John Hancock

Disgusted, pissed off, alienated - maybe turning pinko!

bgponder

Theophilus astutely comments:

In keeping with my above comments, I ask, what can be more recoverable than that which the majority (the world economy) now depends upon?

And speaking of recovery, to put this all in a real perspective, "recovery" is also a term in the Petroleum industry which refers to the amount of oil/gas which can (commercially) be obtained from any particular oil/gas bearing formation. As such, I would like to say that the Iraq reserves are already developed , i.e. they are economically accessible without additional expenditure. To develop the Siberian oilfields to the extent necessary to supplant the present Iraqi reserves would require years of investment and work. Whole new transportation infrastructures would be necessary, etc....so what will it mean to recover the (stable) political position that existed before hostilities were deemed necessary?

QUOTE]Only a level of force sufficient to redress the asault or to prevent such may be used.[/QUOTE]

I respectfully submit that a level of force necessary to prevent assault must take into account past actions and possible future actions by the antagonist, and as such, could include in this case the supervised (by consensus of the combatants and regulatory agencies) removal of the antagonist completely.

To Krieger:

Then you don't really have a dog in this fight, since it's between a Democratic Republic and a Fascist Dicatatorship, do you? Unless, that is, you are declaring the U.S. to be Imperialist. (That's pretty old, man.)


Sincerely, BarryG

(edited fer spellin')

Kenny

The war will be a great evil on our part. I pray for God’s mercy on our nation if we engage it. Even more so, however, I pray for God’s protection towards the suffering people of Iraq. Our unjust sanctions have already stripped many of them of all most everything. And now, we’re going to kill several thousand of them.

As you can tell, I am opposed to the war. I am a Christian.

There are several reasons why I am opposed to the war. Here are a few:

A just war must have a reasonable chance of success. I have no doubt that we’ll succeed in over throwing Saddam’s regime, but to what end? Well, presumably, its’ to increase stability in the Middle East and prevent terrorism. However, the war will likely only decrease stability in the Middle East and increase Muslim resentment of the U.S. and thereby increase the threat of terrorism.

A just war must be such that the benefit (in lives saved, human rights restored, etc) must out weigh the costs (in lives, human and economic devastation, etc.). Considering how slim the justification for the war already is and the number of Iraqis who will no doubt be killed by the war, I think the war clearly flunks this criteria.

A just war must be a last resort. Clearly war is not a last resort in this case. Why not make the inspection deadline something like 30 years? As long as we have UN inspectors nosing around in Iraq, it will be very difficult for Saddam to hide chemical and biological weapons indefinitely or to construct new ones.

God Bless,
Kenny

John/nyc

A hearty 10-4 to your post, BarryG!

Bush Sr.'s comment about a "new world order" is cogent here.

They seek a pax americana based on economic control.

I'm not entirely sure that its a bad thing to aim for.

I'm not entirely sure its a good thing to aim for.

No matter which: justifications will be found!

It ( an invasion) will happen.

Amos

Whow, Barry. Can we not just buy our needs on the world market instead of forcefully taking it from others?

bgponder

Dear Amos,

What I truly meant was in spite of political situations we must be able to buy oil, from wherever, at a reasonable price. I apologize for sounding as if I supported simply taking over--

We can already see the effects of market speculation on the possiblity of limited access due to war, i.e. there may be no production from those reserves for an unknown amount of time, and prices at the gasoline pumps are reflecting this fear. Just imagine a nuclear-capable Saddam controlling prices at will.

While I acknowledge that it will be a good thing in the very long run as
alternative energy technologies will be spurred on, the short-term economic impact (how many years?), let alone this regime's intentions should it be allowed to continue as is, IMO are too grave to consider. The best thing that could happen is that Saddam steps down, a coalition oversees a transfer of government, and war is averted altogether. But it doesn't seem likely to happen.

Well, I have said much more than the purposes of Theo in starting this thread entitled me to, so I am sorry for that and I am just going to shut up and lurk here from now on.

Sincerely, BarryG

Mr. Superbad

Atheist, liberal-leaning independent

I am opposed to the war as it's currently being handled.

I don't feel it is appropriate to invade Iraq without a coalition similar to what we had in the first Gulf War.

I would like clear and evidence of an impending threat from Iraq if we are going to go at it alone. Evidence that the Ricin found in the UK came from Iraq, or evidence Iraq bankrolled Al-Qaeda for 9/11, or that they are about to get their hands on a nuke, or any evidence of Iraq planning to commit a terrorist attack on the US.

Since there seems to be none, we shouldn't invade by ourselves without a large coalition, or without UN approval (something we could get if we had clear evidence of an impending threat from Iraq).

What's going to happen now, is that we are going to have hundreds or tens of thousands of American troops occupying a huge, destabalized country, surrounded by countries whos populations will be extremely pissed off by what we have done. This will be one huge propaganda video for the islamists. We are going to be faced with sucide bomber attacks from pissed off islamists leading us to treat the Iraqi civilians the same way Israel treats the Palestinians, and a world increasingly hostile to US interests. If Saddam is successful in destroying his oil fields, we'll have no way to foot the bill for reconstructing Iraq with money we don't have.

I want to see a democratic and secular Iraq, but if our handling of the situation so far is any indication of how that will go... I'm not going to get my hopes up.

Misso

I'm opposed to (this) war.
I'm an atheist and socialist.

I don't believe that a country has the right to attack a sovereign nation without a valid reason. I think the US, UK and Spain, first need to come up with a reason because now the reason seems to be hopping from disarming Saddam to overthrowing his regime to bringing democracy and liberty. What excactly are they fighting for?
I don't think any of these reasons are valid because:
- there is no proof of any weapons of mass destruction,
- no regime should have the say in what regime is to be overthrown (this is not to say that other regimes can't do something about violations of so called Human Rights),
- the chances of war bringing actual liberty and democray are slim to none.

MaximusDementis

skeptic, moderate democrat, agnostic

I am opposed to this war.

John Hancock

I respectfully submit that a level of force necessary to prevent assault must take into account past actions and possible future actions by the antagonist, and as such, could include in this case the supervised (by consensus of the combatants and regulatory agencies) removal of the antagonist completely.

To Krieger:



Then you don't really have a dog in this fight, since it's between a Democratic Republic and a Fascist Dicatatorship, do you? Unless, that is, you are declaring the U.S. to be Imperialist. (That's pretty old, man.)


Sincerely, BarryG

(edited fer spellin') [/QUOTE]

Democratic Republic no I don't swallow the this crap from rich fuckers anymore. Chicken hawk war profiteers and New American Century Johnny come latelys are recreating Veit Nam and those 500 billion we spent back then is now coming out of what little socially responsible programs that "Corporate Citizenship" hasn't wrung from the majority of this nation's populace already. This is fine by Loren P and the rest of you Pinochet minded rich fucks.

For you idiots that think all your job skills will raise your balls above the fire, you should read more of 1932.

Martin Buber