Black Dog

Dunno. The reason I posted this article was to make a point about the popular consensus on the situation in Iraq. Most of the conventional wisdom brands the Iraqi insurgency as "Islamofascist terrorists", followers of an extreme religious doctrine who believe there's is a Holy War. I suspect that, while such elements exist within the insurgency, they are the minority. Now, I have little doubt the Marines in the article are the minority (though there are undoubtebly far more than the ones mentioned), yet the commonalities between the opossing religious elements are largely ignored. In other words: both sides have small elements of religious extremism within their ranks who believe God is on their side, yet only one side is uniformly branded with the religious extreimist label.

With US forces massing outside Fallujah, 35 marines swayed to Christian rock music and asked Jesus Christ to protect them in what could be the biggest battle since American troops invaded Iraq last year.

The comparison is not between Western elightenment values and fascism, but between fascism and the "values" espoused by the theoconservativivism embodied by George Bush, "values" which have little in common with those of the great thinkers of the Enlightenment. Today's Republican party has little common idealogical ground with the principles of classic liberalism the U.S. was founded on. If anything, the G.O.P/theocon ideology bears a stunning resemblence to the thinking that was in vogue in pre- World War 1 Germany. The prevaling philosophy was that it was Germany's obligation to bring it's superior culture to the rest of the world by force of arms to create an everlasting peace with the German Empire as it's overseer. You've never actually read Chomsky, have you?

Cdn republicam: I'm still waiting for you to back up your claims of anti-semetism on my part. Evil is a construct. It is useful for purposes of demonization and manipulation of simpeltons unwilling or unable to grasp complex issues, or for the purpose of demonizing opponents. As I've demonstrated above, we have a perfect example on this thread we see Arafat painted as a corrupt terrorist uninterested in peace, while his counterpart, Ariel Sharon, is defended despite similar corruption, a history of terrorism and a demonstratable unwillingness to pursue a meaningful peace. This is yet another nail in the coffin of the myth of contemporary conservatives as "moral" and "principled": nothing could be further from the truth. This breed of conservative (not to be confused with true conservatives who advocate for individual freedom from coercion) are characterized by a fawning lust for power and control. Thus the failure to apply a uniform moral standard, despite falling back on the archaic "good/evil" bianary.

I know exactly what I'm saying: your views on when terror and violence are "wrong" are wholly inconsistent and ever-shifting. There is no objective moral reality for you, only political expediency. I wondered how long it would take you to play the race card. Unless you can produce evidence of anti-semetism, I demand an apology. Israeli historian Benny Morris reported that the original orders issued by the Israeli General Staff for the operation originally called for "blowing up a number of houses ... and hitting the inhabitants", but were changed prior to reaching unit commanders to demand "maximum killing". It is also notable that fully two-thirds of the casualties inflicted during this raid on the "terrorist base" were women and children. Also, in what was to become a familiar pattern, the Israeli government initially denied any involvement, blaming Jewish settlers, before changing the story to claim that troops thought the village was abandoned when they began operations (despite US, UN and Arab Legion reports to the contrary). Nor is there any independant evidence he was not. Indeed, I would say the rather extraordinary admission of responsibility by the Israeli inquiry (the IDF not exactly being renowned for its fairness in dealing with such matters) is evidence that Sharon was negligent, if not culpable. OOOh! You found a thesarus! Here's some more words for you: apologist hypocrite thug quisling equivocator Should be easy to find: just look for your picture.

Ogf course they wouldn't. But thee's no denying that "values" in the political context is shorthand for a certain set of beliefs, namely: pro-religion, anti-abortion, anti-gay etc. That may not necessarily be "extreme religious right" but they are beliefs that contradict the ideals of enlightenment though upon which the U.S. was founded. All of which were made possible by the west's superiority in the realm of force: the imperialism that fueled the industrial revolution is an example. The relative peacefulness of those societies is irrelevant, as the west cannot make a similar claim. But all of those societies were, at one time or another, advanced for their time and civilization: India pre-raj was a thriving pre-industrial society, the Mid East the very cradle of human civilization, whle ancient China produced some of the earliest human scientific advancements. All collided with the west and, confronted with the west superior war-making prowess, fell into the depths of poverty and defeat. Huntington's quote is entirely apt (I certainly seldom agree with the man, butI'll trust his analysis over yours any day of the week).

An entirely predictable response. Membership in a terrorist organization (the Haganah), "the infliction of discriminate, murderous violence not only on able bodied fighters but on the young, the old, the helpless" is considered "restraint" in Sharon's case, but "terrorism" in Arafat's. It's rank hypocrisy. I'll wear the badge of moral equivalency with pride, as it demonstrates a moral and ethical consistency that stands in sharp conterast with your moral relativism (which also undermines your credibility when it comes to other moral issues).

Your posts are certainly evidence of that. Of course, since nuanced thinking is beyond your abilities, I'll spell it out: I *heart* Christian ideals of mercy and generosity and Western enlightenment ideals of secular humanism, individual rights and the equality of all humanity. Your mistake is equating those values with those espoused by George Bush and the reactionary religious establishment that pulls his strings. In efect, you've merely co-opted the language in some twisted manner of Orwellian doublespeak. I knew my old sig would come in handy:

Please. Sharon's crimes are well-documented: The Crimes of Ariel Sharon "UN sponsored poverty" what a joke: it's not the UN that's driving bulldozers through homes, blocking roads and bulding walls: it's Israel. And please: show me where you got that bogus 85% of the West Bank figure. I expect it's the same place you get the rest of your "information: your hind end.

Clinton and Bush both met terrorist Ariel Sharon many times. The Western media has feted Sharon, the former Hagganah terrorist and overser of the massacres at Shabra and Shatila, as a "man of peace", ignoring the m,urderous corrpupt regime that is destroying lives on both sides. Shraon has murdered Jews, Westerners and even his own people. He has murdered many many Palestinians while accumulating millions in in illegal funds and presiding over the corruption and economic decline of Israel. He is no more than a criminal gang leader intent on ensuring the destruction of everyone but himself as he accumulates power, money and land. I find the moral relativism of the right wing to be utterly foul.

Uh...when else would you use an exit poll?

Ah...but look closer: we're seeing massive discrepencies between exit poll data and final results, and we're seeing these discrepencies more in states that used electronic voting machines over paper balllots, which prompted adjustments in the exit poll data. Curious, no?

Well, they are polls, not predictions. No matter how good the sampling process involved in an exit poll, it is still sampling, which means that there is a margin of sampling error. As well, they are useful in providing details of how specific demographic groups have voted and the expressed reasons for their vote. They also help pollsters develop voter turnout models for future elections — that is, a sense of how many of each demographic group can be expected to turn out for an election.

Ironic, then, that one would endorse the bigotry and fear of the Christian right over true Christian values of tolerance and forgiveness and elightenment ideals of egalitarianism and equality. Ineed, it's becoming abundantly clear that those who argue for Bush based on "values" lack a fundamental understanding of what those values are actually supposed to be.

Wrong. Fox News regular and conservative hack Dick Morris says Granted, Morriss' contention is that the U.S. election day exit polls were riged by the networks to swing voters away from Bush. I suspect the more likely explanation is the vote was hacked.

Oops! they did it again! More missiles for terrorists? Thank goodness the world has given Bush four more years to protect them from the terrorists he created and armed.

A perfect summary of the kind of rhetoric peddled to Bush's base: the "self-righteous, gun-totin', military-lovin', sister-marryin', abortion-hatin', gay-loathin', foreigner-despisin', non-passport-ownin' rednecks, who believe God gave America the biggest dick in the world so it could urinate on the rest of us and make their land 'free and strong'." I'd have no problem with Bush (and indeed, would indulge in a bit of schadenfrude at the prospect of the American people getting the kind of "leader" they deserve), were it not for the fact that the U.S. is intent on exporting whatever reactionary madness has seized them to the rest of the world. I feel like it's 1936 all over again.

Ah the spin machine at work. Bad policies, plans and commitments. LEADERS recognize when they've made mistakes and work to correct them; LEADERS reconsider their view points according to the situation, not blindly adhere to dogma. Bush is no LEADER. Eyewitnesses, battlefield citations and Kerry's medical records show Kerry's wounds were recieved in combat. You are peddling lies spread by the partisan slime machine. Spin spin away... Lies about tax increases. Lies about defense cuts. Lies about Iraq funding. Bush captured the largest number of popular votes, not percentage. The flip side being, as I've already pointed out, that he also had more people vote against him than any other president. His 51 per cent win isn't even close to the highest margin of victory: Lyndon Johnson won in 1964 with 61 per cent of the popular vote. Correction: half of the American people plus one percent said no thanks to Kerry : the rest no thanks to Bush. Wrong yet again. Clinton got 42 per cent in 1992, 49 per cent in 1996.

Evidently, it's more important for Americans to have a president they can see themselves having a beer with than one who can talk to world leaders and understand global geopolitics. How very depressing.

A "brilliant campaign"? To paraphrase H.L. Mencken, No one in this world has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the American people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby. To answer your question about how a moron like Bush can pull off such swindles, it's easy when you have the services f the entire Republican party and it's affiliated propaganda apparatus. Here are the facts: Bush oversaw the largest job losses in history. Bush was in office for the largest attack on U.S. soil in history and has faile dto capture the mastermind. Bush invaded Iraq based on the bel;ief that teh regime there had WMD, weapons which have since been shown to be non-existent. You haven't pointed out a single factual error. Put up or shut up. Source? According the to Bureau of Economic Analysis, personal income grew 3.5 percent under Bush, 0.5 less than under Clinton. Meanwhile, median income has declined by $1,535 since Bush took office , or 3.4 percent. As well, the number of people living below the official poverty line increased by 14 per cent under Bush, while the employment-to-population ratio has plummeted under Bush's tenure from 64.4 in 2000 to 62.3 in 2003. Nor had there been one since 1993. That's an irrelevant factoid. False: according to the IRS, the vast majority of small businesses do not earn nearly enough money to fall into the highest income tax bracket and thus don't benefit from Bush's cuts at all. Furthermore, since he took office, Bush slashed the Small Business Administration budget by 25 percent. As for the child tax credit, the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy data shows that the temporary increase in the per-child tax credit to $1,000 for 2003 and 2004 will provide no benefit to one out of four families with children under 17, because they do not earn enough to qualify for the aid. i would hardly call the weakest incumbent reelection in recent memory to be "one-sided". This is the largest number of people who have ever voted AGAINST a president Assuming Bush gets New Mexico and Iowa, he will have gotten the lowest percentage of electoral votes (54%) of any incumbent running for reelection since Wilson. If those two states should swing Kerry's way (NM might), it'll be even lower. He will have won with the lowest percentage of the popular vote (51%) of any incumbent running for reelection since Truman He will have won by the lowest margin of the popular vote (3.5M) of any incumbent running for reelection since Truman Finally, he will have won the three states that put him over 270 (OH, NM and IA--assuming the last two go his way) by only 161,989 I suspect the reason the exit poll data did not match the final tallies can be summe dup in one word: Diebold. Exit polls/Electronic voting discrepancies IMO, the Republicans swiped this one too, with a little help from their friends.

My argument all along has been that the differences between the two U.S. parties are so small as to be insignificant.Which kinda defeats the purpose of a pluralistic system, no? Obviously.

Why? Aespite the blather about Bush receiving a "clear mandate" from the people, the fact is nearly 50 per cent of Americans did not vote for the man. So those individuals, who have already endured four years of a regime they disagree with simply have to suck it up for another four? I can certainly see why someone in that situation would choose flight. It seems the U.S. is swimming against the tide of modernity. While the rest of the world's democracies move toward the centre-left to embrace progressive values and cast aside religion, the U.S. is heading the other way, embracing reactionary social policies in the guise of "traditional values", xenophobia masquerading as patriotism and large-scale corruption stemming from the ongoing merger of state and corporate interests. It seems pretty hopeless. Finally, canada has a long history of providing refuge to Americans fleeing oppression, from the Loyalists to the underground railroad to Vietnam war resisters. It's a tradition we should continue to embrace. As much as I dislike the CPC, I'll take our brand of regressive conservatives over the Republican protofascists.

If disgruntled progressive Americans want to come to Canada to escape the clutches of the Republitalibans, I have just one thng to say: "Bring 'em on."

Uh..pointing out Bush's abundant policy failures are not insults. they are legitimate criticisms that you clearly have no answer for. And somewhere, Karl Rove is smiling, knowing his "Bush is just plain folks" meme remains firmly lodged in the frontal lobes of the credulous. The Bush of the cowboy hat and folksy charm is a creation, an articficial personae crafted to appeal to the electorate. how else do you explain the fact that both Bush and Kerry are incredibly rich, Ivy-League sons of privilege with roots in the northeastern establishment, yet it was Kerry who was branded the "elitist"? I prefer to look past the image and at the first-hand accounts of the real Bush: the quick tempered, belligerant with a sense of entitlement and a disdain for those not of the same social strata as him. No. It's a dodge, a canard that basically states "I can't argue with you, so I'll just pretend your opinion doesn't matter". It's telling that you haven't offered up a single well-reasoned defence of Bush. In fact, the best you can manage is that he makes his own sandwiches. A typical response and plays well with the right wing culture of victimhood, which always paints conservatives as victims of the leftist elites. Meanwhile, right wing think tanks and pundits dominate the airwaves, news organizations take their marching orders from the giant corporations that own them (a good example was the president of Viacom's endorsement of Bush. Viacom, of course, owns CBS.) But in order to see the big picutre, one has to have some idea about how the nmedia works and how public opinion is shaped. Neither you, nor the average American, seems capable of seeing that picture, falling back on tired whining about the "liberal media".

A choice without distinction is a false choice. By your logic, third world dictatorships that hold sham elecions with the same candidate "running" for two parties are legitimate democracies because the people have the option of checking one of two different boxes. Silly.