Re: [OT] Iraq

docdwarf@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
In article <uJ-dnaJYC-eXqm7bnZ2dnUVZ_uevnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxx>,
LX-i <lxi0007@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
SkippyPB wrote:
But the job is done. The stated goal was to bring down Saddam and
bring democracy to Iraq. Both have happened.
But can that democracy remain if they do not have trained military and police force?

This is, I believe, called 'moving the target'. If the goal was to 'bring democracy to Iraq' and 'democracy was brought to Iraq' then the job was done. If the job was 'bring democracy to Iraq and insure that it remains for (period of time)' then it was not stated as such; re-stating goals after they've been accomplished is not, in my experience, usually something done by folks known as 'honorable'.

And exactly what good is democracy that fails ten seconds after we walk out the door? That's irresponsible - best voiced by then Secretary of State Colin Powell. He called it the Pottery Barn principle - "you break it, you buy it." Democracy isn't something we can drop from an airlift - it has to be demonstrated, trained, and nurtured.

Of course - when all they hear are the Democrats saying that, after a while they begin to believe it.

Oh no... are those Pesky Jews back to controlling The Media again? I thought that in these days of modern time, with stuff like the Internet and a free market in ideas, that people could hear whatever they looked for.

Heh - if the Jews were running it, I think we'd be just fine. It's the terrorist-sympathizers that I have the problem with. :)

Not today, not tomorrow, not 50 years from now which is
how long we'll be there if current policies prevail. There must be a
political solution and that can't be driven by the US. Only Iraq's
leaders can drive that car.
Tell that to the Democrats (and some liberal Republicans) - *they're* the ones demanding timetables of the Iraqi government.

Ummmmm... didn't you just, a few paragraphs, ask if democracy can remain over time? That seems to be demanding a timetable; does that make you a Democrat or a liberal Republican?

You're "seeming" this wrongly. Establishing a democracy that will last is a far cry from saying "You will do (x) and (y) and (z) by a certain date, or we will issue very, very stern warnings to you." I saw a chart that the Iraqi parliament has accomplished 8 of 17 "benchmarks" suggested to them, while the Democrat Congress chiding them for missing benchmarks has accomplished 1 of the 7 things on which its candidates ran leading up to November 2006. Who's missing the target here?

The military is there to help the process, and give them guidance. But, the legislation is theirs, the voting is theirs, and the enforcement is theirs.

These seem to have been given to them, as noted above... and some say that it is the military's job 'to kill people and break things', not to 'help' and 'give guidance', as you say they are doing.

Training and reproducing is a natural part of maintaining a standing military - involving those of other nations in this training is commonplace. In my current job, I've met officers from several different countries who came to our Safety Center for training. We're not building their nations, but we share lessons learned and best practices.

The State Department folks are the ones giving the guidance.

Socialists in the Democratic Party? Where do you get this stuff and
how do you know they've always "hated" whose success and other stuff?
Just what are you talking about?
Where in our Constitution does it say that health care is a *right*? Where does it authorize the Federal government to run something like the Department of Education? Where is it written that it is the responsibility of the Federal government to bail out businesses who don't handle their books correctly, just because they provide a service that may have values to some Americans? Where are we authorized to pay farmers *not* to grow things?

All this social engineering legislation, welfare, government health care, is *all* socialistic.

Might it be asked where you found your definition of 'socialism'? 'Having been influenced by Federal policy' is not, last I looked, in any definition with which I am familiar; the ones I was taught used phrases like 'collective ownership of the means of production' and 'government administration of the distribution of goods'.

Government has no money of its own. To have money, it has to take that money from its citizens; this taking of money, taxation, being done at the point of a gun. (You don't pay, you go to jail.) Anything the government does with the money it seizes from its citizens, the citizen cannot choose to do something differently. This falls under the second definition you gave above - government administration of the distribution of goods.

Choices are being made for Americans every day, with the money taken from us, and being used for who knows what. Do I want to use my money to bail out an airline? Nope. I fly occasionally, and when I do, *then* they get some of my money to try to help their bottom line. Why are my tax dollars funding schools? Among my three kids, they have a total of one semester in a public school. So, I've basically payed for everyone else's kids to go to school, and I *still* had to write a check to a school (when we sent them to private school) or buy textbooks myself (when we home-school). Sure, it's my choice, and it's one that I've made - but why should I still be taxed to fund public schools? I don't care about public schools!

The same thing applies to all the issues I mentioned above, and then some. When the government takes *my* money to give it to someone else (not the aforementioned "common" things), *that's* socialism. I'm a pretty charitable guy - but I can assure you that if I had all my charity dollars to allocate as I see fit, none would be going to Planned Parenthood, and probably none would go to the United Way either. Yet, last time I checked, both of these organizations received some sort of subsidy from the Federal government.

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