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NubiWan
Skeptic Friend

USA
424 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  10:59:33  Show Profile Send NubiWan a Private Message
http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/01/21/bush.friday/index.html
quote:

President Bush attended the National Prayer Service on Friday, after a whirlwind Inauguration Day on which he outlined a U.S. policy "with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world."



It's kinda like watching a train wreck in slow motion, with your family onboard. Ugly, but ya can't turn away... Welp, as said before, "We're so screwed..."

Siberia
SFN Addict

Brazil
2322 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  11:10:39   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Siberia's Homepage  Send Siberia an AOL message  Send Siberia a Yahoo! Message Send Siberia a Private Message
I wonder what that man has in his head. What does he think he is, God? The savior?

Geez. I'm glad my own president does more mundane fuck-ups...

"Why are you afraid of something you're not even sure exists?"
- The Kovenant, Via Negativa

"People who don't like their beliefs being laughed at shouldn't have such funny beliefs."
-- unknown
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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard

3192 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  12:06:34   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send BigPapaSmurf a Private Message
Dont worry, our President will soon be your President too, should he find you lacking in "Freedom"

"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History

"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini
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iluvmorocca
New Member

USA
1 Post

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  12:09:17   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send iluvmorocca a Private Message
I agree, we are completely screwed. there is no going back now.....
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Robb
SFN Regular

USA
1223 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  12:48:20   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Robb a Private Message
What is wrong with ending tyranny?
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NubiWan
Skeptic Friend

USA
424 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  13:08:08   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send NubiWan a Private Message
Nothing at all is 'wrong' with the goal, Robb, if you don't mind your country, you and your kids being at 'War' for your lifetime and likely theirs.
quote:

Bush's expansive foreign policy vision for the next four years, outlined in his second inaugural address on Thursday, raised questions about U.S. ties with non-democratic leaders in countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

"Does this mean that we will now deal with China in a fundamentally different way than we did in the first term -- or Saudi Arabia or Pakistan or Russia?" he asked.


Despite weak or non-existent democratic practices in these countries, the administration so far has not risked anti-terrorism cooperation to press hard for political reforms.


But Bush's address appeared to set an aggressive goal of doing just that.




Article: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=615&e=2&u=/nm/20050121/pl_nm/bush_policy_dc

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Robb
SFN Regular

USA
1223 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  13:25:01   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Robb a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by NubiWan

Nothing at all is 'wrong' with the goal, Robb, if you don't mind your country, you and your kids being at 'War' for your lifetime and likely theirs.
If we do not stand up to tyranny now, the next generation will have to do the same thing we are doing now. Another generation killed by war. We need to stop it now if we can. If you or us as a country don't believe we can win, then I agree we should stop trying. If it is not our people being killed then it will be theirs (Iraqis, Palestinians, Israelis, Afghans, etc.)

We are the only country that can possibly do something about the killing and oppressive regimes in this world. I think we have a moral obligation to try to help other people. Do we believe in freedom for everybody or safety for only Americans at any cost?
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Siberia
SFN Addict

Brazil
2322 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  13:45:03   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Siberia's Homepage  Send Siberia an AOL message  Send Siberia a Yahoo! Message Send Siberia a Private Message
End tyranny's just an hypocritical excuse to raid somebody else's country and steal their natural resources.

"Why are you afraid of something you're not even sure exists?"
- The Kovenant, Via Negativa

"People who don't like their beliefs being laughed at shouldn't have such funny beliefs."
-- unknown
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard

USA
5310 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  13:48:25   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Gorgo a Private Message
Are you talking about ending Bush's tyranny, or what?

quote:


We are the only country that can possibly do something about the killing and oppressive regimes in this world. I think we have a moral obligation to try to help other people. Do we believe in freedom for everybody or safety for only Americans at any cost?



I know the rent is in arrears
The dog has not been fed in years
It's even worse than it appears
But it's alright-
Jerry Garcia
Robert Hunter



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Robb
SFN Regular

USA
1223 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  14:02:47   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Robb a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Siberia

End tyranny's just an hypocritical excuse to raid somebody else's country and steal their natural resources.

Nonsense. Have we done that? We are reconstructing the country so they can export their oil. Yes, American companies are making money off the war just like every war fought before. Where is your proof that it is the American goal to steel their resources?
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Robb
SFN Regular

USA
1223 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  14:05:43   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Robb a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Gorgo

Are you talking about ending Bush's tyranny, or what?

If Bush was a tyrant I doubt you could write the stuff you write on these boards. Are you being oppressed in the US because of Bush?
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Dude
SFN Die Hard

USA
6891 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  14:48:03   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Dude a Private Message
quote:
We are the only country that can possibly do something about the killing and oppressive regimes in this world. I think we have a moral obligation to try to help other people.


To quote Penn & Teller "Bullshit!"

What have we done for the numerous countries who live under the reign of brutal dictators? Nothing, unless they have something we want.

What about Cuba? Castro is a murdering opressive dictator. When are we invading? Iran? Lets stomp them next... we already have an army in the area. Russia? They are reverting to Stalinist style (hopefully without the mass murders) dictatorship. And on and on and on....

quote:
If Bush was a tyrant I doubt you could write the stuff you write on these boards. Are you being oppressed in the US because of Bush?


Yep. And so are you. Thank you patriot act.

Post up a fucking picture or three of the layout of one of our major airports on a website. See how fast the FBI gets to you.

Take a camera into any area that is nowdays considered "sensitive" and you are going to be arrested and interogated.

and so on and so on.....


Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson

"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin

Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth
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Siberia
SFN Addict

Brazil
2322 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  14:52:48   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Siberia's Homepage  Send Siberia an AOL message  Send Siberia a Yahoo! Message Send Siberia a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Robb

quote:
Originally posted by Siberia

End tyranny's just an hypocritical excuse to raid somebody else's country and steal their natural resources.

Nonsense. Have we done that? We are reconstructing the country so they can export their oil. Yes, American companies are making money off the war just like every war fought before. Where is your proof that it is the American goal to steel their resources?


Isn't that interesting that the first country they sought to free is exactly the one with biggest oil resources?

"Why are you afraid of something you're not even sure exists?"
- The Kovenant, Via Negativa

"People who don't like their beliefs being laughed at shouldn't have such funny beliefs."
-- unknown
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ktesibios
SFN Regular

USA
505 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  20:25:55   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send ktesibios a Private Message
Odd, is it not, that "liberating the people" didn't surface as a rationale for BushCo's elective war until after the "Saddam has WMDs and will attack us" claims turned out to be false and the flavor was chewed out of waving the bloody shirt of 9/11 (an event, I might add, for which no evidence of an Iraqi connection has ever been elucidated)?

It reminds me rather strongly of one of Langmuir's warning signs of pathological science.

Pols have long been in the habit of finding after-the-fact excuses for doing something when they don't want to reveal or discuss their true motives. BushCo just takes this sort of mendacity to an unprecedented level.

I'm inclined to hypothesize that their basic motivation had very little to do with liberating anyone- except themselves to try to drag the USA back to 1898- in other words, manipulating domestic electoral politics.

An attempt to control the disposition of a very large oil reserve ("steal" is probably too strong a word) was, IMHO, just icing on the cake.


"The Republican agenda is to turn the United States into a third-world shithole." -P.Z.Myers
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Dude
SFN Die Hard

USA
6891 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  22:52:12   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Dude a Private Message
quote:
Odd, is it not, that "liberating the people" didn't surface as a rationale for BushCo's elective war until after the "Saddam has WMDs and will attack us" claims turned out to be false and the flavor was chewed out of waving the bloody shirt of 9/11


No, its not odd at all. What is odd, to me, is why so many people believe the bullshit. I cannot understand why the apparent majority of voters accepts the changing excuse.


Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson

"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin

Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth
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Tim
SFN Regular

USA
775 Posts

Posted - 01/21/2005 :  23:27:49   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Tim a Private Message
quote:
Posted by Robb
If we do not stand up to tyranny now
Robb, do you really believe that isn't just an excuse to cover our new/old colonial policy?

I don't believe a review of the myriad excuses we used to invade Iraq is called for. That's already been covered sufficiently in this forum. If the reason truly was Bush's "expansion of liberty," then we have a problem. Why haven't we taken ANY serious steps to introduce liberty and democracy to states such as Sudan, Nepal, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Congo, Rwanda, Zimbabwe, the CAR, Ivory Coast, Malaysia, Guatamala, El Salvador and many more where basic human liberties are denied and threatened on a daily basis? How about our close economic allies like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt and others that have no intention of allowing democracy in any time soon? How about others such as the new oligarchies of Russia and some other ex-Soviet states, or the communists of Cuba, China and North Korea?

Isn't it a better idea to avoid leading by force and follow the example of our founding fathers to lead by example?

quote:
Posted by Robb
We are the only country that can possibly do something about the killing and oppressive regimes in this world.
Isn't this the type of statement that makes us one of the most hated nations on the planet? We are not the only nation in the world that can help accomplish these goals. That statement smacks either of dishonesty or self-deception.

We are one of many nations that would be willing to address these problems. What sets us apart is the unique position we have for leadership. Unfortunately, it's this "[w]e are the only" mentality that makes other nations at least suspicious of our goals, hampering effective statesmanship and alienating our closest friends and allies.

Finally, you can't force liberty on anyone. We can give them the means, but in the end, liberty must be the choice and work of the opressed. Otherwise, it is nothing more than acceptance of a new oppressor.

Edited to add;
quote:
Posted by ktesibios
the flavor was chewed out of waving the bloody shirt of 9/11
I like the imagery, but it appears that the Administration still has to mention 9/11 or terrorism everytime they bring up foriegn policy. It's a matter of appeals to fear, while Osama Bin Laden and Muhammed Omar still threaten us and the nation of Afganistan.

"We got an issue in America. Too many good docs are gettin' out of business. Too many OB/GYNs aren't able to practice their -- their love with women all across this country." Dubya in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, 9/6/2004
Edited by - Tim on 01/21/2005 23:39:31
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