Originally Posted By gadzuux >> "I'm surprised these childish tactics fool anybody. But then I remember that it only has to fool republicans, who apparently will believe anything they're told. << That was my comment. Do you believe the bush administration when they say that the iraq war plan is based on patraeus's recommendations?
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <You don't get to say "I'm a republican" AND "I don't support the war" or "I don't support bush" - that doesn't work.> I can't go along with that, gad. There are tons of Republicans who don't support the war. Perhaps it's because I have family members (including my folks) who are sort of paleo "Main Street Republicans" who don't support the war and don't like what the neocons and the religious right have done to their party, but who are never going to switch parties at this point, that I can allow for this seeming (but only seeming) contradiction. After all, LBJ escalated our involvement in Vietnam. Wasn't it possible in the 60's to be a Democrat but not support that war? Of course it was.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan <You don't get to say "I'm a republican" AND "I don't support the war" or "I don't support bush" - that doesn't work.> I disagree. Just because someone is a registered Democrat doesn't make them responsible or in line with everything Howard Dean says. There are more nuanced positions within each party, not a single-minded monolith of thought. If more Republicans said "I don't support this war" -- and there are more of them now than ever -- it will impact how GOP hopefuls for the presidency develop their agendas.
Originally Posted By DlandDug <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN2322537420070924" target="_blank">http://www.reuters.com/article /politicsNews/idUSN2322537420070924</a> NY Times says discount for Petraeus ad was mistake EXCERPT: >>The ad, headlined "General Petraeus or General Betray Us," accused Petraeus of "cooking the books for the White House." The New York Times' public editor Clark Hoyt wrote that in his opinion, not only did the advertiser [Moveon.org] get a discount it was not entitled to, but the ad violated The Times' own written standards. "The ad appears to fly in the face of an internal advertising acceptability manual that says, 'We do not accept opinion advertisements that are attacks of a personal nature,'" he wrote, adding that the phrase "Betray Us" was "a particularly low blow when aimed at a soldier."<<
Originally Posted By ecdc vbdad, you can keep harping on that I said "Republicans" all you want, while ignoring most of my other points. For whatever reason, there are people who insist on posting the obvious here - that there are extremists on both sides - as if it's some sort of deep insight the rest of us are too thick to get. No, we get it, it's just that obvious, there's no need for that caveat before every single post.
Originally Posted By ecdc BTW, I agree with dabob and 2oony's posts on being Republican and against the war.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 <I'm not buying into this argument that you can be a 'sensible republican' and still disavow the actions of your own party. > voice of ALL GOP bad-- ALL non GOP good. <No, we get it, it's just that obvious, there's no need for that caveat before every single post.< if you truly got it - I would have to keep on harping on it would I ? Dabob and 2toony get it -- but somehow some just don't. If you just want one sided discussions that continue on the path you are on -- here I can joun your side: All GOP supporters are evil Bush sucks All GOP voters support everything they are told because they are dumber than a box of rocks Bush Sucks The Democrats have all the answers - they will fix everything once every last GOP rep is gone from Washington Did I mention Bush sucks there -- all is right with the world now. And yet you wonder why the divisions that exist are there ?
Originally Posted By vbdad55 <I disagree. Just because someone is a registered Democrat doesn't make them responsible or in line with everything Howard Dean says. < should go down as common sense quote of the day on LP ! did I mention - Bush sucks ? ( like this is news to anyone but the furthest gone from reality)
Originally Posted By jonvn Interesting that people are picking out fights to have about this. I said that both parties did bad, it was Congress in general that took a very offensive action, not just Republicans. There is no reason to just lambaste Republicans on this. If they were the only ones to vote this way, then maybe. But over 1/3 of the Dems in the Senate did the same too.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 ^^^^^^^ and that is why I didn't single out your quote. You are right in that there is enough blame for the mess we ar ein to go around. It just gets tiring trying to represent a moderate viewpoint and just see the same bullrepeating over and over --- then usually denied or told it was misquoted. Bush sucks - almost everyone gets it. And no not all Dems not all GOP voters agree 100% with their party..it just doesn't work that way... but if one is looking for someone to blame for why 7 million jobs have been offshored in the past 8 years, or why the housing market is so screwed up, or why there are such deep divisions over issues that should have little to no division, etc. one has to look to both sides of the aisle. The degrees of separation is much smaller than normal in the Capitol.
Originally Posted By jonvn I think so, too. See, I'm not a knee jerk anything. I thought us invading iraq in the first place was a good idea, given that they were building WMD, and were involved terrorism. They were not. Furthermore, we had zero planning for what we were to do once we took over. So, I've changed my thoughts on the subject. Beyond that, Congress is spending time on stuff like this offensive behavior, while the problems you mention go unchecked and unattended to. Talk about rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic...
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <I thought us invading iraq in the first place was a good idea, given that they were building WMD, and were involved terrorism. They were not.> Well, yes, they were involved in terrorism. And they maintained the much of the capacity to build WMD's. <Furthermore, we had zero planning for what we were to do once we took over.> It may be that the plans were insufficient or based on erroneous intelligence, but to say that there was zero planning is incorrect.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder "It may be that the plans were insufficient or based on erroneous intelligence, but to say that there was zero planning is incorrect." All things considered, you'd be better off accepting zero planning.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <All things considered, you'd be better off accepting zero planning.> Unlike some, I prefer to accept the truth.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>And they maintained the much of the capacity to build WMD's.<< LOL! Yes they had such a crack system in place that their president was reduced to cowering in a hidey-hole. What is it, 2002 for some people?
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>based on erroneous intelligence<< The whole WAR was based on erroneous intelligence, Douglas. Intelligence that said things like "they maintained much of the capaciity to builld WMD's".
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder "Unlike some, I prefer to accept the truth." Here we go again. zzzzzzzzzzzz
Originally Posted By jonvn Our plan was Bay of Pigs II. We thought the Iraqis were going to just love us so much that we'd get all the cooperation we could possibly want. Didn't happen then, didn't happen now. People don't like it when you invade their country and bomb them. Do you think the people in the Soviet Union loved Stalin so much they fought the Germans for him? No. They didn't. They fought an invading army coming in to conquer them. Doesn't anyone ever learn anything from history at all?
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <Yes they had such a crack system in place that their president was reduced to cowering in a hidey-hole.> This statement has no relation to mine. <The whole WAR was based on erroneous intelligence, Douglas.> Well, no. As I've pointed out many times now, the joint resolution authorizing force against Iraq gave over 20 reasons why it was appropriate. Only one of those turned out to be incorrect.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>Only one of those turned out to be incorrect.<< The biggie. The one that damaged our credibility and reputation aroound the world. The one that made it so important to go to war. I guess you'd just say "oops" but to most of us, that matters a lot.
