Machjo

Why shouldn't Canada be held to the same standard. If it's determined that Canada is also legally responsible for the irradiation of Iraq, then sure it ought to be held accountable too. Let international law decide that. Why should Canada be protected from any possible breach of international law on its part?

Canada never used depleted uranium in Iraq to the best o my knowledge. Though as for Canada selling such to other countries, then it's debatable. We sell it to them and they are free to do what they want with it. However, if we know they are using it in a criminally negligent manner exposing their troops and more importantly civilian populations to it, then yes I see your point. I don't know the details there but maybe Canada could be held accountable for Iraq too to some degree. As for Afghanistan, if Canada used depleted uranium there, then there is no ambiguity. Clearly Canada is responsible for any rise in cancer rates, birth defects, etc. for generations to come there too.

Yes, war is hell, and that's why we should think before jumping into it. What, the Geiger counter industry ain't doing well? Well, now you have a market.

If Canada has used such materials in Afghanistan, then would it not make more sense for Afghanistan to sue Canada seeing that we were never in Iraq?

Right. So we need to expose them along with entire populations for generations to come and their offspring to even more risk? As it turns out, Iraq intends to sue the US and the UK: But good luck with that I suppose. If Japan is anything to o by, Iraqis will suffer from this for generations to come.

In fact, I'd like to know what Canada does with the depleted uranium from its nuclear reactors. Does it in fact recycle it through the weapons industry via cheap metal like the US does? If we buy US military technology, and they use it, we might even be importing this poison and exposing our own troops to it too.

And another question. Are Canadian troops exposed to this depleted uranium in Afghanistan? After all, if some of that DU is in dust form, and floating around in the wind, then it's reasonable that if some locals are affected by it that Canadian troops could be exposed to it too, and DU not only hurts the troops themselves, but beyond this it also affects their reproductive organs, meaning a future generation of deformities in military children, and yet more cost to our health care system for at lest another generation to come.

Yup. I know you're being tongue in cheek, but for those of you who haven't seen the videos, how can we tolerate the use of deplete uranium when it has a half life of about 1.4 billion years? This means that that uranium will continue to be active for a long, long time to come. Sure in about 800 years or so it will eventually wash down deep beneath the soil or the ocean floor where it will be less likely to harm us, but in the mean time, cancer rates and infant deformities will continue to be high among populations living in those areas for generations to come, unless of course contaminated areas are cordoned off for the next few hundred years. Otherwise the other option is to clean those areas up, but as it turns out NATO has not ye cleaned up it mess from Kosovo, let alone Iraq and Afghanistan. In Kososo, since the Red Cross lacks the necessary safety gear to dispose of the contaminated products, shelled tanks and such continue to sit in the fields and all the Red Cross can do is tell the local population to stay away from them. Yet as long as that nuclear waste sits there, it will be a permanent danger for years to come. In Iraq it's even worse. over 300 tons of depleted uranium has been used already, even in populated areas like Iraq. In one story a child with cancer was found playing with abandoned contaminated materials! And as it turns out, US soldiers are not immune either. Some of them have described the classic symptoms of mild radiation poisoning (and when it comes to radiation poisoning, even mild poisoning is a long-term death sentence) and many of them have given birth to deformed children and are dying from cancer themselves and the US DOD continues to deny that depleted uranium is dangerous. I heard that the Iraqi government is supposedly planning on suing the US for this at a future date, owing to wide spread radiation contamination across the country and the medical and human costs involved. This is just a milder version of Chernobyl for crying out loud, and the effects will be felt for generations to come. Heck, many Japanese continue to suffer from radiation-induced illnesses today. This is going to be a sad reminder generations from today, long after the war is distant history generations from now, when there are still areas cordoned off because of radiation dangers, and continued high cancer rates in those parts of the world. What the US seems to forget, is that the depleted uranium they've deployed in Iraq and Kososo will continue to poison their environment hundreds of years from now, unless it gets blown away by the wind of washed out by the rivers to somewhere else, though even then it will just kill elsewhere for the next many generations to come.

I think my new signature answers this thread nicely.

You don't need any party. Just vote for the best candidate.

Scary. When the US dollar became a reserve currency for the world, it gave the US an advantage in that by having everyone buying the US dollar, the US could print more without fear of excessive inflation, thus giving it its false illusion of wealth over all these many years. The problem of course is that once so much of that money is sitting in reserve, it also makes the currency vulnerable to a sudden stampede if confidence is lost. The US is in that position now, ever so vulnerable to a stampede away from its currency. If it's lucky, countries will dump it gradually, thus allowing the US to deflate gradually via tax increases and spending cuts for many years to come. But what should happen if everyone stampede away from the US dollar? Then the US would be in a world of hurt. I would hate to see Canada get tempted into the same trap, attracted by the allure of being able to print more currency without inflation since the world would be buying our currency. Again, it would make us ever more arrogant over the years, cause us to live well beyond our means without even realizing it, and then what would happen if many years later the world then decides to dump the Canadian dollar? I don't mind a strong currency as long as it's real strength and not the illusion of strength brought on by a reserve currency. I realize there is not much Canada can do to avoid this. If the world wants to buy our currency, how will we stop it from doing so? However, I think Canada should express its wish that the Canadian dollar not be used for this purpose. Granted it's no guarantee other countries would listen, but then Canada could try to offer an alternative, suggesting for instance that countries turn to gold instead of another country's currency. Because just as the uS is now had by the nuts with its reserve currency, I'd hate to see Canada go down the same unsustainable path.

I think the issue is that in Canada at least we perceive our country to be allied to Israel even if only indirectly via the US. As a result, we tend to be harsher on our allies since they also reflect on us as part of the alliance. If for instance we were allied to Palestine, then we'd likely be more critical of Palestine for the same reason.

There have been criticisms of the rocket attacks on Israel. The point is though that it's all one sided. The rocket attacks are evil, yet it's perfectly OK for Israel to occupy foreign land? The two are unrelated. regardless of Israel's actions, Palestinians should not be targeting civilians. And regardles of the rocket attacks, Israel should not be occupying and colonizing foreign land illegally. Start a thread on the rocket attacks, and I'll defend your stance, no problem there.

From this site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Mandate_for_Palestine#United_Nations_partition_plan I especially like the following quote (bolding mine): "These events were the decisive factors that forced Britain to announce their desire to terminate the Palestine Mandate and place the Question of Palestine before the United Nations, the successor to the League of Nations. The UN created UNSCOP (the UN Special Committee on Palestine) on 15 May 1947, with representatives from 11 countries. UNSCOP conducted hearings and made a general survey of the situation in Palestine, and issued its report on 31 August. Seven members (Canada, Czechoslovakia, Guatemala, Netherlands, Peru, Sweden, and Uruguay) recommended the creation of independent Arab and Jewish states, with Jerusalem to be placed under international administration. Three members (India, Iran, and Yugoslavia) supported the creation of a single federal state containing both Jewish and Arab constituent states. Australia abstained. On 29 November, the UN General Assembly voted 33 to 13, with 10 abstentions, in favour of the Partition Plan, while making some adjustments to the boundaries between the two states proposed by it. The division was to take effect on the date of British withdrawal. It is important to note that the UN General Assembly is only granted the power to make recommendations, therefore, UNGAR 181 was not legally binding.[80] Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union supported the resolution. Haiti, Liberia, and the Philippines changed their votes at the last moment after concerted pressure from the U.S. and from Zionist organisations.[81][82][83] The five members of the Arab League who were voting members at the time voted against the Plan." So essentially, partition was doomed from the start based on the last sentence in that paragraph. You don't create a new state the neighbours of which reject. The already existing countries have the first say over a nation-to-be. Personally, I think the idea of a united federal state with Jewish and and Arab sections within would have been the way to go, as it would have allowed them to discuss conflicts at the federal level. By separating them entirely from one another, you also eliminated any strong authoritative body capable of having the final say in any dispute, especially when the dispute is over who owns the land. But again, it's probably too late to go to that now, but at the very least we could expect that Israel return to its original boundaries.

It's ironic that the group that now opposes a two-state solution is the very one that gave birth to Israel via a two-state solution: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Mandate_for_Palestine#United_Nations_partition_plan Had the British never partitioned Palestine, this problem would never have come into being. And seeing that Jews were already free to go to Palestine, why did they need to separate from Palestine in the first place? Could they not have lived side by side with their hosts? Again, now that it has been partitioned, it's a little late to go back to it now. But one would think they could at least respect international law and retreat back to their original borders?

Bob, I've noticed a few inconsistencies: Is Israel a secular state or a Jewish state? If secular, then the 'God gave it to us' argument is gone, never mind the fact that according to the Bible no state of Israel is to be formed until after the messiah has returned. Also, if secular, then why the Judaification the military and the desire to expand Israel's borders to its former boundaries of Biblical times rather than be satisfied with its limits as recognized by international law? And why so little intervention on the part of the police against extremists in Israel who harass and threaten Christians and other non-Jews? And if religious, then why not adhere to the Bible and dismantle the state of Israel until the Messiah returns? Looking at it that way, your best bet is for the secular argument since then you could argue on international law which has at least given some Palestinian land to the state of Israel rather than the Bible which would require you to dismantle the state of Israel entirely until the coming of the Messiah. Now granted the secular argument is not without its challenges too. First off, since the Bible prohibits the formation of the state of Israel until the coming of the Messiah, the UN should never have taken that land from Palestinians and given it to the Zionists in the first place. That said, since native-born Israelis as individual persons have the same rights under international law as the Palestinians, since after all it's not fair to blame the children for the sins of their fathers (though granted the Bible did sometimes mete out multi-generational punishments, but if we're arguing on secular grounds the Bible thus becomes irrelevant and only international law relates), this leaves the UN with no choice but to now maintain the current legal status of the state of Israel.The displaced Palestinains have already been displaced, and to renege on the creation of the state of Israel would then displace many Iraeli Jews while not necessarily fixing the problem for the Palestinians since their old homes are likely not there anymore, already bulldozed and built over. So the best bet it would seem would be for the uN to maintian the current legal status of Israel and continue to insist that Isreal return to its original legal boundaries as given by the UN originally, which has been the position of the UN all along anyway. Why does Israel not comply with international law and retreat back to its legal boundaries rather than to continue to occupy and colonize foreign land?

And then we have the life of an Israeli Christian:

More fun:

IDF having fun on their down time:

Is it really coming down to Holy War: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_ZDvMXWNZI&feature=related

And now we're engaging in Holy War: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oiZ8I35Mtg

Another good day at the office:

By the sound of it all these guys really want is to turn the clock back to pre-Israeli Palestine when Jews and Muslims lived in peace. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skbExDtFiu4&feature=related

And who broke ceasefires: