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THINK

To the "peace" activists and anti-war protesters:

You claim not to be anti-American, yet these pictures were taken from the NYC protest yesterday. Photos and moments just like this were repeated throughout the world yesterday and for many days and months before.


The regime you did not want us to take out has now violated the Geneva convention. They have taken troops hostage and killed them.

Those soldiers were out there fighting for a free world. They were fighting so people everywhere can have a right like you do to burn flags and speak out without fear of retribution.

They have been killed by the enemy. The enemy that the human shields wanted to protect. The enemy that Sean Penn visited, the enemy that - by marching against this war - you march for.

Most of you - not all of you by any stretch - should hang your heads in shame right now. While you are out smashing mailboxes and crying about your peanut butter sandwiches in jail, while you are pissed off because your television show was pre-empted by war coverage and while you bitch and moan about tightened security, while you burn flags and tell the children of soldiers that their parents are murderers, some of those very soldiers were being murdered by the people you wish to leave in charge in Iraq.

Do you see what kind of people we are dealing with now? Do you honestly think that the people of Iraq want to be lead by such inhumane, vile people?

Think about this next time you burn a flag. Think about this next time you smash a window for your cause.

Think.

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Comments

Can I just give a big shout-out to Al-Jazeera, the death porn channel for Muslims the world over? Keep stoking that perversion, Al-J!

The kindest military troops in the world are US military. The most barbaric troops in the world are pissed-off US military.

Once our troops hear about the atrocities being carried out against captured US military they will become really pissed. Bad news for the Iraqis who cross our GIs.

Well you know I wanted peace before this all started (even if I knew deep down it would be impossible forever), but after all I've seen and read of the enemy today -- I'm ready to commence Operation Parking Lot.

Think indeed.

But the left sees themselves as "the enlightened few" and the right as the mindless followers.

The problem with telling them to "think" is that is exactly what they think they do. But they have little or no soul -- feel, live, respect, but especially HONOR, DUTY, COUNTRY are words foreign to these "enlightened" ones whom proclaim to operate on a social/conscious plane far above that of G.W. Bush or anyone else that supports the actions taken to ensure the murderous machine of Saddam Hussein stops dead in its tracks.

The "peace" protestors armed with Molotov cocktails are a perfect reflection of the soul of these "elightened" liberals. There are other countries on this planet that are much better suited to your ilk. Freedom of speech is what our troops are fighting for -- fighting for the right for this gaggle of morons (the axis of ignorance) to not only speak their peace, but burn our flag. Flag burning scum... dirt... you do not deserve the right to speak your mind, but yet you're protected to do it. On the contrary, I feel that my life is at risk if I verbally or otherwise speak my support for the USA... there's a great contradiction for you "enlightened" ones... are you proud of that?

I support our Marines, Army, Air Force, Navy, Coast Guard -- and the rest of the "coalition of the willing!" I support the single best collection of leaders the USA has ever seen... we're fortunate to have the leaders we do.

Over and out.

I would be in favor of Operation Glass Plains.

Greetings
please excuse me for posting here, i didn´t know how to post to u at central command.

i saw the al jazeera "report" live where they "interviewed" americans captured and showed dead americans thrown on the floor with shots in the head! It´s disgusting. I posted what I can remember from the "show." please forgive me again for posting here, but I do only so the news can get out.

Rense, Rivero, Yellowtimes, Indymedia.

All are gloating over recent American casualties.

"Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin"

“It has been counted and counted, weighed and divided.” We will remember our enemies.

I haven't been keeping up with my Al Jazeera viewing, but I'm sure they haven't presented any footage of U.S. troops sheltering and feeding the thousands of Iraqi troops who have thus far surrendered. Al Jazeera needs a swift kick in its biased as, or, lacking a swift kick, perhaps a well-placed MOAB.

Time to bust out the american flags like after September 11th. Let's show our support again. I fear no mindless protestors.

To Iraq: You've crossed too many lines, please give us an excuse, it's all we need. If you think you've seen shock and awe, you've seen nothing yet.

I'll second that motion for Operation "Glass Plains"!

I'd just like to see the US extending the same desire to give freedom to oppressed people by changing the regimes in Saudi Arabia and China or at least enforcing democracy

I don't know if you've read this poem before, but it seems appropriate for this post:

"It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us the freedom of the press.

It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us the freedom of speech.

It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who gives us the freedom to demonstrate.

It is the soldier who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag."

Father Dennis Edward O'Brien, Sergeant, USMarineCorps

Somebody needs to organize some counter protests to these idiots.

When it happens, Pawan, I expect that you'll scream even louder than you do over the liberation of Iraq.

But it will happen, despite that.

It is very unfortunate that those protesters decided to take a hateful approach. Let me say however, that there were thousands and thousands of peaceful protesters out there who were completely disgusted with the actions of these people. They in no way represent us. We are for peace. Why do you find it so hard to believe?

Think. Sometimes, when our government moves like a runaway tomahawk missile in the wrong direction, those who haven't words for the protest it their hearts speak the language that will be heard by those who refuse rational discussion: they burn flags. Some burn a flag not as an act of hatred against America, but as a symbolic statement against her actions. Some burn flags to "shock and awe" the narrow-minded, to slaughter sacred cows that have gotten too fat and arrogant. When the actions of America are so thoroughly disgusting, the anger ignites a flag. The pictures you've shown above are pictures of desperate patriots who are defacing and desecrating a symbol of their government (a government that has been hijacked by lunatics). I'm sure some have pure anti-American hatred, but, essentially it is a symbolic act, Perhaps there are better or more eloquent ways to speak, but we are dealing with a regime (in America) that has no respect for nuanced logic.

Think.

200,000 people congregating to voice their dissent are NOT un-American. If they are un-American, they're as un-American as anyone who would criticize them for speaking out against the gov't.

Think. Killing is wrong. If you depose Hussein by killing more people you have failed. As mom always said, "two wrongs, don't make a right."

In my humble opinion, it is far more anti-American to allow your rights to slip away, to condone the killing of innocent people, to wait for another Highway of Death to occur. That's just me though.

Tom, you're forgetting that leaving Hussein in power also has a direct cost in lives. In the lives of the people he feeds into shredders. In the lives of the people who starve because he restricts humanitarian food aid so that he can use it to control an unhappy populace. In the lives of those raped and murdered by his government.

One of the sloppiest antiwar arguments is those like yours, which assumes that the status quo has no prce. It does have a price, a very heavy one, as things were before this war. If things were to slip further, and Saddam to remain in power and get his hands on nuclear weapons, the price would be much, much worse.

Despite what you state you believe, there are times when not killing is indeed a morally worse act than killing. This should be obvious. You might disagree if that applies here, but simplistic nonsense like "killing is always wrong" isn't a moral argument, its an excuse for ignoring difficult problems.

I grieve for the casualties of the coalition and amongst Iraqi civilians. I loathe their necessity, and hope that every action continues to be taken to minimize them. But I refuse to pretend that things would have been better had we simply ignored the situation there and allowed it to fester.

I, too, have to say that pro-peace protestors who burn flags, get violent, and in general make asses of themselves are in the minority of those who wish for peace. I am anti-war but I have always been for taking Saddam out [I just oppose laying waste to an entire country to get there]. I support our troops. The only reason you see footage of protestors getting stupid is because it makes better news then a bunch of protestors behaving like normal people. I'm sure you're as amazed as I am that the media would blow anything out of proportion, right?

Mork..you say you are for peace. Does that include a peace that leaves Saddam in power? Is your conscience able to bear the terrible retributions that would occur against Iraqis who have "wavered" (on top on the normal, ordinary rapes and tortures, the living humans fed into shredding machines? Are you willing to take responsibility before history for the hundreds of thousands who could die when Saddam completes his WDM development? (and surely you don't believe that inspections would continue for a single day were there not large numbers of American troops on hand).

There are moral consequences to the failure to act, as well as to action.

Craig,

I stumble across your type of arguement often. The one that says "there are only two options. Do nothing, or go to war". I am constantly bombarded with the accusation of wanting to ignore the whole situation. Nothing could be further from the truth. What I'd like to see-yes, here comes the idealism-is a peaceful SOLUTION. Not a turning cheek, a solution. I do not believe that the only solution is war. Do I have this master plan? No, but I have a few suggestions. The way I see it, we have advanced so drastically over the last 100 years that we should be capable of forming a solution to problems that does not result in death.

Mork...you say you would like a peaceful solution, but don't have a master plan..though you do have a few suggestions.

This option isn't open to the President and other government officials. Things can remain in gray areas as long as they are in the realm of pure thought; once action must be taken, they enter a realm which is very much black and white.

Suppose you were the President--right now, not retroactively. What specific orders would you give?

OK, Mork. What is it?

Killing is wrong. That is, essentially, the heart of all arguments against war. All the other reasons are secondary.

Craig, I knew someone would say that. That is also a sloppy pro-war argument.

there are times when not killing is indeed a morally worse act than killing

That is a frightening statement along the lines of Kissinger's realpolitik philosophies. The only time I could find that statement anywhere near valid is in extreme cases of immediate defense.

So we are playing God and deciding that more people must die as a result of Hussein's murderous regime. We're no better than animals. What's a few more dead innocents? -- Hussein killed enough of them... tell that to the children with permanent paralysis from shrapnel wounds. Tell that to the families of the dead American soldiers. The United States should be better than this. (And you wonder why people burn flags...)
The United States should lead the world in solving problems without violence. We certainly have the intelligence and the technology and the heart. But such ideas are too utopian for an archaic hegemony that glorifies its violent past where war was always a solution, not a vile failure of humanity.

Killing is always wrong. No matter who does it. It's wrong in the case of Hussein's regime, it's wrong in every repressive regime.

The status quo DOES have a price (if you need proof, just look at the current American status quo), and the United States has a long history of supporting murderous status quos (including Iraq in the 1980s). It's a convenient reason for the U.S.'s war but it doesn't hold up to scrutiny. If the U.S. government was worth anything they would have found another way. Or they would at least be more consistant in comdemning all murderous, anti-human rights regimes.

War results from those who haven't the heart, the will or the intelligence to find another way to deal with the problem. Such is the case with all violence.

(Besides, there was more to my original post than "killing is bad").

Once you've boiled down your thinking to "black vs. white" you've become the embodiment of propaganda. Black/white, right/wrong, us/them, with us/against us are very convenient ways of looking at the world and justifying terrible actions.

The world of Osama bin Laden in in black/white terms. Look at what that causes.

David, it is not fair to say "right now", because for years the option of finding a peaceful solution has been there. Sanctions were not a solution of any kind. Basically, the government has been putting its head in the sand for years. I wouldnt have. However, at this point, I would have allowed weapons inspections to continue for a bit longer. If nothing had been found by say, the end of March, I would've left it up to the Iraqi people. Not as easy as it sounds, I know. Hussein is a dictator, and getting the truth out of them would have been difficult, but possible nonetheless. If the Iraqis had approved an invasion to take down Hussein, then I would go forth, with a solid plan that would eliminate even one civilian casuality. Remove Hussein and his underlings, allow the Iraqis a democratic election, and move along. Had they voted against an invasion, it would then be solely the UN's problem from then on.

Tom, what you fail to understand is that to people like me, burning the flag makes the statement that you are against everything that flag stands for. That includes all the very freedoms you enjoy.

To me it says you hate having the right to vote. You hate having a voice. You hate having a choice. You hate that men and women of all color are presumed equal. You hate that your religeon (or lack thereof) is just as good as the next guys. You hate that you are innocent until proven guilty. You hate that the majority rules while the minority is protected from overrule. You hate apple pie.

That flag is not just the symbol of Operation Iraqi Freedom. To burn it means you are against America and everything it stands for. Personally, I am thankful every day that I live in a country where people like are allowed to exist, instead of in a country where you would already have been shot in public for treason.

Under Article 3 of the Conventions, each warring party “shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.

To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;

Taking of hostages;

Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;

The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

“The United States of course avoids showing prisoners of war,” Rumsfeld said. “We have thousands of Iraqi prisoners that are in POW camps … but we avoid showing photographs of them.”

Hm. While I agree that Iraq should follow the letter and spirit of the Conventions, the U.S. has been less than thorough in keeping true to these protocols itself, weakening its case. The prisoners at Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo Bay have been held in a legal limbo for months now. Some have been shipped to other countries that employ horrific interrogation methods. Human Rights Watch has urged the Bush Administration to determine the detainees’ status and then launch criminal prosecution “where credible evidence exists.” Indefinite detention is not legal under the Conventions, despite President Bush’s claim to be upholding the “principles” of the Third Convention. As the report from HRW said:

WAKE UP!!!!

The problem Bill, is that many of those things the flag stands for are no longer valid. This war on terror has taken many of those things away, and I suspect that may play into why those protesters were burning it.

The right to vote? Sure, though it wont necessarily matter (George W.). The right to have a choice? Depends. 10,000,000 people chose not to support this war, yet here we are. Equality among races? Certainly, unless you are Arab and want to get on an airplane. Religious freedom? Unless it's Muslim. Innocent until proven guilty? That one's been up in the air for a long time....generally connected to race. Majority rules? Unless the vote is fixed. You see, the things that flag stand for are meager at best right now.

Different Bill, everyone is allowed their own interpretation. Perhaps people should instead burn pictures of the "leaders" (but then you run the risk of being carted away as a threat to national security). It is, essentially, an act of dissent. You are making your own assumptions and creating your own inferences from somebody else's symbolic act. You are projecting those assumptions onto those people. That's as off base as me saying "anyone who waves the flag supports bombing and death." It's equally preposterous. Let it also be known that many protesters wave the flag proudly for the very reasons you cite, because they value the freedoms that we have and want to live up to those ideals in a better fashion.

Either way, the ideals of America are more powerful than some flammable piece of felt.

"If the Iraqis had approved an invasion to take down Hussein, then I would go forth, with a solid plan that would eliminate even one civilian casuality."

I don't even know where to start. Let me just say that your plan is unworkable.

"Equality among races? Certainly, unless you are Arab and want to get on an airplane. Religious freedom? Unless it's Muslim. Innocent until proven guilty? That one's been up in the air for a long time....generally connected to race."

Yes, well in the reality I inhabit those freedoms haven't yet been infringed in those ways. Perhaps you are just visiting from the future?

Mork, you claim to think that we've advanced in the last hundred years. We have not, only our tools have advanced.
You claim to hate war, you have no idea what it's all about.
I hate war, you fear war. I gave my youth to a war. I have seen it up close, I have left my own blood on a dirty, nameless battlefield, I have had my friends, closer than brothers, die thying to get me out of the line of fire as I lay, wonded and helpless. I was later wounded trying to recover other of my brothers. You think you know love? Men have taken bullets for me, as I have for them.
There is evil in this world, raw, naked evil in the souls of many men. That evil can only be resisted by force. The men who willingly use rape and torture and murder to control their population are not interested in a better way, they are interested in brute power for their own enjoyment. There was no better way to stop Hitler from his barbaric acts, ONE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE DIED IN THAT WAR.
One and a half MILLION human beings died in wars that Hussein has started. Should we have waited until it was five million? Ten?
The difference between you and people like me is that I did not hold my precious life as more valuable than the lives of those helpless victims of the evil men who started the war I fought.
My country called, I went. I saw the mass graves of the victims of those who, some say, we should not have fought.
I hate war. My dead brothers haunt me decades later, as does the pain of those wounds. It was worth it.
When I go to greet my Maker, and account for all the areas of my life in which I have fallen so short I will have one thing in my life I can be sure I'm proud of...I resisted Evil with all the love and courage I had.
You cry Peace! There is no peace, nor will there be until brave young men and women resist Evil.
There are far worse things in this world than war.

Owen, have you seen what Arabs go through these days at an airport? Obviously not, as you dont seem to comprehend my statement. Have you spoken to any Arab students to see what they are going through at school right now? Your reality obviously only includes things you'd like to see. I see all kinds of anti-Arab sentiment around here. And as for my plan being unworkable, you notice that I called them suggestions, stating that I did not have a master plan. I just think that it is possible to resolve things without death.

Peter, that was a valiant attempt at being moving, however, its the same thing I hear from many others. You want me to say that I have no idea what I'm talking about, that war is the only way....yadda, yadda. However, in my opinion, it is foolish to repeat history over and over and over. To keep going to war when it has yet to stop horrible things from happening. It has taught no real lessons.

Mork, if you don't have an actual alternative, with any evidence to expect it will create a better solution, then how are you justified complaining about a morally expensive solution that will work?

Tom, its nice that you can live in a fantasy where being nice is an option; I've studied enough history to know that it usually isn't, and also to know how singularly unique the US is in how it wages war.

Should the US be more aggressive in targeting the Saudis, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Cuba, and other civil rights disaster areas? Definitely. But I think you'd still be demonstrating as each one was crossed off the list.

Iraq is the 'perfect storm' in terms of justification for invasion, much more so than Kosovo. Did you demonstrate against Kosovo too?

"The only time I could find that statement anywhere near valid is in extreme cases of immediate defense."

That's because you're more concerned with protecting your right to feel moral than you are with actually making the moral choice. It's a shadow morality that ignores the real questions here.

You refuse to openly admit the morality of killing even in "extreme cases of immediate defence", saying that in those cases it is 'near valid'.

Are you saying that if someone who has killed many times before says "Just wait here while I go buy a gun to kill you", that it wouldn't be valid to kill them then, knowing that if you wait the only difference is that victory will be less certain?

Peaceful solutions were tried for over a decade. They failed. Sometimes you need to use violence to accomplish moral aims.

I would hope that those who have seen the horrors of war up close would only long to see America do everything possible to keep others from the same evil rather than scorn them for wanting peace.

so after we clean up iraq, where do we go next?

Tom: I'm the guy who's seen it. Up close. Keeping others from the same evil is what we're doing.

Mork: You last post is its own rejoinder.

Tom: I'm the guy who's been there. Keeping that horror from others is what we're doing. Sorry you can't see that.

Mork: You las post is its own rejoinder.

Protecting my right to feel moral?

This conversation has deteriorated to the point where nobody will see eye to eye and will just attack one another's beliefs.

I'd never openly admit any morality in killing. Killing means taking it upon yourself to snuff a God-given life (a life that is attached to many others in one way or another), to end it for eternity (and I'm not even a terribly religious person). You believe that you want. There is no morality in that. There is no morality in a human being deciding which other human beings have a right to live or die.

And as reprehensible as it is to kill someone, it is all the more disgustingly tragic when innocent lives are ended because of somebody else's over-glorified "righteous" cause.

read this: http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=3256
and this:
http://www.nion.us/NION.HTM
and this:
http://crissa.twu.net/mirror/ericblumrich/antiwar2.swf

and now think.

Sophia, I am THINKING.

Oh, looks like propaganda to me!

Fredj,

I don't see that. Because too many people still support the horror despite the knowledge that it is aweful. To many people meet violence with more violence and call it glorious. Our culture is based upon "glory glory hallelujah" and "the rockets' red glare." War is just in its glorious violence. As I've said, it is treated as a solution rather than an ugly failure of humanity.

"He hath loosed the faithful lightening of his terrible swift sword. His truth is marching on..."

I just can't believe that Bush actually expected the Iraquis to treat American POW's humanely. They don't even treat their own citizens humanely. That's all I care to say.

Tom,

Your flippant use of lyrics from patriotic songs shows that you've bought in to being bitter about our country. No combat vet glories in combat; it truly is hell. Many of us understand that it is "sometimes" necessary and is the lesser evil. Yes, violence is sometimes morally the only course. Is it moral to kill the convicted murderer/rapist who is holding a gun to the head of a neighbor's child? Mork says no, but I believe that it is evil not to take action; and I believe that this is exactly the circumstance we are in.

No, we have not always been perfect. Doesn't matter. We can only strive to be the best we can be in this and every future situation. The alternative is to be France (morally bankrupt, with oil concessions and arms and nuclear reactor sales to Iraq, unwilling to clean up their own mess); or Russia (continuing arms sales to Iraq, including smuggling aboard humanitarian food shipments). I will not stand by while innocents are killed. I know that you think you're doing the same, but I think you're like the New Yorkers who listened to Kitty Genovese scream and DID NOTHING.

BTW, I certainly support your right to disagree with me. Peter, my brother in arms, Mork is wrong. I was VERY moved.

Tom said: " 'there are times when not killing is indeed a morally worse act than killing'
That is a frightening statement along the lines of Kissinger's realpolitik philosophies. The only time I could find that statement anywhere near valid is in extreme cases of immediate defense. " and "I'd never openly admit any morality in killing. "

So Tom, if you were in Germany in 1935 and you had the opportunity to kill Hitler you wouldn't do it? It wouldn't be an act of immediate self-defence but it would it still be immoral?

Flippant!? I'm, at this moment, trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored!

I worry about people who aren't a little bitter about America right now...

Ooh, yeah. He pulls out the Hitler card.

I don't know, Joel. Next time I have access to my way-back machine (it's in the shop at the moment) I'll get back to you. My flex-capicitor is on the fritz and I can't seem to get 1.21 Gigawatts.

It just shows the limit of your scope. If I was a time-traveler and close enough to Hitler there are quite a number of things I might have been able to do to stop him. Why do you ask if I would kill him? That's a very telling question...

Regardless, at the moment I'm trying to decide on the relevance of the difference between an apple and an orange.

The rubber of Tom's argument never really seems to hit the road of the real world, does it? He seems determined to keep it airborne, fearing its total deflation should it have to bear the weight of reality.

Meanwhile we lesser being who inhabit the imperfect physical world will have to make do with a more flawed approach. As one elderly parishoner at a Catholic mass quipped, "It’s the Pope’s job to shake his head over the wicked way of the world, and it’s our job to do something about it."

"However, in my opinion, it is foolish to repeat history over and over and over. To keep going to war when it has yet to stop horrible things from happening. It has taught no real lessons."

Um, so I take it you were strenuously opposed to Al-Queda all throughout the 90's, engaging with Muslims who believed in the jihad in online forums and trying to convinve them that blowing up Westerners over and over again was not the answer and taught no real lessons? And are you still in their comment sections, arguing over and over that purposefully blowing up innocent civilians is not the answer? Judging from the totality of your comments, you only think it's bad for westerners to do these things.

And as far as war never having stopped terrible things from happening...for someone who keeps repeating the word "history," you obviously don't know any. Besides, history never repeats itself. It's human folly and behavior remaining constant.

Wars obviously don't make things peaceful once they end, otherwise we wouldn't keep having them.

Also, as far as I'm aware, Iraq has had no-fly zones since the sanctions began, so I wouldn't say it's been all peaceful in that country for over a decade.

No one's answered this from an anonymous commenter: "While I agree that Iraq should follow the letter and spirit of the Conventions, the U.S. has been less than thorough in keeping true to these protocols itself, weakening its case. The prisoners at Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo Bay have been held in a legal limbo for months now."

I find that rather interesting.

Sometimes war is necessary, in this case I believe the action was taken because it has been perceived to be an expeditious (and rather grand) solution to a problem. But pathological anti-American feelings can only be stoked by dropping bombs on entire countries whose dictatorial leaders are morally abhorrent. Thus the problem is not solved, only temporarily delayed from rearing its head once again.

The only way you can go to war to wipe out terrorism and 'why they hate us' is to blow up the entire world.

your highness John "Akatsukami" Bauer..that was not a sarcastic comment...I would genuinely like regime change and introduction of democracy in Saudi Arabia and China..I see a lot of good coming out of the war in Iraq as well..I have yet to meet a single Iraqi who has anything but bile to spill when it comes to Saddam Hussein..as for those who fear American control of Iraqi oil ..would you rather have Saddam control it ?
But Kurds will no longer have to fear being gassed by Saddam, women wont have to fear being raped by his sons and their soccer team wont be tortured everytime they lose a soccer game.

Gee, it looks to me as if war has solved the problems of German and Japanese militarism, and it certainly taught the ORIGINAL Islamic terrorists to play nice with others. It seems that the Ismailis took the lesson the Mongols taught them to heart. No more "assassination" for them.

http://ismaili.net/histoire/history06/history645.html

Go check out the arch-liberal Eschaton blog
(http://atrios.blogspot.com/) under the post "Whores" from today (3-23-03).

The Atrios crowd is in deep, deep, denial over the course of the war.

Americans find an Iraqi chemical plant that little Hans Blix never heard about. American dead & wounded are paraded about on Al Jazeera TV.

This stuff REALLY ticks off the Atrios types. It exposes them for the liberal moral frauds they are.

I'm over there right now, letting them know it. As you might imagine, they're not being very kind to yours truly.

-nikita demosthenes

Where not the Gitmo prisoners uniformed combatants? If they weren't uniformed combatants (and possibly just for belonging to a government that employed same to deliberately target civilians), they have very few rights under Geneva. Geneva has rights you earn, by behaving properly.

As for war stopping terrible things from happening... If history is an indicator, Terrible things are the natural way of the world; order, imposed by force, can forestall them but not altogether end them as long as people have emotions and flaws.

Even if the US used some superweapon that automaticaly killed at the push of a button every torturer, every terrorist, every brutal dictator, and every murderer, trouble would spring up agains, somewhere, some time.

In the meantime, Tom, I stand by my judgement of you. In the real world, people have to make hard choices based on known probabilities; because real people suffer from the results of their choices... and even the choice to do nothing is its own choice.

But you shut out the real world, where wars, however nasty, vicious, and destructive, have indeed stopped evils greater than what the war caused.

War should almost never be your first option; even a war in which you lose few men can still have a heavy price on the minds of those men. But to always leave it to the last, the most dire emergency is to ensure that when it comes, it will be most terrible... better for the surgeon to remove the gangrenous foot, than to vacillate and delay to the point that the entire leg must go, or even so long that the patient is lost.

Don't go crowing over the chemical plant:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,918027,00.html

With all the lies and half-truths the media is spilling these days, it's probably best to stick with speculation and personal rancor. It seems to get michele a lot of hits here. And it's obvious from the comments that the flimsy arguments for war don't hold any water whatsoever.

It's unfortunate that we have to witness the deaths of innocent people (soldiers included) just to find out in the end that the warmongers were wrong. I'm tired of people characterizing those of us who would like to see an end to war as unrealistic fantasy-dwellers. The cost of war is also prohibitively high, so high as to be unaffordable and impossible. However, our leaders find ways to afford it because in the end it lines their pockets with power and money.

I'm sorry for the deaths of soldiers who I feel to be innocent pawns in the chess game of the rich. May their souls rest in peace, and may the people find the means to rise up and put an end to this bullshit once and for all.

THINK: Our troops could be out fighting the people who attacked us on 9.11, or defending the homeland. Instead they're dying to satisfy our president's paternal anxieties. You think.

There are some intelligent and well thought out arguments posted here against the war in Iraq. Having read through them all, I would simply like to say to Tom, YOU HYPOCRITE!

You're moralizing and pontificating that killing is wrong, regardless the circumstance, but there you sit in your warm and cozy home, click-clacking away on your computer about how vile and arrogant the US is to go to war. Well, maybe I'm not the brightest bulb in this chandelier, but it seems to me that our troops are risking their lives, and in some cases, losing their lives so that idealistic loud mouths like you can sit in comfort and talk about how evil our country and it's leaders are.

If you are truly sincere in your vehemence to our government's actions now, (or in the past,) then leave. Go find some neutral country to live in, where you no longer have to be ashamed to call yourself an American.

I'm just glad our forefathers had the fortitude to fight for what is right. Had they not, you and I both Tom, would be singing God Save The Queen instead of The Star Spangled Banner.

Ah yes, Oliver cares about the troops so much that he uses them as a vehicle for attacking Bush.

"You hypocrite!!!...If you are truly sincere in your vehemence to our government's actions now, (or in the past,) then leave.

How adorable!!! I'm cracking up. And it is oh so constructive. Oh Clarisse, you are the first person to ever hit me with that one!!! (I wish). "Shut up you fat american!!! You don't know how good you've got it! Don't speak out about how you think it could be better! Just leave! America, right or wrong."

I give up.
Michael Moore for president! :-)

Tom, haven't heard much from you about "how it could be better"; just a lot about how bitter you are about "how it is".

That's just it Tom; you're not speaking out about how it could be better. You're just speaking out about how bad it is.

Just for the record, I am always open to a person's opposing opinion on any given subject. What I do have difficulty with, is listening to a litany of all the problems, without an offer of any solutions.

As they say, if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. And unfortunately, lip service doesn't solve a thing.

I support the single best collection of leaders the USA has ever seen... we're fortunate to have the leaders we do.

brian, you're kidding, right?

These people have no solutions. They're like the annoying people in your work lunch group, who keep rejecting all your restaurant choices ("Taco Bell gives me the runs," "Jack-in-the-Box is too greasy and I'm afraid of dying from food poisoning," "I don't eat Chinese/Italian/Mexican/Thai food") but when you ask them where they want to eat they say, "Oh, I don't know -- you pick something!" And then the round of rejection starts all over again, until lunch hour is almost over and you only have time to grab a bag of chips from the office vending machine.

Children, you are all making blogs and Americans look badly. People are not idiots just because they disagree with you, and a thug is still a thug, even if they claim to be protesting for peace.

Stop calling each other names and attacking your fellow Americans (or allies). Stop assuming what other people believe, just because they advocate one position. Peace activists are rarely pro-Saddam, and war activists are rarely for killing innocent victims. Just because a relatively small group of vocal people do seem to want these things does not mean the vast majority would agree.

Stop asking people to "THINK", when what you really mean is to agree with you. We are all thinking, and coming to our own conclusions. That is the primary reason for a free society. It works well, if you'll let it.

In the end, none of us has any power over anything we write so passionately about. A small group of people have that power, and while we can argue how they should use it, it is foolish to attack people who cannot control anything.

Pro peace people are not killing American soldiers, and pro war people are not killing innocent civilians. Killers are doing those things, and they deserve your scorn, not people that have a political or social disagreement with you.

Lowering yourself to making comments in favor of mass killing of any group is sick. It may be easy to do while inflamed by anger, but that doesn't make the thought any less sick. So perhaps we should all "THINK" before we talk about nuking someone.

Unless, of course, you have thought it out fully and have come to the conclusion that a large group of people should all be violently killed for the actions of a few over which they had no control. In that case, asking a sick mind to "THINK" would be a waste of time.

Okay, I've said my bit. You can go back to your name-calling again.

hey, i was really interested to hear how Tom or Mork would have talked Hitler out of murdering millions of Jews, homosexuals, Gypsies, etc. that would be one hell of a counseling session.

"now Adolf... i know you're just misunderstood and ill-appreciated. you don't REALLY want to kill all those people. killing is bad."

and huh, didn't Britian and France try that? oh, wait - it was "killing is bad, but we'll stay out of your way if you just don't kill us"

OH shut up. The Iraqi army is doing exactly the same thing the US army is doing--KILLING THE ENEMY. That's the nature of war. That's why the protesters are against it. KILLING is Killing IS KILLING! Be it Iraqis or Americans it is JUST as wrong.

Hear that? Killing is wrong! For any reason! So we should shut up and just bask in the wisdom of Mr... Miss.. Um, whoever this brave person is. Because!

A "solution" to Saddam OTHER than this war? Wake up. 12 years of meaningless UN resolutions (meaningless ONLY because the UN lacked the cajones to pack some no-kidding heat alongside their high-minded diplomacy) have FAILED. Take a number while those of us with commitments DO something.

When Iraq is free -- and her people are finally free, free to really talk, free to really reveal the horrors of that country's past quarter century -- the truth will ring clear. And then the peace-at-all-costs "appeasement street" will have to come up with yet more fast-talking jibe to handle THAT week's round of brand new CYA assignments to explain how a sit-on-our-butts, why-can't-we-all-just-get-along, status-quo approach could possibly end the horrors that one man has visited on an entire country. Study your WWII history and accept the responsibilities that being a moral and incredibly powerful country together entail.

Gut check, you kneejerk peacenik wheel-spinners: http://komo1000news.com/audio/kvi_aircheck_031003.mp3

If peace is ALWAYS the answer, then keep your "life in a vacuum" answers -- reality has a rude habit of intruding. In the meantime, I'm going to rejoice in the "incorrect" security and freedoms my countrymen bought for me in World War II with their lives, and do all in my power to support the defense of those freedoms, now until the day I die.

As a parting consideration (not that I should have to remind any of you, but all the same):
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

When I see people in this country burn the flag I don't think "wow, they've really thought through the issues, researched the tough questions and have decided that they are so upset with the government that they just have to burn the flag to get it out of their system."

No, what I think is "here we go again, a group of morons acting out one of the oldest cliches in the "protest" handbook. This just screams 'please somebody pay attention to me!!'. Can't they think of anything more original than that? Don't they realize how completely stupid they look."