vincible

Reply to Bill O'Reilly: Blowhard in Politics JoeUser Forums

AFAIK these people would not receive CO status in the US. To qualify as a CO you have to think that *all* war is morally wrong, not that the particular war in which you are being asked to serve is morally wrong--so the objection can't be political. From what I have heard, the deserters object only to this particular war, and not all war. So the fairness of the hearing would have nothing to do with their rejection. They don't meet the standar

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

*shrug* Well I do know people who felt that further sanctions were not an option, partly because they were failing to stop Hussein's weapons development. I was one of these people, and I was wrong on that score. The left is right to bring it up. At the very least, the absence of WMD destroys *an* argument for war, and not a straw man argument--it's one that was made by, among others, by GW Bush, and one that was influential in my thinking on the matter

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

people like me were arguing against containment before we went to war. I addressed those issues countless times in those links. Feel free to READ them rather than trying to get me to rehash what I've written counltess times in the past. I fail to see what I'm asking you to rehash. Let me try one more ti

Reply to Pictures of American Soldiers tortureing Iraq POW's in Politics JoeUser Forums

Yeah, the Mirror is a pretty sketchy paper. They also were hyping up the non-existent Kerry intern scandal a few months ago.

Reply to Dover Air Force Base - Mortuary Procedures in Politics JoeUser Forums

I'm basing my comment on what he wrote in his previous blog, "Bush Campaign ads should show 9/11 images," which he wrote during that controversy a couple months ago about Bush's 9/11 ads, one of which showed firefighters carrying a flag-draped body. In that blog, he was supportive of this ad campaign. Certainly we didn't hear about how it was a violation of basic decency. http://draginol.joeuser.com

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

I admit I am not well-versed in exactly how enforcement does take place, but sanctions did work for a decade in spite of substantial opposition, so there couldn't be "nothing" enforcing compliance. Whatever flaws in enforcement you may think might have developed (and I'd be interested if you could expand on this), it seems plausible to me that an investment of a couple billion dollars from the US would have fixed them. It would certainly not h

Reply to Dover Air Force Base - Mortuary Procedures in Politics JoeUser Forums

just a matter of basic decency but apparently anti-war people are willing to shed decency and instead use their bodies for crass political gain Interesting that you think this when you support Bush using images of the 9/11 dead in his advertising. Why aren't those pictures a violation of basic decency t

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

Again, let me remind you that we have a security council veto, just like them. Sanctions could not be lifted unless the US agreed to it.

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

Who said we'd lift sanctions? Not I... I've said multiple times that the choice was war or containment. Containment includes some form of sanctions. Your points about what Hussein might have done if sanctions were lifted are totally irrelevant to my comments, as far as I can tell.

Reply to Pictures of American Soldiers tortureing Iraq POW's in Politics JoeUser Forums

Whether or not we judge the army by these individuals, you can be sure that many angry people in the Middle East will. As if we weren't having enough problems over there already.

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

The left's dishonesty on this issue is ignoring how much evidence of WMD programs he had going The point being that his weapons programs had fallen apart. What the Kay report shows is that Hussein was trying, and FAILING, to build WMD. Hussein was no threat.

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

I can't understand those who still think he might have had weapons. We've been in the country for a year now, and we've been able to interview just about every important Iraqi scientist. Face it, there wasn't anything. What in God's

Reply to The reasons to go into Iraq never changed in Politics JoeUser Forums

You're missing the point. The choice being made here was between war and some form of containment. If Hussein had actually managed to maintain a nuclear or biological weapons program in spite of sanctions--as some in the administration had incorrectly claimed--it would mean that containment was ineffective. It meant that in spite of strict sanctions, Huss

Reply to Pictures of American Soldiers tortureing Iraq POW's in Politics JoeUser Forums

Here's a link to some of the images, for those who haven't seen them before. *Warning: nudity, disturbing images of forced sexual acts, etc* http://www.livejournal.com/users/throwingstardna/513278.html

Reply to Mercenary Soldiers in Politics JoeUser Forums

According to google, it's a navy radio term for "well done"

Reply to The Crusade for Religious Ignorance in Politics JoeUser Forums

Schools take out mention of religion or the Bible out of history classes. They went from the good step of taking out teaching of religion to the bad step of taking out acknowledgement of religion. My experience was different. I went to public school fairly recently (graduated high school six ye

Reply to Mileva Einstein responsible for E=MC squared? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Three men are in a hot-air balloon. Soon, they find themselves lost in a canyon somewhere. One of the three men says, "I've got an idea. We can call for help in this canyon and the echo will carry our voices far." So he leans over the basket and yells out, "Helllloooooo! Where are we?" (They hear the echo several times.) 15 minutes later, they hear this echoing voice: "Helllloooooo! You're lost!!" One of the men says, "That must have been a mathematician." Puzzled, one of the other men asks, "Wh

Reply to Mileva Einstein responsible for E=MC squared? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Don't forget that Lorentz made major contributions too. No scientific discovery is made in a vacuum. Though I'm not sure why it matters at this point which dead person gets primary credit for the theory. This was interesting: http://www.mathpages.com/rr/s8-08/8-08.htm "In a sense, the failure of Poincare to found the modern theory of relativity was not due to a lack of discernment on his part (he clearly recognized the Lorentz group of space and time transformatio

Reply to Not so thinly disguised anti-semites in Politics JoeUser Forums

These are the same folks who would skewer anyone else for using anything remotely rascist same

Reply to THE NEW SOLDIER in Republican JoeUser Forums

He actually requested to be shipped over there Can you point me to a source for this? I tried, and failed, to find a reliable source confirming this.

Reply to Bush: Neo-Fascist? in Politics JoeUser Forums

The problem with debates on global climate change is that not many people have the background to understand the subject. Global warming is not some liberal fantasy. The vast majority of climate scientists believe humans are causing global warming. You can either take my word for it (I know no one will) or go to any major scientific magazine in a relevant field and search for articles on global clima

Reply to Rational vs. Emotional Thought in Politics JoeUser Forums

There was an article on this in yesterday's NYT, if you want more detail... Link (Free registration required)

Reply to Father Daughter talk in Republican JoeUser Forums

I've never met someone who is rich that doesn't work their butt off (i.e. >40 hours per week on average). Wow. Maybe it's that I'm recently out of college, but I know a fair number of rich kids who are busy draining their parents' money and not doing anything productive with their lives, because they k

Reply to How minimum wage costs jobs in Politics JoeUser Forums

Of course minimum wage laws will cause businesses to employ less labor. The question is how much less? And how soon? You don't really address these questions--you just assert an answer without giving empirical evidence. Of course there's a point at which humans will be replaced by machines. Is it at a minimum wage of $5.00? $6.00? $8.00? $10.00? $15.00? The answer to this is crucial when you are ma

Reply to Bush Campaign ads should show 9/11 images in Republican JoeUser Forums

All those other taxes don't add. You're not paying grocery tax AND gas tax AND home appliances and so on on the same income--you can only spend a given dollar on one thing, so you only see one tax on that dollar of spending. (So if you spend a dollar on gas, you pay a gas tax on that dollar, but you're not paying a grocery sales tax on that dollar.)