"Hate Speech" or the Truth?

[treesinger]

And besides that, I'm a believer that the War was primarily about establishing a democracy in the heart of the middle east. But we couldn't just charge in there. And while the hard evidence didn't exist that WMD's really existed, the circumstantial evidence was compelling (per the pre-war intelligence investigation).

Iraq had nothing concretely to do with 9/11, though the base at Salman Pak still leaves some questions to whether or not that is true.

 

[ThAnswr]

I also agree that people who needlessly drive SUV's have no right to complain. I do hope though that you aren't begrudging larger families that need the room (I have a minivan 18-ish mpg) from owning what they need.

Once again, the American people got exactly what they wanted. If the country had followed just some of the energy solutions proposed by the Carter administration, you wouldn't have this dependence on foreign oil.

Instead, the first thing the Reagan administration did was remove the solar panels from the WH roof. The message "real Americans don't use solar power". And didn't Cheney say "conservation is not the answer".

What is the answer........keep drilling. We couldn't drill enough wells to keep up with the demand.

But, the American people bought the bull****, and now you have $2.85 per gallon gasoline (I paid that on Friday), and a looming home heating oil crisis on the horizon. In another month or so, some parts of this country are going to start seeing snow. Just wait until families start getting bills of $500+ per month just to keep warm. The money's got to come from somewhere to pay those bills as not heating your home is not an options. Watch how fast this economy tanks.

But, don't worry, be happy...........Bush has a solution.

Hahahahahahaha.........broke myself up with that one.

Once again, the American people got exactly what they wanted. Now live with it.

 

[peachgirl]

I see a lot of complaining about how the war in Iraq was been mishandled. Point taken. Horse beaten

This is always the last argument the right comes up with and it won't work. You're basically wanting to blame us because you don't think we are coming up with solutions to fix what Bu$h screwed up, therefore we have no right to complain???

Who is it that says you can't make this stuff up?

ThAnswr's post pretty much covers my position as well in regards to solutions for this mess Bu$h had gotten us into.

But we couldn't just charge in there.

So we lied in order to do it?

Btw, as long as the right continues to believe that somehow, somewhere those damn WMD's exist, that despite all the factual evidence that 9/11 and Iraq are somehow magically linked....don't ask us for solutions.

At a 34% aprroval for the handling of the war in Iraq, you're at the base.

If you take Dawn's "stats" as accurate, that 80% of military familes agree with the war, that 60%+ negative rating becomes even more amazing.

 

[Lebjwb]

How about drilling in Alaska? If you own an SUV are you going to give it away? The market will drive the demand for the type of cars Americans are willing to fuel. It happened in the 70's, it will happen again. Soldiers aren't dying for oil so how is giving up SUV's rational? With regard to the soldiers and their families who are deployed and serving in the war on terror. A recent poll determined that 80% support the mission and the president.

A recent poll determined that 80% support the mission and the president.

Really? Back this up with a link or something.

 

[treesinger]

Pardon me, but mishandling a war is not one of those "gee, I'm sorry" situtations. There is no wiping the slate clean.

If you're truly interested in "solutions" the first thing you do is hold those accountable who mishandled this war. And that is one thing the American people failed to do. So basically, you got what you wanted.

There are lots of solutions and ideas out there. The Bush administration, because of their own arrogance in refusing to admit mistakes, isn't listening.

If you want to see solutions offered on this very board, you can do a search and you'll find quite a few solutions offered.

And if you to see a horse that's not only dead, but unrecognizable pulp, try telling Bush he's wrong. The first step in solving a problem is admitting you have one. It isn't going to happen with Bush.

The only way you're going to solve the problems of this mishandled war is to, first, get rid of the biggest impediment to solutions there is, the Bush administration.

I'm not wiping any slate clean. I'm not saying that you shouldn't gather evidence and hold those that you believe have done wrong accountable. That doesn't change the fact that the genie has been out of the bottle for some time now. We can't change what we've done, but we can change what we do. I can't see any better way to do things that what we are already doing. We are being as agressive we can in fighting the terrorists in Iraq without also putting the innocent civilians at undue risk. Military excursions happen all day every day. Checkpoints are established. We are training their police and military as quick as we can, and replacing them as quick as we can when their countrymen blow them up. We are mingling with the families and children and keeping the PR campaign going as well. As a result, Iraqi children even help our soldiers find roadside bombs before they find our soldiers.

My question remains. What should Bush be telling our men and women to do differently? It is an unmistakable sadness that our troops die daily. So should we leave? Should we fortify and forget the patrols and just keep the checkpoints? Should we only concentrate on rebuilding schools rather than hunting terrorists, or vise versa?

I don't see a better way than the flawed way we have now.

 

[treesinger]

Once again, the American people got exactly what they wanted. If the country had followed just some of the energy solutions proposed by the Carter administration, you wouldn't have this dependence on foreign oil.

Instead, the first thing the Reagan administration did was remove the solar panels from the WH roof. The message "real Americans don't use solar power". And didn't Cheney say "conservation is not the answer".

What is the answer........keep drilling. We couldn't drill enough wells to keep up with the demand.

But, the American people bought the bull****, and now you have $2.85 per gallon gasoline (I paid that on Friday), and a looming home heating oil crisis on the horizon. In another month or so, some parts of this country are going to start seeing snow. Just wait until families start getting bills of $500+ per month just to keep warm. The money's got to come from somewhere to pay those bills as not heating your home is not an options. Watch how fast this economy tanks.

But, don't worry, be happy...........Bush has a solution.

Hahahahahahaha.........broke myself up with that one.

Once again, the American people got exactly what they wanted. Now live with it.

You seem to thing that I've drank of the Kool-Aid. I also think that our energy policy stinks and that Bush holding hands with King Saud was an embarrassment. Careful with that broad brush you are painting me with, it covers over some of our agreements.

 

[treesinger]

So we lied in order to do it?

Btw, as long as the right continues to believe that somehow, somewhere those damn WMD's exist, that despite all the factual evidence that 9/11 and Iraq are somehow magically linked....don't ask us for solutions.

Peachgirl, my take on the pre-war intelligence investigation was that it was hard NOT to believe that Saddam didn't have WMD. That's not to say that you would feel the same way after reading it. If you haven't read, I encourage you to. Maybe it won't change your mind, maybe it will a little, or maybe it will make you even more sure that Bush screwed up. Either way, it is essential reading, especially in light of this debate.

 

[treesinger]

Unfortunately, it is time to prep for work. Catcha later?

 

[ThAnswr]

I'm not wiping any slate clean. I'm not saying that you shouldn't gather evidence and hold those that you believe have done wrong accountable. That doesn't change the fact that the genie has been out of the bottle for some time now. We can't change what we've done, but we can change what we do. I can't see any better way to do things that what we are already doing. We are being as agressive we can in fighting the terrorists in Iraq without also putting the innocent civilians at undue risk. Military excursions happen all day every day. Checkpoints are established. We are training their police and military as quick as we can, and replacing them as quick as we can when their countrymen blow them up. We are mingling with the families and children and keeping the PR campaign going as well. As a result, Iraqi children even help our soldiers find roadside bombs before they find our soldiers.

My question remains. What should Bush be telling our men and women to do differently? It is an unmistakable sadness that our troops die daily. So should we leave? Should we fortify and forget the patrols and just keep the checkpoints? Should we only concentrate on rebuilding schools rather than hunting terrorists, or vise versa?

I don't see a better way than the flawed way we have now.

So in other words, you really aren't looking for solutions. You're just here for an intellectual exercise in "maybe's".

Here's a cold dose of reality: Bush isn't going to tell anyone to do anything differently because he doesn't think there's a problem. As long as Bush is president, there will not be any changes. If you want change, get rid of Bush as he is the impediment to change. Accept it and move on.

As far as the intellectual exercise of discussing "solutions", it is about as relevant as discussing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin as long as Bush remains in office.

Solutions have been discussed, ad nauseum, from military experts to politicians to the keyboard jockies here. No one at the WH is listening.

 

[ThAnswr]

You seem to thing that I've drank of the Kool-Aid. I also think that our energy policy stinks and that Bush holding hands with King Saud was an embarrassment. Careful with that broad brush you are painting me with, it covers over some of our agreements.

Did you vote for Bush? If you did, you decided not to hold him accountable for any of the mistakes in the first term and that includes the war in Iraq, energy issues, health care issues, etc.

That is the issue. I read and shake my head at the number of people who somehow thought a 2nd Bush term would be different.

Sorry, my friend, the American people decided not to hold Bush accountable, even though they saw the mistakes. And why should the second Bush term be any different than the first? Last November, the American people told Bush he was doing just fine.

The American people made their choice and now they're going to have to live with it. If you want something different, you're going to have to correct last November's mistake first.

 

[Tigger_Magic]

The American people made their choice and now they're going to have to live with it. If you want something different, you're going to have to correct last November's mistake first.

 

[ThAnswr]

Get your head in the game instead of up your ideological back passage.

What's going on here is a discussion of people who see problems and want solutions.

Try to keep up.

 

[Laugh O. Grams]

My question remains. What should Bush be telling our men and women to do differently? It is an unmistakable sadness that our troops die daily. So should we leave? Should we fortify and forget the patrols and just keep the checkpoints? Should we only concentrate on rebuilding schools rather than hunting terrorists, or vise versa?

I don't see a better way than the flawed way we have now.

I do. Demand that the President create a public report that sets a timetime for our withdrawl. Lets just say we set it for January 2006. I know that the neo-cons say that if we set a deadline, that the terrorists and insurgents will just "wait us out" and that may be true, but it also does two things.

One, it hurts the terrorist organizations ability to recruit. If we set a deadline, the insurgents can not claim that they are fighting a neverending "infidel" occupation and takes away their ability to propagandize our efforts. We are then the "freedom fighters" that many Americans hoped we would be when the war started, and much more palettable for the Iraqi citizens.

Two, it tells the Iraqi people that after January 2006, we will be gone. Later! Hasta la vista! And that just might be enough to get the proud citizens to rally their best and brightest to fight the insurgency on their own. It's time that they begin fighting for themselves. Some of the most recent American deaths, where the Iraqi Security forces that we are working with either did not fight the insurgents and ran or turned on American forces and murdered them in cold blood seem to indicate that "Stay the course" isn't cutting it anymore.

The truth of the matter is that we have destroyed their country. We have bombed it's buildings and highways, killed many civilians, and destroyed Iraqs water and electrical systems, but we have also removed a hated, evil (for lack of a better word) dictator and have given Iraq a chance for self government. At a cost of $1 billion a week to US taxpayers and the lives of the men and women who proudly wear the uniform of the US Armed Services, I'd say we've had enough of this little exersize in futility!

Setting a deadline and withdrawing is the way to go.

 

[peachgirl]

Peachgirl, my take on the pre-war intelligence investigation was that it was hard NOT to believe that Saddam didn't have WMD. to say that you would feel the same way after reading it. If you haven't read, I encourage you to. Maybe it won't change your mind, maybe it will a little, or maybe it will make you even more sure that Bush screwed up. Either way, it is essential reading, especially in light of this debate.

"Twas the Night Before Christmas" makes a pretty compelling argument for the notion that there really is a Santa Claus too.

You might want to watch the CNN program 'Dead Wrong' -- Inside an Intelligence Meltdown". It aired last night, but hopefully they'll repeat it. It's an eye opener for those who don't have theirs permanently glued shut.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/08/19/powell.un/index.html

In one dramatic accusation in his speech, Powell showed slides alleging that Saddam had bioweapons labs mounted on trucks that would be almost impossible to find.

"In fact, Secretary Powell was not told that one of the sources he was given as a source of this information had indeed been flagged by the Defense Intelligence Agency as a liar, a fabricator," says David Kay, who served as the CIA's chief weapons inspector in Iraq after the fall of Saddam. That source, an Iraqi defector who had never been debriefed by the CIA, was known within the intelligence community as "Curveball."

 

[ThAnswr]

I do. Demand that the President create a public report that sets a timetime for our withdrawl. Lets just say we set it for January 2006. I know that the neo-cons say that if we set a deadline, that the terrorists and insurgents will just "wait us out" and that may be true, but it also does two things.

One, it hurts the terrorist organizations ability to recruit. If we set a deadline, the insurgents can not claim that they are fighting a neverending "infidel" occupation and takes away their ability to propagandize our efforts. We are then the "freedom fighters" that many Americans hoped we would be when the war started, and much more palettable for the Iraqi citizens.

Two, it tells the Iraqi people that after January 2006, we will be gone. Later! Hasta la vista! And that just might be enough to get the proud citizens to rally their best and brightest to fight the insurgency on their own. It's time that they begin fighting for themselves. Some of the most recent American deaths, where the Iraqi Security forces that we are working with either did not fight the insurgents and ran or turned on American forces and murdered them in cold blood seem to indicate that "Stay the course" isn't cutting it anymore.

The truth of the matter is that we have destroyed their country. We have bombed it's buildings and highways, killed many civilians, and destroyed Iraqs water and electrical systems, but we have also removed a hated, evil (for lack of a better word) dictator and have given Iraq a chance for self government. At a cost of $1 billion a week to US taxpayers and the lives of the men and women who proudly wear the uniform of the US Armed Services, I'd say we've had enough of this little exersize in futility!

Setting a deadline and withdrawing is the way to go.

ITA!..........but, it isn't going to happen as long as Bush is in office. Lots of solutions and ideas have been floated, but the biggest impediment to any kind of a solution is Bush

I read yesterday that Bush is going to go on a 5-day tour around the country to explain the war in Iraq and the war on terror. I guess Bush gets out of his bubble when the polls start to tank, but I digress. In other words, the only problem the Bush administration sees is that the American people "just don't get it" and Bush has to explain it one more time. It doesn't seem to occur to the Bush administration that they're the ones who don't get it.

Any bets as to whether or not it's going to be any different than the same old/same old in front of handpicked, invitation-only audiences? My guess is nothing's going to change because Bush does not see that there's a problem.

Of course, I could be wrong, and after I pick myself up off the floor and shake off the shock, I'll be the first to admit it.

Nevermind, ain't going to happen.

 

[Tigger_Magic]

Get your head in the game instead of up your ideological back passage.

What's going on here is a discussion of people who see problems and want solutions.

Try to keep up.

"What's going on here is a discussion of people who see problems and want solutions."

Whatever you say. I suppose, in some circles, practicing "Bush loathing" might be considered a "discussion." But to me what you are doing is simply laughable. You continue to run the same tired rhetoric up the same weather-worn flagpole even after people have long ago ceased saluting. You talk a good game about "wanting solutions", but yet offer nothing but complaints. Indeed the extent of your offerings is merely a string of ad hominem attacks.

Admittedly, problems exist. Solutions can be found, but not in practicing fear and loathing of the current administration. That's not a solution, but a strategy for continued failure.

 

[ThAnswr]

"Twas the Night Before Christmas" makes a pretty compelling argument for the notion that there really is a Santa Claus too.

You might want to watch the CNN program 'Dead Wrong' -- Inside an Intelligence Meltdown". It aired last night, but hopefully they'll repeat it. It's an eye opener for those who don't have theirs permanently glued shut.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/08/19/powell.un/index.html

Maybe someone can explain this timeline. In October 2002, after countless speeches and appearances by the Bush administration to peddle the war in Iraq, Congress passes the resolution authorizing Bush to use all necessary force.

On December 21, 2002, George Tenet (then CIA director) presents Bush with the intelligence about Saddam Hussein's WMD's:

"The president, unimpressed by the presentation of satellite photographs and intercepts, pressed Tenet and McLaughlin, saying their information would not "convince Joe Public" and asking Tenet, "This is the best we've got?" Woodward reports".

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/04/18/woodward.book/

I've got a few questions: What the hell was Bush looking at before December 21, 2002 when he described Saddam Hussein as a "grave and gathering danger"? What was anybody looking at if Bush's first words were "This is the best we've got"?

What's wrong with this picture?

 

[Laugh O. Grams]

ITA!..........but, it isn't going to happen as long as Bush is in office. Lots of solutions and ideas have been floated, but the biggest impediment to any kind of a solution is Bush

I hope you're wrong, but as you've stated, he is going on tour to re-explain his reasoning, which, as ever American knows, is "Stay the course". Got it! No more explaination is necessary, Mr. President...Thanks!
My problem is with some of the conservative posters is that they don't seem to pay attention when alternate plans are suggested. They do, however like to continue to parrot the Fox New/Rush Limbaugh point "Well, what plan do the Dems have?!?" I have just offered, IMO, an acceptable alternative. I wonder if it registers or is just ignored.

 

[ThAnswr]

"What's going on here is a discussion of people who see problems and want solutions."

Whatever you say. I suppose, in some circles, practicing "Bush loathing" might be considered a "discussion." But to me what you are doing is simply laughable. You continue to run the same tired rhetoric up the same weather-worn flagpole even after people have long ago ceased saluting. You talk a good game about "wanting solutions", but yet offer nothing but complaints. Indeed the extent of your offerings is merely a string of ad hominem attacks.

Here's your problem: you don't know what you're talking about. I have offered solutions a half dozen times on these very boards the last time being in a discussion with "What The Heck".

Do a little research and engage your brain before opening your mouth and embarassing yourself.

:Admittedly, problems exist. Solutions can be found, but not in practicing fear and loathing of the current administration. That's not a solution, but a strategy for continued failure.

So you think this administration is going to look for solutions? Why?

 

[ThAnswr]

I hope you're wrong, but as you've stated, he is going on tour to re-explain his reasoning, which, as ever American knows, is "Stay the course". Got it! No more explaination is necessary, Mr. President...Thanks!
My problem is with some of the conservative posters is that they don't seem to pay attention when alternate plans are suggested. They do, however like to continue to parrot the Fox New/Rush Limbaugh point "Well, what plan do the Dems have?!?" I have just offered, IMO, an acceptable alternative. I wonder if it registers or is just ignored.

"I wonder if it registers or is just ignored".................good question, but the end result is the same. Sooner or later someone else will come out with the post expressing the thought "no solutions, just complaints".

And we go through the process all over again.

These people redefine "chutzpah" every day. They vote for Bush and then they blame those on the other side of the aisle for not coming up with solutions.

Here's a fresh idea:

If you don't like what's going on, maybe you're voting for the wrong people.