Microsoft products in Cuba

[Calum]

quote:Originally posted by Chooco:
well you have a point there......the US almost tried to be the enemy with all the stuff about getting involved in their governments such as helping Saddam Hussein and Muammar Kadafi into power then supporting a war between Iran and Iraq.....

but still, sanction!!! *waves little American flag*    

almost? the US is the fucking enemy!!! i don't mean the people, just the pervasive cultural notion that if people do not do things their way, then it's wrong and should be changed/obliterated.

That's not meant to be a racist statement and i realise that most US citizens aren't that offensive, but the citizens don't control foreign policy, do they?

[Nobber]

quote:Originally posted by Chooco:
well don't sanction Israel i guess, they have atually decided to become quaint with tecnhology of the 1900s unlike the other countries such as places like Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Jordan which are living 200 years in the past.

Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Jordan are living 200 years in the past? I wonder where you get your information from. I suppose with Iraq you have a point: the US and UK have been bombing it continually since the Gulf War, which (along with the UN sanctions) prevents the Iraqis from rebuilding the social and economic infrastructure that was destroyed.

Anyway, is having outdated technology really a reason to impose sanctions against a country? You could argue that the only reason Israel is up to date technology-wise is that it receives massive aid from the US - aid which is (uniquely) not project-specific and can therefore be spent on whatever toys the Israeli government wants.

[Calum]

yeah, a lot of countries had their own nuclear weapons 200 years ago, didn't you know?

also, no need to worry about the US putting sanctions on Israel, those countries will be buttfucking each other (metaphorically) until we all choke to death on the dust from their bombs while they kill innocents and take their land, ignoring the real terrorists of the world in favour of media publicity.

[Chooco]

living in the past itself is not wrong, if you think it is then go kill some local amish people. what i'm getting at is that one of 2 reasons they hate Canada, US, Britain, France, etc is because they're religion actually demands that they not be friends with non muslims, a guy at anandtech put in about 5 entries straight froma the quaran that say this. modern day people have decided to not follow religion so blatantly.....for example, the bible actually said that if your eyes want you to look at a beautiful woman and think sexual thoughs, you have to rip it out to prevent sin, excessive??
they live in a past that still thinks of non muslims as the enemies somehow and the cause of a lot of problems (well the US is the cause of a lot of mid east problems). ya can't just hate the west because you think modernization causes you to live in sin although people live happier, easier, healthier and longer.

[ June 10, 2002: Message edited by: Chooco ]

[Calum]

it says that in the old testament, although many do not believe that to be a literal command. In the new testament we are offered a 'new covenant' which basically negates the old one (of which that eye plucking command is part). While i do not agree with christianity in paractice, and am not a christian, i do know that to discredit someone on the grounds of facts, you must research the facts first. Although, i am willing to believe that thing about muslims not associating with nonmuslims, i think only some would take it literally, and i wouldn't want to judge individuals, on those grounds.

[choasforages]

um what i don't think that most people get is that they will never be happy until the other side group/country is wiped out and toast, jesus, this has been brewing for thousands of years, the same old shit has been going down for ever maybe if they kill each other there will finaly be peace ???

[Calum]

there won't. War is a necessary part of the economic cycle if capitalism is going to continue to be the dominant societal model.

[ahri]

"bombing (like the US vs Afghanistan) only harms the people, not the regime"

I totally disagree with that. Removing the teliban at the expense of some civilains was the best thing that has ever, and that will ever happen to that country. The teliban would slaughter entire villages when they were in power. You think that is better than the civilain deaths from the bombings? What the teliban did to afghanistan was nothing compared to the short term damage caused by US attacks.

[Calum]

oh yes i certainly do. Bombing is the best thing that happened to that country? look at how up in arms the US was at four planes crashing into buildings? one of them even missed, and you say that the whole fucking country getting ploughed under, and thousands upon thousands of innocents getting killed is the best thing that ever happened to it? what a piece of nonsense.

I don't mean to imply that there is any justification for the plane/building terrorists' acts, what i'm saying is that bombing always kills a lot of people that didn't need to be killed. And doesn't kill anybody that should be strategically removed in the interests of a quick resolution to the situation.

It's like that stuff about not killing Milosevic, because it's against the Geneva convention to knock off the premier of a country. So instead you just allow him to fuck over tons of innocents while you join him in fucking over some more innocents. In the meantime you sell each other arms and oil so everybody wins (except the innocent and the poor, but who gives a fuck about them, eh?)

[voidmain]

A whole country gets plowed?  Get real Calum, a few hills with some caves got blown up, along with a few non-innocents who were hiding in them. If the regime that was controlling the country were not allowing terrorist training camps then the US would not have had to go in and try and clean the place up. And one could suggest that the planes crashing into WTC might never have happened. Believe me, I sure could have used the tax savings. What do you propose "should" have happened in response?

[ June 10, 2002: Message edited by: VoidMain ]

[Calum]

good question. And one i am not qualified to answer. I'm not too hot on current military tactics i'm afraid, i suppose maybe this is one of those times when some sort of insider espionage would have been able to winkle the head bastards out before they got wind and went to ground. This action though, would not have appeased the thundering masses who wanted to see that something was being done.

On the other hand, maybe that wouldn't have been right, as i say i am no contemporary military tactitian, but as far as i see there have been several dozen bombing campaigns in the last century and they have none of them done much damage to the "enemy". I realise you may not agree with me, and i also realise that you will have more of an understanding of the tactics and so on, but i just think that it would be nice if war was not based so much on economics, greed and public opinion, but actually on a genuine will to end it all as quick and clean as possible. Bombing is almost an admission that you would rather dig in than get it all over with, in my opinion.

[voidmain]

It would be nice if it could have been some sort of inside job, but in Afghanistan there really was no "inside". War is ugly, bombing is ugly, it will continue from here until the end of time. I'm certainly not the brightest person in the world by a LONG shot but I can't think of much else that could have been done. I certainly don't believe that "nothing" should have been done.

And you are right about economics/etc should not be part of the reasons for military action, and decisiveness is also extremely important. I believe in the last two major conflicts the US was involved in they were pretty much on track although in the Gulf war I am undecided as to weather the mission was complete. Saddam should have been part of the mission and he wasn't. Looking back, more should have been done in the Nothern territory right after the cease fire when Saddam was tearing up the Kurds.  I happened to be there for that one and I didn't realize until years later what actually went on in the northern parts of Iraq.  I wish there were an easy answer and it seems that the US can not win no matter what they do. There is always a huge portion of the world population that hate us.  If we do something, they hate us.  If we do nothing, they hate us. It sucks because I don't hate anybody (except Microsoft, and XP Luser).

[ahri]

As much as i respect your opinion Calum, your way out in left field on this one. Thousands of deaths? Most of the deaths were teliban solders, few civilians diead in comparison. The bombs were intended for military targets. Yes, a few missed, but very few in comparision to the ones that didn't. Civilain infustructure wasn't bomb as was the case with Iraq and Yugaslavia.

The idea of the bombing having no effect on the regime (teliban) is ridiculus. The teliban is gone isn't it? Can you say the same about the russian attacks in the 80s?

As for the stuff about ecomnomics enetering the dicission making. The US lost millions of dollars worth of bombs, fuel, food and other reasources. They would have definitly prefere to keep that money in their pocket. The truth is, the teliban needed to be removed. The US did that the safest and most cost effective way they could. IMO, the only thing they did wrong was let bin laden escape.

There aren't peaceful solution to every problem. Violence is sometimes neccessary. It's unfortunate, but true.

[ahri]

Actually, my statement about the US conducting the war in the most cost effective way they could was incorrect. They could have not used bombs, thus saving millions of dollars, and just sent solders in instead. But by using bombs, they spent a lot more money, but less people died.

[iustitia]

quote:Originally posted by Ctrl Alt Del 123:
Wow, my 4 years in Spanish MIGHT ACTUALLY PAY OFF AND HAVE A USE!!!!!