Where do you stand? (Warning..Political Discussion :lol:)

[PrincessFiona]

Where do you guys stand on the whole missing weapons of mass destruction debate? Have any of you changed your mind on your stance on the war with Iraq based on the fact that no weapons have been found? As I understand it, we've searched all of the major sites where we thought they would be and now the joke in the funny section of the papers is that we invaded iraq on a typ-o...ie should have been iran instead of iraq....

I don't know...It bothers me that we can't find the weapons of mass destruction...and that we are kind of back peddling and now saying that iraq had a 'weapons program' instead of weapons of mass destruction....


There just seems to be a lot of bad intelligence on our parts.....It bothers me because this morning I was listening to CNN and they said that there are new alerts out there that AlQuada is likely to attack us in the next two to three years with weapons of mass destruction...I found myself rolling my eyes instead of taking it seriously. This is kind of like the boy that cried wolf one time too many....


In any case...it would be fun to debate and hear how everyone feels about this issue....I know I swing far to the left, (I've been told I fall off the scale) so don't be offended by my opinions....

kris

[Rapunzel]

My opinions?

On WMD in Iraq: I don't feel informed enough to have an opinion.

On the war in Iraq (the recent one): We need to just stay out of everyone else's business. It's damned if we do, damned if we don't in the world and I say let them all figure out their own problems. We can't be the policemen of the world and history has proven you can't rescue a nation from a dictator and then have that nation become a democracy - usually the people in those nations will just support another dictator. If we fight everyone else's wars for them the people get soft and expect to be "protected" by a world policeman rather than defending themselves against oppressive governments.

On terrorism: We need to tighten our borders up considerably and tighten up security around foreign US targets (such as embassies). If we find a group that openly supports war with the US we should immediately and without mercy bomb that particular group to oblivion and then leave. The message then, is: Kill US citizens and you die - period, no negotiating.

The purpose of the federal government of the United States is to act in the best interest of its citizenry by physically defending it's borders and promoting economic growth through trade with other nations. That attitude was why it was so hard for the US to enter WWII. Unfortunately that attitude has changed since that time period to one of "We are the knights in shining armor who need to run around 'rescuing' the world from themselves" - it's a nice sentiment but not practical and not Constitutional.

Jennifer

Edit: I forgot one thing. We need to infiltrate Middle Eastern nations with spies. I agree that our information network in that region is absolutely miserable.

[Meenah]

Well, it is no secret how I feel about George W. I haven't changed my mind. Even though they did have them in the past, in my opinion they did NOT have them when we invaded!!!! We totally destroyed another country, and now we have to rebuild it. All because of our greed for oil.
Do you really want to know how I feel!!!!!! Love you guys.
Luanne

[migirl]

I was pretty skeptical of the existence of "WMD" when this was all starting, but I figured our leadership must know something that I didn't because they wouldn't possibly be stupid enough to manipulate the intelligence to justify the war... Now, it is looking to me like they did just that. Not only did our wonderful leadership (heavy sarcasm here) destroy an entire country, they are undermining our credibility with the rest of the world. Why should anyone believe anything we say anymore? What about the next time that there's an actual threat, why should other heads of state believe us? This really bothers me.

As for our "meddling" in other people's business, I agree with Rapunzel... We give billions in aid to other countries, and look where it's gotten us. I say we take that money away, and let them pick themselves up and figure out their own problems. I'd personally like to see just how far they get without our help!

I am also skeptical of the existence of WMD. Especially that they could be deployed in 45 minutes, as British intelligence reported at one point. And, not that this makes a difference, I think that Iraq would have WMD if the had the $$$ and resources. But that doesn't mean they did. I also thought that leadership must know some things that they couldn't publicly disclose....now I'm not so sure.
So, my hope is that the Iraqi people end up being better off after all of this. Hussein is a horrible, cruel person and hopefully he will be replaced by a better leader. Hopefully. Although Afghanistan sounds like a mess, I think the country and people there will be better off without the Taliban.
I agree that the US can't go around fixing everyone's problems -- especially if they don't want them fixed. Iraq certainly wasn't and isn't the only country with an unjust leader and a suffering population. It is sad to realize the poor state of so many people's lives all over the world. For me, a (very) small solution is to give money and support organizations that promote health and sustainable livelihoods for people in some of these countries. I think that is the most likely means of change.

[PrincessFiona]

intelligence

I hope that at least the Iraqi people will be better off too...One of the underreported things right now is that a main reason for a lot of violence against US soldiers now has to do with the fact that there still isn't electricity and access to clean water in many parts of the country, which is causing the people to revolt....It's so sad.

As to military intelligence....my step-brother is an intelligence officer in the Navy...who was btw stationed on a ship near Iraq.....he tried to get into the military as an officer once, and his college gpa was so low that they made him get another degree 8O ...so he did...He wanted to be a pilot and was accepted to pilot training....that he failed out of after being given 3 attempts to retake portions of the training He was then 'promoted' to intelligence officer...and after his short training period was sent to the gulf....he just came back and he is not going to be TEACHING at the training school for new intelligence officers.....I'm going to hold off judgement here...but I'm wondering if this could be part of our problem?

kris

[SueC]

Yeah, I'm on the same page as everyone else. I think it is so arragont of us (The United States) to assume that everyone else wants or needs a democrazy. It seems like we have enough problems in our own country without feeling the need to go around and police other countries! I assumed when the war started that the government must have been pretty darn sure that Iraq had weapons of mass distruction (or mass murder as George likes to say!), so I'm disappointed that they have gone to all this trouble and not turned anything up!

[Rapunzel]

I don't think it is arrogant for us to assume democracy is the best form of government currently available to average people. That was most certainly not my point. My point was that if the US is the driving force behind democratization of other nations then those democracies will be overwhelming failures. Why? Because for a democracy to remain stable it requires quite a bit of work on the part of the local populace. The US running in to "rescue" nations promotes laziness and ineptness among the "rescued" citizenry because it prompts the response of "The US will take care of everything." That is the problem.

[twinsmom]

Just a thought about the whole deal. I was listening to an interview with Condaliza(sp?) Rice, and she brought up a very good observation about the whole criticism of not finding the 'smoking gun' and the government making up reports, etc.
1) People criticized the government for not connecting the dots soon enough to prevent the 9/11 attacks, and there were a lot more dots connected with the whole Iraq situation...
2) It wasn't just the current administration that has had intelligence and knowledge about WMD in Iraq - Clinton made several speeches about the WMD and the evilness of Saddam, and was even trying to plan an attack to get rid of the weapons. Even the UN has several reports about the WMD programs going on in Iraq.

Just my 2 cents...

Jen B.

Let's say there are WMD in Iraq -- hopefully the US does find them soon before they fall into the wrong hands.