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[Raise Havok]

Come on Bill, I thought this was the no spin zone. Moore was spinning more than Top Man from Mega Man 2.

And to add to some things you've all said...

This country pays people to server in the military, they make good money, why is it so back for them to do their job? When I go to work, I have to do... work...

And as for the we need to find the weapons of mass distruction before we invade, I agree. But I also agree that if some intelligence says there are weapons of that nature, we have to take that threat seriously and not give them time to use them. Let's face it, if I have a giant bomb, and I know the most powerful country in the world was looking for it, I'm going to do one of two things. Take it all apart and sell the crap to someone else, or just use it on them. And now if you take into consideration I'm a terrorist with no regard to human life, I'm pretty sure the choice I would make is to obviously blow up the USA. Personally I guess I'm disappointed we didn't find them, because that means there is that many more out there, but am I angry we caught Saddam? No, in fact I'm slightly happier for that, I realize there is damn near an infinate supply of these guys, but this one has been running a muck for too long. I don't see why everyone gets so angry about us going to war, maybe one of you guys can explain that to me. Do you all remember how we became the strongest country in the world? Do you remember what the strong countries did in ancient eras? Do you think Troy and Rome and the Greeks never had wars? Times change, but history always repeats itself, and this is one fact of life you need to just deal with. No matter how much you complain that we shouldn't be at war, the men in war, for the most part, and glad to be serving their country and the fact that a good number of people in their country are angry with them for that fact, is sad. If I was in the armed force, I sure wouldn't what the country I was fighting for to not support me. But hey, that's just me.

 

[Late Stage Marxist]

This country pays people to server in the military, they make good money, why is it so back for them to do their job? When I go to work, I have to do... work...

There are plenty of jobs that require the employee to perform immoral actions. The fact that you get paid does not make the actions instantaneously right.

And as for the we need to find the weapons of mass distruction before we invade, I agree. But I also agree that if some intelligence says there are weapons of that nature, we have to take that threat seriously and not give them time to use them. Let's face it, if I have a giant bomb, and I know the most powerful country in the world was looking for it, I'm going to do one of two things. Take it all apart and sell the crap to someone else, or just use it on them. And now if you take into consideration I'm a terrorist with no regard to human life, I'm pretty sure the choice I would make is to obviously blow up the USA.

The USA has plenty of WMD's and plenty of time to use them. Iraq has no WMD and has little or nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks.

Personally I guess I'm disappointed we didn't find them, because that means there is that many more out there, but am I angry we caught Saddam? No, in fact I'm slightly happier for that, I realize there is damn near an infinate supply of these guys, but this one has been running a muck for too long. I don't see why everyone gets so angry about us going to war, maybe one of you guys can explain that to me. Do you all remember how we became the strongest country in the world? Do you remember what the strong countries did in ancient eras? Do you think Troy and Rome and the Greeks never had wars?

And look at them now!

Times change, but history always repeats itself, and this is one fact of life you need to just deal with. No matter how much you complain that we shouldn't be at war, the men in war, for the most part, and glad to be serving their country and the fact that a good number of people in their country are angry with them for that fact, is sad. If I was in the armed force, I sure wouldn't what the country I was fighting for to not support me. But hey, that's just me.

I don't respect the stupidity of the soldiers who are going into this war gung-ho. I doubt there are many of those, as I'm aware that it's become a similar situation to what happened in Vietnam, with soldiers realizing that they are fighting a losing fight to a faceless, intangible enemy.

 

[human5892]

I don't see why everyone gets so angry about us going to war, maybe one of you guys can explain that to me.

Because we went to war under false pretenses, would be the short answer. I think even those who don't think Bush deliberately misled the public about WMDs and whatever else can agree on that one. The main reasons originally provided for the war (WMD, and an inference of a September 11th connection) have proven blatantly untrue. Going to war should be a last resort, and it's clear that this "pre-emptive" strike was far from that.

 

[KilledByBill]

Do you all remember how we became the strongest country in the world? Do you remember what the strong countries did in ancient eras? Do you think Troy and Rome and the Greeks never had wars? Times change, but history always repeats itself, and this is one fact of life you need to just deal with.

Your comparrsions sound absurd! This is the United States of America, it's a total betrayal of our nation's founding principles to be behaving like some tyranical empire of the past.

Our country became the strongest in the world because we had no choice but pour all of our resources into stopping Fascist millitarism. Of course before then and certainly since then people within our country have sought to use America's power and position to advance selfish and often immoral interests. I don't want this country to simply repeat history, I want us to use this fleeting position of world "dominance" to set the right example. We need to be multilateral in our actions and we need to be restrained in using our millitary power. The war in Iraq was none of that and sets a horrible example. Why should nations follow the "rule of law" when our gov. only does so when it suits our supposed interests? The Bush administration is giving people around the world very good reasons to resent us and is no doubt filling Al Qaida with all the new recruits they need.

We're certainly not any safer now than when Saddam was in power building his palaces. I seriously doubt the people of Iraq are any better off either. We, the most powerful nation in the world, can't get control of their country and terrorists are running rampant. Democracy isn't going to take hold there as fast as we want it to if at all. The Kurds want their own country, the shia's and the sunni's hate each other (and the Kurds) and half the country seems to want to set up a government modled after Iran. This is a total disaster that's seems to be getting worse by the day.

 

[CrimsonSkies]

"I seriously doubt the people of Iraq are any better off either."

While I don't exactly support everything about going to war in Iraq. I don't see how anyone could possibly believe that living under a dictator's boot is better than living in a democracy.

 

[human5892]

While I don't exactly support everything about going to war in Iraq. I don't see how anyone could possibly believe that living under a dictator's boot is better than living in a democracy.

It depends on the Iraqi you talk to. For some, living under Saddam's regime wasn't so bad, as long as they kept themselves in-line and didn't have a high profile. For others, it was downright excellent, as they were in favor with him. Of course, there were also many who were badly oppressed by his regime, and those unfortunate enough to become prisoners or even executed.

I think overall, the majority of Iraq would probably prefer the situation now, but unforunately, it's like preferring being burned with hot water to being burned with an iron -- it's a bit better, but it's still no paradise.

 

[spangler]

I believe you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone, from O'Reilly to Moore, who believes that Saddam was a good leader for the people of Iraq.

The problem (as has probably already been stated in this thread and many others on this forum) is that the US is trying to take some moral high ground on this issue that simply cannot be supported. Saddam was not a good leader when the US supported him during the Iraq/Iran war. His human rights violations were not a problem then, apparently. This supporting of a brutal dictator's regime as long as that regime is open to US government and business interest is not uncommon in American history. Look at Nicaragua or Panama (among other Latin American countries) for examples of this.

There is also the ridiculousness of getting rid of Saddam while leaving other brutal dictators in place in locations around the globe who are as bad or much worse than Saddam. We're talking about nations that actually do have WMD's here. What's the difference between Iraq and these other nations then? The answer is rather obvious, isn't it?

 

[FightyF]

While I don't exactly support everything about going to war in Iraq. I don't see how anyone could possibly believe that living under a dictator's boot is better than living in a democracy.

It'd be nice if Iraq suddenly had a democratic government and all the public services that we enjoy, but in reality it's going to take years before that occurs.

I know that if Calgary was missing a simple service such as trash removal, there would be chaos and people would be disgruntled...what's going on there is much like this on a larger scale.

 

[Socreges]

FYI, guys, the CIA is not just an imperfect body. It's been corrupt in the past. I'm not about to dismiss the potentiality (probability?) that facts were manipulated or ignored, rather than simply 'miscalculated' or however they'd manage to fuck up so badly.

 

[KilledByBill]

I don't see how anyone could possibly believe that living under a dictator's boot is better than living in a democracy.

I believe you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone, from O'Reilly to Moore, who believes that Saddam was a good leader for the people of Iraq.

First of all, I never implied that Saddam was in any way good, what I said was that the the situation since the invasion has gone from bad to worse for the Iraqi people. Before the war I don't remember terrorists blowing up the country's oil pipelines and infrastructure or Iraqi's having to face the prospect of sucicide bombings on a daily basis. While the war has cost more than 700 or so coalition lives since the start it has certainly cost many thousands of Iraqi lives including non-combatants killed by our errant strikes or by terrorist attacks. Of course the administration and the Pentagon have refused to give an estimate on the number of Iraqis killed since the invasion so true numbers will probably never be made public.

Second, I don't see how anyone could call the current situation in Iraq anything resembling a functional democracy. Anarchy seems much closer to the truth. Their provisional government is looking ahead to taking some heavy-handed actions such as declaring a state of martial law to try and restore a semblance of order in the country. Again, as I said before I have serious doubts regarding the survival of any kind of Iraqi democracy without U.S. troops holding it up artifically.

 

[spangler]

KilledbyBill:

I agree with you. The setting up of a puppet "democracy" in foreign nations is not uncommon practice for the US. I thought this was implied in my previous post.

 

[KilledByBill]

Well if that's the case then, thanks. It gave me a good reason to expand on my position.

 

[Slurpy]

I honeslty believe the general public WAS better off. People are fucking scared to leave their houses. There are attacks every fucking day. Noone knows when this will end. Streets are often deserted. There is no security. Basic services such as electricity, etc are lacking.

And isn't Iraq going to be a 'democracy' when there is a damned election? The phrase 'they are better off now in a democracy' blows my mind with its stupidity. What democracy? God knows when the 1st democratic vote will be held.

 

[Raise Havok]

Out of the the comments about my post only one sticks out as "What the hell?" the others were pretty well thought out and everything, but to the guy who posted directly after me with this

"And look at them now!"

In regard to the Roman Empires and such. Did you mean how they lasted so long? Are we praising them? "Wow did you see that Egyptian Empire lasted like 2,000 years, that was sweet!" Fact is, no one is the best forever, Let's not forget that Great Britain was until we beat them in a war, oh no, did I say war?!?! We are such bad people. We will all die horrible deaths 1,000 times over.

Other than that you guys have good reasons, I can understand the whole false purposes, but A) who is anyone to say Bush knew about that, and B) Even if he was unsure about it, I still think as the leader of a country he has to take that seriously. What if Bush listened to you guys and backed down like a wuss, and they did have these WMD, and then happened to use them on us, who do you think people would blame for that? (If any of us were left...) In todays wacked out, super intelligence world, you have to take the slightest threat and surpress it. Otherwise the USA isn't going to be the top country for much longer. Civilizations rise and fall, it's going to happen, sooner or latter the USA is going to get beat in a war, or the people of the country fixed on their own beliefs will over the run the government, and this great civilization will fall. I hope that is no news to anyone. But I hope with the growing threats of WMD and the many terrorist groups, that somehow we can stay strong enough to make it into the history books, because most of what we have done is great. But let us remember we haven't been on top very long. When you look at the rulers of Egypt and China. The long raines that withstained, we have just cracked the surface. But if our own people of our country would support eachother, we can make this last that long, if not longer. But when people can not support their country, and their countries choices, that is the first step of being over thrown. I hope I didn't anger anyone with this, I'm just post my view. Well except that historic idoit I talk about at the top, he can be angry.

 

[fart]

O'Reilly's show has nothing to do with logical and coherent debate. His show is all about speaking louder than the other person, asking them ridiculous questions, and trying to make them say ridiculous statements. In this case, Moore did all of that, on O'Reilly's own show! I consider that ownage to the max.

It's like calling someone out to your own turf, planning to beat the crap out of him, but then he does it to you. Note: the point isn't to "win" the arguement, the point is to make the other person uncomfortable and not able to answer your questions. O'Reilly repeatedly dodged Moore's attempt to get him to say he'd send his children to Iraq. He just couldn't get himself to say it, he was frozen like a deer on a highway at night with highbeams in it's eyes.

along these same lines, that wasn't an interview. o'reilly doesn't interview people. he just starts shouting and the masses grab their popcorn and go "boy howdy that was some interllectual debate!" as far as "ownage" is concerned i think they both got some jabs in, but if it weren't for o reilly's massive ego, he would have been out of control by the end, totally lost it. moore was much moore composed (lolz). also i don't totally trust a drudge incomplete transcript. anyone have the full transcript?

of course, there's nothing enlightening here. o reilly immediately steered discussion away from fact and reason and into his usual morality and righteousness shouting match bullshit, why do people watch this show again?

 

[Azih]

Problem is that by any standard there are much better targets than Iraq to go after.

WMD? North Korea.

Supporting terrorism? Iran/Pakistan/Saudi Arabia.

General bad person/Making the world a better place? Plenty of places much worse off than Iraq. And this standard falls apart because it was when Saddam was at his absolute worst that he was America's buddy.


Iraq was in no way shape or form a front in the war on terror. It is now and because of that the world is a less stable place.

And don't use the 'we didn't know' line. I remember tons of people screaming about how Hans Blix needed more time and how much Saddam and Bin Laden despised each other way before the war started. Guess the administration should have listened to them instead of demonising and belittling them huh?

 

[Boogie]

Out of the the comments about my post only one sticks out as "What the hell?" the others were pretty well thought out and everything, but to the guy who posted directly after me with this

"And look at them now!"

In regard to the Roman Empires and such. Did you mean how they lasted so long? Are we praising them? "Wow did you see that Egyptian Empire lasted like 2,000 years, that was sweet!" Fact is, no one is the best forever, Let's not forget that Great Britain was until we beat them in a war, oh no, did I say war?!?! We are such bad people. We will all die horrible deaths 1,000 times over.

You're American, right? That's what you mean by "we"?

So, are you telling me that you actually think that it was America's victory in the Revolutionary War was the end of the dominance of the British Empire? Where's the damn :lol smiley when I need it?