Those who instigated the war in Iraq have the blood of Madrid on their hands.
Those who instigated the Iraq war have the blood of Madrid on their hands.…
"A sinister cabal of superior writers."
Those who instigated the war in Iraq have the blood of Madrid on their hands.
Those who instigated the Iraq war have the blood of Madrid on their hands.…
Article comments
— go to most recent comments26 - Al Barger
You merely PRESUME that the war in Iraq generated more recruits for terrorism. I see no evidence of that. They had plenty of recruits and were attacking us before. Best evidence is that we're killing the bastards quicker than they can replace them.
That doesn't mean there aren't any terrorist. It just means we're working on thinning the herd.
It's not that you don't hate terrorism, Mike, it's just that you seem more concerned with having excuses to denounce Bush than in stopping terrorism.
27 - Joshua Scholar
By the way what do you think Kerry will do about Iran (one of those wonderful terrorist supporting countries) will do about those nukes they'll have any day. Oh remember former president Rafsanjani promising (when he was still president) the moment Iran has nukes they'll nuke Israel. Gotta love 'em.
Oh and are you happy or sad that our adventure in Iraq convinced Kaddaffi to turn states evidence on the vast nuke development network that Pakistan and companies around the world are using to arm our enemies?
Or better that we didn't know about that and just wait for the bombs?
28 - RadarRider
The fallacy behind this argument is the assumption that not taking the war (and it is a war, make no mistake) to the terrorists and their supporters would have kept everyone safe. They want us all dead or subjugated. Not fighting them, but rather trying to appease them, is doomed to fail because the *will not* be appeased. Nothing we can do will satisfy them short of dying, surrendering to them, or converting en masse to their extreme form of Islam. Not taking the war to them would not have prevented further attacks.
Note that I most emphatically do *not* include all Muslims in the above characterization. Only those by whose words and deeds have shown themselves to be enemies of freedom. Cliche? Perhaps. But most cliches exist because they're true.
29 - Sonetka
Mike -
Back when I was a college student, I spent a lot of time in Russia. There were several fairly spectacular (so to speak) terrorist bombs set off during the time I was there. A few apartment buildings went down, with quite a few casualties. One of the underpasses I used to go through five times a day was bombed one week after I left the country.
As an American, I had no responsibility for Russian foreign policy. I didn't agree with it, didn't endorse it, deplored their violence, talked rather like you do now. And it didn't matter a bit. If my plans had been a bit different and I had been transformed into a red smear on the wall, it would have meant nothing to the bombers except another enemy gone, and proportionally a little more terror. I'm planning on going back there in a few months. If the day comes that I encounter a bomb, I won't be myself anymore. I'll be The Enemy. Even if my views were the duplicate of yours, which they aren't now, it will mean absolutely nothing to the bombers. I am not them, and am therefore expendable. And so, in their minds, are you.
These people are not awash in sweet platitudes of self-esteem. They do not celebrate and sing the lovely diversity of the world. Cast your mind back to what you learned about the Middle Ages - the dreadful and impressive certainty that one was right, the other was wrong, and you were willing to die for that. Think of the bombers as Crusaders. Do they look a touch less victimized now? Perhaps a bit more responsible for their own actions? Because no matter what social forces are at work, they made those bombs, they deposited them in full knowledge that innocent people would die, they detonated the things. They were the ones with instruments in their hands, and they chose to kill. To treat as being somehow helpless dragged along in the tide of history is to deny that they are as human and responsible as the rest of us - inherently inferior - and I'm sure you don't think that.
30 - Shaefer
I love it! I love it!
"I don't know a goddamn thing! I can't properly argue my way out of a phonebooth! I don't really have the brains to form a defense for my opinions, so I'll just call anyone who doesn't think like me a racist! That's what all the other hipster libs that I mimic are doing these days! It's, like, the new "cool" way to argue!"
31 - Debbie
"Yes, I hate terrorism. Duh! By generating recruits for jihad, the Iraq war, as 3-11 shows, has made Islamists infinitely more powerful. So it's people like you who are aiding and abetting terrorists with your insane and ignorant policies."
Where have you been living for the last 15 years? They have been attacking us for at least that long.... The Iraq war started last year, what about the 14 years before that? It's really pathetic to make excuses for that type of behavior.
32 - Eric Olsen
mike, surely you see the speciousness of the logic that any given terrorist attack was caused by any given action on anyone but the terrorists' part. Surely you see the self-defeating nonsense of trying to ferret out "what the real reason was" for any given attack. The "raison d'etre manifesto" is just a game the killers play in the hope that we will be distracted from the enormity of their hatred and opposition to the entire Western/democratic way of life. They laugh at us when we take their statements seriously because the only statement that means anything is that they want all of us dead and our civilization destroyed. They don't give a fuck about Iraq, they don't give a fuck about Afghanistan or anything else other than causing maximum death and destruction. Our ONLY option is to aggressively seek them out and destroy them and their networks - nothing else matters.
And indignation will not change the fact that Spain voted out of fear - how would you characterize a radical change in voting patterns threee days after a bomb attack? Were they bombed to their senses? Did the death of 200 civilians yield sudden clarity? It's called "panic" and the stink can be smelled from here.
33 - mike
This ahistorical airy rhetoric has been rejected, not only by the Spainish people, but by most of the world. It has been rejected because the policy it undergirds has failed.
The U.S. approach is like the Israeli approach; it may deal with the individual group or individual causing terrorism, but because it doesn't address greivances of the people the terrorists hide among, it makes the problem worse. The U.S. approach actually causes more terrorism.
Hopefully, 3-11 is a turning point that will lead to the isolation and disarming of the two greatest threats (in order) to the world: Al-Queda and the U.S. military.
34 - Joshua Scholar
The underlying grievence, you creten, is the existance of people who aren't fundimentalist Salafi/Sunni Muslims and who aren't imprisoned by Sharia law.
As I said, you know nothing. Go learn.
35 - Eric Olsen
Yes, certainly if the U.S. military ceased to exist tomorrow the world would be a better place and the joyous spring of peace would bloom the world over because it is only the US military that is causing despots the world over to oppress their people, causing delusional monomaniacs to attack and subjugate any they feel are vulnerable, causing death to be worshiped as preferable to life, causing religious fanatics to attempt to convert the world or bomb it out of existence.
Yes, dismantle the warmongering US military and and the boot will be removed from the necks of the oppressed everywhere.
36 - Joshua Scholar
Of course for Iran, the "grievence" is different. For them it's the existance of people who aren't fundimentalist Shiites imprisoned by Sharia, law.
37 - Jeff B.
Eric, you give posting privileges to the strangest people...
Oh well. Takes all kinds, I suppose. Except right now (after that "disarm the US Military" comment) I feel like thwacking this kind upside the head.
38 - Eric Olsen
If by "posting" privileges you mean making comments, anyone and everyone can make comments other than spammers. If you are referring to writing and posting ariticles, then all one has to do is have a blog adn join Blogcritics. We have no political litmus test.
And as you can read, our political range is exceptionally wide.
39 - hibigibi
3 ways out of the current situation:
1) You already are muslim
2) You convert to islam
3) You insist on being an infidel-YOU DIE
40 - LCDR S
Visited Spain five times in the last decade. Loved the country.
Will never go back as long as the terrorist bootlicking Socialists are in power.
It's sad that the Socialists got a majority of cowards to put them into power.
A country that can kill innocent bulls for sport but cowers under the table in the face of a few terrorist maggots and their revolting "religious" beliefs is in a tailspin of decline. We don't need this "ally" anymore.
41 - Ms. Tek
A country that can kill innocent bulls for sport
In the US, sportsfishing is popular. They do a lot of throwing back.
So is deer hunting. Not so many eat that deer meat.
Bear Huntning.
Actually, hunting and fishing, if you are not going to eat it is cruel.
42 - mike
Let's see: the people of Spain kicked out the government that failed to protect them from terrorism, and they're cowards.
Keep it up, right wingnuts. You're just digging yourselves in deeper.
43 - Joshua Scholar
Mike is a one note kazoo.
We're not even right wingers.
Idiot.
Ok, I'm leaving.
44 - Davey Jewstein
No government can protect it's people from terrorism. That's why it works. Anyone could put a bomb on a NYC subway at any time. One day this will happen and "Mike" will still be an idiot.
I am not "right-wing".
Mike, honestly you seem like the indoctrinated robot.
45 - NC
Hey, did you know that 9/11 never would have happened if we had elected Ralph Nader president? Little known fact.
46 - IB Bill
Mike Larkin:
You seem to be making a "reasonably foreseeability" argument. That's taking U.S. tort law (specifically negligence) and applying that law in an international context (specifically the conduct of war).
While certainly we need to take into account the reactions of folks we are fighting with, your argument really boils down to: We shouldn't have taken out a haven for terrorists in Iraq because the bad guys will go after us and our allows.
Well, the bad guys in this case don't need a reason to fight back. They're on the offense in this war. The war on terror is a counter-offensive -- but essentially it's a defensive war.
So blood on our hands? Not legally, not morally, not ethically. The blood is on their hands for starting the war in the first place ... all of it.
The only way the blood is on our hands is if you believe the terrorists didn't start it -- that we did. Which is a different argument.
47 - mike
If another 9/11 or mini-9/11 or even micro-9/11 (e.g., the shooting down of a commercial airline by terrorists) occurs in this country, martial law will be declared, the writ of habeus corpus will be suspened, and the country will have essentially moved to a modified form of military dictatorship.
And I predict that people like Eric Olsen, Instapundit, and Andrew Sullivan will heartily endorse it--after the usual hand-wringing about how they feel slightly uneasy, and they certainly hope abuses aren't too excessive, etc.
Mark my words.
48 - URN
You're an idiot.
49 - Joshua Scholar
URN, he certainly is.
50 - mike
I notice you didn't deny it.
51 - Eric Olsen
Okay, I deny it.
52 - NC
I deny it. I'm also endlessly amused to see these newbies trying to reason with the nuttiest nut in the big bowl of nuts known as Blogcritics. That's like being the fattest member of the Fat Boys: You have to really work at it to reach that level of grotesqueness.
I did notice that Barger took the bait and chimed in with a couple of comments here. Shame on you, Al, howling into the void like that.
In conclusion, I'd like to say that if Bush and Hitler arm-wrestled, it would be a tie. Thank you.
53 - mike
Here's how it may go: If there's another terrorist attack in this country before the election, and it looks like voters are going to pull a Spain and (rightly) blame the ruling party, the Sean Hamitys will declare that since the terrorists wanted John Kerry to win, then canceling the election will be the best way to fight the terrorists.
Mark my words.
54 - Debbie
We would rather mark you as an idiot...
55 - IB Bill
Martial law? There's no need for that until the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, 2008, when Dubya's second term expires and to prevent the election of Hillary Clinton.
You know, analogous to what second-termer Ferdinand Marcos did in 1972 (or 73, I forgot). At the end of his second term (they had a two-term limit), Marcos instigated unrest and declared martial law.
56 - IB Bill
Well, not when the term expires but when the election will be held for Bush's successor.
Must proofread.
57 - Patrick Carroll
I'm afraid that Europe still hasn't got the lesson: you can't appeae terrorists. It didn't work with Hitler, it won't work with the Islamofascists.
In this vote, all the people of Spain have really done is done is to encourage the terorists and make it more likely that both the US and Europe will see more of the same.
I truly am not looking forward to saying "I told you so."
58 - Al Barger
Oh for crying in a bucket Mike, that comment #53 is utter hysterical nonsense. You're completely pulling that out of the blue. On what basis do get the idea that ANYBODY would even propose such foolishness as canceling elections.
PS First whining bad loser that responds to this with something about Florida gets a beat down. As Patrick Fitzwilliam and William Fitzpatrick say, "Save it."
59 - Doug
Allahu Akbar!
60 - mike
Who said it, Al? Tommy Franks said it
61 - Shark
Somebody please visit my entries. Please? Purty please?
I'm a nut, I'm a robot, I'm no wing, and my hyperbole is MUCH MORE ENTERTAINING.
Plus: free hot dogs and Doctor Peppers for the first ten visitors!
Thanks --- Shark's Management
62 - kemikalsupafreek
I'm terribly disappointed you did not respond to my eloquent comment (#2), although perhaps your comment (#4) was an attempt. Pitiful one, if so.
I made such an excellent point, perhaps you simply agreed with me. Would have been polite for you to acknowledge such a brilliant observation, though.
63 - Joshua Scholar
"I notice you didn't deny it."
Actually we did deny it. That was implied in being so impressed with the stupidity of your assertion that we just called you an idiot and left it at that.
64 - David
Dumbest. Thread. Ever.
65 - Eric Olsen
I find that hard to believe
66 - Mark Saleski
yea, some of the hiphop threads had DumbHallOfFame commentary (ja rule, maybe?)
67 - Eric Olsen
The magical Pirates of the Caribbean thread is now almost 1000 comments strong and every one of them has said essentially the same thing. At least they are inoffensive and haven't contained threats of bodily harm.
68 - Shark
I'm currently working on a post called,
"The Passion Pirates of the Caribbean Half-Time Show Vote for the Best Guitarist---EVER: Mel Gibson!"
Leaderboard --- here I come!
69 - Craig Lyndall
Shark that is probably one of the funniest things I have ever read here.
70 - Eric Olsen
Classic, but you have to work 50 Cent in there somewhere.
71 - Dawn Olsen
yo, dat's right bitches, 50-cents da shizzznit, aight!
piece out
72 - JR
"The Passion Pirates of the Caribbean Half-Time Show Vote for the Best Guitarist---EVER: Mel Gibson!"
Yeah, that would be a good post, but WHERE IS SLASH!?!?
73 - Craig Lyndall
No way Dawn. 50 is shifty, and Ja ain't no fool. or something...
Yeah the rap wars were hilarious.
74 - Joe
Did anyone bother to check out mike's link to the Tommy Franks quote? Or should I say mike's link to Juan Cole paraphrasing Newsmax.com reporting on an article in Cigar Afficianado magazine. I wish I had the talent to make this kind of stuff up. The internet is the coolest thing EVER!
75 - mike
Head down to the library and read Cigar A magazine yourself. My links are accurate summaries.