Bizzaro world in Kentucky!!!

[Knapik]

I can't believe someone just equated our attacking an Iraq innocent of holding the weapons we accused them of with with our defending the world from being taken over by Adolf Hitler. We were attacked and drawn into the war. Iraq did a whole bunch of nothing to us. A WHOLE bunch.

I don't know if I could count myself among the liberals (you'd obviously disagree), but I would suspect the reason a large group of intelligent people don't see things in black and white is because so very few things are black and white. The war in Iraq is CERTAINLY not something that can be simplified into 'good vs. evil'.

Conservatives will love a Republican president, no matter the damage he does to our country and others. On the other hand, I suppose a Democratic president would receive the same treatment from liberals.

I am so proud to say I don't see everything in black and white. I will think things through until I die. I won't agree with what I'm told because of the person that told it to me. I refuse to blindly agree with anything out president does, Democrat and Republican. I'm pretty done here, this is a boring debate of "I'm right/No I'm right." Welcome to the grey.

[gwffantrav]

Thanks for all of your responses Jon to make it so boring

And remember if you ever get married and your wife is (God forbid) raped or have a kid and they are (God forbid) molested....don't forget...it's only a shade of grey Please don't forget that..pleaseeeee

[traviz]

This topic has gotten way off course, but since it has...

The Bush Administration had the same intel that the Clinton Administration had back in 1998 when Bill Clinton said that Hussien was hiding WMDs, the same intelligence that the British had, the same intelligence that in 2002 made future presidential canidate John Kerry say "I will be voting to give the president of the United States the authority to use force - if necessary - to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
Were they wrong? Maybe, but if all our intelligence and the intelligence of our allies indicated that the threat was real, why wait until Isreal is no more, why wait until the mushroom cloud was over New York to do anything about it.
Even if you don't agree with why we are over there, the fact is we are over there now and if we were to pull out tomorrow, we would be hit again within the year, because every terrorist would think that when the U.S. suffers big losses, we cut and run and we can't afford to send that message.

[thefamoustommyz]

Pshaw.

I didn't hear anyone moaning about wiping our Afghanistan after the Taliban hid bin Laden.

Most of the hijackers were Saudi Arabians. The leader of al-Quiada is Saudi royalty. There was a money trail a while back that was unearth, leading from Saudi royalty to the 9/11 hijackers. And we go after Iraq?

History lesson, Trav. America inserted Hussein into power and turned a blind eye to everything he ever did, until he crossed the line.

What line? Genocide? Wrongful imprisonment? Nono, silly...

He attacked our oil interests in Kuwait. Then, and only then, did he become "the bad guy". Oddly enough, when Germany and France threw a fit about THEIR oil interests (Iraq) being attacked (by us) with evidence so fuzzy that the man that sacrificed his credibility with the world (Colin Powell) later called the whole thing a huge regret, we considered them traitors and cowards.

Tell me...where's the black and white there?

I am completely convinced that the only reason we are in Iraq is because the civilian warmongers in D.C. thought that a turban-wearing caveman would be an easy mark, and when they got outsmarted by Osama bin Laden, tried to turn the focus onto a head of state, because Hussein would almost surely have to be in Iraq somewhere, so if they blew up enough stuff and dug around deep enough, they could at least shut HIM down.

And don't go spouting any liberal/conservative garbage at me, either. I am very much not a fan of either "side" anymore...

[thefamoustommyz]

traviz said:

This topic has gotten way off course, but since it has...

The Bush Administration had the same intel that the Clinton Administration had back in 1998 when Bill Clinton said that Hussien was hiding WMDs, the same intelligence that the British had, the same intelligence that in 2002 made future presidential canidate John Kerry say "I will be voting to give the president of the United States the authority to use force - if necessary - to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
Were they wrong? Maybe, but if all our intelligence and the intelligence of our allies indicated that the threat was real, why wait until Isreal is no more, why wait until the mushroom cloud was over New York to do anything about it.
Even if you don't agree with why we are over there, the fact is we are over there now and if we were to pull out tomorrow, we would be hit again within the year, because every terrorist would think that when the U.S. suffers big losses, we cut and run and we can't afford to send that message.

I don't disagree here...after all, when you run into someone's house and tear up everything you own, then realize "Oops...this might have been the wrong house." You should probably stick around to clean things up.

That said, it's cute how the politics of this whole thing shook out. When Clinton wanted to go to war with Hussein, The Right said "You're just trying to take the heat off your extramarital affairs."...when Bush wanted to go to war, The Left said "It's all revenge and oil."

That is why I'm sick of The Right and The Left. There is no consistency. Both sides pick and choose their moral outrage. The Bush Administration said themselves that they could not attack Iraq on their human rights violations because that reasoning wasn't good enough, and then turned around and expected people to buy that as the reason they went to war when no WMDs were found.

If you're going to be disgusted by a mass-murdering dictator, be disgusted all the time and not just when its politically convenient, like our leaders on both sides of the debate have done.

[Knapik]

gwffantrav said:

Thanks for all of your responses Jon to make it so boring

And remember if you ever get married and your wife is (God forbid) raped or have a kid and they are (God forbid) molested....don't forget...it's only a shade of grey Please don't forget that..pleaseeeee

Don't you dare play that game, Trav. Someone disagrees with attacking a non-aggressive country and all of the sudden I'm cool with someone I care about being raped? I said FEW things are black and white, that not being one of them. Of course. I know you're not a moron, so I also know you don't equate the two things. Why then would you choose to say such a thing? I'm no pacifist and in fact enjoy fighting with a passion that drives me to training. I however don't think wars that cost thousands of lives based on a MISTAKE are cool. How silly of me!

I'm sorry people disagree with you, but as long as you take the stance that George Bush is the bomb, you're going to constantly be faced with this sort of disappointment.

Please don't attempt to insult my intelligence again just because people think you're wrong. In my case - perhaps especially - that's another avenue in which you're going to feel disappointed.

[traviz]

thefamoustommyz said:

History lesson, Trav. America inserted Hussein into power and turned a blind eye to everything he ever did, until he crossed the line

I'm pretty sure that the U.S didn't insert Hussein into power, although we did help him in the Iran-Iraq War.

And while I'm glad that you don't blindly follow any party ideology, the fact remains that almost ALL intelligence indicated that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, BOTH DEMOCRATS & REPUBLICIANS have stated that at one time or another. So given that and the fact that Hussien ignored U.N. Resolutions what should we have done?

[gwffantrav]

knapik said:

gwffantrav said:

Thanks for all of your responses Jon to make it so boring



I'm sorry people disagree with you, but as long as you take the stance that George Bush is the bomb,
.

When did I say that??? I never even said I was a republican...just conservative

And Traviz is right Tommy, the US did not put him into power, but did help him in his fight against Iran back in the early 80s

[gwffantrav]

And Tommy, you would have heard no complaints from me if Clinton would have did more that drop a couple of bombs on abandoned warehouses on Iraq. I would have fully supported him...I'm just against far left liberal social ideas (socialism, welfare, pacifism (in EVERY case, affirmative action, etc). Never against any kind of military action against any threat against the US be it that president is Dem or Rep. They will always have my full support on that!!!!

If Lieberman and McCain were to run against one another...I'd be casting the vote for ol' Joe in a heartbeat. He knows the evil of that world...we can just work on some of those social issues of his.

And look at transcripts (if they aren't hidden) of Clinton (bill and Hillary), Kerry, ol' blow hard himself Ted Kennedy, all in the mid to late 90s were all calling for an end to ol' Saddy's reign...and they were totally right. I hear the soundbites all the time on Michael Medved, Dennis Prager, Mike Gallagher, Hannity and all of the radio talk shows. Did they just change because of any kind of new intelligence, or just scared of the increasingly far left anti peace mongers?? I'd say it's the latter

Ask about his immigration policy, or No Child Left Behind, or his spending....then you'll hear me rip Bush.

[offspring515]

And remember if you ever get married and your wife is (God forbid) raped or have a kid and they are (God forbid) molested....don't forget...it's only a shade of grey Please don't forget that..pleaseeeee

That's the most distastful and assinine thing I've ever read on this board. I like you Trav, and while I don't agree with your politics I can appreciate your passion for the subject. But THAT was way out of line.

But I'm sure since I don't agree with you, it has nothing to do with the content of the post, and it's probably related to hating W. Right? That's the only possible explanation for someone having a differing viewpoint from everything you've said so far.

[thefamoustommyz]

traviz said:

thefamoustommyz said:

History lesson, Trav. America inserted Hussein into power and turned a blind eye to everything he ever did, until he crossed the line

I'm pretty sure that the U.S didn't insert Hussein into power, although we did help him in the Iran-Iraq War.

And while I'm glad that you don't blindly follow any party ideology, the fact remains that almost ALL intelligence indicated that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, BOTH DEMOCRATS & REPUBLICIANS have stated that at one time or another. So given that and the fact that Hussien ignored U.N. Resolutions what should we have done?

You are correct...we didn't insert him into power. No, we just gave him the money and weapons to fight our battles for us while turning a blind eye to everything he did to his own people, until he decided to go after our oil interests.

Then, and only then, did Saddam Hussein become our enemy.

My point is that if he had never moved on Kuwait's oil, and in turn threatened our contracts with Kuwait, none of our nation's leaders, right or left, would have ever found the moral imperative to remove him from power.

Trav only proved my point...the leaders on both sides have called for war in power, and tried to stop it when they weren't, all because they were afraid to be seen cooperating with the other side.

The only differences, and I mean the ONLY differences between Clinton's call to war and Bush's call to war were the circumstances right before the call to war (Zippergate vs 9/11) and Karl Rove is a better spin doctor than the politcal scene has had in AGES.

[gwffantrav]

offspring515 said:

And remember if you ever get married and your wife is (God forbid) raped or have a kid and they are (God forbid) molested....don't forget...it's only a shade of grey Please don't forget that..pleaseeeee

That's the most distastful and assinine thing I've ever read on this board. I like you Trav, and while I don't agree with your politics I can appreciate your passion for the subject. But THAT was way out of line.

But I'm sure since I don't agree with you, it has nothing to do with the content of the post, and it's probably related to hating W. Right? That's the only possible explanation for someone having a differing viewpoint from everything you've said so far.

I don't think that at all Off...I like you as well and don't think your response is because of anything other than what you stated. As you could have read in my other post above...I'm not fully a W supporter...just these people rip him on the war and that's totally wrong. I'm not republican, just conservative...and I don't know if Bush is fully that...but at least he's not Ah-nald or Rudy or McCain!

I'm sure that post may have ticked some off and you know what, it's supposed to...either you see evil or you don't. If that point was extreme and uncalled for so be it, but like many, sometimes people use those efforts to make a point. If someone is going to brag and blah blah about only seeing things in grey, be consistent and see things in grey.

BTW you misspelled asinine and distasteful (I'm just joking with ya there off)

But I've caused enough controversy on this subject...sorry for posting anything!!! Everyone can now hate me, put parodies in their thread...whatever. It's over and done..everyone has spoken as I have.

But if there is one thing we all have a passion about is rolling the dice...and I'm getting back to that!

Now for any further controversy, just go back to the TNA boards!! ;D

P.S. Tommy, as much as you hear it in the media....Bush never connected Iraq with 9/11.....

[offspring515]

I don't think the spelling changes the content of my meaning.

But as you have said, it's probably best to let this one go. I may see mostly shades of grey, but on this subject I think we both see black and white.

[gatekeeper]

gwffantrav said:

offspring515 said:

P.S. Tommy, as much as you hear it in the media....Bush never connected Iraq with 9/11.....

That's not exactly true. He said that al-Queada had connections in Iraq during one of his speeches.

And to say ripping him for the war is wrong?? Excuse me.

I don't like it when after we are attacked by a group clearly from Afghanistan, he says we need to go to war with Iraq because 1st reason - they have weapons of mass destruction, which they never found, 2nd reason - connections to al-Queada, and then 3rd - to free the Iraqi people. Give me a break. If that was Clinton, people would have wanted to hang him form the highest tree.

Would we care so much about the Iraqi people if they weren't in a nation sitting on the 2nd largest supply of oil in the world? No.

And if we care so much about freeing people from horrible govts., why are we not doing anything about the genocide in Darfour? Or like I said, not equating their threat to al-Queada's but a communist govt. and it's dictator reside just a few miles from Florida, in Cuba.

It just fills me anger when I hear W.'s reasoning for this war. Because clearly, he can't see that it's got a ton of holes.

[Tournament Master]

Wow, this conversation took a nasty turn. But then again any time politics or religion is brought up its bound to turn ugly.

Now I am not one to give two craps about politics..or atleast I didn't until a few years ago when Bush's regime brought me into the fold, by completely despising everything they do. I was completely floored when he was reelected...but since he was won for all the wrong reasons (being at war which was strategically timed to help him get reelected) I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.

Now, I can't claim that I follow the news too closely, but I thought that it came out a while ago that we actually didn'y have any intellegence that there were weapons of mass destruction, the reason was just created so we could go to Iraq. I thought this came out after the Colin Powell resignation, but I could be wrong...that seceret may still be intact.

It will be interesting to see what happens in two years and who comes out on top of both parties. If it is between Lieberman and McCain...the choice will be extremely simple one for me, as McCain is the much better candidtae in my eye (its just too bad he has to pander to the Christian right in order to have a chance). The two guys should really be in the other's party given their views of the world.

I don't think there is anything I can agree with Trav on in this thread. But thats why they have a menu in restaurants, because not everybody likes the same thing. See you boys on the other boards.

[Chris Ingersoll]

tournamentmaster said:

Wow, this conversation took a nasty turn. But then again any time politics or religion is brought up its bound to turn ugly.

That's why we don't have a dedicated forum for it.

Well... that and the fact that it can't even be remotely associated with CotG/LoW in any serious manner, unlike the other "off-topic" forums.

[Tournament Master]

admin said:

tournamentmaster said:

Wow, this conversation took a nasty turn. But then again any time politics or religion is brought up its bound to turn ugly.

That's why we don't have a dedicated forum for it.

Well... that and the fact that it can't even be remotely associated with CotG/LoW in any serious manner, unlike the other "off-topic" forums.

We get enough problems in the TNA thread, I can't imagine what we would get in a true political forum.

[traviz]

tournamentmaster said:

Now, I can't claim that I follow the news too closely, but I thought that it came out a while ago that we actually didn'y have any intellegence that there were weapons of mass destruction, the reason was just created so we could go to Iraq. I thought this came out after the Colin Powell resignation, but I could be wrong...that seceret may still be intact.

Yes, Bush made it all up. Thank goodness he had the Clinton Administration and British Intelligence and the U.N. Weapons Inspectors from 1998 helping him with "the Big Lie" by saying the EXACT SAME THING 5 years before we went to war.

And if you think that oil is not a good enough reason to go to war then you are not living in reality. Oil is the backbone of our economy. At $5 a gallon, the rules of business change, people get laid off as companies try to cut costs, Prices on every good or service goes up, if you are jobless and on welfare it won't be enough to feed your family, the very way of life in the U.S changes. American citizens starve. Is that enough reason to go to war?
And don't tell me about how we have people livng in poverty now, because, truth is, we have very few people who know the true meaning of poverty in the U.S.

Fire away!

[thefamoustommyz]

Wait...haven't gas prices spiked in correlation with rising violence in Iraq?

I distinctly remember tons of angry customers wondering why gas was going up when we had just taken over an oil rich country.

[traviz]

thefamoustommyz said:

Wait...haven't gas prices spiked in correlation with rising violence in Iraq?

I distinctly remember tons of angry customers wondering why gas was going up when we had just taken over an oil rich country.

That is a more important question than "should we be over there" and it's one that we should hold the President accountable for. I understand the reasoning for going to war
1).because all intel suggested that Hussein had WMDs
and 2). oil interest. I don't understand why we haven't helped ourselves to some of that crude. My argument was that you can't claim that Bush made all this stuff up when so many others on both sides of the politcal spectrum have said the same thing and oil is worth fighting for, because of it's place in our economy AND our way of life.