He wrote...(edited, no offense intended Jack)

"The 2 Persian Gulf wars and Afghanistan show that we have an unbeatable military machine.   I would say that the advantage is in electronics - sensors, communications, etc, and it may be decades before anybody else comes close.

What will defeat us is the lack of strategic insight to use that machine intelligently, and (a) not ask it to do political things that it can't, and (b) don't get bogged down in land wars in places like Iran, China, Siberia, where all those electonics can't protect us against some dink with an axe riding on a reindeer."

So, here's my question...we know that the US war machine is world class when it comes to flying in, dropping bombs, and scaring the ever-loving crap out of anybody & anything.  Second place in that aspect of military strength is a long way behind us.  But...have we lost our leadership as Jack asserts, or has the enemy changed the battle to one where we're not as overpowering?  Think of it as a sporting contest for a second, for the purpose of dicussing strategy.  If the other team has a high powered offense, I want to slow the game down to have a hope.  Early on in the Iraq "contest", the US blew up all kinds of stuff, toppled the government, and declared victory.  But before the contest has ended, we're no longer unopposed as we were at the start.  Did we drop the ball, or did the opposing coach regroup during the halftime break?

is that nobody's gonna beat us in the air, at sea, or in a NATO type pitched battle - unless the entire damn world turns on us, as Dubya may arrange.

We've even gotten damned good at the Afghan style warlord politics.

The problem is not the military.  It's in meshing the military and politics - it's turning military power into poliical power - EXACTLY as in Vietnam.

That comes down to convincing the Iraqis that American style govt is better than insurgent style govt.   That's always a hard sell, because every Iraqi is suffering the effects of what we did, and that's more recent than Saddam.   Takes a disciplined memory to realize we may not be as bad as Saddam.

But Saddam isn't their problem anymore.  We are their problem now, and if we aren't obviously a better deal than the insurgents, guess who wins?

The insurgents are their relatives.  We're not.  We don't speak the language, observe the customs, and we may not be there tomorrow.  We drive around in bigassed armored vehicles blocking traffic, roughing up civilians and busting into homes.  How would YOU like cops like that?  Would you cooperate with them?  Would you rat out your cousin or your barber?  I doubt it.

So we have to train Iraqi cops.  Problem is of course that they have their own agenda, and it ain't necessarily ours.  Remember we tried that in Vietnam, too - called it "Vietnamization".  Didn't work.

Obviously, the Shinseki school of thought is that we need a lot of cops on the ground to have a chance.  The Rumsfeld school is that well, we'll negotiate something among the Iraqis that will make them be a govt like we want.   I would sympathize with Shinseki's skepticism, but I still don't have a clue what the RNC thinks they can accomplish there.  Change Iraqi politics?  Not at the point of a gun, I don't think.   We'll prop somebody up that we like, and he'll fall the minute we leave.  If he had the strength on his own, then what does he need us there for??

The invasion created a reaction that everybody will try to exploit; and meanwhile we have an entirely separate war going with AQ and other terrs, and are vulnerable to whatever else may happen.

We are particularly vulnerable when our political leadership has other priorities.  This whole thing smells too much like Vietnam to me.  At least LBJ was honestly ignorant, if Nixon was reckless.  We still had 58,000 KIAs.   And all we get from Dubya is incoherent crap.

I don't see the GOP has a plan.  I don't see they have a clue.  If they had paid attention to people in the Pentagon who remember Vietnam, they'd have been prepared for this, and they could at least explain it.  I think they're too busy with other priorities, like loading the Supreme Court with people acceptable to Pat Robertson.

After all, you have to realize that Iraq is a sideshow next to controlling the US government.  The question is, what constituency does the GOP represent?   Enron?  Worldcom?  The 700 Club?  The "Moral Majority"?  Halliburton?  Who?

I think the GOP figures that as long as they can keep the religious right in their pocket, they can use the US armed forces to keep us on a war footing and scared shitless, and they make their money in dishing out corporate contracts.  Eg, just look at private prisons, and how many private security contractors are dealing with the govt in various issues?

This is a question, partially, of what is the nature of military power? and what can military power accomplish?

People think because you are strong you will get your way.  Not always, as being strong does not automatically translate into having a desired effect on the behavior of others, for lots of reasons [in personal life and in political life].  It's necessary to be strong and feared, at a minimum, if you wish strength to translate into your desired outcomes.

Similary, we must distinguish between deterrence and compellence [this was coined by Thomas Schelling].  Deterrence is preventing someone from doing something you don't want them to do.  It's a negative, the absence of action on the part of a given actor.  Often detrrence is not difficult.  Compellence is getting someone to do something you want him to do, often against his will and his natural instincts.  This is much harder to pull of, as you must produce some positive action on the part of actor X - the Iraqis must stop sniping at US occupation forces, they must learn to love liberal-democratic institutions, they must learn to love the practices and procedures of democracy, they must stop hating Israel, they must lower the price of their oil, etc...  Good luck achieving any but the most modest change in any actors' behavior by way of getting him to do what you want him to do.

The US has had great military power for the last 60 years, and has demonstrated time and again the capacity and the will to use it in pursuit of its political goals.  What it has not demonstrated is an ability to translate that strength into desired political outcomes in any but the grossest manner [repulse the invasion of South Korea, evict Saddam from Kuwait, topple Saddam in Baghdad, arrst Noreiga in Panama, sorta conquer Grenada].

In any competative pursuit, it's a sucker's bet to play to your opponent's strength.  People ain't stupid - they know the US is so infauated with, if not hopelessly irredeemably dependent upon, technological wizardry that we are sometimes paralyed in it's absence.  Hence, low tech war, lots of hit-and-run small scale engagements, stealth and guile are essential, don't stand and fight in large numbers, fight at close quarters, and inflict lots of bloody and traumatic casualties on the US.  It's a cliche, but we can't fight a war of attrition when it's our manpower being atritted.  It's simple enough to recognize.  Kisinger once observed about the Vietnam War that the North Vietnamese/Vietcong win by not losing, that is, all they had to do was to avoid outright defeat.  The Iraqi resistance can figure this out just as easily.  No one is going to fight in a way that plays to the US strength.  Only we believe that an eneny is out there that is that stupid.  Except for possibly North Korea, for historical reasons having do do with their militry relationship with the former USSR, has war plans which envision fighting large scale conventional mechanized war with the US.  Apart from them there  ain't anyone that deluded or optimistic..

In 1812 Napoleon managed to conquer and occupy Moscow, but achieved no discernible polical objective by doing so. He soon decided to evacuate French forces and the rest is history.

That's our historical analogy to keep in mind, I think.  We're in Iraq, exactly what do we do next?

the reason the PRK maintains conventional plans is the knowledge that they're living in the shadow of China, and we won't do shit without PRC approval - so you can bet they aren't going to piss the chinese off very much.

What next? is always the question.

If it was REALLY in our best interests to win at any cost (as in, somebody was trying to take over our country), we could bomb the shit out of them until there were more of us left than them, and then outlast them in a battle of attrition?  Not pretty, but it would work, absent a better plan.

Because if that's really true, it seems that we need to re-think WHY we start wars, as opposed to where.  Iraq, like Vietnam, isn't supported by the masses because there's no apparent need to have started it (as opposed to ending it now that we have).  Without that support, the war is little more than an expensive way for a few thousand of our citizens to be mercilessly slaughtered.  Of course, that's an oversimplification meant to leave room for the assumption that there may have been a valid reason to go to war, that Shrub & Co. haven't shared.

Much, much more to come on this eventually but for now :

1. if you don't know what you want to accomplish by going to war, you've made a mistake ;

2. if you don't understand WHY you're fighting a war, you've made a mistake ;

3. if you haven't formulated some basic means-to-ends relationship about the war, you've made a mistake.

Wars are about something, not just an orgy of pointless violence, conducted by presumably rationally-acting governments peopled by, we hope, responsible political and military leadership.  If they haven't tried to ask these questions in their decision-making processes, they are neither rational nor resposible.

Relevant to US war in Iraq, it seems we may have patrialy tried to address Q1, deluded ourselves into believing we've addressed Q2, and irresponsibly never considered, or worse never even conceived of, Q3.

I am not a happy unit typing this.

Peace and good health to you.

No one can stand up to the US in a war of attrition in 2005 as long as it's ONLY things being attritted.

No doubt your analysis of the iraq problem is 100% correct.But I think you underestimate their constituency.Most big corps- GM,Ford,IBM,GE... you name it, support mainly the GOP with $$ that win elections but to ensure they land on the winning side, they contribute some to the other side.....remember what happened to the McCain-Feingold proposal?

In a military contest when one side wields overwhelming power the other side has only one option left- hit & run tactics.This has always been true e.g. resistance movements in several european countries and in russia during WWII where partisans operated behind enemy lines, or more recently the vietcong and now Al-Qaida.In this case AQ counts on inflicting enough casualties that would sway our public opinion leading us to abandon the moslem world and allow them to establish a Muslim empire free of "infidels" stretching all the way from Morocco to indonesia.I believe our political thinkers & military strategists see it in the same stark terms.Military planners are acutely aware of our achilles heel of high casualties and are inclined I think to develop robotics technology.Given our overwhelming technical superiority the idea of robots fighting men may not be that far-fetched.

the "information age". We're conducting a war in an inter-networked, globalized world where propoganda is spread at the speed of light.

Think about the recent idiocy over the use of WP on the battlefield. The agenda of a few, multiplied by the ignorance of many, resulted in a propoganda win for the terrorists in Iraq.

"All warfare is based upon deception" -Sun Tzu

1. the military portion ended the only way it could, 2.then, the real fight, aided by the Traitor Party loyalists, began to take it's toll.

the next big battle seems to be a race against time while the Traitor Party tries to prevent democracy from taking hold

on both sides, so they have a fallback plan.

But the corp money doesn't buy the votes, it only markets for them.

The votes come from lotsa places, including small town libertarians (who think that eg the power grid just came from nowhere and doesn't need maintenance) BUT the evangelicals are the biggest single bloc; and they can be relied on for volunteers, and they are many times larger than the margin of victory.

The GOP KNOWS they are shaving it close - they are pursuing a strategy that shares power with the FEWEST people, not the most; and the religious right is so predictable that it allows them to do this:  declare a few "Jesus Days", make sure nothing pisses off a dozen televangelists, polish up the churches, and you can gut people's 401(k)s, take the money from public works, anything you want, as long as you give them their circus.

it's not just about fast information, it's about what information people believe.

A stone age villager is gonna believe one thing; a NY mall rat another.

I think that calling the WP brouhaha a "propaganda victory for the terrs" is being oversensitive.  Ya gotta have faith in your presentation:  if you get up and start shaking with anger, you're not as credible as if you come on like Colin Powell.   Ya gotta have faith in the "facts", understanding that  there's lots of reasonable interpretations.  EG, "DUI" is both a fact and an opinion.  In a democracy, people are entitled to facts, even in wartime.

I think the best thing to do in that circumstance is just post to the reporter and publisher what WP is all about - because I KNOW the insurgents are using it whenever they can.   I saw one stupid journalist say WP was an illumination round.   It's used more often to screen than to set a flammable target on fire.  If you wanta kill people, HE VT is a better round.

IMHO, the best propaganda is NOT BS, it's education.  IMHO, honesty is the best way to spread democracy, and that's why I doubt that the RNC is qualified.

Change 1:  The RNC has disqualified itself by its utter dependence on the RR, which is a fraud on society.  What else can you say about people who preach that the WTC was God's punishment for tolerating queers?  

-- Modified on 11/17/2005 12:19:35 PM

If you recall, during the 2004 campaign Kerry favored direct, unilateral talks with North Korea. President Bush however, would not agree to speak to the PRK without the rest of the region, especially PRC involved.

Can you admit, on this one issue at least, that Bush actually got it right? Or will your hatred of Bush force you to take Kerry's side and take the intenable position, that we would be better of dealing with PRK ourselves and not using the one big stick that we have which is PRC?

As you said yourself, "they aren't going to piss the Chinese off very much"

Just a question, I'm curious about your thoughts.

the PRK isn't going to piss off the Chinese *too much*.    Of course the Chinese are likely to regard them as a PITA, but will try to make them convenient when possible.

Direct talks are not exclusive to regional talks unless you agree, and even then, diplomacy is full of BS and back channels.

One of the problems with politics is that changing position is necessary as facts change.  And what's really going to happen here is that the State Dept will have a LOT to say about it, because you can't ask people to do things they don't understand, and guess what - the State Dept better understand Korea better than any president.

I don't think there will be a *solution* for PRK unless (a) they surrender outright - not likely unless we can really starve them, and even then, the PRC may keep them conveniently alive, or the professional bleeding hearts at the UN do, or (b) the PRC forces them to give it up.

At this point, I think that we and the PRC are aware that we are potentially the biggest fight in the world.  I think the PRC knows they can keep us off balance and a lot of our Army tied up in Korea, and I think they will want to make us pay for a solution.   In that respect, the PRC may be a bigger problem than the PRK; but of course the PRK will try to get a high price, too; and at some point, we just have to walk away.

What do *I* think?  I think that either candidate would wind up doing BOTH.   Negotiation is all about options, right?

What we have at stake there is (a) lancing an Asian boil, (the PRC feels more comfortable and in control there) and (b) freeing up all our soldiers there.  All in all, the PRK doesn't care about that, their leaders just want to stay in power; but the PRC would really rather see us tied down, don't you think?  

So I think we might be playing off regional pressure on the PRK versus leaning on them directly; and doing whatever we could to undermine the Pyongyang regime by making their people uneasy and dissatisfied.   Send Pepsi in there.  Get the Russians selling vodka, so every time they see the Russians they realize how much better they're off without Commies.  Get an exchange program going between the Koreas, so that the people see the difference.

And talk to the PRC about PRK nukes, and how they should deal with PRK as we did with Noriega.  Bearing in mind that they're just fine with us having problems.

No, I am not at all comfortable with a President who (a) cannot explain himself credibly, and instead (b) claims he doesn't remember where he was for drills.   It's nothing personal, it's just that I don't trust people like that, and I'm sure not going to ask anybody else to trust him.  Dubya is just out of his league, and he's there because he's a convenient shill or lightning rod for the RNC.

OTOH, one of the problems Democrats, esp Mass Dems, and including Kerry have, is terminal fucking earnestness.  They simply do not understand that you can't make everything perfect.

EG Dubya and every teacher knows that "no child left behind" is BS.  There will be kids left behind.  It's merely an expression of resolve, which means a lot for teachers, but of course nothing for Dubya, who would cut teaching programs any time he could.   But there are lots of Dems who truly believe that if we are only PC enough, that we can save the world.  [sigh] Once again, a good reason to teach kids what it's like to knock heads, both physically and intellectually.

US politics would be one hell of a lot more productive - and coincidentally less hateful - if the parties were not so goddamned intransigent.

What makes them this way?  Who are the hateful fucks on either side?   The Dems are fragmented into SIGs, and lots of them are bitchy, but NONE of them can hold a candle to the religious right (RR).   Not Al Sharpton, not the insecure fairies, NONE of them even come close.  

The RR is personified by Pat Robertson, who has said (and IMHO his actions show he believes) that Episcopalians are "the Antichrist" and he's not gonna negotiate.

Man, if he can't get along with Episocopalians, he can't get along with anybody.   The Methodists and Lutherans and everybody who has any sort of scientific job, all those folks are toast.

Politics is about compromise for the sake of productivity, and the RR is all about having it all, even if they are too fucking stupid to know how to run it.  The corporate brains and money will run it; they just need the RR for their foot soldiers.  So as long as the corporate money knows to maintain the surface appearance of silly shit like "intelligent design", they run the show.

What some patriot needs to do is sue the shit right out of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell - drum up a class action that puts their methodical frauds in front of God & everybody.

of a man who starts out saying he's never been arrested, & doesn't remember where he was for NG drills?

Bush's gaffes get a lot of press, because they're funny.  What DOESN'T get a lot of press is the way he talks all the time - empty bullshit.  He gets up a yammers.  The gaffes, the deer-in-the-headlights expression, it's plain as the nose on your face, he's a well-connected C student who may be drier than he used to be.

Like somebody else said, he's not a neo-con, he's an opportunist.  It's the politics behind the curtain that we have to be conscious of.

there is a verb form of "attrition" LOL!!!!!!

is, what would be left over afterwards?  Well, Iran & Syria would be slugging it out.

So gas Iran & Syria too.  That's fair enough, except that would bring in Russia, Turkey, Israel, etc.  Gas them too, OK?

Except at some point, there's not enough pretty girls left around to play with, and we've just fucked ourselves.  

What Dubya never learned was to think ahead.  And of course his neo-con constituency either believes thinking is the devil's work, or doesn't have the RL experience to judge what doesn't work.

Exactamundo! Stone-aged villager, stoned mall-rat, and anyone who's fooled themselves into thinking that Bush and all Republicans are the only crooked pols in the universe are going to believe the same BS.

Albeit a small win, it's an incremental win for the enemy. It has a negative effect on the ability  of the troops to successfully carry out their mission. These small propoganda victories begin to add up.

As far as HE goes, it's not very effective against hardened positions, regardless of the fuse type. WP is a good tool for flushing goblins out of their holes, then killing them with bullets and explosives.

-- Modified on 11/17/2005 12:41:33 PM

I don't hate the sinner, only the sin.  

Dubya's nothing to me.   I'm contemptuous of any person or group that behaves as Dubya does.  Yeah, I'm also contemptuous of a Pres who is such a dumbass as to fuck his intern thinking he's not gonna get caught - you know my theory that he shoulda fucked Catherine Deneuve - no woman can feel bad about taking 2nd seat to that, and he'd have been a national hero to both Americans AND the French (I think they all secretly want the American dick, eh?).  Why, he'd even have given Oprah something to talk about, like she needed it.

In fact, I'm contemptuous of lots of things - I don't understand Teddy Kennedy's chutzpah, or Ken Starr's, or Newt Gingrich's.  I mean, I have brass balls, but I could not even imagine doing what these guys have done.

I think that to get beyond contempt with me, you have to talk about televangelists, those pudgy, pasty little assholes who lie to little old ladies to take their social security, and come up with shit like WTC being God's punishment because we aren't locking up queers.

the deal is, people who have the knowledge carry the most weight, because they're the ones who do it.

A gross of NY babes protesting WP doesn't carry the weight of one GySgt who knows what it's about, and uses it.  Just like a dozen GySgts won't know anything about abortion or douching, and they don't need to be concerned.

HE fz delay was just fine against VC bunkers, but I don't know about a concrete roof - I'd bet 155 HE fz delay would  go thru a stiff roof (like tile) and the next 2 ceilings, but never tried it.  Indirect fire (WP or anything) isn't that accurate, you can't count on it going down a hole.  You can shoot 155 @ chg 3&4 ranges at a door all day & never hit it - been there, done that & it was a waste of ammo.  (The solution is assault fire, which is usually at chg 1/2 ranges, and not too many people know how to do it.  Been there, done that too)  If you're using grenades, why not use HE and kill them outright?  Ah, I suppose smoke could go into adjacent rooms like fragments don't.  

But suggesting that one crooked pol justifies another is crap.   Trading Clinton for Bush was crazy - Clinton was a good negotiator, and knew he had to keep a coalition together.   His lies were hypertechnicalities - "I didn't inhale"  - so the fuck what?  While Dubya's lies are simple inability to know the truth, or recognize the value in  telling the truth.  Dubya's lies are rooted in the RR belief that reality is not objective, it's all talk, and as long as you talk a good line, it doesn't matter what you actually do, because Jesus will forgive you tomorrow.  

claiming that questions - even excited ones - hurt the troops.  The troops I knew didn't give a damn about Democrats, but they were damned concerned that their officers knew WTF they were doing, and rightly so.

Voters in a democracy have the right to be informed.  The GOP panic about disloyal Democrats is pure political crap - whose White House fingered our spies?

America Firsters before WW2 were not disloyal - they had a different view, and they may have been right to delay our entrance until we had a damn good reason, and the other countries had shot their wads.

Where were the Republicans when the Clinton went into Kosovo, etc?   Well, they were looking for BJs.   They're not traitors, unless you want to point out that they were so damn busy looking for leftover pubic hairs that they couldn't be bothered (according to the 9/11 commission) with all the signs of impending terrorist attack.   Not treason, just incompetence.   Which of course explains why they would disregard the risk of FEMA's #2 emergency, hurricanes in New Orleans.

But who needs a freaking commission to tell them Bush is incompetent?  Just listen to him for 10 minutes.

On this point, we agree completely. the right does not have a monopoly on this however, an overwhelming majority granted, but not a monopoly. I detest Jesse Jackson every bit as much as I abhor Pat Robertson.

What's scary about both Jackson and Robertson is the fact that millions of mindless fucks  buy unquestioningly into their bullshit.

Well, there OUGHT NOT to be, but believe it or not I have seen it somewhere within the last 10-15 years in some really overwrought report by a lesser known foreign policy think tank.

My eyes jumped off the page, I thought to myself it couldn't be - but it was.

If I ever come accross this again I'll definitely post the reference fot your edification and disbelief.

He may be good at getting grants, but he couldn't get a platoon to their polling places at the point of a gun.

And IMHO, begging for money is a losing plan - people have to do it themselves, along the gift versus teaching lines...

School of Overwrought English, the same ones that came up with "lase" as a verb, meaning "to illuminate with a laser" - as you know, laser is an acronym for Light Amplification, etc.

There's a lot to be said for semi-literacy, I suppose.  I'll think of something....

It's odd - I try to refrain from speaking in that manner, and when I hear myself speak, or someone else speak who similarly refrains, it sounds so damn strange and wrong because these verbal misdeamnors have become so widespread.

Oh, well.

A fave - "how did thank impact you?"  As if it's too hard to ask "what impact did that have on you?" or even "how did that affect you?"

Oh well.  

I think people think it sounds intelligent and complex.  If they only knew?

My dad - poor idiot - used to say "thee-ay-ter" thinking it was High English, not realizing it just exposed him for the foolish fellow he was.

Yeah, "impact" as a verb - instead of "affect" - is another good one.  I think that's the Corporate school of crappy English.

I think it comes from people struggling to sound bureaucratic, instead of just saying what they mean.

Oh well, no big deal.  We'll survive.

"direct talks" vs. "only regional talks" could be code for "we'll talk" versus "only when everybody else agrees".  (CH 1:  Of course, "let's talk" is pure show when you know they won't.)

Now, there can be a time for either stance; but I see no conflict in talking.  What's to lose?  I'd be a SOB as a diplomat, because I'd have no qualms about talking while I was ordering an assault.

Because that's my business - talk, but don't ever trust words or stop the clock.   Does not disturb me in the least to ambush an enemy, and while I don't regard myself as exactly a hometown Machiavelli, I know they're out there and must be dealt with.

-- Modified on 11/18/2005 1:40:12 PM

to wit, the left focuses on making excuses for people, forgetting that if nobody's responsible, then nothing gets done.  Jesse is an example; Bill Cosby is the antidote.  The better example is psychiatry:  there is nobody in the world who can't fit into some DSM category for the purposes of avoiding liability.

The RR is just irrational.  If they had the power, they'd lock up everybody with a B.S. degree in the USA.  Science is the devil's work, you know?

What's more, the incompetent left isn't really a danger to anybody except themselves.   That is simply not true of the RR.  Granted, Pat & Jerry are 2 of the biggest wusses around, but that ain't true of their followers.  They'll bomb a clinic or shoot a Dr in a heartbeat.  No, I don't think Al Sharpton sets off riots - I don't think he could control his own bowel movements.

1987 - Tawana Brawley hoax. Sharpton singled out Steve Pagones. "If we're lying, sue us, so we can prove you did it."  Pagones won a $345,000 verdict for defamation.  

1991- A Hasidic Jewish driver in Brooklyn's Crown Heights section accidentally kills Gavin Cato, a 7-year-old black child, and antisemitic riots erupt. At Gavin's funeral Sharpton railed against the "diamond merchants" with "the blood of innocent babies" on their hands.  He mobilizes hundreds of demonstrators to march through the Jewish neighborhood, chanting, "No justice, no peace."  A rabbinical student, Yankel Rosenbaum, is surrounded by a mob shouting "Kill the Jews!" and stabbed to death.

1995- When the United House of Prayer, a large black landlord in Harlem, raises the rent on Freddy's Fashion Mart, Freddy's white Jewish owner is forced to raise the rent on his subtenant, a black-owned music store.  A landlord-tenant dispute ensues; Sharpton uses it to incite racial hatred.  "We will not stand by, and allow them to move this brother so that some white interloper can expand his business."  Sharpton's National Action Network sets up picket lines; customers going into Freddy's are spat on and cursed as "traitors" and "Uncle Toms."  Some protesters shout, "Burn down the Jew store!"  and simulate striking a match.  "We're going to see that this cracker suffers," says Sharpton's colleague Morris Powell.  On Dec. 8, one of the protesters bursts into Freddy's, shoots four employees point-blank, then sets the store on fire.  Seven employees died in the inferno.

Eco-terrorists, anti-globalization rioters, fuck-headed liberal idiot running a woman off the  road because she had a Bush bumber-sticker on her car. The innocent, tolerant left.

Sharpton is a riot-inciting MFr, and I misjudged him.

Being a losing dfdt is not a big deal, though fraud and doing damage you can't repair is.

What I'm looking for is not isolated criminals, because those will never go away.  What I'm looking at is (a) major criminal conspiracies (eg all the various forms of terrorism) and (b) politicians who incite that.  If your facts are correct & complete, then Sharpton is one of those.  That Pat Robertson is more into fraud than violence doesn't excuse him.

Eg; Sinn Fein had a right to their position, but I don't blame the Brits for watching them like hawks in connection with the IRA.   Lawyers defend mafiosi, they can't step over the line into crime, and that line is damn gray sometimes.

But categorizing people with groups is also aggravating.  One idiot with a Volvo doesn't make John Kerry a nut, any more than 2 rednecks dragging some schwarzer to death behind their pickup makes Clarence Thomas into a murderer.

IOW, deal with the facts, not the labels, or become one of them.

Change 1:  One significant difference is that the right aspires to and often acheives a degree of unity that makes them either ratifiers or conspirators (in the case of the Moral Majority).  The left is by & large just a bunch of disconnected anarchists - eg you describe blacks on Jews, which is an intramural firefight from the POV of your political label analysis.  IOW, don't assume that "The Left" endorses Sharpton, or even apologizes for him.  Much more unity on the right, and the significance is the ratification issue.

-- Modified on 11/18/2005 11:04:35 AM

Is the wrong question.

The right question is, now we've driven them off the field, so what?  The whole idea was to score with the cheerleaders, and we have no plan for translating winning the game into scoring with the cheerleaders.

In fact, it's beginning to look as if the fuckers who stayed home are the ones scoring, and maybe we shoulda stayed home too...

are fun more dilaterious[sic?] than you might imagine.

by overplaying the racism hand for their own benefit, they increase the thickness of the ceiling ghetto kids have to bust thru to get out. that's why see poverty far more prevelant in blacks than in any other race. most have just quit and end up[ on the roof of life waiting for Brownie to bail em out...

you have al and jj and the fisrt black president to thank for the modern ghetto more so than any asshole in a sheet.

so look, I'll put up $100, if you put up $100, and we'll send it to Bill Cosby, and tell him that there's more where that came from if he goes down and knocks their heads together, OK?

And then we'll buy you a dictionary, OK?
http://dictionary.reference.com/

on!!!  Dude!!!

It's all them Traitors in Congress, and the White House, and them TRaitor judges, and question asking TRaitors.

Republicans are NOT the ones fucking things up here.   This is only the 2nd term, and they have NOT had enough time to empty Fort Knox and level San Frisco yet.  THEY ARE WORKING ON IT, JUST SHUTUP AND BE PATIENT!!!

We DON'T!! need no stinkin books.  I know what is right.