--- Doug Pensinger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Gautam wrote: > > > --- Doug Pensinger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> Gautam Mukunda wrote: > I'd guess that nine of ten words in support of > invasion were related to > the threat Hussein posed to the U.S. and the tenth > was about how nasty he > was to his own people. Clearly the American people > would not have > supported a war to liberate Iraq from Hussein. Just > as clearly the > administration used propaganda and fear to sway > opinion.
Clearly to you, perhaps. The _American people_ are also more complex than you seem to think. They might have supported the war for many reasons. Again, this strange conception that you can only have one reason to do anything. > CLearly > > this wasn't about taking over oil fields. That's > just > > the empty cant of ideologically and morally bereft > > leftist extremists. > > You're the one that implied that it was in your > exchange with Debbie. But of course I did not. There's a difference between saying "oil is important" and saying "I want to conquer the Middle East to control the oil there." There's no more clear cut way to say it. I don't want to own the oil - I want to make sure that someone like Saddam Hussein doesn't have his foot on the jugular of the world economy. > But > I'll add some substantiation from the necon think > tank Project for the New > American Century white paper: "the need for a > substantial American force > presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the > regime of Saddam Hussein." You know, Doug, first, you really need to get off the conspiracy theory thing. I'd really recommend reading Richard Hofstader's "The Paranoid Style in American Politics". It's an attack on the right, so you'll be sympathetic, but really, it's a perfect description. The PNAC isn't all that important. I tried to get a job there sophomore year of college, among other things, and found out that they didn't even have enough budget space to hire interns! But in this case, yes, that is true. Keeping the Middle East stable is a very good idea, and we have considerable evidence that having American troops in an area is a good way to keep it stable when before their presence it regularly fought wars (see Western Europe and Eastern Asia after the Second World War for two examples). That's not the same thing as saying we need to control the oil. It just means that it's important to prevent war in the Middle East from disrupting the flow of oil to the world - primarily to Europe and Japan, in fact. > I’ve gotta call it the way I see it Gautam and > whether or not you take me > seriously, more and more people are beginning to > understand that this > administration has been leading us in the wrong > direction. > > -- > Doug So many more that he won reelection overwhelmingly? So how did that work out for you, again? Gautam Mukunda [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Freedom is not free" http://www.mukunda.blogspot.com __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
