One more thing, no one has been toppled in Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, and many other Muslim countries that are seeing this sh*t either. What's your hypothesis now, Einstein?



You might want to look at that again.

To date, rulers have been forced from power in Tunisia,[1] Egypt,[2] Libya,[3] and Yemen;[4] civil uprisings have erupted in Bahrain[5] and Syria;[6] major protests have broken out in Algeria,[7] Iraq,[8] Jordan,[9] Kuwait,[10] Morocco,[11] and Sudan;[12] and minor protests have occurred in Lebanon,[13] Mauritania,[14] Oman,[15] Saudi Arabia,[16] Djibouti,[17] and Western Sahara.[18] Clashes at the borders of Israel in May 2011,[19] and the protests in by the Arab minority in Iranian Khuzestan erupted in 2011 as well.[20] Weapons and Tuareg fighters returning from the Libyan civil war stoked a simmering rebellion in Mali, and the consequent Malian coup d'état has been described as "fallout" from the Arab Spring in North Africa.[21] The sectarian clashes in Lebanon were described as a spillover violence of the Syrian uprising and hence the regional Arab Spring.[22] Most recently, in September 2012 a wave of social protests swept Palestinian Authority, demanding lower consumer prices and resignation of the Palestinian Prime Minister Fayyad.

(09-14-2012 10:27 AM)Machiavelli Wrote:  One more thing, no one has been toppled in Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, and many other Muslim countries that are seeing this sh*t either. What's your hypothesis now, Einstein?



You might want to look at that again.

To date, rulers have been forced from power in Tunisia,[1] Egypt,[2] Libya,[3] and Yemen;[4] civil uprisings have erupted in Bahrain[5] and Syria;[6] major protests have broken out in Algeria,[7] Iraq,[8] Jordan,[9] Kuwait,[10] Morocco,[11] and Sudan;[12] and minor protests have occurred in Lebanon,[13] Mauritania,[14] Oman,[15] Saudi Arabia,[16] Djibouti,[17] and Western Sahara.[18] Clashes at the borders of Israel in May 2011,[19] and the protests in by the Arab minority in Iranian Khuzestan erupted in 2011 as well.[20] Weapons and Tuareg fighters returning from the Libyan civil war stoked a simmering rebellion in Mali, and the consequent Malian coup d'état has been described as "fallout" from the Arab Spring in North Africa.[21] The sectarian clashes in Lebanon were described as a spillover violence of the Syrian uprising and hence the regional Arab Spring.[22] Most recently, in September 2012 a wave of social protests swept Palestinian Authority, demanding lower consumer prices and resignation of the Palestinian Prime Minister Fayyad.

Good God, man. Are you f'n serious? You're not too good at this logic thing. How many times did it take you to figure out the square box wouldn't fit in the round hole in kindergarten?

(09-14-2012 10:18 AM)Machiavelli Wrote:  You know Reb. I'm going to give you quarter on some of this. I believe with all my heart that the events of the Iraq war set the seeds of discontent and you can make the argument that they were already sewn. Reasonable people can come up on both sides of that equation. Neocons looked at what a free Iraq could do for the M.E. I would bet some people still believe this. The problem as I see it is people don't believe we are honest brokers and why should they? We have demosnstrated time and time again our self interest prevail over honest dealings. The more I think about it Internet savvy youth spread more oxygen to the flame than the Iraq war set. It's just one fcked up place where the leaders are too easily corrupted and then we find corrupt leaders easier to deal with.
Que Sera Sera.

Except you've got a historical disconnect. The facts are against you.

The Iraq war (assuming you are talking about W's war and not his father's) happened AFTER 9/11, and 9/11 is proof beyond any doubt that the seeds of discontent were pretty well in place long before W. If you want to go back further, check out what happened in Iran about 1979 or so.

One of the more amazing things about that to me was that I attended an intel brief given to the Chief of Naval Operations in December 1978, at which the briefing officer expressed the unequivocal opinion that the Shah would have no trouble retaining his throne for a long, long time. A month later, he was gone. The Shah, that is, not sure what happened to the intel officer. What is truly scary is the possibility that the incident accurately reflected the state of our intel in the region. Micromanaging is even worse when you don't have a clue what the facts are.

That's the problem. We TRY to be honest brokers, or at least pretend to try to be honest brokers, when in reality the situation cannot be brokered. Let them do their own thing internally, just make it very clear that we have certain expectations in their dealings with us, whoever is in power, and it those expectations are not met we are perfectly fine with killing whoever isn't meeting them.

(09-14-2012 10:30 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(09-14-2012 10:18 AM)Machiavelli Wrote:  You know Reb. I'm going to give you quarter on some of this. I believe with all my heart that the events of the Iraq war set the seeds of discontent and you can make the argument that they were already sewn. Reasonable people can come up on both sides of that equation. Neocons looked at what a free Iraq could do for the M.E. I would bet some people still believe this. The problem as I see it is people don't believe we are honest brokers and why should they? We have demosnstrated time and time again our self interest prevail over honest dealings. The more I think about it Internet savvy youth spread more oxygen to the flame than the Iraq war set. It's just one fcked up place where the leaders are too easily corrupted and then we find corrupt leaders easier to deal with.
Que Sera Sera.

Except you've got a historical disconnect. The facts are against you.

The Iraq war (assuming you are talking about W's war and not his father's) happened AFTER 9/11, and 9/11 is proof beyond any doubt that the seeds of discontent were pretty well in place long before W. If you want to go back further, check out what happened in Iran about 1979 or so.

One of the more amazing things about that to me was that I attended an intel brief given to the Chief of Naval Operations in December 1978, at which the briefing officer expressed the unequivocal opinion that the Shah would have no trouble retaining his throne for a long, long time. A month later, he was gone. The Shah, that is, not sure what happened to the intel officer. What is truly scary is the possibility that the incident accurately reflected the state of our intel in the region. Micromanaging is even worse when you don't have a clue what the facts are.

That's the problem. We TRY to be honest brokers, or at least pretend to try to be honest brokers, when in reality the situation cannot be brokered. Let them do their own thing internally, just make it very clear that we have certain expectations in their dealings with us, whoever is in power, and it those expectations are not met we are perfectly fine with killing whoever isn't meeting them.

(09-14-2012 10:30 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  That's the problem. We TRY to be honest brokers, or at least pretend to try to be honest brokers, when in reality the situation cannot be brokered. Let them do their own thing internally, just make it very clear that we have certain expectations in their dealings with us, whoever is in power, and it those expectations are not met we are perfectly fine with killing whoever isn't meeting them.

That's a foreign policy that makes sense.

Owl,

Have we ever tried to establish democracy in another M.E. country before? I'm not aware of it if. A stated goal of our Iraq adventure was for democracy to spread throughout the M.E. At that time and still, I thought that was an incredibly stupid endeavor. Democracies are not transplanted. They are homegrown. The people have to want it. They have to want it bad. Cue the Micheal Doglas speech in "The President". It's not easy. I've read some books on the Mideast. By no means an expert. One thought that always stood out to me. Me against my brother. My brother and I against my cousin. My cousin and I against the world. I've seen many derivatives of that bedouin phrase. But the gist of it is we will never be cousins with these people but we can foster honest dealings and trade with these people. Our diplomacy should be markets instead of warheads.

That's nice, Mach, and would make sense if the stated goal of many of them wasn't to eliminate the non-believers through force. You can think what you want, but they TELL you why they don't like us. Our "meddling" is secondary, not inconsequential by any means, but secondary to the goal they established thousands of years ago and still practice today. If we didn't meddle at all, we'd STILL have the underlying issue that plagues all of these other places. The only reasopn to install democracy is because it is pretty much the only way to combat the underlying issue. We can stop, but that in no way means that they will stop.

I don't understand why you don't take them at their word, when their deeds have matched it.

(09-14-2012 09:30 AM)Machiavelli Wrote:  I'm going to need a stiff pour.

Got enough for the both of us?

How about we fight a war to win in the military sense of the word. We are confronted today because we haven't fought to win since WW11.

I'm about militaried out. It's been an emotional bummer. I detest the fact that Americans are dying over there for god knows what reason. Bring them home.

Got enough.........
Sure do SMN!!
Plan on hitting it tonight. Honey Jack.

(09-14-2012 10:35 AM)DrTorch Wrote:  

(09-14-2012 10:30 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  That's the problem. We TRY to be honest brokers, or at least pretend to try to be honest brokers, when in reality the situation cannot be brokered. Let them do their own thing internally, just make it very clear that we have certain expectations in their dealings with us, whoever is in power, and it those expectations are not met we are perfectly fine with killing whoever isn't meeting them.

That's a foreign policy that makes sense.

Interestingly, it's usually the left, and on rarer occassions the far right, who insist that we impose things like "human rights" and "rights for women" and other things that we value highly here, but are not valued nearly as highly in other places that often get us in the biggest trouble. In many instances, it is the whiny "save the world" liberal (not necessarily speaking about anyone on here... seriously) who challenges the schoolyard bullie and then gets pissed off when (most often) the conservative fights him. This policy would require tolerance of things we don't tolerate in this country. I'm okay with that... that's why we have borders.

Obama is going to appear on national TV, sitting in a chair, wearing a blue sweater, and then proceed to tell us that America is suffering from "malaise".