The War on Heroism

What we are seeing is not a considered comment on a foriegn or domestic policy.

What we are seeing is hysteria

This didn't happen suddenly - it snowballed thanks to the spin and campaigning of the extreme left - narked that Gore was pipped to the post by a Born Again Christian Republican.

Now I'm not a big fan of Born Again Christians, but the hysteria we are seeing is HUGELY disproportionate to anything Bush could have done wrong ....even if analysed through the eyes of a Democrat.

And the hatred and anger is getting worse. Part of me just wants Kerry to win - just to shut these left wing fanatics up and allow normal people to become normal again.

But a bigger part of me wants Bush to win, because while America is the World's policeman I don't trust Kerry.

Not the view of any of the peaceniks and lefties I've spoken to in the UK. Perhaps Walking with Bears or Wated could put me right (that would be a first )

Whatever - I'm grateful to Bush and Blair for having the strength of mind to rid the world of two of the most obnoxious regimes ever.

I think we need more policemen to patrol the beat.

If doing such things only took "strength of mind," I'm sure there would be little objection.

But neither Bush nor Blair are superheroes, and the Afghanistan and Iraq campaigns still had to be done the old-fashioned way: spending a shitload of money and killing many people. Since Bush and Blair are spending the people's money and sending some of us off to die, they are accountable to the people for how honestly and how effectively they have done all this.

I think we can agree on that, yes?

First of all no.

Second - how about you take a "BB sized wound" from a piece of hot 2000 degree steel flying 3200 feet per second into your arm.
Then tell me how it feels like a bee-sting.

These people bleed so you can eat corn flakes for breakfast and you don't give a shit.

And I never said anything about John Kerry or his medals at the beginning of this thread - as far as I am concerned it is a non-issue.

*forced to scratch my head and wince*

The mede(a)l is a symbol to show that your country appreciates what you did for them. It(')s not (akin to) taking home a goldfish for being able to bob for the most apples. Seriously. Jesus.

Are you telling us that Kerry was given a medal because the United States appreciated what he did? Please elaborate. How did slaughtering young Vietnamese positively affect the United States? The vast majority of medals awarded in Vietnam are, in my opinion, of no more significance than those goldfish given to apple-bobbing champions. These awards are the same damned thing as the gold stars Wal-Mart employees receive. That is, they serve to goad impressionable people who are stuck with horrific, soul-numbing duties, into working ever harder for no greater reward than a shiny trinket. Efficiency experts have been using similar carrots for centuries.




[Edited on Sep 02, 2004 by sixblueten]

as I understand it Kerry recieved a purple heart for
injurries that include scrapnel still in his hip,
bob dole can be quoted saying he didnt deserve the
medal becase the wounds were superficial,
that would be a real dirt bag thing to say if
im correct,how do people like dole have any more power
or controll over your and my lives than we our selves exercise?

I would respectfully disagree.

I think the preposterous idea that John Kerry somehow didn't earn his medals is a non-issue, because it's a lie.

However, I think Kerry's service is an issue, because, since we're now in a war, I would feel better having a commander-in-chief who has actually been in a war, rather than Bush and his cronies. With the exception of Colin Powell, they all fought in the Battle of the Student Union. (Powell, of course, has been largely ignored by Bush et al.)

[Edited on Sep 02, 2004 by saucy_son]

saucy_son said:
I would respectfully disagree.


I was talking about with respect to the topic at hand (delegates of a certain political party denigrating a sacred symbol of honor) and how people who cannot defend a position never fail to change the subject immediately. If they do fail in changing the topic they muddle it with unprovable conclusions until the debate reaches a draw. (or retreat to a stokulaic cave and deny debate)

The real heroes are the men and women in the military who risk their lives on a daily basis.

It would have sooooooo easy for Bush & Blair to do nothing about Saddam. I think the world will a better place without Saddam in power.

That the world is a better place without Saddam in power is self-evident.

That the world will be a better place given the particular way he was removed from power by President Bush, and given the continuing disaster and unforeseen consequences of the occupation (when it comes to the Iraq war, using the past tense is just wishful thinking), is anything but self-evident.


[Edited on Sep 02, 2004 by saucy_son]

I think the world will a better place without -

Abdelaziz Bouteflika
Algeria

Jose Eduardo dos Santos
Angola

Ilham Aliyev
Azerbaijan

Aleksandr Lukashenka
Belarus

Jigme Singye Wangchuk
Bhutan

Hassanal Bolkiah Mu’izzaddin
Waddaulah, Brunei

Than Shwe
Burma

Hun Sen
Cambodia

Paul Biya
Cameroon

Francois Bozize
Central African Republic

Idriss Deby
Chad

Jiang Zemin
China

Fidel Castro
Cuba

Joseph Kabila
Congo-Kinshasa

Hosni Mubarak
Egypt

Teodoro Obiang Nguema
Mbasogo, Equatorial Guinea

Isaias Afwerki
Eritrea

Lansana Conte
Guinea

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
Iran

Nursultan Nazarbayev
Kazakhstan

Askar Akayev
Kyrgyzstan

Khamtai Siphandon
Laos

Muammar al-Qaddafi
Libya

Maumoon Abdul Gayoom
Maldives

Maaouiya Ould Sid Ahmed
Taya, Mauritania

Kim Jong Il
North Korea

Qabus bin Said al-Said
Oman

Pervez Musharraf
Pakistan

Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani
Qatar

Paul Kagame
Rwanda

Abdullah ibn Abdul Aziz
Al Saud, Saudi Arabia

Omar Al-Bashir
Sudan

Mswati III
Swaziland

Bashar al-Assad
Syria

Imomali Rakhmonov
Tajikistan

Gnassingbe Eyadema
Togo

Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali
Tunisia

Saparmurad Niyazov
Turkmenistan

Sultan Zayed
United Arab Emirates

Islam Karimov
Uzbekistan

Nong Duc Manh
Vietnam

Robert Mugabe
Zimbabwe

in power too. Is this a war against dictators, or a war against a group of stateless terrorist who do not care about borders and want to blow up civilians?

It's a war against dictators. Always has been, always will be. Remember, it's the dictators who slaughter the civilians, whose offspring/relatives in turn are labeled "terrorists" when they turn to defend themselves. The Bush family has slaughtered enough civilians to breed generations of anti-U.S. terrorists. Paraphrasing Malcolm X - "The chickens will {/I} come home to roost."

[Edited on Sep 02, 2004 by sixblueten]

SirPsychoSexy said:


These people bleed so you can eat corn flakes for breakfast and you don't give a shit.

QUOTE]


Don't give a shit? I served, you're welcome. Did you? How'd your cornflakes taste?

Whatever? They took their countries to war under false pretenses and your response is "whatever"?

I agree

Both

This is what I meant when I responded to the "World's policeman" comment. If you smash one crackhouse, why not get the one on the next corner? And the one down the street? And the one a couple of blocks over? They're every bit as cracky as the other crackhouse, after all...

Thank you for your service, I have even less respect for a soldier who regards a fellow soldier as a whiny bitch because the piece of exploding shrapnel is not big enough for you.

You should know better.
You should also know a bunch of people who were not there do not know better than you and the people who were.

About knocking over every dictator...
If before the political buildup to the Iraq war GWB told the people of the US that the mission of the new century was crusading around the world alone and that they would spend trillions of our tax dollars and hundreds of thousands of military lives (plus an implicit draft) in a perpetual war to reform the planet for a word (freedom) he would have been run out of Washington on a rail.

So flb0y, the questions that obviously arise, but get ignored when we pussy sissy liberals raise them, are:

1. How many of those bad people do you suggest the US go after? How many countries should we expect to see the US invade? In what order? Over what time frame? Pre-emptively? Unilaterally?

I'd really like to know.

2. Was the war in Iraq, against Saddam, really a war against terrorists? Or a war that appears to have increased the prospects of terrorist activity? How would the current war be judged a success, given how it seems to fit description #2?

I'd like to know about that one too.

Thanks.

"Cost of living goin' up, and the chance of living goin' down..."

My point is, if "policing the world" actually
is the goal, one has to be consistent about it, or it's just a horseshit, off-the-cuff rationalization.