Can Of Worms.

[Mindscape]

Since this has nothing at all to do with the Knights of Pythias, I figured it should go in a new thread. Sorry in advance to all I might offend.

I think Willard's basically of the same opinion as me, which can be summed up pretty easily (due to lots of practice).

1) Before all else is noted, I'd like to point out that I support the troops there. They need the support, and the nation backing them up. Otherwise, morale drops and, as a result, more of them drop. I'd want people wanting me home if I were over there, after all.

2) I don't support the war itself.

Its timing was absolutely horrible, and its motives are still questionable. Attacking and eliminating Al-Qaeda would have been alright (though a bit extremist), but that was supposedly done in Afghanistan, a country that, remarkably, we hear exceptionally little on in the news anymore. No rebuilding after bombing sections of it to rubble, no helping the citizenry, no nothing. The press is ignoring our primary target. Odd? I think so.

Further (and I'll probably get yelled at for this, and Willard likely doesn't share this opinion), I'm still not wholly convinced that the bombing of the World Trade Center wasn't a bit of Wag the Dog itself. Now, I may be wrong, but there's a lot of motive for doing something, even as nasty as that, for the current regime in power. After all, it covered all the bases at once: Bush solidifies his being President, despite that whole Florida recount thing going on and the close margin by which he won; Bush gets a war to make him famous as a great President, because all good Texans know that the only great Presidents were the ones who won wars; and Americans are really good at disliking Middle Easterners to begin with, mostly because most of them know diddly-squat about them. Go poking around Afghanistan for a while, and then you can move on to the real threat... Iraq.

Now, bear in mind that the real target was probably Iraq to begin with, or we would have likely bombed Afghanistan to glass instead of getting just some token footage of hillsides getting blown to bits and then the call of, "They're not here" and moving on. It'd explain why the press hasn't touched Afghanistan since, except in passing, and it'd point toward further motive for something sneaky and underhanded.

You see, going after Iraq ties up two huge loose ends for Bush. First, it solidifies his interests in oil companies, who have their interests over there. The fact that there's a war on means that oil companies have a harder time getting oil (whether they really do or not) and can jack up their prices. That means Bush gets richer off his interests in the oil industry, which is a really good motive (hell, I'd do it... I'd just be more blatant about it). The second reason is probably the whole motive for the thing, though... it's Daddy's War. Bush Junior wins in Iraq, he ties up the loose ends for Daddy, wins Daddy's adoration and approval, and all is good for Bush Junior.

Which has, of course, driven greater men to greater feats, so it's not exactly a bad motivation, and fairly understandable.

Hrm. That ran longer than I thought it would. And, since this is off topic for the Pythians string, I think I'll move it, so WR doesn't have to.

[tyler]

On the topic of 9|11, for the longest time...I believe that it was planned by our current government. As of now, I'm really not sure...the circumstances surrounding the situation are very very strange. But I'm not so much a conspiracy theorist as I was a few years ago. However, I'll post the link to The Great 9|11 Coincidence for anyone who hasn't had the opportunity to read. I've also checked the fact, and those which he cites documents...you can find them and he's correct.

The Great 9|11 Coinciedence
http://www.questionsquestions.net/docs0 ... dence.html

[Sertile]

I'm not convinced that 911 was an inside job, but there is evidence that something other than a plane might have hit the Pentagon, and I don't think they ever said what made that last plane crash in the woods the way it did. It's entirely possible it was shot down, but I wouldn't blame the military for taking such an action.

On the matter of coincidences, here's a big one: The short-lived television series "The Lone Gunmen," which was a spin-off of the X-files, aired in 2001 prior to 911. In the pilot episode, the Lone Gunmen had to thwart a government plot to fly a remote-controlled passenger jet into the World Trade Center in order to start a fictitious war designed to benefit the military-industrial complex. Now I'll admit, that's a hell of a coincidence, but I'm still inclined to think that's all it was.

I didn't have a problem with going into Afghanistan at all, but I now feel like we handled that particular situation poorly.

As for Iraq, I have a friend who just got back and another who's over there right now, and I certainly don't wish any harm to come to either of them, but I'm inclined to agree with John Kerry - that it was the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'm not convinced that the war in Iraq had anything to do with terror, and I feel like if we're going to wage a war or terror, or anything else, we should either do things right or not at all.

[Mindscape]

I loved that show. Didn't get to see the pilot episode, though, but that's a nifty coincidence (that, or the show's written by somebody who knows something). It's also a good thing to know.

Yeah... Afghanistan was retaliation, which, while it may not have been right, was at least justified. Using retaliation for an excuse to get a bunch of people shot for no really good reason, though, was a really bad idea. Had he pitched it differently and planned ahead with a reasonably straightforward war on Iraq, Bush probably could have gone through with this without a whole lot of opposition from much of anybody. After all, his dad did it back a few terms. Sure, Saddam wasn't really doing anything globally stupid this time, but Americans were still pissed at him from the first time.

This is what happens, I suppose, when somebody who's not the sharpest tool in the shed gets it in his head to try to be sneaky. It's like the Incredible Hulk trying to touch-type... it may be a noble effort, but he's just gonna end up breaking something and causing an uproar.

The beauty of a Democracy is that any idiot can be President.
The ugliness of a Democracy is that any idiot can be President.

[Sirius]

speaking of something else hitting the pentagon check out this video at http://www.freedomunderground.org/memor ... ntagon.php

sorry i haven't figured out how to make links yet[/url]

[tyler]

Yeah, that's actually been proven to be a fabricated story. They claim to have footage of a missile on security cameras from stores and stuff. But had a tactical missile been flying over the streets of Washington...I think some speculation would have arisen.