Optical Serenity
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Manedwolf said:
And what President has not? I bet you have never contradicted yourself either?
Perhaps you'd be happy if it was President Kerry instead of GWB?
Bush: Take bin Laden attack threat seriously
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And what President has not? I bet you have never contradicted yourself either?
Perhaps you'd be happy if it was President Kerry instead of GWB?
Camp David
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Lobotomy Boy said:
Howard Dean and select members of the far left Democrat party have said repeatedly that the "War on Terror" is unwinnable...
Howard Dean and select members of the far left Democrat party have said they wish to withdraw the troops and loose the war...
Bush's comment's on bin Laden are appropriate; bin Laden represents a threat and we are addressing the threat. The current administration has a plan to fight terror while the Democrats urge withdrawal of troops and surrender. Indeed, I have never heard any other plan for fighting terror other that George Bush's plan. Have you? If so, let's hear it...
If you can't surface a distinctly different plan for fighting the War on Terror other than George Bush's plan, then I am afraid you are barking in the wind. By the way, surrendering is not a plan...
RealGun
Member
Manedwolf said:....
Okay. So we can't talk about it because it came from him, we have to detach from the fact that HE said it, and discuss the decision as if it drifted in from midair from nobody in particular. You lost me.
HE SAID IT. And I'm sorry...but I feel you're blinded by party loyalty, there.
Because he has that huge, golden glowing (R!!!) behind his name, he can do no evil.
He is NOT making good decisions, he has NOT made good decisions, and he has, on public record, contradicted himself constantly to suit the whims of the moment, to rattle the cage of the American public as needed while not actually dealing with the threat.
Right. An appeal to objectivity is "blind party loyalty". Excellent.
GTSteve03
Member
Simple question: what is Bush's plan for winning the WoT? Not fighting it, but winning it.Camp David said:
Otherwise, is the WoT an un-ending, un-winnable war? How do you win it, anyways? Kill all the Terrorists?
birddog
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Then you should be happy. Many of the high level terrorists have been captured and/or killed. But most people like to ignore that hard fact.
Lobotomy Boy
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So how, exactly, do you "win" the war on terror? By killing or capturing every last person on earth who is capable of instilling terror? How do you know who these people are? I suppose you could just round up all the people of a given religious persuasion that has a history of terrorism--Shiia and Sunni Muslems, Baptist and Pentecostal Christians. Then you could round up or kill everyone in any sort of patriotic organization, since we have had "super-patriot" terrorism. Then we could round up or kill all the gun owners, since they have the potential to terrorize someone. Then, well, we could go on and on.
The root of the problem is that terrorism is not an entity that can be dealt with using a traditional war model. Terrorism is more like arthritis. You don't erradicate it in some dramatic war-like action--you do everything in your power to control it because it is something we will have to live with for the rest of our lives. If you are going to use this as an excuse to diminish civil liberty, don't even pretend that this is a temporary situation that will change once we have "won" this war. Admit that terrorism will always be with us and the eradication of our civil liberties is permanent.
Lone_Gunman said:
+1 is it coincidence that the bin laden tape "surfaces" at the same time the administration is defending/re-asserting the domestic spying initiative? maybe bin laden is like a sith lord...an apprentice to the phantom menace. in all seriousness, i cannot believe that at some level, somebody/people in our government don't have direct contact with him. look at google earth....that technology is available to everybody. multiply those capabilities exponentially....those are the resources available to our government. i simply cannot believe we don't know where he is and what he is doing.
Camp David
member
Lobotomy Boy said:
Convince terrorists that terrorism is not a route to achieve your aim, or kill them so they can't use terrorism as a tactic. President Bush is pursuing both routes with remarkable success.
There is no middle ground here; no diplomacy or second options. Terrorism has existed for many years, but only relatively recently has it been used against global nations by small terrorist organizations.
Note what I said above in response to your request, "how, exactly, do you "win" the war on terror?" Convince terrorists that terrorism is not a route to achieve their aims, or kill them so they can't use terrorism as a tactic. President Bush is pursuing both routes with remarkable success. Part of the first part of convincing involves boots on the ground among the terrorists convincing them that this nation is not the enemy. Part of convincing is to eliminate the madrass schools that preach fanatical Muslim hatred for no reason. Part of the second part, the largest part, is killing those terrorists that can't be convinced.
That fact that we have succeeded so far is that both options are being used by the current administration.
Biker said:
So how do you treat the disease, outside of abandoning Israel and converting to the Wahabi sect of Islam, both of which are the stated goals of the opposition?
The way you fight organized terrorism is by killing the leaders, the ones who get the foot soldiers to die in their place. That's what we've been doing. So yes, we are treating the disease.
Lobotomy Boy
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Your solution involves just one distinct group of terrorists, and that group (radical Muslems) is so large and spread out over such a wide geographic area (pretty much the entire planet) that your solution is logistically unrealistic. Are you saying we should have "boots on the ground" in every country on earth that contains radical Muslems inclined to engage in acts of terrorism? We'd need every man, woman, and child in the United States to be in the infantry to even begin to do this.
Besides, radical Islam is not the only source of terrorism. Last week the FBI released a statement saying that it considered ecoterrorists the greatest terrorism threat faced by our country (never mind that these ecoterrorist twits have not killed a single person). Say we somehow managed to eradicate radical Islam (about as likely as you or I agreeing whether or not we are in a war, as defined in our country's laws), well the FBI has already labeled these ecoterrorist goofballs as our most serious threat. If they are that bad, then fundamentalist Christians must really be a threat, since they have actually killed people by bombing abortion clinics. And how about the so-called "super patriots?" Remember Oklahoma City? Once we've killed or captured all the ecoterrorists and fundamental Christians, we'd better go after anyone who has ever checked out a copy of "The Turner Diaries" from a public library.
This is ludicrous, of course, but no more ludicrous than thinking you can defeat an ideology like radical Islamism through traditional military means, which is what you are suggesting.
Also, if Bin Laden attacks again you will have to quit saying that the administrations tactics have succeeded. I consider the fact that Bin Laden still breathes the same atmosphere as I do a sign of Bush's failure. If the SOB attacks us again, I'm going to have extremely low tolerance for that kind of clap-trap BS.
Besides, radical Islam is not the only source of terrorism. Last week the FBI released a statement saying that it considered ecoterrorists the greatest terrorism threat faced by our country (never mind that these ecoterrorist twits have not killed a single person). Say we somehow managed to eradicate radical Islam (about as likely as you or I agreeing whether or not we are in a war, as defined in our country's laws), well the FBI has already labeled these ecoterrorist goofballs as our most serious threat. If they are that bad, then fundamentalist Christians must really be a threat, since they have actually killed people by bombing abortion clinics. And how about the so-called "super patriots?" Remember Oklahoma City? Once we've killed or captured all the ecoterrorists and fundamental Christians, we'd better go after anyone who has ever checked out a copy of "The Turner Diaries" from a public library.
This is ludicrous, of course, but no more ludicrous than thinking you can defeat an ideology like radical Islamism through traditional military means, which is what you are suggesting.
Also, if Bin Laden attacks again you will have to quit saying that the administrations tactics have succeeded. I consider the fact that Bin Laden still breathes the same atmosphere as I do a sign of Bush's failure. If the SOB attacks us again, I'm going to have extremely low tolerance for that kind of clap-trap BS.
Lobotomy Boy
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If we are doing this, why is Bin Laden still issuing threats against us? Show me Bin Laden's head on a pike, and then I'll give some credence to your assertation that we are killing the leaders.
RealGun
Member
GTSteve03 said:
Well, if it's like any other battle against lawlessness, you do shoot or hang enough of them to make the point that people will not tolerate it, that any supposed justification is not valid, or that any underlying goal will not be reached. Essentially you remove the motivation or provide sufficient disincentives for the behavior. When that isn't working, you kill them or lock them up. When that doesn't fly, you convict them of tax evasion or some such.
Lobotomy Boy
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Okay, think about this for a moment. We are talking about people willing to blow themselves up for their cause. You are suggesting we use traditional threats of punishment (death) to discourage them from killing themselves. Do I need to draw you a picture to illustrate what is wrong with your model for stopping terrorism?
Camp David
member
Lobotomy Boy said:
In fairness Lobotomy Boy, the solution I depicted is, in fact, a solution. Where is yours? What do you propose?
RealGun
Member
Lobotomy Boy said:
If you make it the people's own fight, terrorists will find it difficult to hide. When you see a cockroach, what do you do?
Camp David
member
Lobotomy Boy said:
Successes=>
Seven Listed Here:
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2004/01/15/2003087708
General Army Officers List Successes:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Feb2005/n02182005_2005021809.html
http://www.defendamerica.mil/articles/oct2004/a102204e.html
Strategy:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/iraq/iraq_strategy_nov2005.html
Head on a pike?
Most of the taliban dead, select Al Qaeda individuals and cells imprisoned or killed, Saddam imprisoned, his sons killed, etc. etc. etc.
Lobotomy Boy
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Treat terrorism for what it is--a criminal problem rather than a political. Use a medical metaphor for dealing with it instead of a political metaphor.
Terrorism is a cancer. Its leaders are the tumors. Excise the tumors. As I said in another thread, bring me Bin Laden's head on a pike. Target all the leaders where ever you find them. Use all intelligence resources available (but make damn sure you work within the bounds of the U.S. constitution when operating domestically). When you find a tumor through these methods, excise it. A good example was the missile attack in Pakistan a few weeks back.
What you don't do is whip the populace into a stupid frenzy of fear, then begin to systematically remove their civil rights. If, as I propose, terrorism is a cancer, you do your best to fight the cancer, but in the meantime you live your life as best you can. You don't run around like a chicken with your head cut off wailing about the fact that you have cancer and jumping on the bandwagon of every charleton who promises to cure your cancer if you just give up your civil rights. And right now the Bush administration has about as much credibility with me and many, many other people from all parts of the political spectrum as a snake oil salesman promising to cure cancer.
Terrorism is a cancer. Its leaders are the tumors. Excise the tumors. As I said in another thread, bring me Bin Laden's head on a pike. Target all the leaders where ever you find them. Use all intelligence resources available (but make damn sure you work within the bounds of the U.S. constitution when operating domestically). When you find a tumor through these methods, excise it. A good example was the missile attack in Pakistan a few weeks back.
What you don't do is whip the populace into a stupid frenzy of fear, then begin to systematically remove their civil rights. If, as I propose, terrorism is a cancer, you do your best to fight the cancer, but in the meantime you live your life as best you can. You don't run around like a chicken with your head cut off wailing about the fact that you have cancer and jumping on the bandwagon of every charleton who promises to cure your cancer if you just give up your civil rights. And right now the Bush administration has about as much credibility with me and many, many other people from all parts of the political spectrum as a snake oil salesman promising to cure cancer.
Lobotomy Boy
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I'm not sure what you are getting at, but in answer to your question, I would hire an exterminator. I wouldn't declare war on cockroaches and begin systematically dismantling the Bill of Rights.
Manedwolf
member
RealGun said:
You can step on one of them. Then you realize that you stepped on one, and there could be billions more. You can't check all of your walls for them with sheer brute force without destroying your walls and making your house unliveable.
Then you also realize that they've been around since the dinosaurs and are pretty much impossible to eradicate entirely, since they keep adapting to different conditions. You'd have to destroy all of the buildings and houses, which may or may not harbor a roach, but you'd have to destroy it all to be sure.
You can, however, eradicate the source of a particular nest that's bothering you by hiring a professional to stop the eggs (the root cause of roaches), not the roaches once they're running around.
Good analogy!
RealGun said:
this is an interesting analogy, but my first thought was that i should remove all traces of filfth from my house. my second thought was to ignore them. if you conclude that they have always been. always will be, and that you can't get them out of your house without tearing it all down, then accept their existence and ignore. not that i condone that thinking when applied to this situation, but i am surprised, given the mentality of many americans, that most haven't just tried to ignore it in hopes that it would go away.
RealGun said:
this is an interesting analogy, but my first thought was that i should remove all traces of filfth from my house. my second thought was to ignore them. if you conclude that they have always been. always will be, and that you can't get them out of your house without tearing it all down, then accept their existence and ignore. not that i condone that thinking when applied to this situation, but i am surprised, given the mentality of many americans, that most haven't just tried to ignore it in hopes that it would go away.
RealGun
Member
Lobotomy Boy said:
Why even debate an issue if you will ultimately play the Bill of Rights card? Why not just start there and then wander off in a huff?
RealGun said:
this is an interesting analogy, but my first thought was that i should remove all traces of filfth from my house. my second thought was to ignore them. if you conclude that they have always been. always will be, and that you can't get them out of your house without tearing it all down, then accept their existence and ignore. not that i condone that thinking when applied to this situation, but i am surprised, given the mentality of many americans, that most haven't just tried to ignore it in hopes that it would go away.
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