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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (303285)	9/17/2006 7:55:52 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1572417

didn't start this war. Neither did the Bush twins. Neither of us really even knows the Bush twins opinion of it. Don't play semantics Its not semantics. You could reword it anyway you want, I'm not debating definitions or word use. I didn't start this war. You voted for the person who started the war twice. Does that not make you responsible? Most politicians who participated in getting it started are to old to join up. Their kids may or may not be supporters of the war, either way the adult children are responsible for their own actions. I see.......in your opinion, they can start wars but have no personal responsibility when it comes to fighting them. That's a total non sequitur. What you said has no connection with what you are replying to. I think you mean replying to what you said, not me. In any case, I very strongly believe that politicians should not be allowed to start wars unless they are prepared to make some personal sacrifice.......a family member who fights in the war or they perform some special service that supports the war effort. This business of starting wars without any kind of personal committment is BS. I'm not missing it. Its meaningless. Either having served is an important criteria for people who decide important national security issues or it isn't. If it is, that includes people opposing the war. I disagree. Some people have no empathy. You get your "no empathy" either out of thin air, or based on the assumption that this war is unjust and destructive and the idea that anyone who starts a war that is unjust and destructive has no empathy. I get empathy from reading about wars; from seeing video clips of the personal losses that people experience; from seeing the devastation and destruction. Or perhaps "empathy" equals "liberal". Hard to tell with you, but irrelevant. Talk about a non sequitur. Having said that, there may be a relationship.........so what? BTW I do take note of how you hold the two terms in the way you present them. Why don't you throw in the term 'weak' too and then the circle would be complete. But as you suggest in the end, none of it is relevant. The fact is I can empathize what war is like and I don't need to experience one to know its bad. That may be or many not be because I am liberal. The president and the congress make foreign policy decisions, including decisions about armed conflict. The logical conclusion of your statements is either that only people who have experienced war can be president or a member of congress, or that the US should never under any circumstances (or at least under any circumstances other than direct attack against the US) wage a war or armed conflictThe first is an idea that I oppose and might even consider an injustice, the 2nd is probably a slightly more popular idea but a very impractical one IMO. That's right. If a war is not defensive, then the leaders who vote to have such a war must make a personal committment to the war as defined above. That does not mean they must have experienced war personally as you suggest I posted although I think it would be better if they had. I don't think I've ever said that things aren't so bad in Iraq, let alone given monthly speeches about it. I might have said that things are not as horrible as some people claim but there's a lot of distance between that and "things are not so bad". You know, Tim, you play alot of word games. I wasn't playing games with words you where. You look at what I say, and then claim I said something different. Its not just a matter of exact quotes. I don't mind you using different words to express my thoughts if those words have the same meaning. But if they have an entirely different meaning than you have either made a mistake (which you should acknowledge when its pointed out) or your being dishonest. Tim, whenever the issue of the war has come up, you have said that the war is not lost yet and we must persist. In other words, you defend this war and its perpetuation. You have been a strong advocate of this war and continue to be. To suggest otherwise at this point is to be disingenuous. I know you supported Kerry over Bush, but I don't know if you where enthusiastic about Kerry. If you where, there are certainly people on this thread who supported him over Bush but still didn't exactly think he was the best person to lead the US. If I looked at one of their post arguing that people should vote for Kerry and then later said "you think Kerry is great", I would be doing something similar to what you are doing. Either making an honest mistake, or diliberatly distorting their statements for rhetorical purposes. If I did that I would be the one playing word games not the person who points out my error. I have never defended Kerry in the way you have defend this war. Apparently, our definitions of "not so great" are very different.