One of the world's biggest dicks . . .

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hawl: [quote author=bradleeM link=board=meetgreet;num=1071422232;start=20#25 date=12/16/03 at 19:17:51]Dee,

When was the last time you put your life on the line for another person's freedom?  It is easy to sit and listen to socialist profs tell you how bad it is to live in this country but they don't tell you that freedom is not free, someone has to sacrifice their lives for everyone else.[/quote] I think this perhaps reveals who the real "raging liberal' in the discussion is  ! I do not regularly risk my life for others, I do not ask others to, and I do not expect that others are going to. Rational self-interest powers civilization and capitalism and discourages people from blowing themselves up for Allah or Jerry Falwell or Jodie Foster. Pro-war Republicans have been saying for some time that the Iraq war was more about "nation-building" than an immediate police response to specific terror threats. These guys are talking about stuff maybe improving decades away from our present, lots of stuff that has nothing to do with the average American's life or any threats to it. I'm all for vigilance against threats from everyone from North Korea to Iran to Tim McVeigh types, but all the more reason for me to question spending hundreds of billions of dollars to take out a loud-mouthed Third World gangster whose defense budget of $1.4 billion was less than 3/10 of 1% of ours. It's one thing to talk about "Wouldn't it be nicer if Saddam were gone?" but it's just not that cheap or safe to move these chess pieces around the global board. Did you read the article I posted in this thread about the return of James Baker and thus George Bush I's foreign policy? That is where your beloved Republican Party is heading, or I should say, retreating. You are arguing old points they would prefer you abandon. I'm not saying that that might not be painful for some of you to realize and do. Just in case you think I am some Birkenstock-wearing flower-child, I will post 3 links to articles of the sort I have frequently posted in the "EtcEtc" section from magazines like The American Conservative-www.cecaust.com.au/iraq/1111.html and from Republican John J. Duncan-www.antiwar.com/orig/duncan1.html and (from an anti-war conservative who's been in the news a lot recently!)-http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/12/26/column.novak.opinion.sharon/ I keep thinking of LBJ's famous complaint that he was sending American boys to do what another nation's boys weren't doing for themselves.

 

[Pecker]

I really dont' think that political discussions solve a thing in this venue.

I don't come to LPSG to read magazines or newspapers or other periodicals of people's opinions on politics. As a matter of conciliation, since LPSG is so open to diverse subjects, I feel strongly that there should be a Politics topic available so I wouldn't have to look at it if I didn't feel like it.

This would make me feel much more comfortable that I could participate in any other topic on the board without having to wade through liberals and conservatives spouting the party line. (I know, I know, I'm guilty of it, too.)

It seems like LPSG, unfortunately, is being taken over by Jim Carville and Bob Novak - and we don't even know if they've got big dicks.

Pecker

I told my psychiatrist that everyone hates me. He said I was being ridiculous - everyone hasn't met me yet.

 

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lttle1: Pecker, I agree with you. The saddest part of the situation to me is that these aren't even discussions at all; they're just brawls with words instead of fists. No one is prepared to be persuaded by anyone else on even the smallest point. I fully suport the creation of a Politics section, even separate from Etc., so that people can read posts in Etc. on members outside interests and non-political current events without 1) being upset by all the hostility or 2) learning everyone else's political leanings.

I like a bit of context when conversing on LPSG, and I am extremely interested in the size of everyone's dick, but I would rather NOT know who is a right winger and who is a left winger.

 

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longtimelurker: [quote author=bradleeM link=board=meetgreet;num=1071422232;start=20#36 date=12/17/03 at 19:35:27]To Tracksuitboy and rrrrrrr:

One thing that the rest of the world knows is this.........the American taxpayer pays for the defense of their countries.  European Union knows that and in the  next few years their citizens are going to have to make a choice between their socialist programs and defending themselves.  They have already been told by this administration they are going to have to foot the bill when it comes to defending themselves.
[/quote]

And so it seems will you - I'd never actually realised how astronomical the US military spend was until I just looked at it - 2003 estimate at $400bn excluding the current Iraq/Afghan spend - a 17% rise on last year and 8x your healthcare and education spending. Apparently it has been estimated that at current deficit rates income tax would have to rise by 66% just to break even.

The link for those interested :
http://www.g2mil.com/Oct2003.htm

You know the situation's not good when you're even getting ex-generals arguing for a cut in military spending!

What everyone fails to see is the fact that if Germany, France, and Russia had joined the coalition from the beginning to oust Saddam and his henchmen, there would not have been a war.

That can be argued on two sides - if the Bush administration had allowed weapons inspectors to continue their work then either a) you would have French/German/Russian support or b) the war would have been averted in the first place.

 And Bin Laden would have been put on notice that the world was coming after him and his henchmen, and peace to that whole region would come much faster.

Bin Laden has nothing to do with S H. Bin Laden HATES S H and tried at one time to overthrow him and replace him with an Islamic theocracy along the lines of the Taliban.

 But it will take a terrorist bomb somewhere in Europe to finally wake up the europeans to the real threat.  

And hello?!? Europe has been victim to many different terrorist organisations way before 9/11 - Ireland/UK and the IRA/Unionist paramilitaries, Spain and ETA, Germany and the neo-Nazis. There are many more and this has spanned back much longer than Bush's current war.

And how have we dealt with it? The only real way that terrorism can be - deep intelligence work. After all, I doubt we'd have had many supporters if we'd just decided to nuke Ireland.

One thing I do not like is the fact that Bush is demonized by a lot of people on this site.........and when one hits back at their favorite leaders with the same verbage, they cry foul real fast!!!!  

But those of us who criticise Bush tend to put reasoning behind it - his unilateralism, for instance or the constant 'with us or against us' rhetoric. Saying that Ms Clinton has 'bigger dick and balls' than any Dem candidate isn't making an argument, it's throwing an insult.

As far as America winning the wars, that has never been in dispute by any historian writing about WW I or II.

This was kind of covered in 'Not helping themselves' in etc. the link: http://www.lpsg.org/cgi-bin/YaBB.cgi?board=99;action=display;num=1067118189;start=29

The US involvement was mainly 'speeding up' victory rather than deciding between victory and defeat. After all, WW2 at the end had practically the entire world against Germany, Austria and Japan, and no country can keep up against that kind of pressure.

That is not to say that others roles were not critical, obviously they were.  American, Australia, and England, will always be on the same side when there is a major war.  We all came from the same source.

That is actually quite an interesting point - not too far down the line the majority of America is expected to be from Asian, African or Latino roots, not white European as is currently the case (well, maybe the Latino population). There was a French columnist writing in my paper a few days back asking where our 'special relationship' will be when that finally happens...

 

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longtimelurker: [quote author=Inwood link=board=meetgreet;num=1071422232;start=20#37 date=12/17/03 at 19:52:47]Actually I believe the German Enigma code was first broken by the Poles in the early 30s. It was only after Germany invaded that the machines and Polish code breakers first went to France and then onto Britian.

The British contribution was to continue the work and break the new codes which the Germans developed. But this work was based on what the Poles had already done.[/quote]

I'll keep this seperate...

That's quite interesting - I'd never actually realised the Polish involvement, it seems that we like to blow our own trumpet a little too much ourselves.

Still, not entirely the whole story...

The Poles' involvement was to reverse-engineer a machine from an old broken model. They were able to crack the basic code, but the nature of the machine meant that they were not able to decipher which position the 'coding wheel' was in, and hence they were screwed when the Nazi's started changing the cypher every few days and they were no longer able to decode the messages.

When the Poles gave us a working Enigma machine we were able to find it's fundamental weakness and were able to decode messages without first knowing the cypher used. The final machine used in the decyphering, called 'The Bombe' was actually designed by the Englishman Alan Turing, although it was based upon an original Polish hypothesis which he developed.

It is an interesting story for those with an historical bent - a brief history can be found at http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/

 

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jerkin4-10: LTL...hello...saddam kicked out the UN inspectors in what...98?...wonder what for?...probably not cuz he didnt want them bagging that secret camel dung cookie recipe...whadda ya think?...maybe IF...saddam HADNT kicked out the inspectors in the FIRST place...this wouldnt have happened...i dont want to hear any bitchin about...what they didnt find...hell he had almost 5 years to ship it where ever else it went...the UN came up with the sanctions BECAUSE saddam had PROVEN without a shadow of a doubt that he cant play well with others...after the gulf war...and the coalition had reached the limit of the UN mandate...they had to stop...
couldnt kill him then...because it was a UN coalition effort...so the UN came up with the sanctions including the weapons inspectors...which have all come forward, except that one idiot...and said that the inspectors access was always limited...or they had to give notice when and where they were going...saddam WAS a menace...and he got what he had coming...get with the program son...

 

[Max]

I was going to risk posting on this, and just as I began the post was locked -- so I thought ... maybe that's just as well.

However, here it is! -- reopened and relocated, so I will risk it.

This is just an observation (from outside!) on US political parties and attitudes. In the past from a European perspective, many of us would have found it hard to distinguish Democrats and Republicans so far as the policy outcomes were concerned; the rhetoric might differ a bit, but it would be hard to see major shifts of policy with a government change. This was no doubt partly because both parties seemed way to the right of the mainstream political debate in most European countries, and maybe also because of the limitations imposed by the constitutional checks and balances between the executive and Congress (which if my memory serves me well until recently tended to be dominated by the Democrats even in years when a Republican president was elected).

Contrast that perception of Tweedledum and Tweedledee with the tone of debate here at lpsg of all places. I may be flattering myself, but I think I can fairly readily pick out the Republicans from the Democrats amongst the US posters in this sort of thread. It is almost like a couple of rival tribes with whole sets of conflicting attitudes, heroes, demonologies, etc. And often conducted in an extremely intense manner which fits strangely (from a UK perspective) with the likely lack of real policy shift.

In the UK things seem to be very different ... granted the present government is conservative in all but name, but the result of convergence of policy has not been to heighten the degree of party loyalty, rather the reverse. Personally I am now in the odd position of a long term conservative voter who now finds himself well to the left of not only his own party but also of a 'Labour' government on at least half the major issues of the day.

'Lecture' over.

 

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hawl: [quote author=Max link=board=99;num=1071868584;start=40#46 date=12/19/03 at 23:22:33] It is almost like a couple of rival tribes with whole sets of conflicting attitudes, heroes, demonologies, etc.

[/quote]Indeed, Max, indeed. I think one thing the "rival tribes" can agree on is that the coming election is going to be close and nasty. There are obviously already a lot of "warriors" on both sides who are beating the drums and splashing on the war-paint in preparation for the long slog. I see you are remaining safely off this continent! One thing to anticipate with horror is the eventual Republican Convention in New York, one of the cities most hostile to the President and containing a large number of the sort of Democrats that scare Democrats from other states!

 

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hawl: [quote author=Pecker link=board=99;num=1071868584;start=40#41 date=12/18/03 at 06:06:11]
I don't come to LPSG to read magazines or newspapers or other periodicals of people's opinions on politics. [/quote] By the way, I think especially the newer people should ignore this (Pecker is in no way an owner of this site), and post whatever they want without worrying about if it is what Pecker wants to read.

 

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longtimelurker: [quote author=jerkin4-10 link=board=99;num=1071868584;start=40#45 date=12/18/03 at 14:26:08]LTL...hello...saddam kicked out the UN inspectors in what...98?...wonder what for?...probably not cuz he didnt want them bagging that secret camel dung cookie recipe...whadda ya think?...maybe IF...saddam HADNT kicked out the inspectors in the FIRST place...this wouldnt have happened...
[/quote]

The main reason that SH kicked out the weapons inspectors in the first place was that it was discovered that the CIA had been using it as a cover to conduct spying operations outside of the WMD mandate. There were also murmerings of MI6 and Mossad involvement as well, but I believe it was only the CIA that was proven (there is plenty of news reports about it if you do a google search).

This also explains why SH was initially OK having inspectors return under the condition that there were no US nationals in the inspection teams - something I believe was overruled.

As for shipping the weapons out 5 years ago, Hans Blix has expressed his view that it is 'increasingly likely that any WMDs were destroyed 10 years ago' - and, seeing that he was the one overseeing the entire investigation, I'd have thought he'd be the one to know.

 

[13788]

jerkin4-10: my statement stands as is...when you cant follow the rules...you get sanctioned...still not following the rules...
[not granting unrestricted access] you get spied on...what does he have to hide?...these are all choices SH made for himself...i mean just just got out of an ass kicking...[the gulf war]...he didnt learn his lesson...being the defiant idiot he is... on the other hand...what do you hear out of libya since 86?...ole gadhafi sure has turned the corner...hes somewhat of a good citizen...but SH just believed his own press too much...

 

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josh82823: rrrrr - everyone is entitled to their opinion. Pecker has his, you have yours. You don't have to make a nasty post to give yours.

 

[13788]

hawl: Ugh, I wondered if I should post something to this effect, but didn't think it was necessary. People being entitled to their opinion was what I was talking about. There has long been a torrent of off-topic posting here, and I have never complained about it.  The board at this point is sprawling, and I won't pretend that I don't ignore stuff. There may be a 3-month flame war going on in "Young And Hung" or "Personals" that I don't know about! Who cares? Who cares if I care? Some of the most ridiculous and infuriating posts I've seen here have also been some of the funniest. C'mon, am I the only one who enjoys the weird juxtapositions, people having some "serious philosophical discussion" briefly interrupted by someone perhaps just as seriously asking [move]Any women in the northwestern North Dakota suburbs who wish to service the large?[/move] I'm not saying the place should necessarily be more of a free-for-all than it is now, but as one version of "the real deal", i.e. hung and way into porn etc., I long ago realized (to my great sorrow!) that this site was not gonna be just me and a lotta Jolene Blalock types. If the site was just wall-to-wall dick n' balls all the time, it might be better at providing whatever service is implied by its name, but besides being a bit dry how many heteros would feel comfortable with it, and wouldn't its popularity be about that of some obscure non-profit? Just kinda wondering aloud at this point! Everyone has different ideas I'm sure about what the site would ideally be like, but only one person owns it. I dunno, but looking at some of the "Big-Name" advertising at the bottom of this site doesn't give me a vibe that the place is intended as a non-profit private chatroom for a few dozen people. For some of you newer people, if my response seemed a bit curt or exasperated, it was probably due to the fact that Pecker had raised this "no more politics" complaint about 3 times in the last few months without the owner showing any interest in it (that I know of!). I have seen posts here about everything from coin collecting to Pecker's grandchildren and have never once complained to anyone, not even through Private Messages, so yes I will admit that I took offense at his complaint about my posting tiny links to not-necessarily overexposed articles. I will also add that the owner has made it very clear that he is very supportive of free speech. I have no idea about all the reasons people come here, and quite frankly, in a lotta cases I'm not too sure I wanna know all the gritty details ! Prohibiting "political" postings while allowing people to discuss everything from religion to recipes to cartoons seems like it would be unenforceable, would create more problems than it would solve, and in the meantime would just discourage any interesting newcomers-and let's face it, many people have complained about the lack of "fresh blood" here. For example, I would hate for a hot new Republican, Democrat, etc. chick to be discouraged from joining or posting anything controversial outside of the narrow bounds of some new "category"/ghetto. Anyway, I took the unusual (for me) step of PM'ing Pecker after my post and as far as I know everything is cool between us. Sorry to all if I gave off or extended a bad vibe from the thread. I'll admit that my immersion in politics these days can make my discussion of it both a bit intense and a bit flip. Time for me to get out of this thread and visit some Tara Reid galleries somewhere. Look at the number of viewings and postings this recent thread has-what a "quagmire"! Oops, "too political" ! Hope everyone is well.