Retreat! Run away....Follow

Ok, I'll bite.

Where did you run to?

Interesting to note tho, that even tho uncounted thousands have died in the pursuit of the policies that these guys advocated, there is not hint of apology. instead there is a chorus of "the goal was right, it was the leaders that were flawed".

Weak minds can't admit failure.

See also: Gbaji.

When you think like that, the terrorists win.

Hmmm...

Read very very carefully when the journalists sprikles his own words in and around the quotes of someone else...

Just saying. This story is pretty carefully crafted to make statements that things aren't going as well as they'd have liked into "OMG! We made a total mistake and Bush is a totally incompetant ninny!" (and every other standard Liberal talking point). Notice the actual words in the quotes, and notice the words that surround those words. Notice a difference? All the stuff you guys are parroting around about is outside the quotes. Are Perl and the rest annoyed that things didn't work great? Are they less sure then they were 3 years ago? Of course. Does that mean that they think a different course would have worked "better"? Not so much.


Look. If you'd gone to any political analyst 5 years ago, 2 months after 9/11, and told that person that over the next 5 years we'd lose 2500 soldiers total but would invade Afghanistan, remove the Taliban, disperse Al-qaeda, establish a democracy there and hand off most of the peacekeeping to the UN, and we'd invade Iraq, remove Saddam from power, establish a democracy, rebuild the country to pre-war levels, but still have a fair amount of faction/insurgent fighting still going on, have record economic growth while doing all of this, *and* not have suffered a single major terrorist attack on US soil, every single one would have fallen over laughing. After recovering, you'd have been told to put down the crack pipe because we could not dream to have a result that good. Nope. We'd expect to lose 2-5 thousand men invading and holding Afghanistan. Iraq would require 5-10 thousand just to defeat Saddam's military and that's assuming he actually doesn't have any chemical weapons to use against us (something that wasn't known for sure back then if you remember). We'd never be able to get any form of democratic government in either country. Our economy would be in the dumpster for the next 10 years as a result of the recession and the damage done on 9/11. And we could expect to suffer 3-5 major terrorist attacks similiar in scope to the 9/11 attacks over the next 5 years...


We're basically shying away from Iraq, not because it's been a doomed failure, but because it's *hard*. Period. But I'd argue that nothing worth doing is easy...

Funny he should say this, then:



[:little smiley with the raised eyebrow:]




That's why you have to love spin.

How about this then:

Look, if you'd gone to anyone 5 years ago, 2 months after 9/11, and told them that over the next 5 years the US would have gone to war with Afghanistan and after driving the Talibans out, secured only Kabul, allowed Opium production to reach new all-time records, allowed the Talibans to regroup and rearm, and abandonned the country to pursue an illegal and pointless war against someone who had nothing to do with 9/11 or Al-Qaeda. That they completely screwed up that country's economy, sacked all the army and civil service, turned most of the local population against them, created the greatest terrorist-training course imaginable, turned world opinion against them, gave a huge incentive to Iran and NK to develop Nukes, used up all the existing political will to go to war, did not address any of the underlying issues that caused 9/11, did not find Bin laden, created a "war on Terror" that can never be truely won, managed to drive away historical allies, spent billions of dollars in the process, and in the process curtailed most American's freedom, then yes, people would've rolled on the floor laughing.

But not for the same reasons.

So yopu gave the rosiest version possible, I gave a gloomy one. No doubt the truth is somewhere in between.



No. You're "shying away from Iraq" because it is doomed. Because it is an incredible mess, and no one has any idea on how to solve it, or even make it slightly better. You're shying away because you are finally realising that as long as the US troops are there things will not improve. Most people realise that even when US troops leave, things will not improve either, and will probably worsen. But at least, it won't directly affect the US in the sort-term.

All this mess is the reason why these neo-cons are now expressing their doubt and regrets. The very guys that wanted all this to happen are now saying it was done in the wrong way.

Oh FFS. The world you live in is one hell of a sad place. Your answer to the problems of the world is to keep on killing people?

par·a·noi·a (pr-noi)
n.
1. A psychotic disorder characterized by delusions of persecution with or without grandeur, often strenuously defended with apparent logic and reason.
2. Extreme, irrational distrust of others.

Its like those christian twats that come around your house on a saturday morning, saying that the only way to heaven is by following the particular brand of indoctrination that they've fallen for. Little realising that, for the majority of us, the very thought of ending up in a 'heaven' full of Jehovahs Witnesses, or whatever, all sitting around going "yeah! We were right! Praise be!" is the definition of 'hell' for the rest of us.

You make us hippies (and the baby Jesus) very sad.

Were there hundreds of analysts all predicting that Lisa Simpson would be attacked by a tiger if she didn't do something? Was the rock selected by Lisa specifically to prevent that from happening? Was there any other demonstrable event that can be shown to be more responsible for the predictions of Lisa's demise at the slavering jaws of a tiger being false?

The *** Hoc fallacy requires that the two things actually be unrelated. If an overwhelming majority of political analysts predict that the US will suffer a number of major terrorist attacks in the coming years unless it does something to prevent them, and the government chooses a specific course of action to prevent those terrorist attacks, and after some number of years, no terrorist attacks have occured, we're left with three possiblities:

1. The experts were wrong (the attacks would not have occured anyway).

2. The attacks would have happened but didn't because of something other than the government's actions.

3. The government's actions designed to prevent future terrorist attacks worked.


It's not unreasonable at all to argue that number 3 is the most likely possibility. At the very least, you can't just dismiss it with some clever sounding bit of misuse of logic. You need to argue that one of the other two possiblities happened. I'm betting you can't do that convincingly.

What was the rate of Islamic terrorist attacks on the United States previously? I state Islamic because the argument made here is that Iraq is keeping us safe from terrorism but I strongly doubt that Eric Rudolph or Timmoth McVeigh would have humped out to the Middle East to fight the government there.

The list on Wikipedia shows a 1997 New York shooting aginst the "enemies of Palestine" which I suppose we can chalk down to some Middle East influence although I wouldn't exactly call it an "Attack on American soil". Prior to that we have.. erm... well, the 1993 WTC bombing and failed landmark plot. So we had eight years between significant foreign terrorist attacks on United States soil.

So explain exactly why I'm supposed to say "Wow! Five years without an attack? It must be Bush's actions that are saving us!" You need to establish a more definate rate of attacks before you can start claiming that that rate has been disrupted.

You said U.S. soil. While I know that embassies are technically US soil, an attack in Kenya or whatever does not affect the nation the same as an attack within the US borders. Which is what is typically meant as an "attack on US soil".Based on what? Joe Average is here in the United States, not wandering the US embassies in Africa or sitting on a ship in the Middle East.

If this is the best you can do to support your argument...

It's like passing the SATs I never had.

So according to you, ALL the government's actions are one entity? It's either ALL good, or ALL bad?

The main reason why the US hasn't suffered other attacks since 9/11 is that since then, they've known were to look. Prior to 9/11, most people has never heard of Al-Qaeda. Prior to 9/11, no one in the Bush administration gave a rat's *** about Al-Qaeda. And when they were warned about them, they dismissed it.

Then 9/11 happened.

So yes, maybe it just opened their eyes a tiny bit to what threats were actually worth looking at.

There is no doubt that the freezing of assets of terrorists were a good thing. That increased cooperation between different intelligence services around the world was a good thing. That forcing countries like Pakistan to be on "our" side, and act within their own states to capture, and kill, terrorists was a good thing. And going to Afghanistan to remove the Talibans was also a very good thing. All of that undoubdedly helped the prevention of further attacks on US soil, no doubt about it. But mostly, it's the shift in focus of the intelligence services. When you know where to look, it's much easier than when you're trying to hit a baseball in the dark.

But is that everything the US government has done since 9/11, or are we missing something?

Of course not. The Bush administration has done lots of other things that, in my opinion, greatly increased the desire and the capacity to hurt the US (and Europe). Iraq is the most obvious exemple. Not only the decision and the invasion itself, but more importantly how the post-invasion was planned and executed. No point in listing all those failures again, but Abu, the looting after the invasion, the dismantling of the civil service and the army, etc... This has hurt the US, and has increased the hatred towards them, and the West in general. Then you have Guanto, which also greatly increased the hatred. The you have abandoning Afghanistan, in order to go to Iraq. This was a huge mistake, since it was there that Al-Qaeda found a regime that shared their ideology. And we all know the Talibans have been givent the time and space to regroup and rearm.

And then, you have all the things that they haven't done. No political capital spent on Israel/Palestine, eventhough it's obviously, and by far, the biggest issue of friction between the West and Muslims. And eventhough Bush told us it was the next step after Iraq. They haven't opened a real dialogue with Iran, or Syria. They haven't worked on the US's PR in the ME at all.

All these things increase the hatred, and therefore the threat.

So yes, the US government has done some things that were necessary. The intelligence services have obviously stepped up their game, and focused their attention and ressources where it was needed which is surely the biggest single factor in the fact the US hasnt been attacked since then.

But that's the glass a quarter-full. And yes, it's "good". Or rather, it could've been worse. The US administration could've kept on ignoring Al-Qaeda, and decided to invade Denmark.

You expect a lot from those that can achieve a lot, as my old teacher use to say to me (how wrong she was...). And I'm sorry, but I doubt that people who are aware of what's going on in the world feel that it's a safer place today than it was on the 8/11. Or on the 10th.