[OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.

[Aloofi]

Man, these discussions about Israel makes me look like a frigging fundamentalist. I guess the self-defense mechanism kicks in.
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[Erax]

OK, here's my thoughts on WMDs and Iraq : It is clear to me that Bush expected to find WMDs after Saddam was overthrown. The very fact that none have been found are a proof of this. Why ? Because if he had known that Iraq had no WMDs (or had already destroyed them), he would have prepared some for the US military to 'find' after the war. The fact that this possibility was never covered suggests everyone on his team was certain that they would find those WMDs.

Therefore (if you're still with me), we can assume that when Bush said that Saddam had WMDs, he believed it himself.

Now it becomes tricky. Did Saddam destroy all of his WMDs before the invasion, knowing it would drive Bush crazy ? Or did he destroy them before the inspections because he didn't want to run the risk of being found out ? Did he even have WMDs ? Your guess is as good as mine.

[Erax]

[quote]Originally posted by Aloofi:

I complain a lot about Bush and the American corporations and Hollywood, but America is a great country indeed, especialy for the poor. It's not perfect, and it certainly can be better, but its people is definitively not the bad people that the anti-american propaganda paint.

Actually, this story happened here in Brazil (I should have made that clear), but it could also have happened in the US, or just somewhere in the New World.

Now for a question - how did Israel win the 1948 war with all of the odds against them ? Can you point me to any good historical articles ?

[Aloofi]

Bush Quotes:

"Do you have blacks too?" - Bush ignorantly asked Brazil's President Fernando Henrique Cardoso. Reported by the reputable German publication Der Spiegel. Rumor has it, Condoleza Rice interupted the president and explained in brief the African history in Brazil.
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"{waves hello}"- G.W. Bush waves to the blind musician, Stevie Wonder, as reported by the Washington Post, March 6th, 2002
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"Natural gas is hemispheric. I like to call it hemispheric in nature because it is a product that we can find in our neighborhoods." -George W Bush
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"There's an old saying in Tennessee -- I know it's in Texas, it's probably in Tennessee --that says, fool me once, shame on ... shame on you. Fool me ... You can't get fooled again." - G.W. Bush quoted by the Baltimore Sun - Oct 6, 2000


Are these quotes real?

[Aloofi]

Originally posted by Chief Engineer Erax:
Actually, this story happened here in Brazil (I should have made that clear), but it could also have happened in the US, or just somewhere in the New World.

Now for a question - how did Israel win the 1948 war with all of the odds against them ? Can you point me to any good historical articles ?[/QB]

Oops , I should have read your location.

The Independence War was our worst. We lost 1% of our population at the time.
Here's a link: http://www.israel-mfa.gov.il/mfa/go.asp?MFAH00us0

[Loser]

Originally posted by Aloofi:
Are these quotes real?

At times like these, I really, really wish I had someone else for which to vote. No matter how much I might be able to admire the man for other qualities, the inability to consistantly express himself in a professional manner is quite disturbing.

I continue to hold a grudge against Gore for the Clipper Chip (in fact I registered as a Democrat so I could vote agaisnt him twice), and I dislike his populist ways, and I cannot see the value in voting for a sure-to-lose third-party-type, no matter how much I admine their work or their policies. (Though I guess I would have voted Perot, if I had been older and if he hadn't looked like such a nut there at the end.)

[Suicide Junkie]

and I cannot see the value in voting for a sure-to-lose third-party-type, no matter how much I admine their work or their policies.

Hey, self-fulfilling prophesy... If both the main choices are crap, why shouldn't you vote for someone else?

You really need to get your country out of that "two party system" mindset.

[Andrés]

If it is a sure-to-lose it's because people think like that.

[dogscoff]

Yeah, we've been stuck with just two main parties for centuries - as far as I know we have *never* had an elected government that wasn't either labour (left) or tory (right).

But I think this time it might change. We had more than a decade of tory rule in which they proved themselves again and again to be greasy, corrupt, inept hypocrites. So we voted Blair in who has dominated his party and the country's political scene so completely that half the population don't even know the name of the leader of the opposition. Blair revolutionised British politics and pushed it into the 21st century, just as the tories were dragging their party kicking and screaming out of the 19th. The opposition are laughably outdated, mistrusted, disorganised and utterly unelectable.

But now Blair's position is starting to look shaky. The war hasn't done anything to improve his popularity, and he had certain weaknesses anyway. For one thing he has drifted so far right that he might as well *be* the conservative party. All the socialists, communists and various other left-of-centre ists think he has sold out completely. For another, he and his party have had been exposed in sleazy, corrupt scandals (conflict of interests, backhanders etc) just like the tories- one of their main selling points when they were elected was that they weren't as sleazy.

With this loss in confidence in the two major parties, I think Britain is heading for a >2 party system. All the minority parties (greens, nazis, single issue parties, votes-for-chickens parties, save-our-local-pub parties, independent candidates) are doing better and better with every local election and I think the liberals (our third "central" party, now finding itself further left than the right-drifting new-labour "socialists") might even get into downing street one of these days.

And that will be a good thing. It will shake up British politics enormously, and probably herald a more european-style multi-party system (which may not be such a good thing). Hoefully though, the liberals will be so new to government that for a while they'll actually think they're there to represent and work for the electorate rather than line their own pockets with our money.

[Alpha Kodiak]

Originally posted by Aloofi:
Man, these discussions about Israel makes me look like a frigging fundamentalist. I guess the self-defense mechanism kicks in.
.

I know the feeling. When I read some of my comments about the US, I sound like I believe that the government is perfect and I love every aspect of it. In reality, I complain all the time about dumb things going on in this country. It's just that statements made against the US government are so overblown or just downright false that I take a hard-line stance in defense of the US.