Comments Posted By chris
Displaying 81 To 90 Of 204 Comments
Now, why did Reagan build up our armed forces and put us into debt? Oh, I remember, it was to counter the threat of Communism, specifically the Soviet Union, where protesters were sent to Siberia, or put into "mental institutions" for their intellectual crimes. The same Soviet Union that was the self-proclaimed spearhead, model and organizer of the world-wide revolution. The same Soviet Union where people had to stand in line to get toilet paper. The same Soviet Union that was such a workers' paradise it had to build fences to keep its own people in.
There, I've started a debate. I'm 40-something, and I don't watch O'Reilly.
Comment Posted By Chris On 20.03.2007 @ 06:37
DEMS NEW INDUSTRIAL STRATEGY: MANUFACTURING SCANDAL
You've all got it wrong! Gonzales has problems not because Democrats are scandalized but because lawyers are. They're much, much more powerful than Democrats. And the lawyers that are the most upset are of federal-prosecutor calibre.
Comment Posted By Chris On 15.03.2007 @ 19:00
MASSIVE PURGE IN IRAQ INTERIOR MINISTRY
If he can be whittled down to size, then take him down that way. This is how you defeat your political opponents in a democracy, by removing their power base.
Comment Posted By Chris On 6.03.2007 @ 22:01
"Otherwise, shut the F**k up and stop ginning up the outrage over what anyone with half a brain can see is a deliberate attempt by Coulter to garner cheap headlines and publicity."
But it took you all just forever to arrive at this moment of clarity, and now only because it has ceased to serve your purpose. Why on Earth shouldn't we keep poking you with a stick? Tell me you'd not do the same to an out of control embarrassment making us look foolish. You know you would.
Comment Posted By chris On 5.03.2007 @ 10:49
I have to admit, I was unarmed in the debate about insurgencies. I also have to admit that your take on our goals in Iraq is exceedingly cynical and short-sighted. What would have been the costs of leaving Saddam in power, in terms of American security? I'm really beginning to think that nobody remembers what it felt like immediately after 9/11, waiting for the next shoe to drop, and the next one, and so on.
Allowing a reckless dictator who hated America and had a nearly unblemished record of getting himself and his nation involved in ill-starred foreign adventures was (in the eyes of the early Bush administration, at least) simply unthinkable. If 19 guys with a few hundred thousand dollars could wreak so much havoc, then what would happen when similarly motivated people got a hold of real WMD? What would our response have been to a mass anthrax attack? What will our response be to the growing probability that we lose a city to a nuke?
Is it worth the blood and treasure we are expending in Iraq? Our initial goals have been realized. Saddam no longer controls a nation-state and all of the resources that entails. He is not a threat to aid terrorists in their quest to kill Americans in large numbers. We proved to the world that we were willing to take preemptive action in the name of American security.
The goals that subsequently attached themselves to the Iraq project, of injecting democracy in some form into the Middle East, in destabilizing the region (poking the hornet's nest, so to speak), taking the fight to the enemy's turf, have been frustratingly unattainable so far, to be sure. But is it worth the effort? What is the alternative to not trying these things? To wait until our options are reduced to cringing in fear or lashing out in the most violent and general fashion?
I still think the Iraq project has some promise along the lines of reshaping a part of the world that is exporting a death cult. And now that we're in, I really don't think we can afford to cut out precipitously.
Comment Posted By Chris On 1.03.2007 @ 22:48
Hmm, I failed to mention genocide and resettlement. At least we gave Vietnam 10 years before we pulled the plug, and even then if we would have stuck by our promises to our South Vietnamese allies, we may have won. Or excuse me, "won".
I guess the stakes in Iraq just aren't high enough for you, Drango. I disagree. I believe, along with Rick, that we need to finish this fight, and I also believe that tamping down violence so that it doesn't flare up again, which it has, is a good enough end. Reduction of chaos will allow the Iraqi central government to begin to function "normally", in that more of the citizens can believe that it can at least handle the country on a day-to-day basis.
How about examples of insurgencies in recent times that worked? How about insurgencies that worked without another state's support?
Comment Posted By Chris On 1.03.2007 @ 11:00
Obviously, we can't compare two unlike things, no matter the point. You can't compare WWII, which we won, with the Iraq war, which we are obviously going to lose. Better to compare it to (wait for it) Mao's revolution. Which took place in a different country, with a different history, in a different time.
The insurgents always win, don't you know? Ask the Malaysians. Oh wait, don't ask them. The British outlasted those insurgents. If only we could muster the force of will they had and we used to be capable of, we might see our way through to victory.
A victory defined not by treaty or ceremony, but by a gradual cessation of political violence in Iraq, a gradual growth of stability, and a gradual reduction of the need for U.S. troops.
Comment Posted By Chris On 28.02.2007 @ 22:29
I really don't see how the Iranians could make things worse for us in Iraq. They're already trying pretty hard to plunge the country into chaos. Who knows what Iraqi Shiite groups might do? I doubt if they know.
The "Arab Street" is a paper tiger. How many times have we seen angry Muslims denounce Israel and the U.S., then go back home and pout? It's the authoritarian governments of those people we have to curry favor with, and they don't seem to be too keen on the idea of Iranian hegemony.
How much credibility will the mullahs have with their own people, if they have staked so much national prestige on their nuclear program, if that program is taken out by the hated Jews?
And how much does our stock go up if we become dangerous and unpredictable again, as we were in the initial aftermath of the Afghanistan and Iraq campaigns? The conventional wisdom is that an attack on Iran is unwise. Is it really? Their infrastructure can't take too much of a pounding, and their economy is suffering already, under weak sanctions. We can accept the consequences of destroying Iran's ability to produce oil, but can they?
I think there is too much emphasis on all of the things that Iran might be able to do to us, and not nearly enough on what we certainly can do to them. It's kind of hard to sustain a regional insurgency when your primary source of income is burning, and your military is being systematically whittled down.
Comment Posted By Chris On 25.02.2007 @ 18:24
GOODBYE CHIEF ILLINI...WELCOME SOY BOY!
At least the trustees finally made a decision. They've been kicking this one down the road for years now. I bemoan the loss of tradition, but what's even worse is the power grab by bodies like the NCAA.
I like the Chief, but I know someone of Indian ancestry who doesn't. This decision should have been made locally. It's none of the NCAA's business what mascots or pageantry it's member schools employ.
Comment Posted By Chris On 16.02.2007 @ 19:23
By the way, this Chisum guy sounds like an idiot, even for a god-botherer.
Comment Posted By Chris On 16.02.2007 @ 19:17
