Even (especially) if you made the pie chart yourself I like the visual representation that it affords. GOOD JOB!

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"Most people can't think, most of the remainder won't think, the small fraction who do think mostly can't do it very well. The extremely tiny fraction who think regularly, accurately, creatively and without self delusion---In the long run these are the only people that count."Robert Heinlein

Would you care to quote it?

What the FISA law EXPLICITLY specified was warrantless wiretapping capabilities that DID NOT extend to U.S. citizens.


Just out of curiousity, does a requirement for honesty figure into your "good job" at all?

The Democrats are arguing that calls placed between 2 NON-CITIZENS were considered off-limits if the call was routed through the US...Which is absurd considering about 80% of ALL calls are routed through the US...

So if someone in Afghanistan called someone in Pakistan, the argument that the SECOND the call gets routed through a US hub, that call is now considered prohibited to wireless tapping...

AND the telecom company that provided access to that phonecall can be sued by class-action lawyers with the argument that the conversation passed through American soil making the conversation domestic and under American rules and regulations...

Pretty stupid, huh?...

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"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

Here's a more detailed explanation...

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"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

Certainly a big part of the reason for this war is about oil as bhkad's chart shows.
But what would we do without oil? The lights would go out.

The other thing is there are people who have the means and are committed to demonizing, terrorizing and ultimately destroying the U.S. And that is a fact we shouldn't ignore.
Yes we should be fighting in Afghanistan. Yes we should be in some other countries. But we don't have the men at arms to fight in but one ground theater.
WE need the draft. This a real war. It would behoove us to remain engaged.
But some people see that yes Bush and his crones are making money. Money talks. But I don't say what they do is for the benefit of the country in the respect of their business dealings. But I would rather see an American control that oil than a Ben Laden, Hussein, etc.
Now. You know something? This reminds me of pre World War II.
**America did not want to get into that war. It did not concern us. We had been in the "Great War" and didn't want to see any more of it's calamity and hardship and heart rending scenery. But guess what? We ignored it until the precious "Pearl" was bombed. Then we went in and did what we had to do.
**Matter of fact we were dragged kicking and screaming into World War One!
Make no mistake about it. Although some may seem obsessed by this type of dialouge, it is important dialogue.
Because there is a world war going on. We just have to decide to really do something about it.
I fault our politicians. As I've said before, Bush should fire every speech writer until he gets across to the people how detrimental to our future the terrorists are. Failing that, he should get someone else to do the speaking. I can only hope the next president will be a good communicator. Cause the minute he or she takes office you can bet yer sweet bippy, he/she will be apprised of the seriousness of the situation. Then all campaign promises will be out the window as the next president comes to the realization there must be a draft or else we are going to have to bomb civilians to smithereens.
Meanwhile just read the world news. When you're curious about a country, get out the old Encarta or at least look up the history of the region in Wiki. Next read the recent (20-50 yr) history of it.
It is as our old English teachers admonished : Huck Fynn is a great piece of philosophical literature, but balance that out with some history and some meaty works of fiction.
For some meaty works about the modern middle east, you can search Amazon for any of the terrorist organization' names/or Iran/or Iraq/or Afghanistan.
** READ Les Miserables to see why there had to be a French Revolution!
**And please reread Diary of Anne Frank.
Then you will see there are those times a people have to fight and fight to win.
This is is one of those times.

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Well, quite frankly, I see fear mongering, but I also see many heads in the sand. Flip sides of the same coin, really, since the latter seems a response to the former, and elicits even more of the same which then perpetuates the cycle.

On the part of fear mongering, I see the manipulation of fear being used in partisan ways, with charges that one's opponant is "soft" on terrorism as the ultimate appeal to soldier support for many other agendas besides just the war against terrorism.

On the paret of denial, I see plenty examples of people engaging in apologia for that which they really haven't studied, and who defend one thing under the misapprehension they are defending aginst something else. They engage in dismissal and misdirection rather than inquiry, and simply do not care to understand the ideologies involved.

As far as I'm concerned, what we need as a country is less partisanship with the knee jerk polemics that follow suit and more time spent upon understanding the nature of the threat. We may disagree on TACTICS we see fit to combat the threat, but perhaps if we could at least agree that we are all in this together and that the threat is real, we wouldn't spend so much time tearing at each other and turn our attention to the actual threat, instead.

You had me until the last paragraph...

You suggest "more time spent on understanding the nature of the threat", but there are still large segments of society(and political figures) that believe no threat even exists!!!...

And what's worse is that everytime someone attempts to explain the "nature of the threat", they get beat down as partisan hacks attempting to score political points instead of being seen as genuinely concerned...

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"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

yes, and that's why they need to spend more time understanding it instead of just reacting.


Yes, again. That's why I mentioned the cycle of rhetoric as otlined in my first sentences. Seems that you are somehow seeing disagreement when we are agreeing here.



What I find MOST objectionable in this reactionary cycle is that if one merely states their views about Islamism by voicing their rejection of the actual political philosophy involved -- the totalitarian viewpont, the treatment of women and gay people, the extreme need for conformity, the lengths they are willing to go in order to implement this political philosopy, the lack of freedom of expression, etc., and don't even talk about Bush, republicans or anything else -- then the immediate reaction by imbiciles is STILL "you are a right winger". This makes me want to just scream sometimes, to tell you the truth.

Thanks for making this more clear to me...

What I find even more objectionable is that one can show examples of this threat, and that person will be immediately bombarded with the standard "But what about the Christians?" defense of Islam...

__________________
"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

It's almost pavolovian, isn't it?

Usually this brand of knee-jerk apologia utilizes one of three main logical falacies. The first is one is a matter of degree -- in response to a beheadings or suicide bombings, for instance, just find something a bit annoying -- "well, yeah, they may be beheading people and blowing them up, but , but by golly, how about that Pat Robertson, huh?"

The second falacy has to do with prevelence. If 37% of British Muslims think Jews are a legitimate target for murder or if the vast majority of British muslims want to throw somebody in jail if they so much as breathe a word against them, just find some incredibly tiny sect of Christians or Jews with similarly arch beiefs -- "well, sure the large majority British Muslims want you in jail if you diss them, but just lookie what I found -- seven Jews in Hebron and 14 Christians in Little Rock who think the same thing about their religion/culture!"

The third main fallacy has to do with time. Muslims running amok and harboring barbaric beliefs? Hey, no problem if you use the Star Trek excuse (I chose that just for you because I know how you love the program) by creating your own private little temporal anomaly. "But cap'n, those a Christians be doing all sorts of wicked things 5oo years ago, and without new dilithium crystals, I just don a know how much longer she's going to hold!" Oh, and make sure you throw in the de rigueur bit about how Islam is a "New" religion and Christianity has a head start on it yada yada yada.

I'm convinced that a good many people say things just because other people say things. That's how they earn their card into the club, you know. "I'm a liberal/leftist/multiculturalist/politically correct European", and all the other little so and sos are saying this, so I will say it too. Politics acts in terms of memes to a great degree, and in discussing Islam or Islamists, too often the discussion devolves into simple platutudes and in very predictable ways. Especially when these platitudes are based in denial and in the sorts of logical falacies I've outlined, they sure don't serve any of us particulary well.