Memorial day observed - Do you approve?

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Originally Posted by Alric

Its all about fear.

The fact of the matter is your infinitely more likely to die in a car crash or from a heart attack than from a terrorist attack. You think your in control when your driving though, you think you can't have a heart attack because your not in "that bad of shape", and so you don't worry about that.

So you go along with the wars.

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There is nothing unrealistic about fearing a government that has suicide bomber policies against "infidels", has used WMD's for terrorist purposes, is reported by so many bodies to have WMD's, is without nukes only because Israel blew up their factory, and violated our ceasefire for twelve years on several terrorism grounds. We were not illegitimately worried about that. We were being totally realistic. It is true that more people die in car accidents than die in terrorist attacks. We are trying to keep it that way, and our trying to keep it that way is what has kept it that way this whole time.

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Originally Posted by Oneironaught

Politics - as we all know - is one of those things that can tear friends apart.

As you can see, I've already got people calling me a hate-monger over this crap. It ends here and now.

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I can understand that. Ironically, I first came to this site to learn more about lucid dreaming and to talk about trippy subjects without political hate being thrown at me. I spent a great deal of time on the internet during the first year of the war arguing for American Middle East policy. This site was supposed to be my escape from it. For two and a half years, it was exactly that. But last September, I started seeing some very vicious anti-American posts in this forum, and they were always completely unchallenged. I felt like I had an obligation to open minds by pointing out the other sides of the arguments. Everything was total gravy for me on this site before I started talking about religion and politics. It is mind blowing how certain people will hate you for what honestly seems to make sense to you. But when I see people from other countries saying the worst things imaginable about my country and I don't think that what they are saying is true, I feel the need to say something about it. I can totally understand why people would want to avoid the enemy climate that comes with disagreeing with such posts, but it's not how I personally am wired. I should also mention that the political discussions have involed a lot more tolerance and understanding here lately than they did for a while. I'm glad to see that.

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Originally Posted by Universal Mind

This is Bin Laden's letter to the United States. You can find a great deal in it about how he detests our freedom.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/print...110490,00.html

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Excellent. Thanks for that. I will read it as soon as I've got the time. Make no mistake, though - I knew that they hated our freedom and how our ways deviate from theirs (I've never heard/read that letter, though) but, from what I've read, I just didn't see it as the real reason for this conflict, in relation to the severity which that particular reason has been broadcast to the American people.
That's to say nothing to dampen your post, though. Simply explaining myself. I'll read that letter soon.

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Originally Posted by Universal Mind

...But last September, I started seeing some very vicious anti-American posts in this forum, and they were always completely unchallenged. I felt like I had an obligation to open minds by pointing out the other sides of the arguments. Everything was total gravy for me on this site before I started talking about religion and politics. It is mind blowing how certain people will hate you for what honestly seems to make sense to you.

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Man, thanks exactly what I went through. And I, too, felt it was my duty responsibility to tell the other side of the story. It didn't take too long before I was receiving PMs and "rep. comments" (something we don't have here) that were negative. People said things like "The world would be a better place without @ssholes like you", "You're full of hate" and every other thing you can think of.

It's funny, I was very well-respected at that site until then. I felt the popular tide begin to shift. "Most" people there still have "great respect" for me but, the attitudes of some of the members there discolored my love for the place. The way people attacked me for speaking the truth (even the most obvious truths about things like political correctness, illegal immigration, and so forth) really rubbed a nerve with me. I stood up and held my ground for quite a few months. I finally decided it wasn't worth it. I hadn't become a member of a damn video gaming site to argue politics with a bunch of teenagers who were so ill-informed about world events that it was ridiculous for them to enter any political discussion at all. None-the-less try to dismiss the dangers of terrorism (for example).

Oh well. I'm feeling a hint of DéjàVu going on here. Like you, I'll probably end up involving myself with this crap here eventually. I hope not though. I really, really hope not. Let me muster the strength to avoid the temptation.

Oh, did I mention how thankful I am for our veterans and their courage :bigteeth:

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Originally Posted by Oneironaught

It's funny, I was very well-respected at that site until then. I felt the popular tide begin to shift. "Most" people there still have "great respect" for me but, the attitudes of some of the members there discolored my love for the place. The way people attacked me for speaking the truth (even the most obvious truths about things like political correctness, illegal immigration, and so forth) really rubbed a nerve with me. I stood up and held my ground for quite a few months. I finally decided it wasn't worth it. I hadn't become a member of a damn video gaming site to argue politics with a bunch of teenagers who were so ill-informed about world events that it was ridiculous for them to enter any political discussion at all. None-the-less try to dismiss the dangers of terrorism (for example).

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I completely relate to what you are saying. It is almost as if I wrote that post myself, except for the video gaming part. Some people are so narrow minded that they leap to the conclusion that I didn't actually intellectualize our terrorism threats and come to the conclusions that I really think seem to be the most logical. They seem to assume that I just came out of the blue one day and said, "Now that I think about it, I love the idea of war because it just seems so damn cool, so I want to support one. What people can my country kill now? Yeeeee haaaaaaawwwwwwww!!!" They don't consider for half a second that I might have considered all kinds of possibilities and sided with the one that I honestly believe involves the best good to bad ratio.

College age people who are really into the whole social image thing often fall in love with the idea of being a war dissenter because it makes them feel important and powerful. They feel like they are being rebellious against "the establishment" and like they have joined a powerful cult. There is also the phase of development where people start to question everything they have been taught, which is good if done rationally, but in the late teens and early twenties it often goes to the extent of forming absurd beliefs. Asking, "What about another alternative?" can be very good, but often that mentality causes irrational thinking. That is not always the case with the war protestor type, but it very often is.

When somebody is in it for all of those things, it is 100% impossible to get anywhere in a debate with that person. If a person like that changes his mind, he is giving up a great deal more than some political stance. He is giving up the foundation of his identity. There is no way to reason somebody out of that, and hating your guts feeds the identity he is trying to protect. I even have relatives like that, and they are in their 30's and 40's. A few years ago, I told one of my cousins that I support the war in Iraq. He told his wife that a few minutes later, and she let me know immediately that her entire image of me had gone down the toilet. She kept staring at me that night for seconds at a time with a look that suggested I might as well have joined the Nazis. I have gotten a lot of that, but I am not going to lie about what I think. What makes sense to me makes sense to me, and I will always be upfront with it. However, my desire to have debates about it is winding down.

Thats a joke. The media clearly hypes the threat all the time to scare people. All the time there are reports of new terrorists threats, or targets, or some new way to attack us. Almost always they turn out to be fake. I remeber the last time I went across the country and I took a plane, they had some big deal where no one could take any kinds of liquids onto planes because they were told someone was caught trying to mix a bomb on a plane, and the entire story turned out to be totally made up.

Or the story about someone buying like a truck load of fertilizer and was going to make a bomb out of it and it turned out to be nothing. Or half of dozen times the government run in and arrest a group saying they were planning an attack, and it turns out all the people were just normal citizens, without even criminal records or anything. Totally made up crap.

I wouldn't be surprised, if there hasn't been a single legitimate arrest of a terrorist in our country since 9/11. You say there are terrorists all over the place though. Where are they? Clearly they are not here.

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Originally Posted by Alric

Thats a joke. The media clearly hypes the threat all the time to scare people. All the time there are reports of new terrorists threats, or targets, or some new way to attack us. Almost always they turn out to be fake. I remeber the last time I went across the country and I took a plane, they had some big deal where no one could take any kinds of liquids onto planes because they were told someone was caught trying to mix a bomb on a plane, and the entire story turned out to be totally made up.

Or the story about someone buying like a truck load of fertilizer and was going to make a bomb out of it and it turned out to be nothing. Or half of dozen times the government run in and arrest a group saying they were planning an attack, and it turns out all the people were just normal citizens, without even criminal records or anything. Totally made up crap.

I wouldn't be surprised, if there hasn't been a single legitimate arrest of a terrorist in our country since 9/11. You say there are terrorists all over the place though. Where are they? Clearly they are not here.

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The thing about liquids on an airplane was a result of what factually was a large scale terrorist plot in London to blow up TEN airplanes. Fortunately, the plot was stopped before it could become successful. That is one example of captured terrorists. Have you heard of the "shoe bomber"? Caught. The recent plot to blow up a military base? Stopped. Al Qaeda? Two-thirds of their leadership killed or captured. Tons of terrorists have been caught. This is about the biggest problem we have ever faced. I have no idea where you are getting your information. Do you really think the terrorist threat is some fairy tale? I wish I could agree with you.

Actually that was what I was talking about. It turned out them guys arrested in London were innocent and there was never a real plot by them. As for them losing Two-thirds of their leadership, thats a figure thats been repeated for the last 5 years. Which leaves 1 of 3 things. Either they get people back at an insane rate. They are lying about the numbers. Or they totally suck at finishing off the last third. As for the tons of terrorists caught, they are all people caught in iraq or afghanistan. There isn't anyone over here being caught for terrorism, because there are none.

How many terrorists attack were there before 9/11 on US soil? How many has there been since? How many terrorists are actually caught on US soil and then actually convicted of a crime? A fairy tale? I think the numbers speak for themself.

Significant Terrorist Incidents, 1961-2003: A Brief Chronology

Source = U.S. Dept. of State
Historical Background
Office of the Historian
Bureau of Public Affairs

Those are attacks all over the place, including the U.S. And that's one hell of a long list for something that doesn't exist.

Notice how many of them happened to be perpetrated by those we are actively engaged in battle with.

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Originally Posted by Alric

Actually that was what I was talking about. It turned out them guys arrested in London were innocent and there was never a real plot by them. As for them losing Two-thirds of their leadership, thats a figure thats been repeated for the last 5 years. Which leaves 1 of 3 things. Either they get people back at an insane rate. They are lying about the numbers. Or they totally suck at finishing off the last third. As for the tons of terrorists caught, they are all people caught in iraq or afghanistan. There isn't anyone over here being caught for terrorism, because there are none.

How many terrorists attack were there before 9/11 on US soil? How many has there been since? How many terrorists are actually caught on US soil and then actually convicted of a crime? A fairy tale? I think the numbers speak for themself.

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They did arrest some guys for the London attempt who turned out to be innocent, but the plot was stopped. I might have been wrong in saying there were some positive arrests, but a terrible event was prevented. If the prevention were a put on and part of some conspiracy, don't you think the guys who turned out to be innocent would have been better framed and in Guantanamo right now?

The thing about Al Qaeda leadership is that there is a growth current going against the reduction current, so we have hit a level that has remained for the past few years. But we have caught some major big wigs, like Khallid Sheik Muhammed, who organized the fine details of the 9/11 attacks. Do you think he is some innocent fast food manager who got framed? I would love to believe that sort of thing, but I don't.

Again, the lack of terrorist attacks we are having here is a result of our terrorism prevention. Along with the successes of homeland security and the CIA's intelligence gathering, overthrowing two terrorist governments sent a very strong message to a lot of terrorists who don't want Iran and Syria to go the same direction as Afghanistan and Iraq, and I think that has a great deal to do with why we haven't had another terrorist attack on our soil since 9/11.

You didn't think I would actually read that site did you? It actually proves my point nicely. Out of that huge list of terrorists attacks there are almost none on US soil. And the one or two that are listed are not from the people we are fighting.

Infact reading over that list makes it painfully obvious we are fighting the wrong people. Most of the 'terrorists' activty against us are kidnappings and murders in central and south america. Reading over the list shows that our biggest enemy as far as terrorists is not al qaeda but the FARC. Which most people don't even know about.

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Originally Posted by Alric

You didn't think I would actually read that site did you? It actually proves my point nicely. Out of that huge list of terrorists attacks there are almost none on US soil. And the one or two that are listed are not from the people we are fighting.

Infact reading over that list makes it painfully obvious we are fighting the wrong people. Most of the 'terrorists' activty against us are kidnappings and murders in central and south america. Reading over the list shows that our biggest enemy as far as terrorists is not al qaeda but the FARC. Which most people don't even know about.

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We are fighting all of those people, but the terrorists in South America don't have the goal of obtaining WMD's for the purpose of making us extinct.

And again, the lack of Islamofascist terrorism on American soil is a result of the successes of our efforts. It is not proof that the threat does not exist. It is proof that we are handling the threat.

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Originally Posted by Alric

You didn't think I would actually read that site did you? It actually proves my point nicely. Out of that huge list of terrorists attacks there are almost none on US soil. And the one or two that are listed are not from the people we are fighting.

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I'm cursed by the lure of standing up for what's right. It's the cross I bear. :shakehead2: (I'll be glad when this thread goes away.)

I wouldn't have posting the link if I didn't want you to look at it. Whether the attacks are most prevalent here or abroad is not at all the issue. The fact is that terrorism as "political policy" is all too common. It is terrorism that we are fighting. It is those who harbor and provide safe havens for terrorist sects that we are fighting. It's the ideologies that encourage terrorism as "legitimate" actions that we are fighting. It's a dictator that openly - and under no uncertain terms - tells his people that the way for victory is through the cowardly acts of terrorism that we are fighting. It's the deeply-held beliefs that salvation is achieved by destroying masses of innocent people by means of bombings and other terrorist acts simply because they don't bow down to Allah so many times a day that we are fighting.

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Infact reading over that list makes it painfully obvious we are fighting the wrong people.

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*See above post by Universal Mind.

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Originally Posted by Oneironaught

I'm cursed by the lure of standing up for what's right. It's the cross I bear. :shakehead2: (I'll be glad when this thread goes away.)

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..Hats off to ya Oneironaught! :thumbup:

Oh, I forgot to mention that the link I provided is 4 years out of date so it omits everything that's happened after 2003.

In relation to the original post it depnds entirely on which war we are discussing. If a member of my family joined the British Army to fight in IRaq they would die to me.

However, any soldier who fought in WW2 deserves some form of recognition, not for "fightin for HIS country" but preserving ideals of equality and freedom. Ideals the whole world must embrace for us to truly attain world peace.

Basically it depends. If a country invaded Britain I'd fight, to preserve our freedom. Like if I was an Iraqi I'd be shooting at soldiers. Bu I would never take part in this whole world police attituide.

Imran

Thats the difference between real terrorists and fantasy terrorists. Real terrorists drive bombs into buildings, kidnap people and murder people. Fantasy terrorists capture nuclear bombs, cover entire towns with chemcial poisons and take over entire countries single handedly.

Actually there are real terrorists in places like iraq, they are the ones that place bombs on the side of the road and kidnap US soilders. They are also the ones that are no threat to us, as they can't get to the US to place bombs on the side of OUR roads. Everything else is just hype. They don't have any big plans to harm us, they have no special weapons. They are just people trying to do their best by killing as many people as they can but they are largely limited to doing it only in their own countries.

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Originally Posted by Alric

as they can't get to the US to place bombs on the side of OUR roads.

They are just people trying to do their best by killing as many people as they can but they are largely limited to doing it only in their own countries.

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And why might that be?

Well if they lived in mexico they could probably do it fairly easy. The problem for them however is they need to get a passport, fly over to the US, find some place to live, find some place to buy a bomb or find the stuff needed to make the bomb. Then go out and set up the bomb all while not being seen by their neighbors or local police. To be honest, its really not worth the thousands of dollars setup cost for what is likely to be one road side bomb killing at most half a dozen people. Which is why they do it in their own countries. Its far easier.

I mean if you wanted to go blow something up. Think of how hard it would be. Now picture doing something in some country you never been before, maybe you fly to japan and try it. Its a huge pain. Not to mention you need people to speak english. Thats why they normally work locally, or maybe countries bordering their own.

The same reason why no one will ever use nukes or chemcial weapons. How the hell do you get a nuke half way around the world without anyone noticing? The fact is you don't.

We have a lot of people noticing. That's what the war on terror is all about on the domestic front.

This just in... Today, a plot to blow up the JFK Airport in New York was stopped.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18999503/

Now lets just wait a couple weeks and see how legitimate it actually is.

It might very well be legit, and it's great that they're catching these guys. The one thing is that this kind of stuff has been going on for a LONG time. It hasn't increased as much as you think. It's just been getting more media overexposure. More decent leaders have fought them silently (which makes it easier to catch them), but now, they're using the media to make people scared of something that has been around for decades.

Hmm how long has it been and already the story is already looking to be total crap. The police said they knew about the plan since January last year. In all that time the group still had no money to even try to set anything up. They say the plan isn't even physically possible. The group had no connections to al qaeda.

Fact is best case scenario you had some morons who could never had pulled off an attack. This just wasn't a threat at all. Worst case, they entire thing is crap and they weren't planning anything. For an attack that isn't even possible, that the police knew about over a year in advanced and was still in the 'planning' stages. This story has been nothing but hype. I don't see how you can possibly believe that the media tries to downplay terrorists.

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Originally Posted by Alric

This story has been nothing but hype. I don't see how you can possibly believe that the media tries to downplay terrorists.

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Two three comments:

1) So, because not every single threat pans out to be of highest priority we should just throw in the towel? What if the plan wasn't "foiled"? Even if it hadn't gone as planned or had the devastating outcome hoped for doesn't mean the plan couldn't have still caused great harm or evolved into a far worse scenario.

When some one says they intend to kill you you're going to make it top priority to stop them. Even when you find out the their plan involved beating you with a large cactus. Sure, that cactus may not kill you but the intention means that things can evolve very quickly as the "killer" gets more and more desperate. Plus, when other people are involved in a scheme like that things can turn very ugly, very quickly.

2) Sadly, we live in a time when the world is full of politically correct cry babies who cry foul if every little detail isn't broadcast in the media.

3) Every terrorism plot is of the most serious nature. It doesn't matter how competent the ones doing it are.

I never said we shouldn't arrest criminals. My point was, why are we going all around the world starting wars and bankrupting our country when none of them are a threat? We would be far better off if we used the money instead to hire a few more police in every city.