rights you're cutting off half your country's resources and I think they're better off including women. Anyway, if it's possible to deny one group rights, it's feasible to start denying other group's rights. The "traditional" denial of women's rights in that area doesn't have to exist, shouldn't exist, and will only hold them back in the dark ages.

The fundamentalists in that area are afraid of Iraq's success. If Democracy is able to take route on both sides of Iran, I don't think Iran's government will last long. Obviously this is a long term goal, and we have to stick with this instead of backing out early like we've done in the past. I know we can't just "make" a Democracy in Iraq, but what we've done is give them the blueprint that will enable them to do it themselves. It's just important that we don't leave before they are stable. Handing over power is nothing; we're still not going anywhere.

That's why I'm afraid of people like John Kerry, who is likely to (if not immediately, eventually) cut defense spending, pull troops back, cut intelligence spending, and so on, like Democrats usually do. Bill Clinton's policies overall worked out pretty good during the 90's, but I don't think now is the time to revert into passive mode and start skimping on the defense of the country.

Maybe I'm just more optimistic than you, but I'm just not seeing the same things you say you're seeing. It's been an interesting discussion though, proved the nay sayers wrong when they say "political threads turn into flames".

So much for not being verbose!

Whether Saddam had the WMDs readily at his disposal is a central issue for me because whether he had them ready changes the nature of the threat he posed.

You're right in that someone like Saddam should have been stopped from developing and potentially selling these weapons. But if the weapons did not yet exist, peaceful alternatives existed to stop him from producing them. If they did exist, then we'd have to face the possibility that he would respond to the insistence of inspections, in which case he would pose a threat not only to ourselves, but to the region and the world, so force might then have become necessary.

There is also the issue of ousting the tyrant. I also agree this should have been done -- sooner than it actually happened, but what can you do -- but this is its own issue. As I've said before, Saddam had few allies in the world and I'm sure we could have gotten quite a few countries to help out if we wanted to accomplish that particular goal.

The point is that we could have done what needed to be done in an entirely different way that did not involve burning bridges to the UN and setting back key alliances in the "war on terror." We chose not to because we thought there was an imminent threat in the form of *actual* WMDs pointed either directly at us or indirectly through the hands of terrorists.


That's actually kind of what I was saying. Chechnya isn't central in the US's war of self-defense against al-Qaida, so that's why we don't butt in there; similarly, Iraq wasn't central in much the same way. If any battle against any specific state has proven central in our "war on terror," it has been Afghanistan, for reasons I'm sure you know. Iraq was not inconsequential, but it's not like Saddam was defending and hiding top-level members of al-Qaida. It would have been dangerous (to him) to do so.

For the record, I don't think there's anything selfish about self-defense.

As to whether "leaving them alone is bad enough," well, no, it isn't. Terrorists have been here in this country too, we've let them fly on our planes and crash them into our buildings, but you wouldn't say that the federal aviation authority is a terrorist supporter for this reason, would you? No, you would point to gaps in intelligence and lost leads that could have prevented the tragedy of 9/11.

Saddam and al-Qaida were not allies. Saddam was an evil socialist in al-Qaida's eyes, and they seem to have hated him for much the same reasons they "hate" us. If Saddam was the ruthless tyrant we claim he is, I highly doubt that he would tolerate the presence of al-Qaida members within his country in hopes that they won't attack him but will attack the US and Israel. I think it's much more likely he just didn't know about them. Well, not the ones staying in his hospitals anyway.

And if "leaving them alone is bad enough," well, we'd actually be going into Chechnya and Colombia and Palestine. Arafat'd be dead, Colombia would be burning, and Chechnya would be Yugoslavia all over again. Or at least, we'd be morally compelled to do so.


Well, how one interpret's Israel's actions in Palestine are subject to one's own bias. For my part, I believe that Israel is more than happy to inflict an apartheid-like system upon the Palestinians, forcing them to live in poverty, cutting them off from natural resources, etc. So whether Israel's tactics are fundamentally different than Saddams is... meh... a subject of another thread...

But I think I can at least admit that, while Israel is at least mostly a democracy, Saddam's regime never was, and his actions much more explicitly genocidal than anything Israel's ever tried to do. And it's also clear that sometimes force is necessary.

You might think I'm crazy for saying so, but I wouldn't be surprised if Saddam had eventually allowed himself to leave power peacefully. I didn't used to think so, but if what I've heard is true about him writing romance novels and what have you, I'm sure he would have welcomed a nice anonymous retirement in Argentina or something to a lifetime of conflict and international challenges to his power. I figure he may have felt rather trapped by his previous actions, a tyrant now only because he was a tyrant.

But we might also claim that Saddam was never going to go peacefully, in which case force might have been justified. But, see, the UN said it wasn't -- or at least, it wasn't yet justified. But we invaded anyway. And had it really been our self-defense to do so, I think we'd be justified. But lo, it wasn't really in our self-defense; in the final analysis we just look like we were impatient and didn't want to wait around for the people France to position themselves like they always do, the ever-reluctant imperialists.

I mean, I'm not as pacifist as I often claim. Force is justified in the case of self-defense, regardless of what the UN says. If our self-defense is not an issue, however, if the primary goal is to democratize a tyrannical regime, we had ought to go in there with the moral support of as many people as we can get, since it's going to take their support to give the new regime a head start. In such cases, I think the UN is the only tool currently available to decide whether and how a regime should be overthrown. It's the only place where we have to listen to people who disagree.


Well, when I say it is our "only" priority, I mean, as a priority in the war on Iraq in the first place. It is the only reason for invading Iraq that has had staying power, that keeps us there, this notion of saving the Iraqi people, of liberating them. Every time someone starts whining about WMDs, someone's got a picture of a mass grave to shut them up. I don't think any one seriously thinks we went in for any other reason, any more.

The reason why people like myself keep bringing up those other reasons is because they were there, once, and they took us to war. If we do this again, with another country, can we be assured that we won't discover yet again that our pretenses were false?


Well, I would have liked to say that democracy has never been handed from the top down -- but with Germany and Japan, we seem to have at least some model of a transition into democratic government with some top-heavy direction. To be honest, I don't know enough about WWII history to be able to point out correlations between the Iraqi occupation and the Japanese and German ones. *shrugs*

But there are other options, too. In Iraq, specifically, what I felt should have been done:

1) Immediate military support for the Kurds. The Kurds had been growing their own government under the protection of the northern no-fly zone and had been doing rather well at it. We could have helped guard them, telling Saddam that we would protect them, and that any gesture against them will initiate a war with us. (Thus justifying his ouster if he chose to do so.) After establishing ourselves in Kurd territory, we could have encouraged them to declare independence, thus inspiring the Sunnis and Shiites to petition for -- and ultimately, I would hope, acquire -- our support.

2) In the meantime, heavy-handed inspections. The inspections before the war were making progress, but what we needed were more people and more powers. Eventually we might have expanded the inspections process to ensure that people who needed aid were getting it, maintaining infrastructures, etc.

3) Opening up markets. Iraq was under heavy sanctions, but it is clear now that the only person who seems to have benefited from them was Saddam himself. Not only did his people starve, but it's become apparent that Saddam also plundered what little we gave through the oil-for-food program (is that right? I can't exactly recall). Yet time and time again throughout history has shown that economic liberalization leads to improving living standards for the peoples of nations and ultimately toward liberal democracy. I don't think that particular transition could have occurred in a year or two, but it could have at least been begun and might have begun to bear fruit.

Most of these options include the possibility of force, but only as a last resort. It's not a matter of doing things the way we did and doing nothing at all. Moreover, I think what I've suggested would have home-grown a democracy more suitable to the region and the Iraqi people than anything we could devise or advise for them, what with the success of the Kurds and the possibility of economic vitality. Since none of this would involve imposing US order over Iraqis, I'd bet that we'd have had more support from Arab nations (even if Turkey would withdraw).


I didn't mean to suggest that our long-term goals of women's rights in Iraq were unreasonable. I'm not someone who believes that Iraq is unready for democracy.

My point is that you can't legislate democracy. You can't make people act like they're free. Freedom is something each one of us can have, and it can only be limited by the state. We need to let the Iraqis form their own institutions as much as possible; our only roll in shaping the future Iraq should be in ensuring that autocrats don't take control through force. Everything we do to try to shape Iraq to become a non-theocratic democracy threatens the very foundation of what it means to be free; it means we're telling them, "Yes, it's nice you like that, but you can't have that. You have to have this. And this what it is to be free." It's a hypocritical thing for us to do.

Remember, our constitution has held up wonderfully over the years -- but it was itself the product of individual considerations for an organization of contentious, free-thinking colonialists. Our individual history is to be credited for creating our three branches of government, our two houses of Congress, and so on and on and on. Any democracy suited to Iraq's specific condition must be drawn in a similar way -- by the people, for the people. Bremer needs to spend less time authorizing newspaper licenses and more time defending the infrastructure.


Well, my defense of Kerry, above, was half-hearted at best. I've been thinking about it since our back-and-forth has begun, and I realized I'd have difficulty casting a vote for Kerry come November. I actually probably won't vote for him, as much as I distrust Bush. I'll probably end up voting for some third-party candidate, probably whoever the Libertarians put up.

And I know the people you're talking about, those lunatics who seem to be insisting that we should pull out completely right now. They're just being contrarians, not really thinking beyond trying to find ways to upset their parents and teachers.

I mean, even if the war with Iraq was unjustified, wouldn't it be reasonable to suggest that we have a responsibility to clean up our mess? After we've gone and bombed their infrastructure, that we should stick around and help them get back on their feet? I agree that we should stick around until the "job is done," I just disagree that we're doing it the right way.

As for cutting defense spending -- well, I don't know how much defense spending we actually need. Intelligence is our frontline against terror, of course, but I'm not sure how much good it does to have a bunch of B-52s in the war on terror. The nation's thinking in terms of US hegemony, of how we can keep our place on top, and if that's our goal, then obviously we'll need the most powerful military in the world, but I don't see why that needs to be our goal. In fact, I don't know how we can suppose such a thing is even possible. What unipolar organization of states has proven stable or peaceful? If our goal is to be the most powerful nation indefinitely, we must be willing to commit to a an indefinite war with an indefinite enemy, and I'm not prepared for that. I hope none of us are.

To which you might answer, "Well, the war is already here," to which I would say, well, yes and no. Terrorism didn't start with 9/11, and before then we didn't really consider ourselves at war with al-Qaida or any terrorists in general. We just thought of them as crazy criminals, people to be tracked down and shot down if necessary.

But now we're supposedly at war with them. I don't know. It doesn't seem to me that things are really a lot worse than they were before 9/11, we just notice more now that 9/11's happened to us. I think there are definitely things we can do to track down these criminals more effectively, but do they require rapid increases in defense spending? I would tend to think not. But then I'm not an expert on international terrorist organizations.


Indeed.

I wouldn't describe myself necessarily as "pessimistic." I generally believe that liberal democracy will ultimately prevail in every corner of the globe. I just don't believe that the US is doing its best to bring that future about. Not that it's any fault of our own, we just don't fully understand how to do it yet. I don't think Bush knows what he's doing; I don't think Kerry's got any better ideas. At this point I'd like to chuck them both out and make someone up from scratch.

Someone with ideals cut from the same cloth of the constitution itself. Someone with vision and respect for people who disagree on that vision. Someone who understands the use of force but take great pains to avoid using it.

As for being relatively flame-free... Well, I'm glad for it, too. I don't like political flamewars either. I find them so... unsatisfying.

"Unique among the nations, America recognized the source of our character as being godly and eternal, not being civic and temporal. And because we have understood that our source is eternal, America has been different. We have no king but Jesus." - John Ashcroft

"We are a nation called to defend freedom - a tradition that is not a grant of any government or document but is an endowment from God." - John Ashcroft

So if our rights are an endowment from God I guess we're only allowed the rights God wants us to have. When you have the Attorney General of the United State saying things like the above, you're about one step away from having a Christian Taliban. Ashcroft can't take away your civil rights. He doesn't believe we have any in the first place. These are thoroughly insane, completely dangerous people. They have to go.

WMDs - We may just have to disagree on this one. As Bush has been saying in speeches, I don't think waiting until someone like Saddam IS an imminent threat is a smart thing to do. Everyone--liberals, conservatives, Democrats, Republicans, and other nations--were saying that Saddam had WMDs. The UN had 12 years during which time Saddam played games with inspectors (including kicking them out), ignored 17 UN resolutions, fired at US planes, etc etc etc. I don't think it's possible to work with a guy like that, I really don't. Colin Powell once said "The inspectors are not detectives."-- Saddam was "playing games" with us since the first war; I don't believe he had any plans to cooperate, even Hans Blix (sp?) was frustrated. I recall hearing about Saddam's plans (I believe an Iraqi scientist said this) to work on nuclear research after sanctions were ended...the list goes on.

But worse (I'd have to search to find online sources for this, can't vouch for it's truth atm, but it's from a reliable source), I've heard that Iraqi documents have been found reguarding a deal France had with Iraq. The deal was that France gets oil from Iraq in exchange for stopping the US from invading. If this is true, they *never* would have voted to invade Iraq.

If France is our ally, it sure as heck hasn't been acting like one for quite some time. They did give us that statue, though...

Ties to terror - This (and the above, since none have been found yet) is only about half credible I guess...unless new discoveries come up.

If we knew about them, I find it hard to believe that Saddam didn't know there were terrorists operating in his own country. But unlike the US where terrorists have our freedoms to protect them, Saddam had near absolute power. I think just leaving those camps alone shows a support of them. I believe we know he supported Hamas, which recently even threatened to attack the US after Israel killed their "innocent, disabled" founder. Apparently Saddam had alot of terrorist ties including the link to the 93 Trade Center bombing.

Whatever your view, this stuff sure as heck doesn't help anyone make the case that we shouldn't have gone after Mr. Saddam. When I said "leaving them alone is bad enough" I wasn't talking about the US leaving terrorists alone, I meant Iraq, the Taliban, etc. letting terrorists operate in their country.

Give the UN credibility - Yeah Israel is a whole different topic (actually I think we have about 5 threads in one going here). I'm not going to defend Israel too much here but I think they're mostly trying to protect themselves. As bad as things are there, I don't things would be better if they started eliminating their defenses. And at least Israel tries to be tolerant of Muslim beliefs...if you go over to the Muslim areas there is no such tolerance of Jewish beliefs.

Anyway, I'm off topic.

The UN was being made a fool of by Saddam. Seventeen resolutions over twelve years, plus all the other crap we had to put up with that Saddam was pulling, and so on. We could have waited another five years and just kept trying to work with a guy who had absolutely no intention of working with us (I think that was pretty clear), but I think it would have been a mistake.

Humanitarian reasons - You mean it's the only remaining valid reason to invade Iraq? Or...I may be misunderstanding you, do you mean you don't think anyone believes we went in for a reason other than WMDs? I think what's happening there is we have the media picking out "WMD" and focusing on that, ignoring the other reasons the Bush administration has given. Now that we've been reminded of the other reasons after the WMD one proved a weak reason (still not entirely invalid though IMO), all of the sudden the Bush administration is "shifting" it's position.



Hmm, I'm not sure I understand what you mean here...

To change the face of the Middle East - Interesting opinion, but I can't agree here.

One difference between the Iraqi occupation and the Japanese occupation -- by June 30 they'll be self governing in a *very* short period of time, relatively. I don't know everything about post WWII history either (although I'm a bit of a WWII "buff"...



Ouch...not sure I like that idea, if you mean encourage them to start (or threaten) a civil war. Smells almost like a Richard Clark tactic. We've done stuff like that in the past, probably mostly for Cold War reasons, but crap...it's no good. We used to think that the enemy of our enemy was our friend (oops!), but that was a mistake that is coming back to bite us good. Also, an issue with this is that it'd piss off Turkey, one of our strongest allies in that region which also happens to have much better government system. A rebellion like that would possibly spread into Turkey, and isn't there some Kurds in Iran too?

Heavy handed inspections - I don't see that helping, IMO, since it seems painfully clear that Saddam was determined to fight us on every little thing we wanted from him. The inspectors were not detectives (except maybe Inspector Gadget), and if we have to search a country (bigger than California) for this stuff (while simultaneously having him work against us), we'd never find anything. Heck, I think we're STILL looking through tons of crap there even now.

Opening up markets - I can't be 100% certain of this, but I think this would increase his ability to get the stuff we didn't want him to have. I've been hearing alot about how the UN sanctions/programs were really screwed up bad... But I think the bottom line is that the Iraqi people and economy could never flourish under the dictatorship government they had.

Maybe we can't make people act like they are free. But what I believe is that there isn't a big difference between Iraqis and Americans with respect to what we want. I think most people want to be free, they don't want to have religious extremists telling them how to live, they don't want to be oppressed, etc. My point is that I don't think we need to legislate democracy or freedom, because I think (the majority) of Iraqis want this. We've given them a blueprint for a government which we know works; now it's up to them to mold it in an "Arabic" (lack of better term) style. I don't believe the majority want a theocracy, I think it's only the Al-Sadr's of Iraq that want that. He doesn't have the majority support among Iraqi's...

Some say Bush doesn't have a "vision" for the "new mideast", but I disagree. What we need is a leader who's willing to stay the course and do the right thing. If we can plant Democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan (the first ever in history, in this area), don't you think it will start a domino effect in the long term? Something similar (granted, not identical) happened in America after the American revolution, didn't it?

LESSER evils? Considering that even the most innocent of American politicians have accepted a bribe from someone wanting to overturn laws or dodge restrictions in their favour. Let alone the shear stupidity.

"I think war is a dangerous place."— George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., May 7, 2003

Let's face it... the politicians are highly paid puppets... and the apathy of the population exacerbates the effects. What ever happened to using your own money to travel the country and standing on soap boxes and really winning each vote on your own?