[Genteel Death]

Ikara- it's ok to disagree, I am actually enjoying the last few pages of this thread. I haven't read most of the rest.
Demonrail- You brought up an interesting point about Blair, since his political education would suggest that he'd have tried to avoid a war till the end, then again the whole affair in Iraq gave us the confirmation that the head of state is the face of a more complex political and economical stance that dictates his/her decisions when it comes to critical international matters, in this case the safeguarding of a present and future strategy of re-balancing imperialistic power.

[demonrail666]

Yes, I support their right to exist but I think the decision to establish the only Kurdish sovereign state in Iraq, rather than say Turkey, was motivated more by a desire to create more Western-friendly regions within a particularly sensitive area of the Middle East (and keep them out of a future EU country) than to save the Kurds themselves.

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

Demonrail- You brought up an interesting point about Blair, since his political education would suggest that he'd have tried to avoid a war till the end, then again the whole affair in Iraq gave us the confirmation that the head of state is the face of a more complex political and economical stance that dictates his/her decisions when it comes to critical international matters, in this case the safeguarding of a present and future strategy of re-balancing imperialistic power.

I actually think Blair's involvement in the war is one if the most interestingl aspects of the entire conflict. I've tried to look at it from different directions and none of it really makes sense. Not because it was necessarily wrong for him to have gone to war (although I personally think he was) but because it was so utterly out of step with his whole political self-image up to that point. I don't think he was just a mask for a 'more complex political and economical stance' (although to a degree he obviously was). I do really think that he privately believed in it. I don't think he believed in Bush's reason's but simply felt that they were mutually complimentary. I'll never fully understand it though.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

listen.. we are dealing with ideals in the first place. Equality? Freeing oppressed peoples? Liberation? These are and have always been ideals, BUT without having lofty even unrealistic ideals to strive for, there is no progress. The Constitution was written on lies, hypocrisy, slavery and genocide, but its rhetoric alone was an ideal worth striving for, which after 200 odd years is closest to reality it could ever be. Yet it also remains an ideal, but none of you would say that we should not aim for Equality because it is unrealistically idealistic.

War is never an option.. sure, that is not a practical or realistic ideal, but none-the-less it should be the standard. That way we NEVER get complacent or accepting of war as some kind of norm..

[demonrail666]

Originally Posted by SuchFriendsAreDangerous

listen.. we are dealing with ideals in the first place. Equality? Freeing oppressed peoples? Liberation? These are and have always been ideals, BUT without having lofty even unrealistic ideals to strive for, there is no progress. The Constitution was written on lies, hypocrisy, slavery and genocide, but its rhetoric alone was an ideal worth striving for, which after 200 odd years is closest to reality it could ever be. Yet it also remains an ideal, but none of you would say that we should not aim for Equality because it is unrealistically idealistic.

War is never an option.. sure, that is not a practical or realistic ideal, but none-the-less it should be the standard. That way we NEVER get complacent or accepting of war as some kind of norm..

You have a very absolute attitude about it, namely that war is never an option. It provides an absolute answer. My problem is that I do believe in such a thing as a just and necessary war (even if only hypothetically) but that the criteria determining such a war is never absolute. In the end you're right, we are only really dealing with ideals. The dilemma comes with trying to determine which ideals are worth waging war for.

Also, you showed some admiration earlier in the thread for the IRA. Would you not say they were waging a war? They certainly would.

[Rob Instigator]

FEAR rules all, as always.

Foreign Policy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOCcbKAhlY0

Elimate the incompetents!
Differences don't exist in harmony!
Survival is superiority.
We don't need no hands across the sea!

We've got...

Foreign policy [x3]

The lines are drawn!
Establish the new order!
Suspect everyone
Know your enemies! Know your enemies!


We've got...

Foreign Policy [x3]

Hatred is purity!
Weakness is disease!
Where we bury you
It's manifest destiny!

We've got...

Foreign Policy

[Lurker]

Originally Posted by SuchFriendsAreDangerous

As long as war is considered an option, then it will always become the only option, just like as long as you have a gun, in truth you are not likely to get into a fist fight,

(

Eh? You should come to Britain. It's easier than you think to get into a fist fight.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by Lurker

Eh? You should come to Britain. It's easier than you think to get into a fist fight.

duh.. thats because you Brits are not so heavily armed per capita as the US..

[Lurker]

Originally Posted by SuchFriendsAreDangerous

duh.. thats because you Brits are not so heavily armed per capita as the US..

Oh right, i misunderstood your post. I thought you were saying people don't get into fights even if they don't have as if normally people are scared to fight but guns make it easier for them to be violent.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by demonrail666

You have a very absolute attitude about it, namely that war is never an option. It provides an absolute answer. My problem is that I do believe in such a thing as a just and necessary war (even if only hypothetically) but that the criteria determining such a war is never absolute. In the end you're right, we are only really dealing with ideals. The dilemma comes with trying to determine which ideals are worth waging war for.

Also, you showed some admiration earlier in the thread for the IRA. Would you not say they were waging a war? They certainly would.

Again. I am aware of the contradictions that I am presenting, hence why I called them IDEALS. You can not necessarily reach ideals, but that does not invalidate their worth simply because they are unobtainable. I hold to the standard the WAR is never an option, is NEVER justifiable, and thus I condemn all acts of war BUT...

since this is in truth idealistic, then I also inevitably fall short of the ideal, and offer support for many militant groups and guerrillas, however, I do not universally support acts of war in the name of revolution. With the EZLN or the IRA, I support the cause, not necessarily the military mechanisms to achieve this cause. The IRA is NOT exclusively militaristic, the EZLN builds as many schools as they do militia groups, hire as many teachers as cadres. I would hope that in time, even and especially the militant revolutionaries EQUALLY aim for the IDEAL of true peace.

"There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people."

This applies equally to both the governments and the revolutionaries.

[demonrail666]

Originally Posted by SuchFriendsAreDangerous

Again. I am aware of the contradictions that I am presenting, hence why I called them IDEALS. You can not necessarily reach ideals, but that does not invalidate their worth simply because they are unobtainable. I hold to the standard the WAR is never an option, is NEVER justifiable, and thus I condemn all acts of war BUT...

I understand your point and I wonder if much the same underlying position exists even with those who, in certain instances, support the idea of war. The idea that war must never be an option ... unless. I suppose that's my position, anyway.

I'd certainly say that the massive majority of wars have been unnecessary. I just always have to imagine that a situation can exist where one might be necessary. A re-emergence of state fascism, for example.

The thing is that, just like you, I'm still trying to work through my thoughts on all this (which is partly the motivation for starting this thread). I'm certainly not convinced of every facet of my argument. It isn't even an argument at all in some ways, just a belief.

[Toilet & Bowels]

i don't know if any of you have heard this story, i came across it this week but it's been floating about for a while, it's about chirac's account of how george bush tried to get him to join the invasion of iraq.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...on-george-bush

[demonrail666]

I've never quite been able to get my head around the Right's seemingly quite easy relationship with Christianity, especially in recent years. Even given communism's attempts to supress religion there's continued to be strong ties between the Left and Christianity in countries like Italy and France which make far more sense to me. Is the Right's appropriation of the bible just a recognition of its value as a tradition? Besides that it certainly seems an odd choice of belief for rampant free-marketeers.

[Genteel Death]

Rail: In reply to your earlier post, I do think that Tony Blair knew very well what the intentions of invading Iraq were and still are, he just had to present it, like any other head of state with a ''leftist'' goverment, with the rethorical, liberal debris which imposed itself on mass protests regardless of their provenience. I'm not being cynical here, but c'mon, to invade (a verb that has cunningly replaced declaring, when it comes to odiern wars involving Western powers of democratic belief) a region of the world without any seriously threatening armoury to fight back the biggies with your own mind set to uncertain mode seems suspicious to anyone with a radically different political agenda than his.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by demonrail666

I've never quite been able to get my head around the Right's seemingly quite easy relationship with Christianity, especially in recent years. Even given communism's attempts to supress religion there's continued to be strong ties between the Left and Christianity in countries like Italy and France which make far more sense to me. Is the Right's appropriation of the bible just a recognition of its value as a tradition? Besides that it certainly seems an odd choice of belief for rampant free-marketeers.

yes. the borderline fascist movements of the extreme rightists/ultra-conservatives in America cling to Christianity not in any real religious or moral sense, because their political philosophies and ideologies almost always go directly against many core/fundamental tenets of Christianity. For example, social services and specifically welfare programs are almost universally condemned by the ideologies of the Rightists, but this is the very essense of Christianity! ("All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had" Acts 4; "whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me." Matthew 25:40)

The original Christians were communal socialists, the original Church government was socialist, but the Protestant movement is not religious reformation, it is an economic revolution as the capitalists princes, governers and businessmen sought to free themselves from paying tithes and taxes to the support of the Parish and its less fortunate beneficiary parishioners..

American Rightists Christianity is the descendent of these capitalists, who feigned religion in the name of profit. The epitome of this is the money hungry televevangelists.

[demonrail666]

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

I do think that Tony Blair knew very well what the intentions of invading Iraq were and still are, he just had to present it, like any other head of state with a ''leftist'' goverment, with the rethorical, liberal debris which imposed itself on mass protests regardless of their provenience.

I suspect that Blair's decision to side with the US will be something that'll puzzle historians for decades to come. Here was a young 'progressive', 'reformist' PM with clear European sympathies suddenly standing alongside what he must've recognised as a backward US regime. The obvious answer is that Blair simply had to side with the US, regardless of who was in charge: that the much talked about 'special relationship' was one that no British PM could avoid. And yet we know that Bush actually put far less pressure on Blair to join him than was at first thought. I certainly think it would've been diplomatically difficult for Britain to join ranks with the UN but not I suspect terminal in terms of our ties with the US.

I agree with you that Blair was forced to sell the war to a sceptical people by using scare tactics about WMDs but what his real motivations were (both politically and personally) for actually supporting the war, I still can't quite fathom - at least in terms of his own political ambitions/vision

[Lurker]

Originally Posted by demonrail666

I suspect that Blair's decision to side with the US will be something that'll puzzle historians for decades to come. Here was a young 'progressive', 'reformist' PM with clear European sympathies suddenly standing alongside what he must've recognised as a backward US regime. The obvious answer is that Blair simply had to side with the US, regardless of who was in charge: that the much talked about 'special relationship' was one that no British PM could avoid. And yet we know that Bush actually put far less pressure on Blair to join him than was at first thought. I certainly think it would've been diplomatically difficult for Britain to join ranks with the UN but not I suspect terminal in terms of our ties with the US.

I agree with you that Blair was forced to sell the war to a sceptical people by using scare tactics about WMDs but what his real motivations were (both politically and personally) for actually supporting the war, I still can't quite fathom - at least in terms of his own political ambitions/vision

Removing a brutal dictator and a backward, repressive, ruling religious organisation is not 'progressive', 'reformist'?! Hmmmm

[knox]

Originally Posted by Lurker

Removing a brutal dictator and a backward, repressive, ruling religious organisation is not 'progressive', 'reformist'?! Hmmmm

oh please

[Lurker]

Originally Posted by knox

oh please

Demonrail didn't really mean that Blair seemed like a reformer. He meant he seemed nice, modest, bureaucratic, attractive, attractively weak etc.

[demonrail666]

I was always sceptical about Blair (although I was obviously pleased he beat out the Tories) but I think, prior to 9/11, quite a few New Labour voters did think he was a reformer, however naively. He was a reformer to some degree, anyway. He definitely reformed the Labour party - although what he reformed it into is another matter.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by Lurker

Removing a brutal dictator and a backward, repressive, ruling religious organisation is not 'progressive', 'reformist'?! Hmmmm

not if there is no progress and you replace it with an equally backwards and repressive regime using backwards, repressive tactics of military occupation and political corruption.