Smeggy, good points. The UN is as helpful at keeping World Peace as France would be with Jimmy Carter as their president. For your list, you are forgetting Operation Urgent Fury to squash the covert uprising of the Cuban vegetarian cafeteria workers at the St George's Medical School in Grenada.
Whatever. Anyway, I'd like to see how much world peace is "threatened" if the U.S. decided to back out and let some of these countries take care of themselves. I guarantee we'll have people like Mandela whining that the U.S. isn't doing anything and are sitting back and watching innocent people get slaughtered. Funny, I don't remember Mandela opening his mouth when thousands of people from different countries were butchered like animals last year. And don't get me started on Dick Cheney.
Yes, that dirty draft dodger Clinton, unlike George Bush who protected the skies of Texas from Viet Cong, and Dicky Chaney who "had other priorities". But they're willing to sacrifice fighting men now I guess.
"Then the United States chose to arm and finance the [Islamic] mujahedin in Afghanistan instead of supporting and encouraging the moderate wing of the government of Afghanistan." I like this one. Is he calling the Soviet Union the 'moderate wing of the government of Afghanistan?'
Since the US pays more than half the UN's budget, and provided the force to back up many of those actions, I guess we can give ourselves a little pat on the back on this solemn occasion. SmeggySmeg, Weren't the Aussies with us in Vietnam? And Somalia was a UN project.
If you weren't just an ignorant Australian, you would have read all of the statements from our leaders, articles, etc. circa 1898-1910 that spoke of how we were helping the sub-human Cubans. Heck, even if we weren't helping them...they really were too stupid and backwards to worry about anyway. If you had read all of this, you would at least have evidence to support your claims. Even though the US is so great, I sure do wish we had as pristine an historical record as the Aussies when dealing with the dark-skinned people.
Bay of pigs went well Rimmy and they have generally reacted and handled commmunism rather sensationally, MacCarthyism worked a treat!!!
If you are gonna pat your back for the US paying the UN's budget, does it mean you'd kick your own a$$ for the US delaying to pay the UN's budget?
nothing to do with the thread but just want to bring attention to this part. i'm a malaysian and yesterday i saw one american woman jogging and talking with a few indian joggers. also a few white men eating bbq chicken at a night market. their accent didn't sound alot different than ours (malaysian english accent is pretty similiar with american than british or australian). few weeks ago i saw an american family crossing the street. malaysia is a safe country. please please do not put us in such a bad light. we're more like singapore and thailand than pakistan, iraq ....
<blockQUOTE>Originally posted by rimbaud If you weren't just an ignorant Australian ... Even though the US is so great, I sure do wish we had as pristine an historical record as the Aussies when dealing with the dark-skinned people. </blockQUOTE>Holy Patronization Batman....Well, if you weren't a literary rambo looking to claim poetic license to phrases like "dark-skinned people" you'd realize how that is a derogatory term under any license. Or haven't you read the only book from Australia that was written from circa 1788-1810. Had you read the book that their head penetentiary librarian wrote you'd know that he called them aborigines. And you'd know that is just as derogatory a word as Indian, and the aborigines really want to be called Native Non-Convicts.
Well, I'd have to say I'm a bit gloomy in the way that Surf is, but I want to thank most of you guys for picking me up. I'm not kidding. We love the Rocks, and then our opinions go all over the place, but mostly can share some ideas about this crucial world sh*t with some real respect for each other. If it was all of this tone, ... ... I'd definitely be as down as Surf. By the way, Trader J, this isn't a competition to me, but I don't agree that we're at war. Yes, that's the rhetoric we get, but how do you declare war on an abstract noun? I mean, are we going to send in 4 divisions to invade "sloth" next. But anyway, you win, because we'll be at war soon enough it seems.
In case you missed it...there were several groups from the Texas Air National Guard who were called up and sent to Vietnam. Yes it was unlikely that Bush would get called up...but at least he served at all rather than run to London. To liken Bush to a draft dodger is ludicrous and you deserve to get flamed for it.
TJ, I'm not going to defend Clinton for lying under oath. I'm not going to give Clinton an award for being a great husband. I've said before that I think Clinton was wrong for that stuff. But if you think lying under oath about a sexual harrassment charge, and cheatin on his wife is equivalent with doing business with terrorists, and voting to keep Mandela is imprisoned, I'll keep your priorities in mind when I read your arguments. The stuff Clinton did is definitely wrong, and I think he's a slime ball. But Clinton's actions hurt him most of all, and didn't help any terrorists, or govts. that sponsor terrorism, which after 9/11 we know hurts all of us very much. The stuff Cheney did is on a totally different level though. Selling parts to Saddam Hussein? Knowingly doing business with state sponsors of terrorism, and whining about sanctions that prevented him from doing that business, says a lot about how well Bush has done at 'restoring integrity to the White House.' Then the fact that Cheney lied about it on national television and wanted to keep Mandela in prison only adds ammunition to what kind of a man Cheney is. It's not me starting a smear campaign against Cheney. He's brought about as much dishonor to his name as any man could. All I'm doing is bringing out the man's own actions. Clinton dodged the draft, against a war that he didn't believe in. Big deal. George Bush avoided combat duty by serving in the air national guard in Texas and supposedly Alabama, but it looks like he didn't even show up for the last year of duty. Bush was basically AWOL that whole time. There are commanding officers who say that Bush never served, and a group of Viet Nam veterans who offered to pay $5000 to anyone who could prove Bush actually showed up for duty that last year. The reward was never claimed because Bush didn't show. The Pardons you mentioned are no worse than those Papa Bush did. Even still none of that compares to a man who willingly did business with the leader of the govt. that blew up the German disco with U.S. soldiers inside, did business with Saddam Hussein, and Iran which also sponsors terrorism. The fact that he wanted Mandela to remain imprisoned only helps show his mindset. My memory is fine, thanks. I think the biggest question here is which is less deserving of respect. Someone who lied about a sexual harrassment suit of questionable integrity to begin with, or someone who knowingly did business with dictators, sponsors of terrorism, and wanted to keep a true fighter for freedom like Mandela in prison.
Nah Bush wasn't in any danger of serving, since he didn't show up for half of his time in the guard anyway.
FranchiseBlade -- I'm seeing the same tired arguments from you.... 1) Clinton was guilty of lying under oath. This is fact supported by the Starr Report and further supported by his impeachment. Your allegations about Cheney's company's subsidiary's *legal*, *miniscule* and *approved* transactions with Iraq are not even in the SAME BALLPARK as lying under oath. And quit with the sensationalist "he sold parts to Saddam" rhetoric. You make it sound like this was a face-to-face transaction, when in actuality it is highly doubtful Cheney even knew about these $20mm transactions within a $12 billion company. Relatively tiny deals like this do not make it within 3 levels of the CEO's office. You are really reaching here and you know it. A CEO is not responsible for every tiny, minute transaction in a sprawling, international corporation. Halliburton has subsidiaries in countries across the globe and in the Middle East which would almost have to work hard *not* to have an incidental transaction with something or someone associated with Iraq. FB, you keep dragging this point, when it is evident that you have no grasp at all how an oilfield service company operates. 2) The National Guard is an HONORABLE and HIGHLY RESPECTED institution. To claim otherwise is a slap in the face to millions of Americans to put their life on the line every day. You sir, have no right to belittle this vital area of our nation's defense. While George Bush and Dick Cheney did not fight in the jungles of Vietnam, there is a huge difference between what they did and what Bill Clinton did. Bill Clinton publicly protested against the war while he was in London. Meanwhile, American soldiers were dying for the cause, was Bill by their side? NO. Where was he? Living it up in London, smoking weed, and protesting their cause. and with that, I have nothing to add except a big, loud, CASE CLOSED.
Surfguy, What do you think life was like for the many tens-of-thousands butchered in Rwanda with machetes, for the Israeli's blown up while eating pizza, for the Palestinian children bombed in their beds while sleeping, for the millions slaughtered by Khmer Rouge, for the many innocents who suffered in Bosnia, Kuwait, etc etc. I could go on and on. We are so caught up in our own lives, desires, and goals that we often do not maintain perspective. Many others in the world die through heinous aggression. That's not to belittle what we experienced, but maybe its an opportunity to empathize with others in the world. We are one of the few nations than can do something to help them (and we will also have to endure criticism from those like smeggysmeg when we try to help starving people in Somalia and get ambushed by al qeada ). As for being bummed about our situation, my generation grew up under MAD. Was that any better? The likelihood of aggression against us is greater now, but aggression with the USSR would have brought an end to the US, USSR and possibly humanity (and we came pretty darn close in '61). How about WWII? We can look back on it now with a certain amount of dispatch, after all, it's just history. But people back then saw it as the potential end of the world. London was being bombed every day, could you imagine that terror? Impending invasion? Losing your country? Most here don't even know the death toll from WWII... 61,000,000. Can we even fathom that? Each generation will face unique challenges, and I am confident will persevere, but don't think that magnitude of the threat is anything new. In a way, challenges like this light fire under one's butt. Will more Americans become aware of and active in foreign policy? Will more become empathetic towards other nations? Hopefully. I don't mean to bum you out further, I hope you can understand that this country and others have been through similar challenges before and did just fine. We're in this together, you have almost 300,000,000 people in the boat with you, not even including our allies. Finally, keep perspective on another aspect of this (this is for you too, Azadre), and that is the personal threat to your well-being. Three-thousand Americans died on 9-11. As horrible as that was on many levels, more people died from choking in 1998. Fifty-percent more died from drowning, and about 15x as many died in traffic accidents each year.
I've already agreed that Clinton lied under oath. I don't deny that, and I'm not trying to hold Clinton up as a shining example of honor. Cheney himself gave a speech to the Cato institute which I quoted earlier in which he complains about people seeing his company as not so good business partners because they may not be able to fulfill their obligation because someone in the U.S. passes sanctions against them. Cheney is actually bemoaning someone cutting off trade because they don't want people to do business with terrorist states. I've also agreed that the deals with Iraq, Iran, were legal and approved. That doesn't make them right. I happen to take terrorism seriously, and I wouldn't do business with terrorists. I don't care if it was only one dollar of business. However much those contracts were worth to Haliburton, they helped Iraq with it's own oil business and therefore were beneficial for Iraq. Haliburton did have to pay fines though for doing business with Libya, so those weren't legal obviously. If you don't see the harm in doing business with terrorists and states that sponsor terrorism, Ok I'll just keep it in mind when I read your posts. I HONOR and I HIGHLY RESPECT the national guard. It's George W. Bush that didn't honor or respect it when he didn't show up for duty. The guy was AWOL for almost his final year of guard service. If he HONORED it and HIGHLY RESPECTED it he would have showed up. http://www.boston.com/news/politics/campaign2000/news/One_year_gap_in_Bush_s_Guard_duty+.shtml http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A4291-2000Nov2¬Found=true http://www.awolbush.com/newrep1.html http://www.awolbush.com/
