Harper attacks Justin

[Moonbox]

Nobody said we shouldn't try to understand them. That's always a good idea. What's not a great idea is saying that there's a 'cause' for the attack and that it happened 'because' something was done or not done. That's a "This, therefore that" sort of statement that implies blame, and laying blame before we know anything is idiotic.

[PIK]

Care to back that up?

That is the liberal way, and you can not deny it.

[cybercoma]

That is the liberal way, and you can not deny it.

Your opinion is great and all, except I'm asking you to back up the point that you stated as fact: Justin Trudeau claims the root cause of the bombing was our fault.

Granted, I'm going to assume you mean the US's fault, since the bombing didn't happen here.

[eyeball]

Well the younger brother said they did it because of the hatred his brother had for america. There is your root cause, hatred and jealousy. They came from a place that sucks, and to see how the rest of us live was to much for him to take. Justin's root cause = our fault.

That's right. Our foreign policies piss off so many hundreds of millions of people around the world that we are guaranteed to generate enough that will cross the line to violent hatred - to a place that blows not sucks. We are the radicalizers.

The only suckers here are those who fall for the evil in our midst that drapes itself with the images and sentiments generated by victims of blow back to ensure that no discussion of root causes ever ensues. All that's happening as a result of this policy is that more people are getting pissed off in the world, not less. It's almost as if that were the goal.

Edited April 23, 2013 by eyeball

[Moonlight Graham]

Saying the United States has it coming is like saying a woman that wears revealing clothing has it coming when she gets raped. Not cool.

Those aren't even remotely comparable. Saying the United States has it coming is more like saying a woman who rapes 50 children and then her child gets raped in act of vengeance has it coming. Neither is morally justified whatsoever, but people who play with fire get burned.

[eyeball]

Understanding how and why they did what they did is an important part of preventing further events, it's the "why" I'm getting stuck on.

Maybe you want to be stuck on it. Maybe the pain of changing your position is just too great for you to bear.

If that's the case just wait until the bill for reparations and decades of rape, torture and murder come due. At some point in the future there will be an accounting for past wrongs, there always is.

[eyeball]

Criticize American foreign policy if you want, but have the intelligence not to do it immediately after an event like this. Show some class.

This notion that people like Trudeau victimize victims by not waiting for some classy interval of time to lapse when discussing why we're under attack is a pretty grotesque reversal of culpability when it comes to exploiting their deaths.

[cybercoma]

Those aren't even remotely comparable. Saying the United States has it coming is more like saying a woman who rapes 50 children and then her child gets raped in act of vengeance has it coming. Neither is morally justified whatsoever, but people who play with fire get burned.

Sure, if terrorist acts targeted the military. They don't. They target innocent people to make a political point.

[eyeball]

They must feel they're targeting a homogeneous population that is in agreement with what our society has been perpetrating against so many others.

[Moonlight Graham]

Sure, if terrorist acts targeted the military. They don't. They target innocent people to make a political point.

A raped child is an innocent person.

[Moonbox]

That's right. Our foreign policies piss off so many hundreds of millions of people around the world that we are guaranteed to generate enough that will cross the line to violent hatred - to a place that blows not sucks. We are the radicalizers.

Gee, everything is just so simple isn't it. It's just big bad America's fault right? I mean, take the Americans out of the equation and everything is just peachy right? Islamic fundamentalists are just peaceful, reasonable people if you leave them alone. They have excellent standards of human rights, enlighten and educate their people, and they don't try to impose their beliefs or laws on anyone else....

Wait...I forgot about India/Pakistan, Turkey/Syria, Iran/Iraq, Indonesia, Mali, Sudan etc etc...

The fundamentalist world is so at odds with the rest of the world that there's little hope for simple reconciliation. American foreign policy has its serious faults and there have been some horrible blunders (ie. supporting Afghani mujahadeen against the Soviets, inciting the Shiites to revolt against Saddam in the 90's and then abandoning them, only to have to come back 10 years later on the pretense of a lie and invade again etc), but there are legitimate cases where the US would be doing more harm than good by NOT interfering. You like to pretend that some of the people they go after aren't dangeous nut jobs.

Did anyone else not see the irony of the Americans being asked to support the rebellion against Gadhafi???

Edited April 23, 2013 by Moonbox

[PIK]

That's right. Our foreign policies piss off so many hundreds of millions of people around the world that we are guaranteed to generate enough that will cross the line to violent hatred - to a place that blows not sucks. We are the radicalizers.

The only suckers here are those who fall for the evil in our midst that drapes itself with the images and sentiments generated by victims of blow back to ensure that no discussion of root causes ever ensues. All that's happening as a result of this policy is that more people are getting pissed off in the world, not less. It's almost as if that were the goal.

If that were true every muslim and american hater out there would be on the march.

[cybercoma]

A raped child is an innocent person.

Of course it is. So is a raped woman that wears revealing clothing. No one ever blames a raped child for being raped though. I was drawing a parallel to people that blame women for getting drunk, being in the wrong place, or wearing the wrong clothes, as those have anything to do with the reasons they are raped. Anyway, there's no point debating this here. It was a poor metaphor that distracts from the point.

[Keepitsimple]

Just back to the original thread - it's not just that he said the phrase "root cause"....it's that he went ahead and said there is no doubt of what the cause is:

"But there is no question that this happened because there is someone who feels completely excluded, completely at war with innocents, at war with a society. And our approach has to be, okay, where do those tensions come from?"

Radical Islam is just the opposite - its proponents do not feel excluded....they want to exclude everyone who does not believe in their ideology. If you are anything but a true believer - you are an infidel and not worthy of this world. It's sick - and it's twisted.....and Justin and his apologists still don't get it.

Edited April 23, 2013 by Keepitsimple

[eyeball]

Gee, everything is just so simple isn't it. It's just big bad America's fault right?

No, it's our fault too.

I mean, take the Americans out of the equation and everything is just peachy right? ?

I doubt it, they're not the only diddlers we truck and trade with.

Islamic fundamentalists are just peaceful, reasonable people if you leave them alone. They have excellent standards of human rights, enlighten and educate their people, and they don't try to impose their beliefs or laws on anyone else....

Except we didn't leave them alone so...

Wait...I forgot about India/Pakistan, Turkey/Syria, Iran/Iraq, Indonesia, Mali, Sudan etc etc...

They've all been diddled too.

The fundamentalist world is so at odds with the rest of the world that there's little hope for simple reconciliation.

Actually it's diddling that's really odd.

American foreign policy has its serious faults and there have been some horrible blunders (ie. supporting Afghani mujahadeen against the Soviets, inciting the Shiites to revolt against Saddam in the 90's and then abandoning them, only to have to come back 10 years later on the pretense of a lie and invade again etc), but there are legitimate cases where the US would be doing more harm than good by NOT interfering.

Bad will trumps good I'm afraid, no matter how much you shine it up. As for the west's biggest blunder in the Muslim world I'd have to say it was when America and Britain killed democracy in Iran in 1953 and replaced it with a dictatorship. That was a seriously fucked up thing we did and it crossed a line beyond which everything else has pretty much gone downhill since.

You like to pretend that some of the people they go after aren't dangeous nut jobs.

I just don't like pretenders who deny our complicity in having helped create them.

Did anyone else not see the irony of the Americans being asked to support the rebellion against Gadhafi??

Besides you, you mean?

[eyeball]

Just back to the original thread - it's not just that he said the phrase "root cause"....it's that he went ahead and said there is no doubt of what the cause is:

"But there is no question that this happened because there is someone who feels completely excluded, completely at war with innocents, at war with a society. And our approach has to be, okay, where do those tensions come from?"

You know, in retrospect he did leave enough room for doubt by not coming right out and simply saying the root cause is western imperialism. There is yet to emerge a western leader that can just put it in those simple black and white terms.

Radical Islam is just the opposite - its proponents do not feel excluded....they want to exclude everyone who does not believe in their ideology. If you are anything but a true believer - you are an infidel and not worthy of this world. It's sick - and it's twisted.....and Justin and his apologists still don't get it.

Of course people get that it's sick and twisted, it's just that they also get that western imperialism is too. Why don't you?

[eyeball]

If that were true every muslim and american hater out there would be on the march.

Give it time...

[cybercoma]

Bad will trumps good I'm afraid, no matter how much you shine it up. As for the west's biggest blunder in the Muslim world I'd have to say it was when America and Britain killed democracy in Iran in 1953 and replaced it with a dictatorship. That was a seriously fucked up thing we did and it crossed a line beyond which everything else has pretty much gone downhill since.

*blows whistle* FOUL!

Sorry, I wasn't born yet, so that doesn't matter.

[Moonbox]

eyeball, on 23 Apr 2013 - 15:52, said:

As for the west's biggest blunder in the Muslim world I'd have to say it was when America and Britain killed democracy in Iran in 1953 and replaced it with a dictatorship. That was a seriously fucked up thing we did and it crossed a line beyond which everything else has pretty much gone downhill since.

Is that why Mali was invaded by fundamentalists? Was that the reason for the Sudan rape/genocide? Was that why there was a popular revolt in Libya that needed American support to succeed, or why the Syrian rebels were begging for American support while Assad cracked down on his people?

[jbg]

I also don't see what's wrong with feeling empathy for the victims but also feeling empathy for the 2 guys that felt such hatred they decided to kill. Empathy doesn't mean appeasement or not severely punishing the killers.

It creates the risk of a moral equivalence between butchers and innocent victims. It's that simple.

[jbg]

He said more than that. Read the rest of the post genius.

One has to watch the sickening video of his interview with Mansbridge to get the full flavor.

[jbg]

Perhaps some of our posters haven't actually watched the interview. It's at the end of the interview. It's not so much just the mention of "root cause" - it's the prattling on and on and sounding more like a first year college student. Normally, a guy like Mansbridge might offer the odd nod in agreement but I think he was getting more and more astounded by what was coming out of JT's mouth. If you haven't watched, it's a must see.

Link:http://www.cbc.ca/news/petermansbridge/2013/04/peter-mansbridge-interviews-justin-trudeau.html

I was astounded too. I can't believe that this guy is serious in any way.

[jbg]

The idea of strapping a bomb to your chest and blowing yourself up in a bus is so alien and so despicable to us it seems unimaginable. In other parts of the world, however, people have decided it's a reasonable and desirable course of action. It's not because they're all batshit crazy. It's because they grew up in and live in a completely different world than we did and view it entirely different than we do. Trying to see the world through their eyes is empathy, and it does excuse their actions or mean we sympathize with it.

Though I normally respect your posts I must disagree. There are cultures that are better than others.

In our culture, gays, woman, and minorities have an imperfect chance of decent treatment. Still far better than their chance in any of these countries. We must not forget that some values are and must be absolute. Values such as freedom, initiative, accomplishment and self-discipline. And especially a chance for all to succeed. This is not the way it is in other lands.

Edited April 24, 2013 by jbg

[Moonbox]

I don't disagree with you, and you're touching on the point I'm trying to make. A lot of the values we cherish here mean nothing elsewhere in the world. Women, minorities, gays etc have zero rights in certain cultures. Values like freedom and even life are worthless in certain places, and while we can explicitly state that those cultures are not ones we're going to respect or cooperate with, it's still important to understand them and get in their heads, if for no other reason that to be able to anticipate and stop further attacks.

[eyeball]

Is that why Mali was invaded by fundamentalists? Was that the reason for the Sudan rape/genocide? Was that why there was a popular revolt in Libya that needed American support to succeed, or why the Syrian rebels were begging for American support while Assad cracked down on his people?

No.