Guest
Recommended Posts
Andy9o8 2
You make interesting, and mostly valid points. But in the further interest of fun, since it's Saturday morning and I have a bit of time on my hands, here are a few nit-picks to the spammies you pasted:
The Nobel Peace Prize was co-awarded to Mohamed el-Baradei, an Egyptian Muslim, in 2005 (not mentioned in the list).
On the other hand, in all fairness, awarding the Peace Prize to Yasir Arafat in 1994 was a travesty.
Not much (post-Irgun) terrorism by Jews, but not zero, either. In 1994, US-born Israeli doctor Baruch Goldstein opened fire with a machine gun in a West Bank mosque, firing about 100 bullets and murdering about 30 Palestinian worshippers.
I think there is at least probable cause to suspect that Ariel Sharon and other Israeli military officers under his command were in some ways complicit - perhaps by commission, perhaps merely by deliberate omission - in the 1982 massacres of ethnic Palestinian Muslims in the Sabara and Shatila villages in Lebanon at the hands of Lebanese Christian fighters.
Sirhan Sirhan, who murdered Bobby Kennedy, although a Palestinian Arab, is not and never has been a Muslim; he was born and raised in a Christian family.
The 1979 takeover of the US Embassy in Iran: Yes, those who did it were Muslims. But it's not irrelevant that Iran's population is 99% Muslim; and the Shah's regime being more secular than not, it's not illogical that opposition to his regime would coalesce under the public umbrella of religious figures. The US supported quite a few despotic regimes as "bulwarks against Communism" during the 20th Century, and many of them were not Muslim countries. The popular uprising that overthrew, for example, Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, were engaged in mainly by Catholics (since it's mainly a Catholic country), and led in many instances by priests. Yet history does not label that uprising as one by "Catholic extremists."
The Fort Hood massacre was committed by a person whose principal CLINICAL (i.e., objective) causal motivator was his mental illness, not the religion into which he was born - his delusional process notwithstanding. Every argument to the contrary I've seen/heard thus far has been either obtuse or intellectually dishonest.
Mmm... OK, that's about it.
The Nobel Peace Prize was co-awarded to Mohamed el-Baradei, an Egyptian Muslim, in 2005 (not mentioned in the list).
On the other hand, in all fairness, awarding the Peace Prize to Yasir Arafat in 1994 was a travesty.
Not much (post-Irgun) terrorism by Jews, but not zero, either. In 1994, US-born Israeli doctor Baruch Goldstein opened fire with a machine gun in a West Bank mosque, firing about 100 bullets and murdering about 30 Palestinian worshippers.
I think there is at least probable cause to suspect that Ariel Sharon and other Israeli military officers under his command were in some ways complicit - perhaps by commission, perhaps merely by deliberate omission - in the 1982 massacres of ethnic Palestinian Muslims in the Sabara and Shatila villages in Lebanon at the hands of Lebanese Christian fighters.
Sirhan Sirhan, who murdered Bobby Kennedy, although a Palestinian Arab, is not and never has been a Muslim; he was born and raised in a Christian family.
The 1979 takeover of the US Embassy in Iran: Yes, those who did it were Muslims. But it's not irrelevant that Iran's population is 99% Muslim; and the Shah's regime being more secular than not, it's not illogical that opposition to his regime would coalesce under the public umbrella of religious figures. The US supported quite a few despotic regimes as "bulwarks against Communism" during the 20th Century, and many of them were not Muslim countries. The popular uprising that overthrew, for example, Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, were engaged in mainly by Catholics (since it's mainly a Catholic country), and led in many instances by priests. Yet history does not label that uprising as one by "Catholic extremists."
The Fort Hood massacre was committed by a person whose principal CLINICAL (i.e., objective) causal motivator was his mental illness, not the religion into which he was born - his delusional process notwithstanding. Every argument to the contrary I've seen/heard thus far has been either obtuse or intellectually dishonest.
Mmm... OK, that's about it.
Skyrad 0
Hmm Hmmm, hate hate hate hate blah blah hate hate hate hate blah blah blah
When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Sure it could! And so could just about anything else that happens.QuoteCould this be more foundational evidence of end time prophecy? Eschatology rules!
Speed Racer
--------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------
winsor 236
QuoteYou make interesting, and mostly valid points. But in the further interest of fun, since it's Saturday morning and I have a bit of time on my hands, here are a few nit-picks to the spammies you pasted:
The Nobel Peace Prize was co-awarded to Mohamed el-Baradei, an Egyptian Muslim, in 2005 (not mentioned in the list).
On the other hand, in all fairness, awarding the Peace Prize to Yasir Arafat in 1994 was a travesty.
Not much (post-Irgun) terrorism by Jews, but not zero, either. In 1994, US-born Israeli doctor Baruch Goldstein opened fire with a machine gun in a West Bank mosque, firing about 100 bullets and murdering about 30 Palestinian worshippers.
I think there is at least probable cause to suspect that Ariel Sharon and other Israeli military officers under his command were in some ways complicit - perhaps by commission, perhaps merely by deliberate omission - in the 1982 massacres of ethnic Palestinian Muslims in the Sabara and Shatila villages in Lebanon at the hands of Lebanese Christian fighters.
Sirhan Sirhan, who murdered Bobby Kennedy, although a Palestinian Arab, is not and never has been a Muslim; he was born and raised in a Christian family.
The 1979 takeover of the US Embassy in Iran: Yes, those who did it were Muslims. But it's not irrelevant that Iran's population is 99% Muslim; and the Shah's regime being more secular than not, it's not illogical that opposition to his regime would coalesce under the public umbrella of religious figures. The US supported quite a few despotic regimes as "bulwarks against Communism" during the 20th Century, and many of them were not Muslim countries. The popular uprising that overthrew, for example, Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, were engaged in mainly by Catholics (since it's mainly a Catholic country), and led in many instances by priests. Yet history does not label that uprising as one by "Catholic extremists."
The Fort Hood massacre was committed by a person whose principal CLINICAL (i.e., objective) causal motivator was his mental illness, not the religion into which he was born - his delusional process notwithstanding. Every argument to the contrary I've seen/heard thus far has been either obtuse or intellectually dishonest.
Mmm... OK, that's about it.
Given your line of work, I can see why you absolutely have to pick flyshit out of pepper - it becomes reflexive.
The bottom line is that "equal" does not mean "the same;" the supposition that all peoples have equal merit is demonstrably false.
I have been in neighborhoods that were amazingly resurgent, and it took little to discover that it was the result of a change in demographics. I have also been in neighborhoods where it looked like a war had been fought and lost there, and this, too, was the result in a (quite different) shift in demographics.
Most people espousing the most egalitarian line would not consider living amongst "them"
I once had someone confide in me that they had gone at the behest of our collective Uncle to a location to protect the poor, oppressed members of group A from the mean, spiteful members of group B. He confessed that, after being there for a while he came to the conclusion that the members of Group A were lying, thieving scumbags and that those of Group B were honorable and good to their word, and that he no longer had any sympathy for members of Group A whatsoever.
Naivete is the ultimate luxury, and I am envious (after a fashion) of those for whom it is apparently endless. Realities, unfortunately, have a tendency to be nasty.
BSBD,
Winsor
Skyrad 0
I never cease to be amazed by the fact that so many Americans seem to be unable to see in shades of grey, good guys wear white hat syndrome. The ultimate in naivety.
When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
winsor 236
QuoteI never cease to be amazed by the fact that so many Americans seem to be unable to see in shades of grey, good guys wear white hat syndrome. The ultimate in naivety.
It is not so much a matter of good vs. bad; it is more noting who sucks less. Granted, in some cases there is no discernable difference.
There are some population groups where, in order to find the few worthwhile individuals, it is rather a matter of "with all this around, there must be a pony somewhere."
Skyrad 0
There are as many good Muslims as there are good Jews and Christians the problem is people only focus on the outliers.
When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
winsor 236
QuoteThere are as many good Muslims as there are good Jews and Christians the problem is people only focus on the outliers.
I have met Klansmen I liked very much. Your point is moot.
Coreece 190
QuoteI have met Klansmen I liked very much.
Ya, why am I not suprised?
Your secrets are the true reflection of who you really are...
Skyrad 0
QuoteQuoteI have met Klansmen I liked very much.
Ya, why am I not suprised?
When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
winsor 236
QuoteQuoteI have met Klansmen I liked very much.
Ya, why am I not suprised?
I do not credit you with much in the way of comprehension, so your absence of surprise is of little import.
Put more accurately, people with whom I got along well turned out later to have (or have had) Klan connections. This did not improve my impression of the Klan, though it gave some insight regarding its appeal to those given to membership.
Those who adhere to virulent, pathological ideologies may include fundamentally decent people here and there. Nevertheless, if a large number of them were to be simultaneously felled by a bad batch of crab dip, my reaction would be gratitude that they were not more careful with food safety.
BSBD,
Winsor
muff528 3
Quote.....
Physics:
(zero)
I believe Abdus Salam was a co-recipient in 1979 along with Weinberg and Glashow. Something to do with that whole
Andy9o8 2
QuoteThere are as many good Muslims as there are good Jews
Uh, careful: there are 14 million Jews to 1.2 billion Muslims. Do the math(s) and you've rhetorically shot yourself in the foot.
Guest
QuoteQuoteI never cease to be amazed by the fact that so many Americans seem to be unable to see in shades of grey, good guys wear white hat syndrome. The ultimate in naivety.
It is not so much a matter of good vs. bad; it is more noting who sucks less. Granted, in some cases there is no discernable difference.
There are some population groups where, in order to find the few worthwhile individuals, it is rather a matter of "with all this around, there must be a pony somewhere."
+1
mh
.
"The mouse does not know life until it is in the mouth of the cat."
Guest
QuoteHmm Hmmm, hate hate hate hate blah blah hate hate hate hate blah blah blah
What makes truth "hate"?
Revolution Is In The Air
January 28, 2011: Larger, and more violent, anti-government demonstrations are showing up in Algeria, in the last two weeks (since the dictatorship in neighboring Tunisia was overthrown). So far, the violence has led to about ten deaths, and over a thousand wounded. The people want economic, and political, justice, and an end to the "emergency rule" (sort of martial law, with increased police powers) that has been in force for two decades. Like their counterparts throughout the Arab world, the demonstrators want competent government, less corruption and more economic growth. The young want jobs, opportunity and a future, things too many of them don't have now.
Algeria, and the other North African nations, are all Arab dictatorships, and all worried about the growing, and increasingly organized, popular demonstrations against the ruling groups. It's basically a revolt of the young (teenage to early 30s) men who suffer high unemployment (often 30 percent or more) and encounter constant reminders that education and talent is no match for political connections when it comes to getting a job.
The dictatorships all operate in the same model. The government is run by a skillful politician who has set up a system whereby those who support the dictatorship get jobs or economic opportunities. In this way, about ten percent can live off the other 90 percent. The problem with this system is that it tends to try and be hereditary, and that means that after a few generations, natural selection sees to it that the ruling class is less able and the unhappy other 90 percent has more political talent, often enough to overthrow the government.
The only problem here is avoiding the leaders of the revolution from establishing another. That is supposed to be avoided via democracy, but some of the democracies established in the wake of the 1989-91 collapse of communist governments turned into dictatorships pretending to be democracies. Most of the Arab states are already doing that, and the patronage and corruption system dictatorships thrive on is more resilient that the dictators themselves. Thus while the dictator of Tunisia (Zine al Abedine Ben Ali) may have been gone for two weeks, thousands of his cronies (government ministers and bureaucrats) are hanging on to power. This will always happen, and is difficult to deal with, as many government employees have needed skills for keeping basic government functions going. In Tunisia, it’s been a struggle in the last two weeks to force out Ben Ali's key henchmen, the guys who actually supervised the details of oppression and corruption. These guys are often less able to flee into comfortable exile, and the further down the food chain you go, the more desperation you will encounter.
Another unique factor in Tunisia was the small size (and budget) of the armed forces. Most Arab dictatorships lavish more money on more soldiers (especially the officers and NCOs). In Tunisia, Ben Ali had little oil wealth or foreign aid for the military, no hostile neighbors, and the officers felt less pampered and loyal, and willing to kill protestors . In Egypt, Libya and Algeria, there are more soldiers more willing to kill for the boss. But in all these nations, most of the soldiers have friends or kin who are unemployed and unhappy. Many children of the ruling class support change, even if it hurts their economic situation. If enough people get caught up in the idea of change, it's hard to stop.
There's been a growing sense among educated, and young, Arabs that the world has passed them by and that it's not someone else's fault. In other words, the problems, and the solutions, are in Arab hands. There have been lots of revolutions in Arab nations over the century, and the only form of government that seems to have any staying power, democracy, has been the least popular. There have been socialist and religious dictatorships, as well as many monarchies (Jordan, Morocco and most Gulf States). And with socialism and Islamic radicalism discredited, the dictatorships are now just plain-old-dictatorships. It's all about the money, and the power to get the money with the least effort.
The leftist and religious radicals are still out there, but the majority of people in the street don't want leftist or religious leaders. They want democracy. The leftists and religious zealots can form parties and participate, but the new idea is to let the people rule the people, for the people. It's a novel idea in the Arab world, and it has the traditional rulers checking their guns, and their offshore bank accounts.
In Algeria, the Islamic terrorist groups continue to flee the security forces, who persist in searching the coastal forests, and southern deserts for them. Most of the Islamic radicals have fled south, or left the country. In the south, there is opportunity in the form of transporting cocaine north to the Mediterranean, where it is smuggled to Europe. A tiny bit of the cocaine stays in North Africa, to supply the small ruling classes. The big market is across the water, in the much larger economies of Europe, and to the east, where the oil wealth of the Persian (or Arabian) Gulf can afford to sustain a lot of mistakes. [my emphasis - mh]
mh
.
"The mouse does not know life until it is in the mouth of the cat."
Guest
QuoteI never cease to be amazed by the fact that so many Americans seem to be unable to see in shades of grey, good guys wear white hat syndrome. The ultimate in naivety.
It is the majority of (but by no means all) muslims who see the world in absolute, black-and-white terms. There can be no questioning of the unholy koran, or the prophet (pbuh). Anything else is apostasy, punishable by death in the worst cases, lots of hardship in the least. It's a cradle-to-grave social, political and economic plan (sounds a lot like marxism in that regard) that will not be deviated from. Those who do risk their lives ("honor" killings, anyone?).
My culture and society are superior for one reason and one reason only: despite many flaws, we remain capable of self-criticism and introspection (which gives the PC police their ammunition, unfortunately). One need only read what that asshole Noam Chomsky has come up with this week to know the truth of that; whereas every Arab country I've been in so far censors the Internet of not just "naughty" (read: Haraam) things, but any criticism of islam or of the ruling elite. You won't find that in the West. I'll wager that you are unable to name one country, just one, in Western democratic countries (thus excluding 3rd-world shit-holes like Haiti) that does anything like that.
mh
.
edit for spelling
"The mouse does not know life until it is in the mouth of the cat."
Guest
QuoteHmm Hmmm, hate hate hate hate blah blah hate hate hate hate blah blah blah
The sight of this always makes me laugh. Egyptian protestors stop what they are doing, put their butts in the air for Allah
"The mouse does not know life until it is in the mouth of the cat."
QuoteThe point, dear dreamtroller,
ooohhh look, a childish personal attck - how mature of you.
stay away from moving propellers - they bite
blue skies from thai sky adventures
good solid response-provoking keyboarding
blue skies from thai sky adventures
good solid response-provoking keyboarding
Another thing conveniently overlooked by the apologists and moral equivalence types is that although the Old Testament does have exhortations to attack and destroy opponents, such harangues only cover the peoples that were in immediate opposition to the political and military objectives of the Jewish empire at the time.
Islam demands unending jihad (damn, am I ever sick of seeing that word) against absolutely everyone who isn't a muslim, without exception, and that non-believers will get the three standard option packages: submit, become dhimmi (untermenschen), or DIE. So much for the "Religion of Peace".
mh
.
Share this post
Link to post
Share on other sites