Wasn’t a straw man argument Luc; there was no intention to draw your attention away to another issue. It just showed the flawed structure of your own argument. (Of course another leftist poster slobbered sarcastic praise for “Bomber” Harris, not caring this puts him in sympathy with Britain’s new fascists.)

The Afghan woman MP, whose interview you linked to, seems to be in a nihilistic corner, though I sympathise with her aspirations for Afghan women. If America and its Allies pull out, and the Taliban and the warlords rule, what hope is there for these women. The lady can see the problems, but offers no solution. What would you suggest to help her? Sending Keith Locke (who backed the Soviet occupation) and the Auckland lefties to run a big demo?

The way to win, as the British found a century and a half ago after three failed attempts at conquering, is to buy off the Afghan warlords. Much cheaper than fighting them. However, that means the light of hope will go out for millions of Afghan women, and for the Afghan parents who want a future for their kids.

Tell us how you would bring hope to the Afghan people, without reverting to the rule of warlords and the Taleban, who whipped women who showed their ankles, bulldozed walls on homosexuals, and used sports fields for executions (though they at least stopped warlords kidnapping boys for their male harems).

Luc, you don’t sound like someone who believes who can pray successfully for peace. So what is your bloody answer?

I completely agree with your assessment of the Petraeus strategy: the Russians tried that and failed. The comparison with Vietnam was always partially justified on the grounds that Afghanistan was always a graveyard for empires, and the antidote to that – massive troop presence – was and is unaffordable, financially and politically.

Yes, I will take my time, but I think it’s important to present the missing truth.

You ignorant clown. Iraq is more or less won, the Surge saw to that. Withdrawal is under way, started in the last year of Bush’s Presidency and continued to the letter by Obama (probably the only good thing he’s done this year).

If Afghanistan is lost, it will be due to Obama’s dithering vis-a-vis future Afghan strategy. Britain is not going to allow more of its soldiers to die to prop him up, especially when you consider the near-collapse of US-UK relations on Obama’s part. NATO as a whole is not going to do much further without a significant sign that the US is committed. The strategy I’ve heard that will be implemented (let the rural areas be taken over, hide in the cities and wait to die – Protected Hamlet Strategy v2.0) will not work. Such a tragedy. Such a frustrating waste of time. But then, what’s to be expected from the spectrum that compared Afghanistan to Vietnam a month after it started.

But I will post on that over the weekend.

Please, take your time.

The science is a theory

Theories are valid until proved wrong

The science of anthropogenic climate change has not been proven wrong, yet.

Well, we know it isn’t, so time for a different slogan. How about:-

The Science is Suspicious
The Science is Scurrilous
The Science is Stupid
The Science is Suspicious
The Science is Scam-worthy
.. or just ..
The Science isn’t

Don’t you watch Fox News?

O for Awesome!

Seriously now, in my humble opinion, the surge etc is just delaying the time when all those factions repressed under Saddam finally let loose, while the Yanks cower in their bases. It ain’t long to go.

The only way to do these wars effectively is to go in boots and all, let’s say in Iraq about 500,000 troops and put soldiers on every street corner, terrify and/or pay the general population to inform on the slightest dissent (or just get someone killed for parking in your spot) and, these days, put them on welfare.

Over time, this could be effective. But you seem to miss the point that the US has lost in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and it’s only a matter of time before they get driven out of both. It’s the price one pays for democracy – we like the idea of “good” wars, but not the bill!

And an example of really bizarre moral equivalency is that of comparing the democratic State of Israel to the terrorist organisation, Hamas. But I will post on that over the weekend.

It’s a shame you can’t do coherent posts with at least an appearance of considered reasoning – you present challenging views but are either unwilling or unable to back them up with even a semblance of evidence.

Are you an objectionable arsehole, or just a semi-elaborate piss take?

Just like how al-Sadr was glorified by the left, while they were trying to turn Iraq into another Vietnam. Thank fuck for the Surge and Awakenings.

should we also deploy suicide bombers? Oh, hang on, we don’t need to; we’ve got drones.

That war now is against the Taliban, a nationalist, religious fundamentalist movement which actually mirrors a large segment of the American population.

Congratulations. You’ve managed to take retarded moral equivilency to bizarre new heights of idiocy. I feel sorry for your kid.

me old mate

can you please do a chapter and verse on when Dyer has been wrong.

I agree he is wrong at times, but not that often so as to discredit him. Can you just do us all a favour and honour us with some evidence for your point of view?

I specifically said, did I not, that I approved Obama offering his sympathies to the families of the mass murderer? It’s a tragedy for them all. But there is no need to extrapolate to any other conflict and set up a straw man argument. Classic fallacious argumentation.

I’m not quite sure what to take out of your next paragraph, except that obviously the perpetrators of those attacks had an abiding hatred of western policies and actions somewhere. Westernophobic is not a bad way to express it, except that we do tend to fuel the phobia

No, suicide bombers do not kill bystanders. There are no bystanders in those attacks. Everybody is a target. And just because they do it, should we also deploy suicide bombers? Oh, hang on, we don’t need to; we’ve got drones.

As regards Al Qaeda, have you missed the briefing to Obama that Al Qaeda is all but destroyed in Afghanistan? Do you want to carry on killing thousand of civilians, people just like you and I, just in case we missed a few? And as it is a terrorist organisation it is not in need of a territorial base anyway, and can’t actually do a lot more damage because we have lifted our game in detecting these extremists.

That war now is against the Taliban, a nationalist, religious fundamentalist movement which actually mirrors a large segment of the American population. It cannot be destroyed because it is now the official resistance movement to western occupation. Even you and I would support it, in all likelihood, if we were Afghans.

Take a look at the transcript of an interview with a female Afghan MP

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/10/28/a_woman_among_warlords_afghan_democracy

I agree the golden rule is omnipresent, and not just amongst religions, depending on your dividing line between religion and philosophy, if there is one, but it is basically honoured in the breach (the modern, not the Shakespearean, sense).

Also, lest we forget, twenty years ago most mainstream journalists were on the side of communism.

Under your argument Luc, it was immoral for NZers to commiserate with families who lost sons in World War 2 in the RAF, because German civilians were dying under RAF bombs, too.

Bloody rubbish. Pacifists are the only people who can reasonable argue there is no moral war, yet they probably cannot survive or exist in a society which does not protect them with either moral war or the potential to make moral war (that is war of self-defence).

I bet you wouldn’t be talking Western-ophobe about the terrorist attacks on Manhattan and Washington or on the subways and buses of London.

And as for your indignation about drone bombs kill bystanders, dare you suggest that suicide bombers don’t kill bystanders?

The moral course for today’s Pacificists is to front up to Al Qaeda in the Khyber Pass region with hives and books on honey harvesting, and persuade the terrorists to become men of peace.

The relativist argument against any overarching moralityexisting is weak. Nearly every major religion has at base the golden rule – do unto others as you would have them do unto you.