Anybody else listening to W?

[POINTER94]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

I am sure you missed the numbers it is clear you didn't read my posts. They are there in dollars and in gallons and even maximum performance. You have offered zero, zip no data at all. Accusations, opinions and inuendo but facts are just not there.<br /><br />You don't want to support your position that is your perogative. But don't flash accusations about our soldiers, and end up at the end of the road that D1ck Durbin found. Soldiers fighting soldiers isn't murder. You clearly don't understand the nature and laws associated with war. Would you have felt better if we had used a flame thrower? How about granades or bombs? How about a good old machine gun? What a sad country we have become when putting underwear on a prisoner is considered torture. I sometimes wonder if we deserve the freedom we enjoy.<br /><br />I believe it is possible to make the arguement that things could have been done more efficiently or more effectively but that is the luxury of hindsight that those with the responsibility for the lives of our own troops just were not afforded. I don't stand and salute W for his decision, I salute our troops and the Iraqi people who by a vast majority are working to the solutions not the problems. Meanwhile there are some who want to give undue propoganda to those who would kill innocent civilians including children and declare them myrtars or worse yet freedom fighters. They are terrorists.<br /><br />And exactly how would, if all my post were incorrect would running away help. We all (President AND congress) were in agreement on this war. Fixing the blame for what some may see as slow progress serves anyone how?

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Out of this latest round of links you threw out, the only ones with any real-looking info was the CoE site and the USAID pdf, and both are suspect because of the source, and both still provided plenty of weasel room for comparing apples to oranges. Blogs aren't data. You said so yourself.<br /><br />I missed your oil numbers because I didn't read every word of what transpired here today while I was in town. My Humble apologies. You Still haven't even tried to touch my point about endless war. Not you, or anyone else here.<br /><br />"Soldiers fighting soldiers isn't murder."<br /><br />Soldiers beating prisoners to death who might not have ever even BEEN soldiers is murder. If you and the rest of the W supporters choose to deny the abuses that happened at Abu Ghraib, then you are really in no position to argue about the truth of anything. There are literally THOUSANDS of photos and videos out there of this, high level defense dept officials have admitted that it happened, the Red Cross documented it, soldiers have confessed and ratted each other out and a few have been CONVICTED and sent to prison and yet you sit here and say "Soldiers fighting soldiers isn't murder", as if you think that that is what I'm talking about.

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

"What a sad country we have become when putting underwear on a prisoner is considered torture. I sometimes wonder if we deserve the freedom we enjoy." <br /><br />Oh, how you would howl if this were being done to captive US troops! And you know that that is not even the worst of what went on there. And if one was truly open to the truth about torture, one could look up the research the CIA did on torture for decades and you would find that the most effective methods they found were sensory deprivation, painful positions maintained for hours and cultural offenses.<br /><br />"We all (President AND congress) were in agreement on this war. Fixing the blame for what some may see as slow progress serves anyone how?"<br /><br />Running away or fixing blame has never been my point. My point is one that no one wants to address, and I won't re-iterate here for you. If you are interested, maybe you should go back and re-read my posts. if you are not interested, I'm not surprised.

 

[rodbolt]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

pointer<br /> I read a lot of your links. the school one was particularly interesting as most were mud schools from apr 04 about a year after major combat ops had ceased. but reading the congressional report site it only references about 10 of aproximatly 115 planned schools as of july o5 just over 2 years past the end of major combat.<br /> like I said the govt sites are hard to navigate but ill take a report to congress over any UK or CNN site.<br />yes we are making progress sometimes rearward sometimes forward, however its been a boat load of cash and most the infastructure is still at prewar levels despite the amounts of raw taxpayer dollars being tossed. most the reports end with a summary that the reason it has not been accomplished is lack of security.<br />next is a lack of competative bidding process and lack of any oversight.<br />the report to congress states the electrical production is now about 4600MW slightly above prewar levels, the draw back is the average daily comsumption was just over 8000MW createing rolling blackouts so the residents were without power 22 out of 24 hours in the summer of o5 on an average.<br />schools tend to need that thar lectricity or maybe not.<br />I was hoping that school site you posted would show all 138 new schools or maybe 10 anyway.<br />in two months we will be at the 3 year mark of the end of major combat ops.<br />this site will eliminate all doubts as to when major ops actually started if you hunt a bit, pay special attention to the wounded.<br /><br /> http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32492.pdf <br /><br /> yes saddam was a mean evil rat basterd that gassed folks. can I ask you where he procured the gas, the deployment technology and the use of the weather data from ??<br /> to me thats as important and nasty as gassing.<br /> and we wont even start on the school of the americas,the graduates and what over half did and are doing, thats another topic.<br /> so I look at the numbers submitted to congress as a report. its about the best info I can get <br /> so yes I listen to W's speeches, I even listened to his ramblings on friday at johnson controls.<br /> he says a lot but not much has happened in 6 years.<br />more importantly 3 years after major combat operations were done.

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Rather than go back and edit previous posts, I'll just add a little note here. This whole business about all that happened at AG prison was a little underwear play is straight from the Rush Limbaugh playbook. I don't presume to know if you got it directly from him, but I heard it directly from him myself. <br /><br />It is so deeply offensive to hear otherwise intelligent people spew that crap that I can almost not even sit here typing this. What went on there was torture, murder and perversion of the highest order, on a scale that saddam would have been proud of. And yet so many Americans also seem proud of it, it makes me literally ill. We are doomed if this is the standard that we hold ourselves to.<br /><br />To paraphrase you: "What a sad country we have become when we can look at depraved and disgusting evidence of criminality and torture and shrug it off as if it were nothing."

 

[rodbolt]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

now the other part I dont understand.<br /> why, if we rebuild dams,power grids,water distribution systems and schools and such do the idiots come back and blow it up,sabotage it and loot the stuff?<br /> doesnt make sense to me other than to keep the whole system off balance.<br />but then you have the question of why keep it off balamce and who benifits?<br />thats when it gets fuzzy and makes no sense.

 

[POINTER94]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

The Corp of Engineers web site is not a blog. <br /><br />The NY Jewish Times is not a blog.<br /><br />The Power engineering international site is a trade journal not a blog<br /><br />The BBC is not a blog<br /><br />The NY Times is not a blog.<br /><br />The US Dept of State is not a blog.<br /><br />The Drezner site links its assertions to the SF Chronicle (not a blog) and the USA today (not a blog) .http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20030925/5532524s.htm<br /><br />The usaid site is a government site not a blog. <br /><br />Blog? What blog?

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

The only one I said was a blog was drezner. And it is a blog, one with an obvious bias evident in the first few sentences. One you would dismiss and laugh at if it were like that, but liberal. <br /><br />Th NY Times and the BBC would both be dismissed by you as liberal rot if i linked something from them that you disagreed with. The CoE sites provided some numbers but plenty of weasel room and not a complete picture. the NY jewish times article said nothing useful or important and provided no comparisons or analysis. the trade journal wasn't much better. the state dept is part of the problem and the USAID pdf provided a few numbers but not enough info to really say anything.

 

[POINTER94]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Isn't this telling to you:<br /><br />

the report to congress states the electrical production is now about 4600MW slightly above prewar levels, the draw back is the average daily comsumption was just over 8000MW createing rolling blackouts so the residents were without power 22 out of 24 hours in the summer of o5 on an average.<br />

Why would there be higher demand? People are using it. Things are happening. An economy is emerging. It also bears out my statement that power generation is greater than prior to our arrival. It is very difficult to build an infastructure with idiots wrapped in C4 running around. But it is happening. Maybe not as fast as you would like, but it is happening. Remember they trashed as much as they could before the armies retreated. I got a highway that they have been working on for the past few years and still isn't done. It isn't George Bush's fault.<br /><br />All of the sources provided would be acceptable at any graduate level course. If you don't like a site doesn't make it wrong. If you don't like the Dresner site you will see I posted the USA Today site that was the premise for his report. Acceptable as a source at any university. Just because you don't like what is said, doesn't make it wrong. Again accusations and inuendo about our troops. I had to produce facts, you again disparage our troops without any proof. Do I doubt that bad things might have occured, of course not, you see enough of your friends killed and a soldier or two or ten or twenty or fifty might do something stupid. Some people are just wired wrong, but to blame W is a neat trick. When it was brought to his attention it was stopped. When it was brought to the liberals attention, it was given to al-Jezeera and spawned even more violence. Who is accountable for that? War has adverse effects on people. But there was no systematic procedure to physically extract information or abuse prisoneers. When Bush asked for a specific definition of torture, to prevent just this type of issue, the left went ape. Typical but predictable.

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Not even worth continuing this discussion. Your dismissal and denial and excuse-making about the torture issue is just incomprehensible. The photos were on the cover of every paper in the world, and apparently that isn't a good enough source for you. And your dismissal comes complete with putting words in my mouth about blaming W. If you look you will see that I didn't. But now that you've brought it up, why yes, I believe he did condone it, by publicly proclaiming that those prisoners were not protected under geneva. That was a green light, in addition to whatever creepy **** was going around down below in the pentagon and CIA. <br /><br />As far as dismissing sources that you don't respect or agree with, you have done it on many occasions yourself, pointer.<br /><br />Good night. It's getting late out here in lefty land.

 

[POINTER94]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Gerber said his district is also charged with overseeing the contract to rehabilitate at least 276 existing schools in southern Iraq. The task is a formidable, but gratifying, one, said Valerie Schaffner, an energetic district project manager.<br /><br />+36 = 412 schools.<br /><br />Just read it. Its all in there.<br /><br />This is pointless as you just won't provide any substantiation for your assertions. I believe that our soldiers comport themselves in a professional, effective yet compassionate way. It is concerning to listen to those who would take the word of those we oppose over those who are providing an opportunity for freedom. It saddens me.

 

[Skinnywater]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

This was the latest GAO account Feb. 2006, in text form.<br /> http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d06428t.pdf <br />Seems a lot of the reports they rely on this past quarter were incomplete or not available.<br /><br />Here's the website with Iraq already typed, it'll keep you busy for a while.<br /> http://searching.gao.gov/query.html?st=1&charset=iso-8859-1&qt=Iraq <br /><br />Don't look at any of these reports to paint the picture you are Pointer.<br /><br />All these reports conclude over and over how nation building concurrent with warfare is ineffective. <br /> Simply put, we haven't been able to provide enough security for any of the infrastructure to be adequet or reliable.

 

[Skinnywater]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Gerber said his district is also charged with overseeing the contract to rehabilitate at least 276 existing schools in southern Iraq.

How many in the Suni triangle?Bagdhad?

 

[POINTER94]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

I don't know, this says it all for me.<br /><br />

The United States' goal is to help the Iraqi government develop a democratic, stable, and prosperous country, at peace with itself and its neighbors, a partner in the war against terrorism, enjoying the benefits of a free society and a market economy

But you are right, it does paint a dismal picture. It indicates a level of involvement that will require the Iraqi people to work together and commit to their own future.

 

[Skinnywater]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

The United States' goal is to help the Iraqi government develop a democratic, stable, and prosperous country, at peace with itself and its neighbors, a partner in the war against terrorism, enjoying the benefits of a free society and a market economy

A noble goal for sure, all we need now is a change in strategy to accomplish that.<br />The graph in that report clearly indicates that for past year our military hasn't been instructed to defeat the enemy back to even 2004 levels, and that sickens me.<br />Goodnite Pointer.

 

[POINTER94]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

G'Nite Skinny.

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

"It is concerning to listen to those who would take the word of those we oppose over those who are providing an opportunity for freedom. It saddens me."<br /><br />Photos and videos pointer. Confessions, government officials, red cross, all have documented that terrible abuses were committed by uniformed US soldiers. it saddens me that there are many Amercians willing to ignore and deny the evidence placed right in front of them. Abu Ghraib is old, well publicized news and I won't waste my time digging up links so that you can say they are fake or biased or otherwise flawed.<br /><br />You and the W supporters want to wage a war to wipe evil from the earth, yet you make excuses for the evil done in your name. Sad.

 

[QC]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

woodrat,<br /><br />Thanks, thought we should at least get this monstrosity to 200 . . .<br /><br />

Originally posted by woodrat:<br /> "As far as the original topic of this thread, ie W speaks, he very specifically said in the original campaign he would not use the military for "nation building" What happened to that???"

Tell me again how the Military is being used for Nation Building? Let's be clear here:<br /><br />1) We went to war due to a worldwide belief that Saddam had WMD, many bright people believe that he had at least some of what he thought he had and it was smuggled to Syria, but that is speculation. If he did, it is absolutely conceivable that they could find their way to people who would use them even more readily than Saddam himself. No nation building in that reason, right?<br /><br />2) So we get there, can't find 'em, but we are now just a little pregnant, right? So we do what we have done in most past conflicts. Try to leave the mess better than we found it.<br /><br />So if #2 is a result of #1, then it can be clearly argued that we are not using the Military for Nation Building except that we are already there. So we could take the moral low-ground and simply leave. Or we could take the moral high-round and help get these people on their feet after years of brutal dictatorship rule.<br /><br />I vote for the high-ground . . .

 

[QC]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

Originally posted by woodrat:<br /> You and the W supporters want to wage a war to wipe evil from the earth, yet you make excuses for the evil done in your name. Sad.

Who said that? I want our country protected from evil. If we get sucked into a fight while doing so, and we kill some evil doers while we are at it . . . Great!!! See previous post.

 

[woodrat]

Re: Anybody else listening to W?

"Who said that? I want our country protected from evil. If we get sucked into a fight while doing so, and we kill some evil doers while we are at it . . . Great!!! See previous post." <br /><br />I'm talking about abu ghraib. Torturing and murdering POWs is evil. Especially evil since many of the people imprisoned at AG were there as a result of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and were probably not even combatants. And pointer definitely brushed off the evil at AG as non-important. All I'm saying is that you can't wipe evil from the face of the earth, while doing evil and making excuses for it. is that so hard to understand? What a contortionist act!