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Irritating Things From The 'War on Terror'

evildave

Unregistered
E
Yes, the terrorists angered me *a lot* three years ago. My exact quote when I saw the tower hit was "Lakes of glass.... Drown them [ the people responsible, maybe even the whole Middle East ] in lakes of molten glass!", which wasn't exactly a very peaceful recommendation.

I have in no way forgotten or forgiven them their crimes against humanity, nor the Ba'athists their own seperate crimes. Although this should go without saying, I have to say this because people will claim I'm 'pro-terrorist', 'pro-Saddam' and even 'Hate America' for disagreeing on how things should be done and what things should be done in the name of the 'War Against Terrorism' and in the name of the United States of America, Freedom, Democracy and Peace, and in what order it should be done.

We were supposed to be going to war to round up the terrorists and bring the terrorists (what terrorists weren't killed) to justice. We had virtually the whole world on our side. We had the opportunity to bring about sweeping change. We made a 'sweeping change', all right. Now we have virtually the whole world against us. How did we manage this? Mid-stream from our 'War on Terror', our efforts were deflected to the 'War on Iraq', instead.

From a focus on bringing the Al Qaeda and its leaders, including Usama Bin Laden to justice, and the Taliban leaders for sheltering them, we shifted that focus 90 degrees, out of the blue to bringing the Ba'athists and Saddam Hussein to 'justice' instead.

Iraq was one of the more irritating turns of events for me. It wasn't topped until the torture things came to light, and that was a lot more irritating, and in its own way unforgivable, because it was a betrayal of American values.

One has to ask one's self a few questions about this 'quest for justice'...

What is justice?
Wouldn't having trials and finding innocence and guilt, releasing or sentencing the accused as a result seem like justice? Instead, there is every indication our fearless administration planned to simply keep whatever bodies they rounded up imprisoned indefinitely without a trial, until the supreme court stepped in. Since then, secret military tribunals have begun (only because hearings were MANDATED by the Supreme Court). Many still seem to believe that 'presumed guilt' is the best and safest alternative to sticking to our American ideals.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/10/11/eveningnews/main525342.shtml
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0316-03.htm
(Not all stories from release are negative...)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...8.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/02/08/ixportal.html
And the first to be freed as a result of the supreme court decision that trials HAD to be given. It will be interesting to hear from this man. He's an American, so he's probably certain to do the talk show circuit. I wonder if these 'travel arrangements' (a simple airplane flight from Cuba to Florida) will take until after the election?
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/a...nal_orders_that_guantanamo_detainee_be_freed/
WASHINGTON -- The US military admitted for the first time yesterday that one of the prisoners whom the Bush administration has held without charges for more than two years at Guantanamo Bay was never an Al Qaeda or Taliban fighter and should be immediately released from the interrogation camp in Cuba.
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Before the Supreme Court order, however, the administration had contended that all the detainees were enemy combatants, and had resisted any official recourse for those who claimed to be innocent.
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Apparently Saddam Hussein will be publicly tried before any Taliban or Al Qaeda member linked directly with the 9/11 attack. Even those who have been in custody much longer than Saddam Hussein. What does that say about our priorities for 'justice'?

Where are those Al Qaeda links with Iraq?
This was a major tenet in the faith of invasion. Even to this day, Bush/Cheney insist they were.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/18/cheney.iraq.al.qaeda/
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/17/Bush.alqaeda/index.html

Odd, the 9/11 report doesn't support this at all.
http://www.9-11commission.gov/
http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report_Ch10.htm
Clarke has written that on the evening of September 12, President Bush told him and some of his staff to explore possible Iraqi links to 9/11. "See if Sad-dam did this," Clarke recalls the President telling them. "See if he's linked in any way."60 While he believed the details of Clarke's account to be incorrect, President Bush acknowledged that he might well have spoken to Clarke at some point, asking him about Iraq.61

Responding to a presidential tasking, Clarke's office sent a memo to Rice on September 18, titled "Survey of Intelligence Information on Any Iraq Involvement in the September 11 Attacks." Rice's chief staffer on Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, concurred in its conclusion that only some anecdotal evidence linked Iraq to Al Qaeda. The memo found no "compelling case" that Iraq had either planned or perpetrated the attacks. It passed along a few foreign intelligence reports, including the Czech report alleging an April 2001 Prague meeting between Atta and an Iraqi intelligence officer (discussed in chapter 7) and a Polish report that personnel at the headquarters of Iraqi intelligence in Baghdad were told before September 11 to go on the streets to gauge crowd reaction to an unspecified event. Arguing that the case for links between Iraq and al Qaeda was weak, the memo pointed out that Bin Ladin resented the secularism of Saddam Hussein's regime. Finally, the memo said, there was no confirmed reporting on Saddam cooperating with Bin Ladin on unconventional weapons.62
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Where are the WMDs?
Iraq was supposed to be making 'Weapons of Mass Destruction'. They were making 'nukes'. They were making chemical weapons. They were making biological weapons. You'd think we'd have found these terrible things. They're still looking for them. I thought we had compelling and obvious evidence of the existence of these weapons. Wouldn't that mean we had a good idea where they were making them and stockpiling them? Time after time, they find one of their 'smoking guns', and time after time, it's turned out to be something else.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4654048/
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/Primetime/iraq_barrels030428.html
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/15/sprj.irq.no.labs/

Sure, there's a lot of Iraq to hide WMDs in. But so far (9/9/04) the only chemical weapon they found was a UXO leftover from a previous war (that turned out not to be chemical at all), some old mustard gas, and a small quantity of radioactive waste that was undisturbed in its UN sealed storage facility, that was transported to the US.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,108390,00.html
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20040708_1410.html

Where's that 'People Shredder'?
Apparently, right next to the babies Iraq was accused of dumping out of incubators in Kuwait for the first Iraq war. Pure propaganda. You'd think that a gore-encrusted industrial plastic shredder would be sort of conspicuous in a torture chamber. I wonder what brand of 'fish food' the output was sold under?

The quote seems to come from a "Liberation Update" press release that the White House releases weekly, which always contains the same list of quotes. The three following press release links (dozens carry the same content) all quote the same 'anti-war' man: "Kennth Joseph"
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030423-11.html
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/11/20031111-5.html
http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/iraq/liberation.html

Apparently, not one frame of the video that "shocked" Kenneth Joseph into 'changing his mind' has ever been released. Odd.
http://www.counterpunch.org/lipton04122003.html

They claim you can't find his former 'anti-war' editorials because they're in 'Japanese'. You'd think that someone who speaks Japanese would have tracked those down for us poor ignorant Westerners and gotten a translation of them for us in all this time. The Japanese do have internet news posts, search engines, and all the same information technology that we do.
http://assyrianchristians.com/about_ken_joseph.htm

Japan Times even has an English front-end on their web site.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/

Let's see what a search for 'Kenneth Joseph' yields...

Search Results:

You searched for "Kenneth Joseph" (case insensitive)
Unfortunately, we found no matching articles.
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Not a match on the site for the author's name? Odd, but not conclusive. You'd think the columnist's name would appear somewhere... but maybe his weren't the sorts of columns they bothered to translate... or even his name as a columnist for that matter. Literate, Japanese speaking westerners tend to be a relatively rare in Japan.

Here's the UK half of the 'People Shredder' story.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/analysis/story/0,3604,1155399,00.html
Clwyd insists that corroboration of the shredder story came when she was shown a dossier by a reporter from Fox TV. On June 18, Clwyd wrote a second article for the Times, citing a "record book" from Abu Ghraib, which described one of the methods of execution as "mincing". Can she say who compiled this book? "No, I can't." Where is it now? "I don't know." What was the name of the Fox reporter who showed it to her? "I have no idea." Did Clwyd read the entire thing? "No, it was in Arabic! I only saw it briefly." Curiously, there is no mention of the book or of "mincing" as a method of execution on the Fox News website, nor does its foreign editor recall it.
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Where does the Focus on finding Bin Laden rest?

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010916-2.html
Q Mr. President, do you believe Osama bin Laden's denial that he had anything to do with this?
THE PRESIDENT: No question he is the prime suspect. No question about that.
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http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010917-3.html
Q Do you want bin Laden dead?
THE PRESIDENT: I want justice. There's an old poster out west, as I recall, that said, "Wanted: Dead or Alive."
Q Do you see this being long-term? You were saying it's long-term, do you see an end, at all?
THE PRESIDENT: I think that this is a long-term battle, war. There will be battles. But this is long-term. After all, our mission is not just Osama bin Laden, the al Qaeda organization. Our mission is to battle terrorism and to join with freedom loving people.
We are putting together a coalition that is a coalition dedicated to declaring to the world we will do what it takes to find the terrorists, to rout them out and to hold them accountable. And the United States is proud to lead the coalition.
Q Are you saying you want him dead or alive, sir? Can I interpret --
THE PRESIDENT: I just remember, all I'm doing is remembering when I was a kid I remember that they used to put out there in the old west, a wanted poster. It said: "Wanted, Dead or Alive." All I want and America wants him brought to justice. That's what we want.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/03/20020313-8.html
Q But don't you believe that the threat that bin Laden posed won't truly be eliminated until he is found either dead or alive?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, as I say, we haven't heard much from him. And I wouldn't necessarily say he's at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don't know where he is. I -- I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run. I was concerned about him, when he had taken over a country. I was concerned about the fact that he was basically running Afghanistan and calling the shots for the Taliban.
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http://www.naplesnews.com/npdn/perspective/article/0,2071,NPDN_14966_3166264,00.html
"We don't have any information about bin Laden," Pakistan Information Minister Shaikh Rashid Ahmed told reporters this week.

If so, it's not for lack of trying. Beginning last spring, an offensive by U.S. Marines and Afghan fighters squeezed remote mountain areas where intelligence reports pointed to conclaves of enemy fighters.

Simultaneously, top State Department officials — including Secretary of State Colin Powell and his No. 2, Richard Armitage — have personally visited the most senior Pakistani leaders, escalating the pressure on those officials who U.S. leaders believe can do much more to find America's most-wanted man. Last week, it was State's chief counterterror official, Cofer Black, who traveled to Islamabad with that urgent message.

With 70,000 soldiers deployed to the tribal border areas, Pakistan has managed in recent months to snag bin Laden's former bodyguard, as well as his ex-cook. Its biggest success was the arrest last month, in cities far from that region, of several mid-level al Qaeda operatives and the seizure of computers that significantly expanded knowledge of the inner workings of the amorphous terrorist network.

But so far, bin Laden remains elusive, and the $25 million U.S. bounty on his head is collecting nothing but interest.

Meanwhile, as they have since 9/11, rumors about bin Laden — that he is dead, about to be captured, already in custody, about to trigger a new attack — are swirling in the information void.

One of the most pervasive is the Internet-fueled speculation that the White House has bin Laden stashed away in custody somewhere, waiting to produce him at the time most advantageous for President Bush's re-election campaign.

Another is that bin Laden will resurface for Saturday's Sept. 11 anniversary, this time signaling via video- or audiotape to fellow conspirators that the time has come to launch new attacks to disrupt or influence America's presidential election in November.

On the campaign trail, Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have tried to inoculate themselves against criticism that bin Laden remains on the lam.
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What About The Ba'athists?
But it was much more important to prosecute a war with Iraq, who by all accounts didn't have anything to do with those attacks, instead of track the very last cowering jerk responsible for the attrocities out of whatever hole he was hiding in and make an example of him.

So it seems that instead of prosecuting the war on terrorism, we've given the terrorists at large breathing room, and brought about chaos in a rich new territory for them to infiltrate, now that we've chased all the security people out of Iraq who knew how to track down troublemakers, because, well they were Ba'athist. 400,000 trained military, police, secret police, etc. all laid off at once for being 'tainted' in this way, and you wonder where the insurgents get their recruits? Never mind that in every other totalitarian regime, people who aren't in the 'official' party can't hold down government or management jobs. Here's a group of 400,000 people, 99.99% of whom were just regular troops, officers and job holders, who could have been on our side, that we essentially disenfranchised and condemned to exile or 'McJobs' or worse for the rest of their lives due to a purely politically motivated purge by U.S. forces. Their position will not improve *UNLESS* the Ba'athist regime is restored, so obviously these people have a much stronger motivation to be insurgents than if there had merely been a regime change. Instead of being given an opportunity to renounce their former affiliation, they were branded and fired or run out of the country. Not smart. A general amnesty (with specific exceptions) should have been offered from the very beginning.

Apparently, we're not even replacing them with people any better suited for a position of protection and responsibility.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1293581,00.html
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200408/s1186047.htm

And then (of course) Why Torture?
Apologia Pro Tormento: Analyzing the First 56 Pages of the Walker Working Group Report (aka the Torture Memo)
http://www.discourse.net/archives/2...orking_group_report_aka_the_torture_memo.html

Other places to find the torture memo
http://news.findlaw.com/wp/docs/torture/30603wgrpt.html
http://www.isthatlegal.org/mil_torture.pdf

Human Rights Watch comments on torture documents
http://www.hrw.org/english/docs/2004/06/07/usdom8778.htm

More Bush Documents on Interrogation
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62516-2004Jun22.html

Report from detainees released from Guantanamo bay - similar to Abu Ghraib.
http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/report.asp?ObjID=4bUT8M23lk&Content=424

Less Coercive Techniques Yield Better Intelligence
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/07/international/middleeast/07detain.html
In May, a number of physically and psychologically coercive practices used by interrogators to break down suspected Iraqi insurgents were prohibited, following reports of widespread abuse at Abu Ghraib. Among those techniques banned by American commanders were sleep deprivation, hooding, stripping and the use of dogs to frighten detainees.
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There is a major WMD in Afghanistan ... a true bioweapon or bioterror weapon: its called the opium poppy. It is the perfect weapon against western civilization since its requires its victims to pay the narco-terrorists for the privilege of zombifying themselves.

I grant you that Iraq does not cultivate this weapon but why didn't our armies which invaded Afghanistan not take this out when they had the chance?
 
Probably because that would have disturbed the local economy and angered the various warlords we were busy propping up for their support, who got most of their money from having those cash crops raised, instead of food.

You know, a bit like going into Columbia and telling the drug lords that if they support our efforts to overthrow their local government (yet again), we'll won't interfere in their business.
 
Since when did an invasion force ever care about the local economy? This economy was and still is indeed based on narco-dollars but as we have since learned aLQueda gets a % of the 2.3 billion in Afghan heroin money. It doesn't take a mathematical genius to figure out that in all the money we are spending, there could easily have included a % of the $2 billion while we burned the poppy crops to the ground and made sure this alQueda income source was terminated. We gave $43 million to the Taliban not 8 months before 9-11 ///to shut down the poppy trade. We should have given it to the farmers and warlords.

addicts are supporting the local Afghan economy by continuing to allow ourselves, well some of us, to be addicted to heroin and we are supporting alQueda as well. Its the latter which is the main problem. More in Bush and Kerry and the Heroin Trade.

Bush's "wisdom" in allowing the opium trade to flourish has to be seriously questionned.
 
I agree that justice has not been served by the U.S.'s multi-billion dollar international operations. The only thing I would add is the illegal activites related to the secret prisoners held in Abu Ghraib and other prisons.

Contrary to Army Doctrine, and in violation of international law
Associated Press
September 3, 2004

WASHINGTON - The latest Army investigation into the Abu Ghraib scandal is raising new questions about whether the CIA, operating outside military rules, contributed to the breakdown of military discipline at the prison.

[snip]
The arrangements to hold "ghost detainees" were made between local CIA officers and military officials at the prison, the investigation found. Army investigators said they located information on eight "ghost detainees" held at Abu Ghraib, but said there may have been more.

In one case, military guards at the prison moved a group of detainees around the prison to hide them from a visiting Red Cross delegation, according to the report of U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who conducted a separate investigation into the prison's military police unit. He described the actions as "deceptive, contrary to Army Doctrine, and in violation of international law."
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Yeah, I sort of ran out of steam before exploring every little irk. ;) An important addition, none the less.
 
There are three pivotal events that contribute to the modern international terrorist movement.

The first event was the rise of fundamnentalist islamic revival in the early 1900s. This brand of islam had explicit theocratic aims and sought to displace the cosmopolitan brand of islam that was in most mideast countries. This led to the founding of Al-Ikwan the muslim brotherhood.

The second event, well, lets just say "then came Israel". I don't think I need to expand here too much.

The third big pivotal thing was the cornholing of Lebanon. Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, and other groups gained state sponsorship at this point. Tom Clancy wrote a really good summary of Lebanon in his non-fiction book shadow warriors.

Now, it took an expatriate Saudi intentional targetting America to draw america out of a frankly almost isolationist mentality regarding terrorism.

Does that annoy you? The terrorist world is larger than Osama. Its complex. It consists of old grudges and ruthless people. There are no easy answers. I get into discussions with friends (knowledgeable ones) about the impact of events in Lebanon over two decades ago and how to deal with the effects now.

I don't expect many people to "get it". Bush portays the war on terror in sound bites and easy to grasp short goals. This leads smarter dissidents like yourself to think that the war on terror is in itself shallow and mindless. However, the war on terror is actually so complex that it cannot be reasonably parsed into edible bits as is the style in american politics.

Do some reading Dave, maybe try shadow warriors like I mentioned. Its not specifically about the war on terror but it covers the evolution of US special forces which evolved at the same time as the modern terror movement. As such, many of its topics are tangential and you will see how we have already dealth with these threats in the past and lessons we've learned.
 
In general when things are claimed to be "too subtle" and "complicated", it's because they're utter B.S.

You know, I have read things. Maybe that's the problem. I've done a lot of reading. What I have read is not encouraging.

Another problem is, I have direct experience with people from other countries. I was deployed in Saudi Arabia in the 1980s to watch over the war between Iran/Iraq. I lived on Okinawa for a couple of years and met Koreans and Phillipinos in their own countries. It's why I can't see people in the Middle East, or Japan, or Europe, or other places as anything besides human beings exactly like me, with families and personal goals, and bills to pay and things to do. Just like families everywhere.

Yeah, so they have a different 'religion' from me. Everybody else does, too.

Yeah, so they dress different from me. Everybody else does, too.

Yeah, they do indeed think about many things differently from me as well. Everybody else does, too.

In common, most people everywhere just want to live out their lives in a predictable world where rational long-term plans can come to fruition, and children grow up to have a life a little easier than they had for themselves. This is pretty much universal.

So, when I see civilian casualies, it is highly disturbing to me. They aren't numbers. They are human beings who are being maimed and killed. Our men and women, their men, women and children. I don't see a difference between one human and another.

When I see that people are being tortured for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that their human rights are being trampled by my own government, I can't help wonder when it will be our turn next, as citizens of this same government, for the same treatment. Especially when arrest and search warrants and even trials are made 'secret'. Very disturbing.

Sure the people who made these laws claim they would never be abused. They also claimed 'income tax' would never be applied to anyone who isn't rich, so congratulations, everybody must be rich, now.
 
corplinx said:
There are three pivotal events that contribute to the modern international terrorist movement.

The first event was the rise of fundamnentalist islamic revival in the early 1900s. This brand of islam had explicit theocratic aims and sought to displace the cosmopolitan brand of islam that was in most mideast countries. This led to the founding of Al-Ikwan the muslim brotherhood.

The second event, well, lets just say "then came Israel". I don't think I need to expand here too much.

The third big pivotal thing was the cornholing of Lebanon. Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, and other groups gained state sponsorship at this point. Tom Clancy wrote a really good summary of Lebanon in his non-fiction book shadow warriors.

Now, it took an expatriate Saudi intentional targetting America to draw america out of a frankly almost isolationist mentality regarding terrorism.

Does that annoy you? The terrorist world is larger than Osama. Its complex. It consists of old grudges and ruthless people. There are no easy answers. I get into discussions with friends (knowledgeable ones) about the impact of events in Lebanon over two decades ago and how to deal with the effects now.

I don't expect many people to "get it". Bush portays the war on terror in sound bites and easy to grasp short goals. This leads smarter dissidents like yourself to think that the war on terror is in itself shallow and mindless. However, the war on terror is actually so complex that it cannot be reasonably parsed into edible bits as is the style in american politics.

Do some reading Dave, maybe try shadow warriors like I mentioned. Its not specifically about the war on terror but it covers the evolution of US special forces which evolved at the same time as the modern terror movement. As such, many of its topics are tangential and you will see how we have already dealth with these threats in the past and lessons we've learned.
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I do realize that there are a number of intertwined factors that make the situation difficult. I also realize that there are a number of things that the U.S. government is doing to prevent terrorism in the U.S. For instance, the FBI does a lot of undercover work to prevent powerful weapons from being sold inside the U.S.

Furthermore, I can understand why Cheney initially approved of unorthodox interrogation methods to be used in the field in Afghanistan. I cannot, however, understand how anyone involved in the Iraq conflict could imagine that anything useful could come out of the techniques used in the very prison that Saddam used in torturing people. Especially when some of the people in the prison turned out to not be related to any terrorist activities and were released.

The U.S. has done some things right. The U.S. has also made some very grave mistakes.
 
The U.S. has done some things right. The U.S. has also made some very grave mistakes.
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Yes, like not cutting off their source of funding: Afghani heroin
which continues to be grown unabated, unchallenged and sold worldwide but mostly in Britiain while politicians, including
Kharzai himself yesterday, pay it lip service saying they are working on it. While they have been working on it hundreds of children and adults have died in Russia, car bombs in Iraq continue to kill our own children (=troops) .... all bought and paid for by drug money and Bush won't even bring the subject up.
Nor would Kerry. Are they that afraid of the mafia, the afghani farmers and their war lord protectors?
 
Unfortunately, 'cutting' that funding would certainly cause an insurrection every bit as nasty as in Iraq against their puppet leaders.

Lots of militiamen who are 'on our side' also get *their* funding from poppies.

Realistically, the 9/11 attacks were funded with credit cards, not drug money. The terrorists came to America, got day jobs, established lines of credit and bought their airplane lessons and airline tickets with credit. Once they were established here, they effectively cost Al Qaeda nothing at all. Yeah, so the interest rate is 19% after the first year's introductory rate runs out? Bill it to Allah.
 
Thanks. The links just sort of accumulate. Once you know a quote or a piece of information exists, google turns the links back up readily enough.
 
Irritating Things From The 'War on Terror'

Over the years the US Government has run other major "War On" campaigns. War on Poverty, War on Drugs. Both have cost huge amounts of money, and neither has worked. We still have lots of poor people, we still have lots of drug use. So now we have an expensive, and so far ineffective, War on Terror. Can you see where this one is going?

I am not claiming that there are armies of poor people or drug peddlers out there, but the term "War" implies 2 opposing sides in an armed conflict. When we declare "War", we automatically create an Other Side for anyone that is not with us. We can create an organized enemy where only disorganized problems previously existed.

I am not convinced that a well organized, international police action might have been more effective than a "War" in controlling terrorist activities. Bringing criminals to justice is even supported by Islamic Fundamentalist governments. A criminal investigation makes it difficult to justify harboring criminals, whereas a crusade makes it easy to justify fundamentalism.
 
fishbob said:
I am not convinced that a well organized, international police action might have been more effective than a "War" in controlling terrorist activities.
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But by saying "War", you get patriotic fervor and lots of support and parades and veterans giving speeches and all that jazz to cloud the issue and draw attention away from the fact that you don't really know what you're doing. Ditto with the War on Drugs--you don't want to encourage people to support the enemy by questioning Our Side? Do you?

Whereas, a "police action" sounds wimpy and boring, and raises the question "Are we really the cops?"
 
IMO "War on Terror" assumes the public is stupid. Attempting to round up the criminals assumes the public wants results.
 
fishbob said:
IMO "War on Terror" assumes the public is stupid. Attempting to round up the criminals assumes the public wants results.
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I kind of think the public is stupid.
 
fishbob said:
Well, maybe we (you and me is the public after all) are stupid, but do we want to be treated as if we are stupid?
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Gimme bread and circuses, and I'll be quiet.
 
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