There Goes Egypt & Iraq - Thanks To The Help of Our President, Hillary and Code Pink

[Virtual Insanity]

Christians were doing just fine in the Middle East until America stepped in and ruined everything.

[Three Wolves In Snow]

Originally Posted by stillkit

I hate to tell you this, 'cuz I know you won't like it or even accept it, but this whole Arab Spring process was set in motion by the Bush administration when they adopted the policy of fighting terrorism by encouraging, or even imposing, democracy on the region. They mistakenly believed that democracy is a panacea for everything and if those poor, Arab/Muslim folks would just get the vote, why freedom and peace would break out all over the place. That's been the established policy of the United States now for more than a decade.

Unfortunately for everyone concerned, they once again let their ideology outweigh the facts. Instead of bringing peace and prosperity, it's only bringing radicals into power and, instead of stopping terrorism, it's actually creating the conditions for even more state sponsored extremists. In other words, the misguided and ill-informed policies of Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz and that whole band of Neo-Conservative con artist's is rapidly making things worse.

What "facts" do you say they ignored, you might ask? Just these:

Lebanon: When given the opportunity to vote in free elections, who did they elect? Hizbollah!

Palestine: When given the opportunity to chose their own government, who did they elect? First, Fatah and then Hamas!

Turkey: When given the opportunity to chose, who did they elect? Gul's Islamic party!

Iraq: When given the opportunity to craft their own constitution, on what did they base their laws? The Qu'ran.

Afghanistan: When given the opportunity to craft their own constitution, on what did they base their laws? The Qu'ran!

Iran: When they overthrew the Shah, what did they imposed upon themselves? Revolutionary, radical Islam!

Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Yemen: What domestic movement do they have to keep repressed by force? Radical Islam!

I could go on, but you get the picture.

What the Bush team never understood, and neither do most American's, is that the Arab Middle East is not like us and Islam there is not like religion in the west. Here, we go to great lengths to keep religion and politics separate, but there they are intermingled and co-joined to a degree which we don't fully understand because it's so far outside our understanding. Islam isn't, and never was, designed to be a stand alone institution. It is a "whole life" religion, being part and parcel of government and society. Moreover, that's how they want it.

The point is that you simply cannot encourage or cause democracy in that region without empowering the very people we're supposed to be fighting. Freedom of choice there means freedom to impose Islamic order on society.

Now, Obama is left to clean up their mess and, in an act so typical of people who either don't understand how things work or, worse, won't admit their heroes have been wrong, he gets the blame for everything.

I really, really, really want to paste your words on to my FB page against those neo-cons who think us going around and continuing wars is a good idea for "freedom".

PLEASE?!!?!?!!

[desertdetroiter]

Originally Posted by HappyTexan

Obama put himself in that position. He has a comment about everything and changes it with the wind based on how the majority react to it.

It's not Obama, it's the US way. Always the first to comment about world events, picking winners and losers with our words of who we stand behind but "in spirit" and not with guns.

Whatever happened to "Speak softly and carry a big stick" ?

LOL...i gotta admit, you might have a point there. Didn't think of it that way.

[Who?Me?!]

NOW, OP, please explain how Romney/Gingrich/Santorum/Paul/Palin/Bachmann or any other Repug "genius" would SOLVE the problem....and bring peace to the Middle East



C'mon, don't be bashful!!!!!!!!

[TheThrillIsGone]

Originally Posted by chielgirl

They're not our countries.
They have RIGHT to do as they choose.
I know this will shock you, but we don't run the world.

And Lybia?

[stillkit]

Originally Posted by Three Wolves In Snow

I really, really, really want to paste your words on to my FB page against those neo-cons who think us going around and continuing wars is a good idea for "freedom".

PLEASE?!!?!?!!

Be my guest.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by chielgirl

They're not our countries.
They have RIGHT to do as they choose.
I know this will shock you, but we don't run the world.

It is odd how the US espouses the Freedom of Self-Determination, but only when it suits the US.

Originally Posted by stillkit

In other words, the misguided and ill-informed policies of Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz and that whole band of Neo-Conservative con artist's is rapidly making things worse.

Bush is not a Neo-Conservative. He is a Neo-Liberal Institutionalist, just like his father is, and just like Blow Job Bill and Billary are.

Repeatedly claiming that Bush is a Neo-Conservative when it is more than obvious that he is not doesn't make Bush a Neo-Conservative. You might want to enroll in your local university and take a few classes in IR Theory and foreign policy.

Originally Posted by stillkit

What the Bush team never understood, and neither do most American's, is that the Arab Middle East is not like us and Islam there is not like religion in the west. Here, we go to great lengths to keep religion and politics separate, but there they are intermingled and co-joined to a degree which we don't fully understand because it's so far outside our understanding. Islam isn't, and never was, designed to be a stand alone institution. It is a "whole life" religion, being part and parcel of government and society. Moreover, that's how they want it.

That is incorrect.

First, it wasn't Bush, it was Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama.

Second, the reason Islam has become politicized is because Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush and Obama backed puppet dictators and spent your tax money to set up terror groups under the guise of secret police to ensure that these puppet dictators are not toppled.

Lastly, as Tunisian journalist Mohammed Talbi succinctly puts it, "We have the freedom to shut-up." That's because you have no free speech, no newspapers are allowed to criticize the government, no television or radio stations are allowed to criticize the government, and if you express dissent you are kidnapped, wrongfully imprisoned, tortured and then murdered by the US funded secret police. So, then, there is one and only one place you can go and reasonably express dissent without being kidnapped, wrongfully imprisoned, tortured and then murdered by the US funded secret police...

...and that is to a mosque.

And that's how Islam has become politicized over the last 50 years or so.

The US and UK (and to a lesser extent France) create this monster, not them.

Originally Posted by stillkit

The point is that you simply cannot encourage or cause democracy in that region without empowering the very people we're supposed to be fighting. Freedom of choice there means freedom to impose Islamic order on society.

But you created that monster, and now you're mad because you cannot control it.

You put King Faisal, a Saud from the Saudi Tribe in Saudi Arabia and a Sunni as ruler of Shi'a majority Iraq, not the "Iraqis."

You put the Shah in power in Iran, not the Iranians.

You put King Abdullah in power in Jordan, not the Jordanians.

You put the Sauds in power in Saudi Arabia, not the Arabic peoples who live on Saudi Peninsula.

You murdered King Faisal in cold blood and put General Qasim in power in Iraq, not the "Iraqis."

You murdered General Qasim in cold blood and then let the Baathist Party come to power, not the "Iraqis."

You hounded Nasser in Egypt because he refused to choose sides between the US and Soviet Union, not the Egyptians.

It was you who set in motion the events that allowed Lebanon, who were on the verge of becoming the "Wall Street of the Middle East" to become torn apart by civil war.

When Ambassador Smith was negotiating with Khomeini on ruling Iran when the Shah abdicated, the Iranians told General Hugyens to fly from Washington to Tehran and help instigate a military coup? No, that was Carter (and Sick and Brzezinski).

All of it, all 100% of it is your doing. You did that, not them.

Why is 1/6th of Jordan's GDP US Foreign Aid? So King Abdullah II can stay in power, especially after he disbanded parliament, which is a really democratic thing to do, right?

Jordan doesn't have any oil, so Jordan cannot derive oil revenues to fund a US set up secret police State. Jordan needs US Foreign Aid to run a secret police State.

If you don't like what you see, then here's a novel idea:

Stop interfering in the social, economic and political affairs of those countries.

So, tell us, what was Obama's excuse for illegally overthrowing the government of Honduras 2 years ago?

Radical Islam (snicker)?

Originally Posted by tofurkey

But I wonder why, as the U.S. doesn't run the world, why does the U.S. Secretary of State spend so much time abroad, and particularly in Muslim countries? Does she just like the tea?

I think she likes the ice coffee.

Originally Posted by padcrasher

Right, but he's not saying helping these protestors out was a bad thing. The OP is saying that. She's yet another right wing neocon who pretends to advocate Democracy until that Democracy does something not in Israel's interest.

No, she's a Neo-Liberal Institutionalist, just like her husband Blow Job Bill, and just like Bush the Elder and Bush the Younger.

You need to enroll in a university IR Theory course along with Stillkit. Maybe you can car-pool or something.

Originally Posted by Sporin

I support the people in the ME to be able to freely elect the gov't they choose. If they freely choose Islamist governments then that's their choice and we should butt out.

Look, this isn't rocket science.

There are some 34 so-called "Islamic States" and 16 are democracies.

Which 16? The 16 that do not have a single cash-crop like oil, natural gas, chocolate, sugar cane or coffee.

And yes, I know chocolate doesn't grow on a tree (it's a bean that grows on a bush), but those "Islamic States" that have only a single cash-crop for an economy are all "dictatorships."

The point being that it is more than obvious that there is a relationship between the type of economy, and the type of government.

[stillkit]

Originally Posted by Mircea

It is odd how the US espouses the Freedom of Self-Determination, but only when it suits the US.



Bush is not a Neo-Conservative. He is a Neo-Liberal Institutionalist, just like his father is, and just like Blow Job Bill and Billary are.

Repeatedly claiming that Bush is a Neo-Conservative when it is more than obvious that he is not doesn't make Bush a Neo-Conservative. You might want to enroll in your local university and take a few classes in IR Theory and foreign policy.

In the beginning, the Neo-Conservative movement was created by liberal Democrats who were also anti-Communists. They felt their fellow liberal Democrats were too soft on Communism, so they started their own faction which eventually morphed into today's Republican Party and a sizable portion of the Democratic Party, which I call the Clinton wing of the party for easy descriptive purposes.

We could debate the correct name for it all day, but the bottom line is that no matter what they're called, they are globalist's, pro-corporation and Fascist in everything but name.


The rest of your post seems to advance the idea that the United States is solely and wholly responsible for everything that's going on in the Arab or Muslim world. That's simplistic and historically incorrect, not to mention a mainstay of Arab nationalist/anti-Zionist propaganda.

For instance, Pakistan is a thorn in the side of many peoples, but the existence of Pakistan in the first place was completely the responsibility of Mohammad Jenna, not the US. Nor was the US responsible for the melding of Islam with government and society. That was the norm long before there even was a United States.

Yes, the US has been part of the problem, but so have the indigenous people there. It's not so cut and dried as to just simply blame us for it all.