On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 22:53:37 -0500, "TBA" wrote
in o.net:

snip
Maybe and probably I don't have all the answers or the right ones,


That's an understatement.....


but my
bone of contention is - that we need to defend our country at any cost.


That "any cost" phrase is the problem. The US is founded on some basic
priciples, such as human equality and unalienable rights. If the cost
of our security requires the sacrifice of those principles then we are
effectively destroying our own country. Please read this speech:

http://www.georgesoros.com/index.cfm...ion=SpeechHTML


AND
to NOT play by any "rules". The others could give a **** less about the
Geneva Convention, so why the hell should we?


Because we are not them. If we are going to justify any war against
uncivilized people then we MUST be more civilized than them.


They use our respect of it, as
a sign of weakness and play on it.


They play on our fears. They play on our horror of watching someone
being beheaded. They play on our respect of human life and civil
rights. They play on anything they can, and if we start violating the
Geneva Convention (like we did at Abu-Graid) then they will play on
that, too -- in fact, that's exactly what they did.

They WANT us to stoop to their level, to fight without regard to the
rules. Because when we do it justifies their own use of such tactics.
And then they can proudly proclaim to the world, "Look at the US, the
world's greatest superpower! Look how they commit the same crimes they
condemn! The world can no longer deny American hypocrisy!" And that is
the rally cry for everyone who has been victimized by America to take
up arms against the US, and wage war by any means they wish.

Not a pleasant picture, and certainly NOT a positive step towards our
security.

The root of hatred against the US is several decades of bad policies
in the region. We effectively created these terrorists. If we want to
defeat them we must FIRST change the policies that cause the hatred
and therefore prevent the creation of more terrorists. THEN we can
hunt down the remaining terrorists with the assurance that more won't
pop up to take their places. That's a much better plan than nuking
half the planet. And much more civilized, too.







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