America ranked as "most patriotic"

[The Persnickety Platypus]

When it comes to national pride, Americans are No. 1, according to a survey of 34 countries patriotism.

In a related story, The senate is closer than ever to passing a flag burning ban, which would join America with the ranks of Saudi Arabia, Afganistan, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and former Communist Cambodia as the only countries to ban flag desecration.

Now, I have never personally burned the American flag. But I'll tell you what, the day Congress bans it is the day I do.

Patriotism: how much is too much?

To gauge America's patriotism, I will compare our current administration/society to fascist Italy:

A large percentage of citizens with the physical inability to see any flaws in their nation's policy- Check

Centralization of authority under a dictator- We're getting there. I keep waiting for George to vye for an illicit third term.

Suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship- Flag burning ban

A policy of belligerent nationalism- Do you know what some people would do to me if I came out of the closet as being anti-American?

Corporate control over ecomony- Wal-Mart wages, Oil Companies supressing alternative energy industries and raking in record profits while the consumer suffers, single-source campaign contributer's deciding elections, tax breaks for the rich, overhaul of estate tax, ect.

Self-centered economic policies indifferent of other nation's needs- Definetly.

International attitude of arrogance and assertivness- No sh*t.

Invading foriegn countries simply power, influence, and economic assets- Iraq, Afganistan, soon to be Iran (in addition to the many secret wars and invasions that us normal folk may never know about)





Americans today are completely disconnected. I wish to delve deeper into this, but first, I'd like to hear your thoughts.

Is America too partriotic?
How much is too patriotic?

[Easyrider]

Iraq was, of course, being recalcitrant with regard to the U.N. demands. But the fact still remains that we had the resources to twist their arm further without armed conflict. All U.N. reports coming out of Iraq indicated that headway was being made, however slowly. As your little article indicates all too clearly, the ultimatum was not made by either Iraq or the U.N., but by the United States - they swept the diplomatic option pretty much off the table (deliberately?). We know that the neoconservative platform well before the eleventh of September, 2001 was to go to war with Iraq. So you can understand the decision to do so on Bush's behalf seems only a little convenient.

How many U.N. Resolutions did Saddam thumb his nose at us on? 18? You wanted 30? 50? 100? That's appeasement, pure and simple. And how many innocent Iraqi's would have been murdered and raped in the meantime by Saddam and his criminal sons? How many coalition airmen were you prepared to put at mortal risk?

The fact is that you're dealing with an evil man. He's not going to get better and the day would have come anyway when we would have had to take him out. Your way only postponed the inevitable.

But now he's out, the Iraqis have their own democratically elected government, and they're not a threat to their neighbors any longer.

Justice has been served!

[MagusYanam]

How many U.N. Resolutions did Saddam thumb his nose at us on? 18? You wanted 30? 50? 100? That's appeasement, pure and simple.

You weren't listening. The point was, we didn't even try to use more aggressive diplomatic measures. Bush played Chamberlain perfectly, up until the point where he played cowboy.

I'm guessing there was a better, more Christian way to handle the situation. The option was on the table; we could have provided the U.N. resolutions some teeth. Instead, the U.S. ended up thumbing its nose at the U.N., in spite of those who would have been our allies otherwise.

And how many innocent Iraqi's would have been murdered and raped in the meantime by Saddam and his criminal sons?

Fewer than the U.S. armed forces have murdered and raped and tortured already, that much can be assured. To be honest, I expected better from a civilised nation and U.S. actions in Haditha and elsewhere should be provoking outrage from concerned Americans.

The fact is that you're dealing with an evil man. He's not going to get better and the day would have come anyway when we would have had to take him out. Your way only postponed the inevitable.

Better that the inevitable have taken longer and cost less in lives and money.

But now he's out, the Iraqis have their own democratically elected government, and they're not a threat to their neighbors any longer.

Justice has been served!

If only the Iraqis and U.S. troops still had the luxury of such naivete. Oh well, at least one person is happy with the situation.

[ENIGMA]

Iraq was, of course, being recalcitrant with regard to the U.N. demands. But the fact still remains that we had the resources to twist their arm further without armed conflict. All U.N. reports coming out of Iraq indicated that headway was being made, however slowly. As your little article indicates all too clearly, the ultimatum was not made by either Iraq or the U.N., but by the United States - they swept the diplomatic option pretty much off the table (deliberately?). We know that the neoconservative platform well before the eleventh of September, 2001 was to go to war with Iraq. So you can understand the decision to do so on Bush's behalf seems only a little convenient.

How many U.N. Resolutions did Saddam thumb his nose at us on? 18? You wanted 30? 50? 100? That's appeasement, pure and simple.

A quick google search found that Israel has 50+ UN Security Council resolutions against their activities. Are we going to invade them next?

And how many innocent Iraqi's would have been murdered and raped in the meantime by Saddam and his criminal sons?

According to Christian theology, none. No such thing as an innocent Iraqi.

How many coalition airmen were you prepared to put at mortal risk?

Putting thousands of ground troops in mortal danger does not seem to be a viable solution to having hundreds (at most) airmen in mortal danger. A better question to ask is why those airmen are over there and do they really need to be.

The fact is that you're dealing with an evil man. He's not going to get better and the day would have come anyway when we would have had to take him out. Your way only postponed the inevitable.

We helped put Saddam into power when it was to our tactical advantage to do so. We could then wait until there is a tactical advantage to uninstalling him. No such advantage has occurred.

But now he's out, the Iraqis have their own democratically elected government, and they're not a threat to their neighbors any longer.

...and through the democratic process Iraq falls under Sharia law and a good section of it under the influence of Iran.

Have you ever considered that Iran having a somewhat threating neighbor next door might focus their attention a bit away from the evil infidels on the opposite side of the globe?

[Easyrider]

You weren't listening. The point was, we didn't even try to use more aggressive diplomatic measures. I'm guessing there was a better, more Christian way to handle the situation. The option was on the table; we could have provided the U.N. resolutions some teeth. Instead, the U.S. ended up thumbing its nose at the U.N., in spite of those who would have been our allies otherwise.

That's la la land stuff, or didn't you know that Russia and France, both of which were taking bribes from Saddam and both of which have veto power, would have never voted for anything with teeth? So you would be stuck at the U.N. with meaningless rhetoric until the cows came home, and you still are evidently unaware of that. Amazing!

Fewer than the U.S. armed forces have murdered and raped and tortured already, that much can be assured.

This kind of far left dysentary is only fit for the bottom of a bird cage.

[The Persnickety Platypus]

As you know, there was quite a debate back then on that. Yet quite a few noble Americans volunteered for service and combat in England, such as the Eagle Squadron of American and Canadian fighter pilots who flew combat missions with the British.

And what? That makes America special? Citizens from all over the world did the very same thing. The United States involvment in the war came exclusively from the need for us to save our own asses. It just came as a nice little addition that we happened to save everyone else in the process, which we have since used as leverage for every last one of our self-centered foreign agendas.

France (justly) criticizes us for starting a pre-emptive oil war? "Hey if it wasn't for us, you guys would be speaking German!"

Let's actually do something commendable before patting ourselves on the back.

I'll also remind you that the sort of appeasement and indecisiveness in dealing with evil that you addressed didn't work then, and it doesn't work now in dealing with people like Saddam Hussein and Iran building nukes. You can't condemn what the appeasers did at the start of World War II and now say the U.S. was wrong for going after Saddam & Company. Otherwise you haven't learned a thing from history.

The actions of Adolph Hitler (who HAD weapons, and WAS using them) demands a historical comparison with Saddam Hussain (who NEVER had weapons, and would be a complete idiot to use them)?

If we cared about what Saddam was doing, we would have bagged him in the early 90's when he gassed the Kurds, not when gas prices started to rise. Either that, or never have installed his regressive regime in the first place.

A serious review of American history (and world history) shows that freedom is seldom cheap or easy. To the contrary, it is extremely costly.

And Iraq (who has never in the entire history of humankind attacked America) presents a danger to this freedom?

If safeguarding freedom was the issue, we would be waging war with our own president, not some random corrupt leader accross the globe with a military only slightly more imposing than that of your local Boy Scout troup.

FDR underestimated the threat of the Nazis to them. But at least he didn't ignore it altogether, as the conservatives wanted to do.

Don't try and draw this between party lines. FDR is amoung my favorite presidents, don't get me wrong, but he certainly fed us his fair share of non-interventionist bull. He had secret American forces fighting in China as early as 39' (commendable, albiet not necessarily constitutional), but reassured the public at every turn that we would never get involved.

Re-election always comes before common morals; every politician's hidden philosophy, even amoung the best of them.

Nonsense. The ineptitude was in appeasing this lying mass murderer in the first place. Otherwise you would STILL be dealing with him and his evil regime. Conventional wisdom was to force him out before he could reconstitute his WMD's (of which we have now found some 500 WMD's laced with nerve agents.

But now he's out, the Iraqis have their own democratically elected government, and they're not a threat to their neighbors any longer.

Justice has been served!

No, you don't get it. The question (for me, at least) is not whether we should topple oppressive regimes like Saddam's. The question is a matter of priority.

A while back, Freedom House, an independent human rights group, compiled a list of the twenty most oppressive nations. The list reads as follows:

Burma
Cuba
Libya
North Korea
Saudi Arabia
Sudan
Syria
Turkmenistan
Belarus
Equatorial Guinea
Eritrea
Haiti
Laos
Somalia
Uzbekistan
Vietnam
Zimbabwe

Opps, guess who didn't make the list? That's right, Saddam's very own Iraq.

Curious, don't you think? In America's noble freedom raid, we seemed to have accidently skipped over a quite a few "axis of evil" hot spots. Many of these nations (North Korea, Sudan, Libya) have ACTUAL weapons of mass destruction that could rival even the most dire reports of Iraq's supposed (yet in reality non-existant) hoard. While we were menstruating over Iraq's imaginary stock-piles, Sudan was positively flaunting their extensive weapons of torture, murdering thousands of their own citizens right in the streets. Where were we?

Even more curiously, there are a number of coincoidences to consider. Amoung the previous list of nations, how many have oil? One, Saudi Arabia. Fortunately, they have continuously provided us with the lowest prices in the market, and in all, account for around 25% of all our foriegn oil imports.

But guess which (semi) oppressive nation has a particularly unstable oil supply, at a time when petroleum prices are at record highs? Yep, you guessed it.

We didn't care about Iraq's weapons. We don't care about the oppressed citizens. We invaded Iraq in order to stabalize the oil supply. Over two thousand American soldiers have now sacrificed their lives in order to save us a few cents at the pump. Proud? You sure as hell better be, because it is OUR DUTY AS GOOD AMERICAN PATRIOTS TO SUPPORT EACH AND EVERY CRIMINAL EXCURSION THE NOBLE GOVERNMENT SPENDS OUR HARD EARNED TAX MONEY ON!!!

It's all about priorities. As of now, we have spent over $293 BILLION dollars maintaining operations in Iraq. Know what we could have done with this money otherwise? In the time it takes you to find out, we will have spent enough money to buy every member on this forum a Corvette.




Iraq is the single worst allocation of resources Congress has ever permitted, and will stand for generations as the worst tactical maneuver ever endorsed by the United States government. Period.

(That is, unless you think that little extra percentage of marketable petroleum makes it all worthwhile)

[Easyrider]

Curious, don't you think? In America's noble freedom raid, we seemed to have accidently skipped over a quite a few "axis of evil" hot spots.

Liberals skip over them all the time. At least we hit a few now and then.

Many of these nations (North Korea, Sudan, Libya) have ACTUAL weapons of mass destruction that could rival even the most dire reports of Iraq's supposed (yet in reality non-existant) hoard. While we were menstruating over Iraq's imaginary stock-piles, Sudan was positively flaunting their extensive weapons of torture, murdering thousands of their own citizens right in the streets. Where were we?

This is great. Liberals playing like we should go to war. Then, when we do, they cry bloody murder. Gotta love it.

We didn't care about Iraq's weapons. We don't care about the oppressed citizens. We invaded Iraq in order to stabalize the oil supply.

If that were the case our oil wouldn't be $75 a barrel today. It's hardly stable, is it? Nice try.

Over two thousand American soldiers have now sacrificed their lives in order to save us a few cents at the pump. Proud?

Your thesis is bogus. Strawman.

As of now, we have spent over $293 BILLION dollars maintaining operations in Iraq. Know what we could have done with this money otherwise? In the time it takes you to find out, we will have spent enough money to buy every member on this forum a Corvette.

I wish I had my tax dollars back from Johnson's failed welfare state, and all the other failed programs you guys have pushed over the years. I'd have enough to buy two Corvettes. LOL!

[The Persnickety Platypus]

Liberals skip over them all the time. At least we hit a few now and then.

Not that I wouldn't love to trade baseless political insults with you, but I believe we were talking about the Iraq War.

If you don't have a counter-argument (and therefore must resort to pointless one liners), then don't respond.

This is great. Liberals playing like we should go to war. Then, when we do, they cry bloody murder. Gotta love it.

Don't want to hear me whine? Then attack the right country.

Anyway, war isn't really my thing. I find political/economic blackmail much more effective (assuming good old fashion diplomacy yeilds no results).

I wish I had my tax dollars back from Johnson's failed welfare state, and all the other failed programs you guys have pushed over the years. I'd have enough to buy two Corvettes. LOL!

Excuse me, but exactly when did we start discussing Johnson? Stop trying to change the subject. Either prove to me that the Iraq War was an ethical economic decision, or stop wasting my time.

If that were the case our oil wouldn't be $75 a barrel today. It's hardly stable, is it? Nice try.

Your going to have to look a bit deeper than that.


This is not just some off the wall conspiracy theory. The concept of an oil war is not a new one. In fact, the United States' last two major conflicts (the Iran-Iraq War and the Persian Gulf War) were almost exclusively over oil. Any politician from the time periods, being completely honest, will tell you the exact same.

In 1980 the US pressured Iraq to invade Iran. Friction between the two countries had recently spiked over the oil rich area of Khuzestan, who both countries claimed as their own. The US ended up endorsing Iraq in the massive nine year battle, supplying over $6 BILLION in aid. Why? Because the Carter administration was in bad relations with the new Iranian regime, which adversely effected our oil supply from Iran. I would also like to note that we exported a signifigant number of biological weapons to Iraq during this time. If they still have WMDs or advanced weapon technology, it's because we donated them.

Think I'm bullsh*ting you? The encyclopedia will tell you the very same thing. We have been using Saddam as a political tool ever since we installed him in power. We only decided that his regime was "brutal and regressive" when he stopped serving our purposes. Slimy stuff.

The second oil war- The Persian Gulf. When Iraq invaded Kuwait, it not only gave them control of all the southern oil fields, but also rendered them within close striking distance of Saudi Arabia's eastern fields. Saudi Arabia, as I have mentioned, has always provided the US with the lowest crude prices on the market. Consequently, we commanded a multilateral assault of Iraq, slaughtering many soldiers and citizens for sake of the prices at the pump. The Iraqi annexation of Kuwait, in addition to the forshadowed invasion of Arabia's eastern fields would have given Saddam control of half the world's oil. An oil war in it's purest.

Now, in light of all of this, you ask why I am suspicious of our intent in yet another Iraq war? Look at history. Look at the coincoidences I pointed out earlier. At least consider the scenario.

There are a number of long term reasons for stabalizing Iraq. You mentioned that oil prices are currently at record highs (aside from the crisis back 80'). But imagine how our supply from Iraq will change when (and if) they get their democracy rolling. I have no doubt that we will have troops in Iraq at least another 50 years (Korea, anyone?). Iraq will be our economic pawn, perhaps surpassing Arabia as our main oil exporter. In addition, our control of the reserves will keep it out of the hands of oil hungry China, who may be vying for superpower status in a few decades.

You won't see the changes right away. The government will wait a while before making any drastic moves, else risk uncovering their hypocrisy. The public will soon forget every supposed reason we went to war. Then watch the petroleum start pouring in...

[Cephus]

Now, I have never personally burned the American flag. But I'll tell you what, the day Congress bans it is the day I do.

Same here. In fact, I already own one for that purpose, I bought an extra the last time they went through this whole "Ban Flag Burning" nonsense and it sits ready to be set aflame the second they actually try to ban freedom of expression.

[Cephus]

A word of caution: I highly recommend, in the interest of the preservation of those who would want to burn our flag, that you don't do it in the presence of military veterans, especially war veterans. Though there may be a few vets who might support the right to burn an American flag, one's chances of not getting severerly pummeled in the act are not good. It is highly INCITEFUL.

Like I said, just a word of caution.....

A worthless one at best. In fact, when and if I ever do burn mine, I have a couple friends who are vets who want to help because at the point that the government infringes on the freedom of expression, the U.S. has stopped being something worth caring about and the flag no longer represents the country they fought for.

And, BTW, anyone who attacks for the act of burning a flag is going to prison for assault for a long, long time. It is illegal to assault someone, regardless of the provocation. But then again, I'm sure you're someone who figures women who wear short skirts deserve to get raped because they had it coming.

[juliod]

and will stand for generations as the worst tactical maneuver ever endorsed by the United States government. Period.

That's not true and I won't stand for these liberal lies.

The Iraq war will stand as the worst tactical decision of any nation and for millenia to come.

Historian van Creveld has already called it the most foolish war since 9 BC.

http://www.forward.com/articles/6936

Fair enough.

DanZ