2. Concerned with principles of right and wrong or conforming to standards of behavior and character based on those principles; "moral sense"; "a moral scrutiny"; "a moral lesson"; "a moral quandary"; "moral convictions"; "a moral life".
3. Adhering to ethical and moral principles; "it seems ethical and right"; "followed the only honorable course of action"; "had the moral courage to stand alone".
4. Arising from the sense of right and wrong; "a moral obligation".
5. Psychological rather than physical or tangible in effect; "a moral victory"; "moral support".
6. Based on strong likelihood or firm conviction rather than actual evidence; "a moral certainty".
2. Not adhering to ethical or moral principles; "base and unpatriotic motives"; "a base, degrading way of life"; "cheating is dishonorable"; "they considered colonialism immoral"; "unethical practices in handling public funds".
3. Morally unprincipled; "immoral behavior".
4. Characterized by wickedness or immorality; "led a very bad life".
5. Marked by immorality; deviating from what is considered right or proper or good; "depraved criminals"; "a perverted sense of loyalty"; "the reprobate conduct of a gambling aristocrat".
i have been debating the iraq war quite a bit lately with folks of the right leaning persuasion. now, i am not above listening to good reasons for continuing a war that i believe should not have been started in the first place. i am even open to plans to improve the situation in the middle east- as there seems to be quite a bit of killing going on over there lately(still?). what i have found, however, is that these folks that i have been 'debating' with all sound the same. i am not sure if it is the same person using a different name- or if they are all just 'staying on message.' this is what i have been hearing: "can't cut and run," have to "stay the course," "you only talk about the negative- we have a lot of positive stuff going on in iraq." now, if i hadn't been hearing these sound bites on the msn- notably fox news- and from the lips of our fearless leaders- i may entertain the idea that these are individual thoughts. since the words are almost verbatim every time one of these right leaning folks speak them- i have to think that they are all reading from the same script.
so- here are my thoughts on the middle east:
why is it justified to "fight them over there so that we don't have to fight them over here?" why are the lives of the middle eastern folks who have no link to 9/11 or al quaida any less than americans? why do we continue to fight a war that was based on- at the very least faulty intel- and at worst a pack of lies and has gone through at least 3 reasons for having been started? how is it going to make things better to "stay the course" indefinitely- especially without a viable plan for staying? how are we making things better for iraq when we take credit for everything and treat it's newly elected government with no respect? where is all of the money for rebuilding the infrastructure as not much has been accomplished in that realm since we started? why did the bush administration and repub controlled congress cut funding to rebuilding iraq if that is a main focus for us now maintaining a presence?
if anyone can answer these questions- without spewing any rhetoric- i would be much obliged.
20 comments:
Betmo
From a far left economic determinist perspective this situation has nothing to do with terrorism or a threat to America - its about the need for oil.
From a rightwing capitalist perspective (of the Bush variety) its not about morality - America's defense is an excuse - its about the need to secure oil in the Middle East.
Its also to keep the largest sauce of oil (Saudi Arabia) happy. Iraq is now no military threat to Saudi Arabia.
The Saudi's know that they won't have to deal with their more radical sons internally. These sons can join al Qaeda and go off and get killed by "infidel" Coalition forces in Iraq.
In the end the Western oil industry and economy (and the Bush family fortune) have been well catered for.
And I'm often Rightwing ;-)
Pete
I have a question for you betmo,you know I am pretty easy going and really don't give my opinions on political subjects, Okay my question to you and anyone else who would like to answer. What should we have done after 911? What would the appropriate response be? People out there in blogland do not jump all over me I'm just asking the question
Sorry to step on toes here, but appropriately responding to 911 would have been to take advantage of the Taliban's offer to hand over bin Laden rather than killing an unknown number of people who were suffering under his and his ilk. That would have been pretty simple indeed. But this solution also assumes that this was actually a response to 911...which it wasn't.
Dawn, I’m not going to jump on you, but I want to answer your question firmly.
What should we have done after 9/11? First, oust the Taliban. For the most part we have done that, but since our resources – time, money, support, military, etc, have been drained from that nation in favor of Iraq, the Taliban are actually regrouping, gaining some power, and having influence over our puppet government.
Now, you’d be hard pressed to find those that visit this blog, mine, or the big blogs who didn’t support doing SOMETHING with Afghanistan. There are some on “our side” out there, but by and large, we supported Afghanistan’s invasion because you had a concrete, definable example of state supported terrorism and Islamic extremism, no doubt.
Further, I and many others here (realizing I’m not speaking for anyone but myself) would want to keep the sanctions on Iraq, and KEEP INSPECTORS IN THE DAMN COUNTRY BECAUSE IT WAS WORKING (I’m not yelling I’m firmly stating). Part of the reason why we found no weapons when we invaded is because the inspectors destroyed them Saddam was contained. He was not threatening the US – and sure he was shooting at our planes flying over his country, yet then again we were dropping bombs on them as well. I’m not going to deny there weren’t firefights.
But as far as the UN inspections go? They worked. Ask any conservative you know why they feel that didn’t work, and then subsequently ask them to take your hand and lead you to the banned WMD’s. They will not be able to do either.
Further – I would have taken the unity, the unbelievable unprecedented unity of the entire world at that time – everyone pulling for us – even those commie bastard French – and worked together to cut state funding, increase international intelligence, and take other measures to combat international terrorism, kill or capture Al Qaeda members, and continue to work where Clinton left off in terms of Israeli/Palestinian relations, Russian/Chechen relations, as well as American/North Korean/Iranian security issues.
But I realize your point – so many tell us what we shouldn’t have done, and yes, that’s the easy road. Bush just makes it a hell of lot easier.
One more thing Dawn..
If you want to view some pictures that really speak to how much the world has turned on our country, I'd suggest going here.
I think back to the days when Clinton would travel the world to throngs of fans waving miniature American flags, cheering...like he was a fucking rock star. I felt incredibly proud of my country, proud to live here and to say I lived where those people feel something truly great is happening.
Now, I feel embarrassed when Bush visits anywhere but Crawford.
i just watched the frontline special- and why we didn't catch bin laden- rumsfeld and cheney wanted to discredit the cia and didn't want bin laden caught- because we were already wanting to go into iraq and with bin laden caught- would have been much harder.
dawn- no- no one should jump on you for asking a question. you have a valid question because it is all over what we shouldn't have done. my own personal belief is this- we should have done what we initially did do- went into afghanistan, ousted the taliban- which we did. the cia had bin laden at tora bora- and rumsfeld would not send in reinforcements to assist and so he got away. if we had 'stayed the course' in afghanistan and not gone into iraq- we probably would not be having any of these conversations.
I thought we weren't spewing any rhetotic....... ?
... oh sorry, I dialed the wrong number....
I've marveled at why the left does not ask why we are still in Korea (Truman got us in that one), why we are still in Germany, England, Italy, Iceland, Guam, Diego Garcia, India, The Phillipines, The Marianas, Australia, New Zealand and Japan (FDR gave us the green on that one), why are we still in Kosoovo and the Balkans? (Clinton said it was peacekeeping mission)... Why aren't you guys bent out of shape and screaming for us to get the hell out of there as well? I am for bringing EVERYBODY home... being selective is just the usual political-speak that we ironically rail about, and somewhat (in my opinion) hypocritical. You want to bring the troops home?... cool. Why stop in Iraq?....
We lost 10's of thousands on the D-day invasion of Normandy,..were NBC, CNN et al to be covering that little day of hell they would have gone ape and called for the immediate withdrawal of our troops. Does anybody NOT remember that there were insurgencies of Nazi youth blowing up GI's in the years after the Marshall plan?... I wonder if Congressmen were calling for a pullout then too....
I love the debate, love the discourse, love the loyal opposition. But the selective and localized brand of rhetoric and "patriotism" is just laughable.
And the oil argument?..please stop. We were already in Quwait in 91'! If we really wanted Oil why the hell did we not turn that little royalty into a parking lot and send Mobil-Exxon as Ambassadors?... If we really wanted oil why the hell did we PUSH the provisional Goverment of Iraq (back in the L. Paul Bremmer days) to nationalize and protect the oid fields with loyal IRAQI soldiers?... (anybody?)
Ah shoot...i'm running out of bullets, out of steam and personally out of care. As much as the Dems bark at the moon they are just the flip side of the same coin. I hope Nader wins,... screw the Donkey AND dumbo.
tp- i would agree with you on most of your points- except world war 2. you can't compare apples and oranges. while i understand that war is war and killing is killing- there is a difference between defending your life and going and taking other's. ask the hitler crowd. pre-emptive war is in a different category than defensive war and i personally don't feel that iraq is a defensive war. korea- again not a defensive war- the others that you mentioned you don't mention if we were there on our own or as part of un peacekeeping missions- and truthfully i don't feel like looking them up right now. perhaps after my morning coffee. un peacekeeping is not us invading another country for trumped up reasons. thank you for your perspective- i like the balance.
Thank you for all your opinions I never gave mine.I have 3 sons and if there was a draft I would send them to Canada. I have found that We treat our soldiers terribly and that prisoners have more rights. I agree with mostly everything said about Afganistan. I do think Bush wants to get Bin Laden. Personally I think Iran is more of a threat to Americans.I would also watch Palestinian state. I live in 2006 and feel these are backword thinking ideas in these countries. As for the taliban look how there women were treated. Last but not least I've seen Clinton speak twice and he is mesmerizing. I wish we could go back to those days. I didn't mean to stir up anything but thank you for your opinions I really wanted to see how people felt in the country
love ya betmo
Betmo: Your welcome. I agree that some of my comparisons were not apples to apples. I think I was trying to hit home the fact that all these years after some of these wars, we still have 10's of thousands of men and woman in uniform basically subsidizing that country's security instead of just handing it over. Do we really believe 30,000 troop in the Korean DMZ is really going to stop a North Korean assault should they decide to do so? Of course not. Its a symbolic defense and nothing more. I'm not naive to think we have should bring the whole Magilla back. I was exagerating on that of course. But this "cops of the world" mentality gets in in so much hot water and frankly I don't want to pay for any of it. Good, efficient "self Defense" military? yes! Tax my butt for that, no problem... a "12 Nuclear Carrier" battle group Navy? for what?!! (and this is an ex Republican ex sailor mind you) Leave 20 thousand in Europe as a strike team for Emergencies and lets come home. The world has gotten lazy at our expense in terms of their own military needs.
...."When Johnny comes marching home...."
See how this gets me riled up before going to work? :)
Dawn, looks like you and I are on the same page then. I believed Bush wants to get Bin Laden, until he told us he really didn't care:
"I just don't spend that much time on him...And, again, I don't know where he is. I -- I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."
And you're right - we don't spend that much time on him. We're in Iraq instead, where there was virtually no Al Qaeda and no terrorism before Saddam was overthrown. He was a horrible, brutal dictator - one of the worst in the world. But he was no fundamentalist Muslim leader, i.e. Saudi Arabia, Iran, etc.
And you're absolutely right - Iran and especially North Korea are HUGE threats to the United States, and have both openly threatened us, and have nuclear weapons, and one of them has a missile that can deliver a warhead to the United States, and is getting read to test it soon.
Iraq had nothing like this. NOTHING!! You conservatives can't see how you got this wrong?
Imagine in Clinton was in office and he went to Iraq, and the troops were serving 2nd and 3rd tours, and didn't have the equipment, armor, bullets, and there was no exit strategy, and hardly anyone in Clinton's administration had ever served etc etc...holy fucking shit I can't imagine the riots in the streets from anti-Clinton crowds.
Could you imagine - just for a second - listening to the Sean Hannity radio show, or Rush's show, or Bill O'Reilly's show if Clinton was in office and responsible for this entire mess we're in? Seriously - stop for a second and imagine what they'd be saying.
Jeremy, far be for this libertarian to quell your venacular,... but remember, sometimes kids (like my 14 year old stepdaughter) read political blogs. They should not be exposed to "F-bombs" if possible. Clearly you are a person of intellect and salient argument,... maybe a word substitution for those moments are better suited? just a thought, not a request.
Good argumentation on your part.
tp- i agree that we should not 'police' the world. it seems that once we get a presence somewhere we like to set up military bases. hmmm...
I think we tend to think too much of countries in the middle east, and ignore the culture. There is no doubt in my mind that Iraq and other middle eastern countries helped train and provide training for terrorist activities. And still do.
Pulling our troops out now, completely, with no plan for withdrawal, and an unstable Iraqi government would be a repeat of the fall of Saigon, further endangering civilian and military personnel in Iraq.
Forensic archeologists have already unearthed mass graves of civilians shot and killed for no other reason than standing against the regime of Saddam Hussein. I honestly believe that if Hitler rose to power in this day and age, our country would, by popular oppinion, remain on the sidelines and do nothing.
Deb50, it should be noted that normal Americans totally ignored the murder of six million Jews during WWII.
And comparing Iraq to Vietnam? Absolutely. We shouldn't have been in Iraq in the first place. Iraq isn't the only country in the world with a brutal dictator who kills with no mercy. Should America go and save these countries too? Oh wait, Africa doesn't have anything we want, nevermind.....
Plus - it's been proven time and time against that Saddam had NOTHING to do with 9/11. Both Mr. Bush and Ms. Rice have admitted this fact.
There is absolutely NO reason we should be in Iraq, unless America is intent of saving every country where people suffer under brutal dictators.
i personally am not for an immediate withdrawal- i think it has to be a graduated one. it would be folly to just go and leave a big gap- but we cannot stay indefinitely and shouldn't- even our military is saying that. the big problem in america is that we are bigots- we don't care about other cultures and we want the entire world to conform to our ways. we want everyone to speak english and be westernized because that way is the best. should would have helped us out alot if we had not begun to immasculate the cia in the 90's and almost completely gut it after tenet left. hopefully, we will be able to get some folks into the middle east who at the very least speaks arabic/farsi and perhaps we could get a handle on where all of the secret groups congregate. we can't rely on our so-called allies who are allegedly westernized- saudis, pakistanis, israelis,... they have their own agenda.
Betmo, I support a gradual withdrawl too. But we have to leave.
I'm very libertarian on world affairs. We need to take care of our own country instead of wasting tax money saving others.
The only thing we need our military for is to protect our interests - our country. It's not our job to save the world and impose our beliefs. Our country was attacked by Osama and his ilk, not Iraq and Saddam.
Radical Islamists do not want secular democracy. Those individuals who do will immigrate to freedom-loving countries. Will Iraq ever become a democracy? I don't believe so, because of Islam.
Plus, the Arabs hate us because we support Israel, but I won't get into that mess.
Sarah
Iraq is not the only Arab country in the middles east. One mission in the war in Iraq so far was to stop insurgents from entering the country from Saudi Arabia. We cannot expect as a nation not to be affected by the policies and economics of other countries. That is why we have a foreign relations policy, which in this administration seems to be non-existant. But, we are not isolated. We have been shown that we are not free from terrorist activities. To ignore the atrocities and crimes against humanity in other nations puts our very concepts of freedom and security at risk.
Who were the first to see first-hand the unbelievable tragedy and human degradation of the holocaust?
If people living in other countries want to escape the tyranny in which they live and seek asylumn in another country, which country do you think that will be?
My referance to the fall of Saigon is not to compare this war to why we were in Viet Nam. It is to show the loss of life and devastation that followed our withdrawal of troops. There is no reason to believe that the same thing would not happen in Iraq.
And again, I thank Betmo for allowing me to post my comments here, even though they generally are not the "yes, I agree with everything you say" type. This, is of course, the very essence of healthy debate.
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