Hi Hawkmoon; Re: "Something wrong with admitting that it was the USSR which was the first nation to recognize the state of Israel?"
No. It's ancient history. Nobody but you cares about it. The Israelis don't care. The Arabs don't care. The US doesn't care. Whether the USSR can still care is a philosophical question. Nor can I figure out what your point was.
The fact is that US foreign policy has been tilted towards Israel for 20+ years, and that has soured our relations with the Arab countries. This is a FACT.
Re: "The point is that the USSR's strategy has ALWAYS been to expand ..."
What's your point? Is this another WW2 story? About how the Allies had to march to Germany in the snow, uphill both ways? The FACT is that the USSR doesn't exist anymore and Russia is a runt state. What does that have to say about your comment about their strategy "ALWAYS been to expand?" Don't you agree that the strategies of a state that doesn't exist anymore doesn't matter much to the current situation?
Do you have trouble admitting the simple truth so you have to dress it up with a bunch of unimportant FACTs? Here is the simple truth, admit it: US foreign policy has been tilted towards Israel for 20+ years, the most recent 20+ years, the years that are significant for our relations with the Arabs NOW (not in some glorious PAST), and that has soured our relations NOW with the Arab countries. This is a FACT.
Re: "US support for Israel really didn't manifest itself until 1973 ..."
Oh really? The hell would you imagine that I didn't know this? And isn't 1973 thirty years ago? Do you think that "thirty" falls under the classification "20+"? Why do you think I chose "20+"? Do you think I got lucky? The simple FACT is that US foreign policy has been tilted in favor of Israel for 20+ years and this has soured our relationship with the Arabs. Nothing you can recount from history will change this simple FACT.
Re: "B*tch all you want about US support for Israel, but it was the Soviets who ... So who's to blame? The Soviets, or the Arab states who bought their weapons from them?"
Are you still denying the FACT? Or are you admitting the FACT, but saying it's not really a FACT because the USSR made us do it? Come on, what is your point here, that our foreign policy is in the hopeless thrall of a country that no longer exists? That the Arabs control our foreign policy?
Re: "And why is it that people of your ilk constantly opt to mention the US role in the region as if we were the only nation involved in trying to shape events and influence governments there?"
I really don't give a shit what happens to other countries. If, for example, Panama was getting its buildings destroyed by terrorists because it insisted on stirring the Middle East pot you might see me mention it once or twice (like I occasionally mention that India keeps stirring the pot in Kashmir), but I wouldn't make it a constant refrain because I am not an Indian. So when 100 people get killed by a bomb in India it really doesn't bother me much.
I'm an American, and it's what happens in America that matters to me most. I believe in America, and I know that our cause is just and that we will win in the end through the power of our ideas. You seem to think that the only way we can change the world is with weapons. But history has already proved multiple times that modern weapons, used by a democracy, are useless at pacifying civilians in distant foreign lands.
Maybe you have a belief that America can avoid the consequences of having a tilted foreign policy by blaming it on others. Hey, I agree that other countries are to blame. I'm not blaming us. The policy has been bipartisan. But as time has gone on, it's become more and more dangerous to run a tilted foreign policy in the Middle East and it's time for us to stop before we really get burned. No, 3000 people is not "burned"; that's an unnoticeable pinprick to a country of 250,000,000. "Burned" is when they start setting off nukes every couple of days all over the country. And with the inevitable march of nuclear proliferation, and the fact that Israel's war against the Arabs is hopeless, it is only a matter of time (maybe 20 years, maybe longer).
When the terrorists start using nukes, (and it is only a matter of time), I want them going off in Tel Aviv instead of Baltimore. That's because I am an American patriot, not an Israeli patriot. It's the Israeli's fight, let them find a way of pacifying those 100,000,000 Arabs. Or let them emigrate to the US, we have room, though they won't be able to run a religious state over here any more than the Mormons were.
Re: "There's more than sufficient blame to go around for explaining why the Arab-Israeli conflict still exists."
You keep getting back to this blame game, this morality gig. Why should I care who is to "blame" in the Middle East? Is mother nature is going to punish the other boy after you convince her that you're not to blame? What's the point?
And I'm NOT saying that WE are to "blame" for the problem in the Middle East. In fact, I've repeatedly noted that the place has had problems for thousands of years before Christopher Columbus even sailed over here. I've repeatedly noted that our borders haven't seen warfare in 150 years. The Middle East was messed up long before we ever stuck our paddle in the water.
All I'm pointing out is that if you stick your pecker in a hornet's nest, you're going to get stung. It will hurt. That the hornets (or some 3rd party) are to blame doesn't appeal to me as a reason to stick my pecker in there anyway. I don't think that it's manly to leave it in there just because I stuck it in there once before. I don't give a shit whether the hornets are going to heaven or to hell. I just don't want my pecker in the nest.
Yes Germany in 1941 was a hornet's nest. But Germany had the ability to hurt us a hell of a lot more than the Arabs do, at least in the current situation. Germany was a world class power, and those are the dangerous countries, the ones that require 600 divisions to take down instead of 2. None of the Arab countries are a threat, except if they get lost in chaos and start manufacturing terrorists, but that is exactly what Bush has done to Iraq.
You go on and on about how it's so dangerous that all these Arabs don't have jobs, but then you support Bush who started a war that has left much more of the population of Iraq jobless. I know that you know it will get better, and it will, but when? It's four months now and they haven't even started the reconstruction.
Look. I just want US to be a safe country to make babies and earn money. If you want to go on a crusade to save the world, if you want to be superman and stop crime world-wide, hey, more power to you, but I don't think you're going anywhere. You're staying right behind that computer of yours. Instead, what you want to do is to send MY children off to Iraq to fight in YOUR hopeless crusade, just like Vietnam. No deal.
-- Carl |
