US bases in Iraq under missile attack

[Hugo Stiglitz 23,367]

America’s entire approach to foreign policy needs a paradigm shift.  We’re running 1980s DOS in WarGames while the emerging threats are in the cloud with an iPad. 

[Anastasis 23,514]

I wonder when they are going to find where we hid all the American dead bodies. 

[TXSG8R 3,362]

10 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

America’s entire approach to foreign policy needs a paradigm shift.  We’re running 1980s DOS in WarGames while the emerging threats are in the cloud with an iPad. 

Do you even Cyber Command and Space Force bro?

[Biff Tannen 45,780]

20 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

America’s entire approach to foreign policy needs a paradigm shift.  We’re running 1980s DOS in WarGames while the emerging threats are in the cloud with an iPad. 

Hey man, Operation Crossbow seems like a fucking winner.

[Hugo Stiglitz 23,367]

5 hours ago, TXSG8R said:

Do you even Cyber Command and Space Force bro?

To be more specific, our foreign policy is almost entirely run by the military and the IC with the credible threat of military force as our chief negotiating strategy.  It’s a ludicrous approach to dealing with the world because not only is it ultimately self destructive but it’s also insanely expensive.  This approach does not make America any safer from the kind of foreign threats on the homeland we see today which is the whole fucking purpose of the military in the first place.

Our resources would be much better spent building up a robust State Department with well educated diplomats that build constructive relationships with other countries instead of us just looking for places to park our combat troops in between deployments to bomb people. 

Our shit is really fucked up but it could be so much better. 

Edited January 9, 2020 by Hugo Stiglitz

[DDD Dad 14,376]

2 hours ago, Message Board User said:

We the people!

 

 

[TXSG8R 3,362]

14 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

To be more specific, our foreign policy is almost entirely run by the military and the IC with the credible threat of military force as our chief negotiating strategy.  It’s a ludicrous approach to dealing with the world because not only is it ultimately self destructive but it’s also insanely expensive.  This approach does not make America any safer from the kind of foreign threats on the homeland we see today which is the whole fucking purpose of the military in the first place.

Our resources would be much better spent building up a robust State Department with well educated diplomats that build constructive relationships with other countries instead of us just us looking for places to park our combat troops in between deployments to bomb people. 

Our shit is really fucked up but it could be so much better. 

Totally fair, and unrealistic right now with Pompeo running the show.  

[Hornius Emeritus 12,509]

56 minutes ago, G650 said:

It's bad but not even in the same galaxy as Vietnam.

Depends on how and what you're measuring .

Also, we've pretty much seen the end result of Vietnam. We've not yet seen the end result of the decision to invade Iraq.

 

Edited January 8, 2020 by Hornius Emeritus

[G650 14,303]

5 minutes ago, Hornius Emeritus said:

Depends on how and what you're measuring .

Also, we've pretty much seen the end result of Vietnam. We've not yet seen the end result of the decision to invade Iraq.

 

Basically every possible statistic. Loss of life, societal shifts, you name it. There is no analog today to having one's child plucked up and marched of to be killed or Kent State.

Vietnam to this day is still far and away the biggest cultural driver affecting American society, far more than 9/11 or the 20 years in Iraq/Afghanistan or the Great Recession.

[Pato del Muerto 52,910]

6 minutes ago, G650 said:

Basically every possible statistic. Loss of life, societal shifts, you name it. There is no analog today to having one's child plucked up and marched of to be killed or Kent State.

Vietnam to this day is still far and away the biggest cultural driver affecting American society, far more than 9/11 or the 20 years in Iraq/Afghanistan or the Great Recession.

And why people get scared when the democrats start using the draft to scare the populace with Facebook memes. Nobody is going to be ok with any action that leads to a draft, or volunteer casualty rates that lead to a draft. 
and to make this less partisan, if it was a democrat president then absolutely the republicans would be running the same kinds of things (in a world where republicans find a potential armed conflict they don’t agree with)

Edited January 8, 2020 by Pato del Muerto

[Foosters 17,938]

 

[TXSG8R 3,362]

An update to the rocket impact analysis.  Looks like 2 misses, one was a close miss to a hardened aircraft shelter, and one was just way off and impacted a taxiway.  Still pretty good shooting for some souped up scuds.  

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/31769/satellite-images-show-the-aftermath-of-irans-missile-strikes-on-al-assad-air-base-in-iraq

btw Tyler Rogoway is a great aviation/defense wonk if you're into that sort of thing.  

[G650 14,303]

11 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

Nobody is going to be ok with any action that leads to a draft, or volunteer casualty rates that lead to a draft. 

Indeed

[Pato del Muerto 52,910]

So was the earthquake real, or fake news teasing at a nuke test?

[Telegraph_it 3,374]

5 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

So was the earthquake real, or fake news teasing at a nuke test?

USGS says it was a normal earthquake. It was at significant depth so easy to differentiate from man made. 

[elfenix 34,387]

1 hour ago, Pato del Muerto said:

And why people get scared when the democrats start using the draft to scare the populace with Facebook memes.

pretty sure that happened organically. 

[Telegraph_it 3,374]

Just now, elfenix said:

pretty sure that happened organically. 

I think someone finally read the FAFSA fine print and found out the more you owe the more likely you are to get drafted. Hence the freak out. 

[Bama Llama 1,476]

Enough.

GTFO (all the way out) of Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Africa before we all wake up as dust motes.  Spend those billions on improving this country and educating its citizens so they won't grow up to be dumb fucks engaged in permanent war.  Somebody start a website or streaming service that reports nothing but facts.  I'll ante up a year's worth of what I now pay my dipshit cable company.

[Junior Miller 1,502]

3 hours ago, TXSG8R said:

Forward presence isn't always warmongering, most of the time its to avoid further wars.  Isolationism doesn't work, Joe Kennedy out front should have told ya.  Just to be clear, I'm not arguing that everything can be solved with a bullet, or that any of the previous shit in the gulf was the correct move.  But once you go knock down a country, you establish a presence until the country is back on its feet, otherwise you just create further chaos.  

Your simplistic view of the world makes me think you're young, or a pure academic.  You're correct, the world isn't black and white, and there are very few simple answers to any of the global problems we face.  "We cant be invaded" is a pretty bizarre viewpoint to make decisions from.  We don't have to be invaded to be impacted by things outside of the US.  

Nowhere did I mention anything near isolationism. Actually, what trump is doing now is isolationism as he's isolating us from our allies with hatred and lies. Yet you still support him even though you just stated isolationism doesn't work. 

What I'm saying is to withdraw forces from active combat in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan and back into allied bases in close proximity. We do not need to be there killing people to keep tabs on the area. What I'm saying is the exact opposite of isolationism, it's to rebuild and repair relationships with allies and others across the globe through diplomacy and shrewd maneuvering without the need for attacking people who have not attacked us first. No Middle Eastern country has invaded the US at any point in time yet we've invaded their lands and killed their people and then act all self-righteous and indignant when they have the audacity to fight back. 

This warmongering nature has done nothing but alienate us from the rest of the world while at the same time putting us into uncharted financial ruin territory. Nobody knows what will happen if we keep pushing the deficit to these heights because nobody's done it before at the level of economic power that the US currently has. Why keep testing when there is no need to?

I'm a gen x so not young by any means and have a lot of experience in different places around the world so definitely old enough to know diplomacy and cutting out this warmongering bullshit would serve us better in the long run. Well, it may not serve bloodthirsty people like yourself who apparently benefit from the murder of innocent people but for the rest of us it would. 

[Both Tacos 1,825]

 

Probably just some kids playing hot potato with a hand grenade.

[Enchubben 5,564]

7 minutes ago, Junior Miller said:

No Middle Eastern country has invaded the US at any point in time yet

Sure no country per say; but there was that whole 9/11 fiasco. 

[Junior Miller 1,502]

So 48 years after we started fucking with them on their own homeland they managed to knock down a few buildings and kill a few thousand people. After we were complicit in killing millions of theirs. 

Yeah, they're the only evil ones. Americans are the biggest butthurt pussies in the world. 

Edited January 8, 2020 by Junior Miller

[MNLonghornFUKM 8,918]

1 hour ago, Bama Llama said:

Enough.

GTFO (all the way out) of Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Africa before we all wake up as dust motes.  Spend those billions on improving this country and educating its citizens so they won't grow up to be dumb fucks engaged in permanent war.  Somebody start a website or streaming service that reports nothing but facts.  I'll ante up a year's worth of what I now pay my dipshit cable company.

how awesome would that be?

[Sbbruin 21,925]

1 hour ago, Bama Llama said:

I'll ante up a year's worth of what I now pay my dipshit cable company.

I'll kick in the tree fiddy this place sucks out of me monthly.  Pissing it down the drain here anyway.

[HenryJames 66,311]

 

[TXSG8R 3,362]

1 hour ago, Junior Miller said:

Nowhere did I mention anything near isolationism. Actually, what trump is doing now is isolationism as he's isolating us from our allies with hatred and lies. Yet you still support him even though you just stated isolationism doesn't work. 

What I'm saying is to withdraw forces from active combat in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan and back into allied bases in close proximity. We do not need to be there killing people to keep tabs on the area. What I'm saying is the exact opposite of isolationism, it's to rebuild and repair relationships with allies and others across the globe through diplomacy and shrewd maneuvering without the need for attacking people who have not attacked us first. No Middle Eastern country has invaded the US at any point in time yet we've invaded their lands and killed their people and then act all self-righteous and indignant when they have the audacity to fight back. 

This warmongering nature has done nothing but alienate us from the rest of the world while at the same time putting us into uncharted financial ruin territory. Nobody knows what will happen if we keep pushing the deficit to these heights because nobody's done it before at the level of economic power that the US currently has. Why keep testing when there is no need to?

I'm a gen x so not young by any means and have a lot of experience in different places around the world so definitely old enough to know diplomacy and cutting out this warmongering bullshit would serve us better in the long run. Well, it may not serve bloodthirsty people like yourself who apparently benefit from the murder of innocent people but for the rest of us it would. 

Uh, swing and a miss there chief. I don’t support trump, I’ve been pretty clear about that from the jump. Feel free to look at any of my posts in here, I think he’s a royal piece of shit. 

btw, what you’re describing is pretty much the definition of isolationism. We don’t get involved in other people’s shit unless they attack us?  It’s the biggest reason I can’t get on board with libertarianism. It doesn’t work, you can’t sit back and wait to get dragged into conflict. At the same time, I agree with you that our current policies are shit, Pompeo is an idiot that has dragged our state department down. I also agree that shooting first and asking questions later is wrong. Is that clear enough for you?

There’s a lot of distance between supporting forward defense and warmongering.  You seem more interested in trying to shoehorn people into one tribe or the other, which if you were really as savvy as you try to come off as, would realize is just the other side of the same shit coin. Almost all of our interventions in the Middle East have backfired. That doesn’t mean we ignore the current reality that we are in. We came in and shit on Iraq. We have created a power vacuum that is still being worked out. Our presence is a counterbalance to not only Iran, but Russia, who aren’t squeamish about fucking around in other countries affairs. It’s the same reason we still maintain a presence in some of those allied countries you seem less worried about occupying. 

[Hate 20,164]

1 hour ago, Junior Miller said:

So 48 years after we started fucking with them on their own homeland they managed to knock down a few buildings and kill a few thousand people. After we were complicit in killing millions of theirs. 
Yeah, they're the only evil ones. Americans are the biggest butthurt pussies in the world. 

 

Delete post...forgot where I was.

 

Edited January 9, 2020 by Hate

[freyguy 4,334]

2 hours ago, Telegraph_it said:

USGS says it was a normal earthquake. It was at significant depth so easy to differentiate from man made. 

[Enchubben 5,564]

1 hour ago, Junior Miller said:

So 48 years after we started fucking with them on their own homeland they managed to knock down a few buildings and kill a few thousand people. After we were complicit in killing millions of theirs. 

Yeah, they're the only evil ones. Americans are the biggest butthurt pussies in the world. 

Quicker than I thought, but I knew eventually the left would start defending 9/11.    Perhaps you would describe those events as "some people doing something?"  Maybe Ilhan Omar really is a pioneer.

[David Dennison 19,133]

1 hour ago, Enchubben said:

Sure no country per say; but there was that whole 9/11 fiasco. 

So when do we start lobbing bombs at Saudi Arabia?

[JimmyJames 12,271]

11 hours ago, kevwun said:

Forget to switch to your sock account?

Y’all realize that probably half the trolls on this board spouting trump supporting nonsense are basically one guy/team right? 

[workswithseed 2,143]

2 minutes ago, JimmyJames said:

Y’all realize that probably half the trolls on this board spouting trump supporting nonsense are basically one guy/team right? 

Who are they all under?

[Enchubben 5,564]

4 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

So when do we start lobbing bombs at Saudi Arabia?

Probably not long after this supposed draft that people keep threatening in this thread begins. Especially if women are involved since apparently geography doesn't seem to be their strong suit.

[JimmyJames 12,271]

1 minute ago, workswithseed said:

Who are they all under?

Your mom. 

[GRHorn 105]

7 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

So when do we start lobbing bombs at Saudi Arabia?

When they start accepting something other than USD for their oil. 

[jimmyjazz 46,503]

22 minutes ago, Enchubben said:

Quicker than I thought, but I knew eventually the left would start defending 9/11. 

Oh, fuck off.

[Junior Miller 1,502]

21 minutes ago, Enchubben said:

Quicker than I thought, but I knew eventually the left would start defending 9/11.    Perhaps you would describe those events as "some people doing something?"  Maybe Ilhan Omar really is a pioneer.

Your problem is you have a very juvenile way of looking at things. You're stuck on the bullshit propaganda of good vs evil when In this scenario there is no good. People waging war on each other are two sides of evil. we are a little bit more complicit in the evil since we are the ones who kicked the whole damn thing off by fucking with them after world war II and continuing to fuck with them this entire time. 

if you're going to be a bully and start shit and start fucking with people then you'd better expect they're going to try to fight you back eventually. so don't give me any of this good vs evil bullshit that you and your right-wing Bible thumping idiots like to throw around. We're all ridiculously fucking evil and right now we need to work towards doing the right thing for this country and getting the fuck out of those places and stop messing with those people. 

[Junior Miller 1,502]

59 minutes ago, TXSG8R said:

Uh, swing and a miss there chief. I don’t support trump, I’ve been pretty clear about that from the jump. Feel free to look at any of my posts in here, I think he’s a royal piece of shit.

yeah right, every fucking trumpkin in the world always qualifies their love of the piece of shit by saying they didn't vote for him or they don't like them. You're not being original.

 

1 hour ago, TXSG8R said:

 

btw, what you’re describing is pretty much the definition of isolationism. We don’t get involved in other people’s shit unless they attack us?  It’s the biggest reason I can’t get on board with libertarianism. It doesn’t work, you can’t sit back and wait to get dragged into conflict. At the same time, I agree with you that our current policies are shit, Pompeo is an idiot that has dragged our state department down. I also agree that shooting first and asking questions later is wrong. Is that clear enough for you?

 

Once again your warhawk brainwashed mind doesn't get it. isolationism is literally isolating yourself as a nation from the rest of the world, and that's exactly what your butt buddy trump is doing by alienating all of our allies and spreading nothing but populist hatred and bullshit. What I said is to build the bridges back to a level where the US and it's allies can work together to bridge the gap through trade and diplomacy. You'll never fully trust anybody else but you can get to a point where you're not constantly fighting with them and invading their countries for their resources.

You say it doesn't work but through your entire lifetime America's never done anything differently so how would you ever know? Everything America has been doing for the last 55 years has blown up in our faces and caused all this turmoil, death, and extreme financial deficits with nothing tangible like a functioning healthcare system to show for it. It's time to try something different. 

1 hour ago, TXSG8R said:

 

There’s a lot of distance between supporting forward defense and warmongering.  You seem more interested in trying to shoehorn people into one tribe or the other, which if you were really as savvy as you try to come off as, would realize is just the other side of the same shit coin. Almost all of our interventions in the Middle East have backfired. That doesn’t mean we ignore the current reality that we are in. We came in and shit on Iraq. We have created a power vacuum that is still being worked out. Our presence is a counterbalance to not only Iran, but Russia, who aren’t squeamish about fucking around in other countries affairs. It’s the same reason we still maintain a presence in some of those allied countries you seem less worried about occupying. 

No, there isn't a distance between what I said and supporting forward defense. I said maintain presence in the area through alliances with countries in the area BUT NOT through invading and continuing to occupy foreign nations in a war effort. What I said is forward defense, and what you want is more of the same war activities. 

We aren't there to keep a balance or help them or any of that propaganda bullshit you soaked up. It's about financial interests and oil. It's why we need to rid ourselves of our complete dependence on oil and start building out alternative fuel infrastructure, all of which can easily be funded with a fraction of the printed money used to fund this 20+ year invasion war effort. We don't need to be a presence there other than maintaining our defensive positions in the region in case of attack on American soil. 

[TXSG8R 3,362]

10 minutes ago, Junior Miller said:

yeah right, every fucking trumpkin in the world always qualifies their love of the piece of shit by saying they didn't vote for him or they don't like them. You're not being original.

 

Once again your warhawk brainwashed mind doesn't get it. isolationism is literally isolating yourself as a nation from the rest of the world, and that's exactly what your butt buddy trump is doing by alienating all of our allies and spreading nothing but populist hatred and bullshit. What I said is to build the bridges back to a level where the US and it's allies can work together to bridge the gap through trade and diplomacy. You'll never fully trust anybody else but you can get to a point where you're not constantly fighting with them and invading their countries for their resources.

You say it doesn't work but through your entire lifetime America's never done anything differently so how would you ever know? Everything America has been doing for the last 55 years has blown up in our faces and caused all this turmoil, death, and extreme financial deficits with nothing tangible like a functioning healthcare system to show for it. It's time to try something different. 

No, there isn't a distance between what I said and supporting forward defense. I said maintain presence in the area through alliances with countries in the area BUT NOT through invading and continuing to occupy foreign nations in a war effort. What I said is forward defense, and what you want is more of the same war activities. 

We aren't there to keep a balance or help them or any of that propaganda bullshit you soaked up. It's about financial interests and oil. It's why we need to rid ourselves of our complete dependence on oil and start building out alternative fuel infrastructure, all of which can easily be funded with a fraction of the printed money used to fund this 20+ year invasion war effort. We don't need to be a presence there other than maintaining our defensive positions in the region in case of attack on American soil. 

K, it’s clear you’re a clown that has trouble thinking outside of two boxes. There’s no “trump sucks, but” in any of the stuff I post. He’s a piece of shit, no equivocating. I know it’s hard for you to understand, but you can support positions from one party, and still support positions from the other.  Tribalism is as much of a problem as all the other shit you’re ranting about. 

Ive never said we should invade anyone. My stance is there’s no putting that genie back in the bottle. Iraq got invaded, it got fucked up, and we are responsible. So that’s why we should maintain a presence. If Iraq says leave, we should leave, and that will be trump’s fault. Just like trump fucked up by shitting on the Kurds. It would be great to be able to fall back on our allies, but trump has fucked that up too. Until pompeo and trump are gone, that isn’t changing. That’s the reality of the situation we are in. 

Stop being a cunt about trying to box people in just because you don’t agree with them. 

 

[futureman 22,565]

1 hour ago, Junior Miller said:

Your problem is you have a very juvenile way of looking at things

lulz

[JimmyJames 12,271]

17 minutes ago, futureman said:

lulz

What’s so funny? 

[Fozzz 152]

As I said earlier in this thread, Trump isn’t the one  driving military escalation with Iran.  If Rubio had won the nomination and the presidency, we would probably already be at war with Iran. 
 

The Bolton-Pompeo effort to lure Trump into a war with Iran faltered when the president twice refused their advice to retaliate militarily over the shoot-down of a U.S. drone and the drone attack on a key Saudi oil facility.  Bolton got fired in September, but Pompeo continued what they had begun. On December 13, he condemned two attacks on a Iraqi military base located near the Baghdad Airport on Dec. 7 and Dec. 9, in which two Iraqi anti-terrorist troops were injured, and then added, “We must also use this opportunity to remind Iran’s leaders that any attacks by them, or their proxies of any identity, that harm Americans, our allies, or our interests will be answered with a decisive U.S. response.”

But the circumstances surrounding those rocket attacks made it unclear who might have fired the two to four mortars or rockets at the Iraqi Security Forces headquarters near Baghdad Airport, wounding two Iraqi counter-terrorism personnel. Opponents of the government had just launched new protests against repression of demonstrations by lethal forces by Iraqi security forces, including anti-riot police, and Moqtada al Sadr, who had been supporting the Iraqi government, but had just started to support the demonstrators. It is entirely possible that Sadrist militiamen or other opponents of the government had fired the rockets at the base in protest.

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/pompeos-gulf-of-tonkin-incident/

 

[Junior Miller 1,502]

1 hour ago, TXSG8R said:

K, it’s clear you’re a clown that has trouble thinking outside of two boxes. There’s no “trump sucks, but” in any of the stuff I post. He’s a piece of shit, no equivocating. I know it’s hard for you to understand, but you can support positions from one party, and still support positions from the other.  Tribalism is as much of a problem as all the other shit you’re ranting about. 

Ive never said we should invade anyone. My stance is there’s no putting that genie back in the bottle. Iraq got invaded, it got fucked up, and we are responsible. So that’s why we should maintain a presence. If Iraq says leave, we should leave, and that will be trump’s fault. Just like trump fucked up by shitting on the Kurds. It would be great to be able to fall back on our allies, but trump has fucked that up too. Until pompeo and trump are gone, that isn’t changing. That’s the reality of the situation we are in. 

Stop being a cunt about trying to box people in just because you don’t agree with them. 

 

Oh, Mr. Military bad ass is a thin skinned bitch who can't take it when someone points out how ridiculous he is? Of course, par for the mother fucking course. Your whole stance is invading Iraq was stupid so let's just go ahead and chase that stupidity with decades more stupidity by staying there and wasting trillions of dollars and countless lives all because Mr Neocon fuckhead is too stupid to understand the sunk cost fallacy. 

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the genius level bullshit that pervades our military. No wonder we're a failing civilization full of morons. 

[Thetexashammer 1,062]

14 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

I'm sure the families and friends of the 4,500 American troops who were killed in Iraq, and the 32,000 troops who were wounded in Iraq and their families are all thinking George W. Bush is a good family man.

W can burn in hell as far as I'm concerned.  I had friends, both those I served with, and one from high school, who were killed there.  It was ultimately his call to invade or not, and he chose to do so.  They are dead because of him.

 

Indeed. The remark about being a good family man was meant as an insult, like Czar Alexander III, who let millions die without ever giving a fuck.

Don't you argue on a daily basis that the government should be given control over the economy and personal freedom? Government is evil. Rs, Ds, doesn't matter. The output is almost always bad. None of them give a shit about you or me. This thread is the perfect, the absolute perfect example. 

The political media complex thrives on fear. If you are scared, they can control you, they can take your freedom and you money. "WMD" Bush said. Military draft, land wars, lather rinse repeat. I choose not to be manipulated, most people don't have the intellectual and emotional independence to prevent that.

If you want to avoid war, then you cannot let the media and the politicians control you. Which means you cannot let them make you scared all the time. That's how you stop war, with rational thought. Not by always asking the government to solve every problem. Because they give zero fucks about you or me, they only care about power and money.

 

[TXSG8R 3,362]

7 hours ago, Junior Miller said:

Oh, Mr. Military bad ass is a thin skinned bitch who can't take it when someone points out how ridiculous he is? Of course, par for the mother fucking course. Your whole stance is invading Iraq was stupid so let's just go ahead and chase that stupidity with decades more stupidity by staying there and wasting trillions of dollars and countless lives all because Mr Neocon fuckhead is too stupid to understand the sunk cost fallacy. 

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the genius level bullshit that pervades our military. No wonder we're a failing civilization full of morons. 

JFC you’re an idiot. What I’m saying is you don’t invade a country and then pull up stakes because that makes shit worse. Dubya invadimg without any plans for the backend was just about as bad. Actions have consequences, and the last time we started to pull out isis flooded the country. This time it will probably be Iran, or their proxies, since Iraq is majority Shiite anyway taking over fully. Trump killing Soleimani will probably directly achieve Soleimani’s goals. Kick the US out and allow Iran to take over. 

You cannot prosecute wars fully at 30k feet.  Look at countries like Libya where we tried that. You also don’t go and kill a fuckton of Iraqis and destroy their infrastructure and then go “sorry, helping fix all this shit costs too much, we are out.” I said it earlier, and I’ll say it again since you seem to be more interested in coming off like a tough guy rather than actually comprehending. When Iraq says to leave, we leave. I’m done with derailing this thread trying to get you to understand that I agree with a lot of the stuff you say, but that you’re still a moron for trying to dumb things down to binary arguments  

 

[Fudge Nuggets 19,285]

16 hours ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

Our resources would be much better spent building up a robust State Department with well educated diplomats that build constructive relationships with other countries instead of us just looking for places to park our combat troops in between deployments to bomb people. 

That's not going to juice up the stock prices of Lockheed-Martin and General Dynamics.  Buzz off, commie libtard.

[lemonlime 5,503]

9 hours ago, Thetexashammer said:

Indeed. The remark about being a good family man was meant as an insult, like Czar Alexander III, who let millions die without ever giving a fuck.

Don't you argue on a daily basis that the government should be given control over the economy and personal freedom? Government is evil. Rs, Ds, doesn't matter. The output is almost always bad. None of them give a shit about you or me. This thread is the perfect, the absolute perfect example. 

The political media complex thrives on fear. If you are scared, they can control you, they can take your freedom and you money. "WMD" Bush said. Military draft, land wars, lather rinse repeat. I choose not to be manipulated, most people don't have the intellectual and emotional independence to prevent that.

If you want to avoid war, then you cannot let the media and the politicians control you. Which means you cannot let them make you scared all the time. That's how you stop war, with rational thought. Not by always asking the government to solve every problem. Because they give zero fucks about you or me, they only care about power and money.

 

Lulz at a supporter of  someone who whips up fear of MS-13, Muslims, and windmill cancer saying this.

Edited January 9, 2020 by lemonlime

[atomheartbevo 90,119]

15 hours ago, HenryJames said:

 

I like the little war of words going on between Rand Paul and Mike Lee against Trump, Linda Graham, and Marco.

Shame Rand Paul will still bend the knee when he is told to do so, even though this is actually one of the areas he sometimes sticks to his guns on.

[atomheartbevo 90,119]

12 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

They don't debate it, that's the fucking problem.  The media still talks about this shit like it's kind of normal.  If they were doing their job they would be calling this shit out for what it is and daring his dipshit administration to defend it, instead of letting them openly lie to all of us.

When the administration decides not to hold formal press conferences, and will gladly try and boot reporters out of the pool, they get confused and don't know what to do.

We have come a long way from Walter Cronkite.  PBS has a special on the McCarthy hearings, and how Edward R. Murrow straight-up went after him, while others were quaking in their boots at the thought of it.

[kevwun 15,945]

Murrow got the go-ahead from Ike though.  The Republicans didn't get rid of him until his usefulness was done.