Maddalo
Jr. Member
Oh what a misery it is to have an intellect in splints!
Posts: 70
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Post by Maddalo on May 18, 2004 16:42:38 GMT -5
I am treading on very unsteady ground here, not knowing whether you are a raving Bush accolite or a democrat supporter. Most of the pictures we see here on the news are of people rallying around the President in times of crisis.
Personally, I was greatly disturbed by 9/11 and was impressed at first that the U.S. government acted at the time with meausered and sensitive actions, not immediately rushing into a terrible vengeance on their enemies.
However the subsequent Afghanistan debacle, Camp X-ray, and the 'War' against terrorism in Iraq has been a disgusting and very harmful, destabilising influence on the world at large.
It's true Saddam was a brutal dictator who should have been removed from power. True he may have had some minor weapons for use on his own people, but in no way was he capable of launching a full scale nuclear and/or biological attack on the west.
The war is still ongoing, becoming a modern Vietnam, Afghanistan is still in ruins after two years ,and the middle-east is a tinder-box primed to explode.
My words are poor substitues for such terrible forebodings. Here's Coleridge on another older war (still absolutely relevant today):
"We send our mandates for the certain death Of thousands and tens of thousands! Boys and girls And women, that would groan to see a child Pull off an insect's leg, all read of war, The best amusement for our morning meal!"
Peace - how sweet and unatainable art thou..
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Post by TitanianAnthrax on May 27, 2004 0:55:05 GMT -5
you've got a point there. I personally agree that saddam had to be taken out of office but one has to wonder if there was a better way to do it. and what was camp x-ray?
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Maddalo
Jr. Member
Oh what a misery it is to have an intellect in splints!
Posts: 70
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Post by Maddalo on May 28, 2004 16:32:48 GMT -5
You've never heard of Camp X-Ray?
Guantamano Bay in Cuba?
It's only the most oppressive and illegal prison camp in the world!
Expressly against the rules of the Geneva convention it holds who knows how many terrorist 'suspects.'
Now whatever these people may or may not have done (and some of them are bound to be guilty of offences) they deserve a lilttle legal and human decency to have their cases presented in a just court of international law, not a bararous, almost medieval and draconian treatment.
I'm sorry to see the U.S. stoop to such a low point in its history, you could be such a great beacon of enlightenment and truth, instead of emulating the old world's follys.
Here's a quote to end:
"...in truth I do not believe in this sort of perfectibility - the nature of the world will not admit of it - the inhabitants of the world will corrospond to itself..." -John Keats.
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Post by Golyadkin on Jun 6, 2004 10:23:02 GMT -5
Here's a current political affair:
Former President Ronald Reagan has died. The 40th President, The Gipper, The Great Communicator, died of pneumonia at the age of 93. He will be missed. He may have been a Republician, but he was still one of my favorite Presidents. We have lost a true American hero.
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Maddalo
Jr. Member
Oh what a misery it is to have an intellect in splints!
Posts: 70
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Post by Maddalo on Jun 6, 2004 17:16:47 GMT -5
I know it's commonplace when someone dies to only really remember their good points in their eulogy, but I am somewhat bemused that you think of Ronald Reagan as an American hero.
Even at my age, the 80s are a dim and distant memory - I was too young to realise what was going on in the world, and even now am not fully aware of the whole political situation at that time, so I am at a loss to learn why someone whom was only just born when Reagan was in the last year of his second term would have such admiration for a past leader.
I understand even the once-discredited Nixon was given a fond farewell when he died in the mid-nineties!
What is your understanding of Reagan's legacy?
Why is he such a hero?
Is it because he survived an assassination attempt? The British P.M, (and a friend of Reagan) Mrs. Thatcher also did, but very few would look on her as a hero.
Is it because he battled the terrible alzheimers disease for over a decade?
I'd love to know why you use the word hero for a political figure who at the time split the world by his intervention in Iran, which arguably led to the various hostage crises and to the creation of many of the most deadly terrorist groups of today including Hamas and Hizboula (I'm not sure how to spell this), and a worsening of the Palestinian-Israeli war.
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Post by Golyadkin on Jun 12, 2004 16:40:52 GMT -5
Reagan ended the Cold War. I think that alone is enough to make him a hero. There are thousands of websites dedicated to him, I'm sure they mention all of his achievements.
P.S. I am a very liberal democrat. I believe all conservative republicians (intentionally left lower-case) should be beaten to within an inch of their lives, then taken to a country that uses the metric system and be beaten to within a centimetre of their lives, then taken to a hospital in the middle of an Africian rain-forest. But that's just me.
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Maddalo
Jr. Member
Oh what a misery it is to have an intellect in splints!
Posts: 70
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Post by Maddalo on Jun 12, 2004 17:05:07 GMT -5
I don't have anything personal against Reagan, but this current hagiography (worshipful or saintlike idealising ) of him is a bit too much.
The claim that he personally ended the cold war is not entirely true.
From the outside the Soviet Union looked as cohesive as ever, but it was rotten to the core and on the point of collapse for the whole of the eighties. Reagan might have been less hardline a republican than another president, but he was basically the right man at the right time gently push the barrel over the edge.
True he may have begun the disarmament of nuclear weapons programs, but remember, the Star Wars defence project was first formulated during his time in the White House.
The eighties also were the period in recent history when capitalism threw off it's paternalistic robes and went naked, all it's ugly forms were absolutely, and unashamedly exposed for what it was.
It was deeply materialistic and selfish time for the human race.
Never has greed been so endorsed and enthusaistically embraced by the world, to the detriment of all else. So where there was great prosperity for the haves, the have-nots were ground further in the dust of poverty and ignorance.
Reagan, while being a nice guy, as a president sometimes lacked the necessary dignity of the position, with sometimes inappropriate humour and a lack of gravity for such an important and prestigious job. Also, you may be surprised to learn that he took even more vacations than any other president including Dubyah himself.
The Iran-contra affair could have seen him impeached like Nixon, but somehow he wriggled out of the situation earning the legendary teflon-man tag (usually given to Clinton).
Don't get me wrong, I have great sympathy for his family and friends, but I wish people would not look back at politicians as romantically as they do.
Well I suppose with George W. in the oval office, even Nixon has a halo on his head!!!!!!
P.S. the metric system rules! geddit? No, really it's more logical and mathematically sound than the bizarre imperial measures.
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Post by Golyadkin on Jun 17, 2004 20:20:14 GMT -5
Don't the people in your country remember all of the great aspects of one of your leaders after they die?
P.S. I lived in the Philippines for 5 years. I find the imperial system of measurement far inferior to the metric.
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Maddalo
Jr. Member
Oh what a misery it is to have an intellect in splints!
Posts: 70
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Post by Maddalo on Jun 18, 2004 14:25:27 GMT -5
Most of the political leaders in my country (Northern Ireland) are a bunch of either bigotted idiots or scumbag (ex)-paramilitary terrorists cum wanna -be politicians.
There have not been any real politicians of integrity in this s***thole (am I allowed to swear on here?)for a long time, the possible exception being the very humble and tireless civil rights campaigner, and Nobel Peace Prize winner John Hume.
As for British politicians, there is litte love lost between the public of Britain and their politicians, even in death.
I suppose the death of Winston Churchill was the last time the British felt such an outpouring of grief for a dead leader, and that was nearly forty years ago.
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