Piano World Home Page Forums General Discussions 9/11 - - Never Forget On a day like this.........

Dave,
what makes you think that your viewpoint is more objective (more correct?) than Piques? What makes you so confident in the rightfulness of your viewpoint that you so self-righteously smash somebody elses to pieces?

Both and the rest,
To me both are biased - Dave AND Pique.
Everyone who takes an extreme standpoint, be it liberal or conservative or something else, is per definitionem biased and in my opinion on one eye blind !
None of you has looked any further than the tip of your nose up to now.
If you had done it would surely have dawned on you that:

a) what has happened in the US on Tuesday has meanwhile become an issue for the entire civilised world in general and the NATO countries in particular.

b) therefore, the decision of what steps will be taken in order to fight this kind of terrorism is NOT made by America only.

c) the task of today is to show the terrorists and the countries which sponsered or otherwise helped them that the western (read democratic) world is a UNITY and as such totally against terrorism of any kind.

d)no politician etc. at this point in time knows how to react and what way of dealing with such vermin might be the best. It MIGHT turn out that a military reaction is appropriate. BUT: it also MIGHT turn out that it is not. We have to wait and have to learn more of the FACTS before we can decide about what to do.

I do agree with parts of what all of you have said and I disagree with other parts.
No opinion is more right (or wrong) than another and lashing out at each other in the most aggressive terms does, to my understanding, not help in any way.
However, I render discussions very useful and helpful but only if we remain tolerant and don't start to become insulting or polemic. The main reason why discussions exist is foremost to exchange opinions.
Remember: "Freedom is also always the freedom of those who think differently."(Rosa Luxemburg)

And Dave,
what's wrong with piano playing to soothe oneself? If it helps Pique in this situation I find that absolutely OK and unoffending. But comparing her with Nero...I think words fail me here!

I am in Eastern Europe, and I have been through this tragedy. I was in my home working Tuesday afternoon when a friend called and told me what happened. There is no way to describe how I felt. It just wasn't what had happened, I was alone here and had no one to reach out to. I got on the Internet to try to find out what happened and the more I learned the worse it got, and I was alone.

About an hour after I found out about it my doorbell rang. When I opened the door there was an older man standing there. Although I didn't know him, I had seen him walking, and we had waved to each other in passing. He could not speak a word of English, but he handed me a piece of paper that said in English, “I want to express my condolences to you, your family, and to all Americans, for the tragedy you have suffered. I am so sorry”. He shook my hand and left. There were 5 more people I didn't know personally that came to my house Tuesday evening. Some could speak a little English some couldn't. Several had tears in their eyes. Between answering the door, I was deluged with phone calls all with the same message. I was not alone, and America is not alone.

Since Tuesday I have received over 25 faxes and emails from Germany, Italy, France, Czech Republic, Romania, Korea, and China. I received a fax from the mayor of a small village here, it was signed by all the police and firemen of the village, it said “ Our village is grieving for all the Americans that lost their lives from this senseless act, and especially the brave rescue workers of NYC that died helping their fellow man”.

Yesterday I talked on the phone to a lady that used to be our neighbor in Southern Indiana. They had a daughter the same age as my daughter, they went to school together, and she was at our house a lot. Tuesday morning this girl called her mother on her cell phone and said that she was at work and there was an explosion in the building. She didn't know what had happened and her mother would probably hear it on the news, but not to worry she was ok. This girl worked in the WTC, and she wasn't ok, there has been no word from her since.

This was a young innocent girl that loved life and was so excited about working in NYC. Every time I see pictures of that building collapsing I see her face.

I also see the face of the man that killed her. This is the face of a slimy b*****d crouched in the desert eating camel dung, This person is sub human and has no regard for life. I think that not just 94% of Americans see this face, but 94% of the world see it as I do.

I am deeply angered and offended when someone tries painting over this picture and putting the blame on Americans or American organizations. These people are not just anti-American, they are anti-world.

If their beliefs are so strong, I suggest that Pique and Bernard quit hiding in the seclusion and safety of the Internet, and go stand on any street corner in NYC and shout their message. I guarantee that they will get their a** stomped in short order.

lb

definitely... and a great portion of the world would like to see America take some decisive action against this man, and we will support America to the fullest possible in such a situation...

A war has always been an opportunity for America to make some place in the world better, after we eliminate or subdue the evil enemies who have brought us into a conflict. We have failed in this a number of times, but I am not as interested in those past failures at this time or in this post. If we are about to pursue a protracted war, as seems likely, it is best we determine ahead of time what objectives we will accept as achievable, with clear military objectives, so that the war can be won. We do not want another Vietnam. We especially need to understand the people we are about to do battle with.

The gist of David Pryce-Jones' article, Why They Hate Us http://www.nationalreview.com/01oct01/war_pryce-jones100101.shtml
is that we are dealing with a people who feel so ashamed of themselves for their political and economic situation that they must lash out against all those who have done better than themselves. This is only part of it, but Pryce-Jones' comments about the usual run of traditional relations between ruler and ruled in the Arab world are also part of it. But some of the rest of it should be mentioned as well.

Though they comprise some 247 distinct tribes, the Arabs are among the most racially pure group on the planet. Very few other peoples have mingled their blood with theirs for many thousands of years. They have lived in relative isolation in an inhospitable land where there was no practical place for a police force of any kind, therefore even before Islam institutionalized revenge and lifted suicide during a Jihad to the level of a sacred blessing, these were common sentiments among them, for the Arab needed these to preserve his freedom and his possessions. And the Arab feels most free when he is moving about the vastness of his realm from oasis to trading post.

Essentially the Arabs are a wild and pre-eminently nomadic people who feel most uncomfortable in closed in urban situations and not very much better on farms or practicing agriculture of any kind. Arabs are among the most genuinely hospitable and gracious people I have ever known. They can be staunch friends and terrible enemies as nobody is a better liar or more treacherous. These are generalities, but to a greater or lesser extent they are supported by many people (close friends of mine) who have lived and worked among them for many years. One thing is clear, as it was even during the Crusades; no one who has lengthy contact with the Arabs has ever been left unaffected; certain cultural traits, words and concepts seem to rub off and become part of the home culture; the zero, coffee, playing cards, perfume, silk, dates, and much more.

Their religion is integral to the problem posed by considering an Arab as your enemy. Precise in trifles, but strict in observance, Islam seems easier than many other religious practices. In its mildest or most mystical forms, Islam is capable of inspiring a sense of great serenity and beauty. Unfortunately it also has a fanatical and totalitarian side. Islam was spread by the sword and they are not about to give up this option without a bloody fight. Someone of my acquaintance who lived in Iraq and Iran before they were forced to leave by the Ayatollah, remarked to me that the Moslems seemed to feel themselves of the dispossessed; if they weren't born among the Jews (their brothers only in a sense, I'll explain in a minute) or were unable to be Christians (because they have a deep suspicion that Christians are really polytheists who worship three gods, and maybe more), then they can profess themselves Moslems and remain content with their portion. Giving alms to beggars is an essential requirement of Islam. Since I have been doing this for years, I guess I am Moslem myself at least in this sense.

Believing things that are unsupportable seems to be part of all religions, but for a Moslem, these beliefs must be as absolute as the edges between sun and shade on the desert. Any deviation means going to heck. There is far less concept of forgiveness among them than among other groups as it just doesn't seem reasonable to forgive the unforgivable. This tends to give the Moslem Arabs a rather severe and serious cast. Interestingly, the Prophet seems to have detested music. Despite this, there is a musical tradition among the Arabs far older than Islam, that manages to survive where it is not suppressed.

Obviously the Arabs must have some fun. And they do. Their chief pleasures are food, not drink as alcohol is forbidden among strict Moslems, sex and war, not necessarily in that order. Of course to make a living they prefer trading. They have a looser concept of private property than we do, but they definitely believe in capitalism and have always had an uneasy relationship with socialism as a concept.

All this being said, terrorism is far more likely among Arabs than direct conflict with them in the sense of formal standing armies, as the need for treachery among themselves to settle scores goes back many thousands of years, long before the rise of Islam.

One of the things that we must do is to be aware that in seeking retribution for what was done and what may still be done to us, we may be walking into a trap. We are probably not ever going to be able to trust any of them for too long without accepting certain realities among themselves.

There has been, going back to the time of the Prophet, political splits among Moslems. Islam is idiomatic not monolithic, as all religions in fact are. More to the point, the moderate Moslems have been living in fear and conflict with those who wish to impose a more totalitarian form on Arab societies. There is a conflict among them set up by contact with the rest of the world and the customs of outsiders. Civilizations are in conflict.

One very important question we need to ask ourselves if we really decide to go to war with these people is whether we want to change the Arab culture permanently and forever by force, making it inconceivable to them that the rest of the world would ever again tolerate the spreading of Islam by the sword!!! In the process we would force them to accept a democracy like ours where someone like pique or Bernard could have their opinions aired without fear of being killed for them. This is a concept that is even foreign to many central American societies, although it is changing.

Then there's the matter of Israel. Strange that the Jews are referred to as Semitic people when very few of them are anywhere as Semitic as any Arab. The word Semite derives from being descended from the patriarch Shem. Caucasians are said to be descended from the patriarch Japeth and the black races from the patriarch Ham. These were the sons of Noah. The yellow races of the Far East in Asia are believed to be the descendants of Cain who killed his brother Abel and was driven out from among the rest of humanity, "east of Eden." This is all mysterious and still unproved but there are researchers looking into all the archeological evidence and it is beyond the purposes of this post to pursue these matters further, except concerning the Jews who currently comprise the majority in Israel and elsewhere. To the Arab, these people are Europeans, not Semites. They have been away too long. They have mixed with other races. Before 1948, the Palestinians, whether Jew, Christian or Moslem, got along well. They appreciated being free of the Turk and anticipated being free of the British and French as well. The Arab never minded trading with foreigners, they just didn't like having them camp out among them for long periods of time and imposing their foreign rules on them. This is the prime beef with Israel. The Arabs look upon these people as nothing like their racial brothers, the Jews who have always lived with them, at least those who can with relative ease trace themselves back to Isaac, their younger brother. To reiterate, to the Arabs, these Israeli Jews are just other European outsiders who disturbed the Arab wandering pattern of life, closed off and invaded their land, and have threatened to take one of their holiest sites from them, the Temple Mount, one of the most mysterious pieces of real estate on earth. To the Arabs, the state of Israel is as much a blight on their "portion" as the Kingdom of Jerusalem was during the middle ages. Christian? Jew? Not to the Arab. These people are neither, as they are not truly Semitic and they wish they would go back where they came from and stop treating them like dirt. Unfortunately the Israelis can't go back where they came from and like it or not, Jerusalem and its surroundings have always been considered the legitimate homeland of the Jews by the rest of the world. And the rest of the world is not particularly interested in what happens to three and a half million displaced Palestinian Arabs whom they suppose can jolly well find plenty of space in the vastness of Araby to remove to. It's just not that simple.

This is the quagmire we are being drawn into. In a mysterious way, the terrorists are making us "feel their pain." The message is probably even stranger. They recognize what they have done. They know and expect that revenge will follow. They know that it must be severe. They expect it. But behind it I believe is the desire to have us eventually correct the problems they cannot correct for themselves, as long as we are willing to leave them to their portion after we are through. This seems oddly to be the big problem for this present century. Are we as much up to the fight as we must be up to the compassion?

And remember folks, let's go easy on pique, Bernard and others who may disagree with us. This is after all still America. This is the land where the First Amendment, as Oliver Wendell Holmes said, "allows the fool the right to drool in public." And contrary to political correctness, which is NOT a true or honorable American concept, It also allows the bystander to say who they regard as a fool. Certainly I have been the fool from time to time and I am grateful that America has allowed me this right. The fight we are about to enter with the Arab world, or a significant part of it, will determine how these American ideas of human rights (young concepts as world history goes) which we so often take for granted, may be planted among the oldest people on the planet. Remember, the innocents among them are awaiting liberation and not just from Israel, but from some of their own leaders, both political and religious. Are we up to it?

Nici wrote:

Everyone who takes an extreme standpoint, be it liberal or conservative or something else, is per definitionem biased and in my opinion on one eye blind !

My view is neither extreme nor blind. On the other hand, people that cannot make a connection between cause and effect relationships or in your case, reach a conclusion in the face of empirical evidence are out to lunch. The liberals in the US continue to prove the definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again expecting to get different results.

None of you has looked any further than the tip of your nose up to now.

Your credibility has just tanked, Nici, with a totally ill-informed judgement.

the decision of what steps will be taken in order to fight this kind of terrorism is NOT made by America only.

Wrong. Building an alliance may be a wonderful show of unity, it may even be prudent (although the security issues suggest otherwise) but if nobody else joins us, we will complete the task on our own and take note of the cowards and muddled thinkers who could not reach a right conclusion.

no politician etc. at this point in time knows how to react and what way of dealing with such vermin might be the best. It MIGHT turn out that a military reaction is appropriate. BUT: it also MIGHT turn out that it is not. We have to wait and have to learn more of the FACTS before we can decide about what to do.

When disciplining a child, the response should be immediate so that there is no possible disconnect in their minds between the cause and effect relationship. The intensity and the timing was what made our actions against Khadafi successful. You can be sure that nothing will be done until there has been sufficient fact finding. You can also be sure that the remedy will include the full force of our military might.

No opinion is more right (or wrong) than another

This is where your muddled thinking loses me entirely. It is impossible for any one of us to straighten out people that think a logic flow is spilling coffee inside a computer. Time for you to listen more and speak less, Nici. The "I'm okay, you're okay" mentality is at the heart of many of the problems we find ourselves in at this time.

And Dave,
what's wrong with piano playing to soothe oneself? If it helps Pique in this situation I find that absolutely OK and unoffending. But comparing her with Nero...I think words fail me here!

You're words failing you may be the only good news in your entire post. If Pique wants to find solace in playing the piano, that's fine. If she wants to post on a public forum that she "played some pieces as requiems and gestures of love towards those who died" in the face of all that suffering, her gesture is as useless as her suggested remedies. When she tells me that she volunteered to play in a public memorial service in their memory, I will recant. Until then, the analogy is quite apt.

dave, your self-righteousness and hostility are breathtaking. however did you come to have all the answers and know the one, sole truth? your posts are truly among the most offensive i have ever seen on any forum. the particulars are beneath a response.

david burton, thank you for the background on the arab world. it is very interesting, although there is a bit more to be said on the tribal thing: some jews are of european extraction and they are called ashkenazim. but many other jews are in fact semitic, and do look like arabs. the ashkenazim in palestine is a modern phenomenon, but there are indeed semitic jews indigenous to that part of the world.

last night, on the local commercial television station, they read aloud viewer comments from this (conservative) community. after spending (too much) time on this forum i was truly amazed to hear that at least half of those viewer comments sounded like this one: "we brought this on ourselves." and not a rah rah flag-waving comment among them.

this from people who voted for judy martz! it restores my faith in humanity.

maybe the world doesn't think like piano world after all. hm, i think i'll take a step outside and see. 'bye for now.

I apologize to pique for my flippant tea-time remark but reiterate that I spoke of difference and strength which pique translated as subhuman and murder. When I was young, I too felt that all people were the same. As a teacher I learned that each of my students was different and needed to be treated differently. As much as I loved my students, there was strength in my dealings with them just as there is with my children.

The manifestation of that strength differs as those with whom I deal differ. David Burton has reinforced how these people differ in his post. Regardless of B and N's defense of pique, I believe pique distorted what I said more than I misinterpreted what pique said.

I had hoped to apologize directly to pique via email but the address is not available here. Neither is Bernard's. Probably a vast left wing conspiracy of silence. (just kidding, you two. )

oh, dear, i am still reading. :rolleyes:

i'm going to try to use the quotations function, but no guarantees how it will come out:



well, dt, then i misunderstood your comment about differences. of course the kind of differences you speak of exist. i guess i thought that went without saying. what i thought i heard you saying was that somehow some of us are different from others in a *fundamental* way. and that is what i was disagreeing with. we are all the same in that we all try to find happiness, we all do the best we can, we all need love, we all feel hurt, etc. in otherwords, in our humanity we are the same. and it is from that basis of belief that we have compassion and mutual respect, despite sometimes deep differences.

I believe pique distorted what I said more than I misinterpreted what pique said.[/QUOTE]

sorry for the misunderstanding. i apologize.

I had hoped to apologize directly to pique via email but the address is not available here. Neither is Bernard's. Probably a vast left wing conspiracy of silence. (just kidding, you two. )[/QUOTE]

very funny, dt i think the tenor of the conversation here more than reinforces my decision to not post my email. the last thing i need is to perpetuate these discussions by email as well!

thanks for the apology. accepted and welcomed.

"Pique" --

This is why so many people on this forum are upset with your attitude:

"last night, on the local commercial television station, they read aloud viewer comments from this (conservative) community. after spending (too much) time on this forum i was truly amazed to hear that at least half of those viewer comments sounded like this one: "we brought this on ourselves." and not a rah rah flag-waving comment among them.

this from people who voted for judy martz! it restores my faith in humanity."

Your approval is directed at those who criticise our country and assert that America is somehow at fault and your disapproval is directed at the "flag waivers" who support his country.

These are your words. I can only assume this is your true belief. If so, it is your right to write them and my right to comment that your views are despicable in this time of great tragedy, suffering, and loss.

God bless America,

Brad

there is more than one way to support one's country, brad. from my point of view, i AM supporting my country. i can't say that strongly enough. criticism is called for. self-examination as a nation is called for. to deny that is not my idea of supporting my country.

to say that we have to unite at the expense of examining the truth makes no sense to me. we can be united AND examine our role in the world. they are NOT mutually exclusive.

and how does self-examination make us more vulnerable to terrorists anyway? how does having a debate about foreign policy make us more vulnerable? it doesn't. this is a fear-mongering myth. rather, thoughtful discussion might lead to actions that solve the problem rather than make it worse.

we clearly have extremely different views on this. i did not imagine, when i first posted my views, that it would upset people here so much, and didn't post with the intention to upset anyone. at first, i thought that what i posted was what most people would think. it is certainly how most people i know think.

when i discovered that wasn't so, i had hoped to have an exchange of views with people who believe very differently than i do. but i see that they (you) cannot hear me. i'll quit trying, as i've already had my say, and repeating it clearly won't make any difference.

When Kennedy said in my home town of Berlin:
"Ich bin ein Berliner" I felt I had become at that time already a very young American.

Kennnedy wasn't afraid of the big guys across the wall and this is the wrong time to worry about the small *****s.

I hope you will move on them ,kill'em all
and let Allah sort out the pieces.

Your GI's at the Berlin border would have!

Warning -- Non-"Pique" related comments follow:

Norbert,

One of the seminal experiences in my life was my visit to West Berlin in 1984. I was a young man in graduate school at the time with liberal tendencies and a relatively benign view of socialism/communism. It was easy -- nay, fashionable -- to develop such views when raised in middle class comfort in America in the sixties.

What struck me -- what shocked me -- was The Wall, the guard towers, the guns, the guard dogs, the barbed wire and the realization that anyone who tried to come over from the east side would be killed. I'm sure I intellectually understood this before, but standing on the viewing platform at Potzdamer Platz and looking that that system of evil made it so real. It changed me. Freedom is not easy and must never be taken for granted.

Needless to say, today I'm an example of the axiom (to paraphrase Winston Churchill) that anyone who is not a liberal at twenty has no heart and that anyone who is not a conservative at forty has no head.

I returned to Berlin in 1990 right after the wall came down. What a wonderous experience.

Brad

[ September 14, 2001: Message edited by: Brad ]

And the wall in New York will also come down.

Except there are no cheering crowds on it.

America will do what it has to do.

And emerge stronger than it ever has.

Whow to those who are not on her side.

This time around.

Ah, the Disneyfication of America.

A magic pill for every ill, meat that requires the death of no animals, everybody loves everybody else.

Pardon me whilst I vomit.

Self introspection and motive explanation is wonderful, but it will certainly get you killed in a gunfight. And war is a gunfight between nations, except this "war" is not even with a soverign nation. This war is with rats and we need to exterminate them. Now. By any means possible. Now.

I am reluctant and hesitant to try and make any valid points, or ANY point for that matter for fear that I will be verbally assaulted by Dave and pelted with his sarcastic hostile remarks. Dave, understand that I too feel that a crater should be made out of that place, but in reading your posts I find that you take everything anyone says quite personally and do your best to degrade them and their opinions to the fullest extent that you can. One of the freedoms of our country is that of free speech. You don't have to agree with the views held by Pique and Bernard, but it is unnecessary to insult them. Perhaps you should start trying to disagree in a more civil and less hostile manner.

When at peace, tolerance is easy. We can tolerate silly people making idiotic statements such as, "well after all we trained Bin Laden so what do we expect?" or "we need to be self critical at a time like this: America is partly to blame." But now we have been slugged in the mouth by an organization with the sworn and widely publicized intention of destroying us.

It's time to make a few things clear to some people:

1) We fought the Nazis because if we didn't they would have taken over the world. They were driven by an EVIL IDEA.

2) We fought a cold war against another EVIL IDEA that some people refuse to see as either evil or insane. For the most part we can consider what these people believe as terribly foolish. Most socialists or their sympathizers have no idea that the man behind the idea, Karl Marx, was in fact a SATANIST! It wasn't that Communists were atheists. They BELIEVED in God. They intended to displace God, deliberately. The main reason I came to despise socialism and any who supported it was that IT HAS KILLED MORE PEOPLE THAN ANY OTHER SYSTEM EVER CONCEIVED BY THE MIND OF MAN, far more than THEY attribute to Christianity or for that matter all wars of religion throughout history combined. Communism is a LIE, it has never worked and never will. People run from it where it is installed. Those who can't run from it become its slaves. Indeed organized Communism holds the all time record for murder: over 100 million people in one century! As long as ONE PERSON still believes in this EVIL system, it is still alive and functioning and dangerous to everything America stands for. I have a right to my vitriol: when I was young I considered myself a socialist. Then I got my facts straight and grew up, fast. Apparently a few out there still haven't. There really are EVIL people out there and they become EVIL by accepting EVIL ideas.

3) There are many other EVIL ideas out there too, false views of the world, of humanity, etc. These views inevitably lead to a conflict when they attempt to expand and make a bid to force themselves on others.

I am increasingly angered by opinions that somehow America, with our incredible TOLERANCE for foolish and silly people with their erroneous and EVIL ideas, must somehow accept blame for what terrorists have just done to us. My anger is white hot when I consider these people and their foolishness! Isn't it amazing that America is such a great country that we allow people the FREEDOM to think and say such things? Isn't it amazing that people have DIED in the Civil War, World Wars I & II and other wars to make sure they could still speak and think whatever mush they have in their heads?

I have said many times to many people that IDEALISM IS EVIL and it is imperative that all parents instill in their children an acceptance of REALITY rather than a belief in an idealism. My daughters have been raised not to whine and complain about how unfair the world is, but to go out there and take the world by the horns, to accept conditions just as they find them. They don't have any self esteem problems, that's for sure. Let me explain.

I am distinguishing between an IDEAL which is fine and good and an IDEALISM which is destructive and evil. An idealism, not an ideal, is a system, a world view that sees the world in an idealized state that doesn't conform to any reality at any known time in history. Such twisted ideas as Economic Justice, Reparations for Slavery (as if 625,000 lives weren't enough!) and literally dozens of other "causes" all motivate people to divide the world into two camps, those who support the cause and those who are enemies. It is precisely this inevitable tendency to create ideology that makes an idealism so dangerous. If one does not support the cause, they are inevitably stigmatized and ultimately marked for liquidation. This is what so many of us have against liberals. I know damn well too. I was once a liberal myself! When someone disagrees, the name calling begins. Behind the name calling is a hate motivated by a desire to instill the idealized view of the world on everyone, by force. Well it wont work. It never does. In the 7th century Mohammed tried to get the Jews of Mecca to "convert" to his religion. They wouldn't, so he killed them all, men, women and children. He did the same to those pagans who still worshipped Baal. The pattern he started continued over the next decades.

The IDEA behind the terrorist acts, an idea they were willing to give their own lives up for, was another idealism, that Islamic Fundamentalism should take over the world and that anyone who doesn't want to live under strict Islamic law, as interpreted by THEM, must DIE! There is nothing very new about this. It's just another idealism, and they are all EVIL.

OK America, do we take this on? You bet we do. Let's start by making ourselves clear; Islamic Fundamentalism, the EVIL IDEA that motivates people to KILL THEMSELVES in order that it succeeds must be called what it is; AN EVIL IDEALISM. Those who willingly support it are now our enemies. War as Carroll Quigley has said, is fought to convince the losers that their view of the world is mistaken. Unless we want to accept Bin Laden's view of the world, that anyone who is not an Islamic Fundamentalist BY HIS DEFINITIONS must DIE, we had best face up to the task of wiping out this EVIL IDEA which belongs on the slag heap of history along with Nazism, Communism and Fascism.

GOD BLESS AMERICA!

Dave Andrews said:

I am unabashedly a social liberal. Thank you very much.



I understood every bit of it. You admit that the only reason you monitor those sources is "just to hear the distorted perspectives." It's hardly as if you're paying any attention to them with the possibility of broadening your mind a little.


There is such pomposity in your comments that I can't help but chuckle. Thanks for cheering me up a little. And I have no response to this absurd little paragraph--it generates it's own answer.

To lb,

You wrote:


You offend me. I doubt that you have read anything I've written on this forum and in fact are only listening to the phantoms in your own head. If you'd actually read what I've written, you'd know that 1) I, like everyone else, am horrified by the tragic events of Tuesday, 2) adhor terrorism, 3) am totally behind an effort to fight terrorism and eradicate it as much as we can, 4) have deep feelings of sadness for all the victions, 5) love my country and it's freedoms, 6) believe that Love is far stronger and greater than hate, 7) Hate begets hate, 8) if we do not think carefully about how to fight terrorism we may find the world in a much worse state than it currently is, 9) if we do react with level heads we can achieve a great wonder for the world.

Do yourself and me a favor, READ my posts before lashing out at me.

OK. I'm not sure you know the implications of what you are saying, most social liberals don't. Don't get yourself all upset over what I am about to say. It's not directed at you personally. Being unabashedly anything is often the beginning of a real education. I too was at one time unabashedly a social liberal.

Social liberal idealism, another misguided EVIL, supposes as it does that personal responsibility, private property, the benefits of modern finance capitalism, the right to prosper from the risk of one's own capital, count for nothing compared with making sure that those who are foolish, weak, stupid or LAZY must be coddled by the state, which in turn makes the lives of everyone a hellish equality of bureaucratic "fairness," is a system that has never worked and never will. Indeed NOTHING of any significance which has made our lives materially better has ever been or can be attributed to it. Social liberal idealism has in fact bankrupted a number of countries and in some cases made the way clear for despotism and tyranny. Those who espouse it are fools if not desperately evil. You can always tell them by their attitudes; they are smug, they back away from any reasonable argument and resort to name calling because in fact they are woefully ignorant of the world and how it really works, in fact they don't like the world the way it is, they want to make it over into their own idealized vision, they know more than anyone else about what they have never experienced, their ability to run anything for a profit is nil, they masquerade as compassionate when in fact they are self absorbed spoiled little snots. It's OK. This is America. Brave people have died so that these fools have a relatively safe place to play. We have to take care of all our children, especially now. Hopefully some will grow up. This world could sure use a few more grown ups.

To lb,

One more comment about this statement you made, which I did not respond to above:
[QUOTE]I am deeply angered and offended when someone tries painting over this picture and putting the blame on Americans or American organizations. These people are not just anti-American, they are anti-world.[QUOTE]

Sad to say, but again, I don't think you're really listening to what is being said. For me it is not about placing blame, it is about acknowledging that we're not as perfectly innocent as some would believe. As great as America is, we too have lessons to learn. A little humilitiy would suit us.

Don't you think that slavery was an act of terrorism against black people? We paid and trained and armed a group of terrorists in Nicaragua in the 1980s who killed over 30,000 civilians." and it was our CIA who trained Osama bin Laden so he could carry out terrorist acts against the Soviet Union.