The George W. Bush Poll

I've never heard that he favored the George Patton course of action, but it could be. (Nobody would have bothered to listen, however, since he was a mere captain in the Red Army.) Of course, lots of anti-Communists in the Soviet Union were slow to realize that the Nazis were even worse. The Ukranians initially greeted the Germans as liberators.

Solzhenitsyn's books are among the best windows on what it's like to live under totalitarian rule. Yes, he was accused of treason, but only after the first part of "Gulag Archipelago" - the first expose of the Soviet Union's secret labor camps - was published in 1973. He was exiled the following year. He's still alive, and a real pain in the nice person wherever he's living - he's an Eastern Orthodox czarist, and no society is pure enough for him - but he cannot be accused of cowardice or appeasement in the face of evil.

Now Squid, if you're suggesting that it's necessarily a bad thing to have been considered a traitor by the Soviet government, then you're a lot more of a leftist than you seem!

 

Funny, I have the impression that he is anything but (a leftist, that is).

 

No, no, no....you don't really read that in there do you? Appeasing evil, then going at it half-heartedly, then finally doing what needed to be done all result in more death and destruction than doing it fast and hard in the beginning. My two examples would be the American civil war and WWII.

Many millions died in WWII because we, and the world, stayed out of it for so long. We learned our lesson with the Pacific theatre (using the AS-bomb instead of an invasion)

In the American civil war, it took a few years for the north to get serious and do it right.

 

WWII is the ultimate example of appeasement at all costs and its end results. If Chamberlain had the intestinal fortitude to call Hitler when he marched into the Rhineland, think about how different history would be.

 

Gee, now I know what they mean by "Blame America First" I'd like to ask you the same question you asked me - "are you for real?" Are you really serious about this?

 

Many times intelligent people do poorly in school, do so because they are not challenged and are forced to go as slow as the slowest student, so they lose interest.
Others are distracted seriously with family divorces and trauma to the familiy structure.

Many of those smart people pick things up very quickly and therefore have a short attention span, but if you give them a big enough job to capture thier attention, they can accomplich great feats.

And then again, sometimes people of only average intelligence may have the highest moral intelligence... the ability to feel pain, and care about others...
Many intelligent people are so stuck on themselves they see everyone as beneath thier feet.... I work with alot of surgeons... I know!....

I would rather have a human being run the country, someone who has a heart to feel love and be a defender and protector... somoene with a father spirit even if he is not perfect... but it would be a mistake to look for a leader that was the smartest person in the world!
It is believed that the Antichrist will be such a man!

I am always constantly amazed at how so many people can see the same thing or event, but view it so many different ways through different realities.

What appears totally obvious to one is so invisible to another?.. one mans hero is another mans villian. One man sees this life as heaven on earth, another as hell.

 

Actually, Stanley Baldwin was Prime Minister when German reoccupied the Rhineland. Chamberlain gave up the Sudetenland.

Sorry, I majored in modern military history!

 

It's posters like you that make this such an informative and interesting board to read! Such a variety of knowledge and interests.

 

Do some PC'ers really believe it was all just fraternity pranks at Abu Gharaib? You folks scare me.

Thank goodness for rule of law. Otherwise you'd torture me and then claim I had no sense of humor.

***

Reality check - we are not (necessarily) the Good Guys.

We (the USA's CIA and military) tortured people to death in Iraq.
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/internatio...-389789,00.html
I wonder what else we do, in Gitmo and those clandestine prisons in eastern europe and Turkey.

As a leader of national stature and former POW, McCain should have the right to final say on whether the US should include torture in its fight against terrorism. It shames our government to delay acknowledgement of his credibility. His bill should be adopted, post haste.

"Sir, they have an obligation to try to stop it."
General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, correcting Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's assertion at a press conference (in early December) that troops witnessing prisoner abuse had no obligation to physically stop the abuse, only to report it.

We have a tendency to get heavy handed and have to watch ourselves.

Our military decided to drop the Bomb on Hiroshima, a city populated by civilians. Three days later, we Fat Manned Nagasaki. Truman was appalled by the carnage and wrenched control of the atom bomb from military leaders.

Lots of relatives in the military, past and at present. Some relatives were unjustly put in internment/concentration camps during WWII (I'm Japanese American). I like the idea of a "professional","volunteer" military, made up of individuals who retain their ability to think for themselves.

Remember the Rubicon.

 

AND HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS.

 

Thanks, I'm trying to, even though that idiot fascist-wannabe is still fouling the White House.

 

Well I"m terrible at history.... I mostly think because I had a ruthless mean teacher!...
My son loves it.

But at any rate.. I don't follow you? Are you saying that a phone call could have swayed Hitlers mind?
It takes months to sway minds, unless someone gets a slapp in their face revelation?

Are you trying to say if someone would have just called Saddam on the phone everything would be ok?

Or if we just could just get Bin Laden on the phone?

Surely thats not what your saying correct?

I"ve been trying to get you to see the demise of GM for the last whole month and you still don't see it when its in the headlines?

 

I don't think he's using the word "call" in the manner you are interpreting.
I believe he is using it more in the style of being "called to account".
In other words, standing up and saying "This is what's happening and it is not acceptable."

 

I think there is historical consent that if France had marched into the Rhineland, the German military would have fled and might have likely caused a military takeover of the German goverment. When the Whermacht crossed into the Rhineland, they occupied a large area of land with a couple of regiments, two to three thousand soldiers. It was a completely symbolic move as there was no military strength to back up their occupation.

 

News Flash: McCain's anti-torture bill passed BUT there's a huge loophole in it. Seems the military or CIA (or any other US agency) can do whatever they want to prisoners, just as long as they have a prior okay from a White House legal eagle.

Now all the sadists need is to get Alito in and they can do whatever they want without having to explain themselves to anyone.





Everything the Nazi Party did was legal. Everything.

 

This is another example why we can never let the Democrats back in!!! Wow old Osama loves people like you!!

 

Don't really see the reasoning here. How's anti-torture bill related to anti-terroistism?

Kind of bugs me that we are putting Saddam on trial for torturing, while some ppl in our current admin supports torture. If we allow torture, what the heck is the difference between us and Saddam?

 

Oh, well if thats the case.. thats cool.. my apologies!

 

I guess its a matter of who holds the law as to what is legal?

What is defined as good and bad changes based on whos interest in being represented.

Whats right to the prisoner is often different than whats right to the captor.

 

Clearly an example of the "if you're not with us you're against us" mentality.

Black and white. Right and wrong. Good vs. evil.

Very nice.