You forgot to say "Oh, and JIM is paranoid." :-b

Jim

As always, I feel strongly both ways. :)

Obama is a hope-o-crite. But since McCain thought it'd be funsies to help him & Bush throw the country (and everything Johnny used to stand for, for that matter) under the bus this past month, I don't have a lot of good to say about him at this point either.

And I've been aware of Area.... er, Executive Order... 51 since it was signed last summer. Add that to the Patriot Act, approved wiretapping, etc.... well, let's just say I've never been a big fan of the ACLU but I appreciate at least SOME aspects of them more these days, and that tim's scenario has passed through my own head more than a few times in recent months.

I think the most likely scenario of all is that we'll be mouthing the words "President Obama" in a few months, and that he'll live up to my promise of becoming the black Jimmy Carter (sans the orthodoxy, and as jim fairly points out in this particular instance, you have to wonder about the faith of someone who thinks infanticide is a GOOD thing)....

But yeah, let's see where we're at this time next month. Unfortunately, nothing surprises me anymore.

And just so no-one gets hung up on terminology -- feel free to substitute "humanity" for "faith" in that penultimate sentence. It actually makes the irony/ manipulativeness of Obama's message of "hope" MORE apparent, I think.

Infanticide a good thing? Never. I don't think Obama, and I know I never, wish abortions upon women. We don't go out beating the bushes (although I like the sound of that) forcing abortions on women. Just as no one wants to force anyone into gay marriage. It's about choice and, by definition, choice spawns disagreement. It's when any ideology decides that the choices collectively made and agreed upon by their particulat construct are, indeed, the one and only right choice that hope is lost.

Look at it this way: if there is a god, then let all sins, real or imagined, be dealt with between the god and the sinner. We can only be responsible for our own actions.

OK, now I'll post something funny.
tb

"Look at it this way: if there is a god, then let all sins, real or imagined, be dealt with between the god and the sinner. We can only be responsible for our own actions."

Announcer: "Fastball over the heart of the plate to Carl Simmons, and he..."

A) let's it go by as usual, completely alienating Christ and the brethren with silence, excsuing Byrnes as an exception as usual, and making Jim come in to do stuff he should have been doing 30 years ago.

B) says "wait one freakin' minute here, this clown is dealing with innocent human life here; I HAVE TO come out strong against what he is saying. After all, what we are passionate about defines who we are. And why in the HELL would I want to be anything less than as passionate as Christ to these innocent babies.

We'll see; but I have a feeling it will be

C) use this post as an occasion to make Jim out to be the bad guy.

D) Say "I don't need to do C, because you already do that yourself, Jim".

Jim

How's about E: Realize that B has already been done here & elsewhere.

And granted, D does take care of itself here on a regular basis. :P

But OK, sure, if it thrills yr ass to see what everyone here already knows yet again, and on the assumption that being a broken record helps instead of hurts (although it's apparent to all but one person here that it only polarizes further):

Ultimately each person DOES have to answer to God. But there are several tens of thousands of laws for much less horrific -- and FAR less permanent -- crimes. You take a life, you can't bring it back. And that's not OK.

Just like it's not OK, BTW, to kill hundreds of thousands on the other side of the world (and arguably millions, if you go back 60 years to when we started doing it) in the ever-expanding name of empire-building.

Jim won't lump them together, and I suspect you won't either, tim, for the exact opposite reasons. But *I* do.


Which again, is why BOTH presidential options are unpalatable to me. Neither is offering a better world, just different versions of more of the same -- which, by definition, is farther down the craphole we're already headed down.

Which, it's worth noting, makes abortion such an attractive option to people who oughta know better.

There. Now, is everyone HAPPY? :P

I thought it was Hitler that killed millions, and the US that went in and stopped it before it got worse.

Jim

"Just like it's not OK, BTW, to kill hundreds of thousands on the other side of the world (and arguably millions, if you go back 60 years to when we started doing it) in the ever-expanding name of empire-building."

Where are the American colonies then? Is there even an Amercian Commonwealth somewhere that nobody knows about?

You say we've been killing millions and buildng our empire for years. Where? Which other country has allegiance to us?

Jim

Announcer: "He lines the ball right back to the pitcher for a quick out."

Jim

There ya go Tim. You're not so bad. Sure you vote to kill babies; but at least you have the dignity to want the civilized world to lose to terrorists. They wouldn't hurt us if we didn't hurt them, right? You have Carl's assurance, that you're OK.

So sleep in heavenly peace, and never mind the babies who have that peace interrupted because of people like yourself.

Jim

Anyhow...

Alright Carl here, and Larry in the boxing post!

Flexing a little more muscle, anyways.

There might be some hope here.

Keep it up, and I won't feel the need to chime in anymore, and Tim can finally be free of me.

Jim

PS BTW Tim, I gotta apologize for calling you a "jackass of colossal proportions". I merely meant to say that you often ACT LIKE a jackass of colossal proportions. Only God can be the real judge. I hope my saying of that did not provoke your latest over the top post.

jim.... perhaps you need to study the history of the middle east, and the USA's involvement in their affairs for the last 60-80 years.

that might help you understand what carl was saying.

Let's try this again, however briefly (this way there's less to twist or deliberately ignore :P). A short list:

Musharraf
Reza Pahlavi
Saddam
bin Laden

All of whom have been on the U.S. payroll, all under the excuse of "an enemy of an enemy is my friend." All of whom have come back to bite us on the ass, either directly or because we've perpetually alienated the nations we placed them as puppets over and/or to rebel against.

Which is worse, abortion or puppeteering? To me personally, it's abortion, no doubt. But neither evil is justifiable. On for that matter, neither is both sides going "rah-rah, my evil's not as bad as yours, so therefore I'M RIGHT and justified in abusing you any way I like." I'm thinking God feels differently about THAT, too.

And I'll take a line-out over a fixed game any day.

So November came a little early this year.... :P

Alright, let me keep listening. Can you elaborate a little bit more on your "perhaps millions" comment?

Why do you give that estimate?

More questions coming, no preaching, just questions.

Jim

i would guess, the total over our 60 years of meddling, and installing dictators over there......

Good guess. We're more than halfway past the million mark just post-Saddam. Then throw in Saddam himself, since we propped him to beat up on those Iranians who overthrew our guy over there just cause he'd imprisoned between 25,000-100,000 for daring to dissent against him (which, of course, sounds NOTHING at all like Saddam), and so on, and on, and on....

1) So an honest question is, would you have been happier if we would have sent our own soldiers over there to fight both Iranians and inevitalby have skirmishes with the Iraqis too?

You have to admit its a fair question.

Unless, you have an honest beef regarding what our intentions were to go there, in the first place? Which, if so, please educate, cuz I got moms and babies on the front burner and I don't have time to Google and wiki.

2) If the past is the past and mistakes were made in who we propped up, what good would it do us to do nothing now and let that dictator continue to do brutal things? Isn't that like saying that one shouldn't treat an STD because they shouldn't have been promiscuopuis in the first place?

3) For any legitmate beefs on this issue, doesn't is still seem like true love and patriotism try to understand why things were done in the first place and give the benefit of the doubt? And again, does every time our child try something, we remind them of their faults and failures, or always assume their worst motives? If that wouldn't honestly be loving our kids, then shouldn't we try to more honestly love our country? All of our motives couldn't have been bad and selfish in the Middle East all of the time, now could they?

4) Not trying to be a difficult person, or to disagree, but can you give a little more substantiation of the "half past a million" number of casualties that WE are solely responsible for? Doesn't being a member of al-Qaeda and trying to overthrow efforts towards a peaceful democracy suggest some guilt on the part of the oppressors? If there was not a barrage of al-Qaeda on Baghdad after our initial mission, would there have been as many casualties? Was it our fault that Osama bin Laden said that the great frontier of the battle is Iraq and that the insurgents came over in droves?

5) Also, is it a bad thing, that we stayed in Iraq to defend what was achieved? And wouldn't it be wrong to knock us focusing there, if that is where al-Qaeda was focusing?

6) Does the focus of your discussion give a sense that the US are the oppressors, and that somehow the other side is innocent or less guilty? And, if so, is that honestly 100% fair?

Just seriously think about those, and seriously give YOUR country a fair shake in the answers. It is OK to think highly of your country. It is not the same thing as excusing shortcomings or past mistakes.

Jim

problem is, they are not past mistakes. they are mistakes we're still making. putting people in power, propping up dictators, puppets.....

we should have minded our own business then, and now.

why did other countries help us, in our revolution? their motives were selfish, i assure you. just as the USA's motives are selfish for meddling. i'm not saying that in and of itself is a bad thing, the selfishness, i mean. it's the job of the gov't to watch out for the country, first and foremost. but the means AND the end suck, in our meddling in foreign affairs.

We're assuming that the motives are selfish. What do you perceive as the exact motives, and how are they selfish?

Let's take one case at a time. With a lack of information fresh on my mind or being presented, I'm going to assume that our motives were probably noble. It just as much, or more, fair than assuming that our motives were selfish in a bad sense.

Jim

Also, should securing the well-being of our country be labeled as a selfish expansion of our empire?

The Roman Empire preserved itself from barbarians with buffer-zone countires like Aremenia by trade agreements, and defense agreements, etc. What was ineherently wrong about that? Why is it a sin to preserve the security and well-being of our citizens? ARe there some free peoples thta we are taking over and enslaving? Or are there enslaved people tht we are freeing?

Jim

didn't say being selfish was wrong. in fact i said it isn't. the selfishness of looking out for our country is good. the result is not.

are their people dead in iraq and iran because of leaders WE put into power?

OK, so next time we put someone in power, let's be more careful. I think we're doing a better job of that in Iraq right now. So, let's learn from the past AND do what we're supposed to today.

Jim

saddam in iraq, and the shah in iran looked pretty good at the time, too...

So let's give up hopep and stop trying?

That's what I don't get about this discussion. Its like so what are you ultimately saying?

I'm really at a loss. Its like, "well son, you lost one job, so don't try getting another because you'll screw that one up too."

One thing I'm trying to get at with you and Carl is,what is your ultimate point? That the US is no good, and incapable of doing anything that's good and works?

That's what so weird about the discusion. I'm trying to find where you're leading, and all I'm seeing is the dead-end of an unfair cynicism about the US.

Now, anybody can do that. It takes no talent whatsoever. But as far as serving a fair and sober picture, that's a different story.

Jim

what i've been saying for years is, we need to get the hell out of there, and stay out.

it's not like we had one job and lost it. it's more like "well son, you've been trying to be a doctor for some time now, and it seems you keep killing your patients. i think maybe you oughta think about not being a doctor anymore"

so it's time for us to quit trying to fix that place. it ain't none of our business. we've screwed them over enough.

Again, I'm all for nuclear war because we've got it coming. The thing that both saddens and fascinates me about the above argument, and by extention, the American Culture Wars is just how freaking convinced bothg sides are that they're right. I look at Obama and say, how can anyone vote for McCain while Jim, and millions opthers, look at McCain and say how can anyone vote for Obama. Personally I side w/Carl and Larryl here on the Imperialist stuff. Why Jim, and millions of others, can't (or refuse) to see American culpability in the Middle East is as beyond me as, well, how anyone could vote for McCain.

Certainly I'm not one of the great minds of my generation, never claimed to be, but seriously folks, even an idiot like me can see we're doomed. It's only a matter of time before one of these backwater Stalins we've bought and paid for starts believing his own publicitry as well as whatever pre-medieval fantasy his ancient texts provide and will 'push the button' and the last thing you'll see (before Jesus, if yr right. Ore lucky) will be the blinding red flash of humanity's end.


Everybody happy NOW!!??

tb

"Certainly I'm not one of the great minds of my generation, never claimed to be, but seriously folks, even an idiot like me can see we're doomed."

Well, ...

since we're all doomed to die whether the bombs fall or not...

and in not too long from now, ...

then why don't we think about how we can be un-doomed for the next life, ...

and maybe get some better perspective on this life in the process?

And here's another question:

If one of these backwater Stalins gets a fancy idea about dropping the bombs, ...

will there not be a lot of normal leaders that move in to halt the process?

One thing that I can agree that is obvious from history is that empires come to an end.

The longest lasting empire was the Roman Empire. However, there are some pitfalls that it ran into that we can avoid. For instance, 20 hour work weeks, and constant holidays. We're over-worked here. Plus, we got the voting both. So, so far, we seem to have a lot going for us. I'm not too worried about people speaking Hispanic being a downfall.

Jim

Regarding the puppets we put up in the ME (and I'm not saying that I accept that premise to any significant degree), here's what I believe that y'all need to realize:

- If we set up a puppet, you'll complain.

- If we send in our own troops, you'll complain, too.

- If we do nothing, and let get things too bad, you'll complain that we did nothing (even though you may want to deny that you would, right now).

So, the point is, that there has to be some respect and fairness towards the presidents, who at least have the gonads to try to do something, to make life better in the long term. And its not fair to say that it never does. We are much better off with Saddam out of Kuwait, etc.

Any jackass can sit back and take pot shots at any and every effort. Its takes no talent, it takes no class, it takes no long-term vision, it takes no optimism, and it takes no patriotism. Underlying all of that may be a lack of hope, which the good book says is the most important thing next to l-o-v-e, which is another thing we should have for our country.

Jim

I... I like america.

Jim

"The thing that both saddens and fascinates me about the above argument, and by extention, the American Culture Wars is just how freaking convinced both sides are that they're right. I look at Obama and say, how can anyone vote for McCain while Jim, and millions opthers, look at McCain and say how can anyone vote for Obama."

Everybody had different experiences and therefore different perspectives.

That's why:

- table
- information
- tools of logic
- sincerity
- turn caricatures into pictures

That's all there is. Sincerity is it. Its the only way to get at truth. Pride has to wait at the door. Fear has to wait at the door. Comfort has to wait at the door. Those things complicate everything. All there is, is sincerity; that's all there is.

Jim

you're right about a few things, jim...

yea.. we have no business setting up a puppet leader anywhere, ever. i don't want someone doing it here, and i don't think we should do it there.

if we send our troops into somewhere where we have no business being, i'll complain, you're right about that, too. especially if we're sending them in to get rid of someone WE put in power in the first place....meanwhile, i'll complain that we DON'T send them the places they SHOULD be.

the president's job is to take care of US first, not iraqis, iranians, or anyone else. saddam being in or out of kuwait didn't affect your life one little bit.

any jackass can blindly just say we're right. it takes real patriotism to say "hey.. wait a damn minute. this isn't right."

hope? i have a lot of it... it's just not based on the US of A.

and don't try to imply for one damn minute that i don't love my country, you pompous ass.

what uniform did you wear? what service have you given to this country that has given you so much? what have you DONE, besides run your mouth on message boards?

what are you doing for the troops who are serving now? how many letters? how many care packages? you say you support them... do you do it in any ways besides your words here?

don't talk to me about loving this country. it has it's flaws, but you've never heard me say i'd rather live anywhere else (well except for costa rica, and i just want the atmosphere, there.... and you notice i'm still here)..... because it's still the best damn thing going. at it's dead level worst, it's still better than most of the world.

loving my country doesn't mean i have to agree lock-step with our leadership. that type of country has quite a different name and ideal. if that's what YOU want, china awaits you with open arms. o wait.. except you can only have one kid there.

"and don't try to imply for one damn minute that i don't love my country, you pompous ass."

If you're constantly talking down our every move, what the hell am I supposed to think. The way I act, is that I can say "while I think this was good, I think we need to adjust this." I have yet to get the idea from you or Carl that the bad guys are the bad guys and the US is a force of good. Its what is NOT said that speaks louder than what IS said. You'd think its al-Qaeada fighting al-Qaeda instead of The US fighting al-Qaeda, form listening to you guys. What credit do you guys give to Bush for anything, anything at all?

"what uniform did you wear? what service have you given to this country that has given you so much? what have you DONE, besides run your mouth on message boards?"

I give a huge shot to the economy with all of my kids, and I give blood to the American Red Cross. I've voted for candidates who will fund and back our military and I encourage others to do so. I stand for the ideals that veterans have fought for, that some people in our modern age have lost sight of.

"what are you doing for the troops who are serving now? how many letters? how many care packages? you say you support them... do you do it in any ways besides your words here?"

I sent a guy in Afghanistan a "Surfonic" CD, a few other things, and a nice note. He never wrote back, and there were about 50 other people at my work writing to him, so I haven't written him since. I also contributed so some guys in Iraq can get a Catholic response to the anti-Catholic message they were hearing from some Protesant ministries.

My family and I pray for our troope all the time, which the good book says puts angels to work; and we believe it does.

I got two boys who are proud members of the Cub Scouts of America.

Look, I know, you wear the uniform, you put your life on the line, that's the supreme act of patriotism; and I truly thank you for it.

Can't you see where I'm just saying tht acting like Irq is some kind of a total failure, or simply an attempt to be imperialistic, is degrading to our leader and troops? And that maybe, just maybe, it isn't a true, fair, or accurate portryal? Is there anything noble about it?

Jim

jim..... learn the difference between loving your country, and loving the current leadership.

so in other words, you have kids and talk a lot.

and you sent one CD to a soldier.

what on earth do the cub scouts have to do with it?

you should exchange letters or e-mails with some troops, jim, and find out what they feel about the war. i could send you dozens of letters from officers.... not kids who joined for college money, but career officers, who lead troops in combat, who think we have no business in that country (iraq).... you going to tell them they don't love their country too?

for a long time, you said you were a true friend to some of us, because you were willing to call us out on the things we were wrong about, instead of enabling us to continue in those things.......

true love for your country is not being an enabler when you think things are wrong.

but you don't get that, because you can't seperate the country, from the president.

Do any of those who don't think we should be there, think that we should pull out right now, and lose everything we gained?

Jim

some do.

i don't even support that, and you know that.

we broke it, we need to fix it.

HEADLINES: Laster admits that we must "stay entrenched in Iraq, exapnd our forces, and kick the rest of the Middle East's ass" while we're still over there!

Jim

not even in your wildest dreams.

HEADLINES: "Laster prefers Moody Blues to 77s".

Jim

I'm thinking more: "Jim prefers hallucinogens to 'ludes."

Which is kind of surprising, given yr bent for the MBs. :P

The Moody Blues are all upstanding members of their local churches. None of them has ever touched one drug, even once.

They are the true members of The Village Green Preservation Society, that The Kinks can only sing about.

Alright, all that bull and manure, aside, the fact is, I can play any Moodies album any time for my kids without any worry of any bad messages. Any other secular group, forget it.

Jim

Sincerity. That is one puts the Moodies way ahead of all these other groups: sincerity. No bad boy image, no nothing, just plain regular guys. Try playing their "Strange Days" CD sometime; no pretension, pure pop genius, total sincerity. The songs aren't afraid to be slow or to hold off on picking up the pace. But every song is completely sincere. I'm telling you, its so refreshing when you think of Stones, Kinks, Beatles, etc. and some of the silliness and smut they have dotted their work with all too much.

Jim

Dude, get a grip. I'm just talking about nearly every other Moodies fan I've ever encountered. ;D

there are other fans?

i can't even get through nights in white satin, before i'm looking for some decent music.

Well, I gotta admit, ...

"In Search of The Lost Chord"

has its share of stuff for druggies.

However, me, being of a Christian spiritual mind, can glean deeper meanings out of that album; and my kids are totally oblivious to the references.

I guess its like the hippy definition of enlightened is "on drugs", whereas my definiton of enlightened is "enlightened".

So David Crosby will get something other than me out of, say, The Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows".

Jim

And Charles Manson will get something different out of "Helter Skelter" than even David Crosby, although those two are very much of like mind, with Dave being pro-choice and all.

Jim

tim here.

I hope whatever's out there blesses you.

Sincerity, yeah, once you can fake that you've got it made.

And if the Moody Blues never did drugs than how do you explain 'cold hearted orb that rules the night'?


Face it Jim, it was either drugs or homosexuality!