Declarations of Independence

Fahad1

Peace saladin. That verse applies to some muslims and all terrorists...

who are the terrorists ?
peace.

oneway

peace oneway and all. I am from a muslim background/tradition and i have been personally expressing outrage at all manner of harmful interpretations of quran/hadith/any philosophy which oppresses and harms humanity. You are right,self-styled irresponsible and delusional clerics have played a part in tricking some muslims into believing all manner of non-sense.People not using their god-given conscience and intellect has also lead to a decline in morals and development. I am not ignoring the misdeeds of clerics and extremists,in fact i venture to say they are causing huge harm to theirselves and others by their lack of grasp of reality,and their disdain for human life in pursuit of their cause.
I could also bracket some elements of the us into this illusional category,who seems to have disdain for peoples lives. Collateral damage is a dangerous term,which dilutes the suffering and loss of life caused.This is also done in the name of the ideaology of democracy. I personally believe that true democracy(with in built accountability and reality checks on power.)is the best current method of government.However i would not kill innocents in its name. I could buy that some in the us want to install democracy in the name of peace/stability but the end does not always justify the means.We have to be very careful when defusing terrorists not to become terrorists ourselves. I do wonder why the us did not go in to rwanda when hundreds of thousands were reportedly killed,or sudan etc,etc.. is not saudi arabia an oppressive society etc.etc..? what sometimes worries people about the us administration is that it normally seems that they pursue their own interests,not the interests of the whole of the world or even the us people.
Witness the kyoto treaty,world trade,how the UN is over-ruled and the new orleans situation....
Do you think iraq and the world are more stable now the us is in iraq? Please answer that honestly. I dont doubt that some of the administration are decent,genuine peole who hope their actions will make the world more peaceful....But i also hope they can admit when they make massive mistakes/miscalculations which creates a lot of suffering and death. And i defintely dont absolve the muslim extremists who kill innocents in the name of islam. I condemn all terrorism,whether islamic,U
S,iraqi,christian,atheist,etc... i think all these people need to take on board that we are all brothers and sisters in humanity,that we will reap what we sow,and that hurting others hurts ourselves as well in the long run.
Life is precious,....Increase the peace...
Peace all.

Thanks, enquirer. Very well said and I agree with a lot of you thoughts. I do believe the reports of civilian deaths directly attributed to the US in Iraq are tremendously overstated, and as I said earlier, no one can claim the US is without corruption, but you are right that much caution is required and in many cases the miscalculations and mistakes in Iraq are evidence of insufficient caution and planning.

Not sure if you wanted to discuss some of the specific examples you raised, so I'll just offer a few thoughts on them briefly here

kyoto treaty First, while there is no doubt we are observing global warming, there is some well reasoned debate in the scientific community regarding the causes of that warming. There are problems with some of the statistical analyses that have been done to support the view that the warming we've observed is man made. Still, in light of our discussion regarding caution and due care, it would be better to see the US playing more of leadership role in this debate rather than creating the perception of apathy.
UN I spent some time with the UN in Iraq. As the Oil for Food and other recent scandals show, that organization is quite corrupt. My experience was that the competing interests of the member nations completely disabled any meaningful collaboration to the point of absurdity. We certainly may not agree about what the US does, but none of us should look to the UN for guidance. It is hopelessly broken.
New Orleans I think there were three main contributors to the post-Katrina problems. First, it was foolish to ever build a city in a bowl next to an ocean and expect that nature wouldn't eventually reveal our folly. Second, in the US, state and local governments, like those in the state of Louisiana, bear the primary responsibility things like evacuation plans and emergency preparedness for their residents. That there were buses sitting empty in flooded parking lots when Katrina hit is purely a leadership failure of the local leadership in Louisiana and New Orleans. Third, the enormous US federal government is slow and inefficient and in many cases incompetent. I believe the US is the best place on Earth to live, but relying too heavily on the federal government has caused many of the domestic problems we face today.
Rwanda/Sudan You're absolutely right. Nations act first in selfish strategic interest and there isn't much strategic value in Rwanda/Sudan so they get ignored by the US and pretty much everybody else. I don't know what the best solution to those problems is, but I think the problems at the UN contribute greatly to the lack of effective world response to those crises.
Saudi Arabia You definitely hit the nail on the head with this one. The 9/11 hijackers were all Saudis. Saudi clerics teach their children the US is evil. Saudi Arabia has some of the most oppressive laws and rules of any Islamic state. Yet we treat them like great allies because of their oil. I fully agree that that is a huge problem and we need to look at some fairly drastic measures to correct that, starting with eliminating US dependence on foreign oil. That is certainly tied in to the corruption and lobbying problems that exist in the US government.

Thanks again for your thoughts.

Regards,
oneway.

unknownuser

peace saladin. The terrorists are any people who in their ignorance and incompetence kill or harm innocent people in the name of their belief or in the name of peace.And then do not repent,rectify or stop when they see the horrible suffering they have caused.And instead justify their actions with illusions and dogma. They can be from any religion or background.Its the harmful,horrible deeds they do that defines a terrorist...,not the label,nationality or religion..
peace all.

oneway

Oneway,

I agree that there are some deviated muslims who misuse the Quran and follow much of the hadith (fabricated history). Real islam is just peace but nothing else. However, the US and European policy is clearly not right, all driven by greed that you have to agree with.

We should keep an open mind.

Peace

There are definitely problems with the policies of the US and its allies to be sure, but I think just categorically saying they are 'clearly not right' paints with too broad a brush. I don't agree that its all driven by greed simply for the fact that it is costing us much more than we'll ever get out of it monetarily.

Fahad1

peace saladin. The terrorists are any people who in their ignorance and incompetence kill or harm innocent people in the name of their belief or in the name of peace.And then do not repent,rectify or stop when they see the horrible suffering they have caused.And instead justify their actions with illusions and dogma. They can be from any religion or background.Its the harmful,horrible deeds they do that defines a terrorist...,not the label,nationality or religion..
peace all.

peace.
i agree then . i thought u were refering to "muslim" terrorists only .

oneway

Thank you ONEWAY for your honest reply.

lol

That means you were fighting the British occupation army. Iraqis are fighting the U.S. occupation army and they are called Terrorists Thugs Insurgents people who hate freedom. If we apply the same criteria to revolutionary war than American Terrorists Thugs Insurgents people win - don't they lol

Nice try, but pretty predictable KGB smile

Now here's one for you Tell me, who are the insurgents in Iraq and who comprise the bulk of their victims?

The answer to those questions makes clear that your comparison doesn't apply.

ONEWAY get your facts correct. America hundreds of billions dollars are the expenses of their occupation. The fact is that very small amount of money is spend on construction what they have destroyed.

Sure, the conflict is ongoing, but that doesn't mean there isn't significant reconstruction, training of police and troops, protection of infrastructure, etc., going on. Try as you might, you can't just ignore all of that if you want to talk about US motivations in Iraq.

Good progress. Like what?

U.S. is trying to find a easy way out of Iraq now as they have lost the war. First they will come up with a beautiful slogan American win - Terrorists lost and get out of Iraq.

You pay too much attention to our liberal media smile

The consensus here is that leaving Iraq too soon would be a very bad thing for all parties, mostly for the Iraqi people.

Good progress is not hard to find if you look new democratically elected governments in both Afghanistan and Iraq, the ripple effects causing Libya to give up pursuit of WMD, Lebanon to oust Syria, and more pressure being applied to Iran.

Its a mess to be sure and progress is slow and very painful, but you can't deny that some good progress is being made.

oneway

savage_carrot,

Good thoughts -- I hope to reply more fully later but I have to go out for a bit now so I'll just touch one of your thoughts.

You asked if I want the whole world to "believe as I do". I think my answer to that is a qualified YES I want the whole world to believe in freedom and democracy.

Thanks,
oneway.

So where's the outrage against the "slogans" in the Quran and hadiths that, according to many on this site, are being misused to justify all kinds of evil?

Give us examples instead of allegations. Are we talking about this website? The entire world? There are plenty of people trying to change the tide, just like there are in your country. As is the way of the world, these people are in the minority, and mocked at by the majority.

Like you, some here see it but the vast majority of the Muslim world intentionally ignore it because their mind controlling clerics, leaders, and apologists like MAsadi, keep them amped up that the Great Satan of the US and capitalism is to blame for everything instead of their 7th century mindset wrapped up in a corrupt view of holiness.

Would you like to talk politics or religion? Are they both sides of the same coin? Everyone has their own demons to fight against. That does not transform the demon into an 'angel'.

And no, that is not a Christian vs Muslim rant as much as AhmedBaghat would like to oversimplify it to those terms. Its about good Muslims willfully ignoring the misdeeds of those who claim to be acting in the interest of Islam because its easier to villify Jews, Christians, Israel, the US, whoever, than to accept the responsibility to self police. Apply that mindset over several centuries and you get the mess we have today, where many Islamic countries are so oppressed by their governments that self policing is almost impossible. That leads to terrorism, sometimes state sponsored, and that is obviously a threat to the US. So we're doing something about it.

I'm glad you clarified that, based on your biases that you accept having, many would come to that conclusion. Did you read the excellent link JM provided? If you were a real 'patriot', you would be against the war in Iraq amongst other things.

For all the problems in Iraq and Afghanistan, it has already had a positive impact elsewhere Libya renouncing pursuit of WMD, Lebanon getting rid of Syrian occupation, and Iran is clearly feeling the heat.

Your definition of 'positive' impact? If WMD (not weapons of mass deception) are so bad, why does the US have them if not for self defence? Do you really buy into this hypocrisy? Don't answer that. It's apparent.

My view is not simply a brainwashed form of national pride. I've been involved in projects where I got to see some of these problems up close, both the problems within the US government and the problems abroad. I can assure you, as bad as the problems within the US government are, they pale compared to the effects of oppressive religion and oppressive governments. It isn't freedom ala Braveheart, its about establishing a couple of semi-sane governments in the Middle East to start turning the tide against the more radical ones like Iran.

Ah, so you justify it by that reasoning do you? Semi-sane? What gives you the right to decide for another country? Do you think that your motivations and way of thinking are the epitome of enlightenment? The problems are apparent in that line of 'reasoning', bias and other dubious motivations creep in. You want the rest of the world to believe as you do? You want to control it to your specifications? Sovereign country. Do you know what that means? Radical, just like terrorism, the meaning changes according to who is using it.

I would think at least some on this board would endorse that in the interest of pushing back extremism, even if they have lots of criticism about how its being done. Criticism is fine, but in typical fashion most here circle the wagons, rejecting the possibility that the US could be in it for anything more than some sort of colonial power grab.

Your definition of extreme? Using violence for it's ends? Hmm, would that include your country? In typical fashion you tout the same extremist views that have been debated ad nauseum. You cannot justify the war on Iraq, no matter how badly you want to.

Newsflash We already have the power and the cash. We don't need Afghanistan and Iraq so we can become more dominant. We need them to stabilize to help reduce the havens for terrorists, make clear that tyrants cannot thumb their nose at the world and get away with it, and get the ball rolling toward democracy in the Middle East which will be better for everyone and lessen the threat of terrorist attacks in the US and everywhere else. That's what its about in spite of the conspiracy theories wrapped up in the fancy socialist rhetoric of people like MAsadi.

Newsflash- Read and learn what is happening in your country and the motivations behind it. I realize that you and a lot of your kinsmen are deliberately kept in the dark due to whatever passes for 'journalism'/'media' there, that however, should not stop you from being aware of the big picture. Tyrants? Heh. Read the link JM provided, and then talk about 'conspiracy theories'.

The only thing that ever consoles man for the stupid things he does is the praise he always gives himself for doing them - Oscar Wilde

I would be all for a country doing some real good. Sadly, this is NOT it. This is hypocrisy.

unknownuser

peace oneway and all. In all these debates its healthy to keep an open,unbiased-mind,our goal should be truth...not illusions or partial truths.(myself and everyone else included.) I admire your honesty in your posts. However i also found masadis and magis post to contain several excellent points. I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle of all the posted opinions. The bottom line is suffering is something that needs to be rectified wherever it occurs....,not increased.
Peace all.

savage_carrot

You asked if I want the whole world to "believe as I do". I think my answer to that is a qualified YES I want the whole world to believe in freedom and democracy.

Awesome! Let's go about it without aggression. Let's go about it without false pretences and concocted stories. If the removal of 'dictatorships' and all the evil in the world according to 'insert person of choice here' is the aspiration, there need not be trumped up reasons, and it would not need to be concentrated in any one region. After all, good is it's own reward eh? Spread the love and the money, not that way you understand wink

We would often be ashamed of our finest actions if the world understood all the motives which produced them - Duc de La Rochefoucauld

KGB

ONEWAY

Iraqi Insurgents to are very legitimate Iraqi Resistance who are fighting the occupation army.U.S. invasion of Iraq was illegal criminal act. U.S. destroyed Iraqi cities and towns killed over 110,000 civilians (according to independent sources reported couple of years back) used chemical weapons in small city of Falluja. Iraqi Resistance is fighting the puppet Iraqi government which might have killed few hundred civilians but their struggle is against the occupation forces and its allies. Iraqi Resistance is doing what is commanded by God in Qur'an. Civialian deaths caused by Iraqi Resistance has to be blamed on U.S. illegal criminal invasion.

American news network report BS based on polls popularity. Media is not Liberal or Conservative. Media supported and promoted this war because of overwhelming majority of support amoung Americans.

There is no reconstruction. There are no jobs. There is no stability. There is no security. There is no electricity. There is no supply of clean water. I watched a success story on CNN that U.S. has build a Gymnasium for Iraqi children.

The only progress I see is that Poppy crop production in Afghanistan has gone up considerably. Iraqi Resistance is getting stronger each day passed. Iraq secular government is replaced by sectarian Shiites religious Mullahs. The present so called elected government has control of four kilo meters Green Zone.

The problem is that majority of Americans always support the wrong issues. Look at media criticising Bush's guest worker program and the and the DP World deal. I am always stuck with the minority of Americans.

unknownuser

Peace saladin. That verse applies to some muslims and all terrorists...
ps; very good post savage carrot.
peace all.

Peace bro

this is close to what I believe in, verses 28-20 all about the ones who say we believe in Allah and the last day but they don't really believe and they realize it not, when we tell them stop making mischief on earth they reply by they are the ones who do things right

for me it only apply on the confused muslims

peace

oneway

ONEWAY

Iraqi Insurgents to are very legitimate Iraqi Resistance who are fighting the occupation army.U.S. invasion of Iraq was illegal criminal act. U.S. destroyed Iraqi cities and towns killed over 110,000 civilians (according to independent sources reported couple of years back) used chemical weapons in small city of Falluja. Iraqi Resistance is fighting the puppet Iraqi government which might have killed few hundred civilians but their struggle is against the occupation forces and its allies. Iraqi Resistance is doing what is commanded by God in Qur'an. Civialian deaths caused by Iraqi Resistance has to be blamed on U.S. illegal criminal invasion.

American news network report BS based on polls popularity. Media is not Liberal or Conservative. Media supported and promoted this war because of overwhelming majority of support amoung Americans.

There is no reconstruction. There are no jobs. There is no stability. There is no security. There is no electricity. There is no supply of clean water. I watched a success story on CNN that U.S. has build a Gymnasium for Iraqi children.

The only progress I see is that Poppy crop production in Afghanistan has gone up considerably. Iraqi Resistance is getting stronger each day passed. Iraq secular government is replaced by sectarian Shiites religious Mullahs. The present so called elected government has control of four kilo meters Green Zone.

The problem is that majority of Americans always support the wrong issues. Look at media criticising Bush's guest worker program and the and the DP World deal. I am always stuck with the minority of Americans.

Sorry, KGB, wrong again.

If the insurgents are the "Iraqi Resistance" fighting the US military then why are most of the insurgents' victims Iraqi civilians including women and children?

They are a variety of groups fighting for their own interests and those of their backers Sunnis who lost favor when Saddam was ousted, jihadists from foreign contries funded and supplied by the likes of Syria, Shiites prodded on by Iran and extremist clerics, Al Qaeda, and so on, but they are most certainly not a united Iraqi Resistance focused on fighting the US. They are fighting the US, the Iraqi government, each other, civilians of opposite sects, and the very notion of a free and democratic Iraq.

Anti-war sites that I've seen come no where near your casualty figure and when you read the small print in their reports they readily admit that the rising death among Iraqi civilians is caused by the insurgents and sectarian violence.

According to IBC (www.iraqbodycount.net), 12,617 civilians died in the last year in Iraq. IBC attributes 307 (2%) of those directly to the military presence and activities, but no further details are provided. Of the remaining 12,310 civilian deaths, 2,231 (18%) resulted from "anti-occupation activity against coalition and Iraqi government targets". In other words, combatants who can't even rightly be called civilians died while attacking coalition forces and the Iraqi government.

The remaining 10,079 (80%) civilian deaths are all from insurgents, sectarian violence, and general lawlessness.

So I'm right there with ya' if you want to complain that the US and its allies in Iraq are doing a poor job stabilizing and policing the country, but it just isn't truthful to say that the US is killing all these civilians as if our troops are walking around indiscriminately murdering people when in fact its the multinational insurgency and extremist sects that are doing just that.

As for chem weapons used by the US in Fallujah nonsense. That story was debunked long ago.

Progress is slow and difficult and Iraq's future is uncertain to be sure, mostly because the biggest mistake the US made was underestimating the insane hatred between radical Islamic sects.

KGB

ONEWAY

I believe you are getting your Iraq news from Fox. I really am not paying much attention to the news. Thank you you make me search the latest Iraqi Civialian killed in this illegal criminal war.

How Many Dead Iraqis?
Guessing about collateral damage.
By Fred Kaplan
Posted Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2003, at 623 PM ET

How many Iraqi civilians will die in Gulf War II? It's one of the most disturbing questions going into this battle?the question that fills doves with passion and hawks with doubt?so a few activists and analysts have tried to develop an answer. The most widely circulated one comes from a confidential report by a U.N. humanitarian-aid specialist, which was leaked to a group in Cambridge, which in turn published it on the Internet. This report estimates that civilian casualties could total 500,000. Another much-cited public study, by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, cites a figure of up to 100,000. If these calculations were even close to plausible, they would certainly strain many of the rationales for going to war, especially those that involve the liberation and welfare of the Iraqi people.

So, it's worth asking How were these numbers computed? On what assumptions?especially about U.S. strategy, tactics, weapons, and targets?are they based? There's an old phrase among those who work with computer models "GIGO," for Garbage In/Garbage Out. Feed a computer silly assumptions; it spits out ridiculous numbers. Not to paint a rosy picture on the devastation wrought by any war, especially this one, which is likely to be fought partly in densely populated cities, but these numbers are textbook cases of GIGO. They're not so much wrong as they are completely useless.

source http//www.slate.com/id/2079264/

More latter. You are way too ONEWAY.

As for chem weapons used by the US in Fallujah nonsense. That story was debunked long ago.

US used white phosphorus in Iraq

source http//news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4440664.stm

You want me to bring more on Falluja massace.

oneway

ONEWAY

I believe you are getting your Iraq news from Fox. I really am not paying much attention to the news. Thank you you make me search the latest Iraqi Civialian killed in this illegal criminal war.

How Many Dead Iraqis?
Guessing about collateral damage.
By Fred Kaplan
Posted Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2003, at 623 PM ET

How many Iraqi civilians will die in Gulf War II? It's one of the most disturbing questions going into this battle?the question that fills doves with passion and hawks with doubt?so a few activists and analysts have tried to develop an answer. The most widely circulated one comes from a confidential report by a U.N. humanitarian-aid specialist, which was leaked to a group in Cambridge, which in turn published it on the Internet. This report estimates that civilian casualties could total 500,000. Another much-cited public study, by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, cites a figure of up to 100,000. If these calculations were even close to plausible, they would certainly strain many of the rationales for going to war, especially those that involve the liberation and welfare of the Iraqi people.

So, it's worth asking How were these numbers computed? On what assumptions?especially about U.S. strategy, tactics, weapons, and targets?are they based? There's an old phrase among those who work with computer models "GIGO," for Garbage In/Garbage Out. Feed a computer silly assumptions; it spits out ridiculous numbers. Not to paint a rosy picture on the devastation wrought by any war, especially this one, which is likely to be fought partly in densely populated cities, but these numbers are textbook cases of GIGO. They're not so much wrong as they are completely useless.

source http//www.slate.com/id/2079264/

More latter. You are way too ONEWAY.

Did you actually read the article you posted, KGB?

It does not support your position. It was written in 2003, before the war started, and lists predictions of casualties and then goes on to explain that the predictions are useless.

Not sure how you thought posting useless predictions from three years ago would bolster your argument.

Cheers,
oneway.

KGB

ONEWAY

No I did not read slate.com article before posting.

Following is the article which prove Iraqi Civialians killed by U.S. troops.

War has killed 100,000 Iraqis study
Last Updated Fri, 29 Oct 2004 062507 EDT
CBC News
LONDON - Nearly 100,000 more Iraqis have died during the American-led occupation than would have been expected otherwise, a study posted on The Lancet medical journal's website Thursday estimates.

INDEPTH Casualties in the Iraq war

A building explodes during a U.S. aerial assualt (AP Photo)
Most of the extra deaths in the first 18 months of the occupation were due to violence, the researchers said ? in particular, air strikes that claimed civilian casualties.

"Most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children," they wrote.

Previous estimates of the number of Iraqis killed during the American-led air strikes and occupation have ranged from 10,000 to 30,000.

The report in the British journal is based on the work of teams from Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and the Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. The authors acknowledge that the data cited in the study might be of "limited precision."

However, similar methodology was used in the late 1990s to calculate the number of deaths from the war in Kosovo, put at 10,000.

The information was obtained as Iraqi interviewers surveyed 808 families, consisting of 7,868 people, in 33 different "clusters" or neighbourhoods spread across the country.

In each case, they asked how many births and deaths there had been in the home since January 2002.

That information was then compared with the death rates in each neighbourhood in the 15 months before the invasion that toppled president Saddam Hussein, adjusted for the different time frames, and extrapolated to cover the entire 24.4 million population of Iraq.

The researchers came up with the figure of 100,000 extra deaths based on the fact that the rate rose from five deaths per 1,000 people before the war to 12.3 deaths per 1,000 in the 18 months that followed its start.

Fallujah neighbourhood factored out

One neighbourhood in the besieged city of Fallujah may have boosted the numbers unnaturally, the researchers pointed out.

But even with that neighbourhood taken out, the death rate was 7.9 per 1,000 people ? 50 per cent higher during the occupation than in the months before.

"We estimate that there were 98,000 extra deaths during the post-war period in the 97 per cent of Iraq represented by all the clusters except Fallujah," the researchers said in the journal.

Nearly 1,100 American soldiers have also died in the conflict.

Before the invasion, the most common causes of death in Iraq were heart attacks, strokes and other chronic diseases, the Lancet report said.

Since early 2002, violence was by far the main cause of death, linked to coalition air strikes in about 95 per cent of cases where people died by the intentional act of others. Infant mortality also rose significantly.

Remember there is no offical Civilian Death Counts just like Vietnam war where the whole villages were blown up causing millions of deaths.

oneway