The Enemy

BugsyR wrote:I will answer your questions but I'm waiting for an answer to mine:
1. Do you have a reference for is this statement? "Almost all the other Presidents we have had, including Bush one, realized what a horrible situation it would be (for generations of Americans to come) to have innocent Iraqi children standing over the dead, mangled bodies of their parents while watching the large, gun toting American GI's march around their neighborhoods. Kids don't understand the geo-political reasons for anything but conclude that all Americans are Devils!"

Especially where you insinuate that all Americans are Devils because of the gun toting G.Is.

2. Do you have an experience of visiting the middle east in person or just on the media driven tube?

Look Mike, You misread me.,.......I didn't insinuate that "all Americans are Devils".......That is the way many Iraqi kids are looking at our GI's over there, & those kids will be tomorrow's suicide bombers.
2. I have never been stationed in the middle east, but I have spoken to many people who have, including a number of DEA Agents who were stationed there & understand the vast complexity of the region & problem.
As far as the rest of your post & a reference to my above statement......I will let Dick Cheney asnswer your questions;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8MePwb6TEk



Edit: When you say this..."If it's a classified mission...you will never hear about it...unless you have a relative there and they don't know how to silence themselves. I know, some people don't accept the "you should know what I know" argument. Oh well. "........I had a Top Secret security clearance, (as all DEA Agents are required to have & maintain) & am quite aware of a number of programs & missions that our government has run in the middle east for the last 30 years. I don't know what specific missions (within Iraq) that you are alluding to here but no mission will change the hearts & minds of Iraqi's who have seen their loved ones killed or maimed by our troops or bombs......Regardless of the self defense necessity for it or our good intentions. Just listen to the wise words of Dick Cheney...He was right back then.....It is a quagmire we need to extricate ourselves from ASAP.

When you say this..."The war started anyway, permitted by our Congress,"....The Congress & the American people bought a defective used car of a war sold to us by the worst lying used car salesman in American history. To claim that we now need to keep trying to fix this "Lemon" is just throwing good money after bad, & young lives after those already dead.

Thanks for the “you tube” link. Good interview from 1994 and you’re right, I believe he was... “right back then”. Personally, I wasn’t happy that we stopped back then but that is exactly what Bush wanted in 1991…extricate the Iraqis out of Kuwait…not invade Baghdad…I wanted Baghdad leveled (unfortunately I wasn’t President…maybe I should say fortunately for the U.S. I wasn’t President back then ). Back to that interview, it was discussing Desert Storm and questions were answered why we didn’t go for Saddam back then. If you re-listen to the interview you will hear that Dick is talking about Kurds, Syria, and Iran…not insurgents, Sunnis, Shia, or AQ. 1994 Kurds, Syria, and Iran.
2003 Kurds, Syria, and Iran gave us other problems that were minor compared to what he was not alluding to (in 1994). He also states the Arab nations would not support us going into Baghdad for Saddam…1994 Arab Nations.

Before, during, and since that interview up to 2003 we were controlling the area around Iraq. No-fly zones, boarding ships, preparing for what might happen, etc, etc. Intelligence and modeling didn’t stop after Desert Storm. I firmly do not believe that we went into Iraq in 2003 believing what Dick stated in that 1994 interview. I firmly believe we went into Iraq in 2003 afraid of what “might” happen (a 2003 Vietnam) and “hoping for” what could happen (ALL Iraqis saying “gee..thanks!!”). I believe that the U.S. Government and Military studied and planned for an Iraq Invasion since 1992. I believe that Clinton was offered the same intell that Bush was offered but Clinton chose not to do what Bush did or wouldn’t get the support to do it from Congress or wasn’t fully offered the opportune timing (This is NOT an insult directed at Clinton). Also Clinton had other military issues…Bosnia, Somalia, a little bit of terrorism (over seas, not in NY, PA, D.C.)…and I believe he was comfortable with how things were going with Iraq also…I know I was comfortable with it.

Back to this statement:
“Almost all the other Presidents we have had, including Bush one, realized what a horrible situation it would be (for generations of Americans to come) to have innocent Iraqi children standing over the dead, mangled bodies of their parents while watching the large, gun toting American GI's march around their neighborhoods. Kids don't understand the geo-political reasons for anything but conclude that all Americans are Devils!”

Almost all the other Presidents…that is one reference I am very interested in…Cheney’s “you tube” doesn’t justify your statement or answer my question. 1994 is 14 years ago. It was 9 years prior to 2003 invasion. I’m really interested in which past president talked about realizing… “what a horrible situation it would be (for generations of Americans to come) to have innocent Iraqi children standing over the dead, mangled bodies of their parents while watching the large, gun toting American GI's march around their neighborhoods.” That is a reference I would love to read.

If I misread this or read into this…
“…gun toting American GI's march around their neighborhoods. Kids don't understand the geo-political reasons for anything but conclude that all Americans are Devils!”
…How many other people misread or read too deep into this opinion…written by you. I re-read it, I understand what you are trying to say however…

I know you had a clearance…and with that clearance you also know that if you don’t have the “Need to Know” you’re not going to know…it doesn’t matter how big your clearance is. It kind of fits your signature perfect because I fully understand that signature

“no mission will change the hearts & minds of Iraqi's who have seen their loved ones killed or maimed by our troops or bombs”

Majority of those Iraqis killed that you are writing about are not killed by our troops and bombs…their neighbors (fellow Iraqis) kill more…this is why an Iraqi child will run and hide behind an American G.I. for protection. But we can always sit back and watch the media twist the situation to make it look like the American G.I.s are the ones to blame.

God Bless our Troops!

The Congress & the American people bought a defective used car of a war sold to us by the worst lying used car salesman in American history. To claim that we now need to keep trying to fix this "Lemon" is just throwing good money after bad, & young lives after those already dead.

Then shame on the American people for being as moronic as I am. Isn't it nice to have a Congress filled with morons?

BugsyR wrote:

The Congress & the American people bought a defective used car of a war sold to us by the worst lying used car salesman in American history. To claim that we now need to keep trying to fix this "Lemon" is just throwing good money after bad, & young lives after those already dead.

Then shame on the American people for being as moronic as I am. Isn't it nice to have a Congress filled with morons?

Neither you or The US Congress was moronic! The mistake that we made was in believing that no US President would stoop so low with US Intelligence as to "Cook The Books", "Cherry Pick" or downright lie to us to start an unwarranted war! That is exactly what GW Bush & his neo-con gang did, & that is why yesterday's report on public confidence showed that GW Bush has the lowest public confidence rating of any President in history. (Lower than Nixon at the height of Watergate or Truman in Korea) We have a right to expect more of our leaders than GW Bush has given us.......It's his fault....Not ours!
Another point Mike...When you say this:..." kill more…this is why an Iraqi child will run and hide behind an American G.I. for protection. But we can always sit back and watch the media twist the situation to make it look like the American G.I.s are the ones to blame.

God Bless our Troops!"....

Please dont try to make it that I don't understand the great peril & hard job it is to try to "Nation Build" when you are being shot at! My point is that they shouldn't be put in that situation to begin with....It's a Lose/Lose situation for them. It was this administration that has sent some GI's on the 4th tour & made 15 month deployments the order of the day.Hell.........Cheney practicaly called our volunteer armed forces expendible!


Here's the headline:

Bush's Approval Rating At All Time Low

President George W. Bush hit a milestone Thursday with a poll giving him the highest disapproval rating of any U.S. president since World War II.
Friday, May 2, 2008

Full story here http://www.keener1049.com/cc-common/new ... le=3632946

what do we have , about 250 days left of the *censored* , *censored* , cocksucking , *censored* , *censored* left.

U.S. weighs thousands more troops for Afghan war: paper Sat May 3, 2:49 AM ET



NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Pentagon is considering sending up to 7,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year to make up for a shortfall in contributions from NATO allies, the New York Times reported on Saturday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080503/ts_ ... roops_dc_2

Even our NATO allies are abandoning GW's ME strategy! (where are we going to get these troops???)




Another headline:
[size=150]Bush details $70 billion war funding request for 2009


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush on Friday laid out a detailed request for $70 billion to partially fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/ ... TE=DEFAULT




Another headline from today:


Lawmakers seek probe of Pentagon public relations program
By ANDREW MIGA – 13 hours ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — Forty-one House members are calling on the Defense Department inspector general to investigate a public relations effort that relied on retired military officers to defend the administration's Iraq war policies.

"When the Department of Defense misleads the American people by having them believe that they are listening to the views of objective military analysts when in fact these individuals are simply replaying DoD talking points, the department is clearly betraying the public trust," the lawmakers wrote in a joint letter to Defense Department Inspector General Claude M. Kicklighter on Friday.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jH6S ... gD90DNQL00

LINKS! If you're going to post snippets from articles post links.

Richard S. wrote:LINKS! If you're going to post snippets from articles post links.

Links posted

As Justice Antonin Scalia so eliquently put it, "get over it".



BTW check out the democratic-controlled congress approval rating. They have dipped into the teens.

spc wrote:As Justice Antonin Scalia so eliquently put it, "get over it".

I'll "get over it" as soon as it's over. (Speaking of "Over"....Why don't you stop your brave talk while safely sitting on your butt here & go over & help our troops?)

spc wrote:BTW check out the democratic-controlled congress approval rating. They have dipped into the teens.

That's because they haven't found the guts to impeach/fire Bush......& I agree with the low approval ratings for just that reason.

Devil5052 wrote:Why don't you stop your brave talk while safely sitting on your butt here & go over & help our troops?)

Very unfair statement & I will just leave it at that.

Do you have a reference for is this statement? "Almost all the other Presidents we have had, including Bush one, realized what a horrible situation it would be (for generations of Americans to come) to have innocent Iraqi children standing over the dead, mangled bodies of their parents while watching the large, gun toting American GI's march around their neighborhoods. Kids don't understand the geo-political reasons for anything but conclude that all Americans are Devils!"

You can post all the links about Bush's ratings being extremely low. That's fine with me. I, and I believe everyone else here, already knows that his ratings are very low. I just want to know which past president said...
"...what a horrible situation it would be (for generations of Americans to come) to have innocent Iraqi children standing over the dead, mangled bodies of their parents while watching the large, gun toting American GI's march around their neighborhoods. Kids don't understand the geo-political reasons for anything but conclude that all Americans are Devils!"...
and where you found that info. If you state that you made it up and it is of your opinion, I would believe you. But you don't state that, you state that "Almost all the other presidents..." which means that you quoted these past presidents.

Still alive: Carter, Bush, Clinton
Dead: Nixon 1994, Ford 2006, Reagan 2004

We can rule Nixon out...he was gone before 2003. We can rule Reagan out, still alive in 2003 but he didn't know who he was or even if there was a place called Iraq. So in total that leaves us with 4 past presidents (2 Dems, 2 Rep) still alive when Bush 2 sent troops into Iraq. So if your quote happened before Dec 2006, to get an "Almost all..." count, that means 2 others along with Bush 1 had to say it. Which leads me to another question, which president didn't agree with the other 3 in reference to that quote? You said Bush 1 was included in the "Almost all...".
3 out of 4 had to say it in order to get an "Almost all..." If only 2 said it then it would have to be "Half the other Presidents we have had..." and then if it was only 1 out of the 4 that said it, well then I would have to say that you lied...because 1 out of 4 does not legitimize your quote of "Almost all..."

So, really, did "Almost all he other Presidents we have had" really "realize" what you said or did you just make that crap up to once again let us know that you hate G.W.?

Cheney practicaly called our volunteer armed forces expendible!

(this next statement I speak for myself and for my wife...not for the entire armed forces because there are military members that will not agree with this)
I lived for 20 years knowing I was expendable. (Any destroyerman will understand the words "missile sponge"). My wife lived for 13 years knowing I was expendable. I just asked her if she understood this and her response..."There's always another body to take your place." I could have easily been one of those sailors on the USS Cole, USS Stark, USS S.B. Roberts, etc etc. I could have easily been killed off the coast of Virginia, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Italy, France, etc etc. Any day off the coast of Iraq if they would have gotten lucky. During war or during Peace time I knew I was expendable. How serious am I when I include my wife into this statement...sea story...I was onboard ship night before getting underway (24 hour duty), an argument was had on the phone between my wife and I. As the phone call was ending, my last words were "I love you " she responded by wordlessly hanging up. It was only a 5 day cruise before I would see or talk to her again (no email or phone capability at that time). It was the best home coming I ever had though. Her reason..."if you would have died out there, you would have died not knowing if I still loved you." She knew and still knows how dangerous even Peace time military is.
I know this much Cheney should take his quote back and change it to prevent upsetting the unknowing U.S. public...

As a matter of fact I'll change it for him..."The volunteer armed forces, like Mike, are expendable!"
(I still thank God everyday for keeping me safe for 20 years. Then I thank my wife throughout the year for standing behind me and pushing me to do and become better.)

One more thing...if y'all think I'm a smarta$$...you should meet my wife...

PBS currently is running a documentary on G.H.W. Bush's political career in the "American Experience" series.

In pertinent part, James Baker is quoted saying, "People used to ask me why we hadn't marched on Baghdad in 1991. They don't ask me that anymore."

stockingfull wrote:PBS currently is running a documentary on G.H.W. Bush's political career in the "American Experience" series.

In pertinent part, James Baker is quoted saying, "People used to ask me why we hadn't marched on Baghdad in 1991. They don't ask me that anymore."

Never had anything against G.H.W. Bush himself........ other than having the dumbest genes in Presidential history!

Nor did I; didn't vote for him but never disliked him or thought he couldn't bring a full deck to the office.

The point is that the old man conducted the first Gulf War the way such things ought to be done: with and by a truly broad alliance, not as the Lone Ranger with a bunch of Tontos.