Decius wrote:

I'm not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken — and they're wussy by definition. It's as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn't to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward.

This article has gotten the talk shows all riled up. Its inceditary. If you're really a pacifist and you think war is immoral, obviously you'd offer that those involved are immoral. My problem with pacifists is that there are times when you have to fight. We didn't ask for 9/11, and the people who got involved in the military in its wake largely sought to defend America from aggressive foreign threats. There is an arguement that pre-emptive war is immoral, but this wasn't a choice those involved with the armed services at the time made, and today, I think, walking away from the situation after creating the security vacuum we've created there is also immoral. Eventually, you do get to a point where continuing to support the armed forces is a tacit approval of the things they are doing, but the U.S. is a long, long way away from that point today. If you buy the conspiracy theories about "blood for oil" I suppose I can see reaching this point, but I don't. The strategy in Iraq is hard to understand and there are questions that can be raised about its correctness, but it shouldn't properly be an invitation to fill in the blanks with worst case scenarios. If we just wanted the oil it would have been cheaper to buy it.

The above is a good summary of what has now become an intelligent, though essentially apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour. It needs no response because it puts forward no reasonable case. The psychology though is interesting. The US is afraid. And it responds with threats, violence, repression and accusations.

"9/11" is a brand. A brand of fear. In terms of psychological impact on an overconfident US population it was devastating. In terms of deaths and injury, compared to the events that the US justifies and perpetrates in its wake, it was a minor event. Yet it stands as some inconceivably horrible event justifying almost any act of repression or violence. It is your Holocaust. Excusing everything and anything just by naming it. "How could you do this terrible thing?" we ask. "9/11" you reply, as if in answer.

More publicity stunt than act of war, the Trade Centre attacks were appalling. But how you respond matters. The strong face up to what happened, look at the causes, and move to solve the problem. The weak lash out, blame others indescriminately and absolutely, tearful and afraid, crying out that this was not their fault, they didn't start it. Now, they say, we are justified in all and any acts of violence and retribution - because we were attacked first. Wrong - the violence began long before the Twin Towers, and some of the blame lies at our own feet.

The people of the US have been so comfortably secluded from the rest of the world for so long that they have become among the most fearful in the world. And fear is a sickness that generates its own reasons for inexcusable actions.

oaknet wrote:
The above is a good summary of what has now become an intelligent, though essentially apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour.

Huh? I'm not defending U.S. policy. I mean to argue that there is no basis to accuse individual people who work as bottom rung employees of the U.S. armed forces of being immoral for not quitting their jobs. You don't have to agree with U.S. policy to conclude that people in the Army are not all immoral.

Now, they say, we are justified in all and any acts of violence and retribution - because we were attacked first. Wrong - the violence began long before the Twin Towers, and some of the blame lies at our own feet.

I never made any such argument! I did not say that any kind of violence is justified!! I said that some violence is sometimes needed. Furthermore, if you insist on arguing about U.S. policy, I think its grossly ignorant to call it random retribution. They, in fact, do have a strategic purpose. You may argue about it, but accusing them of bloodthirst or corruption is a cop out that makes it easy to reject their position without thinking about it.

Decius wrote:

oaknet wrote:
The above is a good summary of what has now become an intelligent, though essentially apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour.

Huh? I'm not defending U.S. policy. I mean to argue that there is no basis to accuse individual people who work as bottom rung employees of the U.S. armed forces of being immoral for not quitting their jobs. You don't have to agree with U.S. policy to conclude that people in the Army are not all immoral.

I didn't say you were defending US policy. I said you provide an apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour.

Now, they say, we are justified in all and any acts of violence and retribution - because we were attacked first. Wrong - the violence began long before the Twin Towers, and some of the blame lies at our own feet.

I never made any such argument! I did not say that any kind of violence is justified!!

I didn't say that you did.

I said that some violence is sometimes needed. Furthermore, if you insist on arguing about U.S. policy, I think its grossly ignorant to call it random retribution. They, in fact, do have a strategic purpose. You may argue about it, but accusing them of bloodthirst or corruption is a cop out that makes it easy to reject their position without thinking about it.

I don't recall using the word "random". Nor did I say "bloodthirst" or "corruption. Are you hearing voices by any chance? ;-)

Please discuss my point by all means, but try to discuss the point I make and not the one you would prefer or think it to be. I know you to be intelligent writer, yet you accuse me of being "grossly ignorant to call it random retribution". I called it no such thing. You make an emotional appeal against accusations that no-one has made. All symptoms of that prevelant US fear. Claiming to understand your critics without having listened to them first.

Have you seen Doonsebury today (25/01/06)? A good indicator of the US psyche at the moment.

oaknet wrote:

I didn't say you were defending US policy. I said you provide an apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour.

U.S. Policy defines what U.S. "Behaviour" is.
Being an "apologist for U.S. Behaviour" is the same thing as being an apologist for "U.S. Policy."

If you disagree then please explain what, exactly, it is that you are talking about because clearly I don't get it. I don't understand how arguing that U.S. soldiers are not immoral for failing to quit their jobs is being an apologist of U.S. behaviour or whatever you want to call it.

Now, they say, we are justified in all and any acts of violence and retribution - because we were attacked first. Wrong - the violence began long before the Twin Towers, and some of the blame lies at our own feet.

I don't recall using the word "random". Nor did I say "bloodthirst" or "corruption. Are you hearing voices by any chance? ;-)

No, you didn't say random. You said "all and any acts of violence and retribution." Clearly, as random, bloodthirsty, and corrupt acts of violence and retribution are part of the overall set of acts of violence and retribution, the statement "all and any acts of violence and retribution" encompases those categories.

You make an emotional appeal against accusations that no-one has made.

You said "they say we are justified in all and any acts of violence..."

No one has said this, nor have they engaged in anything remotely approaching the sort of behaviour that this statement implies. Thats what I was reacting to. Saying that Americans might have reasonably decided to sign up for military service in the wake of a large scale domestic terrorist attack and that doing so is not immoral is not equivelent to arguing that the U.S. is justified in "all and any acts of violence and retribution."

Decius wrote:
oaknet wrote:

I didn't say you were defending US policy. I said you provide an apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour.

U.S. Policy defines what U.S. "Behaviour" is.
Being an "apologist for U.S. Behaviour" is the same thing as being an apologist for "U.S. Policy."

If you disagree then please explain what, exactly, it is that you are talking about because clearly I don't get it. I don't understand how arguing that U.S. soldiers are not immoral for failing to quit their jobs is being an apologist of U.S. behaviour or whatever you want to call it.

Now, they say, we are justified in all and any acts of violence and retribution - because we were attacked first. Wrong - the violence began long before the Twin Towers, and some of the blame lies at our own feet.

I don't recall using the word "random". Nor did I say "bloodthirst" or "corruption. Are you hearing voices by any chance? ;-)

No, you didn't say random. You said "all and any acts of violence and retribution." Clearly, as random, bloodthirsty, and corrupt acts of violence and retribution are part of the overall set of acts of violence and retribution, the statement "all and any acts of violence and retribution" encompases those categories.

You make an emotional appeal against accusations that no-one has made.

You said "they say we are justified in all and any acts of violence..."

No one has said this, nor have they engaged in anything remotely approaching the sort of behaviour that this statement implies. Thats what I was reacting to. Saying that Americans might have reasonably decided to sign up for military service in the wake of a large scale domestic terrorist attack and that doing so is not immoral is not equivelent to arguing that the U.S. is justified in "all and any acts of violence and retribution."

Well, having agreed that you misquoted and misrepresented me - for which you deserve some credit - you go on to do it again, to indulge in non sequitur, and to play the usual sematic games. Enough, people can judge for themselves, certainly history will.

oaknet wrote:
Enough, people can judge for themselves, certainly history will.

Tell history I said booyakasha, motherfuckers!

oaknet wrote:

Decius wrote:
oaknet wrote:

I didn't say you were defending US policy. I said you provide an apologist's prayer for unreasonable US behaviour.

U.S. Policy defines what U.S. "Behaviour" is.
Being an "apologist for U.S. Behaviour" is the same thing as being an apologist for "U.S. Policy."

If you disagree then please explain what, exactly, it is that you are talking about because clearly I don't get it. I don't understand how arguing that U.S. soldiers are not immoral for failing to quit their jobs is being an apologist of U.S. behaviour or whatever you want to call it.

Now, they say, we are justified in all and any acts of violence and retribution - because we were attacked first. Wrong - the violence began long before the Twin Towers, and some of the blame lies at our own feet.

I don't recall using the word "random". Nor did I say "bloodthirst" or "corruption. Are you hearing voices by any chance? ;-)

No, you didn't say random. You said "all and any acts of violence and retribution." Clearly, as random, bloodthirsty, and corrupt acts of violence and retribution are part of the overall set of acts of violence and retribution, the statement "all and any acts of violence and retribution" encompases those categories.

You make an emotional appeal against accusations that no-one has made.

You said "they say we are justified in all and any acts of violence..."

No one has said this, nor have they engaged in anything remotely approaching the sort of behaviour that this statement implies. Thats what I was reacting to. Saying that Americans might have reasonably decided to sign up for military service in the wake of a large scale domestic terrorist attack and that doing so is not immoral is not equivelent to arguing that the U.S. is justified in "all and any acts of violence and retribution."

Well, having agreed that you misquoted and misrepresented me - for which you deserve some credit - you go on to do it again, to indulge in non sequitur, and to play the usual sematic games. Enough, people can judge for themselves, certainly history will.

You have yet to clarify your statements after Decius's initial impression. He didn't misquote you (as you might perceive from the large area of BLOCKQUOTE). He might have misunderstood you, but in that case you've still neglected to make any sense.

PS. Home made tanks are pretty spiffy.

Decius wrote:

"I'm not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken — and they're wussy by definition." (from article)

My problem with pacifists is that there are times when you have to fight. We didn't ask for 9/11, and the people who got involved in the military in its wake largely sought to defend America from aggressive foreign threats. There is an arguement that pre-emptive war is immoral, but this wasn't a choice those involved with the armed services at the time made, and today, I think, walking away from the situation after creating the security vacuum we've created there is also immoral.

Lately I have seen individuals defending the war shifting gears. Now that there is no evidence whatsoever that we should have entered Iraq in the first place (at least as a response to 9/11) people keep defending this idea of action vs. inaction. An action taken under false pretenses to solve a made up problem is better than no action taken at all. This is the message I get from Iraq, and from laws against gay marriage, and voter fraud and all the rest. Action is better than inaction- period. Of course this is ridiculous. There are times when fighting is necessary. And those are times when you have done the research, have the proof, and know who and what you're fighting. Blindly firing towards the middle east to solve problems that start and end in the US? Its foolish. And I would have preferred a lot of talk over that action any day.