More US casualties
 

Over the weekend in Iraq, an graduate from my school was killed while riding in a convoy. They were killed by a "road-side bomb". My journalism teacher had this student for all four years of his highschool career and he eventually became like a son to her. This is my bitching:

It was torture to see my journalism teacher, whom I really like not only as a teacher but as a person as well, talk about his death and have her have to go into her office and cry every so often. She had been talking about him all year, saying how absolutely wonderful of a kid he was and how worried she was.

I remember the day that Bush made the announcement that the war was over... She was so happy because she knew (thought) that her ex-student was going to be safe. Now, he's dead because of Bush's incompentence.

No, I don't blame it all on Bush.. I suppose that these types of things cannot be avoided while in war, but according to Bush, we are out of war.

Anyway.. any comments and opinions would be appreciated. Also, I will most likely be showing this thread to my journalism teacher, so anything you can say to cheer her up would be great. Thanks.

Re: More US casualties
 

Let me guess, you're a liberal? Maybe you should go back and reread history before you make stupid statements that are incorrect. Bush NEVER said that the war was over! He announced the end of major combat which is exactly what has taken place. It isn't Bush's incompetence that got us into this mess. If you want to lay the blame then lay it where it belongs: on Saddam Hussein for failing to live up to U.N. resolutions which he was in violation of for over 12 years and also on terrorists such as Al Qaida. We wouldn't be at war if we were not attacked first by terrorists and if murderous dictators actively trying to acquire nuclear and chemical weapons would follow U.N. resolutions that they were required to follow did as they were supposed to do.

Also, the loss of life has been incredibly low for fighting two different wars at the same time. More people in the U.S. die in two or 3 days time from car accidents than have been kiiled TOTAL fighting both wars in 2 years.

I'd rather be in a car than in a war for these imbeciles any day. Use the edit option. Lastly, we funded Al Qaida in the 80's to kill Soviets. So anything they toss at us now, thank George the First, BB. Good game kay thanks.

So, more people die in the US than in wars? How many people in the US die because they were shipped across seas to fight a war and were blown by a bomb in a car?

Bush did say that 'major combat' was over, but what do you interpret this as? More and more US soldiers are dying over there when they need not be!

Let me guess, you're a brainwashed conformist?

/me wonders who's got the facts

BB - Iraq has nothing to do with terrorism, even the CIA admits this.

PS - disagreeing with the US dosen't make you a liberal.

Thanks Marv. Being less inclined to persecute people on moral issues makes you a liberal. Correct me if I'm wrong, please. Don't want to make too much of an ass of myself.

liberal

\Lib"er*al\, n. One who favors greater freedom in political or religious matters; an opponent of the established systems; a reformer; in English politics, a member of the Liberal party, so called.

Hm. Maybe we are liberals, by definition. I'll not be condemned for it though.

By definition, Bush is a fascist.

Once again Grumpy gives us insensative, irrelavant and innacurate posts.

The point here is that another young man has died in another needless war, and his teacher and his friends are upset and saddened.

I've told you once before Grumpy, go away and get your own life. You sad little waste of oxygen.:down:

Thanks Baz. I'm desensitized to most things, but it's nice to see a handful of people have some decency.

I truly appreciate that Baz.

Re: Re: More US casualties
 

It was Bush's fault for shooting himself in the foot before the US entered the war. If he had taken the time to build a stronger coalition that included major military countries like his father did during the First Gulf War, there wouldn't me so much pressure on the US and British forces. A greater number of international troops would make the occupation of hostile areas easier and the attacks less frequent. The world is a much better place without Saddam, but it's quite obvious that the threat was nowhere near what Bush and that faulty State of the Union Address made it to be.

Nicely put and agreed upon, Dawg. I wonder if we'll ever really find WOMDs..

The truth is out there..... Not that will ever find it :blah:

Haha, yes indeed. Especially with how things are run. :restrains from constant bashing of the government:

Re: Re: More US casualties
 

You mean there is life outside of Internet? You're sh~~~in' me! :cry:

There, there, mem. It'll all be fine.

No one is stupid enough to think that the president has the power to declare war. Oh wait...

At least call it the Senate's war, it would be more accurate.

[ignore this]
Well, hmm I think a lot of people would be mad if I said what I think about this war, so I will just not try.
As for the death, I dont like it. There is no need for this "War". I mean, viet'nam at least had a better reason for us to have stayed in there for 12+ years (stop the spread of communism and protect our investmints in the asian nations verses some oil companys' greed and so called wepons of mass distruticion that threaten our lives). But I would just get insulted saying this, as I was not alive at the time so I dont know what happend. Oh well, we killed millions of innocent vietimies (SP, that was bad), even 10-15 years after the combat ended, thanks to all the chemiclas we dumped on them. Wow, off topic.
I dont feel that Saddam was infringing my freedoms in any ways (other then the DMCA, Patriot Act, ect. that he made for us.... right? heh). Sure Bush made many mistakes going into the war. Now the worst is to stay in there, with all the gorilla combat that is happening. There is no easy way to combat it (Viet'nam proved that), and it will not end untill we leave or kill most everyone and turn Iraq into our own dictatorship even worse then what Saddam was doing.

I didnt mean to rant, sorry. I just am really REALLY mad as to what is going over in Iraq. The worthless killing, the pain it is causing everyone. This is not needed, and will only get worse. Which I am suprysed it has not already happend.
[/ignore this]

Sorry. I dont like death one bit, and it is not needed. I feel sorry for what has happend to them personaly, for the death of someone they loved. It is always hard to loose someone you love, I know.
One of my mothers friends son is/was (not too sure if he has come home for good or not) in Iraq for some time.

:edited for spelling (almost), clarity:

So if I give someone a gun and they shoot you, it's my fault?

Hell yeah it is. You provided the tool. They just pulled the trigger. They're partly at fault, but you more so for initiating the chain of events leading to my demise. And laz..:up:, man.

I agree, Laz. You made good points.

Jackal and everyone, for that matter: Not only did we fund Al Qaida, we trained their 'soldiers'. We also funded Sadam to build weapons. So now we're over there killing them because they have weapons? Oh wait.. maybe they don't because we can't find any proof.

I can take the viewpoint of those who are for the war.. He could have used those weapons against us, sure.. but where was the threat? Did he give the pentagon a phone call and say that he was going to use some weapons on us? Did he crash planes into our cities? No.. THAT was a threat, but we've all been trained and manipulated to forget about Osama. My basic opinion is that it wasn't our business.

Think of it this way.. Imagine sitting at home watching TV, specifically the news, and tanks come rolling down your street. You soon find out that someone has come into your country to kill your leader and establish a new government. Even all these Bush supporters would be upset.. Hell, they'd be the first out there with their huntin' caps and rifles shooting at the foreign soldiers. Learn the meaning of hypocracy.

Exactly. I would fight simply because it's my place and there might just be something worse. America is hell in many a way, but there are worse things. So with that thought in mind, what makes it justified to think we have the whole thing right and it's our place to change it? Look what Kissinger did in Cambodia. He's still alive and free. Not in the country, because he'd get tossed in the slammer for war crimes, but he got away. Unspeakable amounts killed on his order and he's out. Yet when Osama bin Laden kills, what, 3000 in WTC, we hear immediately on the news "Don't mess with Texas" and "If you aren't with us, you're with the terrorists". They have a new excuse to make us love them. To go along with it all. It's despicable.

America has this mentality that they are the world power. That is that they have the power and ability to do as they please because they're the most 'civalized' country in the world. America have as much right going over there as Osama (Osama's followers) did coming over here.

Quote universal throughout history of white men (I am one): "It is God's will..."

Popularized and overused by Bush himiself.

Or, as you mentioned, "You're either with us, or you're with the terrorists". Wow. Lord forbid that someone in America be against the war and not be considered a terrorist.

One's argument might be that he didn't mean it *literally*, but.. as the president, everything you say is taken literally. America as a whole is nowhere near intelligent enough to interpret something as not literal.

We're so far behind in intelligence. The only upside is that nowadays people know the president's name. Too bad it's for such a shit reason. I hope that in later years, mankind won't remember us having similar characteristics to barbarians in nature of brute force. But then again, with such a decline, the future's going to seem mentally Neo-Lithic.

I do think the USA is too selfcentered. Sure the "other" super-power is gone, and the US is thinking they own the world. (hey, I can say this, I live in the US, heh). I dont like this mind-set at all. It reminds me of the school-yard bully type situation, and that never lasted long, or worked.

As for some reasons as to what has happend, I am not too sure, the mass media has disotroted everything soo badly, I do not know what is truth from lie. What I do know is that the US supported the "terrorist" organizations in the 80's to combat the Soviets in the middle east, and when the USSR fell, we just left, like that, leaving massive ammounts of wepons in the hands of the well trained men, that are now homeless or worse. We didnt help them recover, so what do you expect from angry war torn people, to not hate the people that caused the situation they are in now? I would. So people that have grudge against us, and have a massive ammont of wepons, and the knowlage to use them, yep, its what is happening right now, they strike at us. Saddam didnt do anything, it was (suposidly) Osama and his "terrorist network". And no government leader (dictator or not) would support an anti-establishment group, that would challange his own authoirty.
But that is not my place to say, seeing I live in the wonderful midland US.

I just want this killing to end, Our president needs to step down, and admit he his wrong, then to get everyone else killed. This reminds me of the salem witch hunts of long ago, then the modernt communist witch hunts. After it happend, no one really took the blame, due to their own ego, they couldnt admit they made a mistake and had other peoples lives destroyed due to it.

Salem Witch Trials, Red Scare. Too many people persecuted and harmed for reasons just..idiotic. I know that there are a few bad apples but come on. Does that mean that we can make a whole army for deeds just as bad or worse?

The communist 'witch hunt'.. I learned of that recently and it just shocked me to hear that America would do such a thing. America definitely has a large problem admitting if their wrong. They never tought us of these 'witch hunts', but they spend weeks, years, on the Holocaust so it 'doesn't happen again'.

Has anyone else noticed this pattern?

This mindless nationalism is just as bad as the fascism that led to the Nazi movement and then, of course bigger and "better" things..

We teach the past of history we did not do (holocaust, wars ect), but the things we did (witch hunts, genocide of the natives of this land), we tend to ignore. I did not learn about the genocide of the "native americans" in my high school history class, we ignored that topic, not by teachers choice, but the school boards.
The mass media has not yet really stated why the middle east is like it is, and I dont think they ever will. We do not want to show the mass the past, and give reason, we just want them to see someone that is against us and our ideals, and that such an action is not tolerated.
This is now getting too close to the 1984 style of rule for my comfort.

Why does there need to be such pointless death?

Sorry about the thread hijack, I just needed to get this off my chest

It's all about thirsty wallets. God, I hate this place. :cry:

[On a lighter note, this is my 100th post. Heh]

Yes, the CIA trained the bin Laden led Mojahedin in Afghanistan to combat the Soviets. It was the reversal of Vietnam on the global "chessboard" as it were. Much like the US in Vietnam, the Soviet Union was bogged down in a fruitless war against a third-world nation of rebel fighters that would not quit. Almost all of the surplus arms found there are either the American made M16 or the Soviet made AK-47.

Saddam in the 80's was really no different. The US used Iraq as a buffer zone against the hostile Iran. Notably, the US helped develop, if not supplied the Iraqi chemical weapons program with various chemical agents including mustard gas.

Both the US and the USSR used a Machiavelian foreign policy to combat each other during the Cold War. Now that the Soviet Union has fallen, it has become much more evident.

I just re-read the thread. I have to say this is the most sensible discussion I've come across on the forum that has touched on the war.

DJ, Jackal, Laz and Dawg, You all deserve praise for your sensetivity.

You may have seen me roast people occaisionally when they post stupid "kill 'em all" comments, it's because those comments are usually made by people who have never and never will kill people in war. I, unfortunately, have been to war.

You restore my faith in youth. DJ if you do show this thread to your teacher, I think it will be a comfort. Tell her I send my condolences.

This is why this country is so messed up, people have no sense of personal responsibility anymore. Just because I give someone a gun, I can't be held responsible for what they do with the gun. People are responsible for their own actions. Similarly, should Ford motor company be held responsible for all traffic accidents involving Ford vehicles just because they build and sold the cars to people, who subsequently used them to drive into other people? I think not.

mattres, I think it is more symbolical then just that. You give them something they can cause distruction with, and you give it to them with the intent of them using it for the distruction.
Cars are one thing, used to transport people/objects, but weapones are another thing. If I give you a gun, and you are in a heated argument with someone, really heated, they would use the gun on the other person. That would be assist in the murder, for giving them the killing weapon, with all knowlage of the intent that was going on and what happend in the past between the members.
It is just irrisponsible to give someone that is unstable weapones. You know they will use them for foul play, and thus also making you at fault.

Sure if you give someone a hunting rifle, and think they have the intent to hunt other animals for sport (something I hate), and they go off and kill 3 people, then no, you should not really be at fault.

And thank you Bazman. And may I ask what war were you in? And I am sorry to hear you where in one. One of my uncles was in Viet'nam, and has never spoken of it since. I can only think of the strain it puts on the people.