Jimmy Carter Attack Sub to be Armed with Nerf Missiles
 

Jimmy Carter Attack Sub Armed with Nerf Missiles
by Scott Ott

(2005-02-16) -- The U.S. Navy on Saturday will commission its newest nuclear-powered attack submarine, the Jimmy Carter, with many new features, including multiple-warhead Nerf missiles.

President Carter, who brought peace to the middle east, vigorously defended America's right to give away the Panama Canal and, in 1994, convinced North Korea to abandon talking about its nuclear weapons, said he's honored to have his name on "one of the most powerful peacemaking devices on earth."

Jimmy Carter is the first of the American Seahare-class subs, featuring a high-tech sonar system which alerts enemy forces to its presence and a safety device on the Nerf missiles which allows firing only after an enemy missile impact.

"This new generation of nuclear submarines is designed to use trust in our enemies as our first line of defense," said an unnamed Navy spokesman.

President Carter has invited leaders from North Korea and Iran to the commissioning ceremony, during which former First Lady Rosalyn Carter, in a time-honored Navy tradition, will give the first order to "man our ship, bring her to life then park her over there by the dock!"

JP

Found the killer bunny pic (It's freakin' massive):
http://www.narsil.org/politics/carter/rabbit_original_3000x2254.jpg

http://www.wickedcoolstuff.com/monpytkilrab1.html
http://shop.store.yahoo.com/wickedcoolstuff/mopykirasl.html

Let's elect Overpaid Slacker as President.
His platform:
Nuke em now before they have a chance to fire back, start with France.
Pan handlers, cut their hands off. That'll show them.
Christ said the poor will be with us always. Get over it.
Out of work. Get a job.
Social security- Smith and Wesson
Environmentalists- send them all to Antartcia to study the ozone hole.
Anti war peace lovers, send them to France soon.

With the exception of the panhandlers, you have the right idea, Steve.

Yeah, I'm tough on "ideas" and "idealists"; guilty as charged. :D

But if you won't assess fault for failures of the Left (b/c nobody's exactly leaping forward to take the blame) how do you learn from them?

I never said anything about panhandlers or social security, and I never invoked Jesus.

But it's easier to create-a-Conservative caricature and attack that straw effigy than deal with an actual Conservative's positions. And Liberals don't like things that are difficult. :D j/k, a little bit.

BTW, you can be pro-war and still love peace. Like me, for example.

JP

Peace. . . is the time it takes you to reload. - Bob Zimmerman

Sorry, I just couldn't resist a little sarcasm.

Issues are more complicated than one liners and sound bites from our administrations.

Politicains, whether conservative or liberal, are guilty of simplification, and both are guilty of egregious deeds, and both are averse to accepting blame. Nixon never thought he had done anything wrong. Reagan couldn't remember. Clinton thought it was none of our business. Carter is the example why a true evagelical should never be in power. George W Bush is the example why a phony evangelical should never be in power. The only person of note who I ever remember apologizing for grave error of judgement was Robert McNamara and getting us into Vietnam.

I was in a state of fear of nuclear war in the 50-'s, swallowed the domino theory and pro war in the 60's, supported nixon for his first term, hated him for abusing my trust in my governement, antiwar in the 70's, out of step with most of my govenment's actions since then. Never voted for Reagen even as Governor, because of what he did to the education system in California, yeah I remember "trickle down" when I was laid off. Those multi-millionaires with their big tax breaks from Reagan sure took pity on me.

Registered Republican and born again christian, fiscal conservative, social liberal, voting mostly for Democrats- yeah that can be divisive. Sort of like the US in general.

Well done, Slacker. Very well done.

When did W ever claim to be on a mission from God? Or anything similar? He hasn't. That's our oh-so-neutral Main Stream Media's characterization of someone who goes to church and believes in God.

I agree that Nixon "sinned," however his greatest sin was in revealing to us what all other politicians had done for decades. He's the guy who let the cat out, and the American people had every right to hate him for destroying their illusion of American politics. Check out Lasky's "It Didn't Start With Watergate". If you lived the life and travelled the miles you have, it'll be an interesting read for you.

"Trickle down", "supply side" or whatever is not a full employment guarantee. Some people get pinched; as cold and dispassionate as it sounds. However, we've all got things in life that "happen" to us w/o our volition, fiscal, personal, physical, whatever. Looks like you recovered from having been laid off back in the day... and do you think there was an overall improvement in educ. in CA from then 'til now? Some people probably were let go along the way to make it better. Just a guess.

JP

Dubya has made reference to his policy chats with God. It wasn't just a WMD thing. It was also a "God made me do it" thing.

Capitalism REQUIRES a certain level of unemployment. It's part of the package. I expect there will be folks who will defend the "survival of the fittest" economic system we've got (and characterize themselves as Christians at the same time...hmmmmm), but restating the fact that we all have problems at one time or another is not the same thing as taking a position on whether these people should get our help or not.

In the meantime, and while there are people freezing, and while families are living in cars, I expect we will continue to cut funding for solving those kinds of problems, and for education.....and Wall Street is having an off-day today, so perhaps more tax cuts for investors will be seen as a good idea. It's amazing what greed can justify, and even WAY more amazing how easy it is to get millions of people to believe in an economic theory that is proven false, and that looks fishy to start with.

I'm banning you JP, and myself as well.

Well put, stevepaa.

Supe, how can you of all people on this board equate looking for spiritual guidance from God with blindly following "God's" orders on some "Crusade?"

I can look to God for what's right and wrong and soulsearch over a decision, but that doens't make me some pawn of the almighty, nor does it mean that I later stand back and say "Well God told me to." I decided, after due deliberation, including but not limited to, prayer to do X. And suddenly he's a Jesus freak. Dude, what happened to you?

You and I will always disagree that throwing more money at something is the only way to solve it (and the inverse, that taking money away from something it was "solving" will necessarily make it worse). But I will always believe that the needy should be helped (... into the cattle cars muuuhuhuhahahahaha... j/k, relax).

And I agree with you on the millions of people believing an economic theory that's been proven false. I'd say billions of people, including millions here in the US (largely in academia) still believe in Marxism.

JP

This is so true, my compassion keeps me from ever becoming a republican.

Who duped you into believing the Republicans aren't compassionate? That's what you've been told to keep you in the fold. It is flatly untrue. Do you really believe that Democrats aren't capitalists, aren't greedy and invisible-hand driven and actually have some monopoly on compassion? You've been duped. Seriously.

And, kach -- you're already a "republican"; in much the same way I'm a "democrat."

Sounds like your intellect drives you toward "Republican" theories but this compassion canard you've bought into prevents you from coming on over b/c you've been hornswaggled that it's the Dark Side.

Maybe it's been all the depleted uranium the republicans have put into Iraq that's kept me fooled.:rolleyes:

http://www.commondreams.org/cgi-bin/print.cgi?file=/headlines04/1101-01.htm

Right, continuing to allow them to be murdered by the hundreds of thousands under the capricious rule of a tyrant is "compassion."

No wonder the Left loves the UN so much, with all the genocide it's allowed to go on right under its nose (Bosnia, Rwanda, Sudan ... just to name three off the top of my head), and the rape and prostitution rings its personnel have serially perpetrated around the globe, most notably, right now, in Congo. THAT, my friends, is compassion. Because they tell us they're compassionate, so we don't need to look into, much less think about, it.

Oh, and the US has been working very hard -- under a Republican administration -- to sanction Sudan and have UN troops go in to Darfur and elsewhere to stop the slaughter of tens of thousands of people. That sounds compassionate to me. Don't let the facts get in your way, though. W's meeeeaaann and hates furrriners.

Guess who blocks sanctions in the Security Council -- Russia and China, who don't want their commercial interests with Sudan disturbed. Geez, the Socialist and the Communist/Marxist aren't being compassionate for commercial reasons.

If I were you, I'd feel pretty damned stupid about the eye-rolling smiley right now. But we know intentions are all that matters, so no matter what the outcome, the Left can feel no shame for its own failures; only for those of their abstract "culture".

JP

Slacker, you're a damn rockstar. :D

Education in California has deteriorated ever since Reagan was governor. I can not blame him for all of it, just getting it started. When I was a teacher, some of my fellow teachers voted for Prop 13. Then we all voted for the lottery because education gets some of it. Every so often we get new politicians who want to make teachers accountable, latest is my governator. I just have the impression that most people want someone else to fix the problem. Blame the school boards and some sort of mismanagement of funds for lack of funds. Blame the teachers who must not be qualified to teach. When I had failing kids, I tried to get the parents more involved in their children. Some parents reacted very well, others told me that when the kid is at school, that's my problem. We have school boards closing schools for next year due to lack of funds. I know that sometimes you just have to close schools as the number of kids don't justify keeping it open. Heck, my high school from the 60's got closed in the 80's and just this year reopened as a junior high. Per pupil spending in Cal is at dismal levels. We used to say you can't make a silk purse from a pig's ear, but someone did. Now most people expect more from less. There still is no such thing as a free lunch. I think we need to pony up and spend more money on education.

On Nixon. Yes, I know most leaders do bad things that we don't want to hear about. He just did something more base corruptible to the underlining structure and faith in goverment in this country than anyone else.

I should not have mixed my layoff with trickle down. I was against the whole supply side argument. Republican tax breaks have never really helped the middle class as much as the very wealthy. Of course, I can not recall a Democratic tax break.

On politicans and God. Most use their religion to further their career. Geoge W certainly falls into that. His appeal to "evangelicals" and fundamental strict morality and his statement of freedom being God's gift to humanity just reinforces my belief that he has more similarity to a Pharisee than real born again christian.
Pharisee: 1) A member of an ancient Jewish sect that emphasized strict interpretation and observance of the Mosaic law in both its oral and written form.
2) A hypocritically self-righteous person.
You probably kenw this, it is mostly for others who have never heard of the word fornication.
A real born again christian would have said that God's gift to humanity was salvation through Christ. The predominant teaching of Christ is love God, love your neighbor and forgiveness. Blessed are the peacemakers. Freedom and democratic govenments are not a christian ideal and never have been. However, W wants to send that mesage. His use of the term crusade was not a misstatement. It is his mindset. I am afraid of what he will get us into and who will ultimately pay the bill.

Oh, like your choice of cars. I have had a 60 MGA, 69 912, 69 2002, always wanted a boatail, on our 4th volvo now. Now have 95 325i and 92 911 C2 ( rebuilding engine now ). Rode my Suzuki 400DRZ and broke my foot last year.

Slacker, please keep up the good work. You are obviously very good at identifying the weakness of the left's arguements and then countering with the truth.

JP, relax. How may espressos today? (smiley waving face goes here)

We won't always disagree on the throwing money part. Throwing money does not necessarily make something better. cutting a budget is not always a bad thing. But one point way may differ on is something Steve said. Many people (those of a certain political ilk, I notice) seem to want someone else to solve the problems. Blame teachers. Blame blame blame. Pretend that gubmint already has all the money it needs, but is just wasting 80% of it. Anybody who believes that should take a peek, just a peek, into the workings of their legislature or Congress. Those organizations (which probably have your party's members in the Chair-person seats) have been engaging in a gubmint witch-hunt for many years now, and it's a DRY HOLE. They keep doing it so you can continue to believe it's all gubmint's fault. They actually know better. It's you that's being fooled. Deliberately. Fact is, and I'll take one example local to me, if we want to relieve traffic congestion here in Seattle, we're going to need money to do it. Folks who pretend money is not necessary are certainly underinformed, and likely also daft.

Also JP, I understand that most all Americans are compassionate. When asked whether we should take care of our less fortunate brethren, nearly every American answers "yes." That's good. But please don't make yourself look silly by pretending that the Republican party is compassionate. Their voting and public policy record suggests otherwise. Apparently that party, and folks like you and others here, adopt the amazingly compassionate and sophisticated policy that the best way to help those less fortunate, is to withdraw our help. That way they'll "Learn to stand on their own two feet." Yes, if you teach a person to fish, they can feed themselves for a lifetime. So, why then is it that the fish-teaching programs are hammered as viciously as the giveaway programs. It's bunk. It's greed. And the entire world sees it, except for the millions of "R"'s in this country.

And don't tell us that Dubya is Sudan's protector. He's basically disbanded the UN, and so I guess you guys have to decide where you wanna go with that. I hear the UN bashed here daily, and now you're suggesting Dubya is promoting their involvement. Decide. Fact is, he probably gave the UN a death blow. And he's not ready (he does not have the resources, frankly) to take up their mission. Here's the bottom line if you are going to go any further with this Dubya-as-Sudan-protector thing: Fact is, we're busy crushing a nation that has massive oil reserves in the name of WMD, or democracy, or whatever the excuse-du-jour is...and all the while Sudanese people are being butchered. Dubya's is cheap. Let's not make your talk seem similar.

It's greed and it's human nature. Dubya is not the genius you guys pretend he is, and you know it.

I wouldn't say that he shows the weakness of the left's arguments.

He defines the argument first so it looks bad from a logical viewpoint.
"No wonder the Left loves the UN so much, with all the genocide it's allowed to go on right under its nose (Bosnia, Rwanda, Sudan ... just to name three off the top of my head)"
I do not love the UN, but I know it does not have an army to stop anything or the ability to force real economic sanctions. All countires have economic interests that may be in conflcit with what is "good for humanity".

And then we also point to them when they disagree with us. France did not agree with the US first strike unjust war in Iraq and many said it was because they just knew that we would find WMD from France once we got in there. None of them have ever admiited that they were wrong.

In fact I have never heard a Pro Iraq war supporter ever admit that oops yes, the unjust was indeed unfounded. What I hear is we really went to war to free the Iraqi people.

Now, W is using the bombing in Lebanon to back Syria into a corner, and darn it, Syria and Iran now have formed a partnership. Be prepared for War in Iran in two years, just in time to get another pro war Republican in office. Yes, Dick Cheney as President and W as VP. I can see it now.

God help us all.

steve -

First off, I LOVE the MGA (esp. the twin-cam) and you do not want to get john cramer going on those cars. He's fanatical, and I'm frankly surprised he doesn't currently own one.

I have no idea what a "real born again [C]hristian" would say about any specific political things; I really don't. So I'm not equipped to judge W pro or con on how well he fits into some definitional box. And, frankly, it's a box whose parameters really don't matter so much to me. But so what.

What I will say is that this country, from its inception, has been guided by men who are guided by God. We, as a country, have not been ashamed to declare our nation as one, "under God" or in God's trust. When we've undertaken great things we've claimed to do so as a result of divine providence and provenance, and for the glory of God and the favors He's bestowed upon us. God permeated this country and its politicians for centuries ... and then it became uncool; unreconstructed; even primitive.

Now I am a cynic. No, no... it's true. I haven't been to "church" in years (though I was in a church twice last year for weddings and escaped un-divinely-scathed). I think a lot of the pro-God rhetoric is self-serving. Is the Rev. Jesse Jackson a Man of God in any sense of a God with whom you want to be associated? What about Rev. Al Sharpton? Etc. But we do have a very strong American history of what we've considered to be most-favored-nation status with the Big G; and our success and wealth point to (to many) the divine blessing on liberty, democracy and freedom.

I can't fault W for taking counsel with God -- not to the exclusion of other counsel, mind you. Would you want your Commander-in-Chief, committing the blood and treasure of the US to an effort such as Iraq without even a thought as to prayer; or the reflection that occurs when you look to a higher power? (Now you can say "I'd rather not have the US get into Iraq in the first place" which dodges, rather than answers, the question).

Not being a Californian, it's "easy" for me to pontificate on its problems... but wouldn't it help raise the $ per student ratio to allow only US citizens into taxpayer-funded schools? I was never very good at algebra, having gone to a public school and all, but I'm pretty sure it would. But that's just me being a cold, heartless Conservative -- thinking that only people that pay for the services (through taxes) should burden the system with their receipt of such services. Obviously I'm no born-again with thatattitude. :D

JP

Is this our legacy of compassion?

http://www.caduceus.info/articles/denver.htm
It also affects US personnel. Wives of Iraqi Gulf War I veterans are three times more likely to suffer miscarriages than the average.

You have no measure of this problem do you Overpaid Slacker?

Warning, this link may contain strong graphics;

http://www.uwec.edu/grossmzc/anderkel.html


http://www.phmovement.org/pubs/issuepapers/hong20.html
http://www.nukewatch.com/du/20030530arbuthnot.html

Yep, pretty obscene. We're certainly making lots of friends under Dubya's leadership. I'm sure they just love us right now over there, and when things settle down and their free society starts to uncover the rest of the story, we'll be thanked in some very special ways, I think.

This is a little scattered ... I'm trying to get the F out of the office, but I'll get back to it if need be.

As far as "measure", no. I don't. However, not having any "measure" of this, allow me a few rhetorical questions that occur to me whenever I read anything of that type:

(1) birth defects increased 2-6 times. OK, what were they before? And over what period? As you know, an "average" doesn't mean that any given year will be "average." If you pick a baseline year of X and that year is very very low, then subsequent years will appear to be much, much higher -- even though they're close to the mean.

(2) having increased 2-6 times, how do they now compare with "normal" rates for other countries? Are they still lower?

(3) 3-12 times as many children have developed cancer and leukaemia. Now, first of all, I'm skeptical about any range such as "3-12 times"; and you should be too. But, use my earlier questions about 2-6 times here as well.

(4) 500 children a day are dying.... let's take that one apart.
(a) The Lancet published this study in 1998, before the Iraq war, so it must have been the results of the (i) Gulf War or (ii) some other post Gulf War, pre-Iraq war agent (more on that under 6 below).
(b) How does 500 children a day match up with other areas? And I'm not even buying that the 500 number is correct.
(c) How many of those 500 children (again, not stipulating that's even true) are dying from depleted uranium. Honestly, this is not meant to be snide, but I don't know if you know how "harmful" depleted uranium is. I've been around it; not a big deal to anyone who's been around it. I wouldn't make my box spring out of it, but I probably could w/o a lot of fear. There was a huge scare a decade or so ago about DU weapons, mostly because people hear "uranium" and freak out. Like Silent Scream and DDT; don't even get me started on that crapola!!!

Simply, I don't buy the DU story -- but I acknowledge that it is very conveeeeenient for people with axes to grind. Believe it if you'd like. However, consider this -- what is the possible geographical density of DU munitions expended in Iraq in the Gulf War? Given that most of the combat in the Gulf War was not in Iraq but Kuwait. C'mon, Kach -- according to your "sources" even among workers at the DU site, where it's presumably the most densely packed in the world, the scare-freaks couldn't muster the numbers they want you to believe resulted from DU in Iraq.

(5) None of this tells me if these statistics are deliberately or "accidentally" sampled from areas in Iraq where Hussein was poisoning, gassing and otherwise killing his own people. Again, as you know, statistics -- even twisted statistics -- are not a matter of surveying every single possible person, but extrapolating from certain data sets to get to the "bigger picture". So, for example, if the data behind these statistics were heavily sampled in regions where SH gassed and poisoned (Marsh Arabs, Kurds, Shi'a, you name it) then these very effects -- if true, which I'm not stipulating -- could be the direct result of SH's actions himself. Whether it's DU or some other agent "causing" all of this alleged cancer is simply not knowable; that's all there is to it.

(6) Outside the numbers for a moment -- wouldn't these people have been better off if, rather than diverting Oil-for-Food proceeds to weapons and palaces, the money was used to take care of children; including preventative and pre-natal care? Hmmmm... do you have a measure of what $110 billion would do for health care in a nation of 26 million? To help with the measuring, that's $110,000,000,000.00 -- syphoned off, with the complicity of the compassionate UN, that not only could've but was supposed to go to public health in Iraq. Who robbed these Iraqis of their money? Saddam and the perennially compassionate UN. Yeah, sucks, doesn't it?

Kach, this is most likely anti-sanction and anti-US propaganda. You can find a MSF Doctor with an agenda longer than my arm that will make up whatever "statistics" he needs to (whether he reports them directly to a paper or indirectly, through someone such as Lancet). To blame the sanctions ("from these sequels to war and sanctions..."), when Hussein and the UN were stealing as much as One Hundred and Ten Million Dollars -- again One Hundred Thousand Million Dollars -- from Iraqis is high farce and only transpares the bias behind these, what I will call loosely and use the word strictly without prejudice, statistics.

Blah blah blah... anyway. Even IF we stipulate that there is merit to this DU crap, it is a conclusion of vastly cynical and bias-revealing proportions to conclude that it's the Republicans' fault these things happened. My recollection is the Democrats approved weapons systems, approved the use of force, and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the Republicans (except for maybe Kerry) during the Gulf War. But all the bad things are the Republicans' fault -- because they're not compassionate.

You're expecting zero political credibility from this point forward, right?

JP

EDIT -- one last thing. one of the sites you linked to quotes Brent Scowcroft. Are you kidding me? Do you know who this guy is? I wish I had the time right now to go through it -- but quoting BS at the top of your page is not the way to be taken seriously, IMHO.

"allow only US citizens into taxpayer-funded schools" yes, but in california the taxes for schools come primarily from property ownership and then from income taxes, neither requires US citizenship. So a non US citizen on a visa working for Intel and living in a nice house still pays taxes to support the schools.

"thinking that only people that pay for the services (through taxes) should burden the system with their receipt of such services."

Well I see two paths from that
1) you should need to pay taxes only for the services you need, or 2) I need to support those who can't pay for the betterment of society as a whole.

That's kind of the dilemna we are always having in this country. I tend to open my wallet with the belief it will make life better for my children because society will be better. Others may close the wallet to ensure their children or themselves are better off.

It is the basic question of why should people without children should have to support public schools.

On George W, I have no doubt he prays to God, my doubt is that he listens.

I believe that George Patton prayed fervently, but I am not sure that his successes were God's handiwork either.

I am not sure that God permeated this country and its politicians. I know religion has. And one can find just about any form of religion under the christian banner to promulgate almost any belief. Hey, my mom belonged to a church that banned root beer. My nephew is a minister in church that forbids dancing and alcohol. In college, I was in a church that taught that the Catholic church was part of the anti-christ. Now, I go to Catholic mass every Sunday, done so for the last 28 years.

I almost joined the submarine force out of college, but got my lung collapsed playing football and got a 4F deferment. Now I work on rocket motors that go into subs.

Boy, with this background it's a wonder I can think at all.



Now don't jump on that.

Go get 'em, Steve. You're certainly welcome here from my perspective, but be prepared for some ad hominem attacks.

No doubt, you raise a smorgasbord of interesting issues with the who-pays-for-services versus who-gets-services issue. And a potential incendiary one as well. As I suspect you know, there is a fair amount of greed and "that's my ball and you can't play with it" notions permeating not just politics but it's getting into American Values disguised as a good thing. You know, the "the best thing for those wretched people is to withdraw our financial support so they will learn to stand on their own two feet" crap.

So yeah, schools are generally paid for through property taxes. Lots of property owners don't have kids. Older people don't have kids who need a primary education. so, let's let the young couples of the nation foot the bill for schools. Anybody see a problem with that?

Okay, I'll stop. I could get fairly wound up about this, because it is a caricature of the myopic, short-term, greedy thinking that is all the rage these days. All these justifications for turning our back on stuff that might be inconvenient for our wallets are disgusting to me. In order to keep talking nice on this BBS, I have to assume the Klingons here are honestly bamboozled. That they actually believe that stingyness is a good thing....somehow. Fact is, it seems incredibly obvious to me what someone once said (not sure who).....that a society is judged not on how its wealthiest do, but rather on how it takes care of the poor souls at the other end of the socio-economic scale.

And you can turn your back on them all you like, and you can probably justify that to yourself, but I am not the slightest bit fooled. And neither is God.

Spontaneous pneumothorax. You too, eh? I can definitely put "tube thoroscopy" under the Not Fun category in the file cabinet of my life...

actually happened twice, the second time I got the tube, it was on my 21st birthday and I got to sign for the medical release myself. I didn't drink that day, but the doctor said I could smoke and watch the smoke come out the tube if I wanted. I said not today, doc.

I don't have the time to get into this properly today - people want drawings from me for some strange reason.

1. Every couple of years 60-Minutes (the TV program) gives this topic some good coverage......................I recommend everyone watches it next time. The last time they gave both sides of the story, nobody wanted even one micro particle of DU lodged in their lungs- go figure.

2. DU dust airborn by battle fires is swept into the wind (to Iraq - Gulf war), dust storms also throw this stuff up into the Trade Winds and it travels all over the planet (your backyard).

3. There is propaganda out there, and a great deal of ignorance to - not an easy chore seperating out the two. Give it time the truth shall be known - it may fall in the middle of where we argue today.......or one of us could be right.

Here is just another info link:
http://www.miltoxproj.org/depleted_uranium.htm

NOTE: One of the training grounds in the US has contaimated wildlife (deer) nearby from DU - good hunting boys. :eek:



Here is more info links:

http://www.cadu.org.uk/info/nuclear/3_2.htm

http://www.grecoreport.com/washington's_depleted_uranium_'dirty_bombs'.htm

OK, Kach... I'll stipulate that you're making your argument in good faith; and if it's true, I regret that innocents (and I'm not putting that word in quotes) get hurt. I just don't buy the magnitude of it.

At the end of the day, I don't get how this point makes Republicans -- and ONLY Republicans -- evil or uncompassionate. Rather than try to pretend to be an expert on this matter, I'm just going to continue to be skeptical about it, and let the first sentence of this paragraph say what I believe is the heart of the matter, rather than being drawn off into the capillaries.

Steve -
Good point, and I was oversimplifying about taxes. Whether it's "only US citizens" or "only US taxpayers" does make a difference and I conflated the two. Go with the latter at this point.

As for the constant keening and self-righteous chest-beating about how awfully we treat the poor in the US; let me ask you -- where would you rather be poor?* Here or just about anywhere else? I'll bet a dollar that every immigrant (legal or otherwise) would likely answer "Here". But they haven't yet been brainwashed by some Liberal Guilt or tried yet to pick up some patchouli-soaked bimbo by blaming America First, Last Always, and Ever.

* Hey, we might not be the "best" country in which to be poor, but I'd hardly consider that a distinction. Yeah -- here, we'll sap the will to succeed right out of you and expect nothing from you!! Woo-HOO! How uplifting to the human spirit!!!

Now, Homelessness as a discreet topic requires a lot different analysis, for another time. Though nobody's asking me to draw pictures for them today (wtf?) I gotta earn my salt.

JP

1. I did a little math on the 500 kids a day............isn't that like 1.8 million over ten years? There is a problem, the size of which can not be verified without study................saying there is a not a problem will never solve the problem - it will only be a denial of it's existance.

2. The simple fact that Bush-1's Gulf war does not make the republican party accountible for DU's- true. However, blocking findings so they are not made public, and going against internationl banning of DU's has been an active republican pursuit in the republican controlled House and Senate for sometime now. Don't get me started on the Whitehouse............nobody's home.

OK, fine, kach... you're a single-issue sort of guy. If DU alone is enough to make you believe that Republicans are evil, I won't even attempt to talk you out of it. I will, however, humbly suggest that there must be even one issue that the Democrats are on the wrong side of. Other than History, I mean.

For me, the constant appeasement of murderers and their regimes (the Soviets, Cuba/Castro, Palestine/Arafat, etc.), and enablers (the UN) by Democrats (and especially Clinton) would disqualify them for any moral high ground or "compassion" awards.

But -- compassion is the marketing package -- the Trade Dress -- they use to sell their arguments to you. And, well if THEY'VE got the monopoly on compassion -- which they tell you they do -- then the Republicans must be heartless. That's all that's left, right? There's only "compassionate" and "heartless." And if you're not one, you're the other. And since Only Democrats Can Be Compassionate, and Democrats and Republicans are Polar Opposites ... well, you've done the math.

If you stop taking the moral superiority/compassion of the Democrats for granted and look more at empirical merits of their arguments, you'll see similar agendas to the Republicans'. They just sweeten their crap so it's easier to swallow; and you can "feel" better about swallowing it.

Crap, I feel (no quotes, note) bad about people being hurt by DU, even if it's just a couple of them.

JP