On 24 Sep 2003 00:09:12 GMT, poisoneda****e@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
(PoisonedA****e)
wrote:
>>I think it's kinda funny, how he said that America wouldn't need the UN
to
>>attack Iraq, that he doesn't care about
>>France an Germany and stuff.
>
>We don't need the UN. It would make the war on terror easier and cheaper,
but
>we dont NEED your worthless, so called "help". What the hell has the UN
done
>but sit on their ***** the entire time this has happened. Maybe the
terrorists
>shoulda crashed into your worthless Eiffel tower.
>When it was obvious Sadam needed to be taken out, France and Germany did
>nothing... Well I take that back, they did whine about the weapons
>investigators not having enough time when it was obvious that Hanz Blitz
>couldn't do his freakin job correctly.
>
>>Now YOUR president is going back to the UN and asking FOR HELP!!!
>
>Our president is going back to the UN because there's some hope you guys
are
>worth something to us. If you weren't going to help the fight on terror,
maybe
>now you can help putting Iraq back together... Actually, I shouldn't say
BACK
>together, because it never was together. Maybe France and Germany can
help end
>the tierney that the Iraqis have lived with for their entire lives and
give
>them something they never had... but we don't NEED your help.
>
>Ashley
Tut tut Ashley, we DO need their help. There is no need, or benefit,
in villifying America, the French or the UN. Hurling insults becomes
none of us.
Sadaam was a tyrant (and perhaps still is) and I shed no tears for his
demise. I am an American, and I love my country and I'm proud of it,
not because it is mighty but because it embodies principles that are
decent and good, but America, sadly, does not always practice these
principles. We talk the talk but we don't walk the walk.
We went into this war without counting the cost, the cost in lives,
the cost in allies, the cost in respect and, perhaps most impotantly,
the cost in credibility.
The basis for our actions was/were intelligence re****ts that were, at
best, simply wrong or, at worst, fabrications and deliberate lies.
From an international standpoint it matters little which it was. The
fat, as they say, is in the fire and we must deal with the situation
on the ground, and to do that effectively and efficiently we need the
help and sup****t of the international community. The alternative is a
continuing strain on the economy of America at a time when it is
already severely stressed. The alternative is the collapse of our
volunteer military after repeated prevarications and demands upon its
members. The alternative is a protracted and unwinable 'holy war' with
Islam.
While it makes little difference from an international standpoint, it
makes a great deal of difference from a national standpoint whether it
was mistakes or villainy that brought us to this point.
We, collectively, took Bill Clinton to task when he lied about his ***
life which was none of our business anyway. Wherher or not George Bush
lied to us about im****tant national decisions very much IS our
business as citizens.
We, America, have been blundering about like a giant with a stubbed
toe, not worrying overmuch who we stepped on or continue to step on in
our rage.
What concerns me is the probability that our enemies (and they are MY
enemies, as well, these terrorists) know us better than we know
ourselves. We throw our weight around in the belief that
demonstrations of our power will act as deterrents to those who oppose
us but instead, our enemies delight in our exercise of power and the
alienation of peoples, particularly Muslims, that this exercise
guarantees.
We need to swallow, not our national pride but our national arrogance
and admit that we have a situation that is largely of our own making
and that we now need the help of others to make it right as it can be
made.
It is not the business of America to remake the world in its own image
and we need to be adult enough to recognize that one man's terrorist
is another man's patriot. The revolutionaries in the Colonies were
thought to be terrorists by the British, as were the Jews who created,
rightly or wrongly, the state of Israel
By declaring war on terrorism, we might as well be declaring war on
'evil' and if we, as Americans, are foolish enough to permit the
dismantling of our individual liberties in the name of a declared war
on evil, then we will deserve the police state which will surely
result from that permission, since a war on 'evil' has supposedly been
gouing on since the beginning of time and will, no doubt, continue
till the end of time.
It is time that Americans wake up to reality and deal, realistically,
with existant situations. It is not only possible but likely that the
people of Iraq do not WANT democracy. They are almost exclusively
Muslim and would probably prefer a Muslim state, like Iran, and yet we
have stated, publicly, that we will not permit that. So much for the
will of the people.
So come on Ashley, be proud of America for what it represented and
conbtinues to represent to the world, a nation willing to be friends
with anyone of good will.
In the United States, liberty is declared specifically in its
Constitution for INDIVIDUALS, not for organizations, not for
governmental entities, not for religions and not for the 'majority',
although the 'majority' can sure as hell vote it away!
It is individual liberty that we can take justifiable pride in and
that we can promote, but not dictate, to the rest of the world.
I invite you to engage your intellect and to realize that the
'freedom' that we wor****p has been diluted and restructured to mean
'economic freedom'. and 'religious freedom'. In America you can do
almost anything you want to make money and you can attend any church
that you want but your 'pursuit of happiness' will be curtailed by
majority after majority, responding to this or that fear of things
real or imagined, until "Libertty" will mean only a well ordered and
well choreographed march toward comfort, security and prosperity and
who could possibly want more than that?
Meanwhile, our prison populations will contiue to grow and grow with
people, individuals, that do want more than that but are judged to be
'out of step' with the 'mainstream', whatever that may be, for reaons
that those who 'have theirs' do not, and don't care to, understand.
"I've got mine chum! Just protect my family, my property and my tender
sensibilities frrom all things different or foreign and I will
willingly hand you the keys to the castle".
"After all, America should be for 'real' Americans, not for the filthy
unwashed who can't make the grade! I've got mine!"
Ashley, you seem to be intelligent and I have no wish to be your
enemy, or anyone elses enemy. What I wish for, hope for, want is for
America to actually be what we so proudly declare it to be,
"The land of the free and the home of the brave"
Best wishes, MrO orvillemyers@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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