ABC News Blotter: Bush Authorizes New Covert Action Against Iran

[PeterMP]

By not creating him in the first place. It was from the Treaty of Versailles that crippled the German people and gave birth to the atmosphere where Hitler and his cronies could assume power.

As I said, sometimes even good people make mistakes. Clearly, this was one of them. There was an intent to "punish" Germany so that they wouldn't do it again. You would recognize that sometimes some punishment is necessary?

However, realizing that hindsight is 20/20, and given the rise of Hitler, I also understand that there are times when the imperfect may need to be done, thus I would have probably done the same thing as the pacifist Dietrich Bonhoeffer as he reluctantly participated in the assassination attempt on Hitler. He understood it to be a failure to do so, but still never advocated all out war. My own position is one where I affirm a police force that seeks to value all life even the lives of the perpetrators, and that in certain extreme circumstances leathal force may be authorized, but only after serious debate and consternation, and in the end realizing that the use of such leathal force is in the end a failure on behalf of all parties.

The problem is that today, military force is all too readily accepted as a viable alternative.

In the case of somebody that does not share your ideals of right and wrong (e.g. Hitler), your time of serious debate and consternation only extends the warning period they have to prepare. You could certainly aruge prior to WWII that Europe went through that very process, and Hitler used that time to build his military, which only extended the damage and deaths caused by WWII. You could argue that we are currently going through that very process now w/ Iran, and what is Iran doing w/ that time? Building nuclear weapons.

Giving said people time to prepare only makes the military conflict more difficult AND in the end, results in more innocent people being injured unjustly, which feeds back into the cycle of trying to make up for their unjustice, which almost always practically causes unjustices to be perpertrated in the effort to address those grievences as in the Israeli/Palestanian situation.

In general, I disagree w/ the idea that the use of force is a "failure" by all of the partys. There are always going to be "evil" (or mentally unbalanced, emotionally stunted, or whatever words you want to use) people that will carry out evil acts. The best way to practially deal w/ them is force, and since we can't control everybody, their actions do not represent a failure on our part, and therefore neither does our necessary response.

This seems to be one big difference between the right and left right now. The left wants to say that 9-11 was our fault and while I will freely admit that our foreign policy was given as a reason for the strike (and that somethings were done poorly at best and I would even argue down right stupidly), Bin Laden and many of his followers are just evil people that wish to control as many people as possible. A conflict between their way of thinking and ours was inevitable and so while 911 as an event may have been the result of our actions, the real conflict is not.

[The 12th Commandment]

I really believe that Bushco needs to just keep their weenies in their pants. The country doesn't want any of this **** and they're not going to have time to finish any of it anyway. I'm surprised there aren't more leaks from disgruntled civil servants who will still have their job after '08 and will be the ones dealing with the arrogant policies of this admin. That's why we have a free press, to provide an forum for citizens (even ones whose jobs are secret) to out politicos doing excessively stupid things.

[AsburySkinsFan]

Pacifists believe themselves to be moral people.

But all that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

That is the definition of the left today- stand around and complain while better men go out and battle for what is good and decent in the world.

Who is going to defend the United States from Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hizbullah and Islamic Jihad? Hippies like Asbury?!!

Who is TODAY protecting your children from being blown up in schools- something that happens in other parts of the world? Think hard about that..

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: I'm a hippie!:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Yep here's the long haired LSD popping hippie and his family.

But all that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

No kidding but then you read pacifist and you hear "do nothing", but what I keep saying is that my pacifism is to be understood as "non-violent" resistence. Which is the oppostie of "doing nothing".

As far as the definition of the right it is kill first think and ask questions later. Not wise. But as it has been said, people would rather follow someone seen as strong and wrong than someone seen as weak and right.

[Larry]

Okay, then how would have prevented Hitler?

The same way we defeated the USSR?

[Larry]

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: I'm a hippie!:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Yep here's the long haired LSD popping hippie and his family.

Hey, what's with those funny-looking green shirts?

Y'all aren't tree-hugging hippies, are you?

[AsburySkinsFan]

Hey, what's with those funny-looking green shirts?

Y'all aren't tree-hugging hippies, are you?

Oh no!! I've been outted!! LOL:laugh:

[PeterMP]

Post 176.

http://www.extremeskins.com/forums/showpost.php?p=3805959&postcount=176

[taylorcoreskin]

nice. I hope we deal with Iran by using force and brutality.

[AsburySkinsFan]

nice. I hope we deal with Iran by using force and brutality.

And.....who are the terrorists again?

[Larry]

nice. I hope we deal with Iran by using force and brutality.

And.....who are the terrorists again?

I'm remembering a scene from the old Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Ted has just done something stupid on the air. Lou announces his intention to go in there and beat him unconscious.

Mary: Lou, you're a grown man. You know violence never settles anything.

Lou gives her a withering look: Mary, violence has settled every war in history, every Super Bowl ever played, and a lot of marriages I know.

-----

There are times when violence and brutality are exactly what's called for.

I'm not 100% certain that this is one of those times, but I will admit that I'm leaning that way. (I'll also admit that I can also imagine that, 20 years from now, the US will no longer be the world's #1 power, and it will be because the US started another war.)

[twa]

And.....who are the terrorists again?

Why am I not surprised you have trouble identifying them?

Wage peace.

[AsburySkinsFan]

Why am I not surprised you have trouble identifying them?

Wage peace.

How is it not hard to identify the terrorists when someone comes out and says that he hopes we deal with Iran with force and brutality. Give me a break TWA, but that mindset would be completely railed against if it was quoted from any in the Middle East if they leveled it against the US. Terror is terror no matter who advocates it, you would do well to recognize the hypocrisy in his post, not to mention your own.

Oh, and like waging peace is a bad thing.:doh:

[PeterMP]

By not creating him in the first place. It was from the Treaty of Versailles that crippled the German people and gave birth to the atmosphere where Hitler and his cronies could assume power.

As I said, sometimes even good people make mistakes. Clearly, this was one of them. There was an intent to "punish" Germany so that they wouldn't do it again. You would recognize that sometimes some punishment is necessary?

However, realizing that hindsight is 20/20, and given the rise of Hitler, I also understand that there are times when the imperfect may need to be done, thus I would have probably done the same thing as the pacifist Dietrich Bonhoeffer as he reluctantly participated in the assassination attempt on Hitler. He understood it to be a failure to do so, but still never advocated all out war. My own position is one where I affirm a police force that seeks to value all life even the lives of the perpetrators, and that in certain extreme circumstances leathal force may be authorized, but only after serious debate and consternation, and in the end realizing that the use of such leathal force is in the end a failure on behalf of all parties.

The problem is that today, military force is all too readily accepted as a viable alternative.

In the case of somebody that does not share your ideals of right and wrong (e.g. Hitler), your time of serious debate and consternation only extends the warning period they have to prepare. You could certainly aruge prior to WWII that Europe went through that very process, and Hitler used that time to build his military, which only extended the damage and deaths caused by WWII. You could argue that we are currently going through that very process now w/ Iran, and what is Iran doing w/ that time? Building nuclear weapons.

Giving said people time to prepare only makes the military conflict more difficult AND in the end, results in more innocent people being injured unjustly, which feeds back into the cycle of trying to make up for their unjustice, which almost always practically causes unjustices to be perpertrated in the effort to address those grievences as in the Israeli/Palestanian situation.

In general, I disagree w/ the idea that the use of force is a "failure" by all of the partys. There are always going to be "evil" (or mentally unbalanced, emotionally stunted, or whatever words you want to use) people that will carry out evil acts. The best way to practially deal w/ them is force, and since we can't control everybody, their actions do not represent a failure on our part, and therefore neither does our necessary response.

This seems to be one big difference between the right and left right now. The left wants to say that 9-11 was our fault and while I will freely admit that our foreign policy was given as a reason for the strike (and that somethings were done poorly at best and I would even argue down right stupidly), Bin Laden and many of his followers are just evil people that wish to control as many people as possible. A conflict between their way of thinking and ours was inevitable and so while 911 as an event may have been the result of our actions, the real conflict is not.

[twa]

ASF, wouldn't condemning the force and brutality on both sides be a better idea than moral relativism which by equating the actions w/o consideration of the goals strengthens the real terrorists?

Do you not see a difference?

When Jesus drove the money changers out of the temple by force was he wrong?...the Son Of God using force and brutality=terrorist?

[AsburySkinsFan]

ASF, wouldn't condemning the force and brutality on both sides be a better idea than moral relativism which by equating the actions w/o consideration of the goals strengthens the real terrorists?

I do condemn the force and brutality on both sides, repeatedly. But, my audience here is predominantly American, if my audience was Islamic Fundamentalists I would be calling them to account directly. The problem is that here there is already the assumption that what the Islamic Fundamentalists are doing is wrong, yet somehow our use of force and brutality is supposed to be applauded because we're doing it? Don't you see the hypocrisy there?

When Jesus drove the money changers out of the temple by force was he wrong?...the Son Of God using force and brutality=terrorist?

LOL:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: LOL

He drove them out using force, but to characterize Jesus' actions as brutality goes way, way over-board. And you know what, there were those who probably would have considered Jesus a terrorist, and if they had such vocabulary they probably would have. He was after all crucified as an enemy of the State.

Just so you know, I really would have let the comment slide if he had just said "use force" but the added "brutality" really did send the comment over the edge.

[Larry]

ASF, wouldn't condemning the force and brutality on both sides be a better idea than moral relativism which by equating the actions w/o consideration of the goals strengthens the real terrorists?

1) Allow me to point out that he is "condemning the force and brutality on both sides".

He's not saying "We're wrong and the terrorists aren't". He's saying "we're both wrong."

2) I always admire the way the label "moral relativism" inevitably gets slung at one side of this debate, when the "other side" has spent the last three pages arguing that hypothermia leading to unconsciousness is clearly morally superior to the application of power tools to body parts.

("You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.")

[AsburySkinsFan]

As I said, sometimes even good people make mistakes. Clearly, this was one of them. There was an intent to "punish" Germany so that they wouldn't do it again. You would recognize that sometimes some punishment is necessary?

Yes of course I recognize the purpose and use of punishment (I have children ), but there were voices at Versailles that warned against the harsh penalties that were being imposed on the German people, yet it was ignored because too many of the allies wanted vengeance against the German government and so they took it out on the German people, and thus indirectly they gave birth to Hitler. The same thing happened in our involvement in the Middle East and as a result gave birth of Bin Laden. This is exactly why I caution against proceeding blindly with force and brutality lest we give birth to yet another world enemy.

In the case of somebody that does not share your ideals of right and wrong (e.g. Hitler), your time of serious debate and consternation only extends the warning period they have to prepare. You could certainly aruge prior to WWII that Europe went through that very process, and Hitler used that time to build his military, which only extended the damage and deaths caused by WWII. You could argue that we are currently going through that very process now w/ Iran, and what is Iran doing w/ that time? Building nuclear weapons.

Hilter was able to build in secret a luxury that Iran does not have, especially with the US ability to gather intelligence data. What we need to be sure of is that the data that we receive about Iran from our adminstration is actually true. After all there is a bit of a precedent for our government giving us information that was not at all accurate, about things like WMD.

Giving said people time to prepare only makes the military conflict more difficult AND in the end, results in more innocent people being injured unjustly, which feeds back into the cycle of trying to make up for their unjustice, which almost always practically causes unjustices to be perpertrated in the effort to address those grievences as in the Israeli/Palestanian situation.

The problem is that we cannot keep every nation under our thumbs because some day they might pose a threat lest in the end we become the dictators. In the end I simply have to wonder why we are the one's who are able to determine who is and who isn't a potential enemy of our state.

In general, I disagree w/ the idea that the use of force is a "failure" by all of the partys. There are always going to be "evil" (or mentally unbalanced, emotionally stunted, or whatever words you want to use) people that will carry out evil acts.

My understanding comes from the theological understanding of living in a world corrupted by sin, and that war is a result of that, thus the use of force is a reflection of that corruption and a failure to live up to the ideals of peace.

The best way to practially deal w/ them is force, and since we can't control everybody, their actions do not represent a failure on our part, and therefore neither does our necessary response.

The question becomes the level of force, and the work that needs to be done to diffuse the sources of violence. This is why I will continue to advocate a police force to be used as such, but one that is governed by an entirely different set of "Rules of Engagement" than our military and which values and seeks to protect the lives of all, and only in the extreme situations resorts to violence but also sees that as a failure. Heck, even Augustine's Just War never viewed war as a good thing.

This seems to be one big difference between the right and left right now. The left wants to say that 9-11 was our fault and while I will freely admit that our foreign policy was given as a reason for the strike (and that somethings were done poorly at best and I would even argue down right stupidly), Bin Laden and many of his followers are just evil people that wish to control as many people as possible. A conflict between their way of thinking and ours was inevitable and so while 911 as an event may have been the result of our actions, the real conflict is not.

I never said that 9/11 was our fault, because nothing can excuse the events of that day, however I will not turn a blind eye to the activities and policies that gave birth to the forces that perpetrated those attacks.

[PeterMP]

The same thing happened in our involvement in the Middle East and as a result gave birth of Bin Laden. This is exactly why I caution against proceeding blindly with force and brutality lest we give birth to yet another world enemy.

What vengance in the ME did we level that gave rise to Bin Laden? We were acting as protectors of a nation that had been invaded.

Hilter was able to build in secret a luxury that Iran does not have, especially with the US ability to gather intelligence data. What we need to be sure of is that the data that we receive about Iran from our adminstration is actually true. After all there is a bit of a precedent for our government giving us information that was not at all accurate, about things like WMD.

Many of the European nations knew what Germany was doing prior to the invasion of Poland. Read a little bit about the Munich agreement.

What "proof" would you require from this administration to act on Iran? It is generally accepted that they are working on nuclear weapons. The AHMADINEJAD has repeatedly promised the destruction of Israel and us and anybody that doesn't surrender to them. I'm going to steal some quotes from an AFC post in another thread:

AHMADINEJAD: "Undoubtedly, I say that this slogan and goal is achievable, and with the support and power of God, we will soon experience a world without the United States and Zionism and will breathe in the brilliant time of Islamic sovereignty over today's world." (Iran's President Warns Muslims Of 'Conspiracies Of World Imperialism,' Available At: www.sharifnews.com, Accessed 10/26/05)

President Ahmadinejad: "If You Would Like To Have Good Relations With The Iranian Nation … Bow Down Before The Greatness Of The Iranian Nation And Surrender." AHMADINEJAD: "And you, for your part, if you would like to have good relations with the Iranian nation in the future, recognize the Iranian nation's right. Recognize the Iranian nation's greatness. And bow down before the greatness of the Iranian nation and surrender. If you don't accept [to do this], the Iranian nation will later force you to surrender and bow down." (Iran: Ahmadinejad Says US, UK 'Resorted To Tricks' 'To Postpone' Cease-Fire, Aired On Tehran Islamic Republic Of Iran News Network Television (IRINN), 8/15/06)

The guy is bad. He's telling you what his plans are just like Bin Laden did and Hiler did in Mein Kampf. He's wants to destroy Israel AND the US and "breathe in the brilliant time of Islamic sovereignty over today's world". To ignore it is only folly.

In the end I simply have to wonder why we are the one's who are able to determine who is and who isn't a potential enemy of our state.

Because it is OUR state. Who else would you have do the job?

My understanding comes from the theological understanding of living in a world corrupted by sin, and that war is a result of that, thus the use of force is a reflection of that corruption and a failure to live up to the ideals of peace.

Then you believe in original sin and that all men are doomed to sin (except Jesus). From that then, conflict is almost enevitable.

The question becomes the level of force, and the work that needs to be done to diffuse the sources of violence. This is why I will continue to advocate a police force to be used as such, but one that is governed by an entirely different set of "Rules of Engagement" than our military and which values and seeks to protect the lives of all, and only in the extreme situations resorts to violence but also sees that as a failure. Heck, even Augustine's Just War never viewed war as a good thing.

Again, though your waiting only allows the evil to gather forces, which CAUSES a higher level of violence to defeat them. Instead of signing the Munich agreement if the European powers would have invaded Germany and captured/killed Hitler, then there would have been much less death and destruction. Dealing w/ Iran now will be much less costly than dealing w/ a nuclear Iran.

I never said that 9/11 was our fault, because nothing can excuse the events of that day, however I will not turn a blind eye to the activities and policies that gave birth to the forces that perpetrated those attacks.

What acts? Defending two internationally recognized goverments (Saudia Arabia and Kuwait) and cold war allies from Iraq and Saddam? Bin Laden was supporting the attacking, terrorizing, and killing people long before he turned his eyes to us by supporting the Taliban.

[twa]

Larry ,while both treatments are harsh which would you choose and which is likely to leave permanent damage?

ASF, does that mean beating someone with a rope is OK or not? :laugh:

[AsburySkinsFan]

ASF, does that mean beating someone with a rope is OK or not? :laugh:

Check your scripture there is no mention that he hit anyone, it just says:

John 2:15 Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables.

One can drive someone from the Temple with "a whip of cords" without ever hitting them, reading otherwise reads into the passage something is not expressed.

[twa]

Sounds terroristic ASF

I am sure he at least terrified them (even if there is no proof of physical contact) enough to make them leave their money,and then destroyed their livelihood...must have been quite a show

[Larry]

Larry ,while both treatments are harsh which would you choose and which is likely to leave permanent damage?

They're both wrong!

What's so tough to grasp about that concept? How long do people tend to dance around that bush before they'll admit that just because there is, somewhere in the universe, a wrong that's "more wrong" than what I'm doing, doesn't justify a wrong?

It's not a justification, it's a confession.

[AsburySkinsFan]

What vengance in the ME did we level that gave rise to Bin Laden? We were acting as protectors of a nation that had been invaded.

Oh come on now you're playing coy, you know full well what US policies led to the rise of Bin Laden, something about funding Iraq in their war with Iran, something about using the Afghans a pawns in a chess match against the Russians and something about leaving the whole Middle East a bloody mess all the while supporting tyranical maniacs one minute and then the next calling them part of the "axis of evil". You want to know why they hate us, its because we use them like useless pawns, and then we act like flipping hypocrites about it when someone calls us out.

Many of the European nations knew what Germany was doing prior to the invasion of Poland. Read a little bit about the Munich agreement.

Building an army is not the same as using an army, now sure there was a long series of appeasement with Hitler, but that is not reason enough to over-react and provoke a war with Iran in order to prevent them from possibly attaining nuclear weapons in the next 3 to 8 years (UN estimates). Do we really think that by toppling Iran we will some how magically make terrorism disappear? We must remember, that the fight we are in is not against a state or a government, but an idea, and ideas are not defeated with force or genocide, they are defeated with better ideas.

What "proof" would you require from this administration to act on Iran? It is generally accepted that they are working on nuclear weapons. The AHMADINEJAD has repeatedly promised the destruction of Israel and us and anybody that doesn't surrender to them. I'm going to steal some quotes from an AFC post in another thread:

Ok, first off surely you understand the difference in a political leader saying something to appease his more radical base. Ahmadinejad, to a point is appeasing the hardliners, now is he a hardliner himself? That remains to be seen, the problem is that the civilized world that we pretend to live in cannot prosecute a crime before the crime occurs, and to date Ahmadinejad has not struck with military force against Israel. And its debateable whether or not he is supplying the insurgents, and even if he is then how is that any different than what we did to Iran by funding Iraq, not to mention Afghanistan? Quite simply it is hypocritical to complain that someone actually stole a play from our playbook.

The guy is bad. He's telling you what his plans are just like Bin Laden did and Hiler did in Mein Kampf. He's wants to destroy Israel AND the US and "breathe in the brilliant time of Islamic sovereignty over today's world". To ignore it is only folly.

No one said ignore, but again we cannot prosecute before the crime, this is what we tried in Iraq, and look what that got us.

Because it is OUR state. Who else would you have do the job?

Hmmm, our track record is not so good with this sort of thing, what on earth makes any of us think that our result in Iran will be any better?

Then you believe in original sin and that all men are doomed to sin (except Jesus). From that then, conflict is almost enevitable.

Yes, but you see that by the Grace of God we are called to a better way, and in some ways, even imperfectly we can achieve. This is the hope that I and other Christians have. And although we need to in some ways accept that some people will always abuse the free will that God gave them, it cannot serve as an excuse for us to involve ourselves in their failures.

Again, though your waiting only allows the evil to gather forces, which CAUSES a higher level of violence to defeat them. Instead of signing the Munich agreement if the European powers would have invaded Germany and captured/killed Hitler, then there would have been much less death and destruction. Dealing w/ Iran now will be much less costly than dealing w/ a nuclear Iran.

Again, what you are calling for is to set aside that which sets us apart and that is the rule of law which forbids the prosecution of a crime before it is actually committed. Now, you may argue that "conspiring to committ terrorism" is prosecuted, but I will simply counter that "conspiring to commit terrorism" is itself against the law. However, building an army and talking tough to one's adversaries is not against the law, if it were Bush would be in the Hague.

What acts? Defending two internationally recognized goverments (Saudia Arabia and Kuwait) and cold war allies from Iraq and Saddam? Bin Laden was supporting the attacking, terrorizing, and killing people long before he turned his eyes to us by supporting the Taliban.

I addressed this at the top of the post, our involvement in the Middle East did not begin with Saddam invading Kuwait. Instead the seeds of Al Qaeda have been sown in the Middle East for the past 3 decades.

[TradeTheBeal!]

^^^A superb post.

[PeterMP]

Oh come on now you're playing coy, you know full well what US policies led to the rise of Bin Laden, something about funding Iraq in their war with Iran, something about using the Afghans a pawns in a chess match against the Russians and something about leaving the whole Middle East a bloody mess all the while supporting tyranical maniacs one minute and then the next calling them part of the "axis of evil". You want to know why they hate us, its because we use them like useless pawns, and then we act like flipping hypocrites about it when someone calls us out.

I've never heard Bin Laden say single thing about us and the Iraq/Iran war and we weren't acting from vengance in the Afghan/Sovient conflict.

Go back and read your post again. You tie the rise of Geramany in WWII to desire for vengence by the Europeans for WWI. You then link that to our current situation w/ Bin Laden. Your statement seems to think that we caused Bin Laden by acting out in vengence in some manner as some of the Europeans did after WWI.

I know exactly what the problem w/ Bin Laden. The question is do you.

Bin Laden initially was unhappy w/ us because we are infedels and we had troops in Saudi Arabia. There were two solutions to these problems:

1. To convert the whole US military to Islam.

2. To leave Kuwait in the hands of Saddam.

Those were the two choices. Any other action was going to anger Bin Laden.

Building an army is not the same as using an army, now sure there was a long series of appeasement with Hitler, but that is not reason enough to over-react and provoke a war with Iran in order to prevent them from possibly attaining nuclear weapons in the next 3 to 8 years (UN estimates). Do we really think that by toppling Iran we will some how magically make terrorism disappear? We must remember, that the fight we are in is not against a state or a government, but an idea, and ideas are not defeated with force or genocide, they are defeated with better ideas.

No, I don't think terrorism will go away if we defeat Iran, but this is no more a fight of ideas than WWII was a fight of ideas. The Nazis had ideas and control of the resources to carry them out. Radical Muslims have ideas and the control of the resources to carry them out. Take away those resources and their ability to spread those ideas and to carry out the actions that are the results of those ideas.

Ok, first off surely you understand the difference in a political leader saying something to appease his more radical base. Ahmadinejad, to a point is appeasing the hardliners, now is he a hardliner himself? That remains to be seen, the problem is that the civilized world that we pretend to live in cannot prosecute a crime before the crime occurs, and to date Ahmadinejad has not struck with military force against Israel. And its debateable whether or not he is supplying the insurgents, and even if he is then how is that any different than what we did to Iran by funding Iraq, not to mention Afghanistan? Quite simply it is hypocritical to complain that someone actually stole a play from our playbook.

It isn't different. The question is does the other country have the ability and desire to strike at you. The Iranians didn't have the ability to really strike at us during the Iraq/Iran conflict. With the Soviets, we had a history do doing that sort of thing and they doing it to us. Just like, we did not strike them for aiding Vietnam. Neither side had the desire to see the conflict widen. We have the ability to hit Iran. Now the question is do we have the desire. If the Iranians failed to take this into account, that isn't our fault.

No one said ignore, but again we cannot prosecute before the crime, this is what we tried in Iraq, and look what that got us.

Just because the execution of the policy has failed doesn't mean the idea was bad. There are several generals that said we would need several hundred thousand troops in Iraq before the war for the democratization. If you do the calculations based on area of the country of the size of the population for Iraq as compared to other successful democratization efforts, the number of troops you would calculate we would need is between 300K to 1,000,000 depending on whether you use population or area and which democratization you use. The fact that their was a decision in the Bush administration that this could be done w/ many fewer troops doesn't mean the over all idea is bad. It just means the Bush administration people were idiots and didn't take the proper steps to execute the idea.

Yes, but you see that by the Grace of God we are called to a better way, and in some ways, even imperfectly we can achieve. This is the hope that I and other Christians have. And although we need to in some ways accept that some people will always abuse the free will that God gave them, it cannot serve as an excuse for us to involve ourselves in their failures.

Yes, but my point is that their will be sin. That sin will have to be handled and unless you are completely against all war handleing that sin sometimes will result in other sins taking place.

Again, what you are calling for is to set aside that which sets us apart and that is the rule of law which forbids the prosecution of a crime before it is actually committed. Now, you may argue that "conspiring to committ terrorism" is prosecuted, but I will simply counter that "conspiring to commit terrorism" is itself against the law. However, building an army and talking tough to one's adversaries is not against the law, if it were Bush would be in the Hague.

What I am calling for is making people responsible for their words and actions.

Saying you are going to destroy the US, holding Americans prisioners (http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/05/25/nobellaureate.iran/index.html), and that you are going to bring in reign of Islam are things that shouldn't bring consequences (note consequneces does not need to be war at this time), but doing nothing will only ensure that he will continue to go down this road just as appeasement did w/ Hitler.

I addressed this at the top of the post, our involvement in the Middle East did not begin with Saddam invading Kuwait. Instead the seeds of Al Qaeda have been sown in the Middle East for the past 3 decades.

When Bin Laden discusses his grievences w/ us, he starts w/ our actions as a result of the Kuwait invasion.