Relax! Take a chill! When I made the comment about Republicans stealing from the poor for the bennefit of the rich, I was only joking… Gee! It was simply a joking response to Extremist who made a joking response about Democrats being guilty of stealing from the rich for the poor.

I apologize for mischaracterizing your position in Africa. As for your position that the Republicans steal from the poor to feed the rich, you are absolutely and utterly disregarding every fact known to man when you say that.

The fact is that the poor don’t pay taxes. The bottom fifty percent of wage earners in America pay almost zero taxes. By contrast, the top 1 percent of wage earners earn 17 percent of the income in America and pay 35 percent of the taxes.

I am astounded that as a future “man of the cloth” you are so cavalier with the truth. It really reflects poorly on you.

Ex: Stealing from the rich but not the poor… My in laws call such behavior as democrat. Their die hard republicans.

My Father, who was a staunch democrat used to say the opposite about the republicans… stealing from the poor to feed the rich.

Semantics…

I didn’t say that those two wars were fought for those two singular purposes; I said they ended the evils mentioned. In other words, the Civil War ended slavery and WWII ended the holocaust. You can’t possibly argue they didn’t.

As for your other points, the fact that the Westphalian order is in systematic crisis does nothing to change my opinion that its principles are superior to the alternatives. And remember, it wasn’t people like me (those who believe in the Westphalian system of state sovreignity) who are responsible for the current state of the world.

In fact, the reality is quite the opposite. It was those who believed that free governments had a responsibility to ensure and enforce the human rights of those in countries without such principles.

I believe I have heard you support US action in Africa to stem genocide. That is the kind of action that brought the end of the Westphalian system.

Simply put, it was people like you (those who advocated US intervention in humanitarian missions) who brought about the current state of affairs… and it’s people like you who are complaining about it.

Oh, the irony.

Does stealing only from the rich and not the poor make me any less of a theif?

Actually, it makes you and Democrat (and no less a thief).

I will not ease my rhetoric, because I believe that our government is guilty of a great miscarriage of justice.

Read your history books and you will see that the Civil war was not about slavery, it was about certain segments of society believing they could defacto from the U.S. (an aside, history should warn those fundamentalist in South Carolina dreaming of defacting from the U.S. to form a ‘conservative’ nation).

WWII was not about the Holocaust for the U.S. We stood by with our hands folded from the mid 1930’s until 1941 while we fully knew of the gross war crimes being committed by Germany and Japan. We only decided to get into the war once we realized that our own interests were in danger.

Those two World Wars which were supposed to end all wars… Well it failed.

And for kickers, let me remind us of how our history was developed by graciously offering to care after the Idians while we supplied them with blankets containing small pox (terrorism?). We ended WWII by showing who could weild the biggest stick — we dropped two Atomic Bombs, with full knowledge that many innocent civillians would die.

And like all history, we will only know years down the road the full scope of our military’s doings in this war in Iraq. But if our history tells us anything, it certainly tell us that even the U.S. is willing to hit below the belt. Why? Because we operate on the ethic which says “The end justifies the means.”

Except American slavery and the holocaust, to name just two…

Rex, why don’t you ease up on the rhetoric. Your outlandish statements can’t be supported, and it really is beginning to damage your credibility. For the most part, I enjoy reading what you bring to a discussion, and it often causes me to stop and reflect on my own position. However, your logic on this one is not doing you any favors.

I could change the definition of the phrase “couch” to mean anything capable of being sat upon. That would not change the fact that a stool is not a couch.

I think it was Lincoln who once remarked about calling a tail a leg. He posed the question (or something very similar), if you call a tail a leg, how many legs does a dog have? When someone answered, “five,” Lincoln said, “No. It is still only four. Calling a tail a leg doesn’t make it one.”

The point is, calling what the US did “terrorism” doesn’t make it terrorism. And you insistence that it does is bordering on silliness…

We could go round and round with logical syllogisms but the only thing syllogism prove is the persons means of logic.

What nobody gets is that it does not matter one iota whether we consider ourselves terrorist or not — our enemy does. And we consider our enemy terrorist but our enemy simply consider themselves to be defenders of their way of living.

It all is a matter of semantics, the bottom line is that this war is not going to solve anything (as if war ever has). It will only prove who weilds the bigger stick. In the end, both sides staunchly justify their war making effort while denouncing their enemies as terrorist — and who suffers? The one living in both lands who never wanted a war in the first place.

I rest my case.

All terrorism is wrong, but not all that is wrong is terrorism. This is a straightforward logical distinction that you seem to want to ignore because it doesn’t support your ultimate position on the Iraq war.

What you seem to fail to see is that it doesn’t undercut your position either. It is simply a different topic — almost entirely unrelated to my post but brought on by your silly and baseless charge that “the U.S. is just one terrorist among terrorists.” That is a factual assertion that you should support with evidence.

What you mean to say, I think, is that we are not morally superior to terrorists because we launched an unjust war against Iraq. As distinct from a factual claim, this would be a matter of moral judgement.

If you said that, it would be subject to discussion and debate. I would still disagree, but I wouldn’t insist you disavow it as a lie or a misrepresentation of the facts.

If theft is wrong does it make a difference whether I used coersive tatics or manipulative tactics in war? Does stealing only from the rich and not the poor make me any less of a theif?

If military force is unjustified, then it does not make a difference who receives the military force (intended or non-intended tagets). In the end, unjustified military force is still unjustified and wrong. Therefore another phrase for “unjustified war making” is simply “committing acts of terror.” Such n act of terror can be intended for civilian or military personel, but it still is an act of terror.

But as I said earlier, it helps us sleep easier by labeling our unjustified war attacks as “justice” while labeling other people group’s unjustified war attacks as “terrorism.”

If Canada invaded the US because we weren’t drinking enough Crown Royal, the war would be unjust.

However, would it be terrorism?

The answer to that question lies in the methods Canada used to wage war. Suppose the Canadian military invaded through New York, making it’s way down US 15 through Pennsylvania, eventually ending up in D.C. Futher, suppose their military only engaged American forces resisting their invasion. Futher still, suppose their military purposefully chose US 15 rather than I-95, because they knew that by using US 15, they would encounter fewer civilians. Still futher yet, suppose their military made every effort to avoid civilian casualties.

Is the war unjust?

Is it terrorism?

I know where I stand. How about you?

Labeling something terrorism has to do with how a war is fought — not why. Even if you were right that the Iraq war was unjust in its purpose, that does not mean it was unjust in its methods.

However, that simply did not happen. Why do you think that it did?

Pre-9/11, I was closer to the Pat Buchanan, Joe Sobran, Robert Novak camp. I thought that Israel’s interests were frequently not consistent with ours.

9/11 changed everything.

It is clear that we cannot avoid the conflict. Like it or not, we are on Israel’s side.

And if you have to be on one side or the other, it’s better to be on the side that rejects the intentional slaughter of innocents rather than the side that embraces it.

What did we do in Iraq a few years ago? Did we not throw the first stone?

I still describe myself as “not 100% sure about pacifism” but I am deeply inclined to lean towards non-violence. The only event in life in which I struggle is the Holocaust, perhaps because I am human too.

Having said that, I think violence is too often to easy of a means to work out differences. Just because we have a big stick in our hand does not mean we need to use it. Jesus could have marshalled an entire army in his defense but instead he chose nails and a wooden cross.

We all are simply agents of terror in a cruel and violent world.

No we are not. There are distinctions to be made. Terrorism has a meaning. The fact that we are all sinners does not mean we are all terrorists. A terrorist intentionally kills non-combatants. There is no evidence I am aware of that the U.S. military does that, excuses it, or condones it. If there is some evidence to the contrary, then show me. Otherwise, stop saying it.

Rex, I’ve read enough of your posts to believe that you would not support ANY use of force (meaning military or police action) for ANY reason. Is that correct or have I mis-characterized your viewpoint?