quote:Originally posted by Jason Abbadon: Britan: We love Tony Blair! Stand him up next to your last three Prime Ministers and he comes across as James-fucking-Bond.
You remember the Prime Minister before Maggie? That's very impressive for a foreign type.
And Blair may have charisma and even (hnnng) a certain degree of "coolness", but you'd still be more terrified of being trapped in a room with Maggie if she didn't like you. And she doesn't like anyone.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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"Now, take that and add 'likely to reward us with business and trade and generally raise our standard of living about 500% if we DO kiss their ass,' and you'll have it."
So, essentially, we are the Mob of the international scene.
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quote:Originally posted by Cartman: in fact, and Khaddafi himself hasn't supported international terrorism since, uh, the early nineties.
That's like saying, that convict has'nt raped and children in ten whole years.
No, actually that's like saying The Colonel's former activities can be dismissed as, to quote Rob, "old crap" and thus do not preclude him from becoming a respected member of the international community. B)
That's truly a sad fact.
So, in twenty years or so, we'll all see Bin Laden as a "respected member of the international community" if he does nothing else wrong? We've already treated Arafat like he was an old pal and it sure did dick for peace.... Now the world views him slightly more as the terrorist he truly is.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Meanwhile, Ariel Sharon now seems to think that with Saddam Hussein safely locked up, he can give up his facade of being nice to Arabs. That whole mess is no more solely Arafat's fault than the damage to the Good Friday agreement in Ireland is Gerry Adams'. Neither side in both those conflicts really wants peace or compromise, they want to win, to be proved right, to kill all their enemies. Sometimes I think that both regions should just have high walls built around them and left to get on with it.
Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
Bin Laden is a special case, of course. He was trained, funded, and armed by the US only because the Reds were making inroads on one of the last Stalwart Bastions of Freedom� (although by that time, Afghanistan wasn't quite so... democratic anymore as it had been in the seventies) in Asia, then promptly went and used that expertise against his Kind Benefactors� because to him they embodied an even greater evil than the godless communists ever did. A classic "enemy of my enemy" thing, really. So no, he won't get off the hook as easily as a Generic Dictator� might, if it's any consolation.
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted
Well, It may be of some consolation to me, but not to Khaddafi's victims or their families.
As to Ariel Sharon: There couldnt be a leader less intrested in Middle East Peace. His track record is very anti-palestinian. We're talking hate here. Lee's post is dead-on: As long as he and Arafat are the top dogs, we might as well make some popcorn and watch the endless circle of street warfare. Sad.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Mr. Arafat seems to have as many lives of Saddam Hussein: just when you think the end is near for him...BOOM! He stays in power, even if he is locked in Ramallah.
One of these days, though, his time will run out. And the world will be a better place.
Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
I think that unless both parties sit down at a table together and say "fuck the ancient religious and territorial claims resting on this damn piece of land, fuck God, fuck Allah, fuck Sharon, fuck Arafat, fuck the infinite cycle of hatred we've locked ourselves in, from now on we're going to solve our differences without bloodshed", that better place will remain a fata morgana for the NEXT two thousand years.
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted
This, from the May/June 2001 edition of Foreign Affairs, sort of takes the wind out of the sails for the 'what a victory for this is for the Bush Doctrine� crowd.
quote:The Rogue Who Came in From the Cold by Ray Takeyh
Summary: The recent trial of two Libyans for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, raises a vexing problem for U.S. policymakers: What should Washington do when American containment policy starts to pay off and a "rogue" state starts to reform? After years of international isolation, Colonel Mu'ammar Qaddafi is ending his belligerence and starting to meet many of the demands placed on him by Washington and its allies. Now President Bush must figure out how to keep the pressure on while recognizing Libya's progress and helping reintegrate it into the world community.
-------------------- Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war. ~ohn Adams
Once again the Bush Administration is worse than I had imagined, even though I thought I had already taken account of the fact that the Bush administration is invariably worse than I can imagine. ~Brad DeLong
You're just babbling incoherently. ~C. Montgomery Burns
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Now if there was only a way to give every American voter a subscription to a magazine full of great ideas but chock full of big words and very few pictures in time for November.
Oh, Cartman, historical tweak... I think you'll find that Afghanistan has never had a democratic government, and the Soviet-backed quasi-Socialist affair they had pre-Soviet invasion was pretty much as close as they got.
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
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quote:Originally posted by Cartman: I think that unless both parties sit down at a table together and say "fuck the ancient religious and territorial claims resting on this damn piece of land, fuck God, fuck Allah, fuck Sharon, fuck Arafat, fuck the infinite cycle of hatred we've locked ourselves in, from now on we're going to solve our differences without bloodshed", that better place will remain a fata morgana for the NEXT two thousand years.
I'm waiting for all concerned parties to snap to the sudden shocking reailization that they've fought so bitterly and sacrificed genereations of their children for some of the most useless, ugly desert in the middle of fucking nowhere. It's now Hawaii people! Just forge a scroll saying how the "real" Holy Land is some uninhabited tropical isle and call it a draw.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
But it does have some nice beach front property...
Give them all real estate licenses and and let them go to town then....
-------------------- "You are a terrible human, Ritten." Magnus "Urgh, you are a sick sick person..." Austin Powers A leek too, pretty much a negi.....
Registered: Sep 2000
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Saltah'na
Chinese Canadian, or 75% Commie Bastard.
Member # 33
posted
quote:Originally posted by Jay the Obscure: Thing is, that Lybia has wanted back into the community of nations for some time. Didn�t they, in fact, a little while ago give up the Lockerbie bombers for trial? And as I recall, they offered recompense to the families of the bombing? So, it�s probably not so much a case of �Iraq scared them,� as it is sanctions and diplomacy working.
IIRC, Libya was involved in some sort of Hostage taking crisis a while back. Not that they were the hostage takers, but I hear that they were involved in trying to negotiate the hostages' release.
I'm with Jay on this one. Iraq may have had an effect, but I believe that effect is relatively minor.
-------------------- "And slowly, you come to realize, it's all as it should be, you can only do so much. If you're game enough, you could place your trust in me. For the love of life, there's a tradeoff, we could lose it all but we'll go down fighting...." - David Sylvian FreeSpace 2, the greatest space sim of all time, now remastered!
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posted
The Mediterranean coastline is hardly a wasteland, and while climate change has had some interesting effects there over the past two thousand years or so, it isn't a place "nobody wants," even if we disregard the religious and cultural significance of, say, Jerusalem.
Also, I'd argue that the primary tension here isn't religious, since we can go back through history and see times when Judaism, Islam, and even Christianity have interacted in the close quarters of the Old City in relative peace. Or rather, that the primary tension is not intrinsic to the religions involved.
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