DL the Doofus/Afghan Famine Averted.

[LoafingOaf]

I know I am obsessive with setting the record straight after so much
propaganda got flung around this board....

A poster by the nickname of "DL" ranted and raved on DEc. 4 about how
America was in the process of murdering "7.5 million" Afghan people
by cutting off their food and starving them to death. Genocide,
basically, was the accusation from this gullible reader of the
twisted Noam Chomsky. DL asked me why I don't care about 7.5 million Afghans.
Well, DL, you silly dunce, the Washington Post article attached below
reveals the truth. America's war on the Taliban is ENDING the
famine, you doofus. You owe some more appologies.

Read it and learn not to buy into zmag.org nonsense any longer.......

========
Massive Food Delivery Averts Afghan Famine

By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, December 31, 2001; Page A01

The delivery of unprecedented amounts of wheat to Afghanistan over the past month has averted a major famine this winter, international and American relief officials said last week.

Although they are wary of claiming total victory, officials said they believe the overall food supply in Afghanistan is now sufficient and conditions are stable enough to deliver food throughout most of the country.

"There will be no famine in Afghanistan this winter," said Catherine Bertini, executive director of the United Nations' World Food Programme, which trucks the food aid into Afghanistan. "There will be deaths, because the country was in a pre-famine condition this summer before the war started. But it will be isolated, and not large-scale."

She said the WFP moved 90,000 tons of wheat into the country during December, probably the largest monthly total in the history of the agency. In the previous three months, 75,000 tons were delivered.

The current assessment is dramatically different from the one given at the height of the U.S. bombing campaign, when war and a three-year drought were said to have put 1.5 million Afghans at risk of starvation, and 6 million in dire need of food.

Even before the war, relief officials reported that Afghans in some hard-hit areas were eating their seed, slaughtering work animals and foraging for barely edible plants. After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and as the Afghan military campaign began, food trucks from Pakistan were unable to cross into Afghanistan because of the fighting, and the Taliban banned communications between WFP offices inside Afghanistan and without. The WFP international staff was out of the country for three months.

But food shipments into Afghanistan picked up in November and swelled this month after the Taliban was routed. The food is entering through five neighboring countries now, an influx relief officials say can feed the millions of needy Afghans through the winter. Supplies have even reached remote areas, such as the mountainous Hazarajat region in central Afghanistan, and have been widely distributed there.

"I thought and feared earlier I would be facing a famine next spring, but now I believe we will not," Andrew S. Natsios, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, said last week. "It was caught at an early stage, despite the war."

Natsios credited the WFP with running an aggressive operation that exceeded expectations. Although the WFP is responsible for the Afghan food relief, USAID supplies more than half of the wheat and money for logistics. The U.S. military also air-dropped hundreds of thousands of food packets during the early phases of the war, but relief officials said the impact was more political than substantive.

WFP officials said there was enough food in Afghanistan now to accommodate a substantial return of refugees from Pakistan and Iran. As many as 4 million Afghans are living in neighboring countries, and thousands have been returning daily.

The USAID and WFP assessment that the food situation has stabilized is generally accepted by the private aid organizations that deliver the food to Afghans once it is trucked into the country by the WFP. "We had been looking at hundreds of thousands of people dying of starvation," said James Bishop, director of humanitarian response for InterAction, a Washington-based coalition of private aid organizations. "But unless there are unexpected interruptions or a rapid return of a large number of refugees, that will not happen."

But he said there were still remote areas where food was not getting in, and some sections where fighting made deliveries impossible. Jordan Dey of WFP in Islamabad said the agency has been unable to deliver aid to 238,000 hungry people in and around the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar. He said armed factions were demanding payments of up to $100 from truck drivers trying to enter the city.

Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America, also cautioned that while the food getting to Afghans may keep many from starving to death, it is exclusively wheat and does not provide a healthy diet. "The WFP has done a terrific job of getting wheat into the country in the last month, but at this point, we have to start diversifying the food going in there," he said. The WFP asked for donations of beans, corn and vegetable oils last week.

Haron Amin, Washington spokesman for the interim Afghan government, said that food was being distributed better now because of the growing authority of Afghan officials, and because the Taliban was no longer present. He said the large-scale food aid would have to continue at least until the winter wheat is harvested in March. Bread baked from wheat is the staple of the Afghan diet.

Even without war and drought, Afghanistan has long had one of the highest rates of childhood mortality in the world with one in five not surviving childhood.

Relief officials said a large-scale famine was averted because public and private organizations reacted so aggressively to the threat. Money was made available to the WFP through the $320 million supplemental bill promoted by President Bush for humanitarian relief work in Afghanistan, and other assistance from the European Union and Japan. Private groups also pushed hard for fast action. "I think the [relief organizations] raising the alarm and doing a fair bit of advocacy with the U.S. government and U.N. system has helped to increase the food deliveries, and broken through some logjams," Bishop said.

Bertini said the WFP's Afghan staff was instrumental as well in keeping the food program running while the international staff was gone. Taliban soldiers took over the WFP warehouse in Kandahar and Kabul at one point, and emptied the Kandahar facility of its wheat.

"We strongly believe that the local staff saved a lot of lives by continuing to come to work," Bertini said. "They're the ones who kept the food moving."

Although Afghanistan is now dependent on food aid, historically it has fed itself and even exported some food products. Natsios said a primary focus of U.S. reconstruction aid to Afghanistan will be to supply sheep and other livestock, seeds for crops, and money for repair of local irrigation systems.

© 2001 The Washington Post Company

[dl]

Gee, doofus? What a wonderful way to start up our debate again.
Can I call you a lazy, stupid lubberly?

> I know I am obsessive with setting the record straight after so much
> propaganda got flung around this board....

You feel you are justified on this one point so you post this story. You don't mention anything else of our ongoing debate or the many points I brought up. If you were such a "stickler" as you claim you would have responded to my many points. But instead you stick to your childish game of "hit and run" and name calling. This was but one single point we had in the debate. As you seem to tend to get off topic and seem to ignore or misinterpret most of what I write, I tried to narrow things down for you at the time and again now.

If anything this story backs up my claims at the time. This story says 1.5 million were in danger of starving and an additional 6 million were at risk. That's 7.5 million my friend. Those were the numbers I used. The numbers given by the UN at the time stated that 10,000 tons of wheat had been delivered. It was estimated that at least 50,000 tons was an absolute minimum to avert a large scale disaster. We were woefully inadequate at the time and failing miserably at our efforts in saving the growing refugee population.

Our argument was based on justification for the war. You still have not given me an adequate response.

> A poster by the nickname of "DL" ranted and raved on DEc. 4
> about how
> America was in the process of murdering "7.5 million" Afghan
> people
> by cutting off their food and starving them to death. Genocide,
> basically, was the accusation from this gullible reader of the
> twisted Noam Chomsky. DL asked me why I don't care about 7.5 million
> Afghans.
> Well, DL, you silly dunce, the Washington Post article attached below
> reveals the truth. America's war on the Taliban is ENDING the
> famine, you doofus. You owe some more appologies.

> Read it and learn not to buy into zmag.org nonsense any longer.......

I suppose you think the UN is a Zmag operation also?

You call me a doofus while stating that "America's war on the taliban is ending the famine". Well my intellectual friend, the "war" was creating the situation, not "ENDING" it. The humanitarian aid is solving it. The fact that the military action is winding down is helping to that end. They are not out of the woods yet, though. The civilian death toll is in the several thousands. The winter has only begun. Like the article pointed out, they need more than wheat.

Out of curiosity, what is your aceeptable loss with a mass starvation? 1 million? 100,000? A civilian death toll equal to 2xWTC?

We promised New York $40 billion to cope with the disaster. The papers shined with stories of how we were going to save New York with our pledge of money. Well, we reneged. Now the papers say we are going to save the refugees with a promise of food. Lets hope we don't repeat.

"We don't know if he (bin laden) is in a cave with the door open or the door closed." George W Bush

It's probably a good thing he is back in Crawford on vacation yet again draining the batteries on his gameboy.

[LoafingOaf]

> Gee, doofus? What a wonderful way to start up our debate again.

What debate was that? The only attempt I recall making to
debate you was concerning the way you were so smittern with Bill
Clinton when he recklessly lobbed missiles at a Sudan medicine factory
in 1998. Your cheering of that was reminiscent of the way a few Palestinians
were caught on TV cheering the attack on the WTC.

Your new-found concern about civilian casualties seems to have more to do with your politics than your morality. You're a prisoner of your ideology.

I don't support Bush's domestic agenda, but that's not going to make me oppose attacking the Taliban.

The rest of our exchanges, to my recollection, consisted of the following:

(1) In one thread you came online all worked up into hysteria about the
military tribunals (you were right to be worked up, but your hyseria was
cut off your brain). You were so excited to post about how the
Constitution is being trashed that you didn't even bother to read a single word I wrote, because I am not a backer of John Ashcroft nor do I support military tribunals as George Bush wants them (I support Congress intervening and reaching a reasonable compromise balancing the concerns on both sides). You began informing me I support this and that, when the very message you replied to showed clearly that I did not. You declined to appologize for your negligent errors, instead trying to spin and lie your way out of it. DEspite the evidence of your idiocy being clear for all to see with just two or three back-clicks! I lost all respect for you, and speculated to myself about your mental health. You're not somebody I will seek out to "debate" on topics far and wide. I'll only correct the record where I must.

(2) I recall you posted some kooky conspiracy theories. You vaguely
alluded to a theory that Bush started the war on terrorism to get
a new oil pipeline. (Boy, that story had sure had legs!) And, in several messages you characterized our war tactics as "genocide" designed to starve to death over 7 million people. (Aren't you looking like the celver one today on that!) In the process of sharing these views, you told me I should stop buying into U.S. "propaganda," and consult the more "accurate" non-U.S. sources you get your garbage from. What sources are those? The Egyptian press? Let me tell you I was unable to contain laughter on my end when you actually, sincerely believed you were "informing" us of "truth" with the deranged views you cut and pasted from the various pro-Taliban news sources.

But I must say I was relieved you didn't come on here with the other leading theory I've seen in your supposedly non-propagandistic sources: That the WTC attack was a Jewish conspiracy. Congratulations for seeing through that one,
at least. Or, perhaps you did buy into it, I wouldn't be surpised.

My point in this thread was simply to set the record straight with facts after you went up and down this forum posting your genocide nonsense. Call it, rubbing reality into your face, hoping that while you're probably too gone to get it, those who read your previous postings will see their falsity. Follow-ups after the dust is settled and the truth emerges are important, and I'm fulfilling my promise to keep posting these follow-ups ad naseum until people like you have no ground left to stand on. Since you're so concerned about people being misled by propagnada, you ought to be big enough to admit you were duped, and express gratitude that the majority of the American people didn't buy into the same crap you did. Then, I could cease with the name-calling and regain some respect for you.

I remember posting an essay originally published in Salon.com, in which an
Australian woman examined anti-Americanism is relation to the war on terrorism.
She observed in one comment that people were condemning America for the
murder of 7.5 million Afghans...even though those people were not even dead! You were outraged by this. How dare she care so little about the lives of 7.5 million who were in the process of being murdered! Guess what, DL, she was right and you were wrong. That now happens to be an established and objective fact. Sorry you're so disappointed that America isn't a bunch of genocidal mass murderers.

Genocide was your word, DL. You threw it around. Now lets see you worm your way out of it. Seems to me, if you were honorable and cared about your
credibility, you would now feel obligated to take it back.

Check the polls. Talk to people on the streets. Go to bookstores where people are buying up books to learn about the Afghan people and Islam. As an aside, personally, I have no interest in learning about Islam, except to learn how to keep it from growing any further, as it, like the other major religions, has inflicted more pain on this earth than anything else I can think of. But the point is, Americans are looking into these things with good hearts and genuine care. The vast majority of Americans want to do the right thing here, and their government is, for the most part, reflecting this desire. You owe the American people an appology for your misjudgment.

> Can I call you a lazy, stupid lubberly?

You can call me whatever you want. I can support the names I call you with
evidence.

>You feel you are justified on
> this one point so you post this story. You don't mention anything else of
> our ongoing debate or the many points I brought up. If you were such a
> "stickler" as you claim you would have responded to my many
> points. But instead you stick to your childish game of "hit and
> run" and name calling. This was but one single point we had in the
> debate. As you seem to tend to get off topic and seem to ignore or
> misinterpret most of what I write, I tried to narrow things down for you
> at the time and again now.

Oh my.

(1) What ongoing debate? You ran away from the Sudan debate. Oh, was I supposed to have a debate about whether or not the true motives of the war
are to build a pipeline? I hate to break it to you, but to most of us, um...sane people, that conspiracy theory is not worth our time. Go tell
it to your local branch of the Revolutionary Communist Party.

(2) I don't take back any names I've called you.

(3) You cannot be for real. You, of all people, telling me *I* ignore
and misinterpret what *you* write is jaw-dropping in its audacity.
Consult back to the "Reading is Fundamental" sub-thread a few weeks back, you
pathetic little hypocrite.

> If anything this story backs up my claims at the time.

Oh, does it now? That article backs up your claim that America is committing
genocide to starve to death 7.5 million people?

>This story says 1.5
> million were in danger of starving and an additional 6 million were at
> risk. That's 7.5 million my friend. Those were the numbers I used.

Those were the numbers being thrown around by the people who wanted the
bombing halted and felt the most humanitarian thing to do for the Afghan
people was to leave the Taliban in power. As the article says,
the reality of the situation today stands in sharp contrast to the
numbers people threw around a few months ago. And to the dismay of
lefty America haters, like Chomsky, who in October was telling us that
by now millions of people would be murdered by America. I have yet
to see a report of a single person in this war who has been "murdered"
by America.

As the article states:

"The current assessment is dramatically different from the one given at the height of the U.S. bombing campaign, when war and a three-year drought were said to have put 1.5 million Afghans at risk of starvation, and 6 million in dire need of food."

Rather than plotting to inflict "genocide" on the Afghan people, America
recognized the need for a swift and hard-fought topple of the Taliban
regime, to, in part, create an environment where food could be brought in.
And this is what has occurred. American might stormed in and blew the
stinking Taliban to kingdom come in record time. You see, the war planners
assessed the situation and all the data and did what was required to achieve the best possible outcome. Now that the Taliban is almost completely defeated, more food than ever before is being brought into the country, and as the article states:

"The delivery of unprecedented amounts of wheat to Afghanistan over the past month has averted a major famine this winter...."

And:

"[Catherine Bertini, executive director of the United Nations' World Food Programme], said the WFP moved 90,000 tons of wheat into the country during December, probably the largest monthly total in the history of the agency. In the previous three months, 75,000 tons were delivered."

>The
> numbers given by the UN at the time stated that 10,000 tons of wheat had
> been delivered. It was estimated that at least 50,000 tons was an absolute
> minimum to avert a large scale disaster. We were woefully inadequate at
> the time and failing miserably at our efforts in saving the growing
> refugee population.

See above.

> Our argument was based on justification for the war. You still have not
> given me an adequate response.

Justification for the war? I posted hundreds of words in this
forum stating why I feel the war is justified. The messages
are still there. There's no longer the need to go over the
points again, because the world can see the war was necessary
and is, so far, just. This is now an established fact among the
good people of the world. (This is not to say all future phases
of the war will get my support - unlike you, I wait to see
what's actually happening before I form my judgments.)

You felt the humanitarian thing to do for the Afghan people
was to leave the Taliban in power. What a friend you were to them!
When is it going to get through to you that the Taliban caused misery and starvation of the Afghan people? And that removing the Taliban is the best
thing anyone has ever done for Afghanistan?

>I suppose you think the UN is a Zmag
> operation also?

No, I think that war is a destabilizing and terrifying thing, and there
was concern about the tactics the Coalition would use to wage our
war (supposedly we were going to take revenge on innocent Afghans, and
"bomb them back to the stone age"), and whether or not it would become a Vietnam-like quagmire rather than, as it turned out, a short term destabilization before reconstruction. I recognized America had no choice but to wage war in this instance, and I reserved my judgments on the tactics chosen
to fight the war until I actually knew what they were. This is why,
unlike you, I stand on the right side of history, as a supporter of
one of the most brilliant, swift, and moral military campaigns in human
history, which is, so far, making the world a safer place. You can
still throw around your outdated and innacurate numbers, and they
will be wronger and wronger each time you do.

The problem with the folks over at zmag is best described is
this passage I found in an essay in the December, 2001, Atlantic Montly:

===============
Having paged through the combined reactions of Sontag, Noam Chomsky, and many others, I am put very much in mind of something from the opening of Marx's The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte. It's not the sentence about the historical relation between tragedy and farce. It's the observation that when people are learning a new language, they habitually translate it back into the one they already know. This work of self-reassurance and of hectic, hasty assimilation to the familiar is most marked in the case of Chomsky, whose prose now manifests that symptom first captured in, I recall, words by Dr. Charcot—"le beau calme de l'hysterique." For Chomsky, everything these days is a "truism"; for him it verges on the platitudinous to be obliged to state, once again for those who may have missed it, that the September 11 crime is a mere bagatelle when set beside the offenses of the Empire. From this it's not a very big step to the conclusion that we must change the subject, and change it at once, to Palestine or East Timor or Angola or Iraq. All radical polemic may now proceed as it did before the rude interruption. "Nothing new," as the spin doctors have taught us to say. There's a distinct similarity between this world view and that of the religious dogmatists who regard September 11 in the light of a divine judgment on a sinful society.
===============

Deep, eh?

> You call me a doofus while stating that "America's war on the taliban
> is ending the famine". Well my intellectual friend, the
> "war" was creating the situation, not "ENDING" it.

So America created the hunger problem in Afghanistan? How does that
work out?

The article I posted stated this:

"'There will be no famine in Afghanistan this winter,' said Catherine Bertini, executive director of the United Nations' World Food Programme, which trucks the food aid into Afghanistan. 'There will be deaths, because the country was in a pre-famine condition this summer before the war started. But it will be isolated, and not large-scale.'"

The food crisis in Afghanistan was the result of a drought and an incompetant
and evil regime. The bombing removed the Taliban, and now rational,
good people can work to feed the Afghan people, stabilize their country,
and give them help in constructing a new beginning...now that they have
been bombed back OUT of the stone age. At some point it will be up to Afghans,
of course, to take responsibility for their own country, and break out of their culture of warlords and dark aged religion. But America must, and has indicated it shall, do what it can to help.

Back to the article:

"[F]ood shipments into Afghanistan picked up in November and swelled this month after the Taliban was routed"

See, after the Taliban is gone, good things can happen.

Also:

"Haron Amin, Washington spokesman for the interim Afghan government, said that food was being distributed better now because of the growing authority of Afghan officials, and because the Taliban was no longer present."

Oh, yes, such a campaign of "genocide."

Is this geneocide:

"USAID supplies more than half of the wheat and money for logistics"

Can you still call it "genocide" despite this:

"Relief officials said a large-scale famine was averted because public and private organizations reacted so aggressively to the threat. Money was made available to the WFP through the $320 million supplemental bill promoted by President Bush for humanitarian relief work in Afghanistan, and other assistance from the European Union and Japan."

I am prouder today than ever for backing my country's brilliant and moral
military campaign against the fascist Taliban regime. It was not just
the necessary action for America to bring the mass murderers to justice and
end their future threat, but as this article proves, it was the humanitarian
thing to do for the Afghan people.

People attacked the food aid drops during the bombing as
merely political. Yes, they were political. But the message they
sent to the Afghan people was accurate: America is not your enemy;
America now recognizes it has an obligation to you; America will
help feed you. I remember Suzanne and company laughing at these
food drops. Chuckling over how one tragically hit and killed a person,
as they sometimes do.
But it always struck me as something special and cool about America that
we would bother to drop food to civilians while bombing the Taliban,
even if it was mostly a political message.

DL, I remember you saying you are a fan of Salon.com. Maybe you should
read the editor's, David Talbot's, recent article about why he, a lefty,
has realized it is right to be a hawk in certain circumstances, such
as Kosovo, Rwonda, and Afghanistan. To oppose military efforts against
evil in those situations is to wind up on the wrong side of history, as you
are today. Along the way, Talbot quotes a new Neil Young song, written
in response to 9/11, called "Lets Roll!" Damn freaking straight!
Too bad some people are so effed up in the head that when they witnessed the
mass murder of their neighbors they did not have the same emotional response in their gut, which was instinctual among the majority of us, well, normal human beings who actually care about the fate of our country and are unwilling to let it go down the tubes. When America took a breath before acting, and combined this emotion with intelligent, moral, and restrained war tactics, it became proof that military might can be a force of good, as it was in Kosovo. We now have the model to follow from this point forward.

>The
> humanitarian aid is solving it. The fact that the military action is
> winding down is helping to that end. They are not out of the woods yet,
> though. The civilian death toll is in the several thousands. The winter
> has only begun. Like the article pointed out, they need more than wheat.

Well, the "genocidal" Americans are doing more, as the article stated:

"Natsios said a primary focus of U.S. reconstruction aid to Afghanistan will be to supply sheep and other livestock, seeds for crops, and money for repair of local irrigation systems."

So evil!

> Out of curiosity, what is your aceeptable loss with a mass starvation? 1
> million? 100,000? A civilian death toll equal to 2xWTC?

Funny, I thought America was the number one supplier of humanitarian aide.
I thought at this moment U.S. soldiers were putting their lives at
risk to, in part, help bring food supplies into Afghanstian.

I also didn't realize America had the option of allowing a terrorist nework, and
their madman fascists regime controlling Afghanistan, to continue to exist after they have proven they will slaughter thousands of innocent people abroad. Everyone knows that war is painful
and causes civilian loss of life, but who's fault is that? The side acting in
self-defense? America, to a degree unprecedented in warfare history, has used every technology at its disposal to keep civilian casualties to a minimum. And the Afghan people appear to appreciate this. American soldiers have expressed frustration over how many times they have had a target in their sights only to be told by those in charge they may not attack because it may harm civilians.
The new America is reshaping warfare with these tight leashes on soldiers
and precision smart weapons. Don't tell me America has not evolved.

It's troubling to me that you compare death tolls between Afghanistan
and the WTC atrocity, as if to suggest there is a moral equivalancy between
what I have just described and these terrorists. There are people in New
York who would, I'm sure, slap you upside your head for implying such a thing.
Usama bin Laden specifically targetted innocent civilians. The whole point of
his attack was to kill thousands of innocent people. The point of
America's counter-attacks was to remove a fascist government and the
terrorist network they have harbored to prevent such atrocities. If you find a moral equivalance between the two, you're too far gone to be helped.
Oh, of course maybe you still think it's all about an oil pipeline!

But you even go further. You say it is TWO TIMES the death toll of the WTC.
So, what is your point with that? That America's war on terrorism is now
officially WORSE than what the terrorists did? You're going down a
disgusting path here, DL.

Ask yourself this. How many people who have the best interests of
the world and Afghanistan in their hearts would, today, advocate
turning back the clock, re-installing the Taliban, and taking a
different course of action? If anything you had been saying
3 months ago had been accurate, people would be looking at the
military campaign in horror, protesting in the streets, and
condemning the United States. Instead, Afghanistan has been relieved
of the most twisted regime on earth, is working on building a new
government, is recieving more humanitarian aid than ever, and
the foreign terrorists who occupied their country to plan mass
murders around the world are on the run.

> We promised New York $40 billion to cope with the disaster. The papers
> shined with stories of how we were going to save New York with our pledge
> of money. Well, we reneged. Now the papers say we are going to save the
> refugees with a promise of food. Lets hope we don't repeat.

> "We don't know if he (bin laden) is in a cave with the door open or
> the door closed." George W Bush It's probably a good thing he is
> back in Crawford on vacation yet again draining the batteries on his
> gameboy.

Rather than reply to these strange points of yours, I'll just leave you with
another passage from the Atlantic Monthly Christopher Hitchens essay:

===============
It is perfectly true that most Americans were somewhat indifferent to the outside world as it was before September 11, and also highly ignorant of it—a point on which the self-blaming faction insists. While attention was elsewhere, a deadly and irreconcilable enemy was laying plans and training recruits. This enemy—unless we are to flatter him by crediting his own propaganda—cares no more for the wretched of the West Bank than did Saddam Hussein when he announced that the road to Palestine and Jerusalem led through Kuwait and Kurdistan. But a lethal and remorseless foe is a troubling thing in more than one way. Not only may he wish you harm; he may force you to think and to act. And these responsibilities—because thinking and acting are responsibilities—may be disconcerting. The ancient Greeks were so impressed and terrified by the Furies that they re-baptized them the Eumenides—"the Kindly Ones"—the better to adjust to them. Members of the left, along with the far larger number of squishy "progressives," have grossly failed to live up to their responsibility to think; rather, they are merely reacting, substituting tired slogans for thought. The majority of those "progressives" who take comfort from Stone and Chomsky are not committed, militant anti-imperialists or anti-capitalists. Nothing so muscular. They are of the sort who, discovering a viper in the bed of their child, would place the first call to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

I believe I can prove this by means of a brief rhetorical experiment. It runs as follows. Very well, I will stipulate that September 11 was revenge for past American crimes. Specifically, and with supporting detail, I will agree that it was revenge for the crime of past indifference to, and collusion with, the Taliban. May we now agree to cancel this crime by removing from the Taliban the power of enslavement that it exerts over Afghans, and which it hopes to extend? Dead silence from progressives. Couldn't we talk about the ozone layer instead? In other words, all the learned and conscientious objections, as well as all the silly or sinister ones, boil down to this: Nothing will make us fight against an evil if that fight forces us to go to the same corner as our own government. (The words "our own" should of course be appropriately ironized, with the necessary quotation marks.) To do so would be a betrayal of the Cherokees.
===============

[LoafingOaf]

As a correction, you did not say the death toll is two times the WTC attack.
You used that in a hypothetical scenerio.

But you appear to be going in the direction of implying the war on terror is
becoming worse than the WTC attack, so my point still stands. I see
a sinister motive behind comparing death tolls.

[Grim]

I don't want to get back into the lengthy debates of old BUT let's also not forget that the bloke who can't even chew a pretzel is still giving the nod to continue the daily bombing of Afghanistan & admits he hasn't a clue where OBL is.
Grim O'Grady

[LoafingOaf]

> I don't want to get back into the lengthy debates of old BUT let's also
> not forget that the bloke who can't even chew a pretzel is still giving
> the nod to continue the daily bombing of Afghanistan & admits he
> hasn't a clue where OBL is.
> Grim O'Grady

So you bought the pretzel story, did you?

Sounded more like ole W was back on the drink!

Think about it!

[drunken demands]

> So you bought the pretzel story, did you?
> Sounded more like ole W was back on the drink!
> Think about it!

It all was rather strange wasn't it? Shame they couldn't have been a little more creative though.

[Grim]

I didn't know he was a lush, thanks for the info, it would appear more realistic.
The Grim