1976 again???

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by momonkey

I'm not sure where to begin. I don't like any politician who thinks raising taxes is a good idea. Everyone should know by now that tax rates and tax revenue have an inverse relationship.

But wait - I guess the opposite would be cutting taxes raises tax revenue? On what planet? Hey, cutting taxes sounds good and all, but it's got to be

The dems love to point to the Iraq invasion and occupation as costing too much money.

Not that I'm a Democrat, but this is true. By the way, there are people of all parties and people of no party (*raises hand*) who see it this way.

Then they blame the skyrocketing cost of crude oil on excessive speculation never connecting the dots between the two. If we were not on the ground somewhere in that repugnant anal cavity of the earth they call the Mideast, Saddam or his brats would be up to who knows what, sending speculation through the roof.

You're the one who's speculating. The UN sanctions weren't 100% effective, but they put a crimp in how much Saddam could make on oil, and how much wealth he could bring into Iraq. This explains why his regime went down with not much of a fight in the invasion. It's what's happened since that's jacked up the cost, both in lives and in money.

Tourism in NYC and DC would be zero because the WMDs that we know he used on the Kurds would be believed to still be out there somewhere.

Chemical weapons have a limited shelf life. No viable WMDs have been found, and none were used by Saddam in the war. Sounds like you're making these statements to try to validate this boondoggle. I guess you're a 30-percenter.

And we still can't have an intelligent conversation about it because everyone is afraid to come off like a racist.

Maybe not a racist, but I'm guessing you think it's the "repugnant anal cavity of the earth" because Christianity is not the dominant religion there.

Like it or not, being in Iraq is not as bad as what will happen when we leave. And we had better prepare ourselves for that day 'cause we just ain't got nothing else to put in our tanks.

You know what will happen? So you can tell the future. Well, I said long before city-data existed that all this invasion would do would force Saddam out only to eventually bring in a hardline Islamist regime. Democracy doesn't work over there. It's counter to the set of beliefs that prevails in that part of the world, and trying to force it does nothing but fuel anti-American sentiments there. It's like trying to put a major league baseball franchise in Moscow.

Bush was trying to get GSE oversight as early as 2003. Other reps were proposing reform, including McCain (S.190) in 2006, but support fell along party lines and nothing got through until this year.

So basically it couldn't happen when the GOP had firm control over Congress, but now that this is the closest thing to a bipartisan Congress (it's controlled by Dems, but only 55-to-45 percent in the House and just narrowly in the Senate - it's even if you don't put the two independents in with either party) it made it through. That's interesting of you to say.

Love barr and Lieberman, wish a third party candidate could win. I'd vote for someone I didn't like just establish an alternative. We need a parliamentary system. It works elsewhere just fine.

So you like Lieberman, who's a Dem in every way except on matters in Iraq. That's also interesting. I do agree that a move toward a parliamentary system would be for the better. Guess we can find a common ground there. The two-party status quo is not good for America. This is why I am an independent, yet I vote for candidates and not parties. This means I might vote for a candidate of one of the major parties, or I might vote third party. Depends on who, when and why.

[momonkey]

What happens when Saddam wakes up horny for a fight and decides the world will simply have to live without his oil until he gets something he wants. Would you really want to settle that situation with diplomacy? I've always considered Saddam a terrorist anyhow. Just because he terrorizes his own people doesn't make him any less a terrorist.

Unfortunately for us, until we achieve energy independence, that oil is our life's blood. Liberals live to bash Bush for the war, but what is the alternative? Please don't say diplomacy!

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by momonkey

What happens when Saddam wakes up horny for a fight and decides the world will simply have to live without his oil until he gets something he wants. Would you really want to settle that situation with diplomacy? I've always considered Saddam a terrorist anyhow. Just because he terrorizes his own people doesn't make him any less a terrorist.

The problem with what you say is that A) Saddam's ability to wage elective wars was obviously limited if he couldn't even put up a fight against a US invasion, B) very little of Iraq's potential oil output was hitting the global market while the UN sanctions were in place, and none during the flux of the invasion. It didn't cause an immediate oil crisis. The global oil market is much bigger than Iraq....oh yeah, and C) Saddam may well have been a terrorist, but you seem to think that all terrorists are linked, if only because they might have a common enemy. It doesn't necessarily work that way. The fact is, Saddam's threat to the United States and in general was grossly exaggerated to make the case for the invasion, which siphoned resources from Afghanistan and the hunt for bin Laden who had demonstrated that he had the capacity to attack the US. He was the bigger threat. Do you ever wonder if we weren't so tied up in Iraq, that we might have found bin Laden? Instead, we create a power vacuum in Iraq, allowing al-Qaeda to come in and turn it into a proving ground. They weren't there before. They were too much a threat to Saddam and the Ba'ath regime. Any group who is led by a guy who has designs on overthrowing all the governments in the Arab world is a threat to all the established governments there. It's not that hard to grasp.

Unfortunately for us, until we achieve energy independence, that oil is our life's blood. Liberals live to bash Bush for the war, but what is the alternative? Please don't say diplomacy!

Until we develop energy sources that are not fossil fuels, "energy independence" is pie in the sky. We can't keep driving Hummers and two-ton pickup trucks just to drive 20 miles and back to the office, just because we want to "live in the country" while working in the city. Things people hold near and dear as Americans nowadays would have to change drastically. Our best chance at "energy independence" came and went 25-30 years ago between the Carter and Reagan administrations. We went right back to OPEC oil after the embargo because it was cheaper, and went right back to gas guzzlers because, hey, it was the American thing to do. Now we're paying the price. That train's long pulled out of the station.