Black Dog

Thank goodness. Now that Hussein is gone we can rest, knowing there's no one anywhere else in the entire world who fits the above critirea. And I'm sure if they were, teh U.S would be really, really quick to step up, right? Right?

No, dipshit, the question was: how does the topic of France and the UN have to do with religion and politics. Other than as a platform for you to wate bandwith with your narrow-minded racist tripe.' An alcoholic, "former" coke-head, a draft-dodger who coasted through life soley on the basis of his priviledged background and familial connections, who acts as little more than a tool for the elite interests who placed him in power. A hypocrite who mouths platitudes about Christianity while shitting all over the principles espoused by Jesus. Who is in bed with special interests whose only interests are enriching themseles at the expense of otehrs and the nation ("Kenny-boy" Lay, anyone?): this is your icon of "conservative" values. No surprise: you both share a total lack of any values, or morality even as you pontificate on the same subject. Just piss you off, sweetie: just to piss you off.

What's this have to do with religion?

I'm a NDPer to the core. But I will vote Liberal if it keeps the Neo Con party from gaining ground. Chances are, I'm not alone.

As I've said: withdraw from the territories. Dismantle the settlements. Set about establishing a viable Palestinian state. There will, of course, still be extremists who would wish to "drive Israel into the sea". However, restoring a measure of dignity, respect and compassion to the Palestinian people would staunch the flow of support for these terrorists and make it much easier for them to be brought to justice. I think it's abundantly clear to even the most casual observer that Israel's heavy-handed tactics aren't working. Israelis are still dying (albeit in far smaller numbers than their Palestinian counterparts) and the cycle of vioolence and death is continuing. So why is there such a profound and deep faith that the use of force will ultimately prevail? Straw man: characterizing the entire Palestinian people as "a group of fanatics willing to martyr themsleves in the name God". Allow me: I believe that in your defense of Israel, the only western, civilized democracy in the entire region, albeit one that has (paradoxially) institutionalized brutal methods of repression and terror in the conduct of an illegal occupation, you are on the wrong side of the issue. I believe that in my defense of the Palestinians, a group of dispossessed and humilated people living under a military occupation, an occupation that has allowed the cause of a small group of group of fanatics willing to martyr themsleves in the name of God to perform hideous acts of inhumanity to flourish, that I am defending the principles of freedom, justice and equality and am, therefore, on the right side of this issue. So why is Israel unwilling to extend this same spirit of tolerance to the residents of the Occupied Territrories? As apppalling and evil as the campaign of terror by Palestinian extremeist groups is, how do Israel and its supporters justify the land grabs, the destruction of infrastructure, withholding of food, water and medical supplies? This kind of false justification (ie. using the sins of Israel's neighbours to excuse its own) keeps cropping up and is a clear sign that, on some level, even the most ardent defenders of Israeli policy aren't wholly at ease with the tactics the state employs. Thus the need to point fingers elsewhere.

Buchanan's a nutjob.

Do you endorse this? Because it seems to be a little strange that the so-called "liberators" would turn to the very people they ousted to keep order. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Did I say anything about Baathists? Nope. But don't let that stand in the way of your straw man argument. Indeed, the Ba'athists brutalized and repressed the Kurds and Shites for years, yet no smug, self-righteous neocons worried about a minority regime of Saddam and his Baathist Party thugs brutalizing a majority of Iraqis. Indeed, many of the same people who called for Saddam's head in the past year were his biggest cheerleaders during the 1980's when he was at th eheight of his brutality. Remember Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam the very same day Iraqi forces used U.S-built helicopters to gas Iranian troops and Kurdish villages? Therefore, I find your willingness to champion the Kurdish cause while supporting the same folks who played major roles in the historical oppression of them to be rather amusing. Funny you'd bring this up... Cheney, Institute distorted study's findings

Yeah, how dare those Iraqis lash out against their conquerers: what do they think? That it's their country? The Kurds deserve their own state or at least a voice in a rebuilt Iraq. But not at anyone else's expense. However, while the Kurds have long been the whipping boys of the region (caught between the rock of Turkey and the hard place of Saddam Hussein), I fail to see how drafting Kurdish goons to brutalize the Iraqi population could serve any purpose beyond sparking a full-scale rebellion and civil war. Put another way: you are a moron.

Olso, as I've already discussed, was a sham. The roadmap was a joke, allowing Israel to play the white hat by dismantling a few "outposts" (a move that was violently opposed by the "peace-loving" settlers) even as they continued to aggressively expand existing settlements. Hypocricy is the word. I'm no fan of Arafat, but Israel's polices have made it really easy for his views to find an audience and for groups like Hamas to breed their message of hate. At the same time: what do the Palestinians have to gain by ceasing the violence? As for the rest of your plea to the historical injustices perpetrated against Israel: cry me a river. Israel is the strongest power in the region, a nuclear power with the unlimited support of the U.S.A. They're no longer the victim here, nor is the state's survival in jeopardy. Rather the oppressed have become the opressors. If you can't see the distinction between understanding the rationale behind an action and supporting said action, you probably shouldn't be debating this subject. Either you're being deliberately obtuse and using this line of illogic to gain the moral high ground, or your just plain ignorant. As for the targeted strikes (which tend to kill far more innocents than targets), these are part of the tactics that are leading Isreal down the wrong path. Even its own leaders are starting to understand that. See? Duh. Fine. Take your ball and go home. It's clear that your ideological blinders are on. I've yet to see a single concession from any of the resident Israel apologists that that state's tactics vis a vis the Occupied Territories are heavy-handed, even as NGO's, groups like the Red Cross, Amnesty International, Human Rights watch, as well as the international community, line up to condemn them (lemme guess: they';re all anti-Semites ). So, since it's clear you are unable to defend the indefensible, stay outta the kitchen.

Finally some sense... Oh crap. Are the continued terrorist attacks against civilian populationsm repugnant and, ultimately, counterproductive? Certainly. however, statements such as the above are the equivilant of the rapists defence that "she was asking for it". As for the final statement, when such "collateral" damage is incurred as a byproduct of state-sponsored and directed policies of terror, dehumanization and repression, the two actions reside on the same moral plane. A question: what motivation do the militant elements of Palestinian society have to stop the terror attacks? Would a cessation of such activities bring about an end to Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip? Would Sharon and his warlords decide to dismantle the network of settlements and re-settle their populations elsewhere in Israel? Would they then commit themselves to aiding in the construction of a viable Palestinian state? If your answer is yes to any of these questions, on what are you basing such a position on? It's clear Israel has no intention of abandoning its expansionist settlement policies, so what is there to gain for the Palestinians by rolling over? Your hypothesis is utter rubbish, as it lays the burden of the actions of a (relatively) small network of extremists on the entire Palestinian population. (This is the point where someone will trot out the "but 75 per cent of Palestinains suupport suicide bombers" blah blah blah. As though hatred of the Jewish state, and not inhumane treatment, humiliation, marginalization and oppression weren't sufficient reasons.) It's a straw man. If anything, it's Israel's government who seems to be carrying the torch of ethnic cleansing as they are aggressively pursuing policies that will marginialize and disperse the Palestinians into a network of ghettos to satisfy certain elements' vision of a greater Israel.

Sorry snookums. Your "reality" is way off.Click. But hey! Don't let the facts get in the way of a good paranoid rant. Au contraire. I recognize (indeed, am proud to say) that my views are quite left of the mainstream here in Canada and even beyond that of the States. What I see is an increasing trend towards the centralization of media power in the hands of a small group of individuals and megacorporations. Ten multinational corporations own virtually all broadcast, internet, or print media in the US—General Electric, Viacom, AOL/Time Warner, Disney, AT&T, News Corp, Liberty, Sony, Bertelsmann, and Vivendi. Now, that doesn't make these media outlets conservative, per se, but what are the odds of CBS launching into a serious criticism of G.O.P policies, when it's mothercorporation is one of the biggestv recipients of government largesse through its massive defense contracts? Slim. Very slim. Indeed, even the most cursory comparson of the media coverage of the last two presidents shows the undeniable conservative slant. Clinton was vilified, hounded and almost driven out by a right-wing backed media establishment, the same establishment that has handled Bush with kid gloves (though that seems to be shifting somewhat). As I said abopve, I recognize where I'm coming from. It seems you suffer from the same malady that you accuse me of: you believe your views are indicitive of the mainstream and are unable to acknowledge that your own bias colors your interpretation. Of course, as William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard and former Chief of Staff for Dan Quayle said:

I fear you're confused. If you want to point fingers, aim them at the shrill army of neoconservative pundits that fill the airwaves of the so-called "liberal" media. Like Ann Coulter, whose book "Slander" was itself so filled with fabrications, half-truths, personal attacks and outtright lies that you could make a career out of ripping it to pieces (oh wait: someone has.). Like Bill O'Reilly, who censored the son of one of the victims of 9-11 for signing the "Not In Our Name" petition: And Rush himself, the pill-head who railed against drug addicts, the multiple divorcee who espoused "family values" and never missed a chance to befoul the character of anyone he disagreed with by stooping to the lowest personal attacks. You neocons really need to get your messaging straight. See, I was under the impression that the media was controlled by liberals. So how is it that Rush and his ilk are so successful if there's such an overwhelming bias against conservative voices? Ocham's Razor has us look for the simplest solution. In this case, it's that the "liberal media" is a myth, a bogey-man invented by conservatives to hide behind, even as they continue to assert the dominance of right-wing voices in the mainstream media.

Please, spare me the martyr routine. I perused the link you provided and am already well-versed in the other side (one has only to pick up a newspaper in order to be inundated with "your" side of the story). Really, I've heard all your lines a million times before this and can recognize when someone is debating on principles and when someone is coming from a position of raw emotion and mounting knee-jerk, idealogivcal defense. You are definitely in the latter category. Whether your answers are remotely conected with reality is another matter... Oh, the burden you carry. So much knowledge, so underappreciated.... Funny how one (alleged) visit to an Arab village trumps a range of opinions and ideas gleaned from across teh region. That'as the beauty of mass media: it allows one to make judgements and form opinions based on a variety of perspectives, rather than the predjudices of experience.

Or one could say that Israel is using terrorist attacks prompted by their continued occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip as a means of accelerating their expansion into those territories to advance a virulent nationalist agenda promoted by the likes of Likud and etremist elements within Israeli society. It's been 35 years since Israel captured this territroy. Why are they still there? Right back at you. So is there a scorecard that you use to know that your side is in the right? "Societies trampled" versus "societies rebuilt"? As long as the U.S. (in your view) stays slightly ahead on the other side of the ledger, there's really no abuse you are unwilling to overlook. I would suggest you take a look at your own posts. If you could stop patting yourself on the back long enough, you can see thatwe've been having this discussion for a few days now, during which time you've merely spouted the same one-sided rhetoric without a single solitary concession that your viewpoint is the absolute truth (from God's mouth to your ear, no doubt). I've been willing to concede that terrorism is indeed a problem, that the Palestinian people have been betrayed by their own leaders and the leaders of the other Arab nations in the region and that the only way to stop the terror and strife is for Palestinians to be given the tools to build a civil society. You, on the other hand, refuse to acknowledge any wrongdoing or, indeed, the remote possibility of wrong doing by your white hats in Likud and the White House. Instead, you hide behind bogus statements concerning the survival of Israel and culpability of the Palestinians (echoing Golda Meir's statement that (and I'm paraphrasing) Israel can never forgive the Palestinians for forcing them to kill their sons (as though the palestiniansd bear sole responsibility for their own situation and were never acted upon by external forces). In your view, the truth is whatever you say it is. And you have the nerve to lecture me about balance. Save it.

So they say. I'm sick of apologists desecrating the memory of the Shoah by using it to justify Israeli state terrorism today. The historical and contemporary persecution of the Jews is black mark on humanity. However, for Israel to employ the same methods that have been used against them in the past is just as loathsome. This is not a struggle for survival of the Zionist state: that battle has been fought and won. What we're talking now is good, old-fashioned ethnic cleansing. So the trampling of peace, justice, democracy, human rights and so forth is okay as long as it's done in the name of of peace, justice, democracy, human rights? I wonder how people like you sleep at night.

No Canada has much to answer for indeed. But our reach has never been, nor can ever be, as long as that of our southern neighbour. Once again, you fall into the typical right wing trap of characterizing America's past (and ongoing) dalliances with dictators and thugs as simple foreign policy "mistakes", as opposed to intentional, deliberate actions borne of a cynical policy of realpolitik that lives on today. During the Cold War, such actions were generally conducted under the guise of fighting communism. No doubt today the boogey man is terrorism, but at the end of the day, it's U.S. interests that are served and not those of the people who must live with the regimes the U.S. props up. My pleasure. and another incident. I wonder how many Palestinians living in the camps have ever actually set foot in Jordan. Not many, i'd wager. It doesn't matter if they are "Jordanian" in your view or Martian: palestine was tehir homeland and Israel drove them from it and is not allowing them to return. Period.

No surprise there. The war on drugs means money for police. My emphasis. If it ain't illegal, how then would such operators stay in business, pray tell? Exactly.

Speaking of propaganda... The Big Lie of Israel's apologists is that Arafat rejected the Camp David accors out of hand, despite Israel's generous offer. That is false. israel offered Palestine's leadership 22 percent of their historic homeland - they agreed to surrender the remaining 78 percent to Israel as part of the "Land-for-Peace" that Oslo promised. Camp David offered the Palestinians 91 percent of this 22 percent. The remainder would be carved up like a Tturkey and criss-crossed with an ever-growing network of settlements that would have divided the Palestinian territory into a series of isolated, unconnected reservations. The 91 percent offer to Palestine was simply this: three parcels of non-contiguous land, divested of prime agricultural real estate, diminished in water supply, surrounded by settlements with armed settlers and Israeli troops and totally sealed off from its current international borders. Some offer. What is "genuine collateral damage" anyway? As for the rest of that issue, a cursory examination of the IDF's tactics, especially in recent "targetted killings" shows them to be either unwilling or unable to take the necessary steps to minimize civilian casualties. Tactics taht include firing a hellfire missle into rush hour traffic are as heavy-handed and deliberate as those employed by suicide bombers. Oh yeah, everything's just peachy. Such expressions of childlike faith would really warm the cockles of the heart if people weren't still dying as a result of the U.S's realpolitik. We can see it today in Pakistan, Columbia, Saudi Arabia and a host of other brutal regimes that exist at the pleasure of the U.S.A. The hypocricy lives. FastNed, while I applaud your willingness to aknoeledge the poisonous affect of certain exterimst elements in Israeli society, I find it interesting that you would write them off as "insignificant" (despite acknowledging that they play a key role is Iraeli politics) while tarring the Palestinian people with the same brush as extremists within that society. It's a double standard and it's a telling one. As have 50 years of oppression, humiliation and death. But then, it's always the other guy that's the problem, isn't it. I wonder what it's like to see the world in black and white. Again: why is the onus on the Palestinian people to make the first steps to peace? They are not the ones who are building settlements, wallas and continmuing to foster condition sof extreme hardship and suffering. They are burdened with a corrupt leadership, indiffernt neighbours and a total lack of the essentials of a civil society (education, a free press, etc.). How can they be expected to make strides when they are being kept down from all sides? Most of the Palestinian people in the OT were either former residents of what is now Israel or their immediate descendants. Israel was founded by an influx of European Jews whose ancestral links to the homeland were, at best, spiritual. to frame this another way: how would you react if you were thrown out of yoyur home, dispossessed and driven out of the country by Canada's Native population (who, it could be argued, have more claim to this land than Eurpoes Jews did to Palestine)? If you were then told to move to the U.S.A. on the assumption that any land populated by white folks must be as good as any other, how would you react? Probably in much the same way as the Palestinians have, I'd wager.

Oh, go stick your condecesion up your ass. You may have "seen it" but that hardly make you an expert, while your sources are going to be as biased as anyone else, if not more so (you say you know settlers for god's sake: hardly an impartial source). Noooooo. I'm saying despots can be expected to act like despots (way of the world). That's a non-judgemental statement, it says nothing of whether or not their actions are excusable. On the other hand, for the US or Israel to claim to be beacons of peacer and justice while fostering terror and oppression is rank hypocricy. Even while conducting unjust and downright heinous violations of international law and basic human rights? Oh yeah right: the good guys don't do that stuff in your world. cause they're good guys.

Yes, but the Palestinians can't be held responsible for the actions of the other Arab nations, now can they? The past conflicts between Israel and its Arab neighbours were not initiated by the inhabitants of the Occupied Territories. Unless you think one "roving gang of Arabs" is as good as another... And are therefore unable to rationally and objectively assess the situation. It's a two-edged sword. Now you're reaching. If you actually read that line in context, it's clear I was talking about an element within the population of settlers, not the Jewish people or the Zionist movement as a whole. This looks a lot like the tactic that Israel apologists employ to deflect criticism by levelling charges of anti-Semetism. Nice try though. Military cheif of staff and a clusterful of generals aren't good enough? Why would they tell a differnt story than Dayan?As for The quotes weren't his, but statements made on the public record. Your beef is with the messanger. Bullshit. When I have I ever excused or apologised for the actions of Iraq or China? Show me. It's not moral relevativism to not be surprised when despots to act like despots and to hope that self-described defenders of freedom and justice conduct themselves as such. You are the moral reletavist because you refuse to hold your "good guys" responsible when they act like the "bad guys". BTW, your analogy is crap. You can't compare nations' deliberate acts of policy to traffic accidents. You can't assign human traits such as "good character" to a bloody country. Ridiculous.

Sorry "they started it!" doesn't work in the scholyard and sure doesn't work here. There's no disputing the struggles Israel went through to establish itself and survive, but past abuses do not excuse those of the present. If Israel was genuinely interested in peace and security, it would end the settlements in the illegally occupied territories, tear down the wall and work to build a viable Palestinian civil society instead of continuing to expand settlement and oppress the Palestinian people (who are caught between the rock of corrupt leadership and the hard place of Israel's war machine). Despite you and others of your ilks attempts to cast Israel as an innocent victim, it holds all the cards in this situation. And I'm sure some of your best friends are black, too. What you think you know is irrelevant. Violence perpetrated by Jewish settlers is a well-documented fact as is Israel's aggression in the Six Day War. (Sinc eyou don't believe me on the latte rpoint BTW, here's what the people who made the call had to say: But I digress. Irrelevant. Example? Also irrelevant. I didn't start thi stopic. If someone were to start a thread on any of the above, I would be happy to participate in the discussion. As for the above, I have personally worked on the Tibetan cause in the past, am oppossed to the continued Russian oppression of Chechnya, and, to be honest, haven't followed the Khasmir situation. Something to look into. It is you who demonstrate your ignorance by defending the actions of Israel. As the only democratic nation in the region, I would expect better than for that nation to engage in the same kind of repressive tactics employed by its tyrranical neighbours. But if you think it's fair to put Israel on the same plane of moral equivilancy as, say, Syria, that's your problem. As for "closing my eyes to gross human rights abuses..." you obviously haven't been reading anything else I've written on this forum. I ma concerned with human rights abuses, illegal wars and occupations regardless of who conducts them You are willing to excuse any abuse, any crime so long as it is perpetrated by the "good guys", as befits a blind idealogue such as yourself. As if there's anything in the world that would ever convince you that you would be wrong. That would require an openess and humility that you and those like you simply do not possess.

There are plenty of fanatics who conduct attacks on their Palestinian neighbours, bulldoze Palestinian property and push their ultra-Zionist nationalist agenda for a Greater Israel. they are as much a part of the problem as Hamas. (By the way "roving bands of Arabs" is a nice little bit of racist imagery) Yes. Yes they are. Waiting for justice. They are settling in illegally occupied land. I don't care if the land is smaller than the Niagara Region or smaller than a football field: they are still grabbing land, it's still expansionism. My point (which you clearly missed) was that there is an obvious middle ground between having no desire to increase their land holdings and your notion that, if they did, they woul dhave just conquered the entire Middle East.

And what is this "efficient manner" you speak of? You ducked the question by posting that little bit of ad hominem dribble about "bleeding heart libs". Answer the question. I guess every nation needs its creation myth. fact is, yes, there was a fairly large jewish population in Palestine prior to World War 2, working alongside their Arab neighbours to build a life under the colonial rule of the Ottomans and then the British. However, the notion that the area was completely barren prior to the creation of Israel is revisionist bunk. Maybe: if the sum total of one's knowledge of geopolitcs is derived from the game Risk. First, despite its military might, Israel's population is quite small, especially when stacked up against its more populous Arab neighbours. An Israeli land grab of which you speak would be logistically and militarily unfeasable, not to mention completely impossible to maintain. (What is it with right-wingers that they can't see things in anything but extremes: ie. Israel mustn't want land because they haven't taken it all. WTF?) Answer me this, then: if Israel has no interest in expanding its borders, why does ity continue to buiold settlements in the Occupied Territories and nudge its aparth...er...security fence beyond the boundaries of the Green Line?

Simple: I considered the source. Also, I found the phraseology of the original statement troublesome, as it implied that the full amount of foreign aid contributions to the PA are directed to terrorist activity, something I found rather difficult to believe and still do. While the PA's funding of terror groups is well documented and undeniable, the idea of $300 million going to Hamas seemed like a whopper to me.

I'm an atheist and the use of God in teh Pledge offends me because it's tantamount to the state promoting religion or at least religious beliefs. I wouldn't care if it was God, Allah, Vishnu or whatever: religion is a personal matter and should not be endorsed or promoted by public institutions. As for this being a trivial matter, both sides would probably disagree with you.