(V):

> Not in the UK they aren't.

Here in Edmonton they are. Alberta is under a long-term oil boom. People have built ne homes in big numbers in the last 6 years. The homes are huge. Builders have lost all sense of proportion because consumers demand those big houses. Considering winters here, heating those houses uses a lot of energy. I am sure some parts of the USA face the same problem. Seeing TV shows from the USA it is obvious that all of North America has similar thinking. Bigger is better.

Artful Dodger:

> I drive a small truck. a friend bought a huge truck.

It is just human nature. We always want things bigger. I see it here in our city. Old neighborhoods have homes that are much smaller than newer neighborhoods. Houses built in the last 10 years are easily three times as big as homes built in the 1950s. With each passing decade homes became larger and larger. At the same time families became smaller. Now people expect huge homes, and have only 1 or 2 children.

This translates into a big waste of lumber, steel, concrete, plastics and other construction materials. It takes energy to make those things, and more energy to heat a bigger home.

We are a society out of control. We are spoiled and we think we are entitled to bigger and bigger things all the time.

Artful Dodger:

> I keep my heat low, turn off lights when not in use, drive only 4 miles to work, don't
> travel much, and on and on. The US may use more (they don't use the most however)
> because it's more available and we can afford it.

I think it is not realistic to ask people to cut their consumption by 80%. It is what the average American would have to do in order to bring consumption to the world average. It would be like asking people to stop using their lights, refrigerator, air conditioner, car, etc. It would not only be unrealistic, it would be economically destructive.

I think that our shcool should teach children to use energy responsibly. Teach children to waste less electricity by leaving lights on, leaving the TV on, keeping appliances plugged in when they don't need to be, etc. We should teach children to reduce wasted energy.

Then we should teach children different values. We value big vehicles. Everybody wants a huge pickup truck, a huge minivan, a huge SUV. We should teach children that cars are not toys, but working vehicles. The vehicles that we choose should be a reflection fo the work we do, not of our desire to have fun. Here people buy big pickup trucks just to show off, not because they need them for work. Those values have to change too.

I think we are decade away from getting rid of oil as a source of energy. However, that does not mean that we should not plan for the future. Oil will run out sooner or later, and when it does we better be ready to substitute it with something cleaner. There are alternatives, they are not perfect, but that is no reason to reject them outright.

One thing is true, the oil industry is trying to milk every cent of profit out of oil. Their economic interests lie with oil and not with "green" energy. Alternative energy companies have interests that lie away from oil. Our politicians are now caught between economically competing interest groups. As always, our politicians will side with whoever puts the most cash in their hands. It is the nature of the lobby system. Since the oil industry has the most cash for now, their political interests will be represented more than those of "green" energy. As green energy becomes a bigger and bigger business, the political wil will shift, but we are decades away from that.

Green energy will never work in the USA. The reason is simple: energy consumption is too great in the USA. The USA has approximately 5% of the population of the world, yet the USA consumes 30% of the energy produced in the world. That means that on average, an American consumes 6 times the world average. Since consumption is 6 times the average, the only way the USA could make green energy viable would be to reduce consumption, and that means reducing wasted energy and improving efficiency at every level. The USA has no political will to change its energy consumption habits. Politicians talk of green energy, but only as a whitewash to the reality of overconsumption and waste.

Artful Dodger:

> Fossil fuels can be harvested efficiently and cleanly.

You are echoing the oil industry propaganda machine. The oil industry is neither efficient nor clean. Look at some photographs by artist Edard Burtynsky. He photographs the reality that the oil industry does not want end consumers to see.

http://www.edwardburtynsky.com/

Look at his works under "Oil".

This one is here in Alberta where I live. The Keystone pipeline is supposed to bring oil from here to the USA. This placed used to be a virgin boreal forest over bogs and ponds. Is this picture "clean and efficient"?

http://www.edwardburtynsky.com/WORKS/Oil/Oil_Book_Large/EXTRACTION_and_REFINEMENT/016-OLF_ALB_07_07_Oil.html

Every year migratory birds land in the tailings ponds and get covered in oil and toxic waste. We need oil, but that is not an excuse to be chanting praises of "clean and efficient" for the oil industry.

Jack:

> http://unknownjournal.wordpress.com/2010/10/06/%E2%96%BC-report-the-kochs-their-nazi-past-american-oil-the-foundation-of-republican-ideology/


"Erich Koch had been in charge of Prussia for Hitler so his ties to the Soviet Union ran deep. A few years later the Soviets took Fred Koch’s oil and prosecuted Erich for war crimes – Fred Koch returned to the US, became anti-communist, and was allowed to do business in the States again."

That article is pure mumbo-jumbo. There is no relationship between Fred Koch and Erich Koch except that they share the same last name. Fred C. Koch is the son of a Dutch father. Erich Koch was born in Prussia and died in prison in Poland for his war crimes. The American Kochs were never communists or members of the communist party of the Soviet Union. Fred C. Koch tried to do business in Russia and became "disenchanted" with communism. Most likely he was always an anticommunist and went to Russia as a spy. Like all westerners, he wanted access to the oil in the Caspian Sea basin.

Nazis and Communists hated each other. Anybody who claims otherwise is merely ignoring the historical reality of the deep hatred between nazis and communists.

The second article:

http://www.tetrahedron.org/articles/new_world_order/bush_nazis.html

is quite good. I saw something very similar in Webster Tarpley's biography of George H.W. Bush:

http://tarpley.net/online-books/george-bush-the-unauthorized-biography/.

Prescott Bush and Samuel P. Bush were nazi sympathizers. Over the decades that followed WW II the American government has tried to sanitize their image. However, their involvement as bankers to Friz Thyssen and his nazi blood money cannot be erased from history so easily. In fairness, just because Prescott Bush was a nazi banker, it does not meant that George H.W. Bush or George . Bush are nazis. They might be right wingers, even imperialists (if one interprets their actions as such), but the sins of the father not necessarily visit the son and grandson.

(V):

> These revolutionary groups are funded by George Soros and the whole thing is being orchestrated by America's most famous community organiser, President Barack Obama.

I imagine that Mr. Beck wanted to rally up people like he did in the USA but it backfired on him. Rather than admitting that he was wrong, Glenn Beck goes on a tirade against George Soros and the president. Glenn Beck is delusional. Just because George Soros donated a lot of money to Obama's campaign it does not mean that they are both some communist conspirators bent on taking over the world. This shows Glenn Beck as a narcissistic and paranoid. Well, the idea for him is to continue in the public eye so he can keep making money. Somewhere in his mind, he probably thinks that at some point he will recover his TV show as people forget some of the stupid things he has done in the past.

Artful Dodger:

> Sad for you that you have to resort to a dishonest appraisal of Fox so that your ideology can be pampered.

Like I said, Fox is not a bad network. I just don't find their style of reporting appealing to me.

Well, I find that no news channel is balanced. I said that I find it better to see several channels rather than limit myself to one.

As for my ideology, for it to be pampered I would revamp every channel. I would kill all advertising to begin with. Then I would set reporters to truly ionvestigate what politicians are doing and uncover the veil of secrecy that politicians use as a way to "protect the public and national security". I doubt that politicians want transparency or honesty. They want to carry on as always, favoring the wealthy and powerful and using the masses as mere tools to secure their power. No channel would ever report like that.

Artful Dodger:

> apples to apples FNC kicks butt ALL DAY LONG

Sounds like a great ad! Do you work for FNC, or hold stock in the company? That kidn of love comes only from somebody with a vested interest in FNC.

Well, of course, ratings is no indication of quality. Lots of people love MacDonald's. It does not mean that MacDonald's is good food, or nutritious food.

How should news be measured? Quality? Quantity? Popularity?

I find that if I want better news with more balanced reporting, then I have to see several channels to get a more complete picture. I never watch CNN or Fox. Simply because their view of the world is given through the narrow looking glass of American centrist and right-wing politics. It does not mean that they are bad networks. I just don't find their way of reporting appealing to me.

Likewise, I am sure the reporting in other channels leave a lot to be desired to other people. It is all colored by people's personal opinions.

I watch BBC News but I find a distinct pro-weswtern slant in their reporting. They are not left-leaning (as some people might want to believe). I find that they do chime of the neo-liberal ideology of modern western politics.

I watch RT (Russian television) news which has a less Eurocentric and Western-centric view. I find that they report much better in things that the western media tries to hide. A good example is their reporting of the rising sectarian violence in Lybia, something that western news media are playing down. While the western media gives a pro-western view of the situation in Syria, RT is giving what I feel is a more balanced view.

Sometimes I watch CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) news. I find them entirely western-centric and neo-liberal in their views, but they are far from left-leaning as some people might claim.

I rarely see Al Jazeera. I find them a souped up (or down?) version of BBC news.

Well, Fox might have high ratings, but I do not necessarily agree with their right-wing slant. That is just me, because I am a left winger. Those who agree with Fox will naturally defend their reporting.

Bernice:

Not all of the data in that chart is right. It was not collected by an independent monitor of the economy, and it is not corroborated. Just of the top of my head I can see the employment picture being wrong. The Bush administration finished with 9.9% unemployment. I know, because I follow the stock and futures markets and employment is one of the main movers of the financial markets. It says a lot that the graph is labelled "Mr. Conservative".

From what I was reading, New Gingrich was speaker of the house during the Clinton administration. That had made him the most powerful Republican at the time. Then the ethics violations came into place in 1997 and almost the entire House of Representatives voted to fine him $300,000. He attempted to stay in his position as Speaker of the House but in the congressional elections of 1998 the Republicans did poorly and he was blamed (rightly so) with damaging the reputation of the Republican Party. He ended up resigning in 1999.

He left politics and went into the private sector. He remained politically active, wrote books, etc. I imagine that after 13-14 years he thought that people might have forgotten his ethics violations. However, his opponents were bound to bring that back. At this point I imagine that it is the Romney camp pushing the issue. For the Democrats the nomination of Newt Gingrich would have been better than Romney because reviving his past ethics violation would have been better right at crunch time one week before the vote.

Reading about Willard Mitt Romney, it seems to me that he is as conservative (and perhaps more so) than Newt Gingrich. Mitt Romney (like George W. Bush) seems to represent more the wealthy elite and inherited wealth.

At this point I am inclined to believe that Romney will win the nomination. I think he will attract more voters within the Republican caucuses. At this point the party will probably see him as the best chance to defeat the Democrats.

As for the Democrats, Romney seems to represent the more difficult opponent because he seems "cleaner" and better equipped to defeat Obama's charisma. However, ultimately Obama has the full support of the finance and banking sectors, and that will give him the edge to win. I am inclined to believe that Obama will be reelected just like Bill Clinton was, specially since the American economy is showing signs of improvement at this point.

gogul:

I agree. The sentence reads strange. I think a few words are missing.

I have looked at the news and debates on these laws. It is funny that the American and other governments are so interested in stopping illegally copied and counterfeit goods (mostly music and movies). At the same time they will do nothing to stop truly destructive things.

It is illegal to copy a movie, but it is legal to make a mysogynistic pornographic film. Half of the Internet is full of pornography that objectifies and denigrates women, men and even children. I wonder if they will shut down or fine advertisers of those sites.

It is illegal to copy a video game, but it is legal to make a video game where people get blown up. I wonder if they will make it illegal to feed to children and youth graphic, interactive violence.

As usual, it is all about money. The only reason why they care about this law is to protect the revenues of billionaires. Here are the Hollywood and media billionaires. Not content with having made billions, they want to continue to make billions. I don't blame artists for wanting to protect their interests and money. If they pass SOPA and PIPA, will they also pass laws that ban violence and pornography in the Internet? After all, many of the users of the Internet are children and youth.

At this point the defenders of "free speech" will stand up on their soap box and say that pornography and violence are a necessary evil to protect free speech. I wonder if free speech is on the mind of the mysogynists that make pornography or the sociopaths that make violence a game. They will say it is up to the parents to stop children from watching pornography and violence. Should it be up to the parents to stop kids from copying movies and games?

Here is the ridiculous thing:
It is illegal to copy a movie of a woman being fisted or being penetrated by three men at the same time, but it is perfectly legal to make that movie.
It is illegal to copy a game where people get beheaded or blown up, but it is legal to make such a game.

gogul:

People forget that the entire "Representative Democracy" scam exists with one and only one purpose: To stop the people from going into another Fench Revolution. Capitalist governments fear revolution more than anything in the world. So the entire political and financial system exists only to stop revolutions from happening so that the rich and powerful can stay where they are. All the crisis and fear mongering exists to distract the population so that they can keep consuming like automatons. As long as the working class lowers its head, the rich and powerful are happy. Democracy and capitalism simply ensure that those heads stay lowered. We no longer need chains to be slaves. We use wages and money to keep the lower classes where they belong. Then we tell the wage slaves that they are "free" because they can consume anything they want. Then we tell them that they have "political power" because we let them cast a meager vote once every four years. Meanwhile the rich and powerful stay where they are: ruling everybody.

Bernice:

Hilarious! You could put just about anything at the end of that line. "Just like a democrat." "Just like a Communist." "Just like a Tea Partier." "Just like a shopper in Walmart." It works with just about anything!

yoyudax:

> We should be looking rather at a society that breeds these types of men, then harnesses and nurtures these instincts and finally celebrates their achievements.

War is a business, and western governments went into war not to promote their ideology but to promote their business interests. Our politicians can talk of freedom and democracy, but the reality is that the entire "intelligence" system exists to justify wars that have as their objective to build ever greater empires. National security is the excuse through which empires are built, and freedom and democracy are the ideological battle cries.

Our governments are made of hypocrites. The best proof of that is the recent visit by David Cameron to Saudi Arabia. His primary objective was to secure the sale of 70 fighter jets to the most despotic kingdom and main supporter of Al Qaeda in the Middle East. When convenient, our governments do business with tyrants, and when convenient, they call them enemies and do war with them.

The American government could have stopped the sale of violent video games to children. Instead they blocked the proposed law and let parents buy war video games that are nothing but propaganda to shape young minds into believing that "war is cool and heroic".

The Pentagon spends milliong of dollars developing video games, financing movies, promoting advertising and using all forms of media to ensure that young people enlist in wars under the hope of becoming heroes. Instead our youth become desensitized, ideologically-blind killers. When they don't come back in body bags, they come back with post-traumatic stress disorder, sociopathic disorder and even psychopathic disorder.

The men who urinated on those corpses became psychopaths because only a psychopath would place so little value in life that he would think it is OK to denigrate and humiliate a dead body. They became psychopaths not to promote freedom and democracy in Afghanistan, but to build and protect a pipeline that will bring oil from the Caspain Sea basin into Pakistan and India.

These men will now be made "an example of", but an example of what? After a few months in jail, they will be released. A slap in the wrist will not be an example of justice, but an example of cold indifference and western hypocrisy. In the meantime, kids can keep playing "Call of Duty" so that they can grow up to become like these men.

(V):

> Heads will hopefully roll on both sides of the pond.

I wish that I had your faith in the legal system. To me the legal system is an inadequate joke when it comes to war crimes comitted by western military forces. I look at the Abu Graib case, and not a single one of the soldiers involved served a full sentence. Most of them pleaded guilty, "cooperated" with prosecutors and got either reduced or suspended sentences. The ones that served sentences ended up being paroled early. It is a joke to me that these people could torture and sexually abuse prisoners, and get no substantial punishment. Worst of all, they can still return to active duty even if they were demoted to privates. Abuses at Guatanamo bay have received no legal prosecution and have for the most part been swept under the carpet.

These men urinating on corpses will be demoted, have their pay suspended for a month, and serve at most 6 months in prison. It will be another legal joke just like Abu Graib.

(V):

I suppose that humilliating a dead body shows their courage, determination and devotion to freedom and democracy. As always, the fascist nature of the war rears its ugly head. One would like to believe that it is the exception rather than the rule, but as with Abu Graib, the crime is not in doing something rotten, but in being so stupid as to film it and then expect it never to be seen by anybody else. I am sure the whistleblower who leaked it will end up in a court martial because the real crime is exposing a dirty secret and then "risking national security".

(V):

As I understand it, the membership of each state casts its vote. The nomination is done through election within the party. People outside the party do not get to vote in the nomination process.

To me it is interesting that people on the right admire Hitchens. Of course he is an atheist, but that is forgiven because he was a big defender of the war in Iraq. If Hitchens had opposed the war, would he be a "scholar and a gentleman"? His friendship with Paul Wolfowitz certainly helped to assuage any concerns about his atheism. People forget that Hitchens started out as a Troskyist (a communist) and it was in that part of his life that his atheism developed. However, when the war in Iraq started he completely abandoned his left-wing politics in favor of right wing ideology. For all his intelligence, he seems to me ideologically flaky. Anybody who goes from left to right like that shows a lack of conviction in his beliefs. Yet in spite of his ideological switch, he still remained an atheist. It is rather a paradox.

I suppose a kid in his early 20s is "entitled" to be a leader. It is no different than kings and queens and the princes that get propped up into power. However, these people are just figure heads. In reality the power resides in a technocratic apparatus, a system of bureaucrats that exercises power on behalf of the figure head.

Well, the technocratic, bureacratic apparatus is the same in every government. Western pseudodemocracies have "cabinets" with their ministers and secretaries. The difference is that in western pseudodemocracies people vote to chose their dictator for a few years, they have the option of calling him names if they don't like him, and finally he leaves only to be replaced by another one. In North Korea the dictator is imposed, nobody can call him names and he leaves only when he is dead.

The military bases are there because of fear that war could break out again. After all, North and South Korea never declared peace. They live under a cease fire, and they are both too radicalized in their ideology to concede peace to each other.

Is North Korea a threat? Historically it is and it is not. North Korea never attacked the USA, or any European nation, or Japan. If anything, it was always the other way around since it was the empires that attacked the weaker nations. The Japanese empire abused Korea for centuries,as did the Chinese empire and the Mongolian empire. However, North Korea did attack the south with the backing of the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union. Our western empires killed 3 million North Koreans, and at the same time they want North Korea to trust the west. Would the USA or the UK trust a country that killed 3 million of their people?

Western empires want North Korea to abandon its nuclear program, even though those empires make no effort to abandon their own. Western empires deplore WMDs, even though they have arsenals that could kill every living thing in this planet. The West expects North Korea to be sane, without admitting the insanity of their own behaviour.

Bernice:

This does not come as a surprise. Specially in a system in which two political parties have monopolized all political power. All representative pseudo-democracies are susceptible to this. Considering the amount of wealth and power involved, we should not be surprised if those in power want to cheat to win elections.

In many countries today Internet voting is being pushed as a way to "entice" voters to participate in elections and increase voter turnout at election time. Instead, computerized systems are easily rigged to manipulate results.

I would say the the USA is the most vulnerable for several reasons. You have a highly polarized political system with two parties that vie for nearly 50% of the vote each. You have highly technified private companies with the capability to program computerized voting systems. You have very wealthy and powerful men who have every interest in making sure that a candidate that represents their interests wins. You have a lobby system that pervades through every sector of your government. While the population votes, all political power resides in the hands of a plutocratic elite that manipulates and corrupts elected representatives. This is just an example of the undermining of the democratic process. I suppose it is up to Americans to protect their democracy and most Americans are too distracted by terror and paranoia to realize that the biggest threat to American democracy is not terrorists or communists, but rather the plutocratic elite that manipulates all western democracies.

(V):

> Piers Morgan is considered a conservative

What passes for liberal in the USA and Canada is a right wing conservative anywhere else!

The USA has two choices: right wing, and right of right wing. Well, it just shows that the concept of left and right is relative.

Way to go Fox News and CNN. It is nice to see those networks lying to their viewers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fk-qRU2nAUQ

Specially Fox News. They are so incompetent that they can't even figure out the difference between Greek and Russian writing.

Artful Dodger:

> And Europe is going broke. You can only give away so much money before you saturate the system. ... And the USA is heading that way fast.

I think the difference is that in some countries the government gives away the money to bankers, troubled giant corporations and the military industrial complex. The question is, what causes more problems? Giving money away through social programs? Or giving money away to the rich and powerful? As of last week, bankers have received bailouts twice! The only reason why the financial markets recovered last week is because in essence central bankers gave banks a second round of bailouts. The third is the charm I suppose. Next time they will be begging communist China to bailout the capitalist system!

Dark Prince:

People do things that they regret later in life.

Herman Cain will of course deny involvement with those women because he wants to be president.

In a perfect world people would be able to distinguish his private life from what he can offer as a poltiician, but people are swayed by personal details in a candidate's life.

I think that somebody in the Republican party wants Herman Cain out of the election. It has been claimed that the inital leaks of Cain's indiscretions came from the Perry campaign. At this point the one who benefits the most is Romney.

Regardless of that, Herman Cain would alienate the Hispanic vote because he openly proposed building an electrified fence across the border with Mexico. That would alienate the 17% of the voters who are Hispanic.

If Herman Cain were to be nominated for the Republican party, Obama is sure to win. "Here is the man who harrassed all those women, kept a mistress for several years, and wants to build a fence to keep Hispanics out." The voting public might not be as discerning, and reelect Barrack Obama easily.

Herman Cain refuses to concede. He keeps denying the allegations, in spite of several women coming forward to disclose the nature of the settlemetns that occurred out of court. If Herman cain was smarter, he would simply own up to his mistakes, apologize, and then point out to the fact that in spite of his mistakes, he has the capacity to be president. Instead all his denials make him look shifty. There are times when honesty and admitting one's mistakes is the winning political move.

Artful Dodger:

> If a claim has no basis other than the claim itself, then all claims would be equal.

"God exists" Isn't that an a-priori statement too? After all, there is no CONCRETE and SCIENTIFIC proof of the existence of God. Just because it says so in a book it does not make it true. Neither does a lot of people believing it. Faith is not proof, if anything, faith is belief in the ABSENCE of proof. Just as you can question the athiesist for believing things "a priori" so can all of religion be questioned, because other than your personal belief there is no proof of the existence of God.

> I'm actually saying that as an atheist, you have no grounds to argue against things
> you claim are "wrong."

How so? We get back to the original question: Does good and evil come only from God? What if God does not exist? You assume that God exists and that good and evil come from him. You assume that atheists have no moral grounds, because they have no God. However, human reality is different. Believer in God do wrong, and are full of contradictions. Atheists are no better.

> I say Al Qaeda is "wrong" because they kill people without justification. But when I
> say justification, I mean more than I just don't like it. I mean it's objectively wrong to kill
> another person without moral justification. For the atheist, it is only subjectively
> wrong. They don't like it. But beyond not liking it, they have no foundational argument.

And belief in God is not subjective? If anything, religion is the ultimate subjectivity. "I beleive in a being that I can never prove exists. I call my belief faith and that is the velief in something that has no concrete, scientific proof." The atheists makes his argument from the opposite poit: "I believe that God does not exists. Nobody can prove God's existence. I cannot prove God's nonexistence. However, all concrete and scientific evidence before leades me to believe that God does not exist. My concept of good and evil exists outside of religious arguments."

At some point people have forgotten that Atheism is as much a belief system as religions are. Interestingly, it is OK to discriminate atheists. If an atheists comes out and speaks against religion, he will be labelled a bigot. But not so when some preacher speaks against atheists. If I open a Christian school, it is OK. But if I were to open an atheist school that openly promotes atheism, I would probably be burned at the stake.

> Here's where you are wrong. You argue that simply because you say so, something
> is right or wrong. If something is truly wrong, it's wrong for both you and I. It's
> wrong independent of your feelings to the contrary. Otherwise it is benign.

But what is truth is not a personal assertion? You tell me God exists and he is the truth giver. Why should I believe that? Because you say so? Because the Bible says so? As an atheist I assert the following: "a human being killing another human being is wrong". Now, others can chose to believe it or they can ignore it. It is their right as free, thinking human beings. Now, if others refuse to believe it, it does not mean that they are right and I am wrong. Masses of people sometimes believe the wrong thing, and that does not make it right. There will also be many times when I am wrong because as a human being I am imperfect. However, I have conviction in my beliefs. Without conviction in our own beliefs we would immediately fold to anybody else's beliefs. I believe what I believe not because somebody told me so, or because a book told me so, but because after careful analysis and consideration, I have arrived at my convictions. Nobody else has any obligation to accept my analysis of things and my version of right and wrong. People can choose to agree, and one would hope they have the common sense to believe out of intelligence and not out of blindness.

> Consequences don't matter. They don't determine if something is right or wrong.
> Consequences are implemented by a society against a particular act it deems
> offensive. But for something to be objectively wrong, it would be wrong EVEN IF
> nobody believed it. (such as abortion).

There are many things that are wrong, and people do them for different reasons. The Law is society's attempt to stop people from tossing aside their values and imposing selfish wrongdoing on others. The law is imperfect, because human motivations are imperfect. It is not the consequences that make an act wrong, but rather it is the act itself. Killing is wrong, not because the law says so, or because the killer will go to prison or hell, but because killing in itself is wrong. That is the a priori statement. The act of killing might or might not have consequences. However, it is the act of destroying a human life that is wrong. Why should it be wrong? This is where personal belief comes in. Some people will cite God, others will cite science, or philosophy, or anything that satisfies their justification. A person could chose to believe that killing is not wrong (like psychopaths and politically motivated killers). However, that does not alter my own beliefs about killing because I have conviction in my beliefs.

> Abortion is either wrong or it is not wrong. It is not both. Same with stealing or lying
> or killing. They are either morally justified or they are not. It is not a personal choice
> that determines right or wrong.

That's right. It is a personal choice. Sometimes pro-life people think that the pro-abortion side thinks abortion is right. In reality, the pro-abortion side sees abortion as a terrible thing, but they justify abortion as a woman's right to chose what is right or wrong for herself and her unborn child. the ultimate choice lies in the woman's mind. A woman can choose an abortion, and those who support her in her choice don't do it callously or without regard to abortion being a terrible thing. However, they believe that the state has no business telling a woman what to do with her body. Well, we had the abortion discussion a long time ago. I think it is something that humanity will always struggle with because it faces off a woman's rights against something that everybody knows is wrong.


> Since something can be truly objectively wrong (killing babies for fun) then they are
> transcendent truths. Since objective truth exists, there must be an objective truth
> giver that transcends our human intellect.

Well, this is a matter of faith. The transcendent truth giver, the intelligent designer, the creator, God. The essence of faith is belief in this transendent being. As an athetist my faith is opposite of this: an atheist has faith that there is no transdent being outside the physical world. Some atheists lose sight of this and they forget that atheism is a belief system.

Atheists see objective truths as just being without the need for a creator or giver. The sun IS. Science can describe how a sun is formed, how it functions, etc. Science cannot prove whether God made the sun or not, because science cannot prove or disprove the existence of God. Thus the atheists says: the SUN is and there is no need for any God to have created. Whether the atheist is right or wrong is a matter of faith.

Artful Dodger:

I have a great idea. Since EVERY system is bad, let's convince ourselves that there is NOTHING wrong with capitalism. Let's treat poverty as something external. It belongs in the Third World and the rich empires that use those countries and those people for profit have NO RESPONSIBILITY whatsoever for what goes on there. Since that poverty is outside the USA, the fact that American companies make a profit in those countries those not even count when it come sto capitalism.

> People are the ones who oppress the poor.

And who makes capitalism? Geese? Capitalism is the result of PEOPLE pursing profit. So those PEOPLE who oppress the poor are the ruling class, and in capitalism it is those who own the means of production; i.e.: the rich capitalists.

Capitalism has changed nothing, except replace the old feudal lords and the old aristocracy with the mechant class. Instead of a feudal lord, now you have a factory owner, or a CEO.

The reason why there is poor today is simply because the unfair and unequal distribution of wealth has been formalized in the name of profit. Nothing new there. Modern capitalism might be an economic success, but it is also a social failure because it has failed to eliminate poverty, exploitation and hunger.

The Soviet Union (like China) might have been run by the communist party, but it was in essence a form of state capitalism. Instead of the monopolies belonging to CEOs in Wall Street, the monolopy was run by the state. The Soviet Union was run by a communist elite, the USA is run by an elitist plutocracy made of the wealthy donors and lobbyists that run the political parties. The only reason why that plutocracy allows a two party pseudo-democracy is just to keep the general public from exploding into anarchy and revolution.

Artful Dodger:

> And whenever we speak of capitalism, I speak of it as it relates to the US. I don't
> care about the rest of the world. It's good for the US and that's the context of this
> discussion. If you want to drag in developing countries, talk to someone else about
> that. I have no interest in that discussion.

Not to drag developing countries into the discussion? It is only about the USA? How many American companies operate in developing countries? How much profit do they make there? If developing coutnries have NOTHING to do with capitalism, then why is the USA doing business there?

What is your behaviour then if not selfish hogwash? "Who cares about the rest of the world?" It is so easy to say capitalism is great if all that you look at are the rich and the comfortable middle class. Yes, capitalism brought prosperity to CEOs, but what about their employees in the developing world? Don't they count in your mind or are you so selfish that all you care about is your own little world?

> Who says it's wrong to exploit the weak? Tough crap on them. Why are humans
> subject to such a rule but the animal kingdom lives by exploiting the weakness of
> others.

Are you a social Darwinist then? Because that is what social Darwinism is. If you believe that the strongest humans should rule, you are a social Darwinist and that is the what drove the Nazi mentality.

> On what basis is any of this true? Who is to say what is right or what is wrong?
> You? How can you hold me to that standard apart from threat of violence? Is it
> objectively wrong or is that just an opinion that most have agreed to? And if in time,
> society decides it's OK to kill babies for fun, then is that act still wrong in your view?
> How so? Based on what?

Like a said in my previous post, many statements about what is right and wrong are made "a priori", meaning without no basis other than the statement itself. The decision to accept an act as right or wrong is a personal decision. What society says and what an individual does are two different things. If I say it is wrong to kill and exploit others, it is my personal choice and something I believe not based on some socially agreed standard.

If you say that the threat of violence is the only thing that stops people from being bad, then give me a reason why it is wrong for Al Qaeda to attack the USA, just because the USA will bomb them and kill them? Why should Iran give up its nuclear program, because the USA will bomb the country? And what is another country threatens to bomb the USA if it bombs Iran? Is the escalation of violence acceptable just because violence is the ONLY way to decide what is right and wrong?

> This is exactly the argument I am making. If there is an actual wrong here, who
> decides? Why couldn't the Nazis decide that for their culture, killing Jews is just fine?

Well, then why is ANYTHING wrong? I make this "a priori" statement: it is wrong to kill someone because of their race. You can choose to believe it or not. It is your INDIVIDUAL choice, and you are responsible for that choice. Whether your choice has consequences for you or not is a different problem. If a Nazi killed, escaped and never faced justice, that does not make his choice right. Since people do wrong things and more often than not they don't face justice, we have invented a "spiritual" deterrent. We say that "God" will punish the wicked. However, in Atheism there is no such luxury, and the choice of right and wrong becomes an individual process. Punishment for Atheists might be inadequate when the evil escape, but then those who believe in God have nothing but faith to go on. Without faith there is no God, and without God there is no punishment. For atheists the only punishment is that which human beings bring upon one another. So atheists reduce right and wrong to an individual choice, rather than some higher religous principle.

> This principle? Who made this principle? Who says people are equal? In the animal
> kingdom, if I'm stronger, you're toast. Sad for you but you get to die. So what
> separates us as human beings? How do the godless justify principles? Based on
> what???

If somebody is strong and can inflict force upon others, that does nto make that person superior, it merely makes them violent and aggressive, but not better. Superiority has nothing to do with strength or the ability to inflict violence. There is no such thing as superior or inferior in nature. The category of superiority exists only in the human mind. A big lion eating a tiny gazelle is not an example of the lion's superiority. It is merely a reflection of the lion's need to survive. The lion does not think to itself: "I am superior and I can kill as many gazelles as I want". The lion merely responds to its instinct to eat, to reproduce, to secure the survival of its species. That is Darwinism in action.

Social Darwinists apply the same idea to social systems. The strongest man defeats its competitors, and it is OK for that man to do so by whatever means are necessary. But the equality of human beings is not based merely on some abstract idea in the human mind. It is based on science. All human beings are made of the same basic elements: carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen. There is no such thing as superior oxygen or superior carbon. Neither are there superior proteins or inferior proteins, or superior DNA or inferior DNA. The molecules that make up a human being have no superiority or inferiority.

Then all human beings are born the same: helpless babies. There is no such thing as a superior or inferior baby. The categorization of superirity is imposed by the mind, not by nature. Then we say: this man is taller, or this man is stronger, or this man is smarter. However, nature has the ultimate equalizer: death. Everybody dies, and it does nto matter how strong or how smart or how rich or how poor you are. Death makes all human beings exaclty equal. You can die of cancer, or be murdered, or die in a tornado; but death is death plain and simple, and it makes everybody equal. For all of his superiority hogwash, Hitler was ultimate the same as everybody else and he died like everybody else dies.

So based on science and empirical observation one can prove that there is no such thing as superior or inferior human beings. Superiority is merely an abstract category in the human mind.

> "The only way a person can make a profit from others is by not paying them a fair
> wage for their labor."

> This is a false statement.

How so? A perfectly fair wage would mean that a person extracts 100% of the value of their labor. Not 99% for me and 1% for my boss, but 100% exactly. The only way my boss can extract a profit is if he takes the value of my labour, pays me a fraction, and keeps some for himself. The lower the fraction of my labour that is paid to me, the greater the profit that my boss makes.

Notice that I am talking about a perfect system in which it is possible for a person to extract 1005 of the value of their labour. In the real world it does not happen that way. A person can have a "good" salary, meaning that the fraction of the labour they receive is adequate to their expectations, in spite of their boss retaining a fraction for himself. That is what we call a "good company to work for". The employer pays a salary that allows the person to have a good life. That still does not make the salary perfectly fair. Companies are constatly looking for ways to lower the salaries paid to employees, so as to maximize profits. It is why they move production to other countries where labour is "cheaper", meaning that the employer can keep a higher proportion of the fair wage that should be paid to employees.

> You must have failed economics. If there were no profits, there'd be no business
> expansion. You couldn't restock the shelves. You couldn't keep up the store or save
> to open a second one.
> You have a very simplistic view of how an economic system works.

Far from simplistic. If anything, it explains how a CEO can give himself a $50 million bonus, while a whole bunch of employees in the third world get $1 per day. Capitalism requires a constant expansion of profits to ensure that a company has a constant increase in capital expansion. The only way to do that is by reducing production costs as much as possible, and the biggest expense in any company is usually the salaries paid to employees. The lower the salaries, the bigger the profits. It comes as no surprise that jobs have been exported out of rich industrialized nations and sent overseas.

> Again with your "right and wrong." Why should I care what you think about right and
> wrong? What if my view differs and I want you to see my view of right and wrong?
> Why should I accept what you say as an objective fact?

It is your personal choice. What you believe is meaningless until you act on it. If you believe that something is right or wrong, it can only be proven through your actions. You are under no obligation to believe what anybody else says. I have my views, you have yours. I can try to make my point across. Whether you accept it or not it is your own choice. I am well aware that you and I will never agree on 99% of anything. Why bother arguing then? Why should you even reply to any post knowing that people will not agree with you?

Artful Dodger:

> Wrong. Capitalism hase brought more prosperity to the world than any other system.
> People who have exploited the system have done harm. But you have far more harm
> being done in a communist system than in capitalism.

Last thing I heard is that 2/3 of the population under capitalism live in poverty. After all, most capitalist countries are "developing". Before making the claim that capitalism has brought prosperity, one must make sure that by capitalism one does not refer to just the wealthy industrialized nations, but also to the poor, developing nations in which masses of people live in poverty. Yes, most African, Asian and Latin American countries are capitalist, and they are poor, not because of socialism, but because capitalism has helped spread inequality, exploitation and corruption. Just remember, just because you are North American middle class person it does not mean that everybody under capitalism lives like you do. 2/3 of the people under capitalism live in poverty. Hardly the "prosperity" of billionaires and bankers.


> This can be said of any system. Again, people doing evil things. But for you as an
> atheist, isn't it difficult for you to justify the standard you are demanding?

What are you saying? Atheists have no sense of right and wrong? Are you assuming that only "God-fearing" people know the difference between right and wrong? Do you really think good and evil come only from God? That assumption presumes that God exists, but what happens if God does not exist? Does it mean that "anything" is allowed? If the only reason you have for being a good person is fear of God, then yours is a God that rules by fear. It is presumptious to assume that only the Christian God can give a sense of good and evil. If that were the case Christians would never do anything evil. I never saw God punish anyone, and I never met anyone who died and came back. The day that happens I will believe that God is the source of good and evil. But then fear of God dictates that it will be too late for me. So a circular logic takes place. I must live in fear of something that I can never prove whether it is true or not. So an atheist refuses faith, and the sense of right and wrong comes from a priori assumptions. For example, it is wrong to kill, it is wrong to exploit others, etc. Do not asume that atheist are intrinsically evil. Some of the best people I have met in my life were atheists. Religion had absolutely nothing to do with being good or bad.

> On what basis do you say a man can't exploit the weakness of others? Who says? Society? The world? By what authority do they say that? At the point of the gun? Then it boils down to who has the biggest gun. If there is no objective right or wrong, only a subjective one, then morals and ethics are up for grabs.

This is a matter of belief. A person can believe that it is OK to kill for money. That does not make it right. Everybody has a sense of right and wrong. If exploiting others is right, then do not feel bad when somebody comes and exploits you or your family. If it is OK for somebody to profit by using others, then it is OK for everybody to do the same. It is the final conclusion of the existentialist ethic. My actions make a statement about the whole world. If it is OK to be selfish for one person, then it is OK to be selfish for everybody.

> Who says what Rockefeller did was wrong? YOu?? Who are you to make that
> claim? Why is it wrong to support a cause you beieve in? Who determines the value
> of any cause? Is exploiting the poor wrong just because you don't like it or is there a
> higher value at play? If so, what is it?

Who says? Well, you can ask 6 million Jews and 8 million gypsies that died in the Holocaust. If ANY cause is acceptable, then there is nothing wrong with the Nazis.

Why is exploitation wrong? Because it goes against the one principle that nobody can deny: human beings are equal. How so? All human beings start out the same way: babies born naked and screaming. Nobody is born rich or poor. Parents might be rich or poor, but all babies are born with nothing. People are made rich or poor by the social structure they live under. If the social system allows an individual to use others for profit, then a social hierarchy arises in which some become very wealthy and many others become poor. The only way a person can make a profit from others is by not paying them a fair wage for their labour. If wages were perfectly fair, nobody could make a profit. But the extraction of plusvalue from other people's wages is what makes profits possible. If a social system allows poverty to occur, it has consequences such as poor housing, poor health care, poor education, etc. Then human beings suffer, and that is the ultimate consequence of exploitation. Now, if human suffering is OK, then the likes of predatory capitalists and nazis are acceptable. If human suffering is wrong, then those individuals are not acceptable.

As human beings we must make a choice, and indeed we do through our actions. Our ideology is nothing but empty words. It is only through actions that we ultimately display our true sense of right and wrong.

Artful Dodger:

> They can afford to work on their golf swing.

Of course, you realize I am being silly. I am sure the rich do more than work on their golf swing. Some work on their tennis forehand too!

> They employ 100s of people who otherwise might not have a job were it not for that
> rich person who took risks and started a business.

Some rich people also took risks, opened a business and got rich by exploiting hundreds of people in their companies. It is not all about idealizing capitalism. Reality is never quite as nice as ideology paints it.

> I know people who work for such rich bosses. They make a decent living wage plus
> benefits. I know at least one multi millionaire who started a trucking business here,
> and a landscaping business, and a coffee shop. He employs over 50 people. He
> doesn't golf. He does take frequent trips to Honduras and uses his money to help
> build churches and homes and wells.

I know another businessman like that. He owns a paving company here. He employs hundreds, runs a professional soccer team, and also finds the time to help others. Not everyone is a ruthless predator. The truth is that it is a mixed bag because the rich are as prone to the failings of human nature as the poor are.

Many poor people work very hard. They take care of their families, help others, do what is right, etc. Some poor people fall through the cracks. They fall into crime, drugs, and other terrible things. There are good and bad people among the poor.

Likewise, there are good and bad people among the rich. Some create jobs, help others with their money, take care of their families and do good things for their community.

Then there are those who would do anything to make more money. Ponzi schemes, big organized crime, exploiting and abusing others. subverting governments, corrupting politicians and law enforcement personnel, etc.

We hear of Bill Gates and Warren Buffet spending billions in charitable work. Then we hear of Bernie Madoff and other crooks.

Some rich people go so far as to resort to murder to make a profit. For example, there is now big problems with a Canadian-owned gold mine in Guatemala where the company sent armed crooks to force peasants out of their land so that he mine could extract the gold. They killed several local activists that wanted the mine to stop polluting the local river water because people in nearby villages are developing cancer and other diseases. We have cases like the Bopal disaster in India. It has been 27 years and people in India are still trying to get compensation from Union Carbide.

> You have stereotyped people with money, lumped them all into the same pot, made a
> caricature of them, and then made fun of the invention in your small mind.

The truth is that both views are caricature. The rich penny-pincher miser who cares only about profit and has no regard for other is a caricature. So is the godly rich man who opens his purse and showers the poor with money.

Reality is somewhere in between because we as human beings are full of contradictions. The best example is John D. Rockefeller. He became the world's first billionaire and gave millions to charity. He helped many poor people with all the money he made through his Standard Oil Company (today's Exxon). At the same time, he gave millions of dollars to the Nazis and supplied the Nazis with the fuel and patents to power their war planes. Rockefeller also gave a lot of money to Franco, the fascist dictator of Spain. Rockefeller did these things because he hated communism and believed in eugenics. Rockefeller had a reputation for honesty and kindness, and also a reputation as a fascist.

Of course, this is an extreme example. The point is, the rich do good sometimes, and they do terrible things for money too. Unfortunately, capitalism has done more harm than good around the world. Capitalists don't like to admit it because admitting wrongdoing implies that something has to be done to fix things. It is always easier to hide behind ideology than to admit that profitting though human suffering is wrong.

Dark Prince:

> The idea that the rich are wealthy because of hard work is true, but it's the hard work of the employees that has made them wealthy rather than their own hard work alone.

The rich do work hard at one thing: their golf swing!

Of course, it takes hard to work to keep one's mistresses happy. I am sure marrying playboy bunnies is hard work too.

Artful Dodger:

> More specifically, the idea that the government can stimulate the economy by spending money is a deeply flawed idea. The liberals here think it's a good idea, even though it's been a proven failure. Yet they want to continue to do now and into the future that which has not worked in the past.

The truth is that every American president since WW II has raised the debt ceiling and increased the deficit. The first truly massive increase came during the Regan administration and every president since then has just added more wood to the fire. The only president to not increase the deficit for 1 year was Bill Clinton who finished his last term with a surplus, and that was only 1 year of the 8 years he was in office.

I think that any president who comes to Washington is very quickly faced with the reality of ever increasing Department of Defense costs. It was the War on Terror that did it for George W. Bush. Barrack Obama promised to scale back by bringing the troops back from Iraq, but I think he was unrealistic. Iraq and Afghanistan (and now Lybia) left to their own devices is a recipe for disaster. So the American government is committed to those expenses for decades to come.

At the same time the American government insists on passing irresponsible tax breaks. Every president since WW II has raised taxes on the middle class while giving tax breaks to the super rich. The rich can argue all they want about "creating jobs by paying less taxes" but the reality is that unless taxes are raised, the USA is never going to get out of its debt. Raising taxes is the most unpopular medicine to the current disease.

Direct government investment and spending in infrastructure was effective in the past, but considering the current deficit any form of spending will be unpopular. The Bush administration survived the economic problems by spending a lot of money and employing a lot of people in war. However, that is not a sustainable approach because when the war ends then the companies (defense contractors) involved in the war make a lot less money.

I think that the only way Washington is going to get out of this mess is if both parties make a true effort to work together. Otherwise they will keep blocking each other and accomplishing nothing. After seeing some of Republican debate a couple of days ago I was left with the feeling that none of the candidates has a concrete solution. They all talked on generalities and concentrated more on putting a negative light on their opponents than on giving real answers to real problems.

I was most bothered by Michelle Bachman. She kept talking of the "economic miracle" of the Regan administration. It seems to me that people confuse the popularity of the man with the real track record of the economy in that period. If the candidates are selling Reganomics as a solution then they have to think twice. It was 30 years of Reaganomics that brought the USA (and the rest of the world) to the current mess.

I have said before the what the USa needs to do is get rid of all the current tax breaks, then give tax breaks only to companies that create jobs at home. For every new job created in the USA, a company would get a tax credit. If a company wants to manufacture overseas, then the price is no tax breaks for that company. It would go a long way to creating jobs and levelling the playing field for smaller companies that cannot compete with big companies manufacturing their products cheaply abroad. However, none of the candidates in both parties will talk about that because their big contributors are companies that benefit from the current system.

Artful Dodger:

> failed Keynesian economics.

What does that mean? I mean Keynesian economics? How did they come about? Why was it necessary to control interest rates and the monetary supply?

Dark Prince:

> I agree with a fair distribution of wealth, but I can't say "fair and equal" does enough to encourage excellence.

I suppose that it depends on what "excellence" means. Is it making a lot of money? Is it becoming famous? Is it being fair to other human beings? Or sharing what you have?

I think that the problem is that we insist on measuring achievement in terms of how much money a person makes, how famous they become, how many inventions they create and how much money they make from them, etc. I rarely see anyone say that the best person is that one who helps the most human beings without asking anything in return. My mother does a lot of work to help poor people. She has spent countless hours collecting money, raising awareness, showing others not to be so selfish, etc. I never saw anyone say that my mother had "excellence" in her. When my mother dies nobody will remember her except those of us in our family. I see people crying over the death of somebody famous who made a lot of money or who became very powerful. I never saw many people shed a tear when some aid worker gets killed in some conflict zone. In capitalism excellence is money. Nobody cares about scientists or artists who made no money, even less about those who put time and effort to help other human beings. People care only when some rich, powerful man gives to charity, because it somehow convinces people that capitalists are a-OK. Don't get me wrong, they do great work and help thousands. But who remembers those who dodge bullets to bring food to a conflict zone?

> Using nukes adversely affects all life. There's already too much habitat destruction from human encroachment not to mention resource exploitation. Nuclear weapons have condemned many to slow agonizing deaths.

Of course, I was talking sarcasticly!

Dark Prince:

> Of course excessive population creates many other problems as well. A common argument is that there are enough resources to sustain an even greater population.
That may be the case with less waste, but that's an ideal that doesn't exist with capitalist economics. In an ideal world nuclear power too would be safe, but we don't live in an ideal world.
Medical advances have greatly reduced infant mortality but have not reduced birth rates. Maybe starvation is the solution rather than the problem.

We could just skip starvation altogether and accelerate things a bit. We can take those nukes that plague our not-ideal world, and then use them to nuke the poor out of existence. We would solve hunger and poverty in one go!

Of course, there is another solution. Give people a good sexual education, make contraception widely available, teach men to accept vasectomy as a safe, cheap and viable means of birth control, accept abortion as another means of birth control, etc. In general use aggressive education and family planning.

But then, the Pope says condoms and contraception are wrong. Nobody wants abortion on religious grounds. Sexual education is wrong because it tells young people how to have sex without getting pregnant. Family planning goes against Genesis and the commandment of being fruitful and multiplying. It generally goes against religious principles.

So on religous grounds starvation is more acceptable. And using the nukes even more so because it spares the poor the agony of a slow death.

Bernice:

> perhaps USA, UK, AUS should just invade the countries and feed the poor.....mainly the USA because their spend on "WAR" is phenomenal

On the surface it seems reasonable. Specially when the cost of the food is a lot less than what is spent on military budgets. However, giving away free food does not eliminate the underlying causes of poverty. It is like putting a bandaid on a wound without first cleaning and disinfecting the wound.

We can give away free food, but that does not mean that we are getting rid of dictatorship, fascism, corruption, imperialism, predatory capitalism, religious fanaticism, exploitation, abuse, etc.

The poor of the world do not need charity. What they is social justice and the fair and equal distribution of wealth. That is the one thing that capitalism can never offer to them. Taking from the rich and redistributing equally among the poor is the stuff that revolutions are made of, and nobody in our capitalist world wants that.

So we look at poverty from far away. We know it is there, but we walk around pretending that it is not there, or hoping that somebody will come up with a good idea. We know what the medicine is, but it pains us to accept it.

Artful Dodger:

> Iraq did have WMDs. Did they still have some at the time of the "invasion?" I doubt it. But no one knew with absolute certainty until AFTER.

But that is the point I was trying to make. They knew BEFORE the war. They were told so by the head of UNSCOM in 1998. Then by UNMOVIC in 1999 and through to the start of the war in 2003. The Bush administration deliberately ignored its own appointed weapons inspectors. They knew the "bombmaker" informant was a fraud, and still pushed him as an authority on WMDs in Iraq. The Bush administration deliberately deceived the American public to justify the war. They "hoped" to find a smoking gun and instead found nothing substantial, as would be expected from years of inspection turning up nothing.

> "What nobody ever talks about is chemical weapons used by the USA in Iraq. The USA used massive amounts of white phosphorus in Fallujah:"
> That is meaningless if Saddam had WMD's of his own. What the US has/had isn't the issue.

Isn't the issue? The USA is invading countries for using chemical weapons, and then it turns around and uses white phosphorus and depleted Uranium. This is being done deliberately. Look at this training video that the American army produced. It clearly identifies the radioactive nature of contamination left behind by depleted uranium. Knowing this fully, the American military is still using a radioactive weapon in the field, exposing not only civilians but also American servicemen in the field:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ML8i3XefHQ

And if anyone doubts what it does, maybe they should see the rise in birth defects in Fallujah:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYBmnw8rgio

> War sucks. And since the intent in war is to kill, white phosphorus is handy. But likely innocents are being killed this way and in those cases, it should be banned.

When will Americans stop and do some soul searching? Talk of freedom and democracy is meaningless if all that an army does is bring death and suffering. Deliberately lying and using false intelligence hardly makes things better. I wonder how many Iraqi children see at what has happened to their country, and then turn around to blame the USA. Then they will grow up hating the USA for bringing a war based on a pipe dream of non-existent WMDs, then seeing their country's wealth pumped out in oil pipelines. Now let's give those kids a reason NOT to become terrorists.

Iamon lyme:

> So I guess the fact that Saddam attacked Kuwait and we were asked to take millitary action against him at the behest of Arabian nations had nothing to do with it, we just used that as an excuse to eventually take control of Iraqs oil. Right.

The Gulf War (1991) was approved by the United Nations. Saddam's forces were defeated and sanctions were imposed on Iraq to stop Saddam from acquiring more weapons and invading any of Iraq's neighbors.

Now, the Iraq War (2003) was not backed by the United Nations because the Security Council saw through the web of lies that the USA and the UK were trying to sell. Most members of the Security Council realized that the claims of WMDs in Iraq were false. Colin Powell gave a speech before the UN General Assembly saying that Iraq was a big threat because of its huge stockpiles of WMDs, in particular its biological weapons nuclear weapons programs.

Weapons inspectors, including those sent by the Bush administration, repeatedly serched and found nothing before the war.

Consider for example what weapons inspector Scott Ritter, director of UNSCOM from 1991-1998, said with respect to Iraq's weapons capabilities in June 1999:

"When you ask the question, 'Does Iraq possess militarily viable biological or chemical weapons?' the answer is no! It is a resounding NO. Can Iraq produce today chemical weapons on a meaningful scale? No! Can Iraq produce biological weapons on a meaningful scale? No! Ballistic missiles? No! It is 'no' across the board. So from a qualitative standpoint, Iraq has been disarmed. Iraq today possesses no meaningful weapons of mass destruction capability."

This was 4 years before the war even started and by then Iraq was already disarmed.

Then UNSCOM was replaced by UNMOVIC in 1999.

"UNMOVIC led inspections of alleged chemical and biological facilities in Iraq until shortly before the U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003, but did not find any weapons of mass destruction.

Based on its inspections and examinations during this time, UNMOVIC inspectors determined that UNSCOM had successfully dismantled Iraq’s unconventional weapons program during the 1990s."

"Bush later said that the biggest regret of his presidency was "the intelligence failure" in Iraq, while the Senate Intelligence Committee found in 2008 that his administration "misrepresented the intelligence and the threat from Iraq". A key CIA informant in Iraq admitted that he lied about his allegations, "then watched in shock as it was used to justify the war"."

Here is more from Scott Ritter:

"We seized the entire records of the Iraqi Nuclear program, especially the administrative records. We got a name of everybody, where they worked, what they did, and the top of the list, Saddam's "Bombmaker" [Which was the title of Hamza's book, and earned the nickname afterwards] was a man named Jafar Dhia Jafar, not Khidir Hamza, an if you go down the list of the senior administrative personnel you will not find Hamza's name in there. In fact, we didn't find his name at all. Because in 1990, he didn't work for the Iraqi Nuclear Program. He had no knowledge of it because he worked as a kickback specialist for Hussein Kamel in the Presidential Palace.

He goes into northern Iraq and meets up with Ahmad Chalabi. He walks in and says, I'm Saddam's "Bombmaker". So they call the CIA and they say, "We know who you are, you're not Saddam's 'Bombmaker', go sell your story to someone else." And he was released, he was rejected by all intelligence services at the time, he's a fraud.

And here we are, someone who the CIA knows is a fraud, the US Government knows is a fraud, is allowed to sit in front of the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and give testimony as a expert witness. I got a problem with that, I got a problem with the American media, and I've told them over and over and over again that this man is a documentable fraud, a fake, and yet they allow him to go on CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, and testify as if he actually knows what he is talking about."

So the government knew that the key CIA informant was a fraud.

"On 23 January 2004, the head of the Iraq Survey Group, David Kay, resigned his position, stating that he believed WMD stockpiles would not be found in Iraq. "I don't think they existed," commented Kay. "What everyone was talking about is stockpiles produced after the end of the last Gulf War and I don't think there was a large-scale production program in the nineties." In a briefing to the Senate Armed Services Committee, Kay criticized the pre-war WMD intelligence and the agencies that produced it, saying "It turns out that we were all wrong, probably in my judgment, and that is most disturbing." Sometime earlier, CIA director George Tenet had asked David Kay to delay his departure: "If you resign now, it will appear that we don't know what we're doing. That the wheels are coming off."

So the head of the Iraq Survey Group, the agency set up by the American government to find WMDs, resigned because the government wanted him to find WMDs that did not exist.

Considering how many people before and after the war found no WMDs, how can the war be justified? The USA can come out and say that Saddam was a brutal dictator, but for decades the American government has supported and done business with many brutal dictators around the world. However, Saddam never attacked the USA, the links to terrorism were never proven, Iraq's military was weak, and Iraq was contained within its borders.

Then one has to wonder how much money Exxon and Haliburton made from the war. If the war was not about oil, then why did Haliburton make billions from both oil and servicing the military at inflated prices?

Artful Dodger:

> the WikiLeaks Web site revealed that small amounts of chemical weapons were found in Iraq
> American troops were able to buy containers from locals of what they thought was liquid sulfur mustard
> troops discovered a chemical lab in a house in Fallujah during a battle with insurgents

Maybe it was the real deal, I mean Grey Poupon!

The truth is that there never was a "smoking gun". Colin Powell stood in front of the UN General Assembly and gave a speech about Iraq's alleged WMDs, even though weapons inspectors and intelligence agencies inside and outside the USA had insisted that Iraq had destroyed its WMD manufacturing capabilities in the 1990s.

The fact that the UK manufactured a weapons dossier, and the man who wrote it mysteriously commited suicide before the inquiry says a lot about the truth. By the admission of both Tony Blair and George W. Bush the intelligence was "faulty".

Some Americans really want to believe that Iraq had WMDs because that gives legitimacy to the war. Without WMDs the war in Iraq is an imperialist war aimed at misappropriating Iraq's oil. 400,000 civilians were killed by the Coalition of the Willing. If there were no WMDs, then those civilian deaths amount to no more than a war crime, rather than some heroic liberation of the country.

If Iraq had WMDs, instead of a few thousand American soldiers being killed there would have been hundreds of thousands of casualties.

If those containers of Grey Poupon truly contained chemical weapons, the insurgents would have killed thousands with a single suicide chemical weapons release. After all, if common citizens had chemical weapons, insurgents would have chemical weapons too, and American servicemen on the ground would have stood no chance.

What nobody ever talks about is chemical weapons used by the USA in Iraq. The USA used massive amounts of white phosphorus in Fallujah:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/4440664.stm

The USA has refused to sign a treaty that bans the use of white phosphorus because it is a convenient way to "provide illumination". The fact that it can set human flesh on fire has nothing to do with anything.

The USA has also used Uranium depleted missiles. These shells are made with a steel alloy containing waste uranium from nulcear reactors and they spread large amounts of radiation. They are in essence a "dirty bomb".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQhvX6Vbvhc
http://www.rense.com/general64/du.htm

The number of children born with birth defects has increased 2-6 times. Cancer and leukemia among children has increased 3-12 times. That is a 300% to 1200% increase in cancer rates. There is already evidence of a large incidence of cancer and leukemia among American servicement who were exposed to depleted uranium left over after explosion.

The question is: who imposes sanctions on the USA for using chemical and radioactive weapons?

Artful Dodger:

> If Jesus was in charge, we wouldn't be in this mess!

I suppose Jesus would do certain things differently. He would probably support free, universal health care for the poor since his ministry dealt so much with the suffering of the poor. He would probably support feeding the poor too, and to do so he might have had to use state funds. Jesus would be on the side of the poor all the way. He would care for the working man (his father was a carpenter), and he would pardon criminals who repented of their transgressions. He would probably get rid of all the weapons, including the nuclear arsenal. He would leave all theatres of war operations and simply refuse to go to war. It is difficult to say. It all depends on how one interprets the New Testament.

> I don't want to vilify the rich generally. I know a few millionaires. One, uses his money to help the poor build churches in South America along with roads and wells.

I don't generalize abou the rich. Some of them do great things with their money. Other are just plain greedy. The rich live in a state of contradiction. They want to make a lot of money, and to do that you have to be aggressive. At the same time they want to be good, or at least be seen as good.

The best example is John D. Rockefeller. He founded the Standard Oil Company (today's Exxon). He turned that company into the biggest monopoly in the world. To do that he engaged in industrial espionage, price wars, heavy-handed marketing tactics, courtroom evasions and shennanigans, bribery, supporting dictators abroad, using thugs to beat up workers who went on strike, influencing and corrupting elected representatives, etc. At the same time he was engaged in huge charity projects and gave away over 1 billion dollars to charity (in today's money that would be about 50 billion).

So there is a deep contradiction between the brutality of his business tactics, and the generosity of his charitable donations. He made thousands of people poor and dispossesed, and helped thousands of poor people at the same time.

Some of the businessmen that influence Washington today probably have the same contradictions. They will use their money to influence representatives, they will use brutal business tactics both at home and abroad, and then they will donate a lot of money to charity. Sometimes those donations are given out of altruistic principles, sometimes the donations become tax deductions. In the meantime representatives are easily swayed by money and a system that undermines the democratic process.

Artful Dodger:

> However, it's the climate in Washington that's really to blame. I don't think all politicians enter Washington that way. But they learn to play the game and learn what it takes to get things done. Along the way, they get taken advantage of and eventually they look and sound like everyone else in DC.

This is a serious problem is most western democracies, not just the USA. The rich and powerful use their money to influence policy makers. In most countries the winners of elections are those who advertise and campaign aggressively. It costs money to mount aggressive campaigns. Advertising is aimed at building up your own image while discrediting your opponents. Character assasination and underhanded tactices go hand in hand.

The rich and powerful know this, so they strategically donate money to candidates that will further carefully selected political and economic interests. Money becomes a tool to influence law makers.

Candiadtes have learned that a mixture of big advertising dollars and populism sells well at election time. Barrack Obama is a great example, as was Ronald Regan.

The situation is such that the candidates generally elected are those who spend the most on election campaigns. Campaign expenditures have risen election after election, to the point that now candidates are spending over a billion dollars during a presidential campaign.

Small political parties with new ideas are shut out completely. The playing field is not level and that means that the two dominant political parties completely choke small parties. Then both parties often represent competing political and economic interests and that leads to a political stalemate. The two parties are virtually unable to function without constantly trumping each other at every turn.

We have heard of Wshington being "dysfunctional". I think the main culprit is special interests and campaign donors that expect the money they donated to buy power and influence. Candidates that take no money have virtually no chance of being elected, and therefore cannot come in and bring change and new ideas.

The public craves change and renewal. Since the dominant parties are unable to deliver, people look for whoever can offer something new. Barrack Obama sold himself as a man who could bring change. I think that at least to some extent he was sincere in his desire, but failed on account of the much bigger and much more powerful machinery of money and hypocrysy.

The Tea Party is offering more transparency, a return to some traditional values of the past, and a more honest, open government. The big question is whether they can deliver. Unfortunately their front runners are people who grew up politically in the same system. Only time can tell whether they can break away from the "old boys club" mentaility and the pervasive presence of special interests and corporate meddling.

Artful Dodger:

> Obama is NO DIFFERENT than the rest. Even though he campaigned on being a cut above the rest. He's cut from the same cloth.

The question is: Is there anyone who is not like the rest?

Is there any Democrat or Republican who has not taken money from corporations or wealthy businessmen?

I think at this point the only political party not takiing money from corporations is probably the Communist Party USA!

Well, many Americans want to believe that somehow Democrats and Republicans are really different, but they do have two things in common: greed and hypocrysy.

Artful Dodger:

And how much did George W. Bush get?

Or are Republicans immune to Wall Street Money?

(V):

The CIA is PART of the government. They do whatever it takes to destroy the enemy. It means supporting fascist dictators, drug dealers, weapons dealers, mercenaries, terrorists, etc. It is well known both by the American government and the American public. Not only is the CIA part of the government, but it is BIG government. It is possibly the best funded of all government agencies. The NSA is not very different, as is the Office for Homeland Security and the FBI.

The general excuse is that this is what it takes to protect freedom and democracy. However, under the Patriot Act anybody suspected of terrorist activity can be detained. In essence the USA has turned itself into a quasi police state. People are free to consume, to say anything they want, to do anything they want, except do anything that leads to political change or a change in the Capitalist economic system. The function of the police state is to ensure that the rich stay rich and the working class stay working for the benefit of the rich. It is a form of police state socialism. The state has a monopoly of judiciary and military power. All that is missing is children ratting on their parents, and you will have full fascism.

In fairness, it is not just the USA. Almost every western country has become that way. "Big government" means programs that help the working class and the poor, but it will never mean a bloated police and military.

(V):

> "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'"

> "I'm from the CIA and I'm here to help."

Isn't the CIa the government too?

I suppose the Department of Defense is part of the government too. I don't see any Republicans talking about reducing the CIA's budget or the defense budget. But then, I never saw a Republican admit that the military are part of the government too.

Bernice:

> The left has caused all of our economic problems and they have endorsed crony capitalism more than the right.

Of course, in the USA the left is really more of the right. The USA has no real left wing party. Even the Green Party is a party of the centre at best. The Democrats are a right wing party, and the Republicans are right of the right. It is just the nature of American politics. Both parties engage in cronyism. It all depends on who is in power at what time. In the end, both parties supported bailouts for banks, both parties supported wars that benefit big oil, both parties support the industrial-military complex. It goes on and on.

rod03801:

> How about Luke 23:36?

To correct the post, it is Luke 22:36. You quoted it out of context. However, this is the great lesson that Jesus taught to us all, and the one that Christians too often forget.

The passage occurs right during the Last Supper. Jesus has finished the Last Supper with the disciples, and he beings to make his predictions:

34 Jesus answered, “I tell you, Peter, before the rooster crows today, you will deny three times that you know me.”

35 Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?”

“Nothing,” they answered.

36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. 37 It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’[b]; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.”

38 The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.”

“That’s enough!” he replied.

On the surface, it seems that Jesus has just ordered the disciples to buy swords. They come up with two.

Later in the passage, the mob comes to arrest Jesus:

47 While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him, 48 but Jesus asked him, “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?”
49 When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?” 50 And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear.

51 But Jesus answered, “No more of this!” And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.

52 Then Jesus said to the chief priests, the officers of the temple guard, and the elders, who had come for him, “Am I leading a rebellion, that you have come with swords and clubs? 53 Every day I was with you in the temple courts, and you did not lay a hand on me. But this is your hour—when darkness reigns.”


And therein lies the lesson. Jesus could have told the disciples to strike and kill as many as necessary to escape. Instead he stops them and performs a miracle. He heals the man's ear and surrenders peacefully to the mob.

Hardly an exhortation to violence. Rather, a lesson in peace and self-sacrifice.

Unfortunately, humanity is not enlightened like that.

Iamon lyme:

> You are missing the point. Jesus recognised the reality of living "in the world." Paul talked about having to deal with wild animals and bandits, how far do you think he would have gotten if he didn't believe in defending himself?

The answer is that Jesus set an example that few human beings can live up to. Jesus could have defended himself physically. He could have grabbed a sword, ask his disciples to arm themselves to the teeth, and then fought against the Romans who came to arrest him. Why would Jesus do that? He could have called on angels to come to his aid. He could have put the Romans and the Pharisees to the angel's sword. Why would Jesus not even be remotely tempted by a violent solution to his unjust incarceration and execution? The answer is that Jesus was giving us all a lesson. Violence among human beings is pointless. It is nothing but a sin in the eyes of God.

Of course, we are not enlightened like that. We make excuses for ourselves. We own weapons for "sport" and "entertainment". We say to ourselves that the guns are there to defend ourselves and our families. We justify ownership of weapons on legal grounds such as the Constitution. But deep inside (and this is where God looks) we know that something is wrong. We want peace, and it comes out of the barrel of a gun. So we contradict ourselves.

Iamon lyme:

> then why am I being tutored in moral principles by someone whose own sense of morality is derived by eons of evolutionary development.. ???

?? What does evolution have to do with any of this?

> We have enough phonies pretending to be just that. We don't need any more fakers trying to pull the wool over our eyes.

Sure I am a phony and a fake. You still haven't proved that there is no contradiction between possessing weapons and Christian ethics. Find me a Bilbical quote, or a sensible argument. Calling me names proves not your point, but your inability to make intelligent arguments.