3,058 Forum Posts by "lapis"
At 11/21/06 03:02 PM, LazyDrunk wrote: I say religion is being used as the mode of transportation for violent ideals. Religion itself doesn't go out and murder people. People murder people. Am I right on that account?
Yes. But you asked why religion shouldn't be blamed for the violence, which I answered.
With that said, should not the religion being pidgeonholed do everything within their power to correct the injustice and (apparently) inaccurate view that their religion is violent?
No, because the religion itself is incapable of doing so. The only ones who can do that are the adherents. They are two separate entities, and even though part of the religion might be up for interpretation there are core principles which the followers must seek to follow. If many or even all of the followers, or governments comprised of these followers, fail then the religion itself is free from blame, and since the killing of innocents is forbidden by the Qur'an, the foundation of Islam, it's not sensible to blame the problems of violence in the Middle East on religion.
Who said anything about justifying violence? I merely stated that religion is the catalyst for middle eastern war. Remove religion, and the violent aggressors have no more crutch to recruit new blood.
I doubt that. They could just as well turn to Nationalism or Communism and take those beliefs to the extreme. Let's not forget that radical Islam didn't surge until the seventies and that Palestinian resistance forces for example were mostly comprised of secular Nationalists (Fatah) or Socialists (PFLP) until the eighties.
Listen well. Religion is being used as the method of transport for violent ideals, and the leaders of the nations and religions 'coincidentally' linked to these acts aren't doing enough to stem the flow of those violent ideals.
True, but nearly every ideology could be used to transport violent ideals. Maybe I shouldn't refer to South Park but I remember them doing an episode recently in which religion was abolished and the atheists turned on each other over what to call themselves. It wouldn't make sense to blame this imaginary conflict on atheism itself.
Why did Iran hang a 17 year old boy and an 18 year old homosexual man? DId it have something to do with religion?
In contrast to terrorism and unprovoked violence, Islam and Christianity do lash out against gays. In this situation it's plausible that someone who was normally ambivalent about homosexuality attained a disapproving mindset because of the scriptures. In the case of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict the causes go a lot deeper, though.
At 11/21/06 02:08 PM, LazyDrunk wrote: PERFECT! I'm glad you brought this up.
"Are you muslim?"
No.
<head chop>
YEAH i REALLY WANT THESE PEOPLE PROPAGATING THEIR IDEALS.
Question: why didn't this happen to the Jews of Jerusalem, Tsfat and Tiberias prior to Zionism?
At 11/21/06 01:41 PM, LazyDrunk wrote: Uh, why?
Right now, blacks in the US are more prone, statistically, to commit homicide than whites. Does it make sense to blame the African race itself for this phenomenon?
Because that's what it all boils down to: can the violence be blamed on the race/religion itself or are their external factors such as local culture and economic position strongly correlated with the race/religion, distorting the apparent impact of the race/religion? I remember Muslims sheltering victims of the Christian vs Christian genocide in Rwanda, how is this possible when their religion is inherently violent? I remember Maronite Christians slaughtering 700-800 Muslims in the Sabar and Shatila refugee camps, how is this possible when their religion is inherently peaceful?
If both religions can be used to justify violence when the situation calls for it, then what's the point in emphasising the fact that Muslims are currently behind more violent acts when Muslims in Quwait, Qatar and Brunei hardly seem to be affected by the bloodlust of their religion, and when Christians have shown to be able to commit atrocities of the same level of inhumanity when local culture is comparably masculine and the situation is equally dire? If I'm a warmongering Christian I'll quote Luke 3:9, say that the tree which bring forth no good represents the infidel and that he must be treated analogously: he must be struck down so that he may no longer contaminate the earth with his heresy.
If I preach this in a wealthy, stable Christian country then I'll be considered a madman. When the country is torn by war or poverty, when the population is desperate and if I propose a solution that no other party manages to provide then I'll be hailed even if Jesus himself would have shivered. This is not Christianity's fault like al-Qaeda isn't Islam's fault per se: it's the fault of the violent preachers and those who adhere to them.
At 11/20/06 07:43 PM, troubles1 wrote: lapis I am not sure why you use this particular passage, to insult the Cristian faith?
Errm, I was comparing his action of linking to the exact same worthless webpage in two consecutive posts to a "cry of him that ruleth among fools" and I tried to imply that he'd be heard more if he posted wise words in quiet. I thought that since that webpage only mentioned (distorted) Qur'an quotes it would be befitting to use a Biblical quote in my response. I don't see how you could interpret it as an "insult to the Christian faith", but whatever.
At 11/20/06 05:10 AM, TwO-FaCeD-PaRaNoID wrote: @ Lapis I read the quran, and it seems like Medieval Catholicism to me. Is this a correct conclusion? The prologue was written by a Professor, and he stated that Muhammed picked up most of his idea's from Christians and jews in that region, he lived around 600 BC, which was the start of the dark ages in Europe.
Before Muhammad had his first vision he was a merchant who traveled to the North where he probably encountered Christians and there were many Jews living in and around Mecca. According to some Hadith his wife Khadija had a Christian cousin who explained Muhammad's revelation in the cave and said that he had been visited by the same angel who had spoken to Moses, Gabriel. What Muhammad taught was supposed to be an extension of the earlier scriptures, the main difference with contemporary Christians of course being the issue of equating a man with God.
At 11/19/06 08:10 PM, cellardoor6 wrote: Lapis didn't own anyone, he didn't prove that Islam isn't inherently violent, he just showed that Islam contradicts itself by providing verses that completely contradict other verses.
Correction: it seems contradictory to you because you fail to understand the whole. Individual verses seem violent if you aren't able to put them into context. Let's use the New Testament as an example. "But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me" (Luke 19:27). Totally contradicts everything Jesus seemed to stand for, doesn't it? No, because it's part of a parable. "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword", (Matthew 10:34). Totally contradictory? No, because it's a metaphor.
On a somewhat similar note, 9:5 (kill the unbelievers) doesn't contradict 32:30 (wait for the last day) and 73:10 (leave them with dignity) because it deals with some specific problems of that time. The war against Mecca that became imminent after the allies of the Meccan idol worshippers violated the Hudaybiyyah treaty and the movements of emperor Heraclius and his Ghassanid allies, who were poised to invade the lands controlled by the Muslims, prompted a violent Sura - since aggression had already been strictly forbidden in earlier Suras it was unnecessary to repeat it. And it never hurts to point out that the ensuing battles at Mecca and Tabouk ended up being bloodless.
Now, take away the actual teachings of Islam and just look at the predominant interpretations and sects of Islam.
"Taking away the actual teachings" would be a pretty dumb thing to do when determining whether or not the religion itself is inherently violent, wouldn't it? A lot of followers in the Middle East are overly violent, sure, but that's their fault and not the fault of the message. Islam says only to fight when attacked or persecuted and Somalian islamists icing an Italian nun because the Pope said something demeaning would have had nothing to do with Islam even if Benedict meant it the way they thought he did. And besides, I'm still convinced that most modern Christians are closer to Islam's teachings about justified violence than they are to the "turning the other cheek" and "keeping the sword in its sheath" as laid out in the New Testament and therefore share these "inherently violent" traits with observant Muslims.
Then try and say with a clean conscience that Islam isn't inherently violent.
Islam isn't inherently violent. Wow, that wasn't so hard.
At 11/19/06 04:46 PM, chocolate-penguin wrote: http://p4h.humanists.net/Islam%20peace/QuranP eace.html
Islam is so peaceful.
sarcasm
Oh, go fuck yourself furball. Here's a nice quote from Ecclesiastes for you:
"The words of wise men are heard in quiet more than the cry of him that ruleth among fools."
At 11/19/06 04:31 PM, Svoboda wrote: Here are a couple of quotes from the Quran : http://p4h.humanists.net/Islam%20peace/QuranP eace.html
It is very instructive about this supposed religion of peace and love.
Ugh, did you ever consider the option of actually reading the Qur'an before passing judgement? I know it sounds surreal, but it might be a better way to get to understand the religion rather than picking quotes from an atheist website. If you're too lazy for this and reject everything that isn't broken down into easily digestible chunks of text then you'll have a wonderful time with these:
Dealing with war:
Sura 2:190 - "You may fight in the cause of GOD against those who attack you, but do not aggress. GOD does not love the aggressors."
Sura 4:89-90 - "They (the hypocrites, those who fight Islam) wish that you disbelieve as they have disbelieved, then you become equal. Do not consider them friends, unless they mobilize along with you in the cause of GOD. If they turn against you, you shall fight them, and you may kill them when you encounter them in war. You shall not accept them as friends, or allies. Exempted are those who join people with whom you have signed a peace treaty, and those who come to you wishing not to fight you, nor fight their relatives. Had GOD willed, He could have permitted them to fight against you. Therefore, if they leave you alone, refrain from fighting you, and offer you peace, then GOD gives you no excuse to fight them."
8:59-61 - "Let not those who disbelieve think that they can get away with it; they can never escape. You shall prepare for them all the power you can muster, and all the equipment you can mobilize, that you may frighten the enemies of GOD, your enemies, as well as others who are not known to you; GOD knows them. Whatever you spend in the cause of GOD will be repaid to you generously, without the least injustice. If they resort to peace, so shall you, and put your trust in GOD. He is the Hearer, the Omniscient."
Dealing with Jews and Christians:
2:62 - "Surely, those who believe, those who are Jewish, the Christians, and the converts; anyone who (1) believes in GOD, and (2) believes in the Last Day, and (3) leads a righteous life, will receive their recompense from their Lord. They have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve."
3:113-144 - "They (the people of the book, mainly Jews and Christians) are not all the same; among the followers of the scripture, there are those who are righteous. They recite GOD's revelations through the night, and they fall prostrate. They believe in GOD and the Last Day, they advocate righteousness and forbid evil, and they hasten to do righteous works. These are the righteous."
Dealing with non-Muslims in general:
60:8-9 - "GOD does not enjoin you from befriending those who do not fight you because of religion, and do not evict you from your homes. You may befriend them and be equitable towards them. GOD loves the equitable. GOD enjoins you only from befriending those who fight you because of religion, evict you from your homes, and band together with others to banish you. You shall not befriend them. Those who befriend them are the transgressors."
These should put verses like 9:5 and 5:51 into context if you ever were to encounter them. Those who reject Islam as being a real religion, or do not believe in the oneness of God will burn in Hell according to the book, yes. Then again, I don't believe Judaism and modern Christianity teach otherwise when you replace the word "Islam" with their respective religion. I used this translation, others can be found here even though I doubt you'll actually use them.
Well, you should avoid quoting Wikipedia itself and only mention the sources they cite. For example, when you're doing a report on WMD in Iraq you shouldn't write "While various leftover weapons components from the 1980s and 1990s have also been found, most weapons inspectors do not now believe that the WMD program proceeded after the early 1990s" and say that you got it from Wikipedia. Instead, you should click on the [1] that's next to the quote and say: "While a small number of old, abandoned chemical munitions have been discovered, ISG judges that Iraq unilaterally destroyed its undeclared chemical weapons stockpile in 1991" and state that the Iraq Survey Group is the source.
Wikipedia is like a portal, it's great to find a multitude of external links on the subject but don't use it as your only source lest your debate opponents or the people grading your report dispute its validity.
I think the general attitude will change but I'm not sure about the impact it will have on those in power, there are a lot of interests at stake with powerful lobbyists arguing against drastic measures, especially in the US, and I don't think developing countries like China will pay that much attention to their environments in the near future. Then again, it's 50-100 years so anything could happen.
I'll take 6.
Daniel, 21, male
At 11/14/06 10:57 PM, gumOnShoe wrote: The point is, that we don't believe abortion is murder and telling us so is almost discrimitory against our beliefs.
I don't think this is a very good argument. If a certain pagan group doesn't believe that infant sacrifice really qualifies as being "murder" then it's not discriminatory to outlaw the practice. When a Christian thinks that abortion constitutes murder then he has the right to try to forbid others from doing it according to the same line of reasoning. I personally think that abortion (until a certain stage of development of the fetus) should be legal but in the end it's a majority issue and religious minorities shouldn't be exempt from regulations regarding life and death.
Darfurian rebels already receive some support, the SLM/A is backed by Eritrea and the JEM is said to have received support form Chad. I don't see moral objections against Wetsern nations supplying the rebels with arms since China is suppyling the Sudanese government with weapons but agreeing to aid a side in a conflict involves a commitment and this plan could easily backfire. If the violence doesn't stop, and I doubt that the Sudanese will easily be pushed into submission since they're hardly reliant on Western aid (if I'm not mistaken there's still a US trade embrago against them in place) and since they have Chinese support in the form of arms sales and oil exports, the West will be permanently mired in an unstable region and if the West pulls out their reputation will be tainted with the abandonment of another party they'd vowed to aid.
Now I'm all for putting as much diplomatic and economic pressure on Sudan as possible but I doubt that giving rebels military support serves anyone's interests. I'm not sure what the JEM and SLM/A will develop into and I hate the idea of supporting a future Taliban. This is primarily an African regional conflict and foreign incursions in these matters don't have the reputation of letting the prospects of the locals take a turn for the better.
At 11/12/06 11:47 PM, Techware wrote: I see you've completely skipped over my post about MSN, CNN, Yahoo, and pretty much every other sites saying it's very highly overexaggerative.
If they apparently use a figure that's 2.5 times as low as the Iraqi government's estimate then how credible are they? Besides, I remember CNN saying: "Professionals familiar with such research told CNN that the survey's methodology is sound."
For the serious criticism, go here: the general majority in the international statistical comunity agrees that the methodology is sound, "there has been a lot of support for the report's methods among the statistical community", but some called the results unreal (which anyone can do) and a few physicists have said that the more urban areas are oversampled. The IBC said that it would imply massive incompetence at hospitals, even though this result became a lot less grave when the Iraqi government raised their death toll estimate with a factor 2.5 and like I said, Iraq is a Muslim country were the dead are buried as soon as possible. One of the authors of the report also replied, it's in the bottom of the article.
So who am I going to believe? 1 death toll statistic that everyone else says is bullshit? Or am I going to go by what everyone else says?
I believe that's called sheep mentality.
Seems logicalical enough to me to go by the people who can get the most credible information, like, oh say... the Iraqi government?
Heh, and you accuse me of "skipping over parts of your post". Reread my other post again and reconsider your reply. The Iraqi government just raised their death toll estimate and the way they count is bound to underestimate the total death toll.
As if anyone can get an accurate representation.
Well, at least not by only taking morgues and hospitals into account. When bodies are hard to track down statistical methods are used, they used them in Sudan, Congo, in many epidemiological studies such as deaths related to smoking and these methods have proven their merit. This report is being villified simply because there are a lot of interests at stake, not because of the actual validity.
At 11/12/06 06:09 PM, reojionline wrote: As for the Hezbollah thingy if I remember they will keep attacking Israel until Jerusalem becomes Palestine capital city?
I think they attacked Israel because their internal position in Lebanon was deteriorating and they needed a popularity boost. I don't think they care that much about the Palestinians, relations weren't all that great between the PLO and the local Shi'ites during the Lebanese civil war. The Hezbollah needs the Palestinians to justify their aggression, that's about as far as their compassion goes, methinks.
Not just that they can kill any one who cause unrest among them (I think living in fear, constant treat and humiliation would be best describe unrest) don’t you think?
Well, that's debatable. 5:32 says that killing someone who spreads unrest or mischief is not as bad as killing an innocent but the Qur'an doesn't ordain the killing per se. I'd say violence is only permitted when the other party attacks you or drives you from your home, not simply because he's causing "unrest", which is a pretty relative term altogether.
At 11/12/06 05:34 PM, Techware wrote: So, don't listen to this this guy as he no idea what he's talking about when most sources (MSN, Yahoo, Fox) will record the iraqi death toll as around 40,000-60,000.
Pffft, even the Iraqi Health Ministry recently raised their death toll estimate to 100,000-150,000 and this figure is only based on tallies at morgues and hospitals. Muslims try to bury the deceased as soon as possible, "When a Muslim dies, he or she is washed, usually by a family member, wrapped in a clean white cloth, and buried with a simple prayer preferably the same day." "Muslims try to bury the dead person as fast as possible, within 24 hours.". Since they base their reports on tallies at hospitals and morgues, a step in the burial process that's likely to get skipped, rather than actual death certificates they're bound to underestimate the casualty figure. I'd also like you to elaborate on your statement of the Lancet study's estimate being "overexaggerated". Are your sources seriously criticising the study's methodology or are they discarding the results simply because they find them unpleasant? Because from what I've read the level of oversampling of violence-ridden regions appears to be pretty minimal, and estimates that are actually based on the amount of counted surplus deaths are a lot more credible than estimates which only take deaths that were registered at certain institutions or reported by the media into account.
Wow, seriously, this is undoubtably the best idea for a series of topics ever, but before you bestow another one of your congress threads upon this forum I think I have to inform you of the fact that these threads will probably survive as long as Mark Foley in an average federal ass-rape prison. Besides, I've got no fucking congress to attend. That's racist, man, and it's wrong. WRONG
At 11/11/06 09:19 AM, qygibo wrote: That argument is stupid because we do marriage laws based on consent. An animal can't really consent to much of anything.
I disagree, my goat always looks perfectly happy when we have intercourse. Besides, some of the more enlightened nations on this planet already recognise man-goat marriages (or "marages" according to the topic starter's lexicon), it's simply the next logical step.
At 11/8/06 10:26 PM, BanditByte wrote:At 11/8/06 09:42 PM, lapis wrote: You're both fucking retards for even considering the possibility of a war.I just love how you completely went over what I said "Europe never would or could declare war on the US."
The part of your post that followed that sentence was pretty redundant then, wasn't it? When you say "A would never happen, but if it would then yada yada" then you're still going along in the other guy's insipid hypothesis and yes, then you are considering the possibility.
At 11/8/06 09:29 PM, BanditByte wrote: If push comes to blow, and the US would win the conflict due to our sheer supremacy of the sea.
You're both fucking retards for even considering the possibility of a war. The level of economic entwinement is high enough by far to ensure that none of the two parties would ever benefit from a violent encounter. Plus, both "sides" have nukes. They would be extremely careful even if relations were to sour immensely. None of the two parties could ever conquer and hold up to 5% of the other party's territory, even if a war were to occur, which would never happen, so this whole discussion is downright stupid to begin with. There are possible and surreal "what-if"s, this one clearly falls into the latter category.
This was probably the lethal jab to his political throat:
However, US policy in Iraq has been heavily criticised in an editorial published in an influential military journal. The Army Times, Air Force Times, Navy Times and Marine Corps Times said Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, the architect of the Iraq campaign, had "lost credibility with the uniformed leadership". It urged President George W Bush to install a replacement at the Pentagon.
At 11/6/06 03:51 PM, JoS wrote: When you have limited resources you have to go after the most likely target or in othe rinstances protect the most likely target.
That's probably what the officials at Lod Airport thought in 1972. Terrorists will always try to send those who are the least conspicious, so if they can find a Western convert who's willing to blow himself up or a potential suicide bomber who somewhat looks like an Italian then they'll dress him up in a nice business suit and send him to carry out the assault rather than a dude with a turban and a large beard. Profiling seems statistically justifiable but it to some extent underestimates the guile of the terrorists and custom officials should also check the ones who seem the least likely to commit an act of terror, maybe they can check darker races a little more often but they can't afford to ignore the small but not completely nonexistent threat of white or East-Asian terrorists.
Well, we've never had a completely leftist government, they were all either entirely conservative/centrist or mixed. There are three major parties here: the Labour/social democratic party, the liberals (as in laissez-faire capitalist) and the Chistian democrats who nowadays mostly adhere to Republican Jesus except they don't really care about abortion or gay marriage.
When you say "on the left side" I'm not sure whether you mean economically or socially. Dutch governments have had reasonable budgets for the bigger part of the last six decades and whenever there was a surplus the liberals wanted to pay off parts of the national debt while Labour vowed to strengthen the social security net - the latter party especially achieved to do so under Drees (1951-1958) and Den Uyl (1973-1977), both of which headed a coalition with the Christian democrats or their precursors. There wasn't really any need to revert their actions (I think the Christian democratic party feared that they'd piss off their own electorate if they started cutting back on welfare) until recently; after the war the economy was rapidly recovering and people started to breed, giving rise to the Baby Boom generation which is now starting to retire in large numbers. This puts a lot of pressure on the social security net and some measures have become unsustainable.
The current liberal/Christian democratic cabinet, headed by Balkenende who fundamentally disagrees with the original Jesus on matters such as how to treat the poor, has been undoing the measures instituted by the social democratic governments of the past so the economic shift to the right originated when he was first elected into office over four years ago.
When it comes to personal liberties it's worth noting that even the most conservative parties are completely apathetic. When a bill legalising gay marriages and adoption was proposed everyone was like "okay" and few have complained since. I also don't think any influential politician has questioned the morality of abortion since the late eighties or so. The Christians do hamper the coming into effect of decent legislation regarding soft drugs (weed, shrooms, peyote) though, it's for example still officially illegal for establishments to sell soft drugs but it's being condoned under cerain restrictions, we've got a special word for it: "gedogen". When something is being "gedoogd" it means that it's technically legal but we don't call it "legal" because that would piss off the French and the Germans. The liberals and social democrats have tried to change this hypocrisy but the Christian justice minister, Donner, has ignored all complaints even though there was a majority in parliament which supported legalisation.
Regarding immigrants, there was a taboo of some kind in the past that rendered all criticism of the way they were integrating politcally incorrect and therefore intolerable. A Nationalist politician, Hans Janmaat, was forced to spend a few weeks in prison (although I believe this was reversed after he appealed to a higher court later on) for discrimination after having stated that he wanted to abolish the multicultural society, and for making statements such as "Own people first" and "Full is full". But people were noticing that migrant groups, especially the Moroccans and Antilleans, were misbehaving in a disproportional manner and they got fed up with the governmental inaction. At some point Pim Fortuyn, a political dark horse, arose and started to openly criticise the multicultural society. He had a particular dislike for Muslims, he called Islam a "backward culture" for example, but the people loved him and he would have done well in the 2002 elections were it not for the fact that a certain environmentalist strongly disagreed with him about the treatment of minks, resulting in Fortuyn being shot and killed.
His party did amazingly well in the elections though, partly due to the sympathy vote for Fortuyn's assassination, but his followers were mostly retards who had no political experience whatsoever. They formed a coalition with the liberals and the Christian democrats but that administration fell after about a month. In the resulting elections all parties shifted to the right in varying degrees, there are still a couple of parties which have adopted relatively harsh stances on immigration and integration, like the Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, but I don't think they'll be able to capitalise on it. Some may agree with them but they don't want the political right to end up splintered which would result in an electoral victory for Labour.
Anyway, I'm currently late for a dentist appointment so I'll stop writing. If you have any further questions I'll answer them later.
At 11/6/06 04:24 AM, cellardoor6 wrote: Most black civilizations are composed of tribes.
That's not an inherent genetic trait, that IS culture, tribal culture to be exact. The difference can best be illustrated by the example of adoption. When a white middle class family adopts a black baby boy then he shares his race (this might be a semantical issue, some only regard subgroups such as "Homo Sapiens" and "Homo Habilis" as distinctive human races rather than caucasoid, negroid and mongoloid) with Africans but not his cultural background, and I doubt they all start forming tribes when they've reached a certain age. From what I know from personal experience they tend to integrate with their parents' ethnicity. Besides, I don't think the Italian cultural trait of interfamiliary vendettas is any less related to "tribal culture" than Bloods and Crips killing each other and I also really doubt that the members of the Neapolitan Camorra are genetically closer to the average African American than they are to other Caucasians.
Look, humankind is still evolving and it's plausible that this has affected factors like neuron activity and testosterone levels which in turn might influence attributes such as intelligence and general disposition, and that the amount of influence varies to some degree between races. But tribes are a cultural phenomenon and they're a poor example of racial differences. If you want to make the case then look for genetic, biological reasons rather than sociological aspects, although no one has ever proven anything when it comes to purely racial differences as far as I know. It seems more likely that culture and socio-economic status strongly affect intelligence and the probability of getting in trouble with the law, and that, since these factors are strongly correlated with race, the individual influence of a person's genetic make-up seems bigger than it truly is.
At 11/5/06 05:58 PM, Grammer wrote:2. republicans say - terrorists want democrats to win.No they don't. (...) No one's saying that,
Well, Cheney did. He said that the insurgents were increasing the frequency and gravity of their attacks in order to influence the US mid-term elections and since I don't think he meant that the insurgents were thereby trying to garner support for the Republicans I assume he meant that the terrorists want the Democrats, or maybe independent candidates to win, either because they perceive the Democrats or independents as being soft on terror or because they want the President's party to lose control over Congress or the Senate.
At 11/5/06 02:38 PM, notld224 wrote: ur name is communist 1... ok, i'm a liberal myself. But contrary to popular belief we DON'T (or at least I don't) enjoy being represented by crappy grammer
Those who write "ur" instead of "your" have no right to complain about the grammar of others.
Anyways.. i'm a hybridist II (my own economical theory)
I just had Ben Bernanke on the phone, he said he'd be honoured to learn about the finer details of your theory. He's always interested in the academic findings of Newgrounds-dwelling 14-year-olds but he seemed particularly excited about "Hybridism II" or whatever the fuck it's called.
At 10/26/06 01:31 PM, Lidov wrote: Yeah, he claims that he is against the transfer, but I don't really believe him.
Heh, well you were right, I guess. If he indeed ever claimed that he was against forced transfers then he totally redeemed himself.
"Minorities are the biggest problem in the world"
-Avigdor Lieberman
I think most Sunni insurgents have already gotten over him so I doubt that his execution will have any effect on the unrest, apart from a few demonstrations in Tikrit perhaps. Hanging him at least guarantees that he won't make a reappearance in Iraqi politics no matter what happens in the future, other than that I see no current reasons as to why the death sentence is more fitting than mere imprisonment - considering that there has already been a lengthy trial. I still think the Iraqis should have given him the same treatment as the Romanians gave Ceausescu when his regime was toppled, this trial was needless and carries the stigma of a farce anyway.
At 11/3/06 06:45 PM, cellardoor6 wrote: But as long as US forces are allowed to keep fighting, they just don't lose because of their overwhelming superiority in every aspect that is fueled by our large military expenditures.
Right, and the insurgents also don't lose as a long as they maintain a reasonable number of sympathisers. The attacks on occupying troops caused by the guerilla warfare usually provoke more stringent security measures and retaliatory strikes that inevitably result in civilian suffering, which only fuels more hatred and support for the guerilleros. Look at Algeria, Chechnya, Vietnam, Gaza. A good way to quell an insurgency has yet to be invented. Sure, the only thing that insurgents cause is fatigue, they'll never beat the occupying troops in a classical military fashion. But it's the home front of the occupying power that might start to question the necessity of the violence since they have a lot less reasons to support upholding a status quo of continued losses in a hostile environment, where support for the occupying power lowers day by day, than the foreign locals who are duped by the violence and are prone to support their own countrymen over those partaking in a foreign incursion. And the larger the distance between the home of the occupying power and the stage of the insurgency, the more susceptible the home front is to doubts about the benefits of the war.
You only win a war against guerilleros by taking away their base of support and foreign powers always have the odds against them. If the occupying forces remain to receive domestic support they can keep their positions but the strength of guerilla warfare is exhaustion. The insurgents make the public weary with little pinches, one at a time, until the war becomes so unpopular or costly that the authorities are forced to pull out or the unrest simply stays forever. Gutta cavat lapidem, non vi sed saepe cadendo. Water hollows the stone, not by force but through constant dripping.
I swear I'd vote for Peter R de Vries if he were running, but he isn't so that option is off the table. But I do know that I'd hate to see the CDA in the next cabinet (even though it's probably inevitable) with that rat Verhagen, that corrupt bastard Veerman, that archaic prick Donner (God forbid he rejoins the next cabinet, he'd better have stepped down for good) and Balkenende who seems to be going out of his way to look like a servile cur in international affairs. Since Mark Rutte, who's still competing for the dubious honour of being the archenemy of the Dutch student with the CDA, has already announced that he only wants a coalition with the CDA he loses my vote by default and voting for D66 is just like not voting at all.
The SP in a coalition will be rampant for the economy, I don't care enough for the environment to vote for GroenLinks and I don't think I agree with the ChristenUnie on most moral issues so I'll probably be voting for the PvdA this election. Last time Cohen would have been Prime Minister in the event of a PvdA electoral victory and I'd be a lot more comfortable with voting PvdA if he were heading the party in the elections, but alas, I'll be voting for anyone who isn't Wouter Bos, probably Nebahat Albayrak or Bert Koenders. In the least bad scenario a new Paars will be established with Wouter Bos *spits on the ground* as the new Prime Minister, the VVD and either D66, ChristenUnie or GroenLinks as a third party, or possibly even two of those. But this is of course a pretty forlorn dream and the CDA and the VVD will form the main body of the next cabinet with some insignificant party like D66 to vote along with them.
And I sure as hell hope Wilders' party doesn't get a lot of seats in parliament.
At 10/31/06 10:51 PM, Metaleks wrote: Thank you for that post Lapis. Very informative =D
No problem.
What I know of Muhommed was that he was a "war prophet". I would rather not get into that though. Anywho, did I take the quotes out of context?
Well, yeah. If someone only reads those two quotes then he might think that Muslims are commanded by the Qur'an to slay all unbelievers - which isn't true. The Qur'an only justifies retaliatory violence, 8:61 for example clearly states that when the other party inclines to peace the believer is ordained by the Qur'an to do likewise. So they were out of context.
