joedirt

I should write a book titled "GEORGE BUSH IS AN ASS". It would probably sell a couple million copies just for the title and I'd be rich. They hate him for everything.

You seem to know very little about the U.S. We drive Japanese cars, watch Japanese televisions and listen to Japanese stereos as well. My grandfather kept schrapnel in his head and shoulder for 30 years thanks to a kamikazi, but we don't keep a grudge either. I'm sure you could hear many stories like this from Americans, but I've met very few people from the last two generations of Americans who hold a grudge against the Japanese for WW2. Oh.. and war doesn't help our economy anymore...it may help a few corporations, but not most of the economy. It is costing us money.

It also has to tell you something about their culture and leaders at the time, since they would not even surrender after the U.S. dropped a nuclear weapon on them. Truman had to do it twice.

Wow this post is still going... it's a pointless argument really. I know lots of people who have handled sabot rounds, myself included. It was always understood to be depleted uranium. There really hasn't been proof either way, but the people who would be affected would be the people using them. I think most guys would like the option to use AP if they need it. I also think these conspiracy theory guys show up in discussion boards alot, but probably represent a very small minority of the public.

Yeah, whenever I hear someone say what caused "Gulf War Syndrome" my B.S. meter goes way up.

I have no issue with either of your points ...they just aren't related to mine. *** If you beleive these reasons aren't relevent as to how the German people let Hitler get into power... then we have very different "perspectives on history".

So which point do we disagree on. 1. Americans are not suffering like the Germans were. or 2. Democrats and Republicans are not killing each other and beating people in the streets fighting for power.

I get the point you are trying to make, it's just a huge stretch. The "Jingoes" are brought together by an enemy. A dictator needs a certain group to blame the state of his own nation on, a group they can rise up and unite against. i.e. the Jews are exploiting our German workers, western europe has kept us down ever since WW1 and are embarrassing us with the peace treaty. Here are the two reasons that come to mind. 1. The U.S. president can use "terrorists" to blame, as an excuse for people to target their anger at, but for what. Germany was in a terrible way in the 1930s, during the great depression. They had lost the first world war and were deep in debt in retribution payment. The U.S. economy is doing pretty good, even the recession after 9/11 turned out to be minor. The U.S. ended up becoming the lone super power on the planet during the cold war. The situations in our countries are very different. We are not suffering. 2. The two political parties fighting for power in Germany were assasinating each other left and right, when the Nazi party was struggling for power. Both parties had paramilitary groups engaged in beating citizens while they were fighting for power. This is the situation Germany was in before the Nazi's even got into office. If Democrats and Republicans start assasinating each other all over the place, then I'll worry about a slippery slope. If either party starts beating on independant citizens like myself, then I'll worry about a slippery slope.

"If you don't like the U.S., then say so." "Already Have" Oops, I didn't know you hated the United States. We have opposite goals so of course we will not reach an agreement. I want to see the United States prosper in the future. I thought I was talking to one of my countryman who wanted the same thing but had a different way of doing it. That is why I started this thread with "should we". That is my fault, I will be more careful about that in the future. Apparently you just wanted to entertain me with your anti-U.S. propaganda. It has been fun though. Goodbye.

The kiiling fields of Cambodia are well documented. No such event took place after the fall of Saigon... in Vietnam the VC had already eliminated many of the elders and intellectuals that opposed them while we were there and "protecting" them. Sorry to assume... I thought that people who were familiar with pol pot would be a little slower to beleive G.W. Bush was a good comparison to Hitler. I stand corrected.

the communist Vietnamese's "re-education" and Cambodia's Pol Pot's "purification" Good luck getting anyone to recognize these here.

Which part of that was for me stud? You haven't explained why I was wrong about anything. Give me a logical answer and I'll be happy to hear it. If you just don't like the U.S., then say so. If you think the Osama Bin Laden's of the world do not wish to install Sharia law throughout the world in the name of Allah, say so. If you don't beleive they are attempting this through a tactic of deliberately killing civilians, say so. If you don't think they have a romantic view of delivering their jihad to the world, say so. If you think we should not assist our allies, (Kuwait, Israel) then say we should not have allies. We know U.S. foreign policy has many black marks, no country is immune from that. It's very easy to explain where we have screwed up in the past, but it's a lot harder to explain where we go from here. If you think everything will be O.K. if the United States would just become isolationist, then please explain why. And lastly of course, please explain what will happen to radical Islam, if we leave Iraq. Nobody, knows for sure, so tell me your opinion.

"palestinian crucifixion" ATTENTION PALESTINIANS: we do not actually crucify palestinians in the U.S. ... please do not chop off some white guy's head this weekend.

Wow, are you comparing germany under Hitler to the U.S. under GWB?

At least tell my WHY I'm wrong on "almost every subject I speak of".

"Iraq launched a jihad against the U.S? I must have missed this memo from fantasy land" Al Qaeda in Iraq has. As in "Jihad of the sword". A stable government in Iraq, with a strong enough military, is needed to stop those types of murderers. Al Qaeda is Sunni, some of these foreigners, with Zarqawi's mujahideen fighters,went to iraq to start a civil war with the Shi'a majority. It worked as they had planned. Enough violence, then the U.S. will leave. They must stay underground untill the U.S. is gone. Does that spell it out enough for you junior?

Define winning - making the Jihad ineffective Acceptable losses - whatever it takes How to pay for it - get rid of 90% of entitlements Draft - yes How do you attack/ contain an ideology - Defending freedom of press/speech Would you change your lifestyle - yes Mental masturbation - yes Oh and the whole trading oil in euros thing is B.S. It would only hurt us temporarily, that is a major reason for the floating exchange rate. Right now we have a lot of foreign capitol invested in the U.S., but a large trade deficit. If oil stopped being traded in dollars, the value of the dollar would drop. Foreign capitol would be invested elsewhere, but this would eventually be offset by a smaller trade deficit due to cheap american goods. As more people would want cheap American goods the dollar would rise back up in value. This is why our money is no longer backed by gold. Believe it or not, its not a conspiracy.

It seems like people just say "It's the middle east pal... come on" or "you can't beat an insurgency" as if these are facts. They must hear they're favorite anti - Bush pundit say it, so they think it's true. It's easier than trying to understand something on your own. Bush is cocky, he's a "fortunate son", he didn't serve in Vietnam, didn't win the popular vote and probably did some blow when he was young. His administration had bad intelligence about WMD and invaded Iraq when they might not have had to. These things don't change the fact that the place where religion is used to teach hatred and violence stems from the middle east. Encouraging democracies in the middle east is a noble goal, one that could eventually minimize the impact of radical Islam and their attempt at Jihad. I get the point of the President's strategy. Two democracies, one on each side of Iran, could have been a very good thing. We have a decent chance of failing though, public opinion changed pretty quickly, it's too bad. If Democrats are right then great, we'll leave Iraq to it's own civil war, all the radicals will quit since we're gone, and the jihadist movement will just fizzle out. I kind of doubt it though. I personally don't understand how people can have such strong convictions about that. FYI - The U.S. military has beaten an insurgency before in the Phillipines (after the American-Phillipine war). It was a ten year insurgency preceded by a declaration of victory by the U.S. government. Sound familiar? Also the British defeated a communist led insurgency in the Malay peninsula after WW2. We may have gone about fighting this insurgency wrong, but to act as if it is common knowledge that an insugency can't be put down is ridiculous.

Dear god,an hour and a half of Noam Chomsky? If you want to learn about ANYTHING except linguistics, start somewhere else. Or if your just waaaay to the left politically, and need to be told "the way things are" without having to do any critical thinking for yourself, then start with Noam Chomsky.

Wow... tough crowd you got here. Lets just get the bong out and read rolling stone magazine for our perspective on history. It'd be easier. I suppose Arabs will be Arabs... they just like to fight... screw it. Furnishings - too funny.

Aren't there differences between communists and radical Islam? Communism had nukes before the U.S. ever set foot in Korea or Vietnam. Communists also fought to win, not to die. "Did the communists take over the U.S. after we left Vietnam?" An army invasion of the U.S. isn't what we should focus on, I think most people understand that by now. "Did they take over any other countries over there?" Ever hear of Ho Chi Mihn City? How about the Khmer Rouge?

That's a good point. "finishing it" could mean a lot of things I guess. We could put troops in - take them out- as if the U.S exists in a vacuum. As if the rest of the world does not respond to what we do. I guess the only real meaning for "finishing" is victory over the present jihadist movement, (which doesn't necessarily have to do with Iraq pre 2003, but it does now unfortunately). We will have to get far more ruthless to beat this enemy, which we won't do, untill or unless they get a nuke, then opinions will change.

Can we just blow off what the president says about fighting them "over there", I can't help but think there's some truth to what he says. What will happen if we leave Iraq, will the jihad movement just move to afghsnistan/pakistan, or would they begin to speed up their plans for the continental U.S.? There's no question the 21st century jihad will do everything in their power to inflict harm upon the U.S., but where and when? Do most Americans get this? Have we gotten comfortable since 9/11. I have to blow off what a lot of democrats say because they have been saying we should leave Iraq since not even a year after they voted to invade. Either we should fight to win or not fight at all right? Or should we know when to fold our hand? We certainly have screwed up some of the broader strategy over the last few years (not to mention the whole WMD issue), but can we win with our modern day attitude about war. Apparently a lot of people think wars should be like Desert Storm, few casualties (on our side) - quick victory, otherwise it isn't worth it, and we should give up. Should our generals fight like Sherman, Ike, and Patton, is that even a possibility? It seems like we fuck everthing up every time we fight for anything other than unconditional surrender. The public won't support a long war when there is no one surrendering, and seemingly no progress, as far as they can see. We can kill 10, 20 or 100 enemy for every U.S. soldier that is killed, but it doesn't seem to matter. We learned that 35 years ago right? It would be nice to hear from any military officers or history buffs. Don't bother with partisan opinions here, I'm just thinking about strategy and realistic expectations. Oh and I understand how grunts will complain about anything, so don't say your third cousins boyfriends brother (who is a private) said we can't win. Private joe snuffy may join up because he's a noble son of a bitch, but three weeks without a shower and he's writing his congressman. Grunts are courageous, but they complain, I've been there, I was one. When I was in the middle east my commander told us "some rich guy's kid" was declaring war on the U.S. and then we found out about the embassies in Africa. I didn't think it was that big of a deal untill 9/11.

I did it, but I had about a dozen jumps before I switched (I moved). They made me do 3 static lines to see that I could pull a ripcord, then they let me jump from altitude. If your just thinking about money, it may not be a terrible idea. Your a student and probably want to keep some continuity to your jumping instead of saving a couple hundred bucks between jumps. That's assuming your young and poor of course.

Thought they were funny in the desert. Not so funny when your under canopy. Canopy ride was at least twice as long. Once we landed I didn't want to say anything for fear of sounding like a pussy untill one of the tandem masters said he thought he was gonna die. That helped put it in perspective.