The Bible and Love and Christians

[CensoredAlso]

But I DO think there's nothing short of poetic justice that the Boogieman that Bush used to further his personal agendas was caught under the big evil socialist Muslim sympathizer's watch.

Yeah these weak attempts trying to give Bush credit for Bin Laden's death are pretty pathetic. There's no clear evidence that the information was obtained through torture. And even if it was, why did they wait like 9 years to do anything?

Still won't vote for Obama though. This isn't Liberty Valance when a man gets elected to office because he killed someone. At least it shouldn't be like that. Obama hasn't produced results for the economy and job creation, he seems incredibly naive about foreign policy and there's some social issues we will just never agree on.

 

[MuppetsRule]

Yeah these weak attempts trying to give Bush credit for Bin Laden's death are pretty pathetic. There's no clear evidence that the information was obtained through torture. And even if it was, why did they wait like 9 years to do anything?

A lot of the credit should go to GWB and the policies he put in place. Donald Rumsfield pushed hard for the special ops forces and intelligence community that eventually led to taking down OBL. Lots of credit to Pre. Obama as well for making the call.

 

[RedPiggy]

The thing is, I have to question where Dubya actually made an impact. Maybe I was raised on too many action movie thrillers, but I was under the impression our government had covert operations (read: assassinations we deny) for a very, VERY long time. Dubya DIDN'T help locate OBL, as far as I'm concerned, because as soon as you put the gun in his hands, he went all Yosemite Sam and shot up everyone BUT the bad guy. Meanwhile, Obama waited, listened, and as soon as Osama made a dumb move, he ordered the quick and efficient "move in and take care of business" move. We could have spared a LOT in deaths and PR mistakes had we just taken care of business from the start.

 

[dwmckim]

Oh... back to the religion thing... uh... did the guy say any specific time zone when the world goes phooey? Cuz it's 6 here, and nothing happened yet.

Jesus made a last-minute cancellation. Discovered current price of gas.

 

[Drtooth]

The thing is, I have to question where Dubya actually made an impact. Maybe I was raised on too many action movie thrillers, but I was under the impression our government had covert operations (read: assassinations we deny) for a very, VERY long time. Dubya DIDN'T help locate OBL, as far as I'm concerned, because as soon as you put the gun in his hands, he went all Yosemite Sam and shot up everyone BUT the bad guy. Meanwhile, Obama waited, listened, and as soon as Osama made a dumb move, he ordered the quick and efficient "move in and take care of business" move. We could have spared a LOT in deaths and PR mistakes had we just taken care of business from the start.

To quote Weird Al Yankovic's Yoda song, specifically the line "Remember if you kill him, then you'll be unemployed." Sure, a bunch of his policies that haven't changed lead to his capture, but most of his policies kept him ALIVE for 9 years. We were closing in, we almost had him, and then they decided naaaawwwww! and they instead went on a "cover our butts" pet project... going after the VERY same dictator his FATHER put into power, only to attack his army (the army, not him) when they attacked an oil rich nation. All the while selling weapons to the VERY same side we helped Saddam into power to fight against. Hmmm....

Now, if GWB spent the entire time on the Afghan War, and got Bin Laden when the country and world had his support, no one would be having this conversation. But his pet project of Iraq, something he had since the 2000 debates, came first, the Afghan war was neglected, and we wound up throwing a bunch of money, time and human lives trying to give him a legacy. All when Saddam wasn't actually DOING anything.

Needless to say, Clinton tried going after these guys in the 90's, but all the SAME people on the SAME side that wanted these wars and wanted us to want these wars were prosecuting him for lying about boinking a chick (again, who WASN'T? It was like a key party in Congress at the time), and they were calling the potential war a "Wag the Dog" situation. We even ignored STRONG warnings that something was going to happen with them. Yeah, worth it.

Above all, killing him changes absolutely nothing... if anything, it makes the situation a little worse because apparently due to their mangled concept of Islam, it's okay for them to kill innocent babies, women, men, elderly, and everyone they can blow up in a building minding their own business (even of their own religion), but if you go after the spoiled rich brat kid poser that lead any of that, it's apparently wrong.

Seriously, WHY the heck did we go into the Middle East again? I mean, all the way back in 79? we should have just left them to their own devices... the terrorists would have blown each other up.

 

[CensoredAlso]

the terrorists would have blown each other up.

And taken many civilians with them along the way.

 

[Drtooth]

And taken many civilians with them along the way.

And we would have taken many civilians with US on the way if we fight them, and WE'D get blamed for the civilians we both killed, adding more fuel for them to go after us. So, the point being...?

 

[frogboy4]

I kind of hate to admit this, but...

What I find particularly interesting is that Republicans keep insisting on playing a cheap and easy political short game based on archaic religious gay fear rather than think of the bigger picture. It's largely generational too. There are many more young Republicans in support of gay marriage rights than ever before. They are the future of their party.

If the Republicans kept their entire platform exactly as-is, yet accepted the advancement of gay rights - they'd win a lot more voters than they'd lose in the long term. It would merely shake things up for a little while. They could then focus on a wide range of other social, foreign and financial matters once removing the gay marriage component from the political arena. There would be far more contrast to Democrats, rather than distraction, in their stance on all other issues.

I'm not particularly in favor of Republican advancement. I don't hold their same personal core beliefs, but many, many of my successful gay friends do and they're exactly the kind of intelligent, informed voters that show up at the polls. They're the kind of distinguished, professional people who rally up awareness and new voters too.

There are many independent voters, but never enough of them to actually take a third-party presidential candidate seriously as a viable contender rather than a spoiler. Theirs is a war of ideology and not one that can be measured by practical political victory. I respect that. I don't believe that the anti-gay religious crowd would gravitate in large enough numbers to the Democrats or Independents to make a difference if the Republicans helped pass civil rights legislation for gays in America. The cynical side of me believes that once our personal households feel protected enough, Americans vote their pocketbooks.

It sure would be interesting to see what would happen. I'm not holding my breath.

 

[CensoredAlso]

And we would have taken many civilians with US on the way if we fight them, and WE'D get blamed for the civilians we both killed, adding more fuel for them to go after us. So, the point being...?

My point is leaving the Middle East to do what it wants wouldn't make us completely blameless. We could have left the Nazis alone too and for awhile we did, figuring they might just go away after awhile, or that it wasn't our problem.

 

[frogboy4]

And we would have taken many civilians with US on the way if we fight them, and WE'D get blamed for the civilians we both killed, adding more fuel for them to go after us. So, the point being...?

I have to agree with this. The Middle East hornets nest is thousands of years old. It's literally Biblical! I don't see a viable solution or any real degree of winning over there. Enough citizens must want change and a lot of them do, but even so it's not our brand of American change. The politics in that region are more complex than any other on the planet. We shouldn't have the hubris to believe that our centuries-old logic can apply to them. Regardless of their politics - the overwhelming majority of them do not want us over there under any circumstances. To me, that says make a graceful exit.