[Bill Gold]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

First of all, as indicated by the tongue in cheek, there was no logic intended in the California/Iraq comparison, other than to show how talk of body counts and dollars spent come nowhere near proving anything.

Costs and body counts may not prove anything by themselves, but they cannot be brushed aside, either. Extreme American casualties and being forced to throw that huge amount of money at this war without yet bringing peace, or any semblance of peace to a country we, without provocation or cause based on fact related to the national security of our country (weapons of mass destruction), attacked should be very jolting to our citizens. These are sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, friends, neighbors, and coworkers. They are all unique people with unique and precious lives. The pitch that President Bush gave to our country and the world was that Iraq was a threat to the security of the world because they were developing and stockpiling weapons of mass destruction. If every human life is precious, it seems clear that every unnecessary death is a tragedy. These American deaths in Iraq have all been unnecessary because Iraq was no national security threat to America before our invasion. There have been 1,040+ unnecessary tragedies as a result of one of the policy blunders made by the Bush Administration.

I’d also like to add that I'm 99% sure that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have been the only wars in American history during which taxes have been cut (and quite drastically), which adds significantly to our annual deficit and national debt. This burdensome debt will now be passed down to people like me, and those younger than me. I thought it was supposed to be a conservative trait not to spend money you don’t have, and to maintain fiscal responsibility. Maybe that was just the compassionate conservative from the 2000 debates against Al Gore who has been left by the wayside to gather dust for four years before magically reappearing on the 2004 campaign trail, although not as emphasized as in 2000.

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

It appears we agree that the heart of the problem goes to man’s inhumanity to man. We agree that the U.S. and Britain are as guilty as any. We agree that terrorism is a plague that has thrived on our complicity with evil dooers. I hope we can agree that we're better off not sending the message; “We’re sorry, please kill us!” We would not do that intentionally, of course, but I’m not so sure that backing down now would be interpreted as anything else. I am sure that replacing our President would be interpreted as backing down now.

I’m not sure what to think about your statement “We agree that terrorism is a plague that has thrived on our complicity with evil dooers.” I don’t think terrorism has flourished throughout the world as a result of our complicity with tyrannical regimes (at least I think that was the intent of the sentence and context, and I apologize if it wasn’t). There have been many different high profile terrorist groups in history, and a reasonable number of them have originated from free and peaceful countries. The Ku Klux Klan is an example of a homegrown terrorist group. Apparently, as a country, we’ve never really taken to heart the continual terrorism around the world until it punches us in the face.

“Bring ‘em [the terrorists] on.”
-President Bush

Intentionally or not, that pretty much said “…please kill us!” I agree with you that we shouldn’t have sent that message.

As much as I opposed this conflict back in 2002 (Should we bomb/strike Iraq?. I wasn’t as courteous as I should have been back then. We’re all learning all the time.), and still strongly feel it was the wrong war at the wrong time for our country, I believe we cannot abandon ship and leave the country the way things are right now. Kerry hasn’t been running for president saying that he would pull the troops out, no matter how bad things are in Iraq, by a certain date, and that position shouldn’t be thrust upon him by Bush or his supporters. Electing Kerry wouldn’t be backing down; it would be the same as changing CEOs during a long period of stagnation after a business decision didn’t pan out as well as projected. This administration has done all it could over the past ~18 months without significant traction (rampant terrorism, talks that the January Iraqi election will only take place in half of the country or be cancelled altogether, and the addition of no allied nation providing 5,000+ troops for stabilization other than Britain), and it’s time for another administration to take over. International support couldn’t get noticeably worse. That is, until Tony Blair looses his next election and his successor brings home their troops à la Spain (with or without terrorist involvement).

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

I have the feeling that we even agree that our choices in November basically s--k. While I’m of the camp that believes that if you want to make an omelet, then you have to break some eggs, I also believe that you don’t have to make too big a mess of the kitchen to do that. That means I believe that the right way to deal with Soddamn Insane was to cut him off at the knees and to raise a prosperous Iraq from his ashes. I know we’re real good at doing the former. What we have left is to pull off the latter, which at this point in time I’ll admit is not looking good. On the other hand, your guys trotted out a dog that just won’t hunt. (Historic examples omitted.) There was one from the Democratic National Kennel that I could have gotten behind, but that wing of the party gave way to the sloganeers. So, I’ll cast my vote to stay the course.

You’re correct that I’m not a diehard Kerry supporter; then again I don’t have to be since my state is going to be in his corner barring a coma. I didn’t support him in the primaries, and I voted for another candidate. I liked two other democratic candidates more than Kerry in the primaries, but I thought that four or five of my party’s candidates, Kerry included, were head and shoulders better than President Bush. It’s the advisors and administration that makes the president, and I feel that now is a time where Clinton’s former advisors and Kerry’s potential administration are better suited to run this country than Bush’s advisors and administration who mostly happen to be former Reagan’s and George H. W. Bush’s former advisors and administration. The candidates always change, but the advisors, staff, and administration officials stay the same.

On a slight tangent, I’m interested in which democratic candidate you would have supported and why.

Originally Posted by gwross

I wasn't under the impression that we had abandoned the search. I think the news media have simply stopped covering it. Some day an intelligence breakthrough will be made, and then the media will pick up the story again -- when there is some juicy stuff to report.

...

I haven't seen MM's film, and I probably won't. (I certainly won't spend money to see it.) But I am interested in hearing what specific things we did (or did not do) that allowed OBL to escape. (And no fair using 20/20 hindsight. )

One of the interesting facts in Fahrenheit 9/11 was that the USA has used ten times the number of troops to invade Iraq (150,000, although the current number there is closer to 138,000) than we used routing Afghanistan (15,000). Let’s compare troop saturation in each of these countries. The following sizes and populations are thanks to my trusty copy of The Statesman’s Yearbook (everyone should own the latest copy).

Afghanistan
20.5 million people (1999)
1 USA soldier per 1,366.67 people
652,090 square kilometers
1 USA soldier per 43.5 square kilometer

Iraq
22.25 million people (1999)
1 USA soldier per 148.33 people
438,317 square kilometers
1 USA soldier per 2.92 square kilometer

Statistically speaking, we would have had a much better chance of finding Osama bin Laden in Iraq than in Afghanistan. It’s just too bad that the commanding Generals, Secretary Rumsfeld, other administration advisors, and finally President Bush didn’t focus the troop strength we used to find Saddam Hussein (who definitively had no role in the September 11, 2001 attacks) in Iraq on finding Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan.

What ever happened to the Governor and President George W. Bush who when questioned why he supported school vouchers in the 2000 election, and yet again three years and two days ago said that he “[thought it was wrong to continue pouring money into a failed system (public schools)]?” The choices made by this administration and its surrogates have mixed their priorities up and attacked Iraq, while failing to keep their promise to get Osama bin Laden “dead or alive.” For once I agree with President Bush, we should stop supporting this failed policy and this arguably failed presidency.

Another great part of Fahrenheit 9/11 was when the recruiters were shown trying to get kids to enlist in the armed forces. Moore raised the point that a large amount of volunteer soldiers, especially in the National Guard, are there because that’s the only way they could go to college or earn money. Many of them come from poor families in poor parts of the country, and the only chance they have to get out is to enlist and give years of their lives to defend us and our country. When joining the armed forces, they trust us to only put them in harm’s way when it’s absolutely necessary, and not before. You can go where you want from there, since you already know where I would be going with it.

Originally Posted by gwross

I think this was the point of Jack's original post: that just electing someone who promises to "do just about everything differently" won't guarantee that things will get better.

I think we all agree that just doing everything differently without thinking about the repercussions will not necessarily make the situation improve. Every time I’ve heard that sound byte of Kerry saying “I would have done everything differently” he was referring to Bush’s actions leading up to and entering the war, which doesn’t preclude him from using some of Bush’s postwar policies without breaking his word. This really doesn’t matter, though.

So far, so civil. Go us!