[Slade]

As for the haliburton thing i can't really argue with illogical claims, next time if you say to make the US richer than atleast it'll make sense. Otherwise you sound like Michael Moore.

I don't see how it's illogical. The equation goes like this:

Iraq has oil.
George Bush is in the oil buisness.
Dick Cheney, Vice President of the United States, is former CEO of large corrupt oil company Haliburton.
Haliburton got all of the contracts to rebuild Iraq's oil supply without any bidding on them.

It's not rocket science. I don't see how you get "We went to Iraq because Saddam had WMDs and was going to use them to attack everybody! I mean, er... we went to Iraq to bring Freedom and Democracy to an oppressed people! Yeah, that's it!" out of it.

Edit: Ren/Civ - You're kinda both just saying "I'm right!" "No, I'm right!" over and over. Renegade, you seem to be ignoring what he's saying, but I'm not sure... *shrug*

Carry on, gentlemen...

This post has been edited by Slade: 04 October 2005 - 01:16 AM

[Jordan]

Did we gain any thing out of the war, like oil or something? I'd like to think the West got something out of it. Even if it was on false pretenses. Gas is a 1.17 a litre. I dont' see jobs rolling in or vast amounts of wealth and I don't see Iraq recovering all that much.

I don't believe that a government could be so stupid as to launch a war with no benefits. Ya whatever, bush is satan blah blah blah, but there must have been a reason we went in. Why would the Americans comprimise their image, army, and friendships for the sake of going in and kiling Saddam.

What was the benefit? Are they all long term?

This post has been edited by Jordan: 04 October 2005 - 01:17 AM

[Renegade]

I don't see how it's illogical. The equation goes like this:

Iraq has oil.
George Bush is in the oil buisness.
Dick Cheney, Vice President of the United States, is former CEO of large corrupt oil company Haliburton.
Haliburton got all of the contracts to rebuild Iraq's oil supply without any bidding on them.

It's not rocket science. I don't see how you get "We went to Iraq because Saddam had WMDs and was going to use them to attack everybody! I mean, er... we went to Iraq to bring Freedom and Democracy to an oppressed people! Yeah, that's it!" out of it.

Edit: Ren/Civ - You're kinda both just saying "I'm right!" "No, I'm right!" over and over. Renegade, you seem to be ignoring what he's saying, but I'm not sure... *shrug*

Carry on, gentlemen...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's illogical because its plain retarded to think the president will go to war to increase the wealth of a couple of his frens and himself and a company... the whole "no bid contract" is true but its decieving. The govt gives out no bid contracts MANY atimes especially in reference to things like this or emergencies. For example with Katrina, we gave a 200+ million dollar contract to some random cruise agency to help shelter people and it was guess what, NO BID. Does that mean Bush had some stock in it?

See i'm fine with someone saying, we went to war with Iraq to stabilize our oil needs but to say we went to ENRICH a oil company is just out of the way retarded and not even worthy of me arguing despite me doin it neway out of boredom

[Renegade]

And I dunno whats up with you and saying the argument is always, IM RIGHT, NO IM RIGHT kinda thing. Neither of us has ever said that and each post is basically a counter to what the other person said but never like, "oh im right just fu". In fact the only time i used any phrase about someone being right is agreeing with one part of HIS argument. Although its pretty rare any of them agree with anything I say -__-

This post has been edited by Renegade: 04 October 2005 - 03:35 AM

[J m HofMarN]

Did we gain any thing out of the war, like oil or something? I'd like to think the West got something out of it. Even if it was on false pretenses. Gas is a 1.17 a litre. I dont' see jobs rolling in or vast amounts of wealth and I don't see Iraq recovering all that much.

The American PEOPLE only suffered. 2000 of us are dead, gas prices are ever higher, world opinion is against us, and terrorism is increasing, and our country is sliding into the worst debt since Reagonomics.

However, as is logical, as the poor get poorer the rich must get richer. The money being stolen from gas buyers pockets, the money being taken from tax payers and given to "rebuild" a country that, after three years of "rebuilding" still lacks electricity and water, all that money has to go somewhere.

Go right now and look up the stock for capitalist pig war profiteers like Mcdonnel Douglas or Northrop Grumman or Boeing, see how high their stock is. Then look up Exxon's and other oil stock. You'll see that stock is going up as a direct result of this aggression. The poor in Iraq and the US are the ones this war is being fought against, and the rich war profiteers are the only enemy worth fighting.

[Renegade]

the money being taken from tax payers

For someone who is a communist you sound awfully anti taxes. I guess you must of also supported Bush's across the board tax decreases too didn't you? Btw i say this because of your reference to linking Lincoln with evilness for also instituting the first income tax..

[Renegade]

and our country is sliding into the worst debt since Reagonomics.

As much as people like to say Reaganomics were crap, there was some big accomplishments that resulted during his administration:

Most of the effects of these policies were favorable, even if somewhat disappointing compared to what the administration predicted. Economic growth increased from a 2.8 percent annual rate in the Carter administration, but this is misleading because the growth of the working-age population was much slower in the Reagan years. Real GDP per working-age adult, which had increased at only a 0.8 annual rate during the Carter administration, increased at a 1.8 percent rate during the Reagan administration. The increase in productivity growth was even higher: output per hour in the business sector, which had been roughly constant in the Carter years, increased at a 1.4 percent rate in the Reagan years. Productivity in the manufacturing sector increased at a 3.8 percent annual rate, a record for peacetime.

Most other economic conditions also improved. The unemployment rate declined from 7.0 percent in 1980 to 5.4 percent in 1988. The inflation rate declined from 10.4 percent in 1980 to 4.2 percent in 1988. The combination of conditions proved that there is no long-run trade-off between the unemployment rate and the inflation rate (see Phillips Curve). Other conditions were more mixed. The rate of new business formation increased sharply, but the rate of bank failures was the highest since the thirties. Real interest rates increased sharply, but inflation-adjusted prices of common stocks more than doubled.

The U.S. economy experienced substantial turbulence during the Reagan years despite favorable general economic conditions. This was the "creative destruction" that is characteristic of a healthy economy. At the end of the Reagan administration, the U.S. economy had experienced the longest peacetime expansion ever. The "stagflation" and "malaise" that plagued the U.S. economy from 1973 through 1980 were transformed by the Reagan economic program into a sustained period of higher growth and lower inflation.

[Slade]

What are your sources? And how many jobs were lost in those years when more were created?

And how were any of his voodoo economics related to what occured? You can say "Look! The economy went up in some places! It was because of the president's economic policies!" but unless there's a correlation between what he did and what went up/down, it could be one of billions of other variables.

"well, well, w-w-w-w-w-well well, w-w-well well, w-w-w-well well..." - Rappin' Ronnie Reagan

[civilian_number_two]

Without any evidence? Osama came out with a video a lil while after taking credit for it... dunno what your talking about.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The video wherein Osama first claimed responisibility for the 9/11 attacks was released during the Iraqi war. Bush claimed Osama was responsible within a day or two of the twin tower attacks. I remember because at the time I joked that he'd jumped the gun and placed blame as quickly as Clinton had blamed Osama for the Oklahoma bombing. I guarantee if they hadn't found McVey, we'd all be saying Osama had been behind Oklahoma, even to this day.

By the way, I think all these tapes are bullshit, about as genuine as the evidence of WMDs and the Jessica Lynch rescue. Osama has been dead for years, and is a convenient demon to pull out and scare the kids into going to war. I still hear yokels saying that if the US hadn't invaded Afghanistan we'd be speaking Iraqi right now. This odd mix of Patriotism, Geographic Ignorance and Political Apathy is making a small set of guys pretty rich. Maybe public school really IS bad.

A no bid contract for a bridge that we gotta build, a levvy we gotta fix, some people we need to shelter; maybe these are justified given the circumstances. A no bid contract to clean up the damage done by an illegal invasion, justified on lies? That's war profiteering. That you can connect the dots to the Oval Office in only three steps is sickening. It's not even a conspiracy; it's open theft.

If the Afghanistan war wasn't bogus, then how come we didn't find any evidence of any international terrorist conspiracy, Al Qaeda or otherwise? How come the only guys we found there were the existing government? Did they resist to protect Al Qaeda? No; they resisted because they knew the US intended to support another government in their place, just like she did the last time, when she put them in power.

I'm glad the two minute hate isn't lost on you, Renegade, but I have to tell you: there is no Goldstein. We have not always been at war with Eurasia.

Slade: we are not!

[Jordan]

So are you saying we went to war to bolster the pockets of a few companies? There are easier and smarter ways to make money. Why don't they just use Navy Seals to go rob wealthy people in Iraq? Fuck sake.

Is this what you're telling me? War was waged for the pockets of a few people? What year is this? 900 BC?

This post has been edited by Jordan: 04 October 2005 - 08:44 PM

[Supes]

From Wikipedia:

The militant Islamist group al-Qaeda, which had been accused of several previous attacks on American targets, was blamed for the attacks although its leader Osama bin Laden denied involvement and knowledge of the incidents. Osama bin Laden had earlier declared a holy war against the United States. Shortly after the attacks, the United States government declared al-Qaeda and bin Laden the prime suspects.

The first public response from Osama bin Laden was read on September 16, 2001. He stated, "I stress that I have not carried out this act, which appears to have been carried out by individuals with their own motivation," which was broadcast by Qatar's Al-Jazeera satellite channel. ([3], [4], [5]). This denial was broadcast on U.S. news networks and worldwide. The second public response was read on September 28 by Daily Ummat a Pakistani newspaper. He stated "I have already said that I am not involved in the 11 September attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid telling a lie. I had no knowledge of these attacks, nor do I consider the killing of innocent women, children and other humans as an appreciable act. Islam strictly forbids causing harm to innocent women, children and other people. Such a practice is forbidden even in the course of a battle. " [6].

According to U.S. military sources, in November 2001 U.S. forces recovered a videotape from a destroyed house in Jalalabad, Afghanistan which showed Osama bin Laden talking to Khaled al-Harbi. In the tape, Osama seems to admit planning the attacks, though the translation provided some dispute [7]. The tape was broadcast on various news networks in December 2001.

The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, known as the 9-11 Commission, released its report on July 22, 2004, concluding that the attacks were conceived and implemented by al-Qaeda operatives. The Commission stated that "9/11 plotters eventually spent somewhere between $400,000 and $500,000 to plan and conduct their attack", but that the specific origin of the funds used to execute the attacks remained unknown. To date, only peripheral figures have been tried or convicted in connection with the attacks.

There is a great deal of information housed on Wikipedia that outlines the various points of view and helps seperate fact from fiction (as much as they possibly could). Some things appear to remain behind closed doors. Such as:

In a closed door session in October 2001, the U.S. presented evidence to NATO of bin Laden's involvement in the September 11 attacks. NATO's general secretary George Robertson described the evidence as clear and decisive and led the organization to invoke, for the first time in its history, article 5 in the NATO pact. Article 5 states that any attack on a member state is considered an attack against the entire alliance. [10] The evidence presented to NATO was never presented to the public for security reasons.

[Supes]

Here also is some food for thought on the Osama Tapes:

Osama Tapes

[Patrick Bateman]

At the end of the day the war will continue until the US get's it's oil and enough international 'don't fuck with us' points.
The war on Terroisism is nothing more than an excuse to fight fight fight, restrict freedom of rights, raise oil prices, chuck a shit load of cash into the Military Industrial Complex and keep us all so shit scared that we don't give a fuck that one percent of the US Military budget would feed a million kids for a year.

[Slade]

Jordan: Humanity hasn't changed all that much since 900BC, or the Middle Ages, or the Rennaisance, or Colonial times... Greed and power always drive the large-scale actions of this species.

Mr. Bateman: Indeed.

Supes: I'd love to see the talk page for that article. :-P

[Spoon Poetic]

Humans suck.

That's why I've denounced my species and converted.

That's right, I converted. I'm a Wookie, now.