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I dunno, some of the really die-hard fundies might like the idea of women walking several steps behind the men and such...

Who are the good guys, the bloods or the crips? Like Perry said "you know the gang and the government are no different..."

resedit wrote:

matt wrote:

I thought you said the absurd comments were going to stop.

Thank you for contributing to the discussion.
Your intellect is truly dazzling.

Bush was the driving force for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. If militia groups have sprung up after the fall of Saddam and if those militia groups are taking and killing hostages, you're damn right George W. Bush bears a large part of the blame.

It's not my intellect that's dazzling. I could never understand the complicated reasoning behind some of the arguments you come up with.

resedit wrote:

Hank Rearden wrote:

resedit wrote:

Here's an interesting question - if you are willing to blame Bush for the deaths of civilians in Iraq that he has nothing to do with, are you willing to blame Hezbollah for the death of civilians in Lebanon?

What? Those are Israel's fault?
But Israel wouldn't be taking action if Hezbollah hadn't attacked!

What?
Oh - I see. Bush/Israel bad.
I understand.

No.  Frankly, I observe that there is PLENTY of blame to partition around to all of those parties that you mentioned, plus a good number more.

It is important to realize that not every struggle has a good guy and a bad guy among the main players.  Unlike Hollywood, the entire cast of main characters can (and often are) bad guys.

Bush- Bad
Hezbollah - Bad
Hamas - Bad
Iran - Bad
Syria - Bad
Saddam - Bad
Blair - Bad
Iraqi insurgents - Bad

Innocent civilians caught in the crossfire - extremely unfortunate...but who notices?

So with all those bad guys and all those victims, how did you choose the bad guys and victim group to start this thread?

Did you spin the wheel for bad guys and roll the dice for the victim group?
Or did you draw straws? You're a man of science, what was your method?

We are a representative democracy. It is our responsibility to be more concerned about the actions of our politicians.
Bush is our idiot so he is our problem to solve.

Hank Rearden wrote:

Ribtorus wrote:

Back on topic, I wonder if the ongoing ethnic cleansing will lead to a permanent and significant reduction of the christian population in Iraq.

From that article, it seems that it already has.

Ribtorus wrote:

My guess is that it will, since I don't think there will ever be a reliable body that will enforce their rights in Iraq. Unless they get some kind of militia that can stand up to the sunni and the Shi'tes, but I don't think they have the kind of base necessary for something like that.

The best that they can hope for is to find a country to go to. I would say that their plight is desparate, to say the least.  And, in the long run, I don't think that Syria would be the country of choice for them either.

An Arab-christian diaspora.

Pariah wrote:

resedit wrote:

Hank Rearden wrote:

No.  Frankly, I observe that there is PLENTY of blame to partition around to all of those parties that you mentioned, plus a good number more.

It is important to realize that not every struggle has a good guy and a bad guy among the main players.  Unlike Hollywood, the entire cast of main characters can (and often are) bad guys.

Bush- Bad
Hezbollah - Bad
Hamas - Bad
Iran - Bad
Syria - Bad
Saddam - Bad
Blair - Bad
Iraqi insurgents - Bad

Innocent civilians caught in the crossfire - extremely unfortunate...but who notices?

So with all those bad guys and all those victims, how did you choose the bad guys and victim group to start this thread?

Did you spin the wheel for bad guys and roll the dice for the victim group?
Or did you draw straws? You're a man of science, what was your method?

We are a representative democracy. It is our responsibility to be more concerned about the actions of our politicians.
Bush is our idiot so he is our problem to solve.

Hey genius - nice response, but there is a tiny little flaw.
Hank is Canadian.

bratboy wrote:

Liability is often shared.  Saying that this administration bears zero responsibility for any of the consequences of our invasion makes absolutely no sense.

"Dubya succeeds in destroying Christianity in Iraq" is hardly a topic that has anything to do with shared liability, and you know it.

The thread is troll. That's why Hank chose Christians as the victim group and Bush as the bad guy and created the title.

resedit wrote:

bratboy wrote:

Liability is often shared.  Saying that this administration bears zero responsibility for any of the consequences of our invasion makes absolutely no sense.

"Dubya succeeds in destroying Christianity in Iraq" is hardly a topic that has anything to do with shared liability, and you know it.

The thread is troll. That's why Hank chose Christians as the victim group and Bush as the bad guy and created the title.

There's probably no thread title about this subject that you'd be happy with. You couldn't stand for your Crusader Bush to be shown to do something other than spread Christianity, could you? Afterall, aren't his policies suppose to be on the more Christian side of the line?

mo' ron wrote:

resedit wrote:

bratboy wrote:

Liability is often shared.  Saying that this administration bears zero responsibility for any of the consequences of our invasion makes absolutely no sense.

"Dubya succeeds in destroying Christianity in Iraq" is hardly a topic that has anything to do with shared liability, and you know it.

The thread is troll. That's why Hank chose Christians as the victim group and Bush as the bad guy and created the title.

There's probably no thread title about this subject that you'd be happy with. You couldn't stand for your Crusader Bush to be shown to do something other than spread Christianity, could you? Afterall, aren't his policies suppose to be on the more Christian side of the line?

To be honest - I'm more worried about non christian deaths than christian deaths.
When a christian dies, she or he goes to be with the creator.

Do you think there is responsibility for inaction? I do.
If Saddam was, say, trying to wipe out the kurds for example - and we could stop him but didn't, then we are partly to blame.

If a man snatches a girl out in front of a school, I'm an smurf if I do nothing to try and stop it.

Removing Saddam was the right thing to do. Yes, there are consequences. People died who would not have died and people lived who would not have lived. Now Iraq has an opportunity to become a strong democracy. They may not make it, but they certainly would not have had we left Saddam in power.

Eventually Saddam would have died. Before he died, he no doubt would have continued his attrocious acts for which he had no accountability. After he died, either another strong dictator would have followed him, or (more likely) Iraq would have fallen into a very bloody civil war.

The biggest mistake the US made was leaving him in power back in the first gulf war.

resedit wrote:

Removing Saddam was the right thing to do. Yes, there are consequences. People died who would not have died and people lived who would not have lived. Now Iraq has an opportunity to become a strong democracy. They may not make it, but they certainly would not have had we left Saddam in power.

They had that opportunity when Saddam was in power.

They did not take it.

Now they have the opportunity to be a pretend democracy and a theocratic state.

resedit wrote:

mo' ron wrote:

resedit wrote:

"Dubya succeeds in destroying Christianity in Iraq" is hardly a topic that has anything to do with shared liability, and you know it.

The thread is troll. That's why Hank chose Christians as the victim group and Bush as the bad guy and created the title.

There's probably no thread title about this subject that you'd be happy with. You couldn't stand for your Crusader Bush to be shown to do something other than spread Christianity, could you? Afterall, aren't his policies suppose to be on the more Christian side of the line?

To be honest - I'm more worried about non christian deaths than christian deaths.
When a christian dies, she or he goes to be with the creator.

Do you think there is responsibility for inaction? I do.
If Saddam was, say, trying to wipe out the kurds for example - and we could stop him but didn't, then we are partly to blame.

If a man snatches a girl out in front of a school, I'm an smurf if I do nothing to try and stop it.

Removing Saddam was the right thing to do. Yes, there are consequences. People died who would not have died and people lived who would not have lived. Now Iraq has an opportunity to become a strong democracy. They may not make it, but they certainly would not have had we left Saddam in power.

Eventually Saddam would have died. Before he died, he no doubt would have continued his attrocious acts for which he had no accountability. After he died, either another strong dictator would have followed him, or (more likely) Iraq would have fallen into a very bloody civil war.

I, and many others don't necessarily disagree with any of that. But...

The biggest mistake the US made was leaving him in power back in the first gulf war.

... I wouldn't say that's the "biggest" mistake, but it certainly is a big one. The second big mistake was Bush, and the way he handled the "liberation," which was, by many informed accounts, quite terrible. That's the reason he is not well liked WRT Iraq and such, not the mere fact that he decided to do something about Saddam (which, if you remember, was done in a somewhat deceitful manner). If Bush and Co. had executed the removal of Saddam in a more organized manner, and IF things had worked out, then a lot of people would be eating crow now. But, lots of predictions and observations were made that weren't flattering to Bush and his handling of Iraq, and a lot of them, unfortunately, have come true. What a lot of MAFers don't understand regarding people who have so much passionate support, is where is that passionate support coming from?

Pariah's previous post is interesting, where he seems to believe that you still are trusting Bush really couldn't see this coming (when so many others did).

Farmerkev wrote:

One thing that gives me pause, it's strenuously maintained that more troops were needed with little thought to what the locals would have thought if our presence was even greater than it is. I'm not altogether sure more would be better in this case.

I don't know that "little thought" was given to that.

My understanding is that the troop numbers were not necessarily dictated by any overarching strategy, but rather by a confluence of two competing visions within the Administration.  Rumsfeld wanted a quick in-and-out, others (such as Bremer) wanted an extended stay, so they got a little of both.