Syria

[mr_genius]

McCain will oppose the Senate War resolution because it's not murdery enough.

 

Turns out he thought there would be a sufficient number of murders.

[Balta1701]

Turns out he thought there would be a sufficient number of murders.

They added extra language calling on the president to help turn the tide of the war, so more murders.

[mr_genius]

They added extra language calling on the president to help turn the tide of the war, so more murders.

 

Maybe. But The House of representatives will vote against authorization on a Syria strike. Unfortunately Obama can just ignore them and start mass murdering people anyways.

Edited September 4, 2013 by mr_genius

[Balta1701]

No Im saying the Syrians can fight Assad.

 

But neither of them can use chemical weapons.

 

It has nothing to do with sides, it has everything to do with enforcing treaties. Because if we dont, then what is the point of agreeing to anything?

 

You point out a "mutual defense agreement" as if it means something. Yet you dont think the Geneva Convention and subsequent treaty mean something?

 

Which is it, either we enforce our agreements or we dont?

 

And you keep saying "killing". I dont believe Ive ever suggested that. Ive merely argued that your solution "giving them aid" and doing nothing more, is not a response to the use of chemical weapons. You are the one who wants to do nothing.

 

My solutions could include: 1) ban of all weapons sales to Syria govt for next 10 years, 2) no fly zone, 3) etc etc.

 

Just because you are unwilling to discuss any option but the "bread" option, doesnt mean that I have to accept a world where chemical weapon attacks are allowed.

By the way, I forgot to point this one out. The UN charter explicitly prohibits military action against a UN member state without authorization of te UN Security Council, which seemingly will not be coming.

 

Therefore the US would be violating several treaties and defying international law if it starts its freedom bombing campaign.

 

So to save international law and the Geneva conventions you're willing to defy international law and the Geneva conventions.

[DukeNukeEm]

If these people are just going to kill each other for free why should we pay to do the same work for them?

[BigSqwert]

If these people are just going to kill each other for free why should we pay to do the same work for them?

 

Using that line of thought, why even bother having a police force or laws anywhere. Just let people kill each other everywhere for whatever reason they want. Who gives a s*** as long as it doesn't personally affect you. You're very important.

[Jake]

I would like to do something that prevents the future use of chemical weapons.

 

I'm not sure what that is - I have a feeling a certain amount of bombing would help accomplish that task, but I'd love if someone can come up with something else.

[DukeNukeEm]

Using that line of thought, why even bother having a police force or laws anywhere. Just let people kill each other everywhere for whatever reason they want. Who gives a s*** as long as it doesn't personally affect you. You're very important.

Wat

 

You're saying the primary function of a police force is to kill people and suggesting anything to the contrary is ludicrous.

[DukeNukeEm]

I would like to do something that prevents the future use of chemical weapons.

 

I'm not sure what that is - I have a feeling a certain amount of bombing would help accomplish that task, but I'd love if someone can come up with something else.

Going through the effort of destroying people to prevent the destruction of people doesn't make sense. Especially when there's a very high likelihood that the people you are destroying will probably be destroyed anyways whether you destroy them or not.

 

Or you could have a moral problem with wiping these savages off the face of the earth, like oh I dunno IRAQ. The about-face from liberals who couldn't find enough ways to call George W Bush a war mongerer but now support unilateral military action because of the EXACT SAME REASONS WE WENT IRAQ.

[Jake]

Going through the effort of destroying people to prevent the destruction of people doesn't make sense. Especially when there's a very high likelihood that the people you are destroying will probably be destroyed anyways whether you destroy them or not.

 

Or you could have a moral problem with wiping these savages off the face of the earth, like oh I dunno IRAQ. The about-face from liberals who couldn't find enough ways to call George W Bush a war mongerer but now support unilateral military action because of the EXACT SAME REASONS WE WENT IRAQ.

 

While I'm not eager to take a position on this conflict, they are totally different.

 

1. The proposed action is not an occupation and it has been explicitly stated that we aren't trying to take power from Assad

 

2. There actually are weapons and they actually have been used

[DukeNukeEm]

While I'm not eager to take a position on this conflict, they are totally different.

 

1. The proposed action is not an occupation and it has been explicitly stated that we aren't trying to take power from Assad

 

2. There actually are weapons and they actually have been used

Saddam did use chemical weapons against the Kurds. We know this as fact. He was however smart enough to not use them against Americans.

 

Also, you are clearly taking a position when you advocate bombing them. That's the line in the sand here, pal.

Edited September 7, 2013 by DukeNukeEm

[Jake]

Saddam did use chemical weapons against the Kurds. We know this as fact. He was however smart enough to not use them against Americans.

 

Also, you are clearly taking a position when you advocate bombing them. That's the line in the sand here, pal.

 

The only position I feel strongly about is that 1. I don't want to be part of a group that says "you cannot use chemical weapons" but fail to react when they are used and 2. I don't really want to get involved in this conflict on the military level, because it doesn't appear that there are many easy outcomes in doing so.

 

Therefore, for me, I am totally conflicted. I wish I could be in these congressional hearings and glean as much info as possible. This is really complicated.

 

As far as the Iraq situation, the last time we knew Hussein to be doing this was in 1988 after Ronald Christ Reagan sold him the materials for those weapons and then pretended those weapons weren't used. It turns out that we weren't all that far from being at war with them at that point anyway. I don't know how that is all that relevant to this situation many years later, though we're still trying to undo much of what Reagan and his cohort has done to this country as well as the Middle East.

[Quin]

Hypothetical: This same situation erupts in Iran, with a civil war.

 

A nuke is used.

 

Do we sit by?

[sircaffey]

Going through the effort of destroying people to prevent the destruction of people doesn't make sense. Especially when there's a very high likelihood that the people you are destroying will probably be destroyed anyways whether you destroy them or not.

 

The intent of the strikes will not be to destroy people. The intent will be to destroy Syrian weaponry. People will die, but strike targets will be determined on their importance to Syria's ability to launch another chemical attack. This isn't a kill people mission.

[southsider2k5]

Using that line of thought, why even bother having a police force or laws anywhere. Just let people kill each other everywhere for whatever reason they want. Who gives a s*** as long as it doesn't personally affect you. You're very important.

 

That is pretty much the line of thought by ignoring what is going on in Syria.

[DukeNukeEm]

The intent of the strikes will not be to destroy people. The intent will be to destroy Syrian weaponry. People will die, but strike targets will be determined on their importance to Syria's ability to launch another chemical attack. This isn't a kill people mission.

You don't actually believe the military when they say minimal collateral damage, do you? I mean its such a well known bold-faced lie I'm surprised the press report isn't in green.

 

 

If Assad has one lick of brains he'll hide his good s*** in the middle of cities, naturally the rebels will do the same. The American military is lot known for giving a rats ass about civilians that are being used as human shields in those situations. Not that they should have to, you'd figure if we go out bombing we'd have reasons that compel us beyond making us feel good or enforcing international law by breaking it that would make those casualities acceptable.

[DukeNukeEm]

Hypothetical: This same situation erupts in Iran, with a civil war.

 

A nuke is used.

 

Do we sit by?

We party is what we do! No more sweating out what those loony toons will do next. The same applies to Israel by the way.

[DukeNukeEm]

The only position I feel strongly about is that 1. I don't want to be part of a group that says "you cannot use chemical weapons" but fail to react when they are used and 2. I don't really want to get involved in this conflict on the military level, because it doesn't appear that there are many easy outcomes in doing so.

 

Therefore, for me, I am totally conflicted. I wish I could be in these congressional hearings and glean as much info as possible. This is really complicated.

 

As far as the Iraq situation, the last time we knew Hussein to be doing this was in 1988 after Ronald Christ Reagan sold him the materials for those weapons and then pretended those weapons weren't used. It turns out that we weren't all that far from being at war with them at that point anyway. I don't know how that is all that relevant to this situation many years later, though we're still trying to undo much of what Reagan and his cohort has done to this country as well as the Middle East.

 

OK, we have to stop thinking of war in terms of easy outcomes. Dropping $10m bombs out of $1b airplanes is always going to be expensive. I don't even know what it costs to empty the Sixth Fleet out of Naples into a holding pattern in the Med, much less start using it for war, but I cannot imagine it being cheap.

[Jake]

OK, we have to stop thinking of war in terms of easy outcomes. Dropping $10m bombs out of $1b airplanes is always going to be expensive. I don't even know what it costs to empty the Sixth Fleet out of Naples into a holding pattern in the Med, much less start using it for war, but I cannot imagine it being cheap.

 

I'm not taking cost into great consideration...it is clear that the US government can always afford military activity. It is also clear they hate spending money to help their own people, so I don't think that the money they spend on this conflict is coming out of needier people's pockets; they have no problem agreeing to spend defense money but rarely agree to spend it (ie, an increase over current spending) in ways to improve domestic matters.

 

The cost of human life is the cost I'm more worried about. I need some argument that more lives are ultimately saved/improved by intervention...even if all of those lives are saved/improved by the stand against chemical weapons and not necessarily improving the body count in Syria itself in the near term. This is a hard argument to make, though, and I'll be skeptical of it.

[Quin]

We party is what we do! No more sweating out what those loony toons will do next. The same applies to Israel by the way.

 

We're getting nuked next if that's the response. And I enjoy your disregard of a US ally.

[Quin]

Iranian leader: U.S. will 'definitely suffer' if it leads strike on Syria

 

http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/05/world/meast/....html?hpt=wo_c2

 

Well balls.

[Texsox]

OK, we have to stop thinking of war in terms of easy outcomes. Dropping $10m bombs out of $1b airplanes is always going to be expensive. I don't even know what it costs to empty the Sixth Fleet out of Naples into a holding pattern in the Med, much less start using it for war, but I cannot imagine it being cheap.

 

America's business is war. The military industrial complex is a huge part of our economy. We have to start depleting our inventories of disposable weapons. I do not believe our economy can do well if we ain't dropping those $10m bombs and losing a few $10b planes.

 

Eisenhower nailed it in 1959.

[DukeNukeEm]

I'm not taking cost into great consideration...it is clear that the US government can always afford military activity. It is also clear they hate spending money to help their own people, so I don't think that the money they spend on this conflict is coming out of needier people's pockets; they have no problem agreeing to spend defense money but rarely agree to spend it (ie, an increase over current spending) in ways to improve domestic matters.

 

How about just not spending all that money?

 

Israel isn't our ally by the way, they've been causing more problems than they solve for a long time now.

[Texsox]

[Balta1701]

Rep. Alan Grayson:

THE documentary record regarding an attack on Syria consists of just two papers: a four-page unclassified summary and a 12-page classified summary. The first enumerates only the evidence in favor of an attack. I’m not allowed to tell you what’s in the classified summary, but you can draw your own conclusion.

 

On Thursday I asked the House Intelligence Committee staff whether there was any other documentation available, classified or unclassified. Their answer was “no.”

 

The Syria chemical weapons summaries are based on several hundred underlying elements of intelligence information. The unclassified summary cites intercepted telephone calls, “social media” postings and the like, but not one of these is actually quoted or attached — not even clips from YouTube. (As to whether the classified summary is the same, I couldn’t possibly comment, but again, draw your own conclusion.)

 

Over the last week the administration has run a full-court press on Capitol Hill, lobbying members from both parties in both houses to vote in support of its plan to attack Syria. And yet we members are supposed to accept, without question, that the proponents of a strike on Syria have accurately depicted the underlying evidence, even though the proponents refuse to show any of it to us or to the American public.

 

In fact, even gaining access to just the classified summary involves a series of unreasonably high hurdles.

 

We have to descend into the bowels of the Capitol Visitors Center, to a room four levels underground. Per the instructions of the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, note-taking is not allowed.

 

Once we leave, we are not permitted to discuss the classified summary with the public, the media, our constituents or even other members. Nor are we allowed to do anything to verify the validity of the information that has been provided.

 

And this is just the classified summary. It is my understanding that the House Intelligence Committee made a formal request for the underlying intelligence reports several days ago. I haven’t heard an answer yet. And frankly, I don’t expect one.

 

Compare this lack of transparency with the administration’s treatment of the Benghazi attack. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, to her credit, made every single relevant classified e-mail, cable and intelligence report available to every member of Congress. (I know this, because I read them all.) Secretary Clinton had nothing to hide.

 

Her successor, John Kerry, has said repeatedly that this administration isn’t trying to manipulate the intelligence reports the way that the Bush administration did to rationalize its invasion of Iraq.

 

But by refusing to disclose the underlying data even to members of Congress, the administration is making it impossible for anyone to judge, independently, whether that statement is correct. Perhaps the edict of an earlier administration applies: “Trust, but verify.”

 

The danger of the administration’s approach was illustrated by a widely read report last week in The Daily Caller, which claimed that the Obama administration had selectively used intelligence to justify military strikes in Syria, with one report “doctored so that it leads a reader to just the opposite conclusion reached by the original report.”

 

The allegedly doctored report attributes the attack to the Syrian general staff. But according to The Daily Caller, “it was clear that ‘the Syrian general staff were out of their minds with panic that an unauthorized strike had been launched by the 155th Brigade in express defiance of their instructions.’ ”

 

I don’t know who is right, the administration or The Daily Caller. But for me to make the correct decision on whether to allow an attack, I need to know. And so does the American public.

 

We have reached the point where the classified information system prevents even trusted members of Congress, who have security clearances, from learning essential facts, and then inhibits them from discussing and debating what they do know. And this extends to matters of war and peace, money and blood. The “security state” is drowning in its own phlegm.

 

My position is simple: if the administration wants me to vote for war, on this occasion or on any other, then I need to know all the facts. And I’m not the only one who feels that way.