DOWNING STREET MEMOS - War before the War

[Guest BlackJesus]

[quote]Moseley told the briefing at Nellis airbase in Nevada on July 17, 2003, that the raids took place under cover of patrols of the southern no-fly zone; their purpose was ostensibly to protect the ethnic minorities. - from your article above

you always mention the kurds and how they have been mistreated, yet you disagree w/ us protecting them...[/quote]



[i][b]My work with the Kurds is precisely why I know it is Bullshit.... Saddam hadn't moved into Kurdish territory in Years after the No FLy Zone was put in... the People there had a semi autonomus state, although he was still stealing the Oil money from N Iraq and not giving it to the Kurds, (now we are doing this) .... Back when Saddam was actually killing the ethnic minorities.... Gassing the Kurds, and exterminating the Marsh Arabs... = WE were his friend and giving him the supplies to do so.

As for your link I will go get it for you....


as for who trained Osama... the CIA did.... one guy who used to head the CIA.... Bushs father we can start there[/b][/i]

[Guest bengalrick]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 13 2005, 04:54 PM'][i][b]My work with the Kurds is precisely why I know it is Bullshit.... Saddam hadn't moved into Kurdish territory in Years after the No FLy Zone was put in... the People there had a semi autonomus state, although he was still stealing the Oil money from N Iraq and not giving it to the Kurds, (now we are doing this) .... Back when Saddam was actually killing the ethnic minorities.... Gassing the Kurds, and exterminating the Marsh Arabs... = WE were his friend and giving him the supplies to do so. 

As for your link I will go get it for you....
[B]as for who trained Osama... the CIA did.... one guy who used to head the CIA.... Bushs father we can start there[/b][/b][/i]
[right][post="113960"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]

i guess we should forget that it was also the biggest reason that the solviet empire fell to huh?

in the long run... bad decision...

in the short run... very, very good decision... where would we be if russia was still the old USSR?

i appreciate your stance w/ the kurds... i don't know enough about that to comment, but why does everything our gov't says, have to be a lie?

[Guest BlackJesus]

[quote]but why does everything our gov't says, have to be a lie?[/quote]

[i][b]The govt tells the truth the majority of the time... just not on the important issues. The Govt is great at being truthful about trivial shit , they usually lie however when it comes to foriegn affairs or National security[/b][/i]

[Jamie_B]

I don’t know if any of you realize this but the President can use Military Force without asking congress, he just has to believe (not prove) they committed or aided in 9/11, (now we all know Iraq and Sadam had nothing to do with it, but the important point is he just has to believe it.... scary, but not illegal apparently)

[quote]That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons [color="blue"]he determines [/color] planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001,[color="blue"] or harbored such organizations or persons[/color], in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons.[/quote]

[quote]According to the non-voting Washington, DC delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, the language in the resolution was "limited only by the slim anchor of its September 11 reference, [it] allows war against any and all prospective persons and entities." Rep. Pete Stark said, [color="blue"][b]"This resolution gives the President the power to conduct a war without reporting to or consulting with Congress.[/b] [/color] Frankly stated, it cedes congressional authority to the President." Rep. John Tierney warned that approval of the resolution would mean Congressional abdication of "its constitutional obligations and responsibilities." Nevertheless Jackson, Kucinich, Stark, Tierney, and Waters all voted in favor of the resolution.[/quote]

[url="http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0315-03.htm"]http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0315-03.htm[/url]

[Guest BlackJesus]

[img]http://rawstory2.com/images/bombings.gif[/img]
[u]General admits to secret air war
Michael Smith
The Sunday Times[/u]

THE American general who commanded allied air forces during the Iraq war appears to have admitted in a briefing to American and British officers that coalition aircraft waged a secret air war against Iraq from the middle of 2002, nine months before the invasion began.
Addressing a briefing on lessons learnt from the Iraq war Lieutenant-General Michael Moseley said that in 2002 and early 2003 allied aircraft flew 21,736 sorties, dropping more than 600 bombs on 391 “carefully selected targets” before the war officially started.

The nine months of allied raids “laid the foundations” for the allied victory, Moseley said. They ensured that allied forces did not have to start the war with a protracted bombardment of Iraqi positions.

If those raids exceeded the need to maintain security in the no-fly zones of southern and northern Iraq, they would leave President George W Bush and Tony Blair vulnerable to allegations that they had acted illegally.

Moseley’s remarks have emerged after reports in The Sunday Times that showed an increase in allied bombing in southern Iraq was described in leaked minutes of a meeting of the war cabinet as “spikes of activity to put pressure on the regime”.

Moseley told the briefing at Nellis airbase in Nevada on July 17, 2003, that the raids took place under cover of patrols of the southern no-fly zone; their purpose was ostensibly to protect the ethnic minorities.

A leaked memo previously disclosed by The Sunday Times, detailing a meeting chaired by the prime minister and attended by Jack Straw, the foreign secretary, Geoff Hoon, the then defence secretary, and Admiral Sir Michael Boyce, chief of defence staff, indicated that the US was carrying out the bombing.

But Moseley’s remarks, and figures for the amount of bombs dropped in southern Iraq during 2002, indicate that the RAF was taking as large a part in the bombing as American aircraft.

Details of the Moseley briefing come amid rising concern in the US at the war. A new poll shows 60% of Americans now believe it was a mistake.



__________________________


[u] The unofficial war: U.S., Britain led massive secret bombing campaign before Iraq war was declared
Larisa Alexandrovna and John Byrne[/u]


A U.S. general who commanded the U.S. allied air forces in Iraq has confirmed that the U.S. and Britain conducted a massive secret bombing campaign before the U.S. actually declared war on Iraq.

The quote, passed from RAW STORY to the London Sunday Times last week, raises troubling questions of whether President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair engaged in an illegal war before seeking a UN resolution or congressional approval.

While the Downing Street documents collectively raise disturbing questions about how the Bush administration led the United States into Iraq, including allegations that “intelligence was being fixed,” other questions have emerged about when the US and British led allies actually began the Iraq war.

According to the May 1, 2005 Downing Street Memo, official minutes of a 2002 meeting between British Prime Minister Tony Blair, members of British intelligence MI-6 and various senior level members of the Bush administration, air strikes had already begun by July 23, 2002.

British Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon “said that the US had already begun "spikes of activity" to put pressure on the regime. No decisions had been taken, but he thought the most likely timing in US minds for military action to begin was January, with the timeline beginning 30 days before the US Congressional elections.”


[color="red"][u]War Dates Officially [/u][/color]
October 10, 2002 - Congress passes the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq.

November 8, 2002 –
The UN Security Council unanimously approves resolution 1441 imposing tough new arms inspections on Iraq and requiring Iraq to declare all weapons of mass destruction and account for known chemical weapons material stockpiles on pain of "serious consequences." Iraq accepts the terms of the resolution and UN inspectors return.

January 28, 2003 – State of the Union Speech on WMD

February 5, 2003 - Colin Powell makes a presentation to the UN, attempting to prove that Iraq is evading the inspectors, continues to produce WMD's, and is linked to al-Qaeda.

March 2003 – Start of Iraq war


The Ides of May-June

Starting in late May to June of 2002 a flurry of activity began both in the United States and in the Middle East. In what appears to be an admission of covert activity, chief allied air force commander Lieutenant-General Michael Moseley divulged in a little-noticed quote in the New York Times that US/British aircraft flew 21,736 sorties between June 2002 and March 2003.

Moseley said that some 606 bombs were dropped before the official start of the war, targeting 391 locations and/or installations.

Moseley explained that the combination of air strikes and covert raids occurred in the southern no-fly zone regions covered by routine patrols.

The targets of these strikes are difficult to pinpoint, but RAW STORY has found a clear divergence between U.S. and Iraqi reports at the time, as well as disagreement over what provoked the strikes.

GlobalSecurity.org, a military defense group, raised concerns about the air strikes when they mushroomed in early 2002, though their worries produced few press reports.

The group saw the strikes as a means by which the U.S. could degrade Iraqi defensive capabilities, and as a precursor to a declared war.

“It was no big secret at the time,” GlobalSecurity.org director John Pike told RAW STORY. “It was apparent to us at the time that they were doing it and why they were doing it, and that was part of the reason why we were convinced that a decision to go to war had already been made, because the war had already started.”

Pike says the allied forces used their position in the ‘No-Fly- Zone’ to engage in pre-emptive action long before war was formally declared.

“They I think had decided to take advantage of Southern Watch and Northern Watch to go ahead and take the air defense system apart and attack any other targets that they felt needed to be preemptively destroyed,” Pike asserted.

“They explicitly altered the rules of engagement,” he added, “because initially the rules of engagement had been that they would shoot back if [someone] shot at them. Then they said that if they were shot at, they would shoot at whatever they wanted to.”

One U.S. Air Force vet told a hearing in Istanbul this weekend, “I saw bombing intensify. All the documents coming out now, the Downing Street memo and others, confirm what I had witnessed in Iraq. The war had already begun while our leaders were telling us that they were going to try all diplomatic options first.”

Iraq complained about the air raids to the UN Secretary-General May 27, 2002. Iraq’s Minister for Foreign Affairs Naji Sabri wrote:

On instructions from my Government, I have the honour to transmit to you herewith a letter dated 27 May 2002 from Mr. Naji Sabri, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Iraq. The Minister calls attention to the ongoing wanton aggression against Iraq by United States and British aircraft in the unlawful no-flight zones and to the fact that in the period from 16 April to 16 May 2002 they carried out 844 armed sorties, 52 of them from Saudi Arabia, 656 from Kuwait and 136 from Turkey, as shown in the statement enclosed with the letter. On 19 April and 1 May 2002, United States and British aircraft bombed civilian and military sites in Ninawa Governorate, killing one citizen and wounding five others and damaging a number of civilian and military installations.

The Minister reaffirms the Government of Iraq’s position that the United States of America and the United Kingdom must bear full international responsibility for these acts of aggression and terrorism, and he further states that Iraq reserves its right, as established by the Charter of the United Nations and international law, to defend itself against this ongoing hostile, terrorist activity. He expresses the hope that you will perform the duties assigned to you under the Charter, that you will urge the governments of the countries in question to halt forthwith their constant aggression against Iraq and that you will call upon the regional parties to desist from providing the necessary facilities.”

In another letter to the UN, Naji Sabri stated that on May 28, 2002,

“American and British aircraft dropped heat flares on crops of barley in the governorate of Ninawa, burning large areas of these crops: 1,630 dunums in the district of al-Hamdaniya and 400 dunums in the district of Hamam al Alil.

This new incident of burning crops illustrates the inhumanity and the immorality of the policy of these two States towards Iraq, which seeks to inflict maximum damage on the Iraqi people and target its source of domestically produced food after imposing comprehensive sanctions on Iraq. This policy constitutes an act of terrorism and a crime against humanity which the international community must not ignore.

The U.S. account differed. The U.S. European Command issued this statement about an attack the following day:

Iraqi forces threatened Operation Northern Watch (ONW) coalition aircraft today. Iraqi forces fired anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) from a site in the vicinity of Saddam Dam while ONW aircraft conducted routine enforcement of the Northern No-Fly Zone.

Coalition aircraft responded to the Iraqi attack by delivering precision ordnance on elements of the Iraqi integrated air defense system.

Coup De Main?

Michael Smith, the British reporter who broke the Downing Street leaks, revealed in the Daily Telegraph that on September 5, 2002 roughly 100 US/British crafts engaged Iraq's major western air defence installation. Smith adds that although “only 12 aircraft dropped precision-guided bombs on to the H3 airfield, 240 miles west of Baghdad and close to Jordan, many support aircraft took part.”

According to the report, Iraq made 130 attempts to shoot down coalition aircraft in 2002.

The public reasons given for at least some of these air strikes generally involved purported violations of the no-fly zone region in Southern Iraq or the disabling of air defense installations.

But the timing and intensity of the strikes suggest otherwise. As the U.S. quietly moved heavy armor to the region in early 2002, along with supplies of ammunition from Qatar in August of that year, the strikes mushroomed.

The number of days per month that allied planes attacked installations in Iraq leapt from six to nine between July and August of 2002, then skipped to thirteen from December to February of 2003.

Congress had approved the use of force pending the exhaustion of diplomatic options in October 2002, and UN inspectors returned in November, while an aggressive air campaign was in full swing.

When President Bush formally declared war on Iraq in March 2003, allied airstrikes in Iraq actually declined.

[Guest BlackJesus]

[color="green"][b]Best article Yet... on Why Bush should be impeached and tried [/b][/color]



[u]The Other Bomb Drops
By Jeremy Scahill
The Nation
Wednesday 01 June 2005 [/u]

It was a huge air assault: Approximately 100 US and British planes flew from Kuwait into Iraqi airspace. At least seven types of aircraft were part of this massive operation, including US F-15 Strike Eagles and Royal Air Force Tornado ground-attack planes. They dropped precision-guided munitions on Saddam Hussein's major western air-defense facility, clearing the path for Special Forces helicopters that lay in wait in Jordan. Earlier attacks had been carried out against Iraqi command and control centers, radar detection systems, Revolutionary Guard units, communication centers and mobile air-defense systems. The Pentagon's goal was clear: Destroy Iraq's ability to resist. This was war.

But there was a catch: The war hadn't started yet, at least not officially. This was September 2002 - a month before Congress had voted to give President Bush the authority he used to invade Iraq, two months before the United Nations brought the matter to a vote and more than six months before "shock and awe" officially began.

At the time, the Bush Administration publicly played down the extent of the air strikes, claiming the United States was just defending the so-called no-fly zones. But new information that has come out in response to the Downing Street memo reveals that, by this time, the war was already a foregone conclusion and attacks were no less than the undeclared beginning of the invasion of Iraq.

The Sunday Times of London recently reported on new evidence showing that "The RAF and US aircraft doubled the rate at which they were dropping bombs on Iraq in 2002 in an attempt to provoke Saddam Hussein into giving the allies an excuse for war." The paper cites newly released statistics from the British Defense Ministry showing that "the Allies dropped twice as many bombs on Iraq in the second half of 2002 as they did during the whole of 2001" and that "a full air offensive" was under way months before the invasion had officially begun.

The implications of this information for US lawmakers are profound. It was already well known in Washington and international diplomatic circles that the real aim of the US attacks in the no-fly zones was not to protect Shiites and Kurds. But the new disclosures prove that while Congress debated whether to grant Bush the authority to go to war, while Hans Blix had his UN weapons-inspection teams scrutinizing Iraq and while international diplomats scurried to broker an eleventh-hour peace deal, the Bush Administration was already in full combat mode - not just building the dossier of manipulated intelligence, as the Downing Street memo demonstrated, but acting on it by beginning the war itself. And according to the Sunday Times article, the Administration even hoped the attacks would push Saddam into a response that could be used to justify a war the Administration was struggling to sell.

On the eve of the official invasion, on March 8, 2003, Bush said in his national radio address: "We are doing everything we can to avoid war in Iraq. But if Saddam Hussein does not disarm peacefully, he will be disarmed by force." Bush said this after nearly a year of systematic, aggressive bombings of Iraq, during which Iraq was already being disarmed by force, in preparation for the invasion to come. By the Pentagon's own admission, it carried out seventy-eight individual, offensive airstrikes against Iraq in 2002 alone.

"It reminded me of a boxing match in which one of the boxers is told not to move while the other is allowed to punch and only stop when he is convinced that he has weakened his opponent to the point where he is defeated before the fight begins," says former UN Assistant Secretary General Hans Von Sponeck, a thirty-year career diplomat who was the top UN official in Iraq from 1998 to 2000. During both the Clinton and Bush administrations, Washington has consistently and falsely claimed these attacks were mandated by UN Resolution 688, passed after the Gulf War, which called for an end to the Iraqi government's repression in the Kurdish north and the Shiite south. Von Sponeck dismissed this justification as a "total misnomer." In an interview with The Nation, Von Sponeck said that the new information "belatedly confirms" what he has long argued: "The no-fly zones had little to do with protecting ethnic and religious groups from Saddam Hussein's brutality" but were in fact an "illegal establishment...for bilateral interests of the US and the UK."

These attacks were barely covered in the press and Von Sponeck says that as far back as 1999, the United States and Britain pressured the UN not to call attention to them. [u]During his time in Iraq, Von Sponeck began documenting each of the airstrikes, showing "regular attacks on civilian installations including food warehouses, residences, mosques, roads and people."[/u] These reports, he said, were "welcomed" by Secretary General Kofi Annan, but "the US and UK governments strongly objected to this reporting." Von Sponeck says that he was pressured to end the practice, with a senior British diplomat telling him, "All you are doing is putting a UN stamp of approval on Iraqi propaganda." But Von Sponeck continued documenting the damage and visited many attack sites. In 1999 alone, he confirmed the death of 144 civilians and more than 400 wounded by the US/UK bombings.

After September 11, there was a major change in attitude within the Bush Administration toward the attacks. Gone was any pretext that they were about protecting Shiites and Kurds - this was a plan to systematically degrade Iraq's ability to defend itself from a foreign attack: bombing Iraq's air defenses, striking command facilities, destroying communication and radar infrastructure. As an Associated Press report noted in November 2002, "Those costly, hard-to-repair facilities are essential to Iraq's air defense."

Rear Admiral David Gove, former deputy director of global operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on November 20, 2002, that US and British pilots were "essentially flying combat missions." On October 3, 2002, the New York Times reported that US pilots were using southern Iraq for "practice runs, mock strikes and real attacks" against a variety of targets. But the full significance of this dramatic change in policy toward Iraq only became clear last month, with the release of the Downing Street memo. In it, British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon is reported to have said in 2002, after meeting with US officials, that "the US had already begun 'spikes of activity' to put pressure on the regime," a reference to the stepped-up airstrikes. Now the Sunday Times of London has revealed that these spikes "had become a full air offensive" - in other words, a war.

Michigan Democratic Representative John Conyers has called the latest revelations about these attacks "the smoking bullet in the smoking gun," irrefutable proof that President Bush misled Congress before the vote on Iraq. When Bush asked Congress to authorize the use of force in Iraq, he also said he would use it only as a last resort, after all other avenues had been exhausted. But the Downing Street memo reveals that the Administration had already decided to topple Saddam by force and was manipulating intelligence to justify the decision. That information puts the increase in unprovoked air attacks in the year prior to the war in an entirely new light: The Bush Administration was not only determined to wage war on Iraq, regardless of the evidence; it had already started that war months before it was put to a vote in Congress.

[u] It only takes one member of Congress to begin an impeachment process, and Conyers is said to be considering the option. The process would certainly be revealing[/u]. Congress could subpoena Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Gen. Richard Myers, Gen.Tommy Franks and all of the military commanders and pilots involved with the no-fly zone bombings going back into the late 1990s. What were their orders, both given and received? In those answers might lie a case for impeachment.

But another question looms, particularly for Democrats who voted for the war and now say they were misled: Why weren't these unprovoked and unauthorized attacks investigated when they were happening, when it might have had a real impact on the Administration's drive to war? Perhaps that's why the growing grassroots campaign to use the Downing Street memo to impeach Bush can't get a hearing on Capitol Hill. A real probing of this "smoking gun" would not be uncomfortable only for Republicans. [u]The truth is that Bush, like President Bill Clinton before him, oversaw the longest sustained bombing campaign since Vietnam against a sovereign country with no international or US mandate. That gun is probably too hot for either party to touch. [/u]

-------

[Guest bengalrick]

[url="http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=18485"]click here[/url]

[quote]    The eight memos — all labeled "secret" or "confidential" — were first obtained by British reporter Michael Smith, who has written about them in The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Times.

    [b]Smith told AP he protected the identity of the source he had obtained the documents from by typing copies of them on plain paper and destroying the originals.[/b]      

    The AP obtained copies of six of the memos (the other two have circulated widely). A senior British official who reviewed the copies said their content appeared authentic. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the secret nature of the material.[/quote]

reguardless of another "secret" british offical said it was authentic, the stupid ass reported destroyed the originals!!! what the hell was he thinking!!! sorry man, this is the reason no body is paying much attention to these memos...

since you seem to love conspiracies let me put one on you... this reporter gets the memos and realizes it isn't quite enough... of coarse he wants to put out the best story, so he decides to add a couple of extra words, to make it sound like it was enevidable... the source that he's quoting can't say shit b/c he's disclosed, and nobody will believe blair or bush b/c he is dispised by so many... they deny it, but since their name is smeared, the extreme liberals don't care... and then people like you call for trying the president and everyone else in the cabinet, and drawing their attention away from a war... game over.

it could definatlely be true... the memos have only a couple of "assumptions" and they could have been misquoted slightly... the main problem is we don't have the originals...

here is a story from that same site you posted your chart from, [url="http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Backstory_Confirming_the_Downing_Street_0614.html"]rawstory.com[/url] here are some more details about the copies...

[i]“I first photocopied them to ensure they were on our paper and returned the originals, which were on government paper and therefore government property, to the source,” he added.[/i]

ok, ok i mean a copy is alright of a source right...

[i]“It was these photocopies that I worked on, destroying them shortly before we went to press on Sept 17, 2004,” he added. “Before we destroyed them the legal desk secretary typed the text up on an old fashioned typewriter.”[/i]

what...

[Guest BlackJesus]

[i][b]bengalrick... if the memos were a hoax and not true, then Bush would say so and address them...

However he doesn't and niether does blair

Also the memos really aren't even the point, the memos only led others to then investigate what was going on in Iraq before the start of the war

That behavior which is known now ( the heavy bombing without autorization) is why he should be tried and impeached. The memos were just the thing to get people to look into the history of the bombing which now is public record. [/b][/i]

[Guest mongoloido]

[quote name='Beaker' date='Jul 12 2005, 10:05 AM']Its sad as I watch a reasonable young man with a good sense of humor tumble out of control into the world of conspiracy theories, paranoia and land in the laps of the far left extremists. Knowing BJs penchant for riling people up, I suspect he's really not this far gone, that he's sitting at his monitor laughing as he sees how much of a stir stick he can be. If he really is this "out there" then I mourn the loss of another of America's youth and the potential he had.
[right][post="113473"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]


I was going to call him a cracked, reactionary douchebag, but I guess I'll try to follow your polite lead. I do, however, sincerely doubt that this is a BJ hoax. His jokes are off color and usually crass. This smells too much like youthful ideology with a side of post-angst aggression. Patience and objectivity come with experience. Until then, you get the funny BJ and this BJ.

[Guest BlackJesus]

[quote]I was going to call him a cracked, reactionary douchebag,[/quote]


[i][b]They called Jesus worse ....[/b][/i]


[color="blue"][i][b]
also if asking questions makes me "cracked" then I don't want to be whole[/b][/i][/color]

[quote]This smells too much like youthful ideology[/quote]
[b][color="green"]
I can't wait till I am older and I don't care when my Country bombs people over Lies

[img]http://www.p10k.net/Images/terror_victim_iraq.jpg[/img]

Oh the wisdom I'll have [img]http://forum.go-bengals.com/public/style_emoticons//30.gif[/img] [/color][/b]

[Guest bengaljet]

When you can't beat a guy on his ideas YOU need to give them names like paranoid,cracked,youthful ideaolgy. Anybody that doesn't see it "your way" has to have a name-Republican talking points.
BJ you'll never change a mind(it will have to be a life experience),but if you're getting "labeled",I'd say you're doing pretty damned good.
Youthful idealogy I'd call intelligence. :smile:

[Guest mongoloido]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 13 2005, 10:19 PM'][i][b]They called Jesus worse ....[/b][/i] [/quote]

No one will confuse you with a prophet. No need for the wink.

[quote][color="blue"][i][b]
also if asking questions makes me "cracked" then I don't want to be whole[/b][/i][/color][/quote]

The trouble is you aren't asking questions. You have Bush and Blair tried, convicted, impeached, and ready for a public execution...


[quote][b][color="green"]
I can't wait till I am older and I don't care when my Country bombs people over Lies[/quote]

I can't wait until you grow the patience to wait for all the information before crucifying the object of your rage. Growing wise enough to consider there are more shades than black and white would also be a positive move.

...Try googling for some nice stuff about what was going on in Iraq before the war. Innocent victoms are sad to see. Dictators butchering their own people sucks too. I thought a person who had lived in Africa could have understood that. I suppose you are too interested in bashing to consider the entire situation...

[quote]Oh the wisdom I'll have  [img]http://forum.go-bengals.com/public/style_emoticons//30.gif[/img] [/color][/b]
[right][post="114108"][/post][/right][/quote]


Do you remember when you were a teen and thought you knew everything? What makes you think you now know everything? You are still too act/react.



[quote name='bengaljet' date='Jul 13 2005, 10:55 PM']When you can't beat a guy on his ideas YOU need to give them names like paranoid,cracked,youthful ideaolgy. Anybody that doesn't see it "your way" has to have a name-Republican talking points.
BJ you'll never change a mind(it will have to be a life experience),but if you're getting "labeled",I'd say you're doing pretty damned good.
Youthful idealogy I'd call intelligence. :smile:
[right][post="114139"][/post][/right][/quote]


Where is the intelligence in this? Where is the search for all the facts. Where is the patience for understanding? I don't know what happened, who is responsible, or what form of punishment should be given. No one does... Except mister bold text, who is so positive he has all the answers that he can't open himself up to possibilities. Being a reactionary liberal snot is no better than being a bible-thumping consevative hick. Neither one has the ability to reason. BJ has repeatadly shown in this thread that he doesn't want information, understanding, or reason. He simply wants vengeance (whether deserved or not). That, in my book, makes you very cracked indeed.


The mind is like a parachute. It only works when it's open (got that from a bumper sticker). Voting donkey in an election doesn't make your mind open. Looking at a situation from every angle, absorbing as much information as possible, mulling over the nuances, and forming a hypothesis that is maliable enough to change makes your mind open. In many situations, I have a long way to go before having that open mind. BJ tends to show he has yet to even try.

[Guest BlackJesus]

[i][b]Mongo.... age and wisdom do not have a causal relationship

Education and wisdom do.

There are plenty of Old Fucks who don't know shit. There are plenty of young bucks who don't know dick. So which one are you?[/b][/i]

[Guest mongoloido]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 13 2005, 11:54 PM'][i][b]Mongo.... age and wisdom do not have a causal relationship

Education and wisdom do. 

There are plenty of Old Fucks who don't know shit.  There are plenty of young bucks who don't know dick.  So which one are you?[/b][/i]
[right][post="114196"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]


I am the guy waiting to see all the pieces of the puzzle before putting it together and saying what the picture looks like. If you consider that being old and not knowing shit, or young and not knowing dick, you lack both the education and wisdom you believe you possess.

[Guest BlackJesus]

[quote]I am the guy waiting to see all the pieces of the puzzle before putting it together and saying what the picture looks like[/quote]

[i][b]Something tells me that it always conveniently makes the picture you expect when finished as well......

also before you start throwing around Young and Niave arguments you should establish yourself as some wise old Sensay....

Also I must be moving in the opposite direction because after 4 years of college and a bachelors, I thought Bush was alright but now after 7 years of college as I complete a doctorate I think he is a huge fuck up....

I wonder why they always say that Academia is a haven for the Left Wing.... why do all these people that study those funny books long enough always think these crazy thoughts.... (spits tobacco in cup)[/b][/i] [img]http://forum.go-bengals.com/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/3.gif[/img]

[Guest mongoloido]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 14 2005, 12:26 AM']Something tells me that it always conveniently makes the picture you expect when finished as well......[/quote]

I doubt it. I am neither republican nor democrat. I don't have blind devotion in leaders, nor do I inherently mistrust them. I do tend to believe I am too small a cog to make a difference in politics though, so I tend to keep passion out of my political reasoning.

[quote]also before you start throwing around Young and Niave arguments you should establish yourself as some wise old Sensay...[/quote]

Haven't claimed to be a master, but I am trying to be a student. I have been blessed to find myself surrounded by extremely smart and wise people all my life. One thing I've learned is that I hate putting my foot in my mouth. A smart way to avoid that has been to pay attention to those around me who don't. They all listen, study, internalize, take their time, and leave room for new information or ideas. You don't have to be a master of those qualities to understand their importance... By the way, it's "sensei." (Kung Fu movies ruled my childhood)

[quote]Also I must be moving in the opposite direction because after 4 years of college and a bachelors, I thought Bush was alright but now after 7 years of college as I complete a doctorate I think he is a huge fuck up....

I wonder why they always say that Academia is a haven for the Left Wing.... why do all these people that study those funny books long enough always think these crazy thoughts.... (spits tobacco in cup)[/b][/i] [img]http://forum.go-bengals.com/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/3.gif[/img]
[right][post="114224"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]


I don't much care about Bush, nor did I care about Clinton. In order for anything to get done in this government, a lot of people on both sides of the fence have to agree on things. Blame doesn't fall on one man or one political party (not that there has been anything proven to require blame yet)... As for your last paragraph: Not sure where you're going with that.

[Beaker]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 14 2005, 04:26 AM']Also I must be moving in the opposite direction because after 4 years of college and a bachelors, I thought Bush was alright but now after 7 years of college as I complete a doctorate I think he is a huge fuck up....
[right][post="114224"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]

BJ, as a guy who has been through much college myself (and am still attending regularly since science is constantly evolving), I can tell you that alot of professors preach as much as they teach. Alot of the things I bought into when I was younger make much less sense when I see them with age and life experience on my side. You can be indoctrinated to alot of views simply by repeated exposure. You hear something enough times from people you hold in high esteem (professors) and you begin to hold it as truth. After 4 yrs of college you were still objective, after 7 yrs agendas have soaked into you.

On a second note, why am I hearing nothing of this memo from the networks? If it was truly that damning, they would be roasting Bush. Not happening. Youve become myopic in your quest.

[Guest BlackJesus]

[img]http://www.indymedia.be/uploads/nowar28b.jpg[/img]

[Guest oldschooler]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 17 2005, 04:37 AM'][img]http://www.indymedia.be/uploads/nowar28b.jpg[/img]
[right][post="115444"][/post][/right][/quote]





Since when is any1 IGNORING it ?

How about we start getting pissed and offended
by insurgents killing their own kind ?

[Guest BlackJesus]

[quote]How about we start getting pissed and offended
by insurgents killing their own kind ?[/quote]

[i][b]Old this post says it all.... those pictures are from Amercias "Shock and Awe" where we essentially went Bombs away on Baghdad. Yet you see insurgents... wow FoxNews has done their job. [/b][/i]

[Guest oldschooler]

[quote name='BlackJesus' date='Jul 17 2005, 03:12 PM'][i][b]Old this post says it all.... those pictures are from Amercias "Shock and Awe" where we essentially went Bombs away on Baghdad.  Yet you see insurgents... wow FoxNews has done their job.  [/b][/i]
[right][post="115516"][/post][/right][/quote]



I don`t even watch FOXNews...



I said..."How about we start getting pissed and offended
by insurgents killing their own kind ?"
But you assume that I was refering to the picture AND
that I have been brainwashed by FOXNews... :roll:


You act like every person that is killed over in Iraq
is killed by an American Soldier. Well let me tell ya...
watch CNN, CBS or any other Liberal, Bush hating news cast
or read and you will see that the Insurgents/terrorists are killing more
people (Iraqis) per day than our soldiers do in a month !


[quote]Iraq counts its dead after bombing frenzy

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AFP) -[b] Iraq was counting its dead after a bloody three-day bombing frenzy, including a devastating attack near a mosque that was one of the deadliest since the fall of Saddam Hussein.[/b]
Against the backdrop of violence, international donors were meeting in Jordan on rebuilding Iraq.

[b]More than 126 people were killed in the attacks, including 83 who lost their lives when a suicide bomber blew up a fuel tanker on Saturday near a Shiite mosque in the small town of Al-Musayyib, south of the capital[/b].[/quote]

[url="http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/iraq;_ylt=Al40vEXp8_..WEzE_tso3S9X6GMA;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl"]http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/iraq;_ylt=Al40...HNlYwMlJVRPUCUl[/url]