Let's take Mr Big Head on his points, then:
ââ¬Â¢ First, war by its very nature creates innocent victims. OK. It sucks. The Lebanese people have gotten the shaft, for example. But that isn't our fault and we can't let it keep us from fighting evil people. ââ¬Â¢ Second, terrorism is an abstraction. The full text of this statement is so obtuse as to be amazing. Does he really think we are not talking with the Iranians or the Syrians, or that there are not people at State and CIA and the White House trying to figure out on a case-by-case basis how to deal with our adversaries? Either he is very naive or this is just verbal demagoguery. ââ¬Â¢ Third, the war on terror emphasizes military action while most territorial conflicts require political solutions. And, as the British have shown, al Qaeda is best dealt with by good intelligence. WTF? Didn't this guy whine about the NSA wiretap program and the bank wire tracking program? So we need better intelligence, but we can't use the tools at our disposal. F-ing brilliant! Who does he think intercepts all the electronic traffic? ââ¬Â¢ Fourth, the war on terror drives a wedge between "us" and "them." We are innocent victims. They are perpetrators. But we fail to notice that we also become perpetrators in the process; the rest of the world, however, does notice. That is how such a wide gap has arisen between America and much of the world. No, that's good PR, fed to the public by an obliging Western media that doesn't trust their own governments but takes the words of fascist groups at face value. BTW, this is EXACTLY the strategy the USSR used against us during the Cold War. Remember the looney idea that the CIA introduced crack into the cities in the 80's to "keep down" black folks? That was a Soviet KGB disinformation campaign, you can read all about it now. Of course, there have been problems with US soldiers (Abu Grhaib, etc.), but our government has investigated them and punished people involved. Our record may not be spotless, but as a government we attempt to deal fairly with problems. Compare that to the record of groups like Al Qaeda, who get cheers in the Muslim world for beheading civilians on camera. How are we ever going to get props for what we do? We aren't. Not in the Islamic world. Not unless we all start bowing to Mecca. WTF? Where does all this moral equivalency come from? As for winning the war, it isn't a conventional war, so there is never going to be a "winning moment". But ask yourself this. How many terror attacks have there been in the United States since 9/11? Zero. I call that winning in the short term. Winning in the long term is beyond our ability to accomplish. It must be accomplished by others. Who? Muslim countries who breed extremists. The underlying problems in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, etc. that lead to extremism are poverity, illiteracy, and the willingness of despots to use Islamism and foster hatred of America and Israel to deflect attention from the incompetence of their own rule. On 8/21/06, So Kenfused <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Wall Street Journal > ââ¬ÂA Self-Defeating Warââ¬Â > By George Soros > -- --------------- Robert Munn www.funkymojo.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Introducing the Fusion Authority Quarterly Update. 80 pages of hard-hitting, up-to-date ColdFusion information by your peers, delivered to your door four times a year. http://www.fusionauthority.com/quarterly Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:213772 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
