Animals?

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
Gizmo:
Arab countries are pissed off since ever since the Cold War when the US started playing power politics funding one group over another to try and force a friendly regime into power. And you can be certain that the complete backing the US gives to the barbarian regime in a series of Israeli governments has made the US the number one enemy to many arab nations.
I agree that the US has had its self-interest at heart when trying to establish influence in the Middle East. However, I would aslo say the the USSR was trying to do exactly the same thing and probably would still like to, given that it's their southern border, if they didn't have money problems now.

Barbarian regime though? I'm not sure why you'd characterize the Israeli government that way...

Look at the current situation in Israel, with Israeli gunships firing rockets at kids with stones. Tanks surrounding arab villages. Their behaviour is condemned by all but one nation on earth. Care to guess which nation is solidly behind Israel?
Curious that you don't condemn throwing rocks to begin with. Is that an acceptable form of protest or something? And I do believe the Palestinian behavior has been condemned by everyone also, at least at the point of the disco attack.

Care to explain why the Europeans threatened to follow the US/Israeli pullout of the UN Racism talks if they weren't behind them?

YJ: As Zadok said, I don't think that's what MOST Arab nations want. Just a few extremists (same as the white supremacists/militias in the US).

It was mentioned on the news yesterday that there was a confrontation of an Arab pilot (working for an American Airline), who got drunk at a bar and refused to pay his bill. Could he have gotten away with this kind of behaviour in an Islamic country? NO, NO, NO!!!!!!!!!
I was thinking that he couldn't even drink (doesn't the Koran prohibit alcohol?)

I'm not even going to bother responding to MrGnome's tirade; as he said he cannot be convinced anyway and he's entitled to his opinion, but its MY opinion that its already agreed that it's so far out there. Not to mention certain discrepancies in it anyway... :rolleyes:
 
T

Thallid Ice Cream Man

Guest
Did you hear?

A man on the news a couple of nights ago said that the proposed war against terrorism could take MONTHS!!! :rolleyes:

I am one of the people on this site most likely to be called naive in any thread.
Basically, I don't believe in killing at all; this is mostly an ethical belief. I've already been called naive countless times. I don't mind that.
But the thought that by working for a couple of months to finally catch about 20 people and try them in court we can eliminate an entire ideology for all time is the most naive and ludicrous implication I've ever heard in my life.

Our economy should not be a concern at all in this case, since it clearly isn't as important as people dying.


Edit: First we were calling them animals, now a cancer? 2 pages and a step down the evolutionary ladder.
 
D

Duel

Guest
I'm surprised. I espouse almost exactly the same views at TICM. I'm glad there's somebody else out there....
 
M

Mr.Gnome

Guest
I have thought about what i posted earlier and decided that i really don't feel that way anymore. i guess that i only felt like that because I was angry about these attacks. I am sorry Gizmo and anyone else that i said things abou in my post. :( I now realize that the best decision is not to kill any select group of people but to find who is responsible and punish the ones that did this. Blaming one country or race is very wrong and yes that would be sinking to their level, something i hope that i never do. I apologize once more and hope that everyone can get through this horrible disaster.
 
D

Duel

Guest
Thank you, Mr. Gnome. That's the most comforting thing I've heard yet, on these forums. I can only hope that everywhere around the country, people are doing just what you're doing now.
 
Z

Zadok001

Guest
Thank you, Mr. Gnome. :) I'm sorry I was so angry at you earlier, and I hope I left no lasting impressions. I can only hope, as Duel, that the rest of the world will slowly come to a similar conclusion.

I stand for justice, not for vengeance.
 
G

Griffith_se

Guest
Sure he had a change of heart.

It's the grieving process, it’s a well-known process.

That's why you shouldn't jump on people that have fresh wounds.

This is what I've been trying to say all along, not very well apparently.

Time heals, time will bring back a clear thinking
process.
2 Hours, or 2 days, 2 weeks maybe not enough time to wipe the blood from a lot of peoples eye.

Have a little faith in people. I know it's
hard, but try.
 
Z

Zadok001

Guest
I know, Griffith. I've been doing my best to try to prevent the rash decision making that comes hand in hand with stage two of grieving - Anger. Once we're out of that stage, we can get through this. In the meanwhile, I'll stand right where I am, trying to bring some hesitation into the minds of those who are angry. All we have to to is wait out the anger being drawn from this incident, and we can make it. But if we start making rash judgements, we're screwed. :)

I'm not trying to attack the people advocating immediete and violent action. I'm trying to slow them down. Just a day or two, that's all I need to stall for. Then we have a chance of pulling out of this spiral without war.
 

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
TICM: Actually, I think the economy is a slight concern because to a lot fo people, if the unemployment lines grow and a recession really begins, they will point to this moment and have "another" reason to blame whoever's responsible. And might push for war because it would pump up the arms companies (war is always good at propping up economies). So there's a slight reason to help the economy before that happens, so people have less reason to blame others.
 
T

Thallid Ice Cream Man

Guest
I agree about the economy. We don't want this to turn into a miniature version of the 30's and 40's.
But a lot of the people who were complaining about the economy approaching a recession were the same people who would most gain from a war starting (namely, people in businesses). So I'm a little annoyed at that. Certainly I don't particularly want a recession, but (IMHO) there are more important things to be doing right now than pumping money into the markets.

In general, I was being a little too cynical in that last post. Sorry.
 
B

Baskil

Guest
Originally posted by Spiderman
(war is always good at propping up economies).


Not always. IIRC, didn't the US economy take a dip even before the last sortie over Iraq was completed? And the way this war (if it comes to that :eek: ) will probably be fought best case scenario, it won't help the ecomony at all.
 

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
TICM: I was unaware that those certain people made those such remarks, so sorry if I misunderstood what you were saying.

Baskil: I am also uncertain of the veracity of your statement (or mine, since you question it). However, since Desert Storm was one of the shortest wars we've had, I don't think it can be applied here. A couple of months is not enough time for an indicator. I was thinking in broad scopes of the arms industry and the length of time it takes to produce a missile, plane, or tank (as examples), the people needed to make them, etc. I don't know if there was enough tim to make any of those except missiles in Desert Storm.
 
G

Gizmo

Guest
I think its a fallacy. A serious war, Total War, on the scale of WW2, will lead towards a case of full employment as industry and manufacturing take up the slack and turn out war materiel.
However in this case 90% of the guns/tanks/missiles are already made and sitting in stockpiles.

However a war always brings uncertainty, and uncertainty always brings a downturn in the stock markets.
 

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
In today's Baltimore Sun, there was a small blurb about this buried in an article about the fed's rate cut today. It says "Many economists have been comparing the present situation to what happened in the summer of 1990, when Iraq's invasion of Kuwait spurred a recession marked by a lapse of consumer confidence and a stock market decline.

But in the summer of 1990, the federal funds rate was a lofty 8 percent. It took the Fed two years and 17 reductions to get the rate to 3 percent, where it served as the launching pad for the economic boom of the 1990s.

This time, by contrast, the Fed has been loosening credit aggressively since January. The funds rate began 2001 at 6.5 percent...."

So Baskil was correct, there was a slight dip in the economy during the Gulf War. But as noted, there are differences between the two and what I'm still uncertain of is if the Fed was trying to cut rates before the Gulf War, like they were today this year, or not, which provides for further discomparison.
 
Top