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Very simply: Your sources are completely incorrect. Afghanistan produced a majority of the world's opium pre-war, up around 70%. After we toppled their previous government, we started working with them to phase out opium production, to prevent massive economic damage and help those farmers. The amount of opium produced by Afghani farmers has decreased by 60% in favor of food crops, like beans and wheat. These food crops go to feeding the people of their country, rather than to drug lords, and the quality of life for those farmers has increased drastically. The United States has thus far only paid money into the Afghani system to help them, and almost nothing has come back to the United States government. However, billions of dollars have been taken from the illegal drug industry.

Unlike many of the misinformed and ignorant I hear, I can provide government sites with information supporting my claims, if needed. Commercial sites are invalid evidence unless the website is particularly reputable. Any politically-aligned or private websites are invalid.

At 3/4/05 09:15 PM, night_watch_man18 wrote: They claimed they fired warning shots... uh huh... Suuuure they did. And even if they did, the people may not have known that it was the Americans who were firing, and then even if they knew it was the Americans firing, they would not necessarily know for what purpose (does a warning shot sound any different than one directed at an enemy militia?).

We know for a fact that they fired warning shots. According to witnesses, every attempt was made to warn them to slow down, and every attempt was made to avoid shooting at the car (which was going in excess of 70MPH). The last time a car was speeding at a checkpoint that fast and the soldiers did not fire at it, 7 soldiers died in the explosion. The American soldiers are NOT to blame, although all the anti-American bastards out there will blame them immediately (I can see a few of you in this thread). It is in fact the driver of the car who is to blame, since the Americans followed every protocol and made every attempt to warn them to slow down.

Yes, WW3 has already begun. However, you identified the combatants incorrectly. In WW3, we have "The First & Second Worlds" vs. "The Terrorists of the Third World & Whiners of the World".

Your words are no better than the defeatism. You say our properly elected leader does not match your politcal views, but then you automatically assume he is comparable to a dictator or genocidal ruler. This comparison is invalid, an obvious hyperbole, and no better that its defeatist counterpart.

While many people think our country is going to shit, it is only because they are looking in the wrong places and for the wrong things. You need to realize that our country is stable primarily because we have a mixed pot, and that means you won't always get your way. A majority of the country declared that Bush matched their political views the best and he has been officially declared our competent leader; regardless of the Drama Queen reactions of his opposition, he still remains a competent leader.

I believe at this point and with attitudes like those, the only role you will be playing in America's future is a negative, damaging one. The choice is yours. The game is set and the rules are defined already: you can choose to act as a positive force, or continue bitching at your protests and blogs and achieve nothing. Put simply, until you present a better, positive alternative, you will accomplish nothing and continue bitching. In reality, the problem is and will be you and your generation of bitching until you make the choice to effect positive change, rather than just complaining without offering an alternative.

Put simply, that's BS. In truth, post-2000 we have had one of the lowest inflation rates in history. Even just 30 years ago, a 10% inflation rate was "small." We have about 2% inflation now. Sure, in about 4 billion years our money will be worth next to nothing at this rate, but that is NOT soon. So don't fall for that crap.

At 2/27/05 09:18 AM, jesus_mcbumshove wrote: In my personal opinion i think the patriot act is just an easy way to throw divergent thinking individuals in jail without a fair trial.

Tell me, how many "divergent thinkers" have you seen jailed since the Patriot Act was instituted? Is Michael Moore in jail? Are those two news reports who made up a story about Bush going AWOL? Are any peaceful peace protestors in jail? The Patriot Act has not been used for removing "divergent thinkers," but it has helped capture or drivey away several dozen terrorists that I know of. So I'd say, yes, it has helped against terrorism.

You guys do know it would be really simple to pay back the entire debt in a single year with one action? If the US govt. decided to end all socialist programs (i.e. health, social security, medicare) for ONE year, then the ENTIRE debt would be paid back. (according to US budget for 2005).

The key problem with Marijuana and all other illegal drugs is the fact that they make you lose a sense of reality. When you lose reality you can't control yourself (like stopping for work) and your ability to judge time goes down the toilet. Marijuana isn't getting legalized.

"It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried."

-Winston Churchill

Captain Brick, if you listened you would hear information about North Korea. First of all, they have made the same claim six times in the past two years and they are trying to use it as a political bluff to force the US into a negotiation blackmail. Bush essentially responded, "Shut up with the blackmailing; we're going to have a talk about your behavior with Mommy China." Also, their weapons can only reach as far as Japan.

You can tell who you should never listen to by how fast they jump to conclusions. Bush says, "Never say never," and suddenly everyone assumes Bush is hell-bent on invading Iran. There are no such plans, and at the moment, any military actions will probably be fronted by the UN. Negotiations are still underway and the chances of war are very slim. Therefore, we are not going to war with Iran.

Affirmative action get a Nay vote from me. Equality is good, but AA is special rights, not equality.

You can't trust completely in the government. The reason is simple: the government is personified as a unified, coherent force, but in reality it is made up of thousands of humans and their interactions, and it takes a large amount of force to make a unified move in any direction; therefore, you can not completely trust these personified interactions to achieve what you believe needs done.

Summary: The govt. isn't a unified being, it's a bunch of things that you can't trust further than you do your computer.

Actually, North Korea has made this same declaration something that 10 times in the past 2 years. They are using it to try and make a political move to force the US into a blackmail type negotiation rather than a 6-way talk where China can actually force N. Korea to lay off. It does not matter if they have the weapons or not.

I should point out, you guys have no idea what the hell you are talking about for the most part. In actuality, very few people voted for Bush based on "moral values" itself, but rather because of issues related to moral values. For example, some issues that are undecidable without taking a morality stand are: abortion, gay marriage, and stem cell research. Hrmm, is it suprising that those are exactly what Bush took a moral stand on? Those issues have persisted for decades because no one wanted to take a moral stand on them; Bush did. He isn't imposing values on anyone. In fact, the belief that he is imposing his religious views on everyone was spawned by the disbelief of Kerry supporters that they lost and a desperate determination on their part to find out WHY people voted for Bush and then to destroy that reason, to make it a negative (so people are stupid instead of them being wrong). Bush isn't imposing anything about his religion on anyone, and you have to be gullible or ignorant to believe he is. And no, I will NOT put this in paragraph form.

Does it suprise anyone that Bush is now trying to push through half a dozen laws to fix this lawsuit mess? Lawyers have been taking advantage of the system by filing cases in counties where they know the judges and juries are generous or stupid. So now the govt. is going to stop them.

Actually, this whole discussion is moot. If this man is allowed to state his offensive opinion, those politicians better damn well better be allowed to state their opinion that he should be fired! According to all of you arguing in the man's favor, it violates his freedom of speech to try to remove him. But what you forget is that the governor was only stating his opinion that the man should be removed from teaching! You have argued yourself out of a side!

I think you have some terrible mislabeling here. Liberal is the wrong label for the Progressive groups. The current Liberal group is just as entrenched in tradition as the current Conservative group. Progressive groups are the ones who win out over time and which are gaining increasing influence in the world. Also, Conservative is technically the correct label, but with the wrong connotations for your meaning.

Put simply, this is not Liberal and Conservative (left and right wing), this is Progressive and Conservative (new and old). It is true the Progressive groups are slowly winning out, but Conservative ideals remain core to our society and the increasing progress from technology has actually forced people to revert to the conservative parts of life for stability.

Heh. This is something you see all the time (your comments and what she is saying). Lots of old(er) people often say, "Well I didn't have that in my day, and they don't darn well deserve to have it either!" But you are wrong. She is most likely from a middle class suburban or city family, and it is common in those areas for parents to require weekly tedious chores and in return the kids receive money. It is a good way to teach business ethics and money management when they have a limited supply. This event is most likely the equivalent of your boss saying, "You turned in this project a day late, so I am deducting $2,000 from your pay this month, even though you only earn $3,000 a month." So she is most likely justified, even though we do not know her exact situation to determine if she is truly justified.

This actually has nothing to do with freedom of speech. You are allowed to say just about anything, and he was allowed to say it. You notice they didn't ban his essay or try to wipe it out of existance? They are not attacking freedom of speech. What happened is that this teacher stepped into the political playground when he released that, and he is fair game. If other players in the political playground want him gone, they can try to get him gone. This is not about freedom of speech, it is about politics. So if he gets removed, it is his fault for making a political essay in the first place.

Actually, we just exited a shallow recession. Everything is heading up now and we have just about exited the recession. We are not even CLOSE to a depression. Oh yeah, and if you never noticed, that surplus was created by the .com bubble, which caused this recession in the first place (it was a false economic boom, which promptly popped when we realized what was happening).

I should also note that Social Security (which accounts for 21% of the nation's budget) is NOT being removed, only scaled down. Although, if it was removed we could actually pay back the entire national debt in two years. That's political suicide and would never pass, but it sure as hell would clean up the debt.

:Which media are you talking about?

That media. If you had thought to examine the rest of the site to determine how reliable they are, you would notice that they are an adament Anti-Conservative website, specializing in conspiracy theories, anti-war articles, and reputation assassination attempts aimed at prominent Conservative members. This is exactly what I am talking about. Bullshit numbers is all they need to make up a story to tell you their propaganda. Notice how they designated people Conservative or Liberal based on their opinion of the person?

Let me quote a few of these bullshit article's titles for you: "The Oh Really? Factor: Unspinning Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly" (Anti-Conservative); "The Emperor's New Hump" (conspiracy theory about Bush being wired during second debate); "USA Today Covers for Bush's Social Security Distortion"; "A Timely Scandal" (conspiracy theory about accusation revealing food-for-oil scandal). Does any of this bullshit raise an alarm in your head? Do you not see how obviously unreliable any news from this website is?

Translation: Everything agaisnt Bush is WRONG! STFU! STFU! STFU!

No, I'm saying, "conspiracy theories are usually wrong."

The terrorist groups that came there as a direct result of the American Declaration of War. Ironic isin't it? You bred more terrorists and gave Osama a new proporganda source. Way to fight them terrorists. This doesn't even count as a damn reason becasue it is a by-product of the war itself if it did indeed occur and becasue you have no proof whatsoever.

You make several mistakes here. First of all, the terrorists came "there" into Iraq when we declared war, but they were ALL "there" in the Middle East and never concentrated enough that we could fight them before. We bred very few new terrorists, much fewer than we are killing, and 90% of the terrorists are NOT Iraqis. I can get proof if you have a sensible argument, but there are too many idiots to call up my sources on all of them.

I'm guessing you have access to CLASSIFIED FBI/CIA documents do you? How do you know this is what happened?

Because they were declassified, dumbass, and released to the public via the news. You can then see these documents by asking the news personnel. THAT is how I know this is what happened. Or you could just ask one of the commanders in the Iraq area. I've also heard one of the generals involved describe it in the same manner.

Wooo! Way to go. Because the whole world wants democracy and capatalism.

Note: Forced democracy. That's kinda hypocrtical there don't you think? And why reverse your policy for one country? Usually when the USA goes into a country , they remove the democratically elected leader and replace him/her with a dictator. (Refer to Iran) So, why are you starting this trend now? Your PR people getting smart all of a sudden or something? Or maybe, you had to think of a new reason becasue the general public began to wonder what the hell we're doing down there anyway. And come to think it, since when did revolutions bring stability? (Refer to French, Russian, hell, anyone).

Idiot, it IS NOT forced democracy. If you didn't know it (due to extreme ignorance), the Iraqis do not have a government system just yet. They had democratic elections to determine what type of govt. they will have, but they do not have a "forced democracy." They will have whatever govt. they choose.

:: A) The USA is an ass that doesn't comply with world regulations. The UN would give it warnings if it wasn't busy asskissing it. And the USA refuses to acknoledge rules held by the international community placing it in the ranks of China and Iraq. So both countries are pretty damn similar. So if you endorse the same attitude as Iraq, why attack it? Seriously, a lot of dictators are "asses" and if your definition of ass is as follows then the USA is an "ass". So why attack Iraq? Among the dozens of dictatorships (most of them USA-endorse or created) why attack Iraq? Becasue Saddam is an ass? Sorry man. You need something I like to call "logic". You might want to check out Saudi Arabia too while you're at it.

And after all this talk about him being an ass, you only got yourselves to blame. Who gave Saddam his WMD? His funding? His power?

The UN hasn't been "asskissing." The members who didnt like the idea and the ones who did each had appropriate responses.
Also, we picked Saddam because he stuck his neck out. If you are going to make an example of an enemy, you get the one who sticks his neck out first. Saddam did that by being an active thorn in the side and threatening our safety. We know he would use WMD if he got them. We dont know that about any of the other countries who have them, because diplomacy is working so far with those people. Oh, and if you want to know who gave Saddam is WMD, maybe you should remember that NO ONE did. He gave himself power and funding. I have logic here: Saddam is equivalent to a man with a gun poking through his coat, threatening to mug us; so we went and kicked his ass. None of the others have been dumb enough to do that.

Uh...the USA's been bluffing about nukes too (they have real ones, but they serve no real purpose except for protection and a kick in the ass of any rogue country). See, its what we call a protective umbrella so no one invades you. A lot of countries do it. America, China, Isreal. Why do the have such massive stocks of atomic bombs? Becasue they want to intimidate their possible opponents. Which is exactly what Iraq was doing.

That's exactly what I said. But you should also note that Saddam did not like us and we did not like him; we didn't want a genocidal dictator to have that ability, because we couldnt afford a bluff. We knew for a fact he was funding terrorists and working with them, so we couldnt take the chance.

And a lot of people hate the US and want to attack it. LIKE OSAMA BIN LADEN. But hey, if you can't find him, maybe its becasue you've sent most of the troops to Iraq. Think about it.

Don't be stupid. Having 100 people search a tiny room for a fallen contact is even less effective than having 5 people search the room. We can only send so many troops to one area before they are just wasted.

1) You need the world (or at least the majority of it) to suffer to maintain your quality of life since it is so wasteful.

2) One America is enough. Seriously. If there were more the world would run out of ressources so fuckin fast.

3) Make it better? Wow. Good job so far. Besides, what Americans think is better doesn't nesscesarily jibe with the rest of the world.

And the entire point is that America as a whole will disagree with those statements.

Also, to the guy who said "Saddam is so far away he cant even do anything to us, so why did we attack?" I have one thing to say: Plane Attacks happened from "way over there" and nuclear bombs can, too. Don't think that distance will stop anyone who is determined.

Actually, the Greeks did accept homosexuals because they actually had an unusually high number of them. However, they didn't have marriage in the form we have now, so they couldn't "get married" in the same sense.

Also, the Roman Empire wasn't insanely Christian, you idiot. It was only in the last 40 years or so that they went all out Christian by the decree of one of the emperors. And in case you guys havent noticed, almost NO ONE has actually read in the Bible that gays are evil and listened to it. So stop blaming the bible for actual culutural trends and beliefs, and start realizing that many people are disgusted or offended by gay people.

From speaking to several homophobes and others who are anti-gay, I think I know why they are like that.

A. In general men are very disturbed by the thought of their best (male) friend considering sex with them; besides being against all the "societal rules" of brotherhood, it makes it impossible to be at ease with said person. So thus most men will be disturbed and ill at ease with gay males.

B. Many people are actually disgusted by gays. It is a disgusting perversion to some people, and it makes them sick to the stomach to even contemplate the sick actions involved in "gay love." Thus their digust with actions required for being gay makes them very ill at ease near gays.

These are the main two reasons for anti-gays. Religion and preachers and all that crap has nothing to do with it, but people may use it as a smoke screen rather than just saying, "You're disgusting." Also, one key thing people forget about gay marriage: You may view the ban on gay marriage as "keeping marriage from gay people," but many more people view it as "not giving gay people a special right that compromises the integrity of something dear and/or sacred (marriage)."

Oh how original. You say something completely unfounded and complete bullshit, and then you immediately disregard anything that proves you wrong. If you post the topic, don't stick your head in the sand and pretend no one is proving your post wrong and pointing out that your unfounded bias is, well, unfounded.

Wow, what a way to completely miss the point. I mean I've seen people do it badly but that was fucking spectacular. With such keen insight you should get a job as a trainer seller (trust me, they're fucking stupid.)

Wrong. I responded to the actual post, unlike the idiots above me who spent time insulting and no time responding. I replied to the post by arguing that the poster is wrong about the analogy and his obviously implied comment that the situation will go just as badly.

Several major differences should be noted.
A. We are fighting in completely opposite terrain.
B. We are not fighting enemies supported by a superpower.
C. We are not fighting enemies who have been fighting in guerrilla warfare for decades already and were experts in using their already-built guerrilla warfare system.
D. We are not fighting in an apathetic country.
E. We are creating the domino effect.
F. We are not fighting unified enemies.
G. We have better and more effective tactics and weapons.
H. Our enemies are mostly foreign to the country we are fighting in.

Similarities:
A. The media is doing its best to turn public opinion against the war and fuck over our chances to win by giving the enemies their support.
B. The hippies (or atleast the surviving ones) are protesting the war.
C. Dumbasses like you still look like idiots.

I'll give her a good court case, just give me her address and I'd scare the shit out of her for being such an ass. There is reason that new laws to throw out such cases automatically are going through the legislative process (they were mentioned in the State of the Union, also). That is absolutely insane. Didn't the dumbass think to OPEN THE DOOR? Perhaps the freakin cookie and notes would calm her down from her own paranoia. The lesson here is that assholes shouldnt be given cookies.

Ignorance, blind hate, conspiracy theories, and nonsense are all amusing when confined to their own little jail topic.

Why do you people think that it is physically impossible for Bush to be a normal human who is fairly intelligent, knows what he is doing, is not omnipotent, is not clairivoyant, follows a religion, and speaks the truth when asked. Why do you assume the President must be some God-like figure or else he is a moron?

I believe there is a number 5 that you forgot.

5. Bush has been completely honest about his reasons for asking us to go to war, but a large portion of the population is too poorly informed or too biased against him to aceept those reasons.

I support #5. We didn't go into Iraq because of links to Al Qaeda (FYI, it was Bush's opponents who said this, not Bush). We didn't go into Iraq solely for suspected WMDs. We didn't go into Iraq for oil.

We went in to. . .

a. Fight the terrorist groups who had fled from Afghanistan and were preparing for another major battle in Iraq. It is an indisputable fact now that Saddam was working with several dozen terrorist groups to set up a network of links and organize for a guerrilla war in Iraq. We know this because we "asked" the terrorists and they told us.

b. Start a revolution in the Middle East to (hopefully) remove most of the dictatorships, spread democracy, and stabilize the region. This would also serve to completely flush out the terrorists and remove any further threats involving WMDs, bombs, missiles, etc.

c. Remove Saddam, an ass who refused to comply with the world powers. We (UN) gave him ten years and atleast 14 warnings. He still refused to comply with the rules everyone else has to follow. The only UN country who did not give us a vote of confidence for attacking Saddam was France. If you didn't know, there has been a major investigation for the past 13 months now in the UN about the fact that many heads of countries, including France (the prime minister, his son, and several dozen major politicians), Russia, and China were being paid bribes in a massive scandal involving millions of dollars in the Food for Oil program. So it isn't suprising that France didn't give us a vote of confidence, but everyone else in the UN agreed that Saddam needed an ass-whooping.

d. Protect ourselves. We did not know what kind of threat Saddam was. We did know he hated us and wanted to attack us (from his own words). We also now know that he was also playing a trick on the world because he has been bluffing about having nuclear weapons for the past dozen years so that no one would invade him (note that before he began this bluff, Iraq was invaded by neighboring countries atleast three times, but after he began this bluff, no one invaded, not even the US until now). Also, according to the words of many of the main terrorist leaders, they wanted America to come fight them in Iraq and they would provoke us through any means necessary to get a bloody fight.

e. Change the world. It is a simple reason, but an undercurrent in most modern american desires (both politically and culturally). We want to change the world and make it better.

Those are the reasons I'll support. #5 all the way! I don't need your biased crap reasons, all of which essentially say, "Bush is an idiot," "Bush is a greedy bastard," and "Bush is a bastard liar."