Will there be another "9/11" ?

Other than Pakistan and some quarters of Iran and Saudi Arabia, I don't think anybody could be empowering Islamic extremists as a side goal to specifically weaken the US.However one might point out that nations who might have something to fear from US reprisals, now have the a US relatively tied down militarily. That means nations can take advantage of, not planned for, Islamic extermism. I wonder when you will ever deal with the major inconsistency in continually praising Pat Buchanan, at the same time you dismiss his current work which skewers Bush policies?If you THINK BUCHANAN IS RIGHT you CANNOT LIKE BUSH POLICIES. It is just that simple.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

You should reread his post. He didn't blame Jews, he blamed neocons which he described as consisting of a large number of Jews who switched party affiliation to promote the interests of Israel.He was actually being kind of accurate with that description.I think his overthetop conspiracy theorist style made him sound more group labelling than he actually was.He looked like a duck and sounded like a duck, but turned out to be a nut.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Agreed with you assessment.As far as cockpit doors, there were other measures as well regarding the whole cockpit area that falls far short of having to revamp the intelligence system (though that needed to be done for other reasons) or things like the Patriot Act.The interesting thing is that such changes to direct physical airplane security were recommended by professional organizations to the Clinton administration. Al Gore specifically wrote the airline lobby telling them not to worry, because they would not be expected to introduce the changes.Yeah, under Al Gore the same thing probably would have happened. I'm sort of a libertarian. I started that way, but have some disagreements with the party, and many of the hardcore ones (living in a Utopia).The latest test polls posted at EvC score me as a left liberal right on the border of libertarian.In the end I am too independent when it comes to any specific issue. But yeah, libertarian is better than straight out liberal.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Let's get some things straight. Not ALL neocons are Jewish. There is a large contingent of evangelicals in there as well.I believe you pointed to Buchanan as well, and he makes that statement in his book. So if you want to fight about it, go to him first. Its pretty straightforward that Cheney and Rummy and Bush and Wolfowitz and Ashcroft are Xian.Second, jewish does not equate to zionism. That would be a bigoted statement to make. Not all jews that make it into power are zionist, though it would not surprise me that zionists would tend to seek power more than other jews (zionists being political radicals by nature) and so create a correlative statistic toward that direction.It is bizarre for anybody to be holding on to a 3000+ year old myth that God will come to reward the jews if the have a temple in Israel, or the 2000- year old myth that God will have an apocalyptic battle there to reinstall Jesus.I mean bizarre to actually defy one's actual national interests to try and make that happen. Or short of the religious angle, sell out this nation's interests for another racist nation state's glory. Just as it was bizarre for all the germans in the US who went to help the "fatherland" in ww2.You oughta tone down the jewish angle and focus on facts. You were already called a bigot and now I'm starting to feel embarassed having defended you. This last post of yours pretty well pushed that border.The truth... some of it you have assessed correctly... is bad enough without excessive hyperbole, including blaming whole groups for the actions of select numbers. Uhmmmm... that ain't gonna help either. But that's my opinion.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

I never said all conservatives are ill-informed, but I am reading one that consistently makes comments which appear to be ill-informed.This reply of yours did not change that fact. I did not say you did not know about ETA, I asked because your ignorant comments that the rest of the world was finally catching up to the US on the war on terror was ridiculous and suggested perhaps you didn't.I notice that you dodged every single point in order to address that one single minute comment, and then ended on an ad hominem attack. So for the record... no response and ad hominem.When your brain catches up to speed that just because a person does not like GW they are not necessarily a liberal, or against him on how he is trying to take care security threats because of a liberal bias, and instead based on facts and careful analysis... post a real reply to my last post.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Crash already did a good job outlining some of the evidence they are NOT the same. But he also brought up something which is more important, YOU have to provide the evidence that they ARE the same.Frankly the evidence has already been reviewed by intel and congress and the word is in... there was NO connection between the terrorists we are fighting and Iraq, just as there was no WMDs.That's why Bush only speaks about it being good because Saddam was a bad guy and that a democracy in that region will set an example for other nations to follow. No terrorism.And by the way, it has also been pointed out... again by intel sources and Congressional reports... that now terrorists have the option of using Iraq as a base. It was denied them before, but in a truly free Iraq, why wouldn't organizations (one's not opposed to the Iraqi gov't itself) be able to set up shop there and operate?Hindsight is supposed to be 20/20. I'm trying to figure out what you are still hanging on to when the facts are pretty much out in the open. Frankly I don't think that many terrorists these days are reasonable. HOWEVER, it always comes down to who the terrrorists are and what their goals are.The Taliban and Al-Qaida sprang from the terrorist organizations WE set up in order to fight a resistance campaign against soviet occupiers. You tell me, were they reasonable then? Were those legitimate goals?We funded numerous terrorist groups throughout central and south america... the CIA had a terrorist training facility within the US until a couple years back for that purpose... for the purpose of undermining "oppressive" governments. Were those people reasonable? Were those legitimate goals?If you remember right, the US was supporting at least vocally the Chechen separatists against Russia, until 9-11 happened, and only NOW we view them as unreasonable terrorists.Terrorism is a tool, which is why the idea of a "war on terror" is itself unreaonable. We would and WILL use it when we need to, and we will support it when we need to. Just as we did back in the revolutionary war... and in some parts of WW2.The important aspect is to judge goals of organizations and whether they are capable of being reached through diplomatic measures. That's funny, because that is all you have used. For certain, evidence has shown that under Bush we commited vast numbers of troops material and money to a nation that had nothing to do with terrorism.They were not likely to even supply WMD technology to our adversaries. HOWEVER, we have gotten in bed with two major dictatorships, one which was intrumental in forming the Taliban and friendly to Al-Qaida, and as it turns out ALREADY SOLD WMD THECHNOLOGY TO OUR ENEMIES. Did you miss that in the news, or were you simply not sharing that here?What's worse we supported Pakistan simply slapping the wrist of the head scientist that sold the technology. What the hell kind of message does THAT send? Boy, you have really missed the boat. The MAJORITY of terrorist groups? I guess by this you must not have included any terrorist groups with light skin or are Xian radicals of some kind.I want you to back that claim up paisano. Show me a list of all terrorist groups currently in operation and show me that the MAJORITY have as their STATED OBJECTIVE the DESTRUCTION of Israel. I think we both know how much hot air that was.Anyhow let's start rolling on this issue. The terrorists we are currently concerned with are Islamic Extremists. In specific Al-Qaida. They certainly do support either the removal of Israel from occupied lands or total removal of the state of Israel. They wander on this in main part because it is not their primary focus.You act like you know something, or that we don't need to know more about them, but clearly we (or you) do.What happened is that after successfully removing Soviet forces from Afghanistan, the organizations which we helped set up, have decided to extend there work to throw our influence out of the region as well.Rational or not, they view our troops on Saudi Soil, and armaments used against Palestinians, as equal to Soviet troops on Afghan soil, and there arms being used against Afgans.Their goal is NOT total domination of the world. Their goal is removing our forces and influence from their region.If you think that is something unreasonable, then I have to wonder what you thought of:1) Manifest Destiny
2) Monroe Doctrine
3) Zionism
4) Bush DoctrineIndeed I would love for you to compare/contrast the four above with the STATED GOALS of our current terrorist enemies.And getting back to Israel, it was formed without question by a number of terrorist organizations. They not only killed Palestinians, they killed British and US forces. Such terrorist organizations continue to exist and kill innocent civilians. They killed Rabin when he was negotiating with Palestinians, and now are threatening to kill Sharon for just giving up a small parcel of land.Shortly after 9-11 it was discovered that a faction of the JDL had plans to burn mosques and kill a US congressman. That didn't get very huge headlines... I suppose because they weren't AGAINST Israel.Many organizations against Isreal, in part or in whole, are reacting to very real situations. They are after all in violation of many UN resolutions, perhaps more than Iraq, for a longer period of time. They continue to break all international laws respecting war and treatment of prisoners. And the latest internal Israeli squabbles show rather clearly they have never intended to get to a negotiating table with Palestinians. They HAVE rejected the roadmap.So are people against this, unreasonable?You appear to have a very limited grasp of reality. Perhaps it is because you feel you do not need to know something which you really should?This message has been edited by holmes, 09-20-2004 05:17 AM

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

What on earth are you talking about. There is a sacred mosque in the area, but under no cricumstances is the Palestinian-Israeli issue... or let's say the Islamic radical's problem with Israel... based on that area being HOLY LAND.That land is HOLY to zionists and evangelicals. Which means members of Jewish and Xian faiths.It was zionists in conjunction with some sympathetic Xians who set the nation of Israel up and are expanding it against international law, in order to get as much of their HOLY LAND as possible.The Palestinians are made up of Xians and Muslims and are being oppressed for not fitting into the picture of a Jewish majority government on those Jewish HOLY LANDS.Perhaps you ought to take a closer look at the situation. Israel is a Holy Land to Jews and Xians and a rallying point for them.If that wasn't the case we'd be dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli issue in a much more rational fashion.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

I stand corrected. He was a duck. My apologies. I'll try not to assume the sanity of people in the future.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Not all jews support Israel, and of those that do, not all believe that it should be at the expense of the US or international law (so they do not support rightists like Sharon and Netanyahu).I agree that there is a large pressure on our government by zionists to support Israel no matter how insane it gets. But zionist organizations are merely presenting themselves as the voice of all jews to put on the pressure.Positions like yours end up being divisive and making 1) Jewish people not listen to you because you've already labelled them bad, and 2) nonJewish people not listen to you because you sound irrational as well as a bigot.You should stick to actual players and not use group labels.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

I'm not.First of all Palestinians are not all Muslim. There are Xians and they are fighting Israeli occupation just the same.Second, muslims who have an interest in the Dome of the Rock are not trying to get something they did not have, and should not have. They are not fighting to "get back" their "holy land".Israel was imposed upon the people of the territories. Before that time there was no real issue of muslims wanting to remove jews in order to protect their holy properties. While the imposition of Israel itself was a land grab removing nonjews politically from Jewish "holy lands", since then Israel has continued to grab land specifically to regain their biblical territory.Trying to recreate something that has been in the dust for over 3 millenia by force of arms and over the local population, is vastly different than regaining and keeping access to a site the local population had easy access to up till 60 years ago.Right?This message has been edited by holmes, 09-23-2004 04:22 PM

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)