Raoul's China Saloon (V5.0) Beta
The Bar Room => The BS-Wrestling Pit => Topic started by: Bugalugs on May 02, 2011, 05:55:57 PM
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It's all over the news, the murderous bastard is dead.
:respect: bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc bcbcbcbcbc cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb cbcbcbcbcb :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: :banana: bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz bzbzbzbzbz
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One down and one to go (the other murderous bastard responsible for more than 100,000 Iraqi civilian deaths). And then there's all the Wall-street guys responsible for the world economic crisis that is doing untold destruction. They need to be nailed.
I'm against the death penalty myself, but I'm for a "Crimes Against Humanity Zoo". The perpetrators could be exhibited with informative placards and videos and whatnot about their crimes. I'm not saying cruel and unusual punishment, per se. No water-boarding or anything like that. Shrub can have his Barney. I'd let the Wall Street guys have newspapers, coffee and even bagels (or whatever food people happened to offer to them at the zoo). There would be suitable habitats, or sort of.
Way I see it now we missed out on the Osama bin Laden exhibit, which would have been very popular. He could have been exhibited hiding in a cave! We could have had him and W next to each other with a some sort of speaker in-between so we could watch them "debate." Perhaps there could be schedule boxing bouts if both parties were willing.
Ah, Dick Cheney could be exhibited in an "undisclosed location" underground bunker thing!
It could be so educational and entertaining, too. There could be rides.
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Another one down, I won't lose sleep over the death of these types (Hussein, Ghadaffi when it happens, Hitler, etc)
Unfortunetly, many to go
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About frakkin time. I hope the 47 virgins he's expecting after death are all Lorena Bobbit types.
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The soldiers are going to get the same parade that the Apollo astronoughts received. The marksman responsible will NEVER ever hve to pay for a meal in America for the rest of his life
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Well, at this point we don't know who the soldiers involved were...there are vague refs to "special ops" forces, which could be anything from Navy SEALs to the CIA. None of these guys, especially the latter, tend to ever release names or photos of their operatives. So those most involved may remain in quiet obscurity for quite some time...
But yeah...I hate to celebrate a death, but I'm glad the son-of-a-bitch is gone. Not sure how many details you're getting over there, but they do have Osama's stank-ass carcass in custody and an ironclad DNA-based ID.
It's very late here, but people are going nuts. axaxaxaxax
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I'm sure whoever pulled the trigger and all the others involved will get well-deserved commendations. Due to the possibility of reprisals even years later, I doubt they'll ever officially acknowledge the names of those on the team.
A pity my cuz isn't in the SEALs anymore. He'd either have been on the team or would know who was. Commandos and a firefight sounds a lot more like SEALs - still the top suspects in news reports - or other special ops. The CIA usually prefers either quiet assassinations or raining Hellfire missiles from above. Whoever they were, I'd love to quietly buy a round for all of them.
agagagagag
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Don't worry...the CIA has its own paramilitary special-ops groups as well. aoaoaoaoao
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Hell, I'll even buy a round for the spooks or even those dangerous mercs from Blackwater if it really was them. agagagagag
My money is still on the SEALs - GO NAVY!!! agagagagag
blblblblbl
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The same happens in Italy when a mafia head is brought down. Reprisals to the families of the agents are common.
Please warn all Americans around the world to be a little extra careful. You don't know who's out there. It should be fairly safe for the Yanks in these parts.
The 10th anniversary in a few months will be a step better than the last 9. Many can sleep better now
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The Soylent Corporation has rejected calls to manufacture a special, very limited edition Soylent Bin Laden. The Soylent Corporation never accepts raw ingredients that have been deemed unfit for human consumption.
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Thought we killed that guy a long time ago.
Oh wait, that was Saddam Hussein, the person the American public had been duped into thinking was responsible for 9/11.
I have to say, honestly, I hardly give a bqbqbqbqbq about bin Laden, and I was living in NY when 9/11 happened. I'd rather he were captured and imprisoned along with a host of others.
Osama bin Laden was responsible for @3,000 American lives. Now he's been killed.
Osama bin Laden killed 1.50% as many people as George W. Bush.
George W. Bush and his crew are responsible for @200,000 Iraqi deaths, and Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and Saddam didn't have any weapons of mass destruction, and everyone knew it at the time but just lied about it otherwise there would be no excuse for war. [Note that according to Wikileaks: 104,924 recorded iraqi deaths, including 92,003[5] (or 66,081[6]) civilian deaths.]
What will have me dancing in the streets isn't just another small time bad guy squelched, but when justice is served to the war criminal George W. Bush, because THAT will signify a massive change in society in which the most powerful aren't allowed to get away with everything anymore. That will mean a brighter future for everyone and will convert this cynic into an optimist.
But Osama Bin Laden. He's just a small potato. There are those who have done far, far more harm and evil in this world going free as a bird in Kennebunkport.
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What will have me dancing in the streets isn't just another small time bad guy squelched, but when justice is served to the war criminal George W. Bush, because THAT will signify a massive change in society in which the most powerful aren't allowed to get away with everything anymore.
Really, i think you are giving Bush waaaayyy too much credit. The guy couldn't find his way out of a paperbag, much less intentionally lead the country into war. I don't disagree with you over the injustice of the Bush years, and what has happened, but blaming Bush is like blaming a three-year old. I'd first look to Cheney and go from there.
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What will have me dancing in the streets isn't just another small time bad guy squelched, but when justice is served to the war criminal George W. Bush, because THAT will signify a massive change in society in which the most powerful aren't allowed to get away with everything anymore.
Really, i think you are giving Bush waaaayyy too much credit. The guy couldn't find his way out of a paperbag, much less intentionally lead the country into war. I don't disagree with you over the injustice of the Bush years, and what has happened, but blaming Bush is like blaming a three-year old. I'd first look to Cheney and go from there.
Behind all the war crimes is a kind of stupidity, but, yeah, I'd go along with Bush being the tool or puppet (so is Obama the tool of the banks and military industrial complex…), but he was still the president. Gotta' have some international standards about what constitutes crimes against humanity, and people shouldn't be too powerful or connected to have to answer for their heinous crimes (like banks that are too big to fail, so their execs get record-breaking bonuses after bankrupting the planet).
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Can we please not turn this over into a political or philosophical wrangle just yet?
A lot of people are happy. Let it be.
Meanwhile: they're now saying on MSNBC that Bin Laden has been buried at sea. WTF? mmmmmmmmmm
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Buried at sea? WTF indeed.
When they said that his body was in custody my first thought was that in China they'd totally show pictures on TV to prove it. Don't you think? The Chinese are not squeamish about the dead. Otherwise there are always going to be conspiracy theorists who will say he's not really dead, etc. etc.
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Apparently, or at least they're claiming, that they basically got what they needed and then buried him in accordance with Islamic law. They weren't going to bring him back to The States. Osama was actually killed a few days ago; they're only now revealing it after the DNA confirmation.
It occurs to me that we didn't see images of Saddam Hussein's body for several days after his execution, either...and very few even then. And we don't know how bad Yo'Sama get mess up afta we bust a cap in his ass. So I'm not too concerned just yet.
It's hard to believe they'd fake something like this...too easy to prove it false. I'm fairly convinced he's gone...but I think many here, including me, want to see images of the body.
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Can we please not turn this over into a political or philosophical wrangle just yet?
A lot of people are happy. Let it be.
Meanwhile: they're now saying on MSNBC that Bin Laden has been buried at sea. WTF? mmmmmmmmmm
Oh yeah, that makes sense. Didn't need to go grinding my axes. Here's to one less "major league asshole" in the world. agagagagag
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Not only am I grateful for the obvious reasons, but CNN has stopped talking about the royal wedding for a little while, as well.
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He was buried at sea for a simple reason: any gravesite on land would become a holy shrine to fanatics all over the world. By killing him they have already created a martyr. People better enjoy the jubilation today, because all his warped and twisted followers will use this to stoke the fires...but still, good riddance to an extremely evil man. There seems to be a fake photo of the body circulating the Web. One can't help but think it would have been better if this had never been reported...I mean, this is just the jolt that thousands of Bin Laden devotees would need to strap on the home-made bomb and get on a Metro in rush hour.
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Not only am I grateful for the obvious reasons, but CNN has stopped talking about the royal wedding for a little while, as well.
He was probably killed a few days ago while watching the Royal Wedding. Being quite the fan of our royal family in secret (ever since he visited the UK as a teenager), that's how they knew he'd be at home.
You'll see the proof once they release the photos; OBL with his Union Jack bowtie slightly tinged by the explosive. His last words, 'Oh, for ****'s sake, somebody else answer the door, they're about to kiss on the balcony.'
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bkbkbkbkbk
If only they could have killed him a couple of days after Michael Jackson died. ahahahahah
Personally, I'd have run his body (Osama's, not MJ's ahahahahah) and a couple of large pigs through an industrial-sized meat grinder. Set the whole bloody mess on a remote mountain top and spread chunks of bacon in a 1 km radius around it. Then we could see if his fanatical followers' need to memorialize him could overcome their aversion to pork products or not. uuuuuuuuuu
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Hmmmm, I still believe he either died a very long time ago or that they killed one of his many doubles, triples whatever.....the timing of it all is pretty damn suspicious. Election coming on, Obama's ratings very low, economy literally grinding to a halt. Well, I guess if they could miraculously pull the troops out of Afghanistan AND Iran before year's end it might prop up the economy once again. I sure hope so. I'm tired of seeing the Aussie $ going gangbusters on the US$. No good for my changing RMB!
(Yes, I am thinking about his death in a very personal, selfish way)
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the timing of it all is pretty damn suspicious.
i think the timing was suspicious to the extent that the announcement came at 10.50 ET, right before the end of Celebrity Apprentice on the east coast. I think Obama had the better elimination announcement anyway.
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the timing of it all is pretty damn suspicious.
i think the timing was suspicious to the extent that the announcement came at 10.50 ET, right before the end of Celebrity Apprentice on the east coast. I think Obama had the better elimination announcement anyway.
Osama, you're fired (at)!
LMFAO!!!!!
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How the hell do they know it's him anyway? where did they get the DNA for the testing from ?
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I find it interesting on the timing of this. This is close to election time and this will be played to the hilt to help BHO get reelected. Don't get me wrong. I was not a big fan of Bush. He went into Iraq for no reason whatsoever. He should have gone after Bin Laden in Afghanistan or Pakistan instead. We could have had this celebration a lot sooner!
bhbhbhbhbh
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Can we please not turn this over into a political or philosophical wrangle just yet?
A lot of people are happy. Let it be.
I agree ... and the same goes for conspiracy theories.
I celebrate the elimination of any terrorist and bin Laden epitomised everything abhorrent about terrorism.
There seems to be some confusion in the Saloon over details at this time but from what I can make out from New Zealand news sources:
DAY - TIME PLACE
Osama bin Laden was holed up in a two-storey house 100 yards from a Pakistani military academy when four helicopters carrying US anti-terror forces swooped in the early morning hours of Monday and killed him.
Abbotabad resident Mohammad Haroon Rasheed said the raid happened about 1.15am local time.
BURIAL AT SEA
After bin Laden was killed in a raid by US forces in Pakistan, senior administration officials said the body was handled according to Islamic practice and tradition. That practice calls for the body to be buried within 24 hours, the official said.
Finding a country willing to accept the remains of the world's most wanted terrorist would have been difficult, the official said. So the US decided to bury him at sea.
DNA
The US was conducting DNA tests on bin Laden's body and used facial recognition techniques to help identify him, a US official said.
Bin Laden was identified by the assault force that killed him in a fire fight in Pakistan in which he resisted and was shot in the head, the official said on condition of anonymity.
Results of the DNA tests should be available in the next few days, the official told Reuters.
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Didn't think they took out the Bins on a public holiday........
I'll get my coat.
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Can we please not turn this over into a political or philosophical wrangle just yet?
A lot of people are happy. Let it be.
I agree ... and the same goes for conspiracy theories.
I celebrate the elimination of any terrorist and bin Laden epitomised everything abhorrent about terrorism.
Easier said than done. It's very difficult to take any stance on 9/11 or bin Laden or "terrorism" without making a politically charged remark with wide ranging implications that also smacks of conspiracy.
I'm holding my tongue and letting people enjoy the moment. bhbhbhbhbh
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And now President Karzai is having a field day:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2011/05/02/afghanistan-osama-bin-laden-reaction.html
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I feel like the government has some "conspiracy" law in which they have to intentionally add a strange grey area to a serious issue, and that's why they quickly dumped the body at sea. You know, to give all the conspiracy theorists something to talk about for decades to come! I mean really, it is an american tradition. ahahahahah
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I mean really, it (conspiracy theories) is an american tradition. ahahahahah
Yer damn right it is. There was actually one that had President Johnson killing President Kennedy. I love these. As for the timing, it would have been a whole lot better to "fake" this before last November's election debacle. However, this happened on the 8th anniversary of Bush's "Mission Accomplished" gaffe. It doesn't get much sweeter than that.
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Commandos and a firefight sounds a lot more like SEALs
My money is still on the SEALs - GO NAVY!!!
Said Brennan: "The president had to evaluate the strength of that information, and then made what I believe was one of the most gutsiest calls of any president in recent memory."
Obama tapped two dozen members of the Navy's elite Seal Team Six to carry out a raid with surgical accuracy.
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It is great news that Osama finally got his. Now, I wonder what will come next. The American Embassy has issued warnings for us to be careful when traveling. We are safe in China but I have friends in the Middle East so I do worry about their safety.
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How long before the movie comes out
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Hey Macattack, yeah in the Middle East we are used to these warnings. Don't be too sure,cos Al Qaida got people in London, Madrid and NY and many other locations,they don't care where you are.
Also can't help feeling that if the Israeli army had done him ,they would have been accused of being bloodthirsty cold-blooded murderers etc etc.The scenes of people in Times Square celebrating made me feel a bit uncomfortable, and put me in mind of the Palestinians celebrating on their rooves and showering sweets everywhere on the evening of 9/11.
And,sorry guys but this IS political whichever way you chew it. :wtf:
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And,sorry guys but this IS political whichever way you chew it. :wtf:
Well yes, everything is political. However, some issues are less politically divisive than others. Given the makeup of this forum, the assassination of OBL, though many of us may have reservations on some of the details and nuances, was always likely to be greeted with somewhere between outright joy and vague acceptance. It's a big event, and it's always nice to be able to feel part of a community, especially when most of us are away from home.
But Israel! They had nothing to do with this as far as I know.
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The scenes of people in Times Square celebrating made me feel a bit uncomfortable, and put me in mind of the Palestinians celebrating on their rooves and showering sweets everywhere on the evening of 9/11.
Yup. So long as you eliminate all sense of reason, morality and common sense. Other than that, they are dead ringers for each other.
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These were on sale at a market this morning! Talk about an opportunist!!
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v112/gingermeggs/binladen.jpg)
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ananananan picture wont load.
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Not sure if the moratorium on political discussion is over and if everyone is done celebrating, so I'll just add a quick thought.
# of American troops who have died in the war on Iraq and Afhganistan = 5,885 (and @ 50,000 seriously wounded).
One can hope that with the death of bin Laden we can at least stop sacrificing more American lives because of the @3,000 lost on 9/11.
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Well, I guess if they could miraculously pull the troops out of Afghanistan AND Iran before year's end ...
Ooops! They have no troops in Iran, though they have made various threatening noises.
Iraq is a very different country. Different ethnic group (Iraq is Arab, Iran Persian), different languages, different branches of Islam, ...
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I feel like the government has some "conspiracy" law in which they have to intentionally add a strange grey area to a serious issue, and that's why they quickly dumped the body at sea. You know, to give all the conspiracy theorists something to talk about for decades to come! I mean really, it is an american tradition. ahahahahah
Exactly. I read that this morning and thought, well-played America, well-played. The rationale was that they don't want his tomb being a holy place for people to visit. Also that Islamic tradition dictates that bodies must be washed and buried in 24 hours. So first of all, I don't know why it would be such a huge problem for him to be buried somewhere and people visit his grave. Call me soft on terrorism, but he's dead now. We bury our war dead and we visit their graves. Second, since when did we abide by the rules of Islam in our treatment of captives and prisoners of war? Okay, apparently, the Obama administration has done a better job of not humiliating or torturing prisoners of war. mmmmmmmmmm
Just seems like the Muslim world, not thrilled with us anyway, would understand not be surprised if we kept Bin Laden on ice for a few extra days just to get the proof out there. I didn't sense much gratitude on their part for our conciliatory gesture of chucking him in the ocean, anyway.
USAnians, face the flag, it's face-palm time: 1... 2... 3... blblblblbl bibibibibi bibibibibi bibibibibi blblblblbl
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Hey Macattack, yeah in the Middle East we are used to these warnings. Don't be too sure,cos Al Qaida got people in London, Madrid and NY and many other locations,they don't care where you are.
Also can't help feeling that if the Israeli army had done him ,they would have been accused of being bloodthirsty cold-blooded murderers etc etc.The scenes of people in Times Square celebrating made me feel a bit uncomfortable, and put me in mind of the Palestinians celebrating on their rooves and showering sweets everywhere on the evening of 9/11.
And,sorry guys but this IS political whichever way you chew it. :wtf:
I understand the reservations. Whenever I see people on TV cheering because someone is dead, however horrible their actions, I feel cold. Not so much out of pity for the dead, but for fear of how easily the line in people's minds might be pushed back - one day they're cheering the demise of a mass murderer, but who might it be in future?
The Chinese teacher I was talking to this morning on the bus was ready to believe the conspiracy theories. It's true that the sea burial is odd. It's as if the Obama administration wants the whole deal over as quickly and quietly as possible. Which is sensible, given that antagonizing the Arabs and the Afghans who still remember bin Laden as a hero of the war against Russia is not the best move. But when do politicians do the sensible thing?
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[quote au. It's a big event, and it's always nice to be able to feel part of a community, especially when most of us are away from home.
But Israel! They had nothing to do with this as far as I know.
All I meant,Mr Benn ,is that over here whenever there is a political assassination of a terrorist,one feels condemnation from all sides,but it's all fine for the great big U S of A to do that. We have had various Hamas leaders who masterminded bombings of innocent civilians targeted and it always feels like the rest of the civilized world is not backing the Israeli army's actions when that happens.
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[hope this isn't too political and whatnot, as others are doing it, and I tried to water down my rhetoric a bit.]
I'm torn on conspiracy theories. On the one hand most of them are wacko, and the one financed by Big Oil to convince a mentally lazy population that global warming doesn't exist is criminally wrong. On the other governments and businesses conspire all the time to F over the rest of the population (think Wall Street, or Melamine, or even Operation Iraqi Freedom), and if one suspects wrongdoing one gets labeled a "conspiracy theorist." After Bush stole the 2nd election with chad-less Republican-owned black box voting machines which produced statistically impossible anomalies, anyone who hadn't drunk the Kool-Aid was a "basement blogger" and "conspiracy nut".
As regards Israel and terrorists and who gets killed and who is a "terrorist" and who celebrates, it's all much clearer when one takes out the label "terrorist" and just uses "killer".
I remember very clearly in the run-up to Operation Iraqi Freedom that Donal Rumsfeld was talking about using "Shock and Awe" to devastate Iraq. I imagine there wasn't much difference when the bombs started falling between "terror" and "shock and awe."
Sometimes if I just think of governments as businesses with weapons, massive PR campaigns and false advertising, everything makes sense. If I try to think of it any other way it's extremely confusing, unless of course I drink the Kool-Aid, accept the labels, and see things as Black & White (Us are white and Them is black).
As soon as someone is labeled a "terrorist" they are automatically wrong, even if they are protecting their homeland from an enemy invader. Meanwhile you can drop bombs on people's homes, and you are a "freedom fighter" or a "hero". So I just prefer "killer" or "murderer". And sometimes the bigger murderer kills the smaller murderer and everyone celebrates, rallies around the flag, while meanwhile getting screwed themselves by the big murderer.
I think Colonel Kurtz got it write when he told Captain Willard: "You're an errand boy, sent by grocery clerks....to collect a bill." It's all business, greed and corruption, and vying for power. The leaders are just selfish neighbors with bigger cars wanting more and willing to do whatever it takes to get it.
The old adage "power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely" still seems to ring true.
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agree with 99% of what you said Ben Dan but too knackered to think clearly enough with you to debate the 1% right now.... awawawawaw
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On that note, I think we should put this puppy to bed
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I agree with DD. Ding-dong the horrible man is dead...now on to more pressing things like on-going wars, famine, the undeniable fact that Tinky-Winky is the spawn of the Devil and other important global considerations agagagagag agagagagag
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agree with 99% of what you said Ben Dan but too knackered to think clearly enough with you to debate the 1% right now.... awawawawaw
ah, well, what I wrote was at least 20% bull bqbqbqbqbq (I'm no expert and there's a lot of overstatement and oversimplification in there, and I haven't figured everything out by a long shot) so any small % you caught on to that you disagree with you're probably right about. agagagagag
…And I'm always glad to agree to disagree.
Get your rest and forget about yours truly bfbfbfbfbf
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(http://www.b3tards.com/u/dc3f4e71b87321aaf1c1/head_shot.jpg)
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http://propagandistmag.com/2011/05/02/what-if-osama-bin-laden-had-been-killed-israel (http://propagandistmag.com/2011/05/02/what-if-osama-bin-laden-had-been-killed-israel)
this is pretty much what I meant. Over here,when the IDF kills a terrorist responsible for a terror attack (and by that I mean a person who goes into where innocent people are going about their daily lives) the knee jerk reaction is to condemn it at the UN
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this is pretty much what I meant. Over here,when the IDF kills a terrorist responsible for a terror attack (and by that I mean a person who goes into where innocent people are going about their daily lives) the knee jerk reaction is to condemn it at the UN
This doesn't really add up. Every Presidential candidate puts on a yamaka and proclaims himself to be the staunches backer of Israel in the field. The U.S. has always allied itself with Israel. That position and our quest for oil are the biggest reasons for fundamentalist uprising against the U.S. and, perhaps, 9-11. Yes, there is a backlash against such lock-step policy and with good reason. Israel's occupation of Palestinian lands it the biggest irritant in the Middle East and all countries who support her pay a price for it. It's long past due that this is reassessed.
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I certainly don't support the occupation of the West Bank and I am all in favour of the Palestinian State which will come whether Netanyahu and the Loony Right want it or not.
However, the problem is the Terror attacks started way before 1967
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attacks_against_Israeli_civilians_before_1967 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attacks_against_Israeli_civilians_before_1967).
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Getting back to OBL; yes, the extrajudicial killing was illegal. Perhaps the lack of comdemnation is because
a) it was isolated, though since we (NATO) had a pretty good go at Ghaddafi at the weekend as well, perhaps not that isolated.
b) it serves a purpose. (Of course that's debatable)
The decisions that world leaders have to take are often morally murky. This killing also throws up the issue of information obtained from Gitmo.
There are certainly ethical problems with celebrating the death of a human being, but I just have to accept that on this occasion at least I'm ok with that.
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I'm fairly convinced he's gone...but I think many here, including me, want to see images of the body.
This came up on a local cfcfcfcfcf site...WARNING!!! It IS Graphic aoaoaoaoao aoaoaoaoao aoaoaoaoao aaaaaaaaaa
http://bermudaisanotherworld.org/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=jd5ckrg7tpb1rvtndun9ihue5&topic=3703.msg118803
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Yep, very graphic. aaaaaaaaaa
I think that may be a real pic, but question if it's really Osama and not just someone with a similar face. Unless he's been dying his hair and beard, the corpse seems to have a lot less gray hair than I'd expect.
Some say that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. I disagree. There's a core difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter:
Like any real soldier, any real freedom fighter would primarily go after military and government targets. Civilian casualties could happen, but would be incidental to striking the true target. In a larger real war, crippling industry, communication, and transportation can also happen, but the enemy's military should still remain the primary focus. On the other hand, a terrorist will usually take the coward's way by deliberately going after civilian targets because they are easier to get to and will create more fear in the general public. Terrorists will only rarely go after military targets, both due to the reduced chances of success as well as the fact that the death of a group of professional soldiers won't usually inspire quite the same level of shock and fear as the death of unarmed civilians going about their daily lives. Suicide bombers have even been sometimes targeted children since that would provoke a larger reaction.
Osama was exceptional in that he did go after more military and government targets than the "typical" terrorist, but his deliberate targeting of civilians when he could just as easily had his suicide pilots use something other than planes full of passengers and done the attacks against military bases removes any chance of classifying him as anything but a filthy terrorist scumbag who deserved to be killed a lot sooner.
I hope there's a special place in hell for people like him. tttttttttt
(and that whoever decided to put My Heart Will Go On in every KTV in China ends up in the same place)
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Piglet:
And,sorry guys but this IS political whichever way you chew it. :wtf:
And politics, as JLMrB notes, can be pretty divisive. One reason why I haven't waded into this one yet. I tend to be rather contrarian.
I saw this article in the sports section today. I'm not a big fan of sports writers who think they are qualified to make observations on larger matters, but in this case I'll make an exception.
http://www.thestar.com/article/985026--kelly-it-lessens-us-to-revel-in-bin-laden-s-death#article (http://www.thestar.com/article/985026--kelly-it-lessens-us-to-revel-in-bin-laden-s-death#article)
If you’re going to celebrate a targeted assassination anywhere, a Philadelphia ballpark is probably the right place to do it.
Those fans have a peculiar brand of angry homerism that combines flag-waving nostalgia and distant violence really well.
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If getting rid of Osama was something that would actually effect US foreign policy, would actually put an end to these wars, I feel like it would be something to more or less be happy about. But news outlets seem pretty quick to run stories about who is next in line and why the mission in Afganistan is far from over.
Unfortunately, I feel like the miltary-industrial complex will always be finding excuses to continue to fight wars and victory really can't be defined. If this isn't a victory over terrorism- a point from which things will actually change- I don't really see the reason to celebrate.
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Hey EL, hope you don't mind if I disagree with you on this a bit. You wrote:
Some say that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. I disagree. There's a core difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter:
Like any real soldier, any real freedom fighter would primarily go after military and government targets. Civilian casualties could happen, but would be incidental to striking the true target. In a larger real war, crippling industry, communication, and transportation can also happen, but the enemy's military should still remain the primary focus. On the other hand, a terrorist will usually take the coward's way by deliberately going after civilian targets because they are easier to get to and will create more fear in the general public.
The difference you are addressing seems primarily one of power, not of choice. Who would strap explosives to his or herself with the assured outcome of blowing themselves to pieces if they could just pilot a drone remotely and take out military targets?
Sadly, the desperate resort to desperate measures. Palestinians, for example, don't have tanks or helicopters. I'm fairly confident that if they suddenly found themselves armed with tanks and fighter jets… the "terrorism" would stop.
It strikes me that "terrorism" may, in some instances, just be the way the underdog fights back against a major power, having no other way to fight and nothing left to lose.
As for taking out civilians, in the war on Iraq the number of civilians killed (@100,000) was roughly equal to the number of military. Even though so many civilians were killed in an unnecessary and opportunistic war (significantly the most protested in history, and before it even started), it seems too great a rhetorical leap to see those responsible as "terrorists." This isn't a problem of fact, but of perception.
The real reason, I think, that "terrorists" are so feared is that they actually struck people in America, where we felt we were invulnerable to attack. Even if only 1.5% as many American people were killed as people were subsequently killed by the US in Iraq and Afghanistan, and less than the number of American soldiers also sacrificed in those wars, it's just a question of who killed who, and not even about civilian or military. Further, military personal are people too and the unjustified killing of them is no better than killing civilians. So, if you destroy a country and kill roughly 200,000 of it's people are you a "terrorist"? If not then it's really just a question of who did what to who, and not what they did.
I also think the term "terrorist" is used to not only make people automatically wrong, but to dehumanize and demonize them. For example, the term "Eco terrorism" is used for groups that take matters into their own hands to protect the environment, when it would much more accurately apply to the big polluters who destroy the environment. My concern is that the powerful will be the ones to define their own enemies as "terrorists" while themselves inflicting more terror and devastation on people and the planet.
Just add another example, and that's Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The two bombs combined killed more than 200,000 people in the first few months, more than half of whom were civilian. From what I remember of what I've read, Japan was willing to surrender before than but not to depose it's king, which would make the bombings unnecessary (consider they followed conventional bombing attacks including one on Tokyo that claimed more than 90,000 lives). Terrorist attack or vengeance or just plain old warfare?
If one just looks at the act and the consequences, and not at WHO does them, everything's much clearer. The enemy isn't the person demonized as "terrorist" necessarily, but the act of killing and inflicting terror whoever does it. Osama's guilty of terrorist acts for sure, and so is Bush.
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Terorism:"The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons."
hmmm "unlawful" sez who?
"organized group" as in government?
any thoughts?
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"With regret we have to inform you that your topic - Bin Laden be Dead - has been reported as:
MISSING IN ACTION
Should the Ministry receive any information relevant to your topic you will be informed."
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Terorism:"The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons."
hmmm "unlawful" sez who?
"organized group" as in government?
any thoughts?
In theory a government has the approval of the people whereas terrorists do not
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I think Bin Laden's death will prove a momentous event for a number of reasons.
Some would argue that the
A columnist pointed out that al Qaida has been increasingly marginalized in the Arab world, even among the most alienated countries. Iraqis got sick of the bombings; the Taliban are a purely Afghani entity; Fatah hates Israel and perhaps America, but appreciates Europe's sympathy; and everywhere Arab people are taking to the streets against their own governments. Al Qaida blow people up- everyone's sick of it. Their Islamist revolution is passe.
So when I hear that the nuts are calling for revenge, I fail to find any footage of demonstrations or condemnations... apart from Pakistan, the most embarrassed country in the world right now. Bin Laden, as the writer put it, was already Yesterday's Man, and now he's dead. And they're vowing revenge attacks? They already were; they've been waging a ten year campaign.
President Obama is being feted as a hero; he'll get a few months of public support, and if he can put through a few reforms and get some job creation help form the ecunomy, he may well win reelection. He's now untouchable on his international record; now for the domestic front.
AFGHANISTAN: President Karzai is having a field day. "I TOLD YOU SO!!! I TOLD YOU SO! WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE? TIME TO GO HOME!" And let's think about that: the Taliban just want power within their country. It was said by Obama himself, a YEAR ago, that a political compromise with Taliban elements would be necessary for a permanent peace. So, with the link between Afghanistan and 9/11 now severed...
... why ARE we there? What do we want to achieve?
Finally, the simple act of turning the page can open our eyes to just how much the world has changed in 10 years. How much the issues have changed. How much common consciousness is increasingly NOT being ruled by fear.
Yes, I think Bin Laden's death will yield great things, not because he got justice- although the pigfucker more than deserved it- but because the world, and America most of all, can wake up and start contemplating what kind of century we want to build after a lousy start.
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Hmm...well, if we are going to be all theoretical, has anyone wondered how a crack SEAL team could not shoot the terrorist without killing him and bringing him to trial? I mean, aren't the days of "Dead or Alive - preferred dead" supposed to be over? I am all for killing bad people, especially mass-mudering fanatic douchebags...but still...is it even right for another country to go in to a country and assassinate someone, no matter how bad they are? They did not assassinate Carlos the Jackal, nor Arafat or Gaddhafi, all notorious terrorists before Bin Laden arrived on the scene. I am throroughly over-joyed the man is dead...but it seems to me that SEAL's should be able to subdue an old, weak dialysis patient without using deadly force....who was also unarmed, acording to what I just read...I mean criminals, whether they be car thieves or Peter Kurten are still subject to juris-prudence, aren't they? Saddam, Mussolini, Caucescou (sorry for spelling that one wrong), the top NAZI's, all got a trial....Just questioning the theoretial legality of the action...but don't get me wrong, the man is hopefully frying in a lava-pit.
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al-qaeida were always marginalised. totally agree that he was already over tho.
just a point of fact eric, Gadaffi and Arafat were both recognised leaders so different to bin Laden
I'm really glad that they just offed him, a trial or anything would be a nightmare. I think treating him like a combatant was the right thing to do. I don't know if that's right or wrong morally, just my feelings
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Yees...recognized leaders...so was Saddam, who was not an Al-Qaida supporter nor had MWD's lying around...did not stop them from invading his country and hanging him...
I don't think Osama's demise will change anything...not the wars, not the terror alerts, nothing...Oh, they killed him, but to other terrorists that just makes him a martyr and, oddly enough, the victor...he managed to make America so afraid the President had to sanction a special night-time raid...All around the world little terrorists are jumping up and down pointing at the TV screen plastered with Osama's name saying "I want that too"...Chop the head of a hydra and two more grow out....It's a sad, sad world...
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The reason they didn't bring him to trial was that then they would have tried to kidnap civilians and hold them at ransom in exchange for his release, something we have seen a hell of a lot of over here.That is a situation you don't wanna be in,believe me.
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Worse than that, could you imagine if it turned out like the Barry Bonds fiasco and for SOME reason, he was not convicted?
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Well, wouldn't that exactly have been the problem? OBL master-minded the 9/11 attack, we know that as sure as we know Sichuan food is spicy, but the law pays no mind to what we know, it wants proof. To come up with another example, Charles Manson and his rag-tag group of misfits killed several people, yet Manson is alive and well...From what I understand, because although he was behind the whole thing he never killed anyone himself and therefore could only be charged with conspiracy to murder. I don't think kidnapping civilians and hostages being taken ever entered into the Am Govt mind (they are also rather famous for having a no-negotiation policy with terrorists)..I think the SEAL team was told to shoot to kill no matter what, as a trial could have blown up in their face simply because, even though there is no doubt that OBL master-minded the attack, when it comes to tangible, irrefutable legally admissible evidence to support it, there may be somewhat of a lack. I do hope they do not release any pictures of his dead body. The last thing they should do is create an icon under which his remmaining rag-tag group of severely deluded mis-fits can gather.
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I guess they didn't need to interrogate him for some reason, though they've kept other guys holed up in Guantanamo for a decade. llllllllll I can't figure it out.
Speaking of Manson being still alive, there was only ONE person who's death sentence George W. Bush stopped as Governor of Texas, out of 130 (he commuted it to life imprisonment). That was Henry Lee Lucas, the prolific serial killer who had killed his own mother and violated the corpse, just to get the ball rolling, and is thought to have been involved in more than 300 murders.
If you're going to spare just one person, why does it have to be the most despicable one imaginable. llllllllll I can't figure this one out either.
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/17/Henry_Lee_Lucas.jpg)
Oh well, don't want to get accused of veering from the topic. blblblblbl
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Back to freedom fighter vs terrorist.
I knew a very lovely woman from Pakistan. When she was in high school, she and her classmates were trained to use suicide bombs as part of their formal education. Surprisingly, this wasn't any sort of terrorist training.
The reason: India and Pakistan have these occasional wars. At the time, India had superior numbers of tanks (I haven't checked - no clue which side has more armor now). My friend and her classmates were trained to suicidally blow up enemy tanks. Unlike a simple landmine, this made her and her classmates into "smart" weapons that would be unlikely to damage their own tanks and troops. I think this was a heroically stupid way to plan to fight a war, but would not call the suicidal defense of one's country to be terrorism. Happily, she was never called on to serve her county in this way (would have been a little hard for her to have told me about it after doing it ahahahahah). The last time I heard from her, she had a US Government position in Washington D.C. I guess they never bothered to translate her high school transcripts. ahahahahah
Palestinian terrorists, on the other hand, have been known to heroically go after areas where children are playing. The one time someone in one of their groups strapped on a pair (as opposed to strapping on an explosive vest) and arranged to rub out a high ranking government official, the payback sent the brave terrorist leaders scurrying back to their rat holes to plan heroic attacks on restaurants, shops, and other softer targets.
BTW - There were other reasons for getting rid of Saddam. Just how much of that Oil for Food money went towards big reward payments to the families of those Palestinian suicide bombers while the people of Iraq went hungry?
Osama started out his career in violence as a freedom fighter against the Soviets in Afghanistan. He seemed pretty happy going after military targets then and didn't feel the need to commit mass murder against civilians in Moscow or Leningrad to make his point. Later, Osama's stated goal was the removal of US troops from what he considered to be sacred soil. He did achieve some successful attacks against military targets in the region. For those operations, he wasn't acting as part of any formal government, so couldn't be called a soldier. Still, he was engaging another country's military for a specific purpose, so could, conceivably, have been considered to be a freedom fighter. When he chose to spend his time, energy, and money deliberately going after civilians, that placed him firmly in the category of terrorist.
The only good terrorist is a dead terrorist. Osama was a bad terrorist, but the SEALs made him into a good terrorist. ahahahahah
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Speaking of Manson being still alive, there was only ONE person who's death sentence George W. Bush stopped as Governor of Texas, out of 130 (he commuted it to life imprisonment). That was Henry Lee Lucas, the prolific serial killer who had killed his own mother and violated the corpse, just to get the ball rolling, and is thought to have been involved in more than 300 murders.
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/17/Henry_Lee_Lucas.jpg)
Yes, but does he have a TEFL qualification? Oh, hold on, sorry. Wrong thread.
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Exactly,EL, any person who can train 16 year old Palestinian girls to strap on explosives and walk into a neighbourhood supermarket (NOT in occupied territory) and kill a 16-year old Israeli girl cashier is a very very sick bastard.The problem is that the masterminds and engineers of these deeds get away with it.( and sometimes then become politicians like Mohammed Def and Khaled Mash'al)
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The problem is that the masterminds and engineers of these deeds get away with it.( and sometimes then become politicians like Mohammed Def and Khaled Mash'al)
or Martin McGuinness or Menachem Begin, who were responsible for their own share of disgusting atrocities.
It's not just in the Arab world that terrorists can become politicians. Arabs don't hold the franchise on terrorism as a fast-track political training scheme. Nor would I suggest that terrorists should never be allowed to become politicians or hold political office. I honestly don't know who your 2 guys are. Maybe they're scumbags, but if they're able to deliver peace at some point in the future then a judgement needs to be made about the benefits of peace against the need for justice. Not suggesting that's ever been an easy calculation to make. Not suggesting anyone invites them round for a cuppa this week. Not suggesting that it always works out well.
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Palestinian terrorists, on the other hand, have been known to heroically go after areas where children are playing. The one time someone in one of their groups strapped on a pair (as opposed to strapping on an explosive vest) and arranged to rub out a high ranking government official, the payback sent the brave terrorist leaders scurrying back to their rat holes to plan heroic attacks on restaurants, shops, and other softer targets.
Whether one attacks children with bombs attached to oneself or by shooting them in the head, it's still killing children. Perhaps to the degree that suicide bombers are considered brave by anyone it's because they must sacrifice their own lives in the act, whereas someone who shoots a Palestinian child in the head isn't likely to suffer any injuries. Note that since September 2000 more than 954 Palestinian and 123 Israeli children under the age of 18 have been killed.
From Wikipedia Palestinian Child Casualties during 2000-2004
According to the Defence of Children International (DCI),[17] of the "595 children killed [29 September 2000 to 30 June 2004], 383, or 64.4%, died as a result of Israeli air and ground attacks, during assassination attempts, or when Israeli soldiers opened fire randomly" and "212 children, or 35.6%, died as a result of injuries sustained during clashes with Israeli military forces".[18]
It is estimated that two-thirds of all injuries are to Palestinian minors. The DCI estimates that from the 1 January 2001 until 1 May 2003, at least 4,816 Palestinian children were injured, with the majority of injuries happening as a result of Israeli army activity, and a small fraction of those injuries being at the hands of Israeli settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the majority of these children were killed and injured while going about their normal daily activities, such as going to school, playing, shopping, or simply when in their homes.[19][20]
According to the UNRWA, between August of 1989 and August of 1993, 1,085 people treated in its clinics had been shot in the head, of whom 545 were under the age of sixteen, and of whom 97 were under the age of six.[21] A study by the Association of Israeli and Palestinian Physicians for Human Rights (PHR-Israel) reveals that during five years of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, a child under the age of six was shot in the head every two weeks.[22]
…Amnesty International claimed that the Israeli government used "excessive, disproportionate and reckless force against unarmed Palestinians and in densely populated residential areas", and that such practices "frequently result in the killing and injuring of unarmed civilians, including children."[22]
BTW - There were other reasons for getting rid of Saddam. Just how much of that Oil for Food money went towards big reward payments to the families of those Palestinian suicide bombers while the people of Iraq went hungry?
Hard to argue the people (well @200,000 of them) were better off with violent deaths than going hungry.
The only good terrorist is a dead terrorist. Osama was a bad terrorist, but the SEALs made him into a good terrorist.
I think in a more fair and just world there wouldn't be terrorists to begin with. Did you know that not one of the people responsible for the illegal scams that caused the world economic crisis have spent even one day in jail?
I'm just sayin'
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(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/17/Henry_Lee_Lucas.jpg)
Yes, but does he have a TEFL qualification? Oh, hold on, sorry. Wrong thread.
ahahahahah ahahahahah ahahahahah good one.
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You know what? If the US had just come out and said "We executed him", it seems to me there'd be a hell of a lot less querying the authenticity of the claims. That's an interesting and puzzling idea, and it leads to one asking why they announced his death at all. One wonders what the difference between a successful military action and an execution is anyway. Presumably only the certainty of the outcome. So included in the frame of combat action is an intention to kill? But presumably kill only other combatants. And presumably only for the higher purpose of securing some military objective. So.... this was a military action? A policing action? A murder?
It's a bit bizarre, I guess, but why not just call it a murder? There's something absurd in having so much raw military power and still seeking to humanize it by claiming impersonal, legalistic controls behind its deployment.
Oh wait--
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Palestinian terrorists, on the other hand, have been known to heroically go after areas where children are playing. The one time someone in one of their groups strapped on a pair (as opposed to strapping on an explosive vest) and arranged to rub out a high ranking government official, the payback sent the brave terrorist leaders scurrying back to their rat holes to plan heroic attacks on restaurants, shops, and other softer targets.
Whether one attacks children with bombs attached to oneself or by shooting them in the head, it's still killing children. Perhaps to the degree that suicide bombers are considered brave by anyone it's because they must sacrifice their own lives in the act, whereas someone who shoots a Palestinian child in the head isn't likely to suffer any injuries. Note that since September 2000 more than 954 Palestinian and 123 Israeli children under the age of 18 have been killed.
From Wikipedia Palestinian Child Casualties during 2000-2004
According to the Defence of Children International (DCI),[17] of the "595 children killed [29 September 2000 to 30 June 2004], 383, or 64.4%, died as a result of Israeli air and ground attacks, during assassination attempts, or when Israeli soldiers opened fire randomly" and "212 children, or 35.6%, died as a result of injuries sustained during clashes with Israeli military forces".[18]
Let's see - strap on a bomb and deliberately head to a playground (and be hailed as a hero and your family gets a big fat check from Saddam) vs. collateral damage in military action (if the IDF deliberately targeted children, the could easily kill thousands every week) or during assassination attempts (who was trying to assassinate whom? - if a 17 year old "child" is attacking soldiers in a way likely to cause severe injury or death, there's NO crime in the soldiers shooting him in the face).
Yes, I'm sure some IDF soldiers may have broken the rules. If so, they should be court marshaled and properly punished. On the other hand, anyone encouraging people to deliberately target unarmed civilians (especially children), suicidally or not, should be slowly flayed alive and have their name, picture, and crimes permanently displayed so that others will be warned not to follow a subhuman criminal like that.
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I don't think deliberately killing civilians is THAT different to targeting combatants knowing full well that you will kill civilians.
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No but the problem is when the terrorists use the civilians as human shields knowing full well what will happen. What are you supposed to do,just say "oh well I can't get those terrorists without harming anyone so I will just let them go on doing what they do"
it's an impossible situation imho
I don't think deliberately killing civilians is THAT different to targeting combatants knowing full well that you will kill civilians.
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Well, the way I see it, it pretty much comes down to this: if they do it to us it's "terrorism", and if we do it to them it's "fighting terrorism". I think it's always been that way. Whoever the enemy is isn't human, and their actions are abominable. They're monsters or terrorists or whatever, so it's OK to kill them, and they see us in the same way. That's why we've had names for them like "gook," to dehumanize the enemy.
Only problem is I'm not really clear on who "us" is and who "they" are anymore. I should probably just stick with America being right because I'm an American and that's probably the most convenient answer, and the safest bet in the long run. Even if we are wrong sometimes, it's better to be loyal and stick to one's own, and to be clear on who the enemy is. Not sure where exactly I lost the ball on this, but it's probably not too late to rejoin ranks and fight the bloody terrorist menaces, whoever they are and wherever they are. When it comes right down to it, it's us versus them, and we'd better stick together and @#$% them!
blblblblbl bcbcbcbcbc qqqqqqqqqq
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Well I could go on at length Ben Dan after living in the Middle East for the last 30 years but I am tired and hubby is laying the table for Friday night nosh,so I will shut up.
However it is certainly not true that if they do it it's wrong and if we do it, it's okay. But some countries/groups have a sort of "ethic" and others don't... like I said v complicated.
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I know where you're coming from Ben-Dan. But, getting too far into a theoretical land in which, for example, Bin Laden and Bush are the same is dangerous. They were both reprehensible leaders, but for different reasons. Not everything bad is the same.
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i do think to some extent it is just two sides of the same coin, people have to stand up against it
not me tho, i'll trick someone stupider and better looking than me to sacrifice themself for my belief :D
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I know where you're coming from Ben-Dan. But, getting too far into a theoretical land in which, for example, Bin Laden and Bush are the same is dangerous. They were both reprehensible leaders, but for different reasons. Not everything bad is the same.
Glad everyone could tell my post was a joke, and that I'm really just saying that if it's our team we will find all sorts of rationalizations and justifications for whatever we do, and if it's the other side we will find every way to distort and twist things so they are automatically wrong and more importantly - inhuman.
The killing of Osama, no matter how bad he was, was clearly an assassination. And yet we were first greeted with information of a "fierce fire fight" and "using a human shield," which would make it NOT an assassination. But over the day the story has become that Osama's 29 year old wife merely "lunged" at the armed Navy Seals and so they shot her in the leg and shot Osama in the head. Holy Smoke, if they hadn't shot her she might have, er, scratched one of them, by Gad. Why can't people just admit it was an assassination, for example? [Note: Osama was assassinated in front of his wife and possibly children. A question remains in my mind why barbarism is the response to barbarism. Is greater violence the way to end international terrorism? Couldn't we have set an example by being more humane? The lack of images or video – originally the confrontation was said to have been filmed, and there's a pic of leaders supposedly observing it – may have something to do with it not exactly looking honorable and perhaps being a bit of an embarrassment if you forget for a second that the victim is the devil.]
Yes Bush and Osama aren't the same. Bush wears a suit and tie for instance, and some find his down to Earth lack of interest in the world and befuddlement with the English language comforting. Osama has a long beard and wears entirely different clothing. Personally I don't find him the least bit charming. Bush we might imagine sitting in the White House or tooling around his ranch in a pick-up truck. Osama we might imagine hiding in a dusty cave, and who wants to live like THAT?!
Both of them are responsible for a lot of deaths, but for different reasons. I forget Osama's original rationale, but it had something to do with sanctions in Iraq, US backing Israel in it's conflict with Palestine, and other matters to do with the American involvement in the Middle East. For this reason he plotted to have planes fly into various targets in America. One thing I keep forgetting is that if they were all successful it would have been MUCH worse, and that the Twin Towers weren't the only target. If he were the leader of a country this would obviously be the start of a full on war.
The Bush team's reason for going to war with Iraq and Afghanistan was to fight the bad guys that attacked us on 9/11 and to prevent a "mushroom cloud" terrorist attack in America. Only problem was Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and didn't have weapons of mass destruction (they'd already been cleaned out after the first war with Iraq under Bush Sr.; "Desert Fox" under Bill Clinton, in which 100 cruise missiles were fired at suspected WMD sites; and with subsequent thorough weapons inspections before the latest wave of weapons inspections).
Because it was becoming very clear Iraq had no WMDs one day Bush faced a terrible problem. No WMDs = No War. He tried to say Saddam was hiding WMDs in his palaces, so Saddam let the weapons inspectors in the palaces. Supposed photos of WMDs or manufacturing sites were found to be bogus. So the Bush team came up with a solution = Give Saddam and his sons 2 days to get out of Dodge, or we blow the place to shit.
At this point I was protesting up a storm, along with hundreds of thousands of other American citizens, and people all over the world. We all knew the War on Iraq was completely bogus and a lot of people were going to die. We also knew the risk of terrorist attacks and retaliation would increase. Everywhere people were waving American flags and festooning their homes and cars with them. In New York employers were cynically using 9/11 as an excuse for unnecessary layoffs. The "We Support Our Troops" stickers were plastered everywhere. The irony and hypocrisy in the air could be cut with a chainsaw.
And we learned about the antidote to "terror" = "shock and awe." When it came to frightening people, we could do it better with fighter planes instead of jets, and with bombs instead of kamikaze tactics of making one's plane into a bomb. So we showed the world who was the most powerful and frightening, terrifying if you will.
The death toll began to rise. Now it's over 200,000 Iraqis. This was the solution to 3,000 Americans killed. Attack a country that had nothing to do with it, destroy the country, cause civil unrest [protect only the Ministry of Oil], and murder people by the thousands.
So, I can basically understand why Osama is a monster and why he'd get assassinated [even if it would make much more sense to interrogate him, after all the song and dance about how interrogation is actually necessary to preserve freedom and setting up Guantanamo…], but I can't get why Bush is human and able to freely go about his business. I guess it comes down to the white lie about thinking Saddam had WMDs even though there wasn't a shred of evidence and Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and was cooperating. Even if he really did believe there were WMDs (I find this impossible to believe because I knew from what the weapons inspectors said that there weren't any, and I'm just your average citizen), there was still no justification for a "preemptive strike." If it's just a "white lie" that separates a despicable villain from a goofy savior, perhaps Osama should have said his rationale for attack was he was certain the Bush administration was going to launch an attack on the Muslim world, and he was doing a preemptive strike. Hindsight is always too late.
So, if someone can tell me the real difference between Bush and Osama, I might be less confused. For now I still stick to my old adage, which is that there are just two types of people in the world: people and people. There's no them and us. There's just different bullshit excuses to commit heinous atrocities, and every culture is guilty of them. Some countries, like Cambodia and Germany can't hide from their history, but the rest of us are the same and if we look carefully our history is pretty dark and murky and sinister. And the way out of that is first to admit it.
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No sorry,Ben Dan that is not the situation at all. Bush's "team" (not that I personally can stand the guy) represents democratic systems of government. Bin Laden's "team" is an ideological group called "Al Qaida" whose sole purpose is to wipe off the earth any people who do not accept the Muslim way of life and ideology be they Christians, Jews or Buddhists. Remember the Moors in Spain? That was the same .They call everyone else "kaffar" which means infidels and they are fair game. Remember what the Taliban did in Afghanistan to those magnificent statues of the Buddha? They smashed them up. Why? because it's not their religion.If you listen to the aim of those guys ( and I am not talking about ALL muslims,god forbid) you will see that "tolerance" is not in their lexicon.They feel that if they don't convert everyone their own salvation is in jeopardy. It is their duty to convert us all.They just don't speak the same language as we do in the Judeo-Christian tradition, of live and let live, turn the other cheek etc etc.
They are extremists and would have no qualms shooting any man,woman,child or baby so long as they thought it would further their chances at Heaven,virgins etc etc.
Try reading Ayan Hirsi Ali's book "Infidel" to get to the mindset. It is NOT The same as Bush's liberal Christian democratic understanding of the world.
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Piglet, there are some Christians that also have the mindset that everyone must be converted. Luckily, they don't kill or torture people to do it (unless you count the Jehovah Witnesses or Mormons knocking on your door as torture).
Of course, this was done done in the middle ages but we do grew out of it, I think.
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No sorry,Ben Dan that is not the situation at all. Bush's "team" (not that I personally can stand the guy) represents democratic systems of government.
Having stolen the election (actually I think both of them) Bush's team represents anything but democracy, and it doesn't matter what one is supposed to represent if what they do is needless slaughter.
Bin Laden's "team" is an ideological group called "Al Qaida" whose sole purpose is to wipe off the earth any people who do not accept the Muslim way of life and ideology be they Christians, Jews or Buddhists.
Could this be an oversimplification?! Have you ever read Osama bin Laden's "Letter to America"?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/nov/24/theobserver (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/nov/24/theobserver)
He's compiled a huge list of grievances against America, including some rather surprising ones, such as (xi) You have destroyed nature with your industrial waste and gases more than any other nation in history. Despite this, you refuse to sign the Kyoto agreement so that you can secure the profit of your greedy companies and industries.
But I can't find anything in there about attacking Americans because we aren't Muslim. Maybe I missed it because I did skim over some parts. But, there's far more semi-legitimate sounding grievances there than the Bush squad ever gave for attacking Iraq.
I know Osama's guilty of crimes against humanity, and there are no excuses for that, but I'm just not clever enough or knowledgeable enough myself to see why he's soooo much worse than others who have killed far more people, and consistently for noble sounding causes. Aren't some of the worst atrocities committed under the noblest rhetoric? Certainly Osama, in that letter (which is quite interesting politically), was trying to claim the higher moral ground.
They are extremists and would have no qualms shooting any man,woman,child or baby so long as they thought it would further their chances at Heaven,virgins etc etc.
Actions speak louder than words, and everyone accuses their enemies of having wrong beliefs, vile motives, and being inhuman. The victors in history have the leisure to rewrite history, claim the high moral ground, and promulgate their interpretation of the past. Inevitably the losers will end up the villains, or simply be downplayed.
I assume you are familiar with the genocide of native American Indians on the American continent. Was that turning the other cheek? Our good Christians gave them blankets with small pox in order to kill them. Now, when Osama was killed the Seals sated, "Geronimo E.K.I.A." The Native American community is in an uproar because of the American military using the name "Geronimo" for "Osama." But, the Apache's didn't win and so they can still be demonized in conventional rhetoric.
It's too difficulty for me to unravel whose lies about the other are correct. It's much simpler to look at the results of people's actions. Whoever kills the most people or children cannot be said to value the lives of people and children more. Whoever kills the most people of another religion cannot be said to be the most tolerant.
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Maybe I missed it because I did skim over some parts. But, there's far more semi-legitimate sounding grievances there than the Bush squad ever gave for attacking Iraq.
aaaaaaaaaa
Done with this thread now.
Hard to argue with an emotional response to something. I think you may have misinterpreted the significance I attach to that statement. Any grievances one might have against America does NOT justify a terrorist attack against innocent civilians! Further, one could easily compile a list of grievances against the world's superpower (ex., the world financial crisis), but attack us for other sinister motives. But, if one is going to ascribe a motive to someone for their actions, it is worth looking at their own statement of their own motives. If one is unwilling to do that, it would be difficult to be objectively informed on the topic.
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Starting to feel a bit out on a limb, but, I just ran across an article by Noam Chomsky, in which he says much of the same thing I have. [If you don't know who Chomsky is he's America's greatest linguist, which perhaps enables him to better disentangle political rhetoric, and is Institute Professor emeritus in the MIT Department of Linguistics and Philosophy.]
http://www.guernicamag.com/blog/2652/noam_chomsky_my_reaction_to_os/ (http://www.guernicamag.com/blog/2652/noam_chomsky_my_reaction_to_os/)
Here's an excerpt:
We might ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos landed at George W. Bush’s compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic. Uncontroversially, his crimes vastly exceed bin Laden’s, and he is not a “suspect” but uncontroversially the “decider” who gave the orders to commit the “supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole” (quoting the Nuremberg Tribunal) for which Nazi criminals were hanged: the hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of refugees, destruction of much of the country, the bitter sectarian conflict that has now spread to the rest of the region.
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Not emotional, but immature. I deleted it soon after I wrote it because it was dumb. Suffice to say, I just think there is a lot of context missing from the post I quoted.
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Well Chomsky may indeed be a brilliant linguistic and king of his field,but unfortunately he is far from being an impartial observer, and his politics stink IMHO.
Just because he says something does not make it God's truth. And of course the Christian religion doesn't have a monopoly on morality far from it (Pizarro, conquest of South America if we continue with that) but their record in the modern period is a bit better. I think if you google the Al Qaida stand on Christianity etc you will find that they DO want to eliminate all kaffars. We may like to see them as just "the other side" and as moral as us, but unfortunately it's a whole different mindset (for example Palestinians cheering on their rooves on 9/11)
News items like this one http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2010/November/Al-Qaeda-in-Iraq-Threatens-Attacks-on-Christians-/ (http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2010/November/Al-Qaeda-in-Iraq-Threatens-Attacks-on-Christians-/)are standard fare over here. BTW the Pal Authority has made sure most Christians who used to live in the West Bank have been driven away.And I don't think that trying to convert people by knocking on their door is quite the same as crashing a plane into a building or blowing them up.
http://www.persecution.org/category/countries/middle-east/west-bank-and-gaza/ (http://www.persecution.org/category/countries/middle-east/west-bank-and-gaza/)
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I think Chomsky goes a bit far in that one. For the president of a country there is a cost to not acting as well as acting. American foreign policy has been pretty crappy, and they do have responsibility for a lot of bad, but it tends to be from an arrogance or not caring about others, something which can be fixed with the system. Al Qaeida follows beliefs that cant' be changed because they think it's gods work
They are more like those people in USA who go and murder abortion doctors than corrupt governments. Maybe I'm being a hypocrite but I don't mind them being shot tbh
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Right on Kitano. If anyone really wants to know how different BL's ideology is from ours, in the west you can read this http://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/4f6818d4-232f-4ce5-a2c0-fb9fe9dd2493/World-According-to-Usama-Bin-Laden,-The---Hashim,-
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I think it's worrying that the US projects power. But then, I think it's worrying that any nation does, or any group. But I also think it's a mistake to class all power as fundamentally immoral. It's a fine thing to assert that all people everywhere have only one moral constraint, do no harm. But it's inadequate for describing what humans are and do. Destructive power and constructive power are, well, how does one produce a objective distinction between the two? Both cause change in the environment. Both produce evaluated outcomes, but it is people who do the evaluating. Maybe one could start saying something about whether or not the outcomes are objectively consistent with the environment, but in the environment are evaluated things already, etc and it it gets complex--not unsolvable, but definitely complex.
Now, in a perfect world... and I use that phrase only to point out that given the environment as it exists--we are animals on a physical world--a perfect world is, if it ever exists, a constructed thing. Power was deployed to build it. And since perfection never arrives, true morality is a question of how to understand the deployment of power during construction.
By the bye, utilitarianism is an extreme answer to such questions, and a false one. Something else intervenes to provide more substantial evaluations and make utilitarian answers alone formally inadequate. Therein lies some rub, probably.
So, umm, yeah. There is something available other than mere patriotism if we do want to talk about just how immoral it was to kill a man who did represent quite a number of other people's faith and hope for this world. I don't know what the other thing is though exactly.
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We may like to see them as just "the other side" and as moral as us, but unfortunately it's a whole different mindset (for example Palestinians cheering on their rooves on 9/11)
I don't argue that they are as moral as us, but that we are as immoral as them. There were people cheering and waving flags after the news of Osama's assassination. On both sides we see ordinary people cheering on the evil other being vanquished.
And I don't think that trying to convert people by knocking on their door is quite the same as crashing a plane into a building or blowing them up.
When it comes to blowing people up you can't beat Hiroshima. However one kills people the more dead there are the more serious the slaughter. 200,000 dead is more than 3,000 however you slice it, and whatever spin one puts on it. Those 200,000 Iraqis who were killed weren't killed by knocks on the door.
When one has lived in China for a while one becomes familiar with the hatred of the Japanese. But can I hate the Japanese with them after Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the internment camps? Can I automatically see my own people as the most virtuous when we inflicted genocide on the Native Americans and kept slaves? What people are not guilty of atrocities? As long as we keep telling ourselves that some other people are essentially different, or extremists different from our own extremists, we're going to have to keep on fighting. Other people aren't the enemy, the idea that there are "other people" is the enemy.
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Al Qaeida follows beliefs that cant' be changed because they think it's gods work
Yeah, it's a problem when people start thinking they are doing the work of God. But, unfortunately, we in America had the same lunacy manifest in our sovereign President. Bush was constantly talking about God and the "evil doers" and making everything into a contest between the righteous US and the evil THEM. It was fundamentalism vs. fundamentalism 24/7.
Here's some classic Bush quotes to jog the memory:
“… The war that awaits us will be a monumental struggle of good versus evil… It will be long and dirty… Those who attacked us have chosen their own destruction… Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists… God is on our side… God bless America” [President Bush,
after the attacks of 11th September, 2001].
Someone get me a bucket…
“Anyone who is not with us is against us”; “we know that God is not neutral”; “We are at the start of a military attack which will be very long. Military intervention in Afghanistan is just the start of the war against terror. For many years, and all around the world, we are going to have to fight against evil. It is our mission, and we are sure that we will win” [Bush speaking to the military that were destined for Afghanistan, 21st November 2001].
"God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East. If you help me I will act, and if not, the elections will come and I will have to focus on them."
This crusade, this war on terrorism is going to take a while.
Can't get much more religious than that.
In this corner = Christian Fundamentalism. & in this corner = Islamic Fundamentalism. Are you ready to ruuuuummmmmbleeee?
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When it comes to blowing people up you can't beat Hiroshima. However one kills people the more dead there are the more serious the slaughter. 200,000 dead is more than 3,000 however you slice it, and whatever spin one puts on it.
There is so much more that matters beyond the numbers. So, so much more. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were dying or "disappearing" during Hussein's rule. It is unfair to blame all of those deaths on the US government (there is no possible way to attach them all to Bush as he didn't act alone, our system of checks and balances is nothing like the dictatorship of a international terrorist organization), to assume that 0 Iraqis would have been killed in the past 8 years if we hadn't shown up.
Those 200,000 Iraqis who were killed weren't killed by knocks on the door.
What is your point? That the US (and the UK, and Australian) soldiers in Iraq weren't being guided by manic religious fervor? (Correct). Or that they were
being guided by their religious views, which you believe are not as kind as piglet made out in her post? That is a pretty hefty accusation to make of people who followed the rules of engagement in a legal military operation.
In this corner = Christian Fundamentalism. & in this corner = Islamic Fundamentalism. Are you ready to ruuuuummmmmbleeee?
Again, there is mountains of context missing. If you could line up Islamic Fundametalism ad Christian Fundamentalism in terms of the human rights violations they are currently perpetuating and, most importantly, the POWER each has... well, no way they would be in the same fighting class. Not even close.
If Bush was TRULY the American equivalent of an Islamic fundamentalist leader, there would have been much greater changes made under his leadership... which would still be going on.
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In this corner = Christian Fundamentalism. & in this corner = Islamic Fundamentalism. Are you ready to ruuuuummmmmbleeee?
Again, there is mountains of context missing. If you could line up Islamic Fundametalism ad Christian Fundamentalism in terms of the human rights violations they are currently perpetuating and, most importantly, the POWER each has... well, no way they would be in the same fighting class. Not even close.
"currently", yes. But if you count the Crusades (which in Al Qaeda doctrine are still going on, via US support for Israel), the Inquisition (some historians claim that in the "burning times", the Church murdered 9 million), Oliver Cromwell, the Hundred Year's War, and so on then it is not at all clear.
Some of that is still current, too; the troubles in Ireland are not over and they are at least partly based on religion.
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Right. The current state of things is almost a mirror of what is was previously, what with Europe being mired in the uber-religious, grotesquely unjust dark ages and the Middle East being the center of both scientific development and economic prosperity. But, Bush's (and Falwell's and Robertson's) brand of evangelical protestant fundamentalist Christianity hasn't been around for that long. Neither has Osama's, for that matter. Fundamentalism in both religions is a recent, reactionary thing.
Now, if you were going to line up Christianity and Islam themselves, over the whole history of the world, I bet Christianity is responsible for much more evil. Currently, most of Christianity is much more moderate and modern, which leaves most of the crazies in the Fundamentalist camp, which is relatively powerless.
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There is so much more that matters beyond the numbers. So, so much more. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were dying or "disappearing" during Hussein's rule.
Many of those were children dying because of sanctions which prevented the country from attaining chemicals needed to purify water.
It is unfair to blame all of those deaths on the US government (there is no possible way to attach them all to Bush as he didn't act alone, our system of checks and balances is nothing like the dictatorship of a international terrorist organization), to assume that 0 Iraqis would have been killed in the past 8 years if we hadn't shown up.
That isn't the total number of Iraqis that have died since the invasion, it's the number who died as a direct consequence of it, so, yes we can blame the US government and it's president for the consequences of launching an unnecessary war. The number injured is astronomical. Now, about 100,000 of those dead were civilian. For the civilian part you can check this website: http://www.iraqbodycount.org/ (http://www.iraqbodycount.org/) Here's a site about Wikileaks documentation of the number of Iraqi dead http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wikleaks-dumps-thousands-classified-military-documents/story?id=11949670 (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wikleaks-dumps-thousands-classified-military-documents/story?id=11949670)[/quote] At wikipedia you can see various sources putting the deaths as high as 600,000 to over a million. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War)
What is your point? That the US (and the UK, and Australian) soldiers in Iraq weren't being guided by manic religious fervor? (Correct). Or that they were being guided by their religious views, which you believe are not as kind as piglet made out in her post? That is a pretty hefty accusation to make of people who followed the rules of engagement in a legal military operation.
I'm not sure what your argument is here. Who says it was a "legal military operation"? I believe the logic of the war was if we don't attack them first they'll attack us. Does it matter what the UN says about it? The United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the BBC that the US-led invasion of Iraq was an illegal act that contravened the UN charter.
Again, there is mountains of context missing. If you could line up Islamic Fundametalism ad Christian Fundamentalism in terms of the human rights violations they are currently perpetuating and, most importantly, the POWER each has... well, no way they would be in the same fighting class. Not even close.
I'm not sure what you mean by that or what evidence you have to support your claim. I was pointing out that George W. Bush was also a fundamentalist and invoked the name of God to justify his actions. There's no question about whether Al Qaeda has killed more Christians or the Bush Administration has killed more Muslims (Bush has a smashing victory there), but I don't really think it's about that.
If Bush was TRULY the American equivalent of an Islamic fundamentalist leader, there would have been much greater changes made under his leadership... which would still be going on.
The question isn't really about who is more fundamentalist – you can be a villain without having any religious beliefs – but who caused more damage to the world and who is responsible for more deaths. There's no contest there. Also, he made about as many changes as an under-qualified, fundamentalist, unelected president could have. Obviously taking the country to war was a big change, and they are still going on. American citizen's rights have been diminished with the USA Patriot Act. He made tax cuts for the ultra wealthy. His environmental record is disastrous. The economy tanked… We got Guantanamo…
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Ben Dan I think you are disregarding the fact that the US did not and does not kill people just because they are Muslims and want to make them Christian. They had reason to believe that there was a real threat (and I believe that there still is if we put Iran into the equation) whereas the Muslim extremists (take a look at what is going down in Britain and Europe right now) want to bring Jihad to the countries which have allowed them equal rights and citizenship to install a theocracy there.
In other words they are abusing the democratic system in order to defeat democracy. That's what I find most worrying.
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It's fine to claim that a sizable segment of a group believe something. It's true that on a worldwide scale, many Muslims, when asked for their opinions on certain issues, state beliefs roughly in line with what piglet alledges.
However, it's fallacious to attribute actions solely to individual beliefs. Perhaps Muslim terrorists act from the belief that non-Muslims are somehow less. Perhaps they act from the belief that Israel's crimes against humanity must be avenged. Perhaps neither of these. Let's be honest, it's probably a mixture of lots of non-unified beliefs.
The same goes for Bush. Did he act out of Christian fundamentalism, a wish to make his pals rich, greed for oil, racism, political ideology or a wish to protect the american people? You may not think that all of those things were factors. He'd be one messed up hombre if they were, but I think his actions had a mixture of beliefs behind them.
I'm no fan of Islam, and like Piglet I find the beliefs of around half the Muslims in the world deeply worrying. But I'm also aware that nearly all Muslims believe in Family, giving to the poor and submission to what they believe to be the morally correct way of living.
So Piglet, I'm happy to take you on in a hatred of Islam pissing contest any time you like, but I have a question. Do you think that Arabs, because of their culture, religion, history, actions and beliefs are basically 'less' than what what you seem to perceive as civilised people?
I've got to tell you, I don't. It's not that I'm a cultural relativist that thinks that all cultures are equal. I teach Cultural Communiation, and frankly I think my British culture's a lot better than China's. But believing that an entire race or culture is somehow less, like African slaves and aboriginal groups, is very dangerous, albeit very convenient if you've taken a fancy to where they're living.
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Far from it mate I have nothing against Arabs as a whole and indeed,as the saying goes" some of my best friends... etc " (true!)My son was at a TED event in Ramallah last week and was sitting tweeting to me from there with his hi-techy lovely Palestinian and Jordanian friends who are all lovely modern upstanding people and so forth.
But it is the Fundamentalist loonies on both sides who piss me off mightily (not to say scare me to death pretty often over here) but the loonies of the Christian variety don't tend to slaughter the others nowadays off their own bat (and don't say Torquemada again). It is not written into their creed that in order to get complete salvation etc etc they have to blow up heathens. And they really believe that,it's not a metaphor or anything.Fortunately there aren't any other religions out there right now which feel they have to forcibly convert others or they will be damned. The Christians AFAIK do it rather politely, the Buddhist certainly, no clue about all the smaller ones,Jews postively discourage new members from joining up and give them a hell's own job to be let in.
It's the whole idea of "my religion is the right one and the rest of you are damned" which I can't stand.(seeing as they are all bunk in my book)
"So Piglet, I'm happy to take you on in a hatred of Islam pissing contest any time you like, but I have a question. Do you think that Arabs, because of their culture, religion, history, actions and beliefs are basically 'less' than what what you seem to perceive as civilised people? "
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Ben Dan I think you are disregarding the fact that the US did not and does not kill people just because they are Muslims and want to make them Christian.
Of course American didn't go to war to convert Muslims to Christianity. Are you saying that Al Qaeda attacked America on 9/11 just because most Americans aren't Muslims and they wanted to convert us?!
I was comparing bin Laden and Bush as war criminals, and pointing out the irony that Bush is not even, as Chomsky put it, a "suspect," despite killing more than 100,000 Iraqis in a war the Secretary-General of the UN called "illegal". Their motives and ideologies are important, but not as important as their actions and the result of their actions.
Another way to put it is that Osama had no justification for killing 3,000 Americans, and Bush had no justification for killing somewhere between 100,000 and a million Iraqis. Both of them had reasons or excuses, but neither claimed it was primarily for religious reasons.
They are both mass murderers.
At this point I think some of us are just circling each other making the same arguments over and over, and we're not going to come to any agreement.
I propose we agree to disagree.
cheers agagagagag
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Fine and it's your round ahahahahah agagagagag
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Heard a funny joke about a week after this happened. Next time you are in a bar (English speaking that is) ask for a Bin Laden. When the bartender gives you a puzzled look and asks, "What's that?" there is a simple reply. Just give him a wink and say, "Two shots and a splash."
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Heard a funny joke about a week after this happened. Next time you are in a bar (English speaking that is) ask for a Bin Laden. When the bartender gives you a puzzled look and asks, "What's that?" there is a simple reply. Just give him a wink and say, "Two shots and a splash."
LMFAO!
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A taxi driver here in Shandong province told me the other day that Bin Laden is his hero aoaoaoaoao
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in my opinion there is nothing wrong with any of the world religions. they all come from the same source. All of their books encourage a life full of respect and appreciation for the diversity of belief. Its the followers of these religions that whip up sentiments of an ill nature and lead the 'sheep like' followers into wrong doings. Most people dont actually take responsibility for their beliefs - they tend to cherry pick the good bits and turn a blind eye to the other obligations and some just follow a belief because their parents do. How daft, blind and non thinking is that!. If they truly had a 'search for the truth' attitude then they will see their belief for what it is and try to live that life and not only abhor the extremists in their faith but work to educating them to the true exhortations of the founder of their religion.
I lived in israel in my early twenties for a while and experienced the hatred towards certain groups by fundamentalists. A sad thing indeed. Then in 1984 i experienced a gun battle at the negev desert in the south of israel. saw the hatred in the faces of the army towards the palestinians. years later it seems not a lot has changed. But then the world has become more global in its mentality. I was talking to a guy in the city who runs a factory. he told me many companies are now moving to vietman as its getting uneconomical to set up shop in China. so we now have chinese companies manufacturing in Vietnam to appease the chinese market. Man! how quick things change. in a few decades we can see in china a move from poverty to boom to struggling. compare that to my country the uk where the manufacturing age spawned in the mid 1800's had its heyday and was around the 1980's where its muscles seemed to weaken. thats a big difference from a mere few decades seen here.
my waffle halts as coffee is required - and a smoke.