In your mind. In their mind they have the high moral ground. But even
if the US does have it momentarily, how long will it keep it at the
present rate? If you're really interested in moral ground, you'll be
deploring the torure of prisoners as vehemently as I do.


I don't like the torture, but we are in no danger of losing the
moral high ground when we are fighting those that hijack airplanes,
cuase skyscrapers to come crashing to the ground, hold children
nostages in their schools, shoot children in the back, and behead civilians.

I don't see any moral outrage from the libs, each time
another dispicable act occurs. That's because I don't think
there is any moral outrage against terrorism, from the left.
All I see is complaints about prisoner abuse.

One thing doesn't negate the other. I'm sickened by what the
terrorists have done. No sane person could be other than outraged by
what happened in Russia. And as for beheading prisoners, I have no
words. Even as I write this I'm watching one of the US prisoners
crying and begging for his life. It's inhuman and evil. But does it
justify the torture of prisoners? Hardly.

paul packer wrote:
In your mind. In their mind they have the high moral ground. But even
if the US does have it momentarily, how long will it keep it at the
present rate? If you're really interested in moral ground, you'll be
deploring the torure of prisoners as vehemently as I do.


I don't like the torture, but we are in no danger of losing the
moral high ground when we are fighting those that hijack airplanes,
cuase skyscrapers to come crashing to the ground, hold children
nostages in their schools, shoot children in the back, and behead civilians.

I don't see any moral outrage from the libs, each time
another dispicable act occurs. That's because I don't think
there is any moral outrage against terrorism, from the left.
All I see is complaints about prisoner abuse.


One thing doesn't negate the other. I'm sickened by what the
terrorists have done. No sane person could be other than outraged by
what happened in Russia. And as for beheading prisoners, I have no
words. Even as I write this I'm watching one of the US prisoners
crying and begging for his life. It's inhuman and evil. But does it
justify the torture of prisoners? Hardly.

He has already said that all the tortured prisonners were terrorists (an
Arab doesn't need any judgment to be declared terrorist), so why are you
insisting now ?

"paul packer" wrote in message
...

In your mind. In their mind they have the high moral ground. But even
if the US does have it momentarily, how long will it keep it at the
present rate? If you're really interested in moral ground, you'll be
deploring the torure of prisoners as vehemently as I do.


I don't like the torture, but we are in no danger of losing the
moral high ground when we are fighting those that hijack airplanes,
cuase skyscrapers to come crashing to the ground, hold children
nostages in their schools, shoot children in the back, and behead
civilians.

I don't see any moral outrage from the libs, each time
another dispicable act occurs. That's because I don't think
there is any moral outrage against terrorism, from the left.
All I see is complaints about prisoner abuse.

One thing doesn't negate the other. I'm sickened by what the
terrorists have done. No sane person could be other than outraged by
what happened in Russia. And as for beheading prisoners, I have no
words. Even as I write this I'm watching one of the US prisoners
crying and begging for his life. It's inhuman and evil. But does it
justify the torture of prisoners? Hardly.


But does the torture of prisoners justify ****canning the
war against the evil monster terrorists? That's the
problem I am having here. Very few people, you being excepted,
are talking at all about these monstrous acts of terrorism.
The complaining is just a venting of hatred toward America, and is
presented as an obstruction to the war on terror. The torture is
all people want to talk about. It doesn't represent
one tenth of one percent of the inhumanity of the
Islamist terrorism.

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:23:51 +0100, The Devil wrote:

redneck

He's not really a redneck, he just pretends to be one to get some
votes from working-class and lower-middle class people resentful of
the wealthy and northeastern urban upper middle-class culture (the
wealthy can't elect a president alone). He went to Andover, Yale and
Harvard, is a third-generation Yale legacy, was a member of Skull and
Bones, Yale's most elite secret society, is the son of a UN ambassador
and congressman, and is a millionaire. He can more accurately be
described as a scion. Moreover, his policies really redound to the
economic benefit of the rich and large corporations, not rednecks.
This kind of faux populism really goes back to William Henry Harrison:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/wh9.html

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:23:51 +0100, The Devil wrote:
That Jesus-loving, brain-dead, redneck,
coked-out, chicken-neck bat-brain

Don't be shy. Tell us what you really think.

Paul Packer wrote:


On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:23:51 +0100, The Devil wrote:
That Jesus-loving, brain-dead, redneck,
coked-out, chicken-neck bat-brain

Don't be shy. Tell us what you really think.








And those are Bush's *better* qualities. You don't want to know about his
other problems. It's scary to think that this dumbass, who can't say "nuclear"
properly, has his finger on the red button.


Bruce J. Richman

Bruce J. Richman wrote:
Paul Packer wrote:



On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 13:23:51 +0100, The Devil wrote:

That Jesus-loving, brain-dead, redneck,
coked-out, chicken-neck bat-brain

Don't be shy. Tell us what you really think.









And those are Bush's *better* qualities. You don't want to know about his
other problems. It's scary to think that this dumbass, who can't say "nuclear"
properly, has his finger on the red button.

Note that not later than today Richman have implicitly supported
Sackman's statement : "Abu Ghraib prisonners are terrorists".

This is the Richman's common double-discourse.

Bruce J. Richman
Limited Psychologist

And those are Bush's *better* qualities. You don't want to know about his
other problems. It's scary to think that this dumbass, who can't say "nuclear"
properly, has his finger on the red button.


It's not whether he can say it, but whether he understands what it
means.

Paul Packer wrote:


And those are Bush's *better* qualities. You don't want to know about his
other problems. It's scary to think that this dumbass, who can't say
"nuclear"
properly, has his finger on the red button.


It's not whether he can say it, but whether he understands what it
means.








I doubt that he understands much of anything when it comes to military
operations.



Bruce J. Richman

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:55:43 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

A lie would mean he knew there were no WMD.

That would have been one kind of lie. Another kind of lie would have
been to say there were WMD when he did not know there were.

"Jacob Kramer" wrote in message
news
On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:55:43 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

A lie would mean he knew there were no WMD.

That would have been one kind of lie. Another kind of lie would have
been to say there were WMD when he did not know there were.

Every indication was that they had them, every intelligence service in the
western world said they had them. Were they all telling a lie? There were
things unaccounted for from the first Gulf War.

In article t,
"Michael McKelvy" wrote:

"Jacob Kramer" wrote in message
news
On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:55:43 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

A lie would mean he knew there were no WMD.

That would have been one kind of lie. Another kind of lie would have
been to say there were WMD when he did not know there were.

Every indication was that they had them, every intelligence service in the
western world said they had them. Were they all telling a lie? There were
things unaccounted for from the first Gulf War.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/06/05/sprj.irq.blix.report/'

Obligatory audio reference: does anyone know how to program the presets
on my Magnum Dynalab FT-11?

Stephen

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:55:43 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

Why is it that the left keeps on telling the lie about WMD. Bush did not
lie about them, the intel was either wrong or they were removed from the
country. A lie would mean he knew there were no WMD and that is simply not
the case.

That would have been one kind of lie. Another kind would have been to
say there were WMD when he didn't know if there were.

"Jacob Kramer" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 19:55:43 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

Why is it that the left keeps on telling the lie about WMD. Bush did not
lie about them, the intel was either wrong or they were removed from the
country. A lie would mean he knew there were no WMD and that is simply
not
the case.

That would have been one kind of lie. Another kind would have been to
say there were WMD when he didn't know if there were.


How many different ****ing ways does it have to be said, everybody, every
government in the western world said he had them, defectors said he had
them. Since we've gone there we've found he was planning on getting more.

3 Separate investigations have cleared Bush on this issue and said there was
no fudging of intel, it was simply bad intel. There was no attempt to
deceive.

"The Devil" wrote in message
news:h3ral01f2mnisrqr1f3vu8l1snljcqpgbt@rdmzrnewst xt.nz...
On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 17:49:37 -0400, "Clyde Slick"
wrote:

They like to live the twelfth century lifestyle.

Is it so hard to accept that some people might not at all be enticed
by our corporate democracy?


Sure, Sharia is a much better choice.

On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 10:24:45 -0400, George M. Middius
wrote:

As you well know, Saddam's cruel despotism was always a subtext. Bush
may not have stressed it directly in his speeches, but the point was
made indirectly. I think even 60 Minutes did a story on the barbarism of
Saddam and his monstrous sons.

I just think there were so many good reasons to go in it was
irresistable. To finish a job started in '91. To take revenge for
Saddam supposedly trying to assasinate Bush Snr. To get rid of a
ruthless tyrant and his unspeakably sadistic sons and liberate 20 odd
millions people. To establish a democracy in the region that might act
as a bulwark against the radicalism of Iran etc and be a model for
western culture. Hell, it's sounding like such a good idea I'm
surprised they didn't go sooner! Pity they've buggered it up.

On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 09:42:25 -0400, George M. Middius
wrote:

Then there's the one about all governments necessarily being awful, but
democracy is the least awful. Not sure who said that, maybe Churchill? He
was certainly no ostrich type.

Isn't that chiselled over the entrance to the US Senate House or
somewhere? But I think the attribution goes back to long before
Churchill. (Actually I think it's something more like, "All forms of
government are imperfect, but Democracy is the least imperfect").

On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 08:48:18 -0400, George M. Middius
wrote:



paul packer said:

Part of the problem may be that what Muslem Arabs see pouring out of
democratic societies isn't particularly attractive to them. I'm
talking of course about films, TV shows, rock music etc full of
swearing, sex, violence...you get my drift. If you wonder why the
Arabs call US 'the great Satan' and shy off democracy you might start
there.

Sad to say, this is true to some extent. People in other countries who see
our escapist TV shows -- but not documentaries -- can misinterpret both
the shows and what it's like to live in America. They sometimes mistake
escapist fantasy for idealization.

I recall that during the time in the 80s when a lot of westerners were
being abducted and held around the Beirut area, one reported after his
release that a captor had removed one of his teeth with a pair of
pliers because he believed it contained a miniature
transmitter--something he'd seen in a James Bond movie and which he
seriously tought was typical of western practise--that is, many
westerners carried miniature transmitters in their teeth. I don't
think we're wrong to assume that much of what is portrayed in western
entertainment is taken quite literally in other countries by less
sophisticated viewers.


Swallowing their own governments' propaganda is a different issue, isn't
it? Many Americans are all too willing to eat up Bush's jingoism, and we
easy access to as much information as any citizenry. It's all too easy to
blame domestic problems on a far-away enemy.

There's another problem: that of being too cynical of what the
government says and rejecting all of it, which is as silly as
accepting all of it. People like Michael Moore believe they have a
monopoly on the truth, but there's as much untruth in Moore's latest
film (documented on several websites) as in most Bush speeches. If one
is going to be skeptical, one needs to be skeptical of both sides.

On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 23:03:14 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

Part of the problem may be that what Muslem Arabs see pouring out of
democratic societies isn't particularly attractive to them. I'm
talking of course about films, TV shows, rock music etc full of
swearing, sex, violence...you get my drift. If you wonder why the
Arabs call US 'the great Satan' and shy off democracy you might start
there.

But there are ultra conservative Christians who are just as disgusted by
such things and manage to keep their souls intact.

Well, I'm not ultra-conservative by any means though I'm certainly a
believer and I'm disgusted by much of what I see on TV and at the
movies. And I've talked with many people who aren't religious at all
who are equally disgusted. It's a mistake to assume that everyone
who's offended by all this stuff is offended on religious grounds.
Many people just have higher standards, or prefer beauty to ugliness,
or an uplifting story to a dark, depressing one. Not so difficult to
understand, surely.


There are also varying degrees of Muslims, not all of whom are as
conservative as say the Taliban. It's the same story as with our
conservative Christians, they don't want to allow their people to have
access to the same stimuli. They want THEIR view to be the only view of the
world, forgetting that is because of the multiplicity of cultural influences
that we get the kind of prosperity that exists here.

Maybe Christians don't want their children to have access to certain
stimuli because they believe it damaging, not because they want their
view to be the only view. Yes, a multiplicity of cultural influences
is good, but why does that have to include the unremitting negativity
of so much contemporary entertainment? None of this was (generally)
available years ago, and were teenagers the worse for it?


Maybe the person who is likely to come up with cure for cancer or the next
big breakthrough in computer technology would be stifled under ultra
conservative religious oppression.

And maybe they wouldn't. I know of no evidence that Christians are
opposed to finding a cure for cancer. Some of them even use computers,
heaven forbid! And anyway, why does religious influence have to be
"ultra conservative religious oppression". You were just talking about
liberal Muslems. Well, there are far more liberal Christians than
ultra-conservative.

"paul packer" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 23:03:14 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

Part of the problem may be that what Muslem Arabs see pouring out of
democratic societies isn't particularly attractive to them. I'm
talking of course about films, TV shows, rock music etc full of
swearing, sex, violence...you get my drift. If you wonder why the
Arabs call US 'the great Satan' and shy off democracy you might start
there.

But there are ultra conservative Christians who are just as disgusted by
such things and manage to keep their souls intact.

Well, I'm not ultra-conservative by any means though I'm certainly a
believer and I'm disgusted by much of what I see on TV and at the
movies.

As am I, but I don't try to get teh government to ban them the way some ultr
religious people do.

And I've talked with many people who aren't religious at all
who are equally disgusted. It's a mistake to assume that everyone
who's offended by all this stuff is offended on religious grounds.

I don't make that assumption, it's just that they make up the biggest bloc
of those people and they have political clout.

Many people just have higher standards, or prefer beauty to ugliness,
or an uplifting story to a dark, depressing one.

As do I, I prefer art to show how things ought to be as opposed to how
others think they are. If I want to see "reality" I go outside.

Not so difficult to
understand, surely.


There are also varying degrees of Muslims, not all of whom are as
conservative as say the Taliban. It's the same story as with our
conservative Christians, they don't want to allow their people to have
access to the same stimuli. They want THEIR view to be the only view of
the
world, forgetting that is because of the multiplicity of cultural
influences
that we get the kind of prosperity that exists here.

Maybe Christians don't want their children to have access to certain
stimuli because they believe it damaging, not because they want their
view to be the only view.

Certainly there is some of that, but there are still those ultra religious
people who think that God's law (as they interpret it) should be the only
law.

Yes, a multiplicity of cultural influences
is good, but why does that have to include the unremitting negativity
of so much contemporary entertainment? None of this was (generally)
available years ago, and were teenagers the worse for it?

Mostly they are worse for the fact that their parents let them see it.With
the number of choices available in entertainment it is possible to find the
uplifting and that which praises human endeavor rather then present a
malevolent universe point of view or the viewpoint of the most uneducated,
the most evil, the most amoral of our culture.


Maybe the person who is likely to come up with cure for cancer or the next
big breakthrough in computer technology would be stifled under ultra
conservative religious oppression.

And maybe they wouldn't. I know of no evidence that Christians are
opposed to finding a cure for cancer.

Not anymore, but it was once the view of the Catholic Church for example,
that suffering was the lot for humans and that things like pain killers were
wrong.

I didn't say anything about them being being opposed to it only that strict
adherence to religious viewpoints tend to stifle original thought.


Some of them even use computers,
heaven forbid! And anyway, why does religious influence have to be
"ultra conservative religious oppression".

Not all of it is, nor did I imply it was.

You were just talking about
liberal Muslems. Well, there are far more liberal Christians than
ultra-conservative.

Primarily because we don't have government that enforces religious law.

On Mon, 27 Sep 2004 19:22:09 GMT, "Michael McKelvy"
wrote:

Well, I'm not ultra-conservative by any means though I'm certainly a
believer and I'm disgusted by much of what I see on TV and at the
movies.

As am I, but I don't try to get teh government to ban them the way some ultr
religious people do.

I think you'll find such ultra-religious people are less numerous than
you imagine. They just make more noise than the other type. Ever heard
of the "silent majority"?


And I've talked with many people who aren't religious at all
who are equally disgusted. It's a mistake to assume that everyone
who's offended by all this stuff is offended on religious grounds.

I don't make that assumption, it's just that they make up the biggest bloc
of those people and they have political clout.

I'm not sure they make up the bigest bloc. Indeed I believe there's a
huge block of people offended by the products of Hollywood who have no
affiliation with religion at all. I know many of them.


Many people just have higher standards, or prefer beauty to ugliness,
or an uplifting story to a dark, depressing one.

As do I, I prefer art to show how things ought to be as opposed to how
others think they are. If I want to see "reality" I go outside.

Actually I'm all for 'reality' in entertainment. I just don't happen
to believe it's as dark and hopeless as film and TV makers seem to
believe.


Not so difficult to
understand, surely.


There are also varying degrees of Muslims, not all of whom are as
conservative as say the Taliban. It's the same story as with our
conservative Christians, they don't want to allow their people to have
access to the same stimuli. They want THEIR view to be the only view of
the
world, forgetting that is because of the multiplicity of cultural
influences
that we get the kind of prosperity that exists here.

Maybe Christians don't want their children to have access to certain
stimuli because they believe it damaging, not because they want their
view to be the only view.

Certainly there is some of that, but there are still those ultra religious
people who think that God's law (as they interpret it) should be the only
law.

It's good to keep in mind that 'empty vessels make the most sound'.
Also, the most extreme are those who invariably get interviewed by the
media. The voice of moderation and considered reason rarely gets heard
above the din of extremism.


Yes, a multiplicity of cultural influences
is good, but why does that have to include the unremitting negativity
of so much contemporary entertainment? None of this was (generally)
available years ago, and were teenagers the worse for it?

Mostly they are worse for the fact that their parents let them see it.With
the number of choices available in entertainment it is possible to find the
uplifting and that which praises human endeavor rather then present a
malevolent universe point of view or the viewpoint of the most uneducated,
the most evil, the most amoral of our culture.

Though we live in different countries, I'd be grateful if you could
point me to those programs which uplift and praise human endeavour. I
may need to get a new aerial, as I don't seem to be receiving them at
the moment. All I'm getting now is Sopranos, Six Feet Under and The
Shield. Oh, and Sex & the City of course.


Maybe the person who is likely to come up with cure for cancer or the next
big breakthrough in computer technology would be stifled under ultra
conservative religious oppression.

And maybe they wouldn't. I know of no evidence that Christians are
opposed to finding a cure for cancer.

Not anymore, but it was once the view of the Catholic Church for example,
that suffering was the lot for humans and that things like pain killers were
wrong.

I didn't say anything about them being being opposed to it only that strict
adherence to religious viewpoints tend to stifle original thought.

You've been mixing with too many Baptist pastors from the backwoods.
There was a time when the church was chief sponsor of both art and
original thought. Ask Michaelangelo and Leonardo (not the Ninja
Turtle!).

Some of them even use computers,
heaven forbid! And anyway, why does religious influence have to be
"ultra conservative religious oppression".

Not all of it is, nor did I imply it was.

Yep, I kind of think you did. Sort of.

You were just talking about
liberal Muslems. Well, there are far more liberal Christians than
ultra-conservative.

Primarily because we don't have government that enforces religious law.

We do actually, since much of common law is founded on religious law.
But that's another story, and shall be told at another time.....