I love this.

Eldritch... i'm in agreement with nearly everything from your last post. Not certain i "generalize EVERYTHING", but hey, atleast Dan gained enjoyment from the assertion so we got that going for us.

Lot's of bad shit going down in Iraq, certainly the American govt. (and american's in general since we elect em) should be held accountable for thier ills. All i've asked is the same barometer of accountability be held to the islamic fundies.

steve

I'm well aware of the "they're animals who hate our freedom" reasoning and the "payback for injustice" reasoning but there is another argument that I was not familiar with that I read recently. Michael Cook, "a specialist in Islamic history" and professor at Princeton has a new pop history book called A Brief History of the Human Race. On pages 344-347 towards the end of the book he describes Al Queda as a political movement whose main goal was to "talibanize" Arab nations. But the past strategies of fundamentalsim from assassination to civil war had been unsuccesful.

He cites How Did This Happen? Terrorism and the New War "an uneven collection of essays", in particular a paper by Michael Doran.

Just throwing it out is all..

That's what happened in Yugoslavia. The various factions there promoted there own interests by creating an us vs. them, nationalistic atmosphere.

Interesting. Add that Bin Laden was CIA-trained, and that it was VERY mutually beneficial to the current administration for there to be a foreign attack on US soil, I think he might be on to something, in a 'Reichstag fire', mutual back scratching sort of way...

Not really. Spin is defined as "to provide an interpretation of (a statement or event, for example), especially in a way meant to sway public opinion". Whether or not it's well documented isn't at issue, it's the interpretation of deeper meaning in those facts and how they are presented that constitutes spin.

I'll give you one example of how this relates to the book you linked to-

In the chapter Thyroid Storm (love that heading) certain actions of Bush were defined repeatedly as "psychotic behavior". Among those actions were Bush giving an obscene gesture in answer to farmers who shouted insults to him in Europe, and his being ill and vomiting in Japan.

For one thing, these are not, in the true sense, psychotic behavior. Psychosis is a severe condition punctuated by an inability to function efficiently in society. Anyone in the position of President could not be psychotic by definition.

Secondly, I found it interesting that the facts of Bush's public chunk-blowing as written could have just as easily been interpreted in an opposite manner. The book states:


"Then came Bush's visit to Japan, crowned by his seizure at a state dinner in the official residence of Prime Minister Miyazawa. Bush had vomited at least once before the dinner. "I got a preview in the receiving line. I turned to the prime minister and said, 'Would you please excuse me,' and I rushed into the men's room there. And I thought that had taken care of it, but back I came. It hadn't been halted. It was just the beginning." [fn 75] According to Treasury Secretary Brady, Bush had been urged to skip the state dinner altogether by his personal physician, Dr. Burton Lee, but Bush had rejected this advice out of hand, saying that his absence would "disrupt" the proceedings. After the vomiting and fainting scene was over, Bush was asked if he intended to slow down. "Nope," Bush retorted. It's just a 24-hour flu." The truth about Bush's collapse in Tokyo has yet to be told; but it was clear that Bush had learned nothing, and was still determined to impose his will on the universe."


Another book could name this behavior as indicative of responsability and dedication. I'm sure you or someone you know has shown up for work when they were ill enough that staying in bed would have been at healthier choice. But they went to work anyway out of a sense of responsibility, perhaps for their family.

Bush could have been defined as being so determined to complete the job he set out to do that he refused his doctor's advice.

Clearly, the authors had much more in mind than simply listing well documented facts.

That the president was sick is documented fact. The interpretation of his behavior indicating a determination to impose his will on the universe is an opinion, and a grossly exaggerated one at that. The same as claiming this behavior to be psychotic; it's not only extreme but inaccurate.

Now, don't fall into the all too common trap of beliving that this observation is evident of some personal need of mine to defend George Bush. It simply means that I require accuracy, and save the creation of my opinions for myself. Besides, I'm sure there are many other facts to bring to light than those, or some puppy-beating anecdote, don't you think?


Relax. I'm arguably the only person on these boards who isn't the least bit interested in forwarding some political agenda. Logic, accuracy, and an awareness of the political spin of others is my concern here. I uphold the rules of logical debate.

Don't worry, there's lots of actual assholes to fight with here.

The source of your genetic inferiority isn't contained in your eyes, it's in what's behind them.

You know what would be hilarious? If you told a blind guy he was genetically inferior to you because of his lack of sight, and he beat the living shit out of you.

Sorry, Phil--the puppy pulping part was a made-up joke. I threw it in to see if anyone would either catch on to the absurdity or fly into a fit. I should have gone less subtle.

Summarized, the Thiessen/Nazi connection to the Union Banking Corporation is well documented in old government paper trail. G.H. Walker and son in law Prescott Bush helped finance the Nazi Party as a start-up in the early thirties, thru Fritz Thiessen, until the US finally caught on and froze German accounts in the US under The War Powers Act in late 1941. The Union Banking Corporation was dissolved the same year that Fritz Thiessen died--1952--in prison (partly for using people in Aushwitz as cheap industial labor), put there for war crimes. That was all in the unsealed materials finally released back in 2000, and the book was DEADLY ACCURATE in those parts for something written in 1991, so it leads me to believe there less pure propaganda, and maybe more hard research and direct informant interviews involved than you presume. I don't believe everything face value either--only when multiple unrelated sources seem to confirm each other do I start nodding my head-- so it's good to know there's another 'Investigative-Type' personality hovering around.

Forget the government, that ain't NOTHING compared to what IBM did with the nazi's independently of everyone.

They developed the Hollerith Punchcard System,which enabled the nazis to know where every jew was at a moments notice. This is the system that eventually grew into the magcard system (ibm selectric anyone?)

Did you know they were able to gas 4400 people an hour and document all of it as a result of that system? They had extermination down to a better science than you would imagine..

To borrow the standard conservative line: it's not their fault that their system was used in such a fashion. Remember, you're innocent selling technology to criminals and tyrants as long as you don't pull the trigger.