|
New poll
We have a new poll — do vote! In our most recent poll, 56.1% of those responding thought the civilizations of Europe and China would most
likely have turned out quite differently if the genetic endowments of their peoples had been reversed, 34.8%
thought they would not, and 9.1% voted “other.” There were 66 votes in all, and considerable commentary.
Comments
I chose the first listed motive, although with reservations. “The Bush administration” contains lots of people with motives other than Bush’s. Some have the second and some the fourth motives on the list (I don’t think the others have any influence). This is not necessarily a criticism or recognition of a weakness. An American administration must, in the nature of things, represent a coalition, and it must have an eye on the next election, whether highly principled people like the posters on VFR like it or not. If those two conditions didn’t exist, the administration wouldn’t be there, nor would it get its supporters or itself (re)elected. This hybrid nature of the administration partly accounts for the administration’s noticeably unconservative positions on various non-war issues. Purists like me need to keep in mind that pressure from us helps keep the compromises to the minimum necessary to electoral success. Posted by: frieda on March 3, 2003 10:10 AMLike Frieda, I view the administration’s position as a hybrid of several views. I voted for No. 2 as the predominant one. I find it difficult to believe that anyone who takes the security of the US seriously would advocate conducting a war against Iraq while insisting that the country’s borders remain open and unguarded. Posted by: Carl on March 3, 2003 10:52 AMI voted “oil” on this one, but of course with MANY reservations. Iraq can in no way be considered a threat against the United States, and I find it hard to believe that the Bush administration (or any administration) can believe otherwise. When Saddam invaded Kuwait his forces where snuffed out in no time at all; his army now is one third of what it was back then, and the majority of the weapons of mass destruction the United States put in his hands during his war against Iran and his assaults on his own Kurd population is destroyed. I don’t see him overthrowing the freedomlovin’, equal, commercial and beautiful Modern West any time soon. Israeli interests might be a small part of it, but the situation is the same here: even if Saddam lives until he’s 80 years old and all UN sanctions against Iraq are lifted, the country would never be able to regain sufficent strength to threaten Israel in any serious way. An assault by Iraq on Israel would render the entire Iraqi nation a radioactive ooze for time eternal, and Saddam knows this as well as anyone else. The “US world Empire” idea belongs on another plane; I don’t believe there are Imperialist lobby groups in the white house, nor that the term “Empire” is used even internally by any modern, pragmatic materialist administration (and even it would be used it could never retain any of it’s actual meaning; a meaning lost since way before the age of colonialism or imperialism). “Empire” in this context would have to be (mis)interprented as a combination of a wish to separate the United States from the will of the international community (a dangerous ambition indeed, even if it is understandable given the current power relations of the world), oil interests (a universal motivation to all governments since oil became a commodity), zionist lobbyism, and perhaps an actual view of Saddam as dangerous. Given the facts pointed out above, combined with the enourmous oil resources (and weak position) of Iraq, I believe oil to be the predominant reason for the United States to attack Iraq. Has everyone forgotten North Korea? The signal is of course obvious to all petty dictators around the world: Get yourself nuclear weapons, and diplomacy will be a possibility (North Korea, Pakistan). Fail and we’re coming for you, guns blazing. Posted by: Martin on March 3, 2003 11:46 AMI voted for physical security. The question was as to motivation. It did not ask whether or not the reasoning made sense, and it didn’t invoke any freudian analysis of unconscious motives. It didn’t invoke Arrow’s Theorem to point out the weaknesses of governance by coalition. The plain question is “what is the leading motive”; and the clear answer to that specific question is physical security. The other answers are either untenable conspiracy theories or don’t answer the actual specific question. Posted by: Matt on March 3, 2003 12:01 PMMatt Yes, “Motivation”, not “official explanation” Personally I cannot even begin to accept that anyone in the US administration truly believes Iraq to be a threat to the United States, regardless of what I think of President Bush’s capacity, so I’ll have to go with the “conspiracy theory” that makes the most sense. “and it didn’t invoke any freudian analysis of unconscious motives.” Did my post contain anything of this nature? If it did, it must have been a slip (I’m all humour). Anyway, no-one has said anything about “unconscious”, just unofficial. Posted by: Martin on March 3, 2003 12:41 PMWell, my post was more a response to the body of previous posts rather than Martin’s specifically. Martin writes: Well, Iraq is in actual fact an objective threat to the United States. There are all sorts of legitimate questions about how imminent a threat, relative priorities (both w.r.t. other nations — e.g. N. Korea — and other classes of threat — e.g. Moslem immigration), etc. But Martin seems to be saying that one simply cannot in good faith view Iraq as an objective threat to US interests at all; that for one to assert that view one must be either deranged or lying. The irony, of course, is that such a view (if it indeed is what Martin believes) is itself irrational. “Well, Iraq is in actual fact an objective threat to the United States.” In what way? Is it their immense military strength, or perhaps the massive impact of Saddam Hussein’s statements has on world opinion? Even if there is any basis for assuming that Iraq actually is a threat, it is clearly not grave enough to justify the massive and utterly expensive war effort. I might add, in support of my “conspiracy theory”, that the US administration in it’s plan for occupation of Iraq (as presented to the media), has put “assume control over the oil” on the 2nd or 3rd place in the list, if my memory doesn’t fail me I believe it was even before arresting/murdering Hussein. Posted by: Martin on March 3, 2003 2:54 PMMartin writes: Martin is getting himself into a bit of a discursive tangle, it seems to me. I haven’t been beating my wife, and even if I have it hasn’t been much, to mangle a metaphor. I said explicitly that there are legitimate arguments to be made about the imminence of threat, priorities, etc. There seems to be this fear that admitting the existence of any threat at all is to give up the argument, when in fact exactly the opposite is the case. By insisting counterfactually that there is no threat whatsoever, and that only liars and idiots pretend that there is, the bulk of the antiwar right simply marginalizes itself. That’s too bad, because there are difficult decisions to be made in a very ambiguous and contentious context. Contra the antiwar right’s predominant claims, this is in fact, for most people, about security. A principled paleo voice in that discussion might be quite valuable, but at this point it seems that will never be known. Posted by: Matt on March 3, 2003 3:12 PM“I haven’t been beating my wife, and even if I have it hasn’t been much, to mangle a metaphor.” Indeed mangled, but quite amusing. I’d rather say “I haven’t been beating my wife, but if you define pushing her during a fight as “beating”, then perhaps I have. It’s still no reason to shoot me in the head and bomb my entire neighbourhood to the stoneage. There are laws and social conventions developed for these matters, and if you still want to murder me I think you have another motive.” Now, please tell me what “threat” Iraq poses to the United States or anybody else, or this discussion is bound for stagnation. Posted by: Martin on March 3, 2003 3:28 PMMartin doesn’t need me to help him figure out whether or not Iraq is an objective threat at all to the US (though of course I’ll be accused of evasion if I don’t provide something now, so there are a few links to prior discussions and other items below). Martin’s apparent position (or one half of his equivocation) is that Iraq is in fact a threat, but not enough of a threat to justify war. His other position/equivocation is that Iraq is not a threat at all. It is the latter mode of this equivocation, and the equivocation itself, that is specifically unprincipled and counterfactual. Martin is back at the same old equivocal game we’ve revisited here for months. The archives link goes to all sorts of stuff here, on this one little web site; itself a mere drop in the ocean of info available at Martin’s fingertips. A few immediate examples: http://www.counterrevolution.net/vfr/archives/000751.html If Martin wants to choose which mode of his equivocation is his actual position it might be possible to engage in further discussion. But he would have to select between: 1) Iraq is a threat to the US, but there are moral or prudential reasons why a war with Iraq is at this time unjustified (perhaps even grossly so); or 2) Iraq as currently constituted is no threat whatsoever to the US. The former claim is credible and principled as a starting place, and leaves plenty of room for a principled opposition to war (on just war criteria, on the evidence, on priorities, or any number of other things). The latter claim is so obviously incorrect that simply asserting it disqualifies one from being taken seriously. Furthermore, it is an assertion that misses the reason why most Americans, no doubt including many in the Bush administration and the president himself, think (quite possibly wrongly) that a war with Iraq is necessary. It is exactly this disconnected refusal to address the argument — even for the purpose of opposition — that ensures the marginalization of the AWR. “If Martin wants to choose which mode of his equivocation is his actual position it might be possible to engage in further discussion.” Ok, let me clarify then: It is my belief that most or all weapons of mass destruction in Iraq is destroyed. However, I can’t give any guarantee of this, and if Saddam Hussein possesses an enormous, undetectable secret heap of nuclear weapons, anthrax and nerve gasses he is of course a potential threat. However, I find it quite obvious that he knows what would happen if he in any way assisted ANY form of military or terrorist attack on the United States (especially one utilizing this kind of weapons): the physical destruction of Iraq, as well as his own death is an OBVIOUS conseqeuense of any action in this direction. The fact that the media tries to portray Hussein as an irrational lunatic does not change this. He is a brutal leader, but so far he has done nothing to justify the theory that he is unstable and dangerous. When he attacked Kuwait, he did so in the belief that he would still be supported by the United States, as he was when he attacked Iran and defeated the Kurd rebellion. For some reason this wasn’t the case, and the United States changed it’s policy. Since then, Saddam has done nothing aggressive whatsoever against the west, apart from saying that he doesn’t like it. I can’t really blame him either, even though I still don’t think he’s a nice guy. So, in conclusion: Saddam COULD of course snap and in a fit of rage dispatch an enormous amount of secret weapons towards the West. So could the leadership of Pakistan, Saudi-Arabia, why not even include the possibility that Russia would? My point is that this is so unlikely that it does not motivate a war in any way. And it is my belief that the American administration knows this. Posted by: Martin on March 3, 2003 5:28 PMMartin writes: That isn’t so obvious to me. If nerve gas bombs went off in Chicago, a few hundred thousand people were killed, and nobody claimed responsibility, that would not automatically translate into nuclear annihilation of Iraq. There have already been unexplained anthrax deaths in America, accompanied by notes obviously written by English-illiterate Middle Easterners or intended to look that way. There is no reason why something like that can’t happen on a larger scale, and there is no reason to believe that such an occurrence would result in immediate nuclear retaliation (against whom?). Mutual assured destruction might work in a world of rational enemies and clear smoking guns, but in other sorts of worlds (like ours) it won’t. So clearly as part of the supply chain for WMD’s Hussein does represent an objective threat, even if he is perfectly sane (and perhaps more so if he is perfectly sane). That doesn’t translate into an immediate call for war, taken in itself, but it does refute the notion that Iraq is not an objective threat. I picked security as the clearly leading motivation. (Bush’s re-election as a choice would make a future poll very controversial.) Posted by: P Murgos on March 3, 2003 6:04 PM“There have already been unexplained anthrax deaths in America, accompanied by notes obviously written by English-illiterate Middle Easterners or intended to look that way.” Now who’s into conspiracy theory, heh? Anyway, I don’t think this discussion will lead any further. We obviously see the situation differently. Posted by: Martin on March 3, 2003 6:19 PMMartin: It isn’t a conspiracy theory. It is an example of the actual use of an actual biological weapon to kill actual Americans; an attack that was never answered and perhaps never will be, because we don’t know who did it. That was the point to bringing it up: it clearly falsifies the paleo notion that MAD (mutual assured destruction) can work in current circumstances at all, and therefore the specific notion that MAD has some efficacy against Hussein. Posted by: Matt on March 3, 2003 6:59 PMIt didn’t take the US government too long to figure out who was behind the WTC attacks, and had Saddam in any way been associated to it the war probably would not have been about to start now, but be over already. Any form of large scale bio/nuclear attack against the United States would be possible to investigate, and personally I can’t see a reason why Hussein would participate in one, given the CHANCE of being found out (and the fact that it would have no positive value to him or Iraq what so ever). I believe it is on this last point that our opinions differ. Posted by: Martin on March 4, 2003 5:43 AMLet’s have another poll: Matt vs. Martin. I vote for Matt. Posted by: frieda on March 4, 2003 10:15 AMMartin: The fact that the anthrax attacks have not yet been resolved is one example that falsifies this. “…personally I can’t see a reason why Hussein would participate in one…” Because he might believe that such an attack would reduce US influence and US willingness to protect its allies in the Gulf, to his benefit. He wouldn’t have to be a lunatic to think so. In order to bet US security on Martin’s view of the situation we would have to: 1) Assume that no sane person can ever convince himself that there is merit in a strategy of physically attacking the US with plausible deniability; and 2) Assume that no insane person can acquire WMD’s. One exception — just one exception ever — to Martin’s presumptions and the result is a mushroom cloud over Manhattan. Posted by: Matt on March 4, 2003 10:22 AMStop what you are doing, and read this article: http://www.currentconcerns.ch/archive/20020506.php We are in the midst of the greatest campaign of organized mendacity in the history of mankind, and I do not exaggerate to make a point. Posted by: Socrates on March 4, 2003 12:17 PMSocrates’ post and the article he cites are more of the same: a body of quite legitimate paleo concerns about demographics and culture on the one hand, and a denial of the existence of any real physical threat or danger on the other. It is precisely the ridiculousness of the latter claim that marginalizes the former in the court of public opinion; and as I said, that is a tragedy. The article by Robert Hickson that Socrates praises so highly consists of little more than mindless ranting. Paragraph after paragraph, Hickson repeats the same thing: that the truth is being concealed from us, that we’re surrounded by untruth, that we’re living in a world of madness and lies, that we must speak the truth. The words “truth” and “untruth”—without any explanation of what he means by “truth” and “untruth”—must be repeated at least 40 times in the article. Then, finally he gets to the “truth.” Guess what the “truth” is? It’s all about Israel. America in opposing Hussein is simply serving the strategic interests of Israel, period, and everything else is a lie. This is the great and wonderful and courageous message that Socrates wants us to hear, and which, he seems to be believe, no one has ever heard before, because it’s been hidden from us by the speakers of untruth. Truly, truly, we are witnessing a breakdown in rationality, when the people who most loudly profess their devotion to “truth” are literally unable to marshal a logical argument in defense of their position and are little better than ranters on a street corner. By the way, here’s a question for those who think that the U.S. is simply serving the strategic interests of Israel. If that were the case, why wouldn’t America be attacking Iran and Syria, rather than Iraq, since those two countries have been vastly more involved in supporting anti-Israeli terrorism than Iraq has? Hmm? And another question for the anti-war right: Which of your various explanations of the “real” reason we are fighting Hussein is the true explanation? They can’t all be true. Some of you say the “real” motive is for the control of oil. Some of you say the “real” motive is to spread democracy. Some of you say the “real” motive is to create an American empire. Some of you say the “real” motive is to advance the interests of Israel. But if one of these motives is the “real” reason for the war, then the other proferred motives cannot be the real reason. So, anti-war rightists, which is it? Posted by: Lawrence Auster on March 4, 2003 2:19 PMMr. Auster’s view that there is a fundamental breakdown in rationality among paleos is right I think. There was some merit to some of Hickson’s points, of course, but none of it was remotely novel let alone a revelation of some hidden beacon of truth. For example, the inability to name the enemy in the “war on terrorism” is every bit the problem paleos say it is; massive Moslem immigration combined with war against Moslems abroad is suicidal; etc. etc. We’ve been over all of this before, repeatedly. Hickson’s notion that “we lost the cold war” was particuarly short-sighted for a self-styled traditionalist, I thought. The cold war (and every war of the twentieth century) was a war between liberals (or antitraditionalist moderns, if you prefer), all of whom agree that freedom and equality are the highest political goods; the various sides just disagreed as to what structures best bring about freedom and equality for the new man, and what constitutes the new man. Hundreds of millions have been murdered over that disagreement; irony isn’t the proper word for the fact that the disagreement is fundamentally over how to gyre the gimbals on the wabe. And the disagreement continues — it will continue until liberalism self-destructs or an at present unthinkable global repentance occurs. This is from the propaganda article posted by Socrates; ” also am convinced, by the cumulative evidence and especially by what I have recently seen, that the Israelis and their intelligence agents (or ‘art students’) at least had foreknowledge of the 11 September attacks, and they have certainly profited by them (cui bono?). I can’t go into the details now, but the Drug Enforcement Agency’s evidence is now public, and, from this source alone, I am convinced that the Israeli operatives probably had, at least, foreknowledge, as well as the dark satisfaction of Schadenfreude.” I read this article through and it is essentially the usual list of conspiracy theories strung together to sound like a rational argument, including the obscene one above. It attacks Evangelical Christians for supporting Israel and God’s first Chosen instead of Muslim terrorists, throws the usual silly claims about oil around, attacks Israel, and tries to slur Israel with unsubstantiated and discredited accusations. If this is the best Paleo’s can do for an argument then they are losing all intellectual credibility, and as I have said before, climbing into the gutter with the anti-American and anti-Jewish Left. ” We are in the midst of the greatest campaign of organized mendacity in the history of mankind, and I do not exaggerate to make a point.” — Socrates. Yes we are, and it’s people like you and your left wing comrades who are behind it. “I might add, in support of my “conspiracy theory”, that the US administration in it’s plan for occupation of Iraq (as presented to the media), has put “assume control over the oil” on the 2nd or 3rd place in the list, if my memory doesn’t fail me I believe it was even before arresting/murdering Hussein.” — Martin. This is why people who are going to comment about Iraq should at least have some understanding of military tactics before wading in on matters they clearly do not understand. There is a real concern that Saddam will do what he did in Kuwait and set fire to Iraq’s oil fields. This would be an environmental disaster, and destroy a source of revenue for the necessary rebuilding of Iraq after the invasion. So of course special forces and other elements of the military are going to secure the oil fields as quickly as possible. This does not mean, nor prove in any way, that America is going to steal the oil fields for itself. So this does not support your conspiracy theory at all, it simply displays your lack of understanding of military tactics. Posted by: Shawn on March 4, 2003 3:36 PMThanks to Shawn for pointing out that “Dr.” Robert Hickson went so far as to endorse the “Israelis were behind/had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attack” theory. I was skimming his article by that point and missed that tidbit. That puts Hickson and his admiring acolyte Socrates in the same league as Sheikh Muhammad Al-Gamei’a and his defenders at a lengthy VFR discussion a couple of months ago: http://www.counterrevolution.net/vfr/archives/001097.html Posted by: Lawrence Auster on March 4, 2003 3:43 PMI missed that in skimming too. Nice catch Shawn. The willful and ideologically dominated comments that this article evoked prove the thesis of the article, that irrationality and madness and the god of power are promoting this war. I guess it is psychologically comfortable to be on the side of power, and when truth is brought in front of one’s eyes, that comfort takes precedence. Either Israel Sharon is a genocidal murderer (or wannabe if he could do it) or he is not. How are all of you so sure he isn’t? Can you really simply refute the following brief argument?: Paying for the Bullet by Joe Sobran “I have nothing against Arabs, but a lot of them seem to hate me. Not as an individual, but just as an American. I think I understand why.
American Middle Eastern policy seems based on the assumption that the Arabs wo not notice the obvious. But if the murder of their children does not shock us, neither should their hatred” Do you have some infallible way of knowing the true situation in Israel? That Sobran is lying?Are not the major media sources owned by corrupt men and dominated by money and power? Oh, they are not? How do you know? DO you think there is really “free speech” when it comes to the major media? Why do you trust the lying neo-con publications? Do you really think that an American President who fires his AIDS advisor, Thacker, because he morally condemned homosexuality (the worst lie and a sin that cries to heaven for vengence), would refrain from lying to the American people, or, at least, be so naive as to belive the lies he is being told? Born again Christainity is one of the most irrational of all religions, because it is based on pure gnosticism (witness the Christian gnosticsm that would support a nuclear war to usher in the rapture!) Do you think a pure gnostic, born-again like Bush can really distinguish truth from error? Can someone who supports the murder of unborn babies “in certain cases” lead his country justly? Would he refrain from murdering other full-grown humans “in certain cases?” Can a country awash in the blood of babies and full of sodomous acts that cry out to God for vengance and impurity and the corruption of children and blasphemous art and divorce and adultery and evil Catholic Bishops and sacreligious Liturgy and drugs and fornication and insane music and hatred for God’s law and ugliness and a regime that is indifferent to religious truth and where Christ is put on the same level as Satan in schools really be the “cause for good” against the “Axis of evil.” Do you see how Satanically upside down that is! Does a regime that will not protect its most helpless citizens from murder really mean to protect you? Do you believe that this war has anything to do with defeating evil? Are your answers to these questions your own, or are you programmed? Now is the time of Lent. Mortify the need to be comfortable, and accept the heartbreak and anxiety that comes from knowing that you are in the midst of an evil regime and an evil culture. There is hope only in this, for it brings one to the salvation of Christ. Don’t pin your hopes on our present government; for it is not of Christ’s spirit. Robert Hugh Benson’s “Lord of the World” would be a good place to start to see oneself through. For God’s sake, SEE THE TRUTH! Posted by: Socrates on March 4, 2003 4:36 PMSocrates: And again: Of course on a certain level one can hardly blame paleos for mimicking George W. Bush’s casting of the conflict in terms of categorical good versus categorical evil. I agree with paleos that cast in those terms, and against that standard, there is no siding with the US in the conflict (I disagree with paleos inasmuch as I don’t think one can side with the Moslems on those terms either, and I think the paleo embrace of murderers and blasphemers is an expression of anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism rather than a legitimate embrace of a putative superior morality on the part of the Islamists). It isn’t about all that for me though. It is plainly and simply about physical security. I don’t have to justify all of civilization in order to take action to keep a specific enemy from killing my family, neighbors, friends, and colleagues. Matt: But security will most probably be damaged by such a war. What makes you think that this war will not bring on World War III or IV? If the war is morally wrong, then more evil will come out of it than good. How are you so sure this is morally right? Iraq is not “terrorism”!, and we should defend ourselves against terrorism. But, once again, Iraq is not terrorism!
“But security will most probably be damaged by such a war. What makes you think that this war will not bring on World War III or IV?” These are matters of prudential judgement. Contrary to neocon/liberal claims on the one side and paleocon/leftist claims on the other, the future is murky. Even the present is murky, for that matter. Acting now and in this way may release a chain of events and bring on world war III. Not acting now and in this way may release a chain of events and bring on world war III. “If the war is morally wrong, then more evil will come out of it than good.” Other than acknowledging our fallen state, I am not sure what this is supposed to imply. If a liberal State is always morally wrong in waging war, and more harm will come than good from it, then American participation in WWII was morally wrong and no good came from it. (I don’t completely dismiss the possibility, but it is counterintuitive to say the least). It is true that the more holy one is the more likely one is to be justified in one’s actions, including going to war; but immanent perfection isn’t an option so there must be some prudential judgement involved somewhere. “Iraq is not terrorism!” True. Calling this a war on terrorism is like calling it a war on sneak attacks. The enemy is radical Islam and its secular support systems; and the failure to name the enemy is indeed a major problem. “The willful and ideologically dominated comments that this article evoked” This is a hypocritical comment to make. The article itself was dominated by ideology of a specific kind. Your own view on thise issue is an ideological one. “prove the thesis of the article, that irrationality and madness and the god of power are promoting this war.” Rubbish. A number of people on VFR have made rational and moral arguments for dealing with Iraq. Why don’t you attempt to debate the substance of those arguments rather than throwing around insulting accusations like this? The reality is that the article you posted did not have one iota of rational argument in it. It simply strung unsubstantiated conspiracy theories together and made silly claims about Americans being brainwashed and gnostic notions of humanity living in a sea of lies. If you want to debate this issue rationally do so. But so far you have utterly failed to make any kind of rational point. “Either Israel Sharon is a genocidal murderer (or wannabe if he could do it) or he is not. How are all of you so sure he isn’t? Can you really simply refute the following brief argument?:” Genocide means the attempt to wipe out an entire race or group of people. To claim that what the Israeli government is doing is genocide is factually incorrect. Here are some real facts. Israel offered the Palestinian leadership an extremely generous peace deal. They rejected it. Instead they chose the path of terrorism. Palestinians would not now be dying if was not for terrorists such as Arafat and Hamas and Islamic Jihad. I deplore and hate the killing of children, both Palestinian and Israeli. But who allows their children to go out and attack Israli soildiers in the first place? The Palstinians do. Who brings their children up to hate all Jews? Muslims do. Who sends children to terrorist training camps? Palestinians do. Ever heard of moral responibility? “Why do you trust the lying neo-con publications?” PROVE they are lying. Making unsubstantiated arguments like this is a poor way to make an argument. “Do you really think that an American President who fires his AIDS advisor, Thacker, because he morally condemned homosexuality (the worst lie and a sin that cries to heaven for vengence), would refrain from lying to the American people, or, at least, be so naive as to belive the lies he is being told?” Again, PROVE that Bush is lying or being lied to. It’s pathetically easy to make these accusations, but you continualy fail to provide any evidence or proof of any sort. It’s a sin to bear false witness. In the case of President Bush, this is what you are doing. “Born again Christainity is one of the most irrational of all religions, because it is based on pure gnosticism (witness the Christian gnosticsm that would support a nuclear war to usher in the rapture!) Do you think a pure gnostic, born-again like Bush can really distinguish truth from error?” Evangelical Christianity is a Biblically based and orthodox Christian faith, not Gnosticism. I know a lot of evangelicals, and have moved in evangelical circles for many years, and I have never found anyone who belives in the nuclear holocaust idea to bring about the apocalypse. Taking a fringe idea and claiming all evangelicals believe it is another form of the sin of bearing false witness. As it happens Bush is not an evangelical Christian, he is an orthodox Protestant from an Episcoplaian background and who is currently attending a Methodist Church. “Can a country awash in the blood of babies and full of sodomous acts that cry out to God for vengance and impurity and the corruption of children and blasphemous art and divorce and adultery and evil Catholic Bishops and sacreligious Liturgy and drugs and fornication and insane music and hatred for God’s law and ugliness and a regime that is indifferent to religious truth and where Christ is put on the same level as Satan in schools really be the “cause for good” against the “Axis of evil.” Do you see how Satanically upside down that is!” This kind of anti-American ranting is vile and obscene. A true Christian perspective would acknowledge that ALL humans and therefore ALL nations are sinful. America is no worse than any other country, and is in some repsects much better. America remains the most Christian nation on earth, far more so than ANY European country. America is NOT indifferent to Christian truth, but we are in a battle with liberals. America at least is still IN the battle however. Europe on the other hand has given up and surrendered. “Can a country awash in the blood of babies and full of sodomous acts that cry out to God for vengance and impurity and the corruption of children and blasphemous art and divorce and adultery and evil Catholic Bishops and sacreligious Liturgy and drugs and fornication and insane music and hatred for God’s law and ugliness” ALL of these accusations are also true of all those European countries that are opposed to war with Iraq, in fact more so as Europe is far far more morally corrupt and secular than America is. So how can their stance be based on morality if America’s cant? “Are your answers to these questions your own, or are you programmed?” I speak my OWN words bud, and I take extreme exception to being accused of brainwashing by someone who’s debating skills amount to repeating unsubstantiated accusations and conspiracy theories. Until you start actually providing evidence, or at least rational arguments, I’m going to assume that it is YOU who are brainwashed Matt: “The fact that the anthrax attacks have not yet been resolved is one example that falsifies this.” No, because the incidents are so small; in fact I hadn’t even heard of them before you mentioned them here. “Because he might believe that such an attack would reduce US influence and US willingness to protect its allies in the Gulf, to his benefit.” Based on what? I believe it is rather obvious that if a Mushroom Cloud appeared over Manhattan(how Saddam would be able to pull that off is far beyond my comprehension; constructing intercontinental missiles takes resources Iraq can only dream of) the United States would respond with violence far beyond anything the world has ever seen, directed towards anything or anyone that could even be suspected. Saddam would most likely be killed even if it was obvious he wasn’t behind it. Even if Saddam IS a lunatic he most definitely understands this. Shawn: “Israel offered the Palestinian leadership an extremely generous peace deal. They rejected it.” Arafat did not reject it. Sharon entered the Dome of Rock with armed soldiers before the negotiations were concluded. This is blasphemy beyond belief - and Sharon did this KNOWING what the result would be. The uprising was spontaneous (not ordered by Arafat or any other palestinian “terrorist”) and caused by many different factors, the extreme day-to-day repression of the Palestinians being the fundamental one, and Sharons action being the “spark”. Israel cancelled the negotiations in response to the uprising and attacked Arafat’s government structure, thus escalating the violence. You are not presenting “facts”, but propaganda. Other than that I actually believe that both Shawn and Matt has legitimate points, even though I am still firmly convinced that further US warfare in the middle east will provoke far mor intense hatred directed towards the United States. Bombs that murder thousands based on “Mushroom Cloud” horror stories doesn’t seem plausible to me. Since the war most likely will be conducted, I believe the future will prove me right as well. Then again, one can always claim that the Iraqi children growing up with no fathers are just “extremists” for loathing the nation that orphaned them. Posted by: Martin on March 5, 2003 8:10 AM“No, because the incidents are so small; in fact I hadn’t even heard of them before you mentioned them here.” The anthrax attacks shut down the US postal system for a week, caused tens or hundreds of billions of dollars in damage, killed a small number of people and required the use of strong antibiotics by a large number of people. Among those targeted by anthrax letters were top government and media officials. It was only the relative ineptitude of the attack compared to the WTC attack that kept the damage so limited, and we still don’t know who did it. Those who are utterly ignorant of our enemies and how they attack us would do well not to presume to criticize our defense. “…the United States would respond with violence far beyond anything the world has ever seen, directed towards anything or anyone that could even be suspected.” That simply isn’t true. If a nuclear weapon exploded on a small boat in NY harbor killing millions and we had no idea who did it, we would not strike out willy nilly at every possible perp. It isn’t the kind of people we are. Martin: I’m pretty ignorant about all of this stuff, so let me try to clarify something. The peace deal was rejected — the Palestinians turned down the chance to get everything they were supposedly asking for and the Intifada was started — because — horrors! — SOMEBODY WALKED INTO A BUILDING? I suppose it is possible. So now I have two interpretive choices when it comes to this particular incident, rather than just one choice. Either the Palestinians are so unstable and violent that it is impossible to make any legitimate deal with them and expect them to stick with it, enforcing it against themselves; or they really didn’t want a peaceful settlement that doesn’t entail the elimination of Israel and the reversal of the Nakba. In either case, their trials continue not because of the actions of others, but because of their own conscious choice to continue them. “Arafat did not reject it. Sharon entered the Dome of Rock with armed soldiers before the negotiations were concluded. This is blasphemy beyond belief” Sharon did not enter the “Dome of the Rock”, he simply visted the Wailing Wall, a right every Jew has. But if you want to talk about blasphemy, lets talk about the “Dome of the Rock” itself. To Christians and Jews alike, this is the site of the Holy Temple, the sight originally built by David under God’s command, and the sight where Jesus taught and worshipped. To a Jew this sight is the holiest place on earth, the sight of the “Holy of Holies” when the Temple still stood, the very center of Jewish religious and national identity, and every day they have to live with the fact that it is being defiled by an occupying power, Islam. Moreover Arafats henchmen have been digging around on the sight and are undermining the foundations, which has placed the Wailing Wall, the last vestige of the Temple, in real danger of collapse. Why is it that Muslims are allowed to invade Jewish and Christian lands, to invade the great Christian city of Constantinople, to turn the Hagia Sophia, one of the greatest Christian Churches into a Mousque while ripping out its icons, build a Mousque on the sight of the holiest Jewish Temple, and we are just supposed to lie down and take it, while the simple act of a Jew visiting the Wailing Wall justifies suicide bombers killing schoolchildren. Whats wrong with this picture? Posted by: Shawn on March 5, 2003 5:05 PMTo everyone, please excuse my extremely poor spelling in several posts above. I normally post here after a hard days work and when I’m not at my best. However I will strive to improve it in future so that I may hopefully honor the work Jim and Lawrence put into VFR. Posted by: Shawn on March 6, 2003 12:36 AM |