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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[Leafsnail]

If we're blatantly morally in the wrong it would be good to stop being blatantly morally in the wrong, though.  That would also reduce the desire for people to join terrorist groups.

[misko27]

On that, would it be better under a Republican? Voting for Obama is a lesser of two evils. Seriously, do you genuinely think, that voting for a non-libertarian conservative would make the situation better?

I do, actually, at this point. Because then the Democrats would have been cast in the role of the opposition, and the outcry could have potentially ended with them putting forward an actually decent candidate. Instead, we have the Republicans having to fill the role of the voice of reason, which is going about as well as you'd expect. For all their flaws, they AND the democrats all tend to be far more reasonable when a Republican is in power, because the Republican radicals lose a lot of their rhetoric and ability to influence the party, and the Democrats have a reason to exhibit a tiny bit of backbone and stand against poor legislation (rare as it is for them to actually do so even then).

I don't know anymore if Obama was the lesser of two evils. As far as I'm concerned, he's effectively declared war on the concept of democratic government, because without an informed populace there is no Democracy, only a farce. And he has fought at every turn to leave the American public unenlightened and powerless, while attempting to placate them so they don't complain about it.

I mean you could not vote, but then you lose your power to change things.

What power to change things? Because it's not that often that votes change much of all, and even rarer that you can actually tell in advance what kind of change your voting for. What I need to is get involved in politics - but I'm afraid I wouldn't survive the experience, hah.

Oh yeah, and a response to this. First off, let me state that I a a bit more authoritarian then many on this board, so keep this in mind. Two, while you bring up a good point, the Republicans are not exactly being the voice of reason (we are just barely getting them saying it "might" have gone overboard, impressive given they despise him) The Repubs in the Committee on Intelligence have agreed with him mostly (including John McCain  who was actually a victim of torture.)


And I plan to get involved with politics assuming I can pull my educational career together.




Anyway, terrorism. They may not be faceless mooks, But Ideology can press them into such. However, these are still humans. People who murder are fundamentally human beings, no matter how much we like to pretend otherwise. And given this, there is a necessary rationality in all groups. religion helps justify some of the insaner things (After all, if you believe you get to go to Heaven for murdering people, why would you fear death?) and many end up on some level of sane. After all, 2+2=5, but when making a gun, 2+2 must equal 4. These people aren't exactly rushing at the government like lemmings. They hide, they fear death. They are rational.


Dealing with Terrorists in such a manner as recommended here is Very unwise. Remember Israel handing over 100 prisoners for one man? Yeah, like that doesn't happen often. North Korea is another example. We always concede to them, and then they will do it AGAIN.

If we're blatantly morally in the wrong it would be good to stop being blatantly morally in the wrong, though.  That would also reduce the desire for people to join terrorist groups.

There are very, very, very few things that are blatant. But we are discussing how to defeat Terrorism, not why they do it. The difference between Freedom Fighters and Terrorist are likewise a Separate issue.

[DWC]

If we're blatantly morally in the wrong it would be good to stop being blatantly morally in the wrong, though.  That would also reduce the desire for people to join terrorist groups.

Sure, but I can't think of any terrorist group that really holds the moral high ground either. The Earth/ Animal Liberation Front or something? Plenty of these organization play the victim, but then go right around and massacre people that have nothing to do with whatever greivences they claim to trying to rectify anyways.

[Leafsnail]

I wouldn't say terrorist groups have the moral high ground, but the immoral acts (eg killing civilians) performed by western countries helps them recruit people.

[GlyphGryph]

But we are discussing how to defeat Terrorism, not why they do it.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry, I really don't.

[Reelya]

If we're blatantly morally in the wrong it would be good to stop being blatantly morally in the wrong, though.  That would also reduce the desire for people to join terrorist groups.

Sure, but I can't think of any terrorist group that really holds the moral high ground either. The Earth/ Animal Liberation Front or something? Plenty of these organization play the victim, but then go right around and massacre people that have nothing to do with whatever grievances they claim to trying to rectify anyways.

Well you can say the same for U.S. forces bombing civilians. Hiroshima for example? I read that Nagasaki was mainly done to test the effects of the 2nd bomb type, and to justifiy the departmental expense of producing 2 type of bombs, rather for any military purpose. The Japanese were already well ready to surrender after the first bombing, and their forces were already completely broken before Hiroshima, with their airforce and navy destroyed, and USA already having complete air superiority over their entire homeland.

Basically it looks more like the genocide of 200,000 people was purely a political exercise aimed at other countries, not even at Japan itself who, already having their armed forces and industry destroyed, needed no such message about American superiority. Japan hadn't even had any oil supplies since April 1945, so, how effective do you think they were going to be after 4 months with no oil supplies against a nation who flew constant heavy bomber raids over their cities?

You might say "they attacked us first", but you're talking cities full of civilians (Hiroshima, like Dresden, had no military or political significance) under dictatorships. Would you accept the "they attacked us first" line if a foreign power bombed civilians in a non-military-related city in the USA following an American declaration of war?

[Owlbread]

I was getting my leftie-fix the other day by watching some Oliver Stone's untold history. He talked about how the Japanese only moved to surrender after the Soviets invaded Manchuria, and it was a Soviet invasion they truly feared - such as the annexation of Hokkaido and such. I reckon an Ainu SSR could have been created with all the Ainu people in Hokkaido and Sakhalin.

I'm going to quote my favourite Gaelic poem in English because I think it's relevant:

At the Stones of Callanish yesterday I heard one woman saying to another: 'This is where they burnt the children in early times'. I did not see druids among the planets nor sun nor robe: but I saw a beautiful blue ball like heaven cracking and children with skin hanging to them like the flags in which Nagasaki was sacrificed.

[Reelya]

I was getting my leftie-fix the other day by watching some Oliver Stone's untold history. He talked about how the Japanese only moved to surrender after the Soviets invaded Manchuria, and it was a Soviet invasion they truly feared - such as the annexation of Hokkaido and such. I reckon an Ainu SSR could have been created with all the Ainu people in Hokkaido and Sakhalin.

I'm going to quote my favourite Gaelic poem in English because I think it's relevant:

At the Stones of Callanish yesterday I heard one woman saying to another: 'This is where they burnt the children in early times'. I did not see druids among the planets nor sun nor robe: but I saw a beautiful blue ball like heaven cracking and children with skin hanging to them like the flags in which Nagasaki was sacrificed.

Well, the Soviets invaded Manchuria on the same day as the Nagasaki nuke was dropped, so while it's true to say that, it's also highly speculative about what was the trigger.


Anyway, the Japanese had been trying to end the war since almost a year before Hiroshima:

http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v16/v16n3p-4_Weber.html

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Japan Seeks Peace

Months before the end of the war, Japan's leaders recognized that defeat was inevitable. In April 1945 a new government headed by Kantaro Suzuki took office with the mission of ending the war. When Germany capitulated in early May, the Japanese understood that the British and Americans would now direct the full fury of their awesome military power exclusively against them.

American officials, having long since broken Japan's secret codes, knew from intercepted messages that the country's leaders were seeking to end the war on terms as favorable as possible. Details of these efforts were known from decoded secret communications between the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo and Japanese diplomats abroad.

In his 1965 study, Atomic Diplomacy: Hiroshima and Potsdam (pp. 107, 108), historian Gar Alperovitz writes:

    Although Japanese peace feelers had been sent out as early as September 1944 (and [China's] Chiang Kai-shek had been approached regarding surrender possibilities in December 1944), the real effort to end the war began in the spring of 1945. This effort stressed the role of the Soviet Union ...

    In mid-April [1945] the [US] Joint Intelligence Committee reported that Japanese leaders were looking for a way to modify the surrender terms to end the war. The State Department was convinced the Emperor was actively seeking a way to stop the fighting.

A Secret Memorandum

It was only after the war that the American public learned about Japan's efforts to bring the conflict to an end. Chicago Tribune reporter Walter Trohan, for example, was obliged by wartime censorship to withhold for seven months one of the most important stories of the war.

In an article that finally appeared August 19, 1945, on the front pages of the Chicago Tribune and the Washington Times-Herald, Trohan revealed that on January 20, 1945, two days prior to his departure for the Yalta meeting with Stalin and Churchill, President Roosevelt received a 40-page memorandum from General Douglas MacArthur outlining five separate surrender overtures from high-level Japanese officials. (The complete text of Trohan's article is in the Winter 1985-86 Journal, pp. 508-512.)

All the available evidence belies the image we're fed of those crazy slanty-eyed yellow people willing to fight to the very last man, so we had to nuke them as the only way to end the war. Just not true at all.

[misko27]

But we are discussing how to defeat Terrorism, not why they do it.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry, I really don't.

I phrased that poorly, but the point stands. No one on Earth can address all grievances. Some are Justified! But people can and will find unpardonable offense at any variety of things no one can or is willing to control. But that shouldn't stop us from defeating it of itself. Terrorists may have valid complaints, but that does not prevent them from being terrorists.


Terrorism so so rarely leads to something positive, and often poisons the thing it was trying to help.

I was getting my leftie-fix the other day by watching some Oliver Stone's untold history. He talked about how the Japanese only moved to surrender after the Soviets invaded Manchuria, and it was a Soviet invasion they truly feared - such as the annexation of Hokkaido and such. I reckon an Ainu SSR could have been created with all the Ainu people in Hokkaido and Sakhalin.

Yes, people tend to to fear the Soviet Union more then Nuclear weapons. They had been trying for a Very, very long time to get them to at least be neutral, so when they went against, it really hurt.


Although, the fact of the matter was they were in fact trained to die fighting. There is a reason the US still has a surplus of Purple hearts dating from that Era. More civilians would have died in a invasion of the islands then in the Bombings.

[Owlbread]

It's interesting that we always jump to the idea of "more marines would have died in an invasion" rather than "more japanese would have died in an invasion".

[Reelya]

Although, the fact of the matter was they were in fact trained to die fighting. There is a reason the US still has a surplus of Purple hearts dating from that Era. More civilians would have died in a invasion of the islands then in the Bombings.

That's the rationalization you're fed to make ourselves feel culturally better about doing what was basically internaitonal political grandstanding that killed a number of people on the order of Ghenghis Kan or something.

What you wrote is what they tell the peons. The war documents tell a different story, of a Japan which had been trying to negotiate a surrender for at least 6 months, no invasion necessary.

[DWC]

If we're blatantly morally in the wrong it would be good to stop being blatantly morally in the wrong, though.  That would also reduce the desire for people to join terrorist groups.

Sure, but I can't think of any terrorist group that really holds the moral high ground either. The Earth/ Animal Liberation Front or something? Plenty of these organization play the victim, but then go right around and massacre people that have nothing to do with whatever grievances they claim to trying to rectify anyways.

Well you can say the same for U.S. forces bombing civilians. Hiroshima for example? I read that Nagasaki was mainly done to test the effects of the 2nd bomb type, and to justifiy the departmental expense of producing 2 type of bombs, rather for any military purpose. The Japanese were already well ready to surrender after the first bombing, and their forces were already completely broken before Hiroshima, with their airforce and navy destroyed, and USA already having complete air superiority over their entire homeland.

Basically it looks more like the genocide of 200,000 people was purely a political exercise aimed at other countries, not even at Japan itself who, already having their armed forces and industry destroyed, needed no such message about American superiority. Japan hadn't even had any oil supplies since April 1945, so, how effective do you think they were going to be after 4 months with no oil supplies against a nation who flew constant heavy bomber raids over their cities?

You might say "they attacked us first", but you're talking cities full of civilians (Hiroshima, like Dresden, had no military or political significance) under dictatorships. Would you accept the "they attacked us first" line if a foreign power bombed civilians in a non-military-related city in the USA following an American declaration of war?

I dunno why the atomic bombs are considered to especially horrific, especially considering the war they were used in they were not even close to the scale conventional firebombing had already accomplished in Tokyo or Dresden. Would it have been better if they just dropped normal bombs until they surrendered? Anytime after Pearl Harbor would have been a good time for the Japanese to surrender. Anyways, the Japanese had done the same and worse to the Chinese, they forfeited any kind gentleman's agreement when it came to the bombing of civilians, it's not like they showed any restraint when they were rampaging in mainland Asia against surrendered and ineffective opponents.

Back to the subject and modern day relevance, I suppose. Countries like the USA don't intentionally target civilians, terrorists do. Therein lies the distinction. So if a smart bomb goes astray and blows up a hospital on accident during a war, it doesn't really justify the opposing side to commit deliberate warcrimes as retribution.

[Reelya]

I was responding to you line about groups who "go right around and massacre people that have nothing to do with whatever grievances they claim to trying to rectify". Can you really claim the people in Hiroshima were personally responsible for the war? Or did were "massacre people that had nothing to do" with starting the war as an expedient way of ending it?

Anyway now you're claiming it's OK to massacre Japanese civilians who had no direct involvement in the war, because of what some Japanese soldiers (totally different people to who the USA bombed) did in China? Then is it ok to massacre some random town in America because of Hiroshima? Or would you understand the concept of individual people only when applied to Americans?

[misko27]

It's interesting that we always jump to the idea of "more marines would have died in an invasion" rather than "more japanese would have died in an invasion".

Literally, my last comment.

More civilians would have died in a invasion of the islands then in the Bombings.

Although, the fact of the matter was they were in fact trained to die fighting. There is a reason the US still has a surplus of Purple hearts dating from that Era. More civilians would have died in a invasion of the islands then in the Bombings.

That's the rationalization you're fed to make ourselves feel culturally better about doing what was basically political grandstanding that killed a number of people on the order of Ghenghis Kan or something.

What you wrote is what they tell the peons. The war documents tell a different story, of a Japan which had been trying to negotiate a surrender for at least 6 months, no invasion necessary.

Are you implying I'm a peon? I can't I get that insult often. Also that I am not smart enough to judge for myself what is true. Saying it was grandstanding is one thing, it is a argument.


Regardless, what happened happened. No one is advocating use of Nuclear Weapons today, so the issue is a tad moot. We can't argue every historical injustice and expect to get anywhere. As opposed to the Terrorism Discussion. Can we get back to that?

[Reelya]

How about Luis Posada Cariles then? GW Bush's favorite terrorist. The dude actually boasts about terrorist attacks on innocent civilians, and they let him walk around America because he's a right-winger / ex-CIA.