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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (70666)	1/31/2003 3:00:05 PM
From: michael97123	Respond to of 281500

"But the results are not the results of the upcoming invasion; the results are the results of the long term occupation/rebuilding which follows. That's the Bush gamble. If the invasion goes well but the ME stays in its present unstable state or gets worse and the campaign against Al Q looks as unproductive as it does right now, it will be a tough electoral fight for the newly born rancher." Short term results will probably be good enough to get him reelected but i think we all(left and right) accept the rest of your post as valid. Finally we agree on something other than the benefits of eating breakfast out while reading the NY Times. Friedman tommorrow with eggs over easy! Mike

To: JohnM who wrote (70666)	1/31/2003 6:15:57 PM
From: Sig	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

<<The results are not the results of the upcoming invasion; the results are the results of the long term occupation/rebuilding which follows. That's the Bush gamble. If the invasion goes well but the ME stays in its present unstable state or gets worse and the campaign against Al Q looks as unproductive as it does right now, it will be a tough electoral fight for the newly born rancher.>>> Tell me what any situation will be in 3 months. Make me rich, I'll buy the right stocks Everyone pins this on Bush, Bush this, Bush that. He did not force Congress to give him the forces needed stop Saddam .They all voted on it.He has 20 Nations willing to support our Iraq effort and more coming on board. And the cowboy did it all by his lonesome ??? There will be many differing results if we take action, some good, some bad The good ones are that Saddam will have no WMD's to supply to anyone or use against others. Leaders of Saudi Arabia, Iran,Turkey will have to admit "they owe us one" for eliminating a huge threat to their neighborhoods. Millions of starving and oppressed people in Iraq will be given a chance for freedom and a better life and help achieving it if they will accept the help offered. IMO our casualties if conflict occurs will probably be higher than the few hundreds that occcured in the Gulf war Saddam has learned too, he knows if he illuminates a radar( turns it on) the coalition will destoy it within minutes So some would be hidden, along with missiles, in Mosques, schools, caves, and never used until the last moments. A big threat to British pilots who often lead the low level attacks and suffer more losses. Some will be certain to say, I told you so ,a soldier got killed Especially the Press Without mentioning that 30,000 get killed travelling our Freeways each year, not to mention the numbers crippled or wounded. And I cant count the Billions paid out in Auto insurance and medical expenses. It may take years to finally decide whether a war was successful or not. Whether it was worth the cost WW! good for us, bad for others WW2 well worth the costs, good for us, bad for others Vietnam - Bad for everyone, I suppose Korea I wouldnt know But overall America did survive and prosper despite the wars and without a great loss of freedom If fact there is one important freedom we did not have in the 1930's Thats the freedom to travel nearly anywhere in the US ,get a job in your chosen profesion and start a new life.To illucidate, people did not have money to do that, and only lucky ones could afford the needed car. So just who is going to decide whether (If you insist, Mr Bush's) war was worth the cost and when will it be decided. Is 500 causalties too many, 1000 ?, 10,000 ? Is a cost of $100 bil too much ( AOL justs lost $98 bil of taxpayers money last year- never even got off a shot) Summary: There are no reasonable comparisons to make in these costs so the left , the right, and the middle will be left with interminable discussions on the Web. Long may the Web prosper. Did FDR really force us into WW2 by conning the Nation ? Hmmmmmmmmmmmm At least, I never had to learn German or Japanese. so will say it was worth it if FDR did that. I had enough problems learning English Latin was nigh impossible Kurdish would be "out of my league" entirely Sig Nothing personal here, I just keep pushing keys to see what comes up

To: JohnM who wrote (70666)	2/1/2003 2:38:12 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Humanitarian Warrior By Mary McGrory Columnist The Washington Post Thursday, January 30, 2003 If George Bush's intensely awaited State of the Union speech had a subtitle, it would be "Dr. Schweitzer reaches for his rifle." For weeks, a jumpy Capitol has been fretting over two questions: Would the president declare war in the House chamber with Congress and the diplomatic corps present? Or would he finally make the case for going after Saddam Hussein? He did neither. For the first half of the speech, he painted a self-portrait of an almost stricken humanitarian, one who will confront challenges with "focus and clarity and courage." The economy? It is "recovering." Less-taxed Americans will invest and spend. Prescription drugs? Of course the elderly and poor can expect them. Patients might not like his medicine; they have to join HMOs and maybe give up favorite doctors. But he knows what's best -- for insurance companies and pharmaceutical firms. The social services that he has to slash to pay for his tax cuts? Not to worry: Big-hearted, patriotic volunteers will take up the slack. The environmentalists, who have been yapping at his heels because of his assaults on air and water, should be ashamed of themselves. He's proposing non-polluting hydrogen-powered cars. His compassion reaches all the way to Africa, where he will take modern medicines to AIDS victims: "This nation can lead the world in sparing innocent people from a plague of nature." Could such a paragon of benevolence lead the world into the plague of war, which would disrupt or end lives and snarl the economies of several continents? Yes, he could, and he plans to. Midway through his hour-long speech, Bush morphed from humanitarian to warrior. His voice dropped several registers. The Republicans, who had been leaping to cheer every paragraph in his domestic recital, fell rapt. The commander in chief brandished his weapons. At last, all thought, he would lay out all the reasons for ordering out the bombers. But the struggle in Bush's mind between his two obsessions, secrecy and war with Iraq, was unresolved. He would disclose nothing. The president is dispatching his stoic secretary of state, Colin Powell, to spill the beans to the Security Council. Then, and only then, will Americans learn why of all the villains and torturers in this world, Saddam Hussein is the one who must be exterminated. Bush told only twice-told tales about his undisputed evil. Nothing Bush said would convince the country that Hussein, and not Osama bin Laden, is the mortal enemy. Bush made no direct link between al Qaeda and Iraq. As a report on world affairs, the Bush review was unsatisfactory. He made no mention whatever of bin Laden -- giving a push to Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan's name-changing quip, "Osama bin Forgotten." Bush mentioned Afghanistan several times, but in the past tense, as if it were a closed and happy chapter, even though guerrillas and U.S. forces were fighting at that same hour in southeastern Afghanistan. He gave Israel, which has just bestowed another blank check on bellicose Ariel Sharon, one sentence, although a word from us could stanch the bloodshed and slow the flow of Arab enmity that an invasion of Iraq would undoubtedly engender. Bush must have noticed that the greatest cheers came with his salute to the U.S. military massing on the borders of Iraq. That was the metaphor for his war strategy. Once the troops are in the field, the country will close ranks and debates will cease. The presence of the troops contributes to the "urgency" of making war. Bush simply could not, the hawks argue, bring them all home again. He doesn't need to, of course. He could send them to Afghanistan to finish the job and keep it from reverting to an al Qaeda recruiting office. North Korea drew a defiant declaration that "different threats require different strategies" and a promise that "America and the world will not be blackmailed," although it seems that this is what is happening. The president is hellbent on war. He's already started the euphemisms of war. "Don't say the invasion of Iraq," he chides -- it's the "liberation." He seems to have thought of everything except the Pentagon's favorite euphemism, "collateral damage." That means civilian casualties, children with big dark eyes who will die for reasons not entirely clear to everybody. _____________________________________________________ Mary McGrory, who has been a national columnist since 1960, won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1975. Her column generally appears on Thursdays and Sundays. © 2003 The Washington Post Company washingtonpost.com