Rue

Thanks. I appreciate some of my ideas may be naive and unrealistic as well. Let me be even more specific. I think the future partners of peace talks are progressive Palestinian intellects in North America who progressive Jews in North America need to reach out to and vice versa and form a coalition to then influence Israeli and Palestinian leaders. I believe the Arab League of Nations, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon are secondary parties. I believe the primary parties are Jordan, Israel the Palestinian Authority, and the leaders of the Palestinian Israelis within Israel. I see the role of progressive Palestinians and Jews outwide Israel as a mediators. I see potential mediators in Turkey and Spain and possibly Norway. I see the issue of compensating past illegal land seizures within the green line of Israel one which can not realistically accommodate restitution (giving land back or having second and third generation Palestinians move back-there is no physical room for them) but will have to provide compensation for those Palestinians who are Israeli citizens because of the Supreme Court of Israel rulings. As part of an overall peace solution, the displaced Jews of the Middle East, have to also be compensated and recognized and it is here I believe the AArab League has to take moral responsibility and say we forced the issue by expelling them all and confiscating all their property, so now we need to compensate them. Then the Arab League needs to accept moral responsibility for creating the initial displacement of Palestinians by forcing the war in 1948 and then forcefully placing them in refugee camps. They have a moral obligation to admit this decision and displacing 900,000 Jews sealed the fate of Palestinians as much as any Zionist did. The Arab world needs to accept equal responsibility for displacing the genuine Palestinian Muslims with Muslims from outside Palestine and refusing to allow them citizenship in the Arab League nations. Both Israel and the Arab League need to accept a responsibility and that can be done in a nation on the West Bank and Gaza and in providing financial compensation and aid to Palestinians in this new country. Palestinians will not ever accept Jordan as their nation. They see it as a British colony that was created as a ploy to stop Jews from forming a country and consolidating British power in the area but they do not and have never considered it a Palestinian nation, even if its coat of arms describes it as a Palestinian nation and even though it has a law of return for Palestinians (except those born after 1988 on the West Bank). I think in return for the practical reality of illegal land transfers within Israel's green line from Palestinian absentee land owners to Jews, the Arab world should understand Israel is trading that off by giving up a legal right to any of the West Bank which legally they have a right to as much as Palestinians because of the continuous uninterputed residences of Jews in Judea and Somaria since Biblical days. Its a matter of practical realistic trade offs and quite frankly JBG I do not give a shit what some of the people on this thread think because they make no effort to find out the legal rights of either Jews in Israel or Palestinians and assume Jews suddenly appeared in 1948 from Europe as colonialists. I only give a shit what Israelis and Palestinians feel and think and Palestinians and Israelis are sick and tired of violence and this continued reference to the past and need to talk about now and jobs and water. Terrorism will not stop without jobs and water for Palestinians and Israelis and Palestinians working on mutual interest projects such as roads, water-ways and a common market. Will terrorists allow such a thing? Probably not. Then again Netanyahu would stop it as well. My approach is the classic labour party approach as now presented by the current Security Minister of Israel who I obviously would vote for if I had a chance or the views of Ehud Barak and the current foreign Minister. From what I understand if a popular vote was held to day, Netanyahu appears to be the winner and he wants to scrap any talks about the Golan, the West Bank and Jerusalem having stated he finds them all defective and premature. So this guessing as to who the peace partners would be, is on both sides. Where you and I agree is that the world will never understand why Jews believe they need a state to protect us from existential extinction and that you and I see Israel and Zionism as an existential exercise not a religious one or even an allegedly philosophical one. You and I both agree terrorism dampens and limits the ability to engage in peace talks, cultivate human rights and tear down barriers of intolerance as it clouds discussions and makes everything subordinate to survival of the fittest. For me it is important I work with people who start discussing Israelis and Palestinians as humans with the same mutual interests and existential anxiety and defusing words that make either side seem inhumane or demon like. I despise terrorism. However I believe anyone who denounces terror, even if they are on the opposite side of the negotiations table and appear in direct conflict-are a potential ally precisely because they put humans first and reason first. I do believe it is possible to achieve anything positive once humans agree they will not engage in violence and will agree to respect each other. I do not doubt their are obstacles and huge ones at that. Part of the challenge is explaining to people being a Zionist is an existential expression not anything else. It has nothing to do with hating Palestinians or wanting to hurt or control them or violate their rights. That was not our intention. Our intention was to escape persecution and create a nation to protect us because in every nation we have lived in, we were not allowed to own land and were under seige. It did not come about to hurt others-just to protect us and seek what all other peoples have and take for granted. Palestinians will never understand why we came back to Israel. They will never understand it ever just like the rest of the world will never understand it. It doesn't matter what they think. What matters is we find practical solutions today, here and now. I could care less if any non Jew ever accepts my identity as a Jew and why there is an existential imperative attached to it through state expression. I really don't care. If they ask and genuinely want to know I discuss it. Otherwise I limit my debates to addressing unfair comments that demonize Palestinians or Israelis. I am not interested in shoving my identity in anyone's face. I prefer to express my identity with quiet, reserved dignity and a gentle kindness because I believe any other way of expressing it becomes threatening and only serves to incite anti-semites. I am no self-loathing Jew who apologizes but I am also not someone who believes might is right and you deal with ignorance by counter-ignorance. My challenge is not with people like you. Its with young people who have no clue as to Jewish history and use the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an opportunity to make themselves feel superior and feel they can lecture Israelis and Palestinians. You must also remember, Palestinians are not dumb. They know the same people that shit on Israel in their name, will do the same with them for the exact same reason they do it with Israel. They are not dumb JBG. Their practical nightmare is finding a way out of the terror cycle they did not start and do not know how to get out of. They aren't stupid. They know all the sanctimonious talk in their name is bullshit. They are looking to Israel not the rest of the world. They aint stupid. They can't say it but they are looking to Israel to find a way to avoid fueling Hamas and the other terrorists by responding in certain ways.

I speak for myself. If a woman is gorgeous, and she allows it, I will hug her. I am a middle aged Jewish man. We do that. We are harmless though. I don't hug any men. My generation expresses affection to other men in one of 3 ways; i-punching shoulders, ii-grunting/burping/passing gas, iii-calling each other abusive names.

Sorry I was late responding but I have had some other stuff. I will answer your question but first off I would like to state this entire thread was not something that makes me comfortable. My vision of Zionism and being a Jew is different then yours as are my politics. To start with I was not brought up as a Jew ever to brag about the good things or beneficial things Jews do. That I was taught is false pride and brings disgrace to being a Jew. So no I am not comfortable making lists of Jews who have achieved things. I do not believe we should throw our achievements about under any circumstance. Secondly I constantly find myself responding in a way that makes me very angry with myself because I happen to care what a BC Chick or Buffy thinks and I am serious now, it brings tears to my eyes when we Jews respond in a way that makes us sound like we are beligerent racists or intolerant. My vision of Zionism was not one that evisioned hurting Palestinians or Muslims and I can see why Buffy adapts the views she does some days. How is it we talk to young people and are not reminded we were once young and what they do not want to hear from us is anger and beligerence? That said, the fact that I am a supporter of Israel and a Zionist does not mean I haveto agree with certain things and ignore others. For example and this is in response to JBGlobe who was entitled to a far better answer from me that what I have contributed so far-yes Israel from 1948 to approximately the year 2003 has passed over 21 property laws and the Supreme Court of Israel has basically said, the method in which Israel transferred the absentee land of Palestinians who left Israel during the 1948 War of Independence through various agencies culminating in their privitization was illegal. That is what we do. We Jews admit when we are wrong. So we were wrong. At least we admit it. So now we have to do something about it as part of an over-all peace settlement. Palestinian Israelis seek restitution. Do we ignore them? It is not what we do. We do not ignore people we have done wrong to and we will not become a weaker people for admitting that. The practical reality is after 60 years, under international law, the citizens of Israel now living on land illegally privatized from absentee Palestinian landlords is called a secondary right and under international law, secondary property rights, particularly residential ones, have strong legal status and will not be ignored. The reality is restitution, giving the land back will not happen, but compensation for the land and new places for those Israeli Palestinians that have been citizens of Israeli since 1948 and who were displaced is part of the equation and we will have to deal with it. So no I am not about to say to Buffy Israel is perfect and does not have problems. Part of the problem is that land issue. But also part of that problem is the fact that 700,000 Jews had to flee to Israel from Arab countries which makes the need for them to be compensated just as important. There are two sets of people who require compensation and ironically the displaced Palestinians were about 600,000 and the Jews 700,000. So the solution? We can't throw Israelis out of Israel to accommodate returning Palestinians and international law does not recognize the rights of anyone but the actual refugees, i.e., not people born after them just the actual people physically who fled. Let me also state Zionism is NOT racist as Socred parrots. All Zionism is and remains is the concept that the state institution is of Jewish character and has as its primary motive of existence the protection of Jews. The only difference between Israel being up front about this institutional bias and the rest of the world is it is blatant and upfront about what it is doing. 80 other countries have the same law of return and do the same thing and yet only Israel is singled out. Palestinians and the rest of the world are mistaken if they think Jews will just go away or giv eup the idea they need a state to protect them. Its not going to happen. Non Jews like Buffy do not understand it because they have never lived in a world where their existence has been threatened on a minute by minute basis. Palestinians do. That is the ironic thing-they do because they understand Jews in Israel better then anyone and certainly better then self-hating Jews like Mr. Finklestein. So you say who is the partner to reach out to. PALESTINIANS. We have to create another state for Palestinians on the West Bank and in Gaza for Palestinians to go to. Then the Arab League has to accept its moral responsibility for starting a war that created them and for placing them in refugee camps by doing two things; compensating the displaced Jews now in Israel and assisting in the building of Palestine and in absorbing as citizens those Palestinians who wish to become citizens of other Arab countries. In return for the above the State of Israel then pulls back the settlers behind the green line and it compensates Palestinian Israelis. I know you disagree JBG but for me Israel's future depends on sitting and negotiating with the Arab League, the Palestinian people, Palestinian Israelis and Jordan. Those are the people to talk to and who are directly involved. Everyone else should butt out. As for terrorism, yes it places the entire region in a deep freeze and it compromises everyone's human rights as security considerations prevail. But terrorism does not come from no where. The current security Minister of Israel who was the former head of Shin Bet said, we must remember Palestinian terrorists became terrorists. If the root causes of terrorism are not addressed as part of this process terrorism will continue. So we have conflict. To mediate and resolve conflict we need to identify which issues are of equal concern and value (mutual interests), those that have value to both sides but not in equal amounts (common interests) and those issues that are only of interest to one side (exclusive interests). To build peace we need to start with the mutual interests, then work towards the common ones, then the exclusive ones. We need to first start with the easier issues and then build on positive successes. To do all that is not easy. It may take many years. Before any of it happens someone has to convince the terrorists to step down and give up their weapons just as it was done with the IRA. That will require delicate behind the scenes liaising through Turkey, Norway, Spain, Egypt. It will also require Israel showing restraint when its very gut says to do otherwise. It will also require people butting out and understanding ultimately any settlement process has to be decided between Palestinians and Israelis and no one else. Religious fundamentalism is an obstacle so are insincere people using the conflict as an opportunity to exploit Palestinians for their own selfish political agendas. No I do not see Palestinians as the problem-I see them as one of two sets of people suffering from the same problem. I do not expect a Palestinian living in the Gaza or West Bank to react any differently then I do when our people were forced to flee to Israel and how our people feel every time there is a war or terrorist attack or someone makes the comment that Jews are not entitled to be protected by their own state institution or that its racist for us to believe that. Zionism has nothing to do with feeling we are superior and never did. Socred is typical of the millions of non Jews who will never make an effort to understand our history and the role his religion has played in it and how it is not and was never meant to be anything other then an existential survival concept and its why contrary to what he or mostly everyone believes, Israel unlike Muslim states is not and has never claimed to be nor has any interest in being a theocracy with one state religion. Its why Israel has religious courts for the different religions. But and its a big but, we Jews believe in democracy and we have to wrestle with that notion. If we are to have a state that protects us from never again being the victims of dhiommitude and Christian oppression and the holocaust and other slaughters and pogroms we have to decide, how much democracy are we willing to sacrifice? I believe Israel is struggling to balance its need to be a Jewish state to protect Jews of the world as well as its own citizens and its own 20% minority of non Jews and has many challenges involved in that regard that will tie in to the oevr-all question of Palestinian state rights in a second state. No I can not give a simple answer, its not a simple question. But I have tried my best to answer it and not leave this thread lending to the impression that being a Zionist does not mean we care, are humanitarian and do not wish to hurt or oppress Palestinians and recognize they struggle as we did and continue to do and Israel will never be complete until their nightmare as well as ours, is put to rest.

Rue 3, Busch-Chaney 0. Lol. I am gonna go easy now on the Bush-C dude. I feel sorry for him. From what I can gather, he's stuck trying to sell all his GM trucks and his hummer to pay his rising food bills and mortgage. Me I am struggling to pay the friggin gas on my Honda and my own mortgage and deal with Flaherty's denials so I can't help Bush. Besides he is probably a Yankees fan. If he was a Cubs fan he might and I say might just get some sympathy.

Speaking about malarkey and back pedaling just listen to you... "....GM's EV-1 predates hybrids by years." So what? It has nothing to do with the issues I raised. "The point of highlighting your error was to demonstrate that Japanese manufacturers were chasing the same big light truck profits and sales as GM/Ford/Chrysler..." That was not the issue and point I raised. Once again you do not read-you go off on tangents that suit your ego. More to the point your tangent is nonsensical. Whether the Japanese sold trucks or did not sell trucks is not the issue and never was the issue. The issue is the Japanese and South Koreans anticipated the small car market and in fact they came about because of it and they are now in the position to be able to fall back on it. The fact they sold trucks is not and was never the issue being able to modify their products and change as the times change was and is. You stated; "GM partnered with Toyota in Fremont CA years ago, and also rebadged econboxes from Asia." So? What is the point of making such a comment? How does it address the issue I raised. How does it even remotely address the issue I raised? The issue I raised and your brain can't seem to absorb is this and we can talk in small easy to understand words for you-GM can not sell large gaz guzzling vehicles and allowed itself to become overly dependent on them at the expense of all the other sales markets and like any entity that has a specialized diet it either learns to eat something else or it becomes exitinct and no all you did by stating the above is prove that point. You state: "More back pedaling....so much for crowing about the JDPowers reports for Oshawa product quality as rated by consumers, huh?" You are like a rat caught in the chicken house. You wiggle and try squeeze but no Bush I got you by the tail and I think we should swing you a bit now. Your attempt to suggest GM products are quality vehicles is an absolute and utter crock and of course misses the point yet again. We all are well aware how GM cars have constantly failed in design and defect. The manufacturer liability law suits, the recalls, the inferior car parts, its all public knowledge. In regards to your attempt now to suggest the trucks are quality trucks, that doesn't change what the cars are-in every case inferior to Japanese ones in quality and longevity, and more to the point doesn't address the issue. Is it hard for that brain of yours to grasp the fact that even if these GM trucks were the quality products you now claim they are and I would concede can make a good argument for in certain lines of trucks does not address the issue of gas consumption and why people won't buy them. Man you are thick and your trying to get snarky with moi is hilarious but no Bush it doesn't change the issue you continue to try ignore and get people to forget with your gratuitous comments and that is you can build the best truck in the world, but no one is going to buy it now with gas at the price it is. You stated; " I'm dumber after reading that." May I respectfully suggest your being dumber could be caused by many things. "I care not in the least." Yes its evident when you are presented with information you have no way to deny you tend to say that a lot. "Just break the union....and establish "Right to Work" laws." Is that before or after you set up the prison camps. Maybe you can just put them all in one big camp. Say now imagine that concept-shipping people to camps because of their ancestry or because they are commies and socialists. Sounds familiar. "Great or not, he is still the president, no?" Do you mean that putz running GM or are you referring to your namesake in Washington, DC? From my perspective they are both in denial and trying to preserve antiquated failed administrations and policies. But from what I gather they are both on their way out this year. By the way, good luck with selling that hummer. I can hear you. And to think you suggest that moi back pedals? Lol. Maybe Miami CSI will buy it for their show.

With due respect look at their inventory. You will see a much more diverse inventory of products available for sale today right now. As well and with due respect you are wrong. The 3 year cycle can be adjusted on a 6 month notice and you do not need to take down the entire platform to keep it productive. You also underestimate the intelligence of the consumer to not be able to understand if they buy a Honda or Toyota or Subaru or Hyundai product they will keep it longer and do less maintenance on it and be serviced better then if they have a GM or Ford or Dodge. People may not know about car engines but they know which cars last longer and whose transmission cracks and whose break linings wear out faster, and whose car's seems are held together with glue and so are impossible to repair once that glue decomposes. But please, go buy your FIX. Lord Love us. Its the Jeep Waggoneer-International Harvester with a new name. Can't wait until they start making those Checkers again. Big and square, like the heads of their designers.

No its not a load the stats are there for any of us to go and look at, for example; http://automobiles.honda.com/news/press-re...e=2005080255723 http://www.hondabeat.com/sales_stats.php http://ca.autos.yahoo.com/s/03062008/31/li...erican.html?p=4 http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/sto...ory/Technology/ http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive...8/03/c6616.html Honda and Toyota did sell light trucks but the point is were and are in a better position to adjust their product assembly lines and sudden changes in consumer demands making available more hybrid cars, and smaller more fuel efficient vehicles to pick up any business they lost or will lose from truck sales. Theyd idn't put all their eggs in one basket. More to the point why don't you so check the resale value of a Japanese vehicle compared to a Ford or GM vehicle and look at the average cost to run them and the service reports. Consumers Reports and many other web-sites have these stats. You want to go into denial and pretend GM and Ford are doing nothing different then Honda or Toyota, try, but it's as stupid as pretending people are going to buy GM trucks if they keep that plant open making them. How long do you think until the plant in Oakville is closed? You really think the FIT is gonna burn up the market place? You want to be competitive, you look ahead not behind. This trying to hold on to the past and deny what is in front of your face, golly gee, sounds familiar. But let's save that for the other thread on why George Bush is a great President shall we.

Being a shallow petty sexist, I think we should decide on the next President by deciding whose wife is better. Now McCain's wife has a Master's degree in Special Education and was given some cushy but high pressured family corporate jobs and looks good in her leather jackets and pants. Nice bum bum for 52. Obama's wife is a Harvard lawyer, ran a tough hospital gig, and has real cute kids and sort of reminds me of Amarosa from apprentice. She looks like she could either punch the snot out of you or make a great dance partner.It's a tie. I like them both. They'z both smart and well put together and they probably make good arm wrestlers. So I go back to the candidates. John McCain has a wierd head. Its small and square but his face on one side sort of folds in and he looks like one of the Munchkins from the Wizard of Oz that or a football coach who gives his high school kids steroids and throws clip boards at their head. Now Obama, well he has a small head too. Sort of looks like Curious George and the Joker from Batman mixed together and Arsenio Hall thrown in their too. So again its a tie. John McCain looks stiff and tight and has that insincere tele-evangelist smile and looks like he is gonna bite someone or the guy on the golf cart who plays through your round and Bam Bam looks like the doctor who tells you that he is gonna shove something up somewhere cuz he suspects cancer but not too worry or is that kid you shot spit balls at cuz he had big ears and now has grown up to sue you. Another tie. So I go to the celebrity supporters and music they like. McCain likes Abba and he's got Tom Selleck. For Gawd's sake someone help him. The Bam man has the boss Bruce Sprinsteen and hello, J-Lo, Scar-Jo, Halle Berry, Angelina Jolie, Jessica Alba, Cameron Diaz. Please. Its settled. J-Lo rules in my world even if she did marry a skeleton. So the Bam Bam wins. Hands down.

Bush Chaney did you wake up today and notice what Supreme Court Justice Kennedy did yesterday? Contradicted you for the third time and once again the USSC has ruled the War Commissions Act is unconstitutional and you know what they say, 3 strikes and you are out and come now, we all know baseball is as American as your attempt to imitate John Wayne. Student of history? Ahahahahahah. With that selective memory? Please have fun reading Kennedy's decision.

Just so Bush Chaney is clear the 5th amendment is used by someone on the stand. They invoke it to not have to say anything to incriminate themselves. The actual constitutional issues in dispute with Gunatanamo Bay and the kadr case are the 6th amendment, (right to a speedy and public trial, right to sufficient disclosuyre and notice of the grounds of accusation, right to confront the accuser), the 8th amendment (cruel and unusual punishment and treatment) and 14th amendment (due process and right to equal protection). But hey why addressthe actual legal issues in dispute right Bush? More to the point, the US Supreme Court has already ruled what is going on in G-Bay is unconstitutional. That is precisely why, Bush passed another law that allows him to ignore that decision. Once again Bush does not adress the actual legal issues or the fact that his argument misses the point for the fourth tiem and that is-using political partisan legislation to ignore the US Supreme Court and the constitution, is bullshit.

Oh look Bush-Chaney says.. "Hey Einstein....over 13,000 Americans were detained in this way. Then you can move on to explaining the internment of 120,000 citizens and resident aliens of Japanese decent during WW2 by FDR, another one of America's greatest presidents. (Hint: that would be after 1866) It was upheld by the USSC." Brilliant. You use an action engaged in by Lincoln's government that was later declared unconstitutional, and the internment of Japanese in World War Two as your basis of argument for why the current War Commissions Act is acceptable. In so doing you demonstrate that; i- you do not know the difference between making a moral argument and a legal one and try fuse them into one and the same, i.e., if you feel its morally acceptable, then it legally must be as well; ii-that morality and legality are defined by whether other people engaged in the same acts. Bush-C let us save for another day why all known doctrines of moral or legal equivalency are not based on partisan political opinions. That seems lost on you. But hey, you feel so confident in your brilliance you call moi Einstein? Well I am Jewish and I do need a haircut. Lol you want to throw physicists around? Here let's engage in some fractal theory shall we? Guess what. Projecting and unilaterally imposing your moral opinion onto people as to what you feel is order, doesn't make that chaos necessarily orderly but it is self-serving and subjective and yes if you see the Virgin Mary's face in that brown stain on your pants, of course it must be true.... Here's a hint for you...law and morality may not simply be defined based on your political beliefs. They might as I am trying to suggest to you, actually be based on fundamental principles that are neutral to partisan political considerations or in this case your subjective opinions as to what is legal or moral. And no, the US Supreme Court has learly rejected the kind self-serving politically partisan justification you try engage in over and over again. Now let us once again expose your fallacious reasoning. You make reference to the fact and infer that the US Supreme Court stated the internment of the Japanese during World War Two was morally and legally acceptable and again I say with utmost sincerity-oh bullshit. In fact the two legal cases that dealt with this matter, Hirabayashi v. United States (1943), and Korematsu v. United States (1944) dealt with the issue of whether their fifth amendment rights were violated by the U.S. government because of their ancestry. In this legal context and only this legal conext in both cases, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the U.S. government. The arguments I have raised to indicate why the legal process regarding Khadr is flawed have nothing to do with his being arrested because of his being a Muslim or an Arab and that is the only legal context in which the cases you quote would be relevant. All the arguments I have raised do not and have never dealt with 5th Amendment concerns and for you to try misrepresent these legal cases out of context shows you either have no clue how to read legal cases and understand the issues they are questioning or you are misrepresenting the context of those cases hoping no one will notice you are quoting them out of context to the limited and specific argument they relate to. Of course I do note Bush that your selective memory kicked in again and you failed to mention that in 1988, the U.S. Congress passed legislation which awarded formal payments of $20,000 each to the surviving internees, (60,000 in al)l and also in that same year formal apologies were also issued by the government of Canada to Japanese Canadian survivors, who were each repaid the sum of $21,000 Canadian dollars, precisely because of the moral injustice these government actions caused. Once again you demonstrate why the US government felt the very thing you claim is legally acceptable was immoral. Great way to establish your moral case. As for quoting cases dealing with a legal issue we are not talking about is a brilliant way to establish the legal precedent for your legal argument. He's a hint, you want to quote a legal case? Try at least have it address the legal issues we are discussing and not some issue that is not being questioned or contested. here's anothe hint Bush. Trying to quivalates a nation in a declared state of war with one that is not and assume they both are in the same legal relationship with their citizens or non citizens is absolutely and unequiviocally wrong. But hey I guess in your world if a tomato is red and an apple is red, that seems good enough to you right? Do you really need for me to explain to you why interning people of the same ethnic group as a country the detaining state has declared war against is not the same legal situation as one which is dealing with people who are being detained because they could be suspected of being of the same nationality as a country the U.S. is not in a declared state of conventional war with? Is that difficult for you to see the difference? Of course that requires yout o first understand the difference between conventional war and the international laws that pertain to conventional war, and other legal situations where the U.S. is not in a declared state of war and also it would require you to understand the difference between a civilian and a military combatant as well. At this point you seem to be fixated on the colour red and unable to get past that fact. I appreciate in uyour simplel world as long as you claim to be fighting terrorism, any legal distinctions magically disappear in favour of your subjective political ones. So why stop at Guantanamo Bay? We shall set up internment camps all over the USA and anyone we suspect of being a possible supporter of terrorists off they go. So let's see now, let's start with anyone with the name Abdul and Mohammed, Omar or Hussein (oops Obama's gonna get caught up in this drag net) and then move on to anyone with a swarthy complexion. As long as Bush Chaney feels its politically acceptable then no problem, it is. No habeus corpus. We just round them up and off they go. Of course Bush Chaney's criteria for when one is interned is going to be if they are " suspected of engaging in terror" which of course will never be abused. Bush won't use it to round up anyone that disagrees with him politically. No not him. Of course how will er know this? We just will take his word for it because you see Bush Chaney is not accountable to us, he doesn't have to provide you the grounds for why he has detained you we just assume he is someone above imposing his political partisan views on us and ignorning basic democractic principles such as freedom of assembly or expression and full disclosure of evidence used against us. Oh hell he would never abuse such a process. You have nothing to worry about if you write a post calling him a facist. He would never arrest you for that. How do I know? Well I don't. I have no way of knowing because in his world we are not allowed to know-but we are to assume what he says and does is o.k. and is beyond question or doubt. Yah right. Brilliant. Sheer genius. Me Einstein. You Benito Mussolini?

American not Israeli. Israel's expertise is not in that area but in testing and modifying computer and electric systems and security and surveillance and counter-intelligence information technology. artificial intelligence systems, not munitions like this big bertha bomb. I personally suspect a lot of the Iran talk is trying to distract people from Olmert's domestic political problems.

And one other rant. Why is it we allow the South Koreans and Japanese to dump their products in our country and engage in predatory and monopoly pricing while they do not let us sell our products in their countries? Its as simple as this-Yoh Mr. Toyota-you want to sell your Corolla in Canada, we get to sell our new small Ford Zit (its a new small red bubble car) in Nippon. None of this one sided trade nonsense. Someone tell that to the Chinese and Indians too. They seem to be in quite the feeding frenzy and looking at us to feed them and what do we expect?. Uh hello someone look at our trade deficit and how easy its been for China and Japan to just walk right in and take over. I don't blame them. I blame us. I will buy Canadian if you make me a good product. Otherwise you leave me no choice but to buy a Honda. I am not about to my a crappola car just because you are a Canadian or American company. Last time I looked, Honda employs Canadians too.

I think we are over complicating the obvious issue and that is-the products our car plants were designed to build were based on the assumption that bigger was better and if we built the bigger ones, it would be better for our workers financial needs. It was a short sighted assumption that BOTH GM Management and the worker's union share. They BOTH bought into it because BOTH assumed there would never be the kind of increase in oil prices that would lead to such products becoming obsolete. Economists have been warning since world war one, that our dependence on oil would lead to such catastrophes. Our businesses and unions have chosen to ignore future forecasting in favour of immediate short term gain. GM and its unions knew what they were doing was short term. There is no excuse. There was a clear warning during the last oil shortage not to build an industry on gas guzzlers and for a brief moment people bought smaller cars but then the car manufacturers in North America swung back to the big monster vehicles. Why? Why not? If you basically take a pick up truck and charge another 25,000 for it by closing the back and placing some more seats on it, why not. All it was, was disguised pick up truck sales and people bought it hook line and sinker. You tell me, why do we need such huge vehicles? Why? Get real. Do any of us need these suv's and four wheel drives and hummers, etc.? I mean come on. Hwo dumb is it buying a hummer or a jeep when all you do is engage in city driving. Did you really need that suv for your 2 brats or was it just easier to throw them back there with a built in t.v. then have them sit closer to you in a smaller car? Suv's and these large vehicles were a sign of short sighted management and unions buying into the greed and consumers wasting their affluence on inefficient products. So now the market does what it does, it corrects itself and what do we do? Well we have a union doing what they do, react and try pretend they can deny the obvious and hold back the inevitable and feed their employees these false promises that they can continue to make such idiot products. GM Management, well they do what business management does, exploit the moment for all its worth, then move on and if people are expendable so be it. Whether its suv's and big pick ups that end up in junk yards or people on unemployment lines, its part of the disposable equation that goes along with making profit. Let's be honest. The Japanese have made idiots of us because they cornered the market on small, efficient vehicles and let us blow our brain out on big inefficient poorly designed and built vehicles. Trying to pretend we can still manufacture dinosaurs and all will be well is as dumb as thinking we can just keep using fossel fuel forever. Its what short sighted, lazy, uninspired fat people do when they don't want to exercise. We now have to get up off our collective fat asses and lose some weight. The Indians and Chinese are about to dump on our market cheap disposable cars made of recycled plastic, glass, plastics, metals, textiles and other garbage. People will snap up these $3,500 disposable cars just as they switched from permanent razors to disposable plastic ones. It's what we do. So the solution is simple. Shut the f..ck up and create a better product. Create vehicles that are smaller and run on hydrogen cells and methane made form recycled organic garbage. Create and design mopeds, motorbikes, and take these people who are unemployed and not making these new products and put them to work doing what we should have done years ago-building mass transit systems. Some of them can also become bus drivers and other support workers for the new mass transit system. More to the point anyone who bought GM products was kidding themselves. GM, Ford, Dodge-Chrysler, come on give me a break. Toyota, Honda, Subaru, left you in their dust years ago. Then it was the South Koreans. Soon it will be the Indians and then God help us all when the Chinese dump into our markets their crappola cars. Please when they come don't suck on your car. They use lead paint.

In Bush Chaney's attempt to take the doctrine of civilian control over the military to justify violating the US constitution and use of military personnel and tribunals to engage in political agenda he completely ignores the fact that the U.S. Supreme Court specifically ruled 5-to-3 in the Haden case that Mr. Bush had acted outside his authority when he ordered Al Qaeda suspects to stand trial before these specially organized military commissions. That ruling said that the commission process at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, could not proceed without violating US military law and provisions of the Geneva Conventions and that "The commission lacks power to proceed," as oer the words of Justice John Paul Stevens for the court majority. It is precisely why Bush then passed another law to deliberately disobey this decision. That is precisely what the War Commision Act is-a deliberate, blatant, violation of the US constitution by Bush acting above the law. It is precisely because the US military is controlled and accountable to the same US President and thefeore obliged to follow his orders why Bush has used the military as a political agent in his current exercise to openly ignore the US Supreme Court's decision telling him what he is doing is unconstitutional. All Bush has done is pass a law saying he can violate the US constitution, ignore the US Supreme court and use the military to engage in this exercise. For Bush Chaney to ignore the Haden decision and the reason why the War Commision Act was created and passed is again selective. He tends to only refer to those facts which suit his political opinion and ignore the rest which is exactly what Bush has done and is exactly a tendency in the US that the constitution was created to keep control over. The US constitution exists precisely to prevent the Bush Chaney's of the world from thinking because they agree with something politically, they don't have to follow due process of the law and they can just force it on everyone else. Iw ould suggest Bush Chaney's attitude reflects a primal US political tendency to try use force (the gun, violence) to define order. It dates back to the vigilante mentality that founded the country and reflects the popular belief of most of its citizens have the right to own a gun and establish right through might and force. It's also a selective process which will see people invoke the constitution when it suits their political purposes (the right to own a gun, the right to control the military to carry out a political agenda) but also ignore the constitution (suspend habeus corpus, the right to full disclosure, the right to a speedy and fair trial) when it does not suit them. Now do you think Bush Chaney who selectively uses the constitution when it suits him, (the military must obey Bush's desires) and ignores it (oh let's just ignore the US constitution in regards to anything but owning guns shall we and that includes Supreme Court decisions and due process of law or redefining military combatants as civilians but still trying them by military officers and of course violating international law) when it does not-do you think this paragon of consistency who quotes Lincoln will also lecture us that; there is this crazy thing in the US called the Posse Comitatus Act and know it does not have to do with lynch mobs rounded up by Sheriffs. This law was enacted in 1878 to prohibit the use of the U.S. army in civilian law enforcement, unless otherwise instructed by the president, thereby excluding the military from the civilian sphere. It came about after President Ulysses S. Grant sent a posse comitatus to the polls in the election of 1876, presented by Southern Democratic members of the House who sought to limit the use of federal troops during Reconstruction. Its precisely why ever since the US military is not used as a domestic police force. That is the point. By redefining Kadr not as a soldier but a civilian, the US military is now being asked to be a police force against civilians not enemy combatants something they were not and never intended to be used for. If we follow Bush Chaney's reasoning we do not need to seperate civilian and military courts. We just make one big court and have one armed force. What Bush has done and has been very open in doing is stating he implemented the Patriot Act and War Commissions Act to violate the US constitution and create a new parallel enforcement agency that is not accountable to the Supreme Court of the USA, not accountable to congress, and not even accountable to the JAG office and military law, but the political partisan agenda of George Bush. Some of us call that fascism. I know Benito Mussolini would approve. That is precisely the model of government he created.

I now wish to address another misrepresentation Bush-Chaney engaged in regards to the US Armed Forces and military law in an effort to justify using the military trubunal system as a political court. Bish-chaney tried to misrepresent my response and suggest I was arguing the US military is not accountable to the US Constitution and civilian rule. That is not what I said. What I said is, the US military should be used for partisan political purposes or for that matter ANY political purpose. Bush-Chaney would have you believe using the military as a political tool is legal since they are accountable to the US consitution and President. Nonsense. If this was the intent of the US legal system, then Presidents would rule by military force. Bush-Chaney is misappropriating the doctrine of civilian control of the military. That doctrine does not state civilian control entitles civilians to use the military for partisan political purposes. What that doctrine states is that the ultimate responsibility for a country's strategic decision-making remains in the hands of the civilian political leadership, rather than professional military officers, not that civilians use military officers to carry out domestic and partisan political agenda. The doctrine is intended to assure the military is subordinate to the policies created by the civilians elected to office but not if those policies are unconstitutional, illegal or violate international law. More to the point as Buish-Chaney should have been aware if he was a soldier, in day to day operations a soldier of any rank is accountable to his commanding officer not civilians. Military members who fail to obey the lawful orders of their superiors in the US military would violate Article 90 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) which makes it a crime for a military member to WILLFULLY disobey a superior commissioned officer. More to the point Article 91 makes it a crime to WILLFULLY disobey a superior Noncommissioned or Warrant Officer and rticle 92 makes it a crime to disobey any lawful order (the disobedience does not have to be "willful" under this article). I will finish this in the next post.

Bush-Chaney has tried to use an incident during Lincoln’s reign as President to suggest suspending the habeus corpus writ is acceptable under American law. This is an an absolute representation of the legal precedent that rose from that suspension. In fact in the specific case where the writ of habeus corpus was suspended, Lt. John Merryman, of the Baltimore County Horse Guards,was imprisoned on May 25, 1861, in, Baltimore in Fort McHenry, by order of Union General Winfield Scott after the union occupied the city and began arresting suspected secessionists. Since Baltimore was within the judicial circuit of Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Taney and Judiciary Act of 1789 required that the justices of the Supreme Court also serve as judges of the circuit courts which in those days. performed both trial and appellate functions, Taney presided over the case which allowed Merryman’s right to habeus corpus be suspended. What of course Bush-Chaney deliberately ignored in his attempt to use this case as precedent to justify the current legal suspension’s suspending of the U.S. constitution was that less then two months later, Lincoln stood before Congress and in an Independence Day Speech stated and I quote; "Soon after the first call for militia it was considered a duty to authorize the commanding general in proper cases according to his discretion, to suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, or in other words to arrest and detain, without resort to the ordinary processes and forms of law, such individuals as he might deem dangerous to the public safety. This authority has purposely been exercised but very sparingly. Nevertheless, the legality and propriety of what has been done under it, are questioned; and the attention of the country has been called to the proposition that one who is sworn to 'take care that the laws be faithfully executed,' should not himself violate them." Here let’s read that last sentence again for Bush-Chaney who suggests I find things to difficult to graspb and let’s all say it slowly for Bush-Chaney without any foreign accent; “one who is sworn to take care that the laws be faithfully executed should not himself violate them.” Someone may also want to point out to historian Bush-Chaney that Merryman was eventually released, and the above decision successfully challenged and thrown out.After the war, the Supreme Court officially restored habeas corpus in the case of Ex Parte Milligan (1866) which ruled that trials of civilians by Presidentially created military commissions are unconstitutional. Of course Bush-Chaney’s selective memory seems to ignore that fact. Yet another American patriot with a selective memory.

Of course you will provide proof for the above accusations that he is a closet Wahhabi Muslim. Also do me a favour stop pretending you care about Jews, Christians and non Wahhabi Muslims. Your agenda is transparent even if you wear a hood.

With utmost respect, I am not sure if you help your case or argument by missappropriating the holodomor. If you do have an argument or concern about immunization can you not make that argument without dettracting from the holodomor? By taking it out of context and using it for your present issue of concern, you devalue the meaning of the holodomor whether that was your intention or not. The Holodomor is a specific and unqiue tragedy and should be referenced with respect and reverence..at least I think. As for your concerns, may I respectfully suggest ou stick to the medical facts and you might find it a more effective way to persuade people.

I personally think you are dead on. I guess we shall find out in August.

With due respect you are the first soldier I know who speaks of soldiers abusing civilians as something you feel is legitimate and makes a case for violating due process. The few soldiers I know like you were thrown out of the army and never made it passed boot camp or end up in military prison. I know plenty of good men compelled to do bad things, you are the first I read who talks about it as something admirable. I find your lack of humility unusual. With due respect the people I have come across with such bravado usually are people who have never served in a theatre of war or conflict. The ones I do know are tight lipped and introspective. I confess my bias comes from witnessing what they were asked to do and the toll it took on them and from having a father who served in the military and who brought me up to never believe force without reason and accountability is acceptable.

Your response and reference to rectums did not address the issues I raised. Ask Abe? Are you again serious? For someone who claims to understand US history you lost me on that comment. Your comment about the US not giving a crap about the SCC does not surprise me. of course you speak for yourself not anyone else. I have a gut feeling despite your crap comment, ou would be the very same person screaming for the court you ridicule to release you if you were arrested and detained illegally. You call yourself a student of history, maybe its time you go read the Nuremberg trials, Dwight Eisenhower and Abe Lincoln. The entire U.S. system is designed to maintain moderation and prevent extremism through an intricate system of checks and balances in its legal doctrine and protocols. The fact that you do acknowledge them doesn't mean they do not exist. On a more serious note, hey now my rectum is boring. As for that rectum while I am glad you are interested in it, trust me its a democratic rectum and my colon works on the fundamental principles of checks and balances. So yes I try put fibre in my diet.

64 pages later and we have someone allegedly native engaged in a moral debate as to whether he has more of a claim to Canada then a Jew does Israel? This is what it comes down to? A true aborginal would never insult his own heritage and ways questioning the spiritual link of a Hebrew to Israel and speak of it using the exact same reference non native Canadians use to deny the aboriginal peoples as a collective indentity with a spiritual link that predeceases those Canadians of other ancestry. This has become nothing more then an exchange of intolerance. Grow the f..ck up all of you spewing these intolerances. Here is the point. Aboriginal people have a spiritual collective and a spiritual link to the land which predeceases the cultures of Canadians who came after. Part of that is now recognized in legal treaties the Canadian confederation agreed to recognize. Hebrews have a spiritual link to the land of Israel no different then aboriginals may have with North America or any other land. It is absolutely no different. To suggest Moses is a colonizer who invaded Israel is as idiotic as saying the aboriginal peoples who came across the Bering Straight invaded Canada. The point is Palestinians and Israelis have equally as valid claims. The point is Jews, Christians and Muslims have equally as valid claims in the Middle East. The fact is we define all peoples in Canada, aboriginal, French, English, European, what-ever entitled to the same fundamental rights of respect and dignity. The point is any of you who forget you are a human first and what-ever else the f..ck you are second means you have lost touch with the most basic rules of nature. Your collective identity is no excuse to hate, and use it as a weapon to allege superiority whether that be moral, political, religious, cultural or what-ever. Now shut the f..ck up and get along from where I sit you are all a bunch of jibbering primates sticking out your inflammed buttoxes at each other. try behave like whales for a change.

The word "native " when used in reference to First Nations people or aboriginal peoples refers to a person having origins in the original peoples of North America, and who maintains cultural identification through tribal affiliation or community recognition. The fact that some of you want to use discussion as to its meaning as a pretense to insult aboriginal peoples is transparent. This idiot exercise of pretending native peoples does not refer to the original peoples of North America who existed here long before Europeans is par for the course. Some of us by the way have no problem acknowledging the fact that aboriginal peoples civilization pre-dates the Canadian confederation of 1867 and that Canadian laws and the Charter and constitution all acknowledge this and recognize the legal treaties that were signed between these peoples and the British and then were inherited and recognized by the Canadian legal system. The only people trying to revise history by the way are the usual few who pretend aboriginal peoples have no collective legal rights or whose ancestry does not precede some of the inbreds who later came from Europe and obviously have left their legacy.

That's a different issue. What you are now talking about is a basic theory of negotiation and that is-whoever comes to the table to negotiate, is a legitimate representative able to represent a state or a specific identified group's political will and has as a condition precedent to sitting down and negotiating agreed that he does not believe in terror or as a legitimate means to express political will and that political will is to be dealt with through words not weapons. The issue is not whether Hamas should sit at a peace table, its the fact they need to first do what the IRA did and that is to disarm themselves and renounce violence. Likewise any other terrorist group must be willing to do the same to be able to sit at any table. Israel has made it clear they will speak with anyone in the Middle East who recognizes their right to exist and does not support terrorism as a means to express political will and will not engage in it. Indirectly Israel has negotiated with Hezbollah and Hamas through third parties but it can not and will not ever sit at a table as long as they are armed and calling for its destruction. Everyone knows that. Israel is no different then Egypt, Jordan or Saudi Arabia in that stance. If Lebanon had their way, there would be only one army in Lebanon not the Lebanese Army and then Hezbollah which is a militia and law unto itself violating Lebanese state law. Likewise in Syria if you think Mr. Assad sits and has peace talks with the Muslim Brotherhood think again. Half of this is posturing for public consumption. What people do not get is Hamas is just as concerned about Syria,Egypt and Jordan as it is Israel in terms of surviving. Its all a game of men trying to consolidate power by force some through terrorist organizations others through state military structure. Either way peace talks do not happen if people stay armed and intent on destroying their enemy. Their has to be a sizeable cognitive shift to seeing the enemy you want to destroy as a potential ally. Its not there with Hamas or Islamic Jihad or Fatah Hawks or 300 other organizations on the West Bank and Gaza. They have no intention to change as long as they can support their power bases and self-interests through funding from Egypt, Saudi Arbia, Iran, Syria, China, North Korea and Russia all playing them off each other for political gain. For those who want to scapegoat the US and Israel they can, but they are far from the only players in this battle of hegemony and control of oil, water, and heroin. But it doesn't mean it won't happen. Eventually it happens if for no other reason everyone becomes stalemated and wants to share in the greed or power or slice of the pie.