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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: techguerrilla who wrote (13639)	2/27/2003 1:24:34 PM
From: Jim Willie CB	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 89467

Mr Rogers dies at age 74 I hitchhiked a ride home from highschool from him once in his brown Mercedes sedan he was an arrogant asshole I will not miss him, or his music his children hate him, having disowned their father he neglected them, while appearing on children TV shows he asked me on my ride home: "do you know who I am?" I knew but was a rascal, replying: "no, do you know who I am?" he said "I am Mr Rogers" I said "I am Jim X" we drove on, with me showing no curiosity I remarked "nice car, gotta get me one of these" Mr Rogers sang a stupid song at my Carnegie Mellon Univ masters commencement the audience laughed him off the stage goodbye, Mr Rogers / jim

To: techguerrilla who wrote (13639)	2/28/2003 6:05:53 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 89467

We can handle the truth, Mr. President By CHI-DOOH LI SPECIAL TO THE POST-INTELLIGENCER Thursday, February 27, 2003 Memo to President Bush: Whatever you do with Iraq, don't lie to us. Far better to say little or nothing than to lie to us. Tell us what you can, within the confines of national security. But don't try to win our support for an Iraq war with lies. With all due respect, let me tell you why. The voices of protest against an Iraq war are loud and clear here and across the world. Many of those portray you as international Public Enemy No. 1, a rogue cowboy hell-bent on aggression and bullying. They accuse you of concocting a flimsy case against Saddam so that you can take control of Iraq's oil fields and hand them over to your big-oil buddies. Next to you, even Osama bin Laden takes on the visage of a charitable benefactor and humanitarian, as our Washington Sen. Patty Murray has actually described him. But a great many of us who haven't been marching in the streets know that Saddam Hussein is the real bad guy here, the one who thumbs his nose at United Nations edicts. We haven't forgotten that Saddam is the one who has actively developed chemical and biological weapons and is maniacal enough to use them against his own people as well as his neighbors. Call us the silent majority, if you will. We're the ones who are choosing not to vilify you personally. We're the ones refraining from the knee-jerk reaction of automatically attributing the worst possible motives to you and to our government. But that doesn't mean we're cheerleaders for war against Iraq. Long gone are the days when men hankered to go to war to prove their manhood and win honor on the field of battle. The nature of war itself has changed in the past century, drastically and horrifically. The U.S. version of war, with cruise missiles, smart bombs and rocket-firing unmanned drones, seems to take on the dimensions of a surreal high-tech computer game. But we are not deluded for one moment in understanding just how deadly it is to the enemy and its civilian population and the risks that our own troops will face. We are willing to give the benefit of the doubt to you and the case you are building. But that doesn't mean there isn't a deep sense of unease over the inexorable march toward war in Iraq. Our silence will change, in a flash, into an ear-splitting crescendo if we find out you're lying to us about the rationale for war. Don't forget that many of us still have bitter memories from discovering that our leaders deliberately lied to us during the Vietnam War. Lyndon Johnson was a man of enormous strengths. The political courage and statesmanship he showed in overriding senior Southern senators from his own party to push through the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964 will forever be a mark of greatness for his presidency. But he lied to us about Vietnam and the bombing in Cambodia and Laos. Over and over. And so did his generals. Right on the heels of Vietnam came Watergate, when we heard tapes and read transcripts showing President Nixon and his top aides lying to the country and covering up various high crimes and misdemeanors. This was a devastating one-two punch that shattered the faith of an entire generation in its political leadership. The cynicism toward government that developed during those fateful days persists to this day. Did you notice the disproportionately large number of gray-haired people like you and me in those protest marches in U.S. cities two Saturdays ago? We silent ones desperately need to believe that you and your highly talented and experienced team of Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Donald Rumsfeld are telling us the truth. When you make the link between al-Qaida and Iraq, it had better be based on fact, and not fabrication. Lying may achieve some short-term goals that seem paramount right now. It may win over more public support for taking action against Iraq. It might even gain you the coveted U.N. sanction for the use of military force against Saddam. But in the long term, those lies will surely and systematically poison the very roots of our democratic system. They will destroy yet another generation's faith in their leaders and make cynicism of government a required badge of honor for intelligent citizenship. Our children and grandchildren will suffer the consequences in ways we cannot imagine. So please, Mr. President, tell us the truth. We can handle the truth. It's the lies that will destroy us. _____________________________________________________ Chi-Dooh Li is a Seattle attorney. E- mail: CDL@elmlaw.com seattlepi.nwsource.com

To: techguerrilla who wrote (13639)	3/3/2003 3:19:40 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 89467

Newsweek Conventional Wisdom [is not impressed this week ] msnbc.com UNTIED NATIONS EDITION It sounded like a good idea: Get another United Nations resolution against Iraq. But now more of our allies are resolutely against us. Bush (down) Is he making it up as he goes along? Offers yet another unconvincing reason for war: Mideast peace. Huh? Saddam (down) Outfoxes Bush with missile-destruction gambit, distracting attention from bio weapons. But days still numbered.