Current Events — HabitableZone

Current Events » in reply to re: my opinion

re: my opinion

Some reasonable points here, but...
Bear in mind, it was off the top of my head, and I didn't spend much time on it. People we pay to do this should be able to do significantly better.

We broke it, we fix it:

This is, to some extent, a valid point, although I don't agree with the unspoken corollary that somehow Iraq wasn't "broken" long before we got there. Now that the compulsory "Saddam, bad; US not so bad" is out of the way...

What's kind of irritating is how many of your suggestions have already been implemented, in many cases quite successfully. Are you aware how many placed in Iraq are already holding regular local elections? Yes, I'm aware it is happening on a small scale (got statistics?). It's not working. Why not?

You don't read about these things, or see them on the news. You have to go to original press releases and other sources to get details. Sure I do. You should get over your aversion to NPR and PBS. Join the dark side, Tom.

Trouble-shoot what will go wrong, before it happens, and keep it from happening.

Boy, wouldn't life be easy if we could trouble-shoot things before they happen. You can, I do it for a living. You do too (hopefully), in engineering.

Of course, nobody gets any credit for disasters that don't occur, so you lose either way. Disagree completely. You get fewer disasters. If you don't think that's a desirable outcome, then [insert your choice of Brosz-expressions-of-hoplessness here]. If water&power were restored in a few months, if mass looting was averted, if basic security was provided, if most Iraqis had the feeling that the US was a friend, etc.... then I would give Bush huge credit for pulling it off.

Get the international community invloved, even if it takes eating portions of French and German shit. Overlook some crimes committed in the past (or leave them to the respective countries to fix). Just get the task done.

In several months, not a single person has described to me what the French would do that we couldn't. The French (plus Germans, Russians, and a lot of other countries) can provide money and manpower. This is so brilliantly obvious that it makes your question brilliantly stupid. They also make it a real coalition. The more we can make it a worldwide endeavor, the better. The more we can avoid the perception that this is something the US is doing to/for them, the better.

Sure, we can throw French bodies and cash into the pot instead of Americans. That should get them all eager to join up. Above you seemed to say that they couldn't contribute anything useful. Here you seem to say that they could but (if they are in their right minds) will not. Why not ask them nicely and see what they have to say?

Get US troops out of SA and any other Arabic country where they are not specifically welcomed.

They DID get out of Saudi Arabia. This didn't get much press either. Where DO you get your news? I read that more than just embassy troops are still in SA. I'll try to find the piece, for you.

Quit kissing Sharon's ass.

Sharon isn't the problem. Neither were the Israeli leaders before him. Bush isn't the problem. Neither were the presidents before him. Until the Palestinians change their psychotic leadership, nothing else will change either.
We have a previously-noted disagreement here. You think the Palastinians should move out of contested territories, and seek refuge in Jordan. You think that Palastinian treaty/UN-resolution/"road map" violations are bad, but Israeli violations are all the Palastinians' fault. Fine, whatever. No need to rehash this one.

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