Bush did not restrict his declaration to 9/11 terrorists. He was going after all terrorists and all who harbor them. You pantywaists can't seem to understand that. This is a global war. Terrorists are not going away. They must be exterminated. You don't kill the termites under the house and ignore the ones in the wood pile.
I was being cynical. We need an icon for cynical and sarcastic remarks. Bush did say that countries would not be allowed to harbor the terrorists. Pakistan has not turned over bin Ladin nor will they allow us to go and get him. No, there are many other military operations available than just invasions, LC. I fear war with Pakistan will come soon enough when they undergo an Iran-like Islamic revolution and we must be ready. Then we must deter them from exporting revolution. It would be a risk since Pakistan has nuclear weapons and missiles to deliver them, but it would be national suicide if they used them against US forces. They may be radical, but they ain't crazy. But they might use them against regional rivals India and Iran. An Afghanistan-style airpower and special forces operation in the mountains where Al Qaida is hiding is all we really need to accomplish there. An invasion and occupation of the whole country gains us nothing.
Lame insults are poor substitutes for discussion. Just a series of one-liners without a shred of reasoning. Sad.
Well you can't very well be cynical and then use that to blame Bush for failing. We do have men in the nether regions of Pakistan. They allow us to fly over also looking for terrorists....i.e. see Predator destroy huts. So using bin Laden hiding in Pakistan and us not finding him as an insult to Bush is a stretch. Bin Laden and his henchmen aren't the end all of this deal anyway. These Islamofacists have to be killed wherever they are in the short term. In the long run, the only hope is for us to work with these countries in the middle east to reform.
You know, this argument isn't even really worth having anymore because everyone generally resides themselves to their own little myopias. But if I'm up-to-date on current events, I believe that we had already 'gone after Saddam' when Kerry was up for election. But it's of little matter since I didn't vote for the clown anyway. Further, and here's a shocker, I voted for W in 2000, so bite your tongue on the Gore retort. However, it certainly is humble of you to talk about how you would have nobly supported a democrat's foreign policy, even though not a single person here is gullible enough to believe that inane drivel. Carry on without me. Trust me, none of you want to know where I stand on this (despite how much you think you already know).
WHAT? You try to indict Bush for failing to pursue 9/11 terrorists in Afghanistan while at the same time bashing him for invading Iraq, a hotbed of Al Quaeda activity. You act like we leapt from 9/11/01 to the present with nothing in between. What Dems and Bush haters refuse to understand (or refuse to admit) is that the terrorism threat is real and it is not confined to the handful of radicals responsible for the WTC collapse. 9/11 was a symptom, not the problem. Bush realizes that you have to go after them everywhere. If you weren't trying so hard to play politics with the issue, you would realize that the security of the entire US is a stake and you should be damn happy that Bush is trying to keep Americans safe. You go ahead and parrot the Ted Kennedys and Al Gores of the world in an effort to get Republicans out of the White House. In the meantime, the real work will continue to get done by the Bush Administration. Just know this: Had Kerry been elected, the SearsTower, Transamerica Pyramid and Empire State Building would be reduced to rubble by now.
Bullchit. There was zero Al Qaida activity in Iraq until we went there and provided them with an insecure border and a bunch of American targets that they could actually get to. Saddam and Osama did not get along. And you aren't paying attention. I've always said that the Afghanistan operation was smartly and efficently conducted. It is the reluctance to pursue them in to their lairs in Pakistan that I question. Only a fool would favor attacking all of the world's muslims instead of relentlessly pursuing the few thousand AL Qaida criminals who hit us on 9/11. Is there any greater priority than getting those guys? Even Bush has admitted that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Waving the 9/11 flag at every instance of the Bush adminstration fouling things up is a sad misperception of reality. Look, Bush has never said that we invading and occupied iraq to "Go after AL-Qaida"! First our mission was to punish Saddam for violation of UN sanctions on WMD's. Then it evolved into making Iraq into some kind of Jeffersonian democracy by holding elections. Now the mission has been redefined simply as getting the Iraq army into shape so that we can leave. Nowhere does the administration vow to eradicate Al Qaida in Iraq, as you maintain we are doing. The Al Qaida leadership was never there and Bush and everybody else knows it. Wise up. How many times does he have to screw up before you realize that he is incompetent to be president and surrounds himself with corporate yes-men. How can we feel safe with this guy making decisions? We are both playing politics here, you know. It's a political forum. BUSH FAILURES 1. The imprudent invasion of Iraq. 2. The unprecendent National Debt of 9 Trillion dollars. 3 trillion came about under Bush. Absolutely irresponsible. 3. Spends more while cutting income. Irresponsible. 4. Squandered the international good-will after 9/11 5. The slow Hurricane Katrina support 7. The failure to privatize Social Security 8. The failure to secure our border with Mexico and our ports. Wrong, it is not republicans, but the incompetent Bush that I want out of the White House and all of his neo-con henchmen. If McCain runs, I'll probably be voting for a Republican again. You know good and well that I have never been a fan of Gore or Kennedy. Go ahead, find me a post where I have advocated either of those two doofuses. You are strangely convinced that everybody who sees the failures of Bush is Jane Fonda or Ted Kennedy. Trying to paint me with those brushes just won't work. I don't parrot anybody and I've stated my rationale in detail. Read the polls, amigo. Bush has lost the middle as well as the left . . . and he's begining to lose the right. Perhaps you are just parroting Limbaugh and Hammity, though. :grin: Of course. You point out each accomplishment and I'll point out each failure. I expect three failures to one accomplishment in the next three years. Did Osama tell you that personally? I'm reporting you to homeland security. :lol:
Sure it can. But it does take a little effort. I imagine martin will not give up so easily. He has indeed influenced my opinions upon certain rare occasions.
out of curiousity, on what topics have your opinions changed, even if only very slightly influenced by my foolishness? i am pigheaded and i rarely change my mind about anything. there are some topics i know nothing about, so i will start thinking about those in a few years. if anything, my opinions will become more extreme versions of my older opinions over time or i will figure out a more cogent version of my old opinions. in the past 10 years or so, i have really only changed my opinion on two things. gays and drugs. i am more tolerant of both. oh yeah and also my loco opinion that a balanced budget is not necessarily a good idea for the government, that one is a recent development. the topics i have been devoting time to thinking about lately: 1. the placebo effect. it is unreal how strong it is. a doctor can give you a placebo, tell you it is a placebo, and it can still work. how can that be? 2. hypnotism. i am 99% sure it is 100% BS, but i cant reach a final conclusion.
