President Bush's Image Improved a Little......
Moms View Message Board: The Kitchen Table (Debating Board): President Bush's Image Improved a Little......
for me when I watched "Nightline" last night. He gave a news conference where he talked about CIA prisons where we have incarcerated the worst of the Al Quieda operatives. They talked about how we "broke" them, and got them to tell us about planned U.S. targets for terrorist attacks. It has probably saved thousands of lives.
I know that we have First Ammendment rights, and we have a free press. However, telling about the prisons, and even the methods we use to break down the prisoners, should be on a "need to know" basis. They did everyhting but tell the enemy WHERE the prisons were.
However, Prez Bush seemed confident and self-assured, and conveyed to the public that we really ARE making headway toward thwarting terrorism, and that it will continue. I felt somewhat comforted in seeing him last night. I would definitely NOT get that same feeling if Kerry were president right now.
I have not been a Bush supporter, tho I voted for him because I didn't want Kerry. I want the war in Iraq to end and the troops to come home. However, we need someone who will be strong against an evil power that wants to destroy our way of life.
I found it interesting that one of the methods that they used to break down prisoners was playing Eminem's "The Real Slim Shady" on a PA system 24 hours a day. One guy only took three days to break. ha ha! It would take even less than that for me! LOL!
I spoke with my Aunt in England last week because it was her 80th birthday. I asked her what the English people thought of President Bush. She said that they don't like him, and they were upset with Prime Minister Tony Blair for allying with Bush. They, too, are against the war, and have had many casualties. She said that he probably wouldn't get re-elected.
Well, I heard on the radio today that Blair is stepping down. I hope that we don't lose England as an ally. The U.S. doesn't have that many friends in the world.
Sometimes doing the right thing is hard, even if you are the only one.
There may have been many mistakes made by the Bush Administration, but one thing is for sure- the terrorists hate us. It doesn't matter why. We don't have the time to figure it out. Terrorism is a cancer that has taken over the Middle East and is growing in other parts of the world. We need a leader who has the determination and the courage to deal with it. So far, Bush has been that leader.
One thing is for sure- there is no negotiating with evil. Everytime good negotiates with evil, evil wins. How do you negotiate with an enemy who wants nothing short of your death?
I am frustrated, too. The war in Iraq has dragged on so long because it is being fought minimally. Kind of reminds me of the Rocky movies. Remember Rocky's strategy? Wear the opponent down, make him tired, and then pour it on for the knock-out. Well, I can't say that we are wearing down the terrorists. New terrorist leaders are contantly stepping up. But I can say that they are wearing us down. It's like we keep trying to stomp out the ants, and they just keep coming back for more.
A victory would be much more certain if the public were behind the effort. But our public isn't. That may be because of the mainstream liberal media's attempts to discredit the Bush Administration at every turn. It may be because we have so few allies in the war. Whatever the reason, I can only pray that God sees us through this. I believe in the war, even in Iraq, and we need all the positive reinforcement we can get. So yes, Bush's speeches have helped, and I hope that the hope in Bush's words is contagious.
I was also encouraged by the interview with Bush. I am very strongly NOT a supporter of him or many of the decisions he's made regarding this war but I do think he made a good impact with this interview. Lisa, I disagree with almost everything you said but it's simply a matter of seeing things from a different perspective, not worthy of debate.
I can tell you that, when I was in London last October, there were soooo many anti-Bush/anti-war demonstrations. He is greatly disliked in England and they aren't the least bit afraid of letting the media there know about it. I do think that England will be much less likely to align themselves with us now that Blair has stepped down. No one else is going to be willing to put themselves up for the type of criticism that Blair has dealt with.
Let's see - President Bush announced the transfer of 14 key terrorist prisoners from the secret CIA prisons that, 6 months ago, the administration said we didn't have.
The Bush administration is proposing a new format for the "tribunals" to try these terrorists, and all four heads of the military legal/justice system say that the key things the Bush administration wants - that defendants not be allowed to see the evidence against them or confront their accusers if the prosecution says "security", that confessions gained by torture be allowed as evidence, to name two - are illegal, counter-productive, and would put our military service members at even greater risk.
Former CIA agents and other members of U.S. intelligence organizations say publicly that (a), they saw torture take place, and (b) that information gained from torture is almost never truthful or reliable.
We have First Amendment rights (thanks to our foresighted founders), but anyone who says we need to start thinking about a time-line for getting out of Iraq is called a "cut and runner", a traitor, giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
Members of this administration - servants of the people - appear before congressional committees and tell members of Congress that they (administration representatives) cannot give information to the committee. Members of the military who do answer questions from Congress are transferred, denied promotion, or otherwise punished.
Oh, and when our President signs a law passed by Congress and he doesn't like parts of it, he writes a "signing statement" saying which parts of it he disagrees with or thinks are unconstitutional. But he hasn't issued one veto yet, hasn't officially told Congress or us what bills or parts of bills he does not want made into law.
In 2003, Michael De Kort, a Lockheed engineer, told Lockheed that Coast Guard security boats "there are blind spots in the boats' video surveillance system, navigation equipment that malfunctions in sub zero weather and a classified communications system that can be tapped by eavesdroppers"; only now is Homeland Security investigating, after he posted a 10-minute video on the internet.
Almost anyone can go into any of our port facilities - there is still no system for registering truck drivers or running security checks on dock workers. Still - after the 9-11 Commission recommendations.
Five years after 9-11, and at least 2 - 3 years after the Commission's report, our first responders still cannot talk to each other in most areas because their communication equipment operates on different frequencies.
Hong Kong scans every container that passes through its ports. We inspect, maybe, 5%. There is no serious mechanism for keeping people from getting off of ships that head for the U.S. coast.
We were at war with the Third Reich from December 11, 1941 to May 7, 1945 - 42 months. We were at war with Japan from December 7, 1941 through September 2, 1945 - 45 months. We invaded Iraq in March of 2003 - 41 months ago.
Osama bin Laden is still leading Al Qaeda, from Pakistan - one of our allies in the "war on terror".
Although several U.S. generals have said that Iraq is on the verge of civil war, the administration says that there is little risk of civil war.
Over 2,600 members of our armed forces have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan - nearly 20,000 have been wounded. Depending on who you believe, somewhere between 40,000 and 45,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed.
We were in a reasonably successful mission in Afghanistan - where bin Laden had been operating - seeking out and capturing or killing terrorists. But troops doing that critical task were pulled out so that we could invade Iraq, because Iraq had "weapons of mass destruction" and was working with terrorist - even though every serious intelligence report said that (a) there were no WMD (and, lo and behold, there truly were no WMD). Every serious intelligence report said that Sadam Hussein was not working with terrorists and, in fact, his government (as terrible as it was, I agree) would not work with terrorists because most of the terrorist are Shiite fundamentalist moslems, and Hussein's government was mostly Sunni and not only did not subscribe to the Shiite cultural or religious beliefs, but actively worked against them.
Senator McCain said, yesterday or today, that we are playing Wack a Mole in Iraq. We keep shifting our limited troops around from hot spot to hot spot, and as soon as we move them out of one area to cover another hot spot, the area we left heats up. Many generals have said publicly that if we are going to have any chance of putting a lid on the sectarian violence going on in Iraq (over 3,500 Iraqi civilians killed last month alone), we will need thousands more troops.
The U. S. military is running an experimental program of using civilian recruiting agencies (head hunters) to recruit people for the U.S. military, and they are getting bonuses of up to $10,000 a month, depending on how many recruits they sign up.
Troops are being sent back to Iraq 2 and 3 times, sometimes with as little as a 6 month respite. Stop-loss orders keep people in the mlitary, despite their wish to resign, long past their "normal" separation date and their term of enlistment. And both the Army and Marines are calling up "ready reserves" - people who have served their enlistments and have been out for up to 5 years, and have been out of training since they left the active military.
Despite the fact that we are supposed to be at war, if you don't have a family member or friend in the military, you'd hardly know it. Somehow, we are fighting a war that only a few people are fighting, and the cost of war is not being shared by the general population.
Halliburton had, at one time, up to $1.2 billion in no-bid contracts for work in Iraq.
But, let's see - oh, yes, there is a congressional election in about two months. So, let's talk about terrorism and fear and how much more secure we are now. And how much we are at risk from terrorists, even though we are more secure than we were before 9-11.
Oh, and let's equate Islamic terrorists with Germany and Japan - probably the most ridiculous analogy I've heard in the past ten years. And while we're at it, let's make up a new code word - Islamifacists.
Lisa, I think your analogies of terrorism being a "cancer", and that trying to defeat the enemy is like trying to step on ants, are very accurate.
I still remember (as I'm sure everyone does) the strange feeling that I had all day on 9/11/2001. I was at work in the salon when the planes hit. I worked at a salon that was in the owner's home. She had TV on in the kitchen and came into the shop to tell us the first tower had been hit. Like everyone else, my coworker and I thought it was an accidental plane crash. When I was real little, I remember the Empire State Building being hit by a plane.
Well, when the boss came in to tell us the second tower had been hit, I remember looking at my co-worker and saying "We are at war. This is it". I immediately called my DH at work to see if he was okay.
I got out of work at one o'clock and went to the grocery store. I will never forget the eerie silence. There was no music playing, and no one was talking. It was like everyone was walking around stunned. When I checked out, the cashier said something about terrorists. I said, "Yeah, well they're like cockroaches. For every one you kill, three more come out of the woodwork". Well, a man was standing near me and gave me the DIRTIEST look, and he didn't look middle eastern. He looked as caucasian as myself. I'm sorry if he was offended, but that's how I felt, and still do.
Ginny- I was going to type a response- but you saved me the trouble- I will just go with DITTO!!!!!!!!
Hol, we all agree 9-11 was a nation-changing event, and a terrible, terrible thing. I, too, remember that day - vividly. And get the shakes every time I remember.
Where we disagree is (1) whether the Bush administration is taking the appropriate steps to battle terrorism, (2) whether invading Iraq was justified or appropriate, (3) whether the Bush administration makes us safer and more secure, and (4) whether, by throwing the 9-11 mantra at us, the Bush administration and its congressional supporters deserve our approval and re-election and can excuse or make up for all the mistakes they have made and the wrong things they have done.
My answer to these points is obviously a resounding NO!
Just a couple of thoughts...whether or not we should have gone to war or not is really indifferent now. We are there. Pulling out is a bad plan. Yes we have been there 44 months. If you look back in to military history sometimes that is just how it is. I don't know the year that we went to korea (which was never an official war), but my dad was there in 1974 and we are still a very strong presence there. No one is complaining about that, people still die in korea, but I really don't know the casuality rates at a similiar time. I do think there needs to a plan, and I don't think we really have one. I also agree that starting the war was done off of bad info. But I think Bush was scared, bad choice, but all we can do from here is move forward.
I think we have made tremendous strides towards saftely since 9-11. Short of putting us all in a bubble and microchipping everyone, there are going to be weaknesses. Sadly a chain is only as strong as it's weakest link, or person who is willing to do anything for a buck.
However I do think maybe we should put mastercard in charge of tracing people...they seem to know all the goods on everyone 
I don't think there is a right answer, there are several different answers and ultimately people will not agree.
I don't think that we should have entered Iraq. I do, however, believe that there WERE weapons of mass destruction. The problem was, our government gave them too much advance warning, and they got rid of them. We kept saying, "If you have weapons, we're coming in".
Sadam Hussein is a very evil man, and I am glad that he is out of power. However, judging from the civil war that is raging now, there will be another like him to take his place. There always are. My Grandma used to say "The devil protects his own". There will never be stability in Iraq or anywhere else in the Middle East. It is hatred that goes back to Biblical times. In the meantime, our children and those of our allies are being killed and maimed. As much as it grieves my heart to think that they have died in vain, I think we should cut our losses and bring the troops home now.
All I meant to say in my above posting was that I was happy to hear that some of the world's most dangerous men (notice they're always MEN??!!) have been captured, and have given us vital information to help prevent further attacks.
I also believe that we do have an obligation to respect, if not the person, the office of the Presidency. We must pray for and support whoever is in that office, and give them the benefit of the doubt, that they are privvy to much more information than we are. I detest John Kerry and most of the other Democrats whose names have been suggested as candidates in the next election. The one who frightens me even more is Hillary Clinton. I think that she and her husband are totally devoid of morals and integrity. That being said, I don't see anybody from the Republican side that really fills me with hope either, at this point. However, if any of them were to become President, we would have to support them. This is still one of the few countries in the world where we CAN criticize our leaders and not be imprisoned.
I think that we should provide added funding for the CIA and let our intelligence network do what they are commissioned to do. That sort of "warfare", if you will, is much better suited to the type of enemy that we now have in the world. This is not like other wars where there is a battlefield, and the enemy wears a uniform, so that we KNOW who they are.
I am also the mother of two young men, and I SO fear the reinstitution of a draft. It is inevitable because, as you acurately stated, Ginny, we are exhausting our troops, and calling people back into service that have done their time and should be left alone.
Our world has always been a very scary place for every generation, but now it has also become very complex.
Kaye - ROFL over your "Mastercard" remark!! VERY TRUE! LOL!
If someone were to ask me if I feel safer now than on 9-11-01, I would probably say yes. After all, what is 5 straight years of absolutely no successful terrorist attacks and dozens of thwarted attacks? One has to admit that we are doing something right.
However, when the NY Times and other various high-powered democrats are constantly undermining the effort by exposing tools used by law enforcement in combatting the terrorist threat and advertising to terrorists what they think our vulnerabilities are- the ports, the subways, the container ships, the chemical plants, etc., then I would say that the chances of our being attacked again are increasing. They are actively sabotaging our effort to defeat this enemy. I mean why don't we just draw the terrorists a map?
They are thinking that if there is another attack, all they need to say is that Bush didn't follow the 9/11 Commission recommendations and it would be all his fault. However, what they are also doing is making the case that we need to be at war with these people. If we are so darn vulnerable to the thousands of people that want to kill Americans and are willing to die in the process then we have a pretty good reason to be at war with them.
As far as Iraq goes, I agree that it is very frustrating. I believe that we need MORE troops. I wish we could saturate the entire region with U.S. troops so that everywhere the terrorists looked they'd see an Amercian military uniform. I agree that we are playing Whack A Mole, or Spider Stomp. We will never get them all at this rate.
But I also think that to leave would be an even bigger mistake. Terrorists definitely do not want a democratic government in Iraq, and as it stands right now, the government and its defenses are too new and too weak to withstand a total terrorist invasion.As it is, if we leave a city alone in Iraq, it is taken back by the terrorists. So if we leave the entire country of Iraq, it will all be taken back by terrorists in its entirety. There is no way that should happen.
If we leave Iraq before it is ready, then we admit that we lost. And what is patriotic about wanting our defeat?
Yes, we have First Amendment Rights, which means that the government is not going to put anyone in jail for stating that they want the U.S. to get out of Iraq. However, those who disagree have the First Amendment right to state their opinion as well. I do challenge the patriotism of people who disagree with Bush and his plan for Iraq because many of the people who disagree with him want us to lose. The far-left fringe in this country is so deeply rooted in Bush hatred that they are actively seeking our defeat. Why can't I simply say that there is nothing patriotic about hating our president and seeking our defeat?
Lisa- I have to agree with you about our left-wing press. My DH was watching an interview by Ted Koppel last night and he was trying to get the interviewee (a Navy admiral)to admit that we use torture to break these terrorist prisoners. Bob said that the admiral held his own, but that he felt Ted Koppel was being very antagonistic.
The press does a lot to harm national security, as you said, exposing our "weak spots". They only do it to discredit Republican leaders, though. I didn't see them saying much when the USS Cole was attacked and Clinton did nothing. Even when Clinton committed his indiscretions in the White House, the press was more ruthless to Ken Starr.
My DH says that, as far as he is concerned, (being a 30 year military veteran), the soldiers who took those photos at Abu Graeb prison, and released them to the press, should have been hanged for treason. He says that they have blood on their hands because innocent people were killed in retaliation.
I just wish that our world could know peace. Just think how much we could accomplish to make life better for so many if we didn't have to expend our energy and resources in war. However, I know that that will never be reality as long as evil prevails in the world, and there are people who hate freedom.
I agree that we can't leave Iraq in the mess we made there. And we did make the mess. We invaded a relatively calm, secular nation with no ties to terrorists (according to most intelligence reports) and no WMD. If you think Hussein could have moved or removed WMDs with the UN observers and everyone else watching, well ... I simply don't think so.
I don't want us to "lose". We can't afford to lose, and the world can't afford to have us lose. If we leave Iraq before it is reasonably settled and under control, it will blow up - Iran will invade and take over - and that area of the world will turn into a major battlefield in which we and the rest of the democratic world *will* have to be involved. And then it will truly become a western war against Islam, which would be horrible. This link is to today's column by Trudy Rubin in today's Philadelphia Inquirer, titled "Despite the mess, we can't leave Iraq." Trudy Rubin has spent extensive time in Iraq, knows and frequently speaks with many present Iraqi leaders and scholars, and U.S. Military. Her column starts, "There's a compelling argument for why the United States can't set a time line for an Iraq troop withdrawal."
Rubin
I also think Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, in particular, planned this invasion of Iraq and this war for reasons that had very little to do with 9-11 and a whole lot to do with their uninformed vision that if they could create one Arab democracy in the Middle East, democracy would flower throughout the Middle East. They did little advance planning for what could go wrong, ignored the advice of the generals and intelligence people who knew very well what could go wrong and wanted to plan for it just in case, and sent our military people in with inadequate planning and inadequate equipment and supplies.
Even in his "non political" speech Monday night, the President said that he believed it was necessary to invade Iraq because Iraq posed a danger to us. What danger? No one who pays any attention to the reports of Hussein's government before we invaded, or subsequent intelligence reports, believes Hussein or Iraq gave any support to the terrorist, and most particularly not to bin Laden and Al Quada. The last thing a secular, Sunni-controlled government wanted was to be involved with Shiite fanatics who insisted on strict, traditional Islamic rule - that was one of the reasons Iraq attempted to invade Iran in 1991.
As for WMDs, even if Iraq had them, they certainly weren't of a type or power that could pose any threat to the United States. Even North Korea, which clearly has nuclear capability and has been firing off test rockets, doesn't have rockets that have the ability to reach any part of the United States or even Europe.
Oh, and don't forget that even President Bush has said, publicly, that there were no WMDs and that Hussein's regime had no links with terrorists. Cheney disagrees, but that is what President Bush said. What the President is now saying, essentially, is that we had to invade Iraq because Hussein was a bad man (true, he was). How many bad men are ruling how many countries now - and how many 4 years ago? If that is a criteria, we'd be fighting in at least 20 places around the world.
Afghanistan - yes. Invading Afghanistan made sense. It still makes sense, in terms of attacking terrorists, breaking up their bases, and removing them from their support. One problem is we pulled a lot of troops out of Afghanistan for that ill-planned invasion of Iraq before the job was completed. The Tabliban is rising again, gaining control and power, and the only part of Afghanistan where the Taliban is not encroaching now is Kabul, the capital. The present government of Afghanistan desperately needs help if it is to be able to maintain control and get rid of the fundamentalist Islamic groups, and they are not getting enough help.
I repeat, we call Pakistan one of our allies in the war on terror. And by all reports, bin Laden and large parts of Al Quada's leadership are in Pakistan. The central government of Pakistan just signed a treaty with the "tribal leaders" (translate - war lords) in the area of Pakistan where bin Laden is probably based, and this treaty says that the central government will not try to exercise any military or civilian control of that area and leave it all up to the tribal elders - who are and have been supporters of the fundamentalist Islamic positions and of terrorists all along. (And remember that Pakistan has nuclear weapons.)
Remember also - most of the 9-11 hijackers were Saudi. Saudi Arabia is rife with fundamentalist Islamic schools led by teachers and imams who teach support of Al Quada and recruit suicide bombers. Members of the Saudi royal family provided significant financial support for Al Quada.
As for Abu Gharaib and Guantanomo - the photos and reports - well, personally, I think it is un-American to torture. I think it dimishes our stature in the world. And I think it places our troops in even graver danger. Think about it - why would a fanatic, a person who buys into the belief that dying as a suicide bomber, a person who believes that if he dies while attacking the "infidel" he will go straight to paradise - tell the truth about the plans of his group because of torture? Almost every person who has experience in and knowledge about intelligence techniques will tell you that you cannot rely on information gained through torture - either the person being tortured will lie out of his fanatic beliefs, or he will tell you what he thinks you want to hear so you will stop.
It seems to me that you "support" First Amendment rights until someone actually exercises them - and then it is wrong. I've followed a lot of discussion, in the NY Times and many other publications, about this - and yes, I also read Buckley and George Will, two very intelligent writers and with impeccable "conservative" credentials. Even George Will and Charles Krauthammer - another national columnist with impeccable "conservative" credentials, have written that this war was poorly planned and that the Bush administration's policies have made things worse. Yes, the NY Times published information about the phone-tapping system - and spent a year meeting with administration officials and others before they published it - and has stated that they published it because they believed it is important for U.S. citizens to know that our government officials are breaking U.S. laws. Yes, the NY Times published that the U.S. is monitoring international banking - and administration officials bragged about it at least two years earlier (and, by the way, I think that program makes sense). Yes, the NY Times and a whole lot of others published the Abu Gharaib photos - and they should have. One result was that Senator McCain, who personally experienced torture while a prisoner in Viet Nam, led Congress in passing laws against torture by the United States (and President Bush issued one of his famous "signing statements" when he signed that law). (Oh, and by the way, how about the "right wing" media - Rush Limbaugh being a prime example.)
Here we are, two months from an election that can determine the political composition of the House of Representatives and, maybe, the Senate. So this administration suddenly produces people it has held prisoner for months and perhaps years, and says they should swiftly be brought to trial. How swiftly? Before November? Doesn't it strike you as just a little to coincidental that after denying for months that there are secret CIA prisons, suddenly these 14 men are produced and moved from those secret CIA prisons to Guantanamo to be tried - two months before November? Doesn't it strike you as a little strange that this administration first denied that the U.S. used torture, now admits that some forms of coercion were used and are alright, in terms of how this administration defines "torture", and at the same time, this administration wants laws that will forbid the U.S. military to use coercion but will exempt non-military personnel (read CIA and private contractors) to use coercion - and at the same time wants to prevent any possible trial of U.S. personnel who are accused of torture by granting amnesty and exemptions?
Every one of the present Judge Advocates General has publicly stated, at the current congressional hearings, that the U.S. should not in any way allow any kind of torture or coercion - that it is ineffective in gaining useful information and it seriously endangers any member of the U.S. military, now and in the future, who might become a prisoner of war. It also endangers civilians - U.S. civilian personnel, aid workers, and the like - who could, by our own terms, easily be deemed non-military combatants.
(And don't produce that old, tired scenario of a fanatic who is captured and you know he has definite knowledge of an imminent attack and he won't reveal this information. If a fanatic has knowledge of an imminent attack, all he has to do is lie or keep silent for a few days, until the imminent attack happens. Even in the worst days of the Spanish Inquisition, questioning under torture usually took weeks and months to "break down" the suspected heretics - and they used really serious torture, like hot irons and methods that left the victim unable to walk to their trials and execution.)
I *am* a loyal American. I don't consider my criticism of the Bush administration to be disloyal. My patriotism is linked to this nation, to what it stands for, has been, and generally is. To tie patriotism to support of one particular politician or specific political positions mistakes political or personal loyalty for patriotism. They are *not* the same, and in this nation never have been. And most democratic nations have and recognize the concept of a "loyal opposition". I think there is a grave danger in linking patriotism and support of any President or any administration, in that it supplants our loyalty to our nation and system of government and replaces it with loyalty to a person. That is not patriotism, and it is the very kind of government that we rejected in the American Revolution.
Do I feel safer? No. That there has been no attack on U.S. soil in the past five years is not proof that our programs "work". The British have had extensive experience with terrorist for decades, have a system that recently found a large number of would-be terrorists and suicide bombers - and they suffered the London bombings despite their extensive, hard-earned experience. I think, first, that there is no security system, no intelligence system, that can totally prevent a suicide terrorist attack. Second, I think the way to battle and win against terrorists and terrorism is to remove their support. For example - right now, in Iraq, there is much more support for the various religious armies because our bumbling mistakes there have polarized Iraqis against the U.S. If we had handled things better, that would be less likely, and there would be less support for terrorists in Iraq. We've created a focal point and a recruiting tool for terrorists by our misguided, ill-planned and inadequately supported actions. I feel, in fact, less safe, because I am terrified of what the outcome is going to be in the Middle East and the potential for a really major war that will involve all of us.
This is far longer than I intended.
Well, this is a lot to digest, but I'll give it a shot.
I disagree that Saddam had no ties to terrorists. I believe that what was eventually agreed upon by the administration was that there were no direct ties to 9-11. Saddam was by no means as pure as the wind driven snow when it came to terrorist sympathies. There can be no doubt that Saddam had terrorist connections and that he had tried to get his hands on nukes as far back as the late 1970s when his first nuclear reactor was built by the French. So the question had to be faced: Is Afghanistan enough?
Just because U.S. intelligence was never able to pinpoint WMDs doesn't mean they were never there. The CIA hasn't been able to get foreign weapons intelligence right since Stalin in the 1950's. Nevertheless, it had become clear that doing nothing was just as dangerous as going in despite the gaps in intelligence. Ultimately, if there was the slightest chance that leaving Saddam in power would subject the West to nuclear terrorism, then pacifism was not an option.
Would the correct decision have been to leave Saddam alone? We could speculate, but I guess we'll never know. One thing is for sure, there is one less evil dictator in power in the Middle East.
As for the stereotype "Islamofascist", I have to ask what would the appropriate distinction be? If what the Taliban did to the people of Afghanistan was not fascist, then what would it be called? What would one use to describe rule by terror, confusion, and lies?
It's okay for Bush to be referred to as Hitler, but it is not okay to refer to evil murderers who have perverted the religion of Islam to justify their terror plots as Islamofascists? A generation ago, who would have thunk it?
We have discussed the purpose of "stereotyping" here before. (I had use Google to search momsview for this post.)
My explanation of stereotyping
That the President has chosen (and many have used the term before him) to refer to the evil murderers who threaten us as Islamofascists is simply the most efficient way to distinguish the terrorists from the rest of the world's population. It is actually quite accurate. They have perverted and are hiding behind the religion of Islam so as to give them license to carry out their evil terror plots. The Italian name of the movement, fascismo, is derived from fascio, “bundle, (political) group." It is defined as a system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of opposition and criticism through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism. Hence the term "Islamofascist." I see no problem with that.
I in fact DO support First Amendment rights every time someone actually exercises them. It simply goes both ways: if it is one's First Amendment right to declare their contempt for our President and our current path in the war, then it is also my First Amendment right to question that person's patriotism- especially when those declarations come from any individuals in our own government in positions of power and influence over the entire world view of our effort.
I am not suggesting that we must be loyal to the president in order to be patriotic. However, it would be appropriate, especially in times of war, if we could all throw some modicum of support towards the leader of our nation and at least make it appear to our enemy that we are presenting a united front. The proper time for us to reveal that we do not support a particular politician is on election day.
As for torture, all I have to say is- my gosh, taking pictures of a terrorist with underwear on his head is torture??? We don't even know the meaning of the word until we have seen how the terrorists torture their prisoners.
That there has been no attack on U.S. soil in 5 years is the result of a great deal of hard work on behalf of Homeland Security and the various other law enforcement networks that are now working together to connect the dots that couldn't be connected before 9-11. It is a classic case of outcome-based results.
Yes, there is more work to be done. The terrorist threat against the U.S. has been brewing for more than 20 years, and a complete iron-clad security system cannot be constructed and put in place in a matter of 1/4 that amount of time. I believe that just today the U.S. Senate took up HR 4954, a bill passed in the House that would strengthen port security.
Does it strike me as strange that the U.S. denied it had secret prisons? No. I believe that all that war-related information is strictly on a need-to-know basis, and I do not need to know. In fact, I would rather not know. It seems that the moment anything at all is revealed regarding our government's conduct in this war, it is immediately known all over the world, including in the enemy camps. I would rather the government keep as much information under wraps as possible and keep it away from the blabber- mouths at the NY Times (and other publications as well).
Not only that, but we are so harshly judged on our conduct in this war. Where the he!! is the criticism of all the atrocities committed by the terrorists???? Where is their accountability to the Geneva Convention???? Why aren't they being held to the same standards as the U.S.????
OOOHHHH, that's right. They go by their own rules of engagement.
(Yes, that is ooozing with sarcasm. Sorry if it offends anyone. )
As for your fear that we will end up in a major world war, I agree that is a possibility. But this goes back to my optimistic view of this Great Nation known as the United States of America. We were strong enough to get through the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, WWI, the Depression, WWII, Korea, and yes, even Viet Nam. We have taken our blows and we have stamped out slavery, nazism and communism. If the time comes for an all out world war, we will prevail over this enemy as well.
Again with the women's underwear on the head - as if that were the only thing that happened at Abu Ghraib.
"As for torture, all I have to say is- my gosh, taking pictures of a terrorist with underwear on his head is torture??? We don't even know the meaning of the word until we have seen how the terrorists torture their prisoners."
According to Red Cross reports and the U.S. Army's own investigations, the acts at Abu Ghraib included: "prisoners kept naked in total darkness in empty cells at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison and male prisoners forced to parade around in women's underwear. Coalition forces also fired on unarmed prisoners from watchtowers, killing some of them.
In another episode, nine men were arrested by coalition forces in Basra and beaten severely, leading to one death, it added."
Not to mention reports, some from people who are former intelligence personnel who were stationed at Gitmo, of prisoners being forced to stand for 10 - 20 - 30 hours (stand, not sit or lie down or lean against a wall), prisoners being handcuffed to a post so they could not do anything but stand, prisoners handcuffed to a post and doused with water and the temperature of the room lowered so they went into hypthermia, water-boarding (securing a prisoner to a board, placing a cloth over his face and mouth, and pouring water over his face so that the cloth over his mouth went into his mouth and he could not breathe).
And yes, the terrorists go by their own rules, rules which every civilized nation deplores and condemns.
But, we are supposed to be the shining light, the "city on a hill", to have higher standards. If we use the excuse that "they do it, so why shouldn't we?", we are lowering ourselves to their level - we, in essence, become them.
The United States should not, now or ever, allow or permit or promote torture or degrading treatment as acceptable interrogation techniques because of what it does to the United States. It degrades us. It degrades the solders who are ordered to participate (whether it is actual participation, or simply standing guard, or handling the prisoners before and after). It diminishes our moral position as a nation that does "the right thing". And, not least, it violates our laws.
As to why the "enemy combatants" and terrorists are not held to the Geneva Convention, they are not signatories to it. The United States is. The United States Congress (which is the only body that can make laws for our nation) ratified the Geneva Convention several times, most recently in 1949, and made it part of our laws governing military actions and treatment of military prisoners.
In addition, the U.S. War Crimes Act of 1996 (Title 18, Chapter 118, Section 2441) War Crimes Act specifically bans violations of Geneva Convention Article III, relating to treatment of prisoners of war. This is, again U.S. law.
As for throwing "some modicum of support towards the leader of our nation and at least make it appear to our enemy that we are presenting a united front."
No. I am not a lemming.
If I think the President is leading us over a cliff into international disrepute, into a war that cannot be won and which has been and will continue to be terribly costly in terms of the lives of U.S. military and Iraqi civilians, and in dollars spent on a misguided war that could be better used in our own nation, I will not give him even a modicum of support. If I believe that the war was poorly conceived, poorly planned, and that the present administration's policies are making things worse for the U.S. and Iraq, I will not give a modicum of support.
No, I don't think it is alright to call the President (or anyone else) Hitler, or a Nazi. What I was deploring was the development of a new "code world" "Islamifacists". In fact, there are several different groups involved in terrorism - some are fundamentalist Islamics, some are not. Some want to restore Sunni rule to Iraq, some want to expand Shiite rule. Some want Israel wiped off the map; others are more focused on getting the U.S. out of Iraq and out of the Middle East (though eventually they would probably go after Israel). Syria, which provides significant support for Hezbollah, is more or less a secular nation, with Islam being the major religion but not being run by Islamic ayatollahs or leaders.
Lumping them all together under the catchy phrase of Islamifacists makes it seem that they are all the same, and that we can fight them much as we fought the armies of the facist nations of Germany and Italy in the 1940s - and, in fact, VP Cheney has referred to WWII as a model for how we should behave. He has referred to the attempts made to negotiate with and placate Hitler as similar to what "liberals" and "anti-war" and "cut and runners" are doing now. It's a false analogy. The problem with the analogy is that in WWII we (and western Europe) were fighting recognized, uniformed armies, with recognized generals and leaders, and recognized headquarters. What we are fighting now is much more like Viet Nam (and yes, I know that people who support the war in Iraq don't like references to Viet Nam). But there are many similarities. The fighters are part of the indigenous population. They dress like everyone else, they look like everyone else. They can commit their acts of violence and fade into the surrounding population. And every time we - accidentally or deliberately - harm or kill a civilian who was not a terrorist, we make more enemies, more terrorists. There are much smarter ways to fight terrorism, with intelligent people who have studied this kind of war being willing and able to teach them. In fact, there is now an instructor at West Point whose role is to teach the cadets how to act in order to truly "win the hearts and minds" of people in an occupied territory. But right now we are not fighting that way.
Many of our military leaders, including those who have been or are in Iraq, say that if we are going to get and maintain control of just Baghdad, we need more troops on the ground - but our leaders say we don't.
I do believe that we can't just leave. And I believe that setting a time-table for leaving would be folly. I also believe that turning over the governance and security of Baghdad alone, never mind the rest of the country, to Iraqi forces at any time in the near future would be folly. They are not adequately trained, and so many of them are so closely linked to one side or the other of the religious conflicts that they cannot be relied on to act against their co-religionists if their co-religionists are the ones doing the shooting. It's a mess, and it's a mess our current leaders have gotten us into - with no plans of how to get us out other than turning things over to the Iraqi government and police and armed forces when our leaders deem they are ready.
So no, I won't be a lemming. I won't give even am modicum of support to leaders whom I believe are responsible for getting us into this mess because of their lack of foresight and their unwillingness to listen to the people who, because of their experience, did know better - and who apparently have no plan for how to get us out and leave Iraq in a reasonably stable condition.
You are far more optimistic than I about what a true world war could be like, and whether it could be "won" as WWI and WWII were won. Any more than we "won" the war in Viet Nam (yes, that reference again).
(And yes, for a devout fundamentalist Muslim, being forced to wear women's undergarments - or, as has been reported, having a woman interrogator rub her body against his, or rub red liquid on his face and tell him it is menstrual blood, is mental/psychological torture - minimally, degrading treatment. Such things are definitely forbidden by his religion and are a source of contamination by his beliefs. Sort of like rubbing pig fat over the body of a Jew, if you can relate to that.)
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