From:
Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 18:42:08 GMT

What is it you want to win? Security? Peace of mind? Goodwill? None of
these are possible with people around like the Iranian government or any
government that doesn't recognize the inherent right of human beings to
live. That includes Israel.

That includes 160 or so nations on this planet. So you want to rub out
Israel and Iran. How about Syria as well? And let's go get North Korea,
several of the 'Stans' from the former Soviet Union, 9/10 of Africa,
part of South America, Cuba, Haiti (again), and what the hell, while
we're at it, Canada (just because they're close). And the UK because
Pooh Bear is a smart ass and Stewart Pinkerton is a goofy nickname.

We can't vote them out. We can't attack and overrun them all (since
this would also go against your 'attack only if attacked' statement, I
presume you agree), and even if we could we'd run into other nation's
spheres of influence (think MacArthur in Korea. Remember what happened
with the Chinese there?). Our military is stretched to the limit,
unless you propose forming a permanent occupational warrior class like
the Mongols or Romans or Macedonians had. Kerry proposed forming two
more Army divisions, which based on today's reality, made a lot of
sense.

You probably realize the US military was in Bosnia for almost 10 years,
and we were invited there.

One answer (Kerry's, actually) was to look at the root causes, the
second, third, and fourth order effects of our foreign policy and try
to form world consensus. Another (Bush's, Cheney's and Rumsfeld's,
actually) was to tell the world to get ****ed and to be rootin-tootin
cowboys, and then hand the keys to the vault to Halliburton. Oh, and
while we're at it let's ridicule the idea of trying to form world
consensus until we realize that we're stretched too thin, and then
let's go back to the UN and all the others we've ****ed off and ask for
help. Maybe soon we can start eating Freedom Toast and Freedom Fries
again.

The Germans and others are trying diplomatic solutions with Iran. Until
Iran actually does something 'wrong' (i.e. test a bomb) or until we
have conclusive proof that they have built one (hopefully from a source
more credible than US intelligence apparently is)(see factcheck.org for
their stellar performance);-), what other course is there?

So aside from hand-wringing and wishful thinking about Utopia, what
exactly do you propose?

I propose that we start by unelecting the dim-witted lying republican
asswipes that are in power right now ASAP. Although we may not have to,
because it appears likely that gobs of the self-righteous corrupt
crooks will be going to jail pretty soon anyway.