Bush/neocons still don't get it!! His speeches always begin by demonizing

[keithyboy]

the very people we are bombing and abusing. Until we can realize that people just don't commit suicide for NO reason. Bush labels everyone fighting us in Iraq as 'terrorists' 'evildoers' 'thugs' and 'haters of freedom'. It's as though these people have no reason to feel and behave the way they do. WE INVADED THEIR COUNTRY, OPENED IT FOR ISLAMIC MILITANTS TO COME IN (something Saddam would never have allowed), we bomb, kill, rape, abuse their men and women and children and then demonize them for having the guts and the courage to fight back!

The US will never be able to find solutions to the problems of the ME and terrorism until this one fact works its way into their brains:
Theses are people too! Sadly, a lot of Americans believe as many Israelis that all life is worthless except their own peoples'. It is the very reason that there is no peace in the ME and never will be. There will only be lulls between wars that the west initiates and supports.

[Fear]

1. Did the people clap to early btw? on the end? -> and yup you're right

[lil-petunia]

3. nope

They hav crowd clap-prompters, ordering the good soldiers when and for how long to applaud.

[Cocoa]

2. and that leads directly to the torture scandal

the reason it was possible to get the MPs to torture the Iraqis is that all Arabs had been demonized since Sept. 11. Just listen to the words of the MPs themselves.

[nodictators]

10. They even named Camp Bucca after a NYC firefighter who died...

...a hero in the WTC on 9/11. Camp Bucca reportedly also had torture used against the detainees there.

That dirty trick helped convince the troops that Saddam was responsible for 9/11.

[Jacobin]

12. Good grief

My head is spinning.

[jmowreader]

20. Ron Bucca was an Army veteran

There's an even dirtier trick...Camp New York, Camp Pennsylvania and Camp DC.

They named the camps they launched the war against Saddam from after the three states (okay, two states and one district) where the 9/11 deaths occurred.

[leeroysphitz]

4. Why do you hate america?

[hexola]

5. Welcome to DU leeroysphits...

[hexola]

9. Have a good day leeroysphits...

That was fast...

[rocktivity]

6. The answer to "Why do you hate America?"

is "Why do you like hiding behind that ridiculous copout instead of facing reality?"


rocknation

[hexola]

8. Why do you hate america?

[Unperson 309]

16. Do I Hate America?

My family came to this country along several lineages. One branch arrived in 1632. One branch arrived on the second boatload to Jamestown. My direct maternal line had two members killed in the salem witch trials and my direct paternal line arrived in California in 1843, before the Gold Rush.

In my paternal line, I had one ancestor who was interned at Andersonville Prison during the Civil War. My lineage runs through this country since before America was a nation. Our family's very BLOOD stains the soil of Tennessee, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Ohiuo, through the Revolutionary war, the Indiuan wars, the Civil War and every war this nation has fought, INCLUDING Vietnam and Korea and *both* Gulf wars!

I love this country more than a mother loves her child, I am prouder of it than any father of his son...

And THIS is why I criticize her!

If I, as a parent, see my child stealthily take a candy bar from a store rack, I do NOT simply beam on in blind parental adoration. No! I confront my offspring and I CORRECT the action! Why? Out of love!

If you saw your spouse do something illegal, would you not, out of love, try to determine WHY s/he had done it? Would you not question the act and try to make it right?

When I think of the United States of America's past, I REMEMBER my OWN family lineage. My Cherokee ancestors, my German ancestors, my Irish, French, Scottish, Dutch, English and Scandinavian ancestors and I know them for what they were: AMERICANS! ALL of them! Their blood, their sweat, their vision, dreams, hopes, trials and deaths are soaked into the very fibers of our flag, into the rocks and the prairie grasses, into the lakes and the rivers! They ARE America and SO AM I! We are the flesh, the blood, the bones and the heart of this country.

When I think of America's future, I weep. Hate America? I could no more tear my own arm off than hate this land. My outcry is not the roar of hatred, it is the angushed cry of someone who sees the very fabric of my OWN family torn like cheap rags! I see the bones of my ancestors, which should undergird the strength of tomorrow, broken and charred for temporary gain.

I stand in front of a careening country, KNOWING that my opposition will be misread, knowing that I shall be accused of the diametric opposite of what I do. Do I hate America? No. If I hated this land, I would remain silent. I would step back, mute and unopposing while she plunged over the guardrails of common sense. I would support every cheap, jingoistic yahoo who tore their hair in feigned patriotism and I would applaud each wrong turn this country took!

For those who state that the critics' words stem from hatred, know this: your accusations are as cheap and tawdry, as temporary and baseless as that torn, ragged and faded scrap of flag fluttering from your car antenna. I fly no flag on my car, to fade and fray in the slipstream of my headlong rush... MY flag remains unstained and bright, strong and clean IN MY HEART!

NO, I do NOT hate America, and I never could!

309

[opihimoimoi]

25. OUTSTANDING, 309, Beautiful, you speak what most of us think and feel

Sending lifetime beer, wine, soda, caviar, lauaus, smoked ribs, steaks, fish, chicken, veggies domestic and foreign, pork chops, and roasts too.

[KoKo]

29. You Said it 309! Thank you!

You speak for so many of us who are raging against what this group of idealogues has done to our country. We have reason for rage.

[Jacobin]

11. Did Hannity suggest that line for you?

Please come back when you have an independent thought to share.

[ibegurpard]

14. You forgot the sarcasm tag

It's always a good idea to put some indicator of sarcasm down when you say something ludicrous like that otherwise people might think you're being serious.

[hexola]

18. I think he WAS serious...

leeroysphits is no longer with us...

[leeroysphitz]

22. Whoops...

My bad. I should have indicated sarcasm. I thought everyone here would get the reference to Al's book. So, my apologies to everyone who somehow took that seriously. IT WAS SARCASM. :0)

[Jacobin]

26. Man you sure set off a shitstorm!!

Welcome to DU.

[leeroysphitz]

27. I would have spoken up

earlier but I was at work and got called away from my desk...

[leftchick]

7. Did you see the soldier interviewed on MSRNC?

It was aired this morning during Nora O'Donnell's segment about reaction to chimpy*s speech. They cut to a soldier in Iraq and he refered to the Iraqi Resistance as terrorists. I have also seen where a lot of the soldiers STILL believe they are getting revenge for Sept. 11 by fighting in Iraq. It is pitiful that they fall for this meme from aWol* because it is the ultimate scam on them.

[ibegurpard]

13. Did you ever consider that maybe they don't care?

Perpetual war is good for some companies' bottom line.

[outinforce]

15. A Lot of Americans and Israelis Believe......

"Sadly, a lot of Americans believe as many Israelis that all life is worthless except their own peoples'"

Are you suggesting that suicide bombers are driven by a deep and profound repect for the lives of the people they choose to kill?

Am I to understand that the "reason" that people choose to blow themselves up on airplanes or in crowded marketplaces or in theaters or on trains is somehow "nobel", but efforts to stop it are not?

Are you suggesting that someone who has "the guts" to fight back against bombing, killing, raping, and abuse is better than someone who has the guts to fight back against people who recruit, nurture, support, supply, and dispatch suicide bombers against "other people"?

[CJCRANE]

17. It's chicken and egg..

how many "terrorists" were there in Iraq before the pre-emptive invasion? And how many are there now?

If there are now more "terrorists" in Iraq then it is likely that the invasion caused this to happen and the invasion is potentially morally worse.

If I broke into someone's house and beat them up to stop them robbing me (with no evidence), and they subsequently hit me back, who would be morally worse. You decide.

[outinforce]

21. How Many Iraqis Have Been Killed

by suicide bombers?

I'm not sure how many suicide bombers there were in Iraq before the US took action to depose Saddam Hussein.

How many Iraqis are now dead because of suicide bombers?

My earlier post in this thread was directed more at a comment in the original post to this thread: "Until we can realize that people just don't commit suicide for NO reason."

It would appear that the person who posted that comment thinks that suicide bombing -- the intentional taking of one's own life and the lives of others -- is ever justified.

I would observe that there have been, I think, some suicide bombing in Iraq in which Iraqis have blown themselves up -- along with other Iraqis.

Even if I were to agree that suicide bombing was "reasonable", I think I would have a very difficult time understanding how Iraqis killing other Iraqis makes any sense at all.

I'll leave the whole question of the morality of Iraqis bombing other Iraqis to someone else.

[Name removed]

19. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[keithyboy]

23. Just as nobel as dropping a 2,000 lb bomb on the heads of thousands.

And the answer to your last question is "yes" If you don't like suicide bombers, give these people weapons and money equal to those of their enemies.

[Violet_Crumble]

24. Are you suggesting?

That anyone who believes that a lot of Americans and Israelis do believe that all life is worthless except for their own peoples are justifying suicide bombings?

Are you suggesting that because there are suicide bombings that 'efforts to stop it' involving the killing of innocent civilians is somehow justified?

Not quite sure how the Iraqi children who were killed and wounded in that wedding that we're all supposed to believe didn't exist were people who were recruiting, nuturing, supporting, supplying and dispatching suicide bombers, nor can I see anything justifiable in the deaths of tens of Palestinians recently for the net result of supposedly finding two or so tunnels...

Violet...

[outinforce]

28. Here's My Point

Any side in a conflict can attempt to "justify" its own use of the power it has.

The United States attempts to justify its killing of people in Iraq as being necessary to defend itself against terrorist attacks.

But the bottom line is that the US ends up killing innocent people.

The suicide bombers in Iraq attempt to justify their use of power (for certainly no one will argue that the use of bombs attached to people is a instrument of power) as being necessary to drive the US from Iraq.

But the bottom line is that the suicide bombers end up killing innocent people.

The initial post in this thread stated that the violence in the Middle East would end when the people of Israel and the people of the United States -- many of whom, according to the person who wrote the initial post in this thread, have a low regard for life -- view their enemies as being people, too.

My only point is that viewing one's enemies as people is really a two-way street. Bombing and killing innocenet people is not something the USA or Israel have a monopoly on.