U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

[John Mullen]

Richard Bernstein, NYT
Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.

U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

BERLIN In the two years since Sept. 11, 2001, the view of the United
States as a victim of terrorism that deserved the world's sympathy and
support has given way in the months after the war in Iraq to a
widespread vision of America as an imperial power that has defied
world public opinion in an unjustified and unilateral use of military
force.
..
"A lot of people had sympathy for Americans around the time of 9/11,
but that's changed," said Cathy Hearn, 31, a flight attendant from
South Africa, expressing a view commonly heard in many countries.
"They act like the big guy riding roughshod over everyone else."
..
Across the globe, from Africa to Europe, South America to Southeast
Asia, the war in Iraq has had a major impact on a public opinion that
has moved generally from post-Sept. 11 sympathy to post-Iraq-war
antipathy, or, at least to disappointment over what is seen as the
sole remaining superpower's inclination to act pre-emptively with
neither persuasive reasons nor United Nations approval.
..
To some degree, the resentment is centered on the person of President
George W. Bush, who is seen by many as, at best, an ineffective
spokesman for American interests and, at worst, a gunslinging cowboy
knocking over international treaties and bent on controlling the
world's oil supplies, if not the entire world. Foreign policy experts
point to slowly developing fissures born with the end of the cold war
that emerged only in the debate leading up to the Iraq war.
..
"I think the turnaround was last summer when American policy moved
ever more decisively toward war against Iraq," Joseph Joffe, co-editor
of the German weekly newspaper Die Zeit, said. "That's what triggered
the counter alliance of France and Germany and the enormous wave of
hatred against the United States."
..
The subject of America in the world is, of course, complicated, and
the nation's ebbing international image could rise quickly in response
to events. The Bush administration's recent turn to the United Nations
for help in postwar Iraq may, by stepping away from unilateralism,
represents such an event. Even at this low point, millions of people
still see the United States as a beacon and support its policies,
including the war in Iraq, and would, if given the chance, be happy to
become Americans themselves.
..
Some regions, especially Europe, are split in their view of America's
role, with the governments, and, to a lesser extent, the people, of
the former Soviet Bloc countries much more favorably disposed to
American power than the governments and people of American allies in
Europe, most notably France and Germany.
..
In a strongly allied country like Japan, insecure in the face of a
hostile, nuclear-armed North Korea a short missile distance away,
there may be doubts about the wisdom of the American war on Iraq. But
there seem to be far fewer doubts about the importance of American
power generally to global stability.
..
In China, while many ordinary people express doubts about America's
war in Iraq, anti-American feeling has diminished since Sept. 11, and
there seems to be greater understanding and less instinctive criticism
of the United States by government officials and intellectuals. The
Chinese authorities have largely embraced America's "war on terror."
..
Still, a widespread and fashionable view is that the United States is
a classically imperialist power bent on controlling global oil
supplies and on military domination.
..
The prevailing global mood has been expressed in different ways by
many different people, from the hockey fans in Montreal who booed the
American national anthem to the high school students in Switzerland
who don't want to go to the United States as exchange students because
America isn't "in."
..
But even among people who do not believe the various conspiracy
theories that are being bandied about, it is not difficult to hear
very strong denunciations of American policy and a deep questioning of
American motives.
..
"America has taken power over the world," said Dmitri Ostalsky, 25, a
literary critic and writer in Moscow. "It's a wonderful country, but
it seized power. It's ruling the world. America's attempts to rebuild
all the world in the image of liberalism and capitalism are fraught
with the same dangers as the Nazis taking over the world."
..
A Frenchman, Jean-Charles Pogram, 45, a computer technician, said
this: "Everyone agrees on the principles of democracy and freedom, but
the problem is that we don't agree with the means to achieve those
ends.
..
"The United States can't see beyond the axiom that force can solve
everything but Europe, because of two world wars, knows the price of
blood," he said.
..
Lydia Adhiamba, a 20-year-old student at the Institute of Advanced
Technology in Nairobi, said that the United States "wants to rule the
whole world, and that's why there's so much animosity to the U.S."
..
This week, the major English language daily newspaper in Indonesia,
The Jakarta Post, ran a prominent article entitled "Why moderate
Muslims are annoyed with America," by Sayidiman Suryohadiprojo.
..
"If America wants to become a hegemonic power it is rather difficult
for other nations to prevent that," he wrote. "However, if America
wants to be a hegemonic power that has the respect and trust of other
nations, it must be a benign one and not one that causes a reaction of
hate or fear among other nations."
..
Crucial to global public opinion has been the failure of the Bush
administration to persuade large segments of public opinion of its
justification for going to war in Iraq.
..
In striking contrast to public opinion in the United States, where
polls show a majority believing that there was a connection between
Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and the Al Qaeda terrorists who carried
out the Sept. 11 attacks, the rest of the world does not believe that
argument because, most people say, the evidence has not been produced.
..
This explains the enormous difference in international opinion between
American military action in Afghanistan in the months after Sept. 11,
which seemed to have tacit approval around the world as a legitimate
act of self-defense, and the view of American military action in Iraq,
which is commonly seen as the arbitrary act of an overbearing power.
..
Perhaps the strongest effect on public opinion has been in Arab and
Muslim countries.
..
Even in relatively moderate Muslim countries like Indonesia and
Turkey, or countries with large Muslim populations, like Nigeria,
polls and interviews show sharp drops in public approval of the United
States over the past year.
..
In unabashedly pro-American countries like Poland, perhaps the most
important America ally on Iraq after Britain, polls show 60 percent of
the public opposed to the Polish government's decision to send 2,500
troops in Iraq under overall American command.
..
For many people, the issue is not so much the United States as it is
the Bush administration, and what is seen as its arrogance. In this
view, a different set of policies and a different set of public
statements from Washington would have resulted in a different set of
attitudes toward the United States.
..
"The point I would make is that with the best will in the world,
President Bush is a very poor salesman for the United States, and I
say that as someone who has no animus against him or the United
States," said Philip Gawaith, a financial communications consultant in
London. "Whether it's Al Qaeda or Afghanistan, people have just felt
that he's a silly man and therefore they are not obliged to think any
harder about his position."
..
But while the public statements of the Bush administration have not
played well in much of the world, many analysts see deeper causes for
the rift that has opened between the United States and even many of
its closest former allies.
..
In their view, the Iraq war has not so much caused a new divergence
but highlighted and widened one that has existed at least since the
end of the cold war. Put bluntly, Europe needs America less now that
it feels less threatened.
..
Indeed, while the United States probably feels more threatened now
than in 1989, when the cold war ended, Europe is broadly unconvinced
of any imminent threat As a result, America and Europe tend to view
the world differently.
..
"There were deep structural forces before 9/11 that were pushing us
apart," said John Mearsheimer, professor of political science at the
University of Chicago and the author of "The Tragedy of Great Power
Politics."
..
He added: "In the absence of the Soviet threat or of an equivalent
threat, there was no way that ties between U.S. and Europe wouldn't be
loosened.
..
"So, when the Bush administration came to power, the question was
whether it would make things better or worse, and I'd argue that it
made them worse.
..
"In the war, you could argue that American unilateralism had no cost,"
Mearsheimer continued. "But, as we're finding out with regard to Iraq,
Iran and North Korea, we need the Europeans and we need institutions
like the UN. The fact is that the United States can't run the world by
itself, and the problem is we've done a lot of damage in our relations
with allies, and people are not terribly enthusiastic about helping us
now."
..
Recent findings of international surveys have given a mathematical
expression to these differences. A poll of 8,000 people in Europe and
the United States conducted by the German Marshall Fund of the United
States and the Compagnia di Sao Paolo of Italy, found Americans and
Europeans agreeing on the nature of global threats, but disagreeing
sharply on how they should be dealt with.
..
Most striking was a difference over the use of military force, with 84
percent of Americans and 48 percent of Europeans supporting force as a
means of imposing international justice.
..
In Europe overall, the number of people who want the United States to
maintain a strong global presence went down 19 percentage points since
a similar poll last year, from 64 percent to 45 percent, while 50
percent of respondents in Germany, France and Italy express opposition
to American international leadership.
..
Many of the difficulties predated Sept. 11, of course. Eberhard
Sandschneider, director of the German Council on Foreign Relations,
has listed some in a recent paper: "Economic disputes relating to
steel and farm subsidies; limits on legal cooperation because of the
death penalty in the United States; repeated charges of U.S.
'unilateralism' over actions in Afghanistan; and the U.S. decisions on
the ABM Treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, the International Criminal Court,
and the Biological Weapons Protocol."
..
"One could conclude that there is today a serious question as to
whether Europe and the United States are parting ways," Sandschneider
writes.
..
From this point of view, as Sandschneider and others have said, the
divergence between the United States and many other countries will not
be a temporary phenomenon stemming from the Iraqi war, but a permanent
aspect of the international scene.
..
A recent survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project showed a growth of
anti-American sentiment in many non-European parts of the world. It
found, for example that only 15 percent of Indonesians now have a
favorable impression of the United States, down from 60 percent a year
ago.
..
Indonesia may be an especially troubling case to American policymakers
who have hoped that Indonesia, a moderate country with a relatively
easy-going attitude toward religion, would emerge as a kind of
pro-American Islamic model.
..
But since Sept. 11, a group of extremists known as Jemaah Islamiyah
has gained strength, hitting targets in Bali and Jakarta and making
the country so insecure that Bush may not be able to stop off there
during an Asia trip planned for next month.
..
One well-known mainstream Muslim leader, Din Syamsuddin, the
American-educated vice president of a 30 million-strong Islamic
organization, called the United States the "king of the terrorists"
and referred to Bush as "drunken horse."
..
This turn for the worse has occurred despite a $10 million program by
the State Department called the Shared Values Campaign in which
speakers and short films showing Muslim life in the United States were
sent last fall to Muslim countries, like Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia
and Kuwait.

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, John
Mullen > wrote:

> Richard Bernstein, NYT
> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>
> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

<snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
copyright>

The sympathy of the world (whatever the hell "world" means in that
context) plus two euros will buy you a cup of coffee in some capital
cities.

This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
important than the War against Terrorism.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Aerophotos]

one of the best articles i had seen in years... world is what is beyond
the navel gazing 12mile limit border of the northern american continent
where you live...

first find a atlas and look...you maybe be surprised...since 75% of
yanks dont have a idea where some americans states are...

hard to handle the truth being a yank aint it...??? so sad..

like believing iraq was a walk in park.. its really another vietnam....

be the first mother on ya block to have ya kid come home in a box.. 1
2
3
4
what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
die in vietnam


John Mullen wrote:
>
> Richard Bernstein, NYT
> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>
> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> BERLIN In the two years since Sept. 11, 2001, the view of the United
> States as a victim of terrorism that deserved the world's sympathy and
> support has given way in the months after the war in Iraq to a
> widespread vision of America as an imperial power that has defied
> world public opinion in an unjustified and unilateral use of military
> force.
> .
> "A lot of people had sympathy for Americans around the time of 9/11,
> but that's changed," said Cathy Hearn, 31, a flight attendant from
> South Africa, expressing a view commonly heard in many countries.
> "They act like the big guy riding roughshod over everyone else."
> .
> Across the globe, from Africa to Europe, South America to Southeast
> Asia, the war in Iraq has had a major impact on a public opinion that
> has moved generally from post-Sept. 11 sympathy to post-Iraq-war
> antipathy, or, at least to disappointment over what is seen as the
> sole remaining superpower's inclination to act pre-emptively with
> neither persuasive reasons nor United Nations approval.
> .
> To some degree, the resentment is centered on the person of President
> George W. Bush, who is seen by many as, at best, an ineffective
> spokesman for American interests and, at worst, a gunslinging cowboy
> knocking over international treaties and bent on controlling the
> world's oil supplies, if not the entire world. Foreign policy experts
> point to slowly developing fissures born with the end of the cold war
> that emerged only in the debate leading up to the Iraq war.
> .
> "I think the turnaround was last summer when American policy moved
> ever more decisively toward war against Iraq," Joseph Joffe, co-editor
> of the German weekly newspaper Die Zeit, said. "That's what triggered
> the counter alliance of France and Germany and the enormous wave of
> hatred against the United States."
> .
> The subject of America in the world is, of course, complicated, and
> the nation's ebbing international image could rise quickly in response
> to events. The Bush administration's recent turn to the United Nations
> for help in postwar Iraq may, by stepping away from unilateralism,
> represents such an event. Even at this low point, millions of people
> still see the United States as a beacon and support its policies,
> including the war in Iraq, and would, if given the chance, be happy to
> become Americans themselves.
> .
> Some regions, especially Europe, are split in their view of America's
> role, with the governments, and, to a lesser extent, the people, of
> the former Soviet Bloc countries much more favorably disposed to
> American power than the governments and people of American allies in
> Europe, most notably France and Germany.
> .
> In a strongly allied country like Japan, insecure in the face of a
> hostile, nuclear-armed North Korea a short missile distance away,
> there may be doubts about the wisdom of the American war on Iraq. But
> there seem to be far fewer doubts about the importance of American
> power generally to global stability.
> .
> In China, while many ordinary people express doubts about America's
> war in Iraq, anti-American feeling has diminished since Sept. 11, and
> there seems to be greater understanding and less instinctive criticism
> of the United States by government officials and intellectuals. The
> Chinese authorities have largely embraced America's "war on terror."
> .
> Still, a widespread and fashionable view is that the United States is
> a classically imperialist power bent on controlling global oil
> supplies and on military domination.
> .
> The prevailing global mood has been expressed in different ways by
> many different people, from the hockey fans in Montreal who booed the
> American national anthem to the high school students in Switzerland
> who don't want to go to the United States as exchange students because
> America isn't "in."
> .
> But even among people who do not believe the various conspiracy
> theories that are being bandied about, it is not difficult to hear
> very strong denunciations of American policy and a deep questioning of
> American motives.
> .
> "America has taken power over the world," said Dmitri Ostalsky, 25, a
> literary critic and writer in Moscow. "It's a wonderful country, but
> it seized power. It's ruling the world. America's attempts to rebuild
> all the world in the image of liberalism and capitalism are fraught
> with the same dangers as the Nazis taking over the world."
> .
> A Frenchman, Jean-Charles Pogram, 45, a computer technician, said
> this: "Everyone agrees on the principles of democracy and freedom, but
> the problem is that we don't agree with the means to achieve those
> ends.
> .
> "The United States can't see beyond the axiom that force can solve
> everything but Europe, because of two world wars, knows the price of
> blood," he said.
> .
> Lydia Adhiamba, a 20-year-old student at the Institute of Advanced
> Technology in Nairobi, said that the United States "wants to rule the
> whole world, and that's why there's so much animosity to the U.S."
> .
> This week, the major English language daily newspaper in Indonesia,
> The Jakarta Post, ran a prominent article entitled "Why moderate
> Muslims are annoyed with America," by Sayidiman Suryohadiprojo.
> .
> "If America wants to become a hegemonic power it is rather difficult
> for other nations to prevent that," he wrote. "However, if America
> wants to be a hegemonic power that has the respect and trust of other
> nations, it must be a benign one and not one that causes a reaction of
> hate or fear among other nations."
> .
> Crucial to global public opinion has been the failure of the Bush
> administration to persuade large segments of public opinion of its
> justification for going to war in Iraq.
> .
> In striking contrast to public opinion in the United States, where
> polls show a majority believing that there was a connection between
> Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and the Al Qaeda terrorists who carried
> out the Sept. 11 attacks, the rest of the world does not believe that
> argument because, most people say, the evidence has not been produced.
> .
> This explains the enormous difference in international opinion between
> American military action in Afghanistan in the months after Sept. 11,
> which seemed to have tacit approval around the world as a legitimate
> act of self-defense, and the view of American military action in Iraq,
> which is commonly seen as the arbitrary act of an overbearing power.
> .
> Perhaps the strongest effect on public opinion has been in Arab and
> Muslim countries.
> .
> Even in relatively moderate Muslim countries like Indonesia and
> Turkey, or countries with large Muslim populations, like Nigeria,
> polls and interviews show sharp drops in public approval of the United
> States over the past year.
> .
> In unabashedly pro-American countries like Poland, perhaps the most
> important America ally on Iraq after Britain, polls show 60 percent of
> the public opposed to the Polish government's decision to send 2,500
> troops in Iraq under overall American command.
> .
> For many people, the issue is not so much the United States as it is
> the Bush administration, and what is seen as its arrogance. In this
> view, a different set of policies and a different set of public
> statements from Washington would have resulted in a different set of
> attitudes toward the United States.
> .
> "The point I would make is that with the best will in the world,
> President Bush is a very poor salesman for the United States, and I
> say that as someone who has no animus against him or the United
> States," said Philip Gawaith, a financial communications consultant in
> London. "Whether it's Al Qaeda or Afghanistan, people have just felt
> that he's a silly man and therefore they are not obliged to think any
> harder about his position."
> .
> But while the public statements of the Bush administration have not
> played well in much of the world, many analysts see deeper causes for
> the rift that has opened between the United States and even many of
> its closest former allies.
> .
> In their view, the Iraq war has not so much caused a new divergence
> but highlighted and widened one that has existed at least since the
> end of the cold war. Put bluntly, Europe needs America less now that
> it feels less threatened.
> .
> Indeed, while the United States probably feels more threatened now
> than in 1989, when the cold war ended, Europe is broadly unconvinced
> of any imminent threat As a result, America and Europe tend to view
> the world differently.
> .
> "There were deep structural forces before 9/11 that were pushing us
> apart," said John Mearsheimer, professor of political science at the
> University of Chicago and the author of "The Tragedy of Great Power
> Politics."
> .
> He added: "In the absence of the Soviet threat or of an equivalent
> threat, there was no way that ties between U.S. and Europe wouldn't be
> loosened.
> .
> "So, when the Bush administration came to power, the question was
> whether it would make things better or worse, and I'd argue that it
> made them worse.
> .
> "In the war, you could argue that American unilateralism had no cost,"
> Mearsheimer continued. "But, as we're finding out with regard to Iraq,
> Iran and North Korea, we need the Europeans and we need institutions
> like the UN. The fact is that the United States can't run the world by
> itself, and the problem is we've done a lot of damage in our relations
> with allies, and people are not terribly enthusiastic about helping us
> now."
> .
> Recent findings of international surveys have given a mathematical
> expression to these differences. A poll of 8,000 people in Europe and
> the United States conducted by the German Marshall Fund of the United
> States and the Compagnia di Sao Paolo of Italy, found Americans and
> Europeans agreeing on the nature of global threats, but disagreeing
> sharply on how they should be dealt with.
> .
> Most striking was a difference over the use of military force, with 84
> percent of Americans and 48 percent of Europeans supporting force as a
> means of imposing international justice.
> .
> In Europe overall, the number of people who want the United States to
> maintain a strong global presence went down 19 percentage points since
> a similar poll last year, from 64 percent to 45 percent, while 50
> percent of respondents in Germany, France and Italy express opposition
> to American international leadership.
> .
> Many of the difficulties predated Sept. 11, of course. Eberhard
> Sandschneider, director of the German Council on Foreign Relations,
> has listed some in a recent paper: "Economic disputes relating to
> steel and farm subsidies; limits on legal cooperation because of the
> death penalty in the United States; repeated charges of U.S.
> 'unilateralism' over actions in Afghanistan; and the U.S. decisions on
> the ABM Treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, the International Criminal Court,
> and the Biological Weapons Protocol."
> .
> "One could conclude that there is today a serious question as to
> whether Europe and the United States are parting ways," Sandschneider
> writes.
> .
> From this point of view, as Sandschneider and others have said, the
> divergence between the United States and many other countries will not
> be a temporary phenomenon stemming from the Iraqi war, but a permanent
> aspect of the international scene.
> .
> A recent survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project showed a growth of
> anti-American sentiment in many non-European parts of the world. It
> found, for example that only 15 percent of Indonesians now have a
> favorable impression of the United States, down from 60 percent a year
> ago.
> .
> Indonesia may be an especially troubling case to American policymakers
> who have hoped that Indonesia, a moderate country with a relatively
> easy-going attitude toward religion, would emerge as a kind of
> pro-American Islamic model.
> .
> But since Sept. 11, a group of extremists known as Jemaah Islamiyah
> has gained strength, hitting targets in Bali and Jakarta and making
> the country so insecure that Bush may not be able to stop off there
> during an Asia trip planned for next month.
> .
> One well-known mainstream Muslim leader, Din Syamsuddin, the
> American-educated vice president of a 30 million-strong Islamic
> organization, called the United States the "king of the terrorists"
> and referred to Bush as "drunken horse."
> .
> This turn for the worse has occurred despite a $10 million program by
> the State Department called the Shared Values Campaign in which
> speakers and short films showing Muslim life in the United States were
> sent last fall to Muslim countries, like Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia
> and Kuwait.

[Sunny]

"Aerophotos" > wrote in message
...
<snip crap>
>> what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
> die in vietnam
<snip more crap>
**** your a dork JGG. (get someone to read your **** out loud to
you...slowly)

[Aerophotos]

hey sonny

youve never heard of the famous anti vietnam war protest song in the 60s
obviously..

that send up was quite famous, obviously your so PTSD wound up you cant
remeber it...

and obviosuly sonny aka skip cant understand the relation between
vietnam and iraq... both were quagmires started by the us foreign
policies which are in no way useful to the worlds health



Sunny wrote:
>
> "Aerophotos" > wrote in message
> ...
> <snip crap>
> >> what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
> > die in vietnam
> <snip more crap>
> **** your a dork JGG. (get someone to read your **** out loud to
> you...slowly)

--

[The Revolution Will Not Be Televised]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 10:49:27 +0100, Alan Lothian >
wrote:

>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
><snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
>copyright>
>
>The sympathy of the world (whatever the hell "world" means in that
>context) plus two euros will buy you a cup of coffee in some capital
>cities.

The US never had the sympathy of the world in any recognisable,
cohesive fashion. Even the enormity of 9/11 was only just sufficient
to suppress the "They brought it on themselves/US foreign policy is to
blame" rants for about 5 seconds.

>This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
>policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
>the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
>important than the War against Terrorism.

Got my vote.

Gavin Bailey

--

Another user rings. "I need more space" he says.
"Well, why not move to Texas?", I ask. - The ******* Operator From Hell

[Keith Willshaw]

"Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
...

>
> This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> important than the War against Terrorism.
>

I'll support that without hesitation.

Keith

[John Mullen]

"Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
...
> In article >, John
> Mullen > wrote:
>
> > Richard Bernstein, NYT
> > Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
> >
> > U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> <snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
> copyright>

Having had a look at the Copyright notices of both publications, it seems
you are (technically) right here. Morally, I would contend that crediting
online sources you have lifted text from for a non-profit purpose such as
this, is sufficient. Certainly it's a very common practice. After all,
anybody who wants to can read it online in the original.

> The sympathy of the world (whatever the hell "world" means in that
> context) plus two euros will buy you a cup of coffee in some capital
> cities.

??? Don't get your drift at all.

> This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> important than the War against Terrorism.

Obviously I didn't think the article I posted was bull****, I thought it was
intreresting and well-written. What made you think it was bull****?

John

[Gene Storey]

"John Mullen" > wrote
>
> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

We don't need sympathy, we need a sense
of honor in fighting a common enemy.

[John Mullen]

"Gene Storey" > wrote in message
...
> "John Mullen" > wrote
> >
> > U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> We don't need sympathy, we need a sense
> of honor in fighting a common enemy.
>
>

Agreed. I would contend though that the means chosen to fight world
terrorism by the US in recent years have not been terribly effective.

John

[Prof. Vincent Brannigan]

Alan Lothian wrote:

> In article >, John
> Mullen > wrote:
>
> > Richard Bernstein, NYT
> > Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
> >
> > U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> <snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
> copyright>

On this point I have to disagree. It is clealry being distributed for the
purpose of comment and reaction, which is classic "Fair use" under the
copyright law.

BERNE CONVENTION FOR THE PROTECTION OF
LITERARY AND ARTISTIC WORKS (Paris Text 1971)

Article 10

(1) It shall be permissible to make quotations from a work which has already
been lawfully made available to the public,
provided that their making is compatible with fair practice, and their extent
does not exceed that justified by the purpose,
including quotations from newspaper articles and periodicals in the form of
press summaries

Vince

[Mike Marron]

>"John Mullen" > wrote:
>>"Gene Storey" > wrote:
>>> "John Mullen" > wrote:

>>>U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

>>We don't need sympathy, we need a sense
>>of honor in fighting a common enemy.

>Agreed. I would contend though that the means chosen to fight world
>terrorism by the US in recent years have not been terribly effective.

Militarily I'd say the U.S. has been *extremely* effective, but from a
public relations standpoint I'd have to agree with you.

But it's kinda' tough to fight world terrorism when, for example,
almost 70-percent of our so-called Canadian "friends" believe
that the U.S. is partly responsible for the 9/11 attacks and
15-percent of Canadians believe that the U.S. is entirely to blame.

Then there's our other so-called European "friends" whom are
card-carrying members of the flat-earth society and whom have
convinced themselves that the U.S. rigged the WTC towers and
Pentagon with explosives just so the U.S. could start a war in the
desert and take over the oil fields etc. ad nauseum.

As the World's Only Superpower, I suppose that is to be expected
but rather than the U.S. worrying about losing the sympathy of
the world, perhaps the world should start worrying about losing the
sympathy of the U.S.!!

-Mike (if ya' can't run with the Big Dogs...) Marron

[John Doe]

> This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> important than the War against Terrorism.


Maybe a bit less of Fox News biased propaganda and a bit more listening of
the worldwide opinion would help the USA in dealing with foreign countries.
You're so self-centered and buried in your own pro-US propaganda that you
have no real contact with the rest of the world, so how can you pretent to
bring peace and stability (with weapons!!!) throughout the world without
knowing it, and without wanting to know it.
It's not american people fault, it's all propaganda and biased information,
of the same kind germans invented at national socialism time and which is
still used at each crisis (please, I'm not saying US people are Nazis!).
It's the same kind of propaganda that was used by soviets and of course by
extreme islamists.
You should know, especially you in this "military" forum, that at war time,
misinformation and propaganda play a major role. So, do you really swallow
every word, all the bull****, that your puppet of president Bush says?!

The tv news we have in Europe are not the same as US ones, we have another
point of view of the world from where things don't look the same. So in
example it's better to put US and European news in the balance to get an
opinion that should me more correct. You should do the same in the US,
before things to get worse. This article isn't bull**** (at least you think
the others opinion always is bull****...) and you should have the
intelligence to pick some good points in it.

Not being single minded and keeping a critical spirit is a good thing,
whatever the situation is...

Yours, John

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
"John Mullen" > wrote:

> Agreed. I would contend though that the means chosen to fight world
> terrorism by the US in recent years have not been terribly effective.

Let's see...

Two years ago, we almost 3000 people in one terrorist attack.

Last year, we lost a fraction of that.

This year, we lost even less.

In the meantime, we've killed or captured hundreds of terrorists, while
removing from power two different governments that supported terrorists.

What *is* your definition of "effective?"

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, John Doe
> wrote:

> > This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> > policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> > the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> > important than the War against Terrorism.
>
>
> Maybe a bit less of Fox News biased propaganda and a bit more listening of
> the worldwide opinion would help the USA in dealing with foreign countries.
> You're so self-centered and buried in your own pro-US propaganda


What's this "you" jazz, Doe boy? What makes you think I am American?
Must be my .sig, with a quote from a very great Muslim scholar and a
human-readable dot uk address, I suppose.

<snippaggio>

> So, do you really swallow
> every word, all the bull****, that your puppet of president Bush says?!

Not my puppet.

> The tv news we have in Europe are not the same as US ones, we have another
> point of view of the world from where things don't look the same.

Some of us in Europe can construct English sentences, too. Pas
seulement en anglais: est-ce que tu me conseilles de lire les avis du
Monde de Paris, par example, ou peut-etre The Guardian te suffit?


> So in
> example it's better to put US and European news in the balance

"Europe's in the balance; neither side prevails.
There's nothing left in either of the scales."
-- Alexander Pope.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, John
Mullen > wrote:

> "Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
> ...
> > In article >, John
> > Mullen > wrote:
>
> > The sympathy of the world (whatever the hell "world" means in that
> > context) plus two euros will buy you a cup of coffee in some capital
> > cities.
>
> ??? Don't get your drift at all.

Then there's no point in my trying to explain it.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Keith Willshaw]

"John Doe" > wrote in message
...
> > This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> > policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> > the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> > important than the War against Terrorism.
>
>
> Maybe a bit less of Fox News biased propaganda and a bit more listening of
> the worldwide opinion would help the USA in dealing with foreign
countries.
> You're so self-centered and buried in your own pro-US propaganda that you
> have no real contact with the rest of the world, so how can you pretent to
> bring peace and stability (with weapons!!!) throughout the world without
> knowing it, and without wanting to know it.
>

Ahem the chap you are replying to isn't an American
I suggest that you actually READ the post before
engaging in any more wit and wisdom.

Keith

[Cub Driver]

>This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
>policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
>the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
>important than the War against Terrorism.

I don't entirely agree with your closing idea, but thank you for the
fight that led you to it.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

[Cub Driver]

>It's not american people fault, it's all propaganda and biased information,
>of the same kind germans invented at national socialism time

Kill-file!

Probably should program the old kill-file to incorporate anyone who
styles himself "John Doe" with my intervention...


all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

[Cub Driver]

>>> what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
>> die in vietnam

Isn't that amazing? A product of which demented school system? He
can't spell, can't punctuate, and thinks George Bush was prezdint
during the Vietnam War!

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

[phil hunt]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 13:34:57 +0100, John Mullen > wrote:
>"Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
...
>> In article >, John
>> Mullen > wrote:
>>
>> > Richard Bernstein, NYT
>> > Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>> >
>> > U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>>
>> <snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
>> copyright>
>
>Having had a look at the Copyright notices of both publications, it seems
>you are (technically) right here. Morally, I would contend that crediting
>online sources you have lifted text from for a non-profit purpose such as
>this, is sufficient. Certainly it's a very common practice.

This is true of lots of antisocial activities.

>After all,
>anybody who wants to can read it online in the original.

I disagree. Posting a paragraph or precis and refering to the whole
article is acceptable. Shoveling entire articles into discussion
groups is not.


--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Chris Mark]

Some knowledgeable common sense on the subject:

A Funny Sort of Empire
Are Americans really so imperial?

By Victor David Hansen

It is popular now to talk of the American "empire." In Europe particularly
there are comparisons of Mr. Bush to Caesar — and worse — and invocations
all sorts of pretentious poli-sci jargon like "hegemon," "imperium," and
"subject states," along with neologisms like "hyperpower" and "overdogs." But
if we really are imperial, we rule over a very funny sort of empire.

We do not send out proconsuls to reside over client states, which in turn
impose taxes on coerced subjects to pay for the legions. Instead, American
bases are predicated on contractual obligations — costly to us and profitable
to their hosts. We do not see any profits in Korea, but instead accept the risk
of losing almost 40,000 of our youth to ensure that Kias can flood our shores
and that shaggy students can protest outside our embassy in Seoul.

Athenians, Romans, Ottomans, and the British wanted land and treasure and
grabbed all they could get when they could. The United States hasn't annexed
anyone's soil since the Spanish-American War — a checkered period in American
history that still makes us, not them, out as villains in our own history
books. Most Americans are far more interested in carving up the Nevada desert
for monster homes than in getting their hands on Karachi or the Amazon basin.
Puerto Ricans are free to vote themselves independence anytime they wish.

Imperial powers order and subjects obey. But in our case, we offer the Turks
strategic guarantees, political support — and money — for their allegiance.
France and Russia go along in the U.N. — but only after we ensure them the
traffic of oil and security for outstanding accounts. Pakistan gets debt relief
that ruined dot-coms could only dream of; Jordan reels in more aid than our own
bankrupt municipalities.

If acrimony and invective arise, it's usually one-way: the Europeans, the
Arabs, and the South Americans all say worse things about us than we do about
them, not privately and in hurt, but publicly and proudly. Boasting that you
hate Americans — or calling our supposed imperator "moron" or "Hitler" —
won't get you censured by our Senate or earn a tongue-lashing from our
president, but is more likely to get you ten minutes on CNN. We are considered
haughty by Berlin not because we send a Germanicus with four legions across the
Rhine, but because Mr. Bush snubs Mr. Schroeder by not phoning him as
frequently as the German press would like.

Empires usually have contenders that check their power and through rivalry
drive their ambitions. Athens worried about Sparta and Persia. Rome found its
limits when it butted up against Germany and Parthia. The Ottomans never could
bully too well the Venetians or the Spanish. Britain worried about France and
Spain at sea and the Germanic peoples by land. In contrast, the restraint on
American power is not China, Russia, or the European Union, but rather the
American electorate itself — whose reluctant worries are chronicled weekly by
polls that are eyed with fear by our politicians. We, not them, stop us from
becoming what we could.

The Athenian ekklesia, the Roman senate, and the British Parliament alike were
eager for empire and reflected the energy of their people. In contrast, America
went to war late and reluctantly in World Wars I and II, and never finished the
job in either Korea or Vietnam. We were likely to sigh in relief when we were
kicked out of the Philippines, and really have no desire to return. Should the
Greeks tell us to leave Crete — promises, promises — we would be more
likely to count the money saved than the influence lost. Take away all our
troops from Germany and polls would show relief, not anger, among Americans.
Isolationism, parochialism, and self-absorption are far stronger in the
American character than desire for overseas adventurism. Our critics may slur
us for "overreaching," but our elites in the military and government worry that
they have to coax a reluctant populace, not constrain a blood-drunk rabble.

The desire of a young Roman quaestor or the British Victorians was to go
abroad, shine in battle, and come home laden with spoils. They wanted to be
feared, not liked. American suburbanites, inner-city residents, and rural
townspeople all will fret because a French opportunist or a Saudi autocrat says
that we are acting inappropriately. Roman imperialists had names like Magnus
and Africanus; the British anointed their returning proconsuls as Rangers,
Masters, Governors, Grandees, Sirs, and Lords. In contrast, retired American
diplomats, CIA operatives, or generals are lucky if they can melt away in
anonymity to the Virginia suburbs without a subpoena, media exposé, or
lawsuit. Proconsuls were given entire provinces; our ex-president Carter from
his peace center advises us to disarm.

Most empires chafe at the cost of their rule and complain that the expense is
near-suicidal. Athens raised the Aegean tribute often, and found itself nearly
broke after only the fifth year of the Peloponnesian War. The story of the
Roman Empire is one of shrinking legions, a debased currency, and a chronically
bankrupt imperial treasury. Even before World War I, the Raj had drained
England. In contrast, America spends less of its GNP on defense than it did
during the last five decades. And most of our military outlays go to training,
salaries, and retirements — moneys that support, educate, and help people
rather than simply stockpile weapons and hone killers. The eerie thing is not
that we have 13 massive $5 billion carriers, but that we could easily produce
and maintain 20 more.

Empires create a culture of pride and pomp, and foster a rhetoric of
superiority. Pericles, Virgil, and Kipling all talked and wrote of the grandeur
of imperial domain. How odd then that what America's literary pantheon —
Norman Mailer, Gore Vidal, Susan Sontag, and Alice Walker — said about 9/11
would either nauseate or bewilder most Americans.

Pericles could showcase his Parthenon from the tribute of empire; Rome wanted
the prestige of Pax Romana and Mare Nostrum; the Sultan thought Europe should
submit to Allah; and the Queen could boast that the sun never set on British
shores. Our imperial aims? We are happy enough if the Japanese can get their
oil from Libya safely and their Toyotas to Los Angeles without fear; or if
China can be coaxed into sending us more cheap Reeboks and in turn fewer
pirated CDs.

Our bases dot the globe to keep the sea-lanes open, thugs and murderers under
wraps, and terrorists away from European, Japanese, and American globalists who
profit mightily by blanketing the world with everything from antibiotics and
contact lenses to BMWs and Jennifer Lopez — in other words, to keep the world
safe and prosperous enough for Michael Moore to rant on spec, for Noam Chomsky
to garner a lot of money and tenure from a defense-contracting MIT, for Barbra
Streisand to make millions, for Edward Said's endowed chair to withstand Wall
Street downturns, for Jesse Jackson to take off safely on his jet-powered,
tax-free junkets.

Why then does the world hate a country that uses it power to keep the peace
rather than rule? Resentment, jealousy, and envy of the proud and powerful are
often cited as the very human and age-old motives that prompt states
irrationally to slur and libel — just as people do against their betters. No
doubt Thucydides would agree. But there are other more subtle factors involved
that explain the peculiar present angst against America — and why the French
or Germans say worse things about free Americans who saved them than they did
about Soviets who wanted to kill them.

Observers like to see an empire suffer and pay a price for its influence. That
way they think imperial sway is at least earned. Athenians died all over the
Mediterranean, from Egypt to Sicily; their annual burial ceremony was the
occasion for the best of Hellenic panegyric. The list of British disasters from
the Crimea and Afghanistan to Zululand and Khartoum was the stuff of Victorian
poetry. But since Vietnam Americans have done pretty much what they wanted to
in the Gulf, Panama, Haiti, Grenada, Serbia, and Afghanistan, with less than an
aggregate of a few hundred lost to enemy fire — a combat imbalance never seen
in the annals of warfare. So not only can Americans defeat their adversaries,
but they don't even die doing it. Shouldn't — our critics insist — we at
least have some body bags?

Intervention is supposed to be synonymous with exploitation; thus the Athenians
killed, enslaved, exacted, and robbed on Samos and Melos. No one thought Rome
was going into Numidia or Gaul — one million killed, another million enslaved
— to implant local democracy. Nor did the British decide that at last
17th-century India needed indigenous elections. But Americans have overthrown
Noriega, Milosevic, and Mullah Omar and to rid Iraq of Saddam Hussein, to put
in their places elected leaders, not legates or local client kings. Instead of
the much-rumored "pipeline" that we supposedly coveted in Afghanistan, we are
paying tens of millions to build a road and bridges so that Afghan truckers and
traders won't break their axles.

In that regard, America is also a revolutionary, rather than a stuffy imperial
society. Its crass culture abroad — rap music, Big Macs, Star Wars, Pepsi,
and Beverly Hillbillies reruns — does not reflect the tastes and values of
either an Oxbridge elite or a landed Roman aristocracy. That explains why Le
Monde or a Spanish deputy minister may libel us, even as millions of
semi-literate Mexicans, unfree Arabs, and oppressed southeast Asians are dying
to get here. It is one thing to mobilize against grasping, wealthy white people
who want your copper, bananas, or rubber — quite another when your own youth
want what black, brown, yellow, and white middle-class Americans alike have to
offer. We so-called imperialists don't wear pith helmets, but rather baggy
jeans and backwards baseball caps. Thus far the rest of the globe — whether
Islamic fundamentalists, European socialists, or Chinese Communists — has not
yet formulated an ideology antithetical to the kinetic American strain of
Western culture.

Much, then, of what we read about the evil of American imperialism is written
by post-heroic and bored elites, intellectuals, and coffeehouse hacks, whose
freedom and security are a given, but whose rarified tastes are apparently
unshared and endangered. In contrast, the poorer want freedom and material
things first — and cynicism, skepticism, irony, and nihilism second. So we
should not listen to what a few say, but rather look at what many do.

Critiques of the United States based on class, race, nationality, or taste have
all failed to explicate, much less stop, the American cultural juggernaut.
Forecasts of bankrupting defense expenditures and imperial overstretch are the
stuff of the faculty lounge. Neither Freud nor Marx is of much help. And real
knowledge of past empires that might allow judicious analogies is beyond the
grasp of popular pundits.

Add that all up, and our exasperated critics are left with the same old empty
jargon of legions and gunboats.


Chris Mark

[Ed Rasimus]

Cub Driver > wrote:

>
>>>> what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
>>> die in vietnam
>
>Isn't that amazing? A product of which demented school system? He
>can't spell, can't punctuate, and thinks George Bush was prezdint
>during the Vietnam War!
>
>all the best -- Dan Ford
>email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

And, doesn't quote the song correctly either.

"And it's one, two, three, what are we fightin' for?
Don't ask me, I don't give a damn.
Next stop is Vietnam.
And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates.
Well, there ain't no time to wonder why,
Whoopie! We're all gonna die!"

Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
between 58,000 dead and less than 200; can't tell the difference
between an occupied country and an ongoing Communist insurgency.

Probably thinks a quagmire is related to a quahog.



Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

[WDA]

Like we have ever really had it? In this world a nation has occasional
allies; It NEVER has "friends"!
As for sympathy, especially that ersatz European variety, let them put it
where the sun never shines.

WDA

end

"John Mullen" > wrote in message
...
> Richard Bernstein, NYT
> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>
> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> BERLIN In the two years since Sept. 11, 2001, the view of the United
> States as a victim of terrorism that deserved the world's sympathy and
> support has given way in the months after the war in Iraq to a
> widespread vision of America as an imperial power that has defied
> world public opinion in an unjustified and unilateral use of military
> force.
> .
> "A lot of people had sympathy for Americans around the time of 9/11,
> but that's changed," said Cathy Hearn, 31, a flight attendant from
> South Africa, expressing a view commonly heard in many countries.
> "They act like the big guy riding roughshod over everyone else."
> .
> Across the globe, from Africa to Europe, South America to Southeast
> Asia, the war in Iraq has had a major impact on a public opinion that
> has moved generally from post-Sept. 11 sympathy to post-Iraq-war
> antipathy, or, at least to disappointment over what is seen as the
> sole remaining superpower's inclination to act pre-emptively with
> neither persuasive reasons nor United Nations approval.
> .
> To some degree, the resentment is centered on the person of President
> George W. Bush, who is seen by many as, at best, an ineffective
> spokesman for American interests and, at worst, a gunslinging cowboy
> knocking over international treaties and bent on controlling the
> world's oil supplies, if not the entire world. Foreign policy experts
> point to slowly developing fissures born with the end of the cold war
> that emerged only in the debate leading up to the Iraq war.
> .
> "I think the turnaround was last summer when American policy moved
> ever more decisively toward war against Iraq," Joseph Joffe, co-editor
> of the German weekly newspaper Die Zeit, said. "That's what triggered
> the counter alliance of France and Germany and the enormous wave of
> hatred against the United States."
> .
> The subject of America in the world is, of course, complicated, and
> the nation's ebbing international image could rise quickly in response
> to events. The Bush administration's recent turn to the United Nations
> for help in postwar Iraq may, by stepping away from unilateralism,
> represents such an event. Even at this low point, millions of people
> still see the United States as a beacon and support its policies,
> including the war in Iraq, and would, if given the chance, be happy to
> become Americans themselves.
> .
> Some regions, especially Europe, are split in their view of America's
> role, with the governments, and, to a lesser extent, the people, of
> the former Soviet Bloc countries much more favorably disposed to
> American power than the governments and people of American allies in
> Europe, most notably France and Germany.
> .
> In a strongly allied country like Japan, insecure in the face of a
> hostile, nuclear-armed North Korea a short missile distance away,
> there may be doubts about the wisdom of the American war on Iraq. But
> there seem to be far fewer doubts about the importance of American
> power generally to global stability.
> .
> In China, while many ordinary people express doubts about America's
> war in Iraq, anti-American feeling has diminished since Sept. 11, and
> there seems to be greater understanding and less instinctive criticism
> of the United States by government officials and intellectuals. The
> Chinese authorities have largely embraced America's "war on terror."
> .
> Still, a widespread and fashionable view is that the United States is
> a classically imperialist power bent on controlling global oil
> supplies and on military domination.
> .
> The prevailing global mood has been expressed in different ways by
> many different people, from the hockey fans in Montreal who booed the
> American national anthem to the high school students in Switzerland
> who don't want to go to the United States as exchange students because
> America isn't "in."
> .
> But even among people who do not believe the various conspiracy
> theories that are being bandied about, it is not difficult to hear
> very strong denunciations of American policy and a deep questioning of
> American motives.
> .
> "America has taken power over the world," said Dmitri Ostalsky, 25, a
> literary critic and writer in Moscow. "It's a wonderful country, but
> it seized power. It's ruling the world. America's attempts to rebuild
> all the world in the image of liberalism and capitalism are fraught
> with the same dangers as the Nazis taking over the world."
> .
> A Frenchman, Jean-Charles Pogram, 45, a computer technician, said
> this: "Everyone agrees on the principles of democracy and freedom, but
> the problem is that we don't agree with the means to achieve those
> ends.
> .
> "The United States can't see beyond the axiom that force can solve
> everything but Europe, because of two world wars, knows the price of
> blood," he said.
> .
> Lydia Adhiamba, a 20-year-old student at the Institute of Advanced
> Technology in Nairobi, said that the United States "wants to rule the
> whole world, and that's why there's so much animosity to the U.S."
> .
> This week, the major English language daily newspaper in Indonesia,
> The Jakarta Post, ran a prominent article entitled "Why moderate
> Muslims are annoyed with America," by Sayidiman Suryohadiprojo.
> .
> "If America wants to become a hegemonic power it is rather difficult
> for other nations to prevent that," he wrote. "However, if America
> wants to be a hegemonic power that has the respect and trust of other
> nations, it must be a benign one and not one that causes a reaction of
> hate or fear among other nations."
> .
> Crucial to global public opinion has been the failure of the Bush
> administration to persuade large segments of public opinion of its
> justification for going to war in Iraq.
> .
> In striking contrast to public opinion in the United States, where
> polls show a majority believing that there was a connection between
> Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and the Al Qaeda terrorists who carried
> out the Sept. 11 attacks, the rest of the world does not believe that
> argument because, most people say, the evidence has not been produced.
> .
> This explains the enormous difference in international opinion between
> American military action in Afghanistan in the months after Sept. 11,
> which seemed to have tacit approval around the world as a legitimate
> act of self-defense, and the view of American military action in Iraq,
> which is commonly seen as the arbitrary act of an overbearing power.
> .
> Perhaps the strongest effect on public opinion has been in Arab and
> Muslim countries.
> .
> Even in relatively moderate Muslim countries like Indonesia and
> Turkey, or countries with large Muslim populations, like Nigeria,
> polls and interviews show sharp drops in public approval of the United
> States over the past year.
> .
> In unabashedly pro-American countries like Poland, perhaps the most
> important America ally on Iraq after Britain, polls show 60 percent of
> the public opposed to the Polish government's decision to send 2,500
> troops in Iraq under overall American command.
> .
> For many people, the issue is not so much the United States as it is
> the Bush administration, and what is seen as its arrogance. In this
> view, a different set of policies and a different set of public
> statements from Washington would have resulted in a different set of
> attitudes toward the United States.
> .
> "The point I would make is that with the best will in the world,
> President Bush is a very poor salesman for the United States, and I
> say that as someone who has no animus against him or the United
> States," said Philip Gawaith, a financial communications consultant in
> London. "Whether it's Al Qaeda or Afghanistan, people have just felt
> that he's a silly man and therefore they are not obliged to think any
> harder about his position."
> .
> But while the public statements of the Bush administration have not
> played well in much of the world, many analysts see deeper causes for
> the rift that has opened between the United States and even many of
> its closest former allies.
> .
> In their view, the Iraq war has not so much caused a new divergence
> but highlighted and widened one that has existed at least since the
> end of the cold war. Put bluntly, Europe needs America less now that
> it feels less threatened.
> .
> Indeed, while the United States probably feels more threatened now
> than in 1989, when the cold war ended, Europe is broadly unconvinced
> of any imminent threat As a result, America and Europe tend to view
> the world differently.
> .
> "There were deep structural forces before 9/11 that were pushing us
> apart," said John Mearsheimer, professor of political science at the
> University of Chicago and the author of "The Tragedy of Great Power
> Politics."
> .
> He added: "In the absence of the Soviet threat or of an equivalent
> threat, there was no way that ties between U.S. and Europe wouldn't be
> loosened.
> .
> "So, when the Bush administration came to power, the question was
> whether it would make things better or worse, and I'd argue that it
> made them worse.
> .
> "In the war, you could argue that American unilateralism had no cost,"
> Mearsheimer continued. "But, as we're finding out with regard to Iraq,
> Iran and North Korea, we need the Europeans and we need institutions
> like the UN. The fact is that the United States can't run the world by
> itself, and the problem is we've done a lot of damage in our relations
> with allies, and people are not terribly enthusiastic about helping us
> now."
> .
> Recent findings of international surveys have given a mathematical
> expression to these differences. A poll of 8,000 people in Europe and
> the United States conducted by the German Marshall Fund of the United
> States and the Compagnia di Sao Paolo of Italy, found Americans and
> Europeans agreeing on the nature of global threats, but disagreeing
> sharply on how they should be dealt with.
> .
> Most striking was a difference over the use of military force, with 84
> percent of Americans and 48 percent of Europeans supporting force as a
> means of imposing international justice.
> .
> In Europe overall, the number of people who want the United States to
> maintain a strong global presence went down 19 percentage points since
> a similar poll last year, from 64 percent to 45 percent, while 50
> percent of respondents in Germany, France and Italy express opposition
> to American international leadership.
> .
> Many of the difficulties predated Sept. 11, of course. Eberhard
> Sandschneider, director of the German Council on Foreign Relations,
> has listed some in a recent paper: "Economic disputes relating to
> steel and farm subsidies; limits on legal cooperation because of the
> death penalty in the United States; repeated charges of U.S.
> 'unilateralism' over actions in Afghanistan; and the U.S. decisions on
> the ABM Treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, the International Criminal Court,
> and the Biological Weapons Protocol."
> .
> "One could conclude that there is today a serious question as to
> whether Europe and the United States are parting ways," Sandschneider
> writes.
> .
> From this point of view, as Sandschneider and others have said, the
> divergence between the United States and many other countries will not
> be a temporary phenomenon stemming from the Iraqi war, but a permanent
> aspect of the international scene.
> .
> A recent survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project showed a growth of
> anti-American sentiment in many non-European parts of the world. It
> found, for example that only 15 percent of Indonesians now have a
> favorable impression of the United States, down from 60 percent a year
> ago.
> .
> Indonesia may be an especially troubling case to American policymakers
> who have hoped that Indonesia, a moderate country with a relatively
> easy-going attitude toward religion, would emerge as a kind of
> pro-American Islamic model.
> .
> But since Sept. 11, a group of extremists known as Jemaah Islamiyah
> has gained strength, hitting targets in Bali and Jakarta and making
> the country so insecure that Bush may not be able to stop off there
> during an Asia trip planned for next month.
> .
> One well-known mainstream Muslim leader, Din Syamsuddin, the
> American-educated vice president of a 30 million-strong Islamic
> organization, called the United States the "king of the terrorists"
> and referred to Bush as "drunken horse."
> .
> This turn for the worse has occurred despite a $10 million program by
> the State Department called the Shared Values Campaign in which
> speakers and short films showing Muslim life in the United States were
> sent last fall to Muslim countries, like Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia
> and Kuwait.
>
>
>

[Kevin Brooks]

Aerophotos > wrote in message >...
> hey sonny
>
> youve never heard of the famous anti vietnam war protest song in the 60s
> obviously..
>
> that send up was quite famous, obviously your so PTSD wound up you cant
> remeber it...
>
> and obviosuly sonny aka skip cant understand the relation between
> vietnam and iraq... both were quagmires started by the us foreign
> policies which are in no way useful to the worlds health

JGG, have you *really* been accepted into the RAAF? I would have
thought that their requirements would have included some rudimentary
written communications skills...which you have yet to demonstrate. And
BTW; GWB did not send us to Vietnam.

Brooks

>
>
>
> Sunny wrote:
> >
> > "Aerophotos" > wrote in message
> > ...
> > <snip crap>
> > >> what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
> > > die in vietnam
> > <snip more crap>
> > **** your a dork JGG. (get someone to read your **** out loud to
> > you...slowly)
>
> --

[El Bastardo]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 10:49:27 +0100, Alan Lothian >
wrote:

>In article >, John
>Mullen > wrote:
>
>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>>
>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
><snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
>copyright>
>
>The sympathy of the world (whatever the hell "world" means in that
>context) plus two euros will buy you a cup of coffee in some capital
>cities.
>

Add a couple more euros and you can get a nice cappucino.

[El Bastardo]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 13:34:57 +0100, "John Mullen" > wrote:

>"Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
...
>> In article >, John
>> Mullen > wrote:
>>
>> > Richard Bernstein, NYT
>> > Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>> >
>> > U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>>
>> <snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
>> copyright>
>
>Having had a look at the Copyright notices of both publications, it seems
>you are (technically) right here. Morally, I would contend that crediting
>online sources you have lifted text from for a non-profit purpose such as
>this, is sufficient. Certainly it's a very common practice. After all,
>anybody who wants to can read it online in the original.


Ever heard of fair use, or the newswothiness exception?

Do you think "copyright notices" fully and fairly inform you of the
law? Which of course varies in different jurisdictions.

[av8r]

Coudn't hack basic training eh, or did you even go ??????????????????

[El Bastardo]

On 12 Sep 2003 16:52:18 GMT, (Chris Mark) wrote:

>Some knowledgeable common sense on the subject:
>
>A Funny Sort of Empire
>Are Americans really so imperial?
>
>By Victor David Hansen
>
>It is popular now to talk of the American "empire." In Europe particularly
>there are comparisons of Mr. Bush to Caesar — and worse — and invocations
>all sorts of pretentious poli-sci jargon like "hegemon," "imperium," and
>"subject states," along with neologisms like "hyperpower" and "overdogs." But
>if we really are imperial, we rule over a very funny sort of empire.

******
snip

******
>Add that all up, and our exasperated critics are left with the same old empty
>jargon of legions and gunboats.
>
>
>Chris Mark

You don't think all this new found hatred of the "American Empire"
will encourage a bit of defense spending in Europe do you? Nah, doubt
they would do anything that would hurt their pensions.

What a pity.

How can the US respect a world power who won't stand up against a
bully like us?

[El Bastardo]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 21:26:18 +1000, Aerophotos >
wrote:

>
>hey sonny
>
>youve never heard of the famous anti vietnam war protest song in the 60s
>obviously..
>
>that send up was quite famous, obviously your so PTSD wound up you cant
>remeber it...
>
>and obviosuly sonny aka skip cant understand the relation between
>vietnam and iraq... both were quagmires started by the us foreign
>policies which are in no way useful to the worlds health
>
>
>

Can somebody please supply with the "moron" cipher key so I can
decrypt this message?

[Vince Brannigan]

Ed Rasimus wrote:
> Cub Driver > wrote:
>
>
>>>>>what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
>>>>
>>>>die in vietnam
>>>
>>Isn't that amazing? A product of which demented school system? He
>>can't spell, can't punctuate, and thinks George Bush was prezdint
>>during the Vietnam War!
>>
>>all the best -- Dan Ford
>>email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9
>
>
> And, doesn't quote the song correctly either.
>
> "And it's one, two, three, what are we fightin' for?
> Don't ask me, I don't give a damn.
> Next stop is Vietnam.
> And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates.
> Well, there ain't no time to wonder why,
> Whoopie! We're all gonna die!"
>
> Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
> between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
> between 58,000 dead and less than 200; can't tell the difference
> between an occupied country and an ongoing Communist insurgency.
>

However, given that the Song was released in 1965 Country Joe McDonald
certainly qualifies as a brilliant political/military analyst. As just
one example even by the end of 1965 we had lost only 528 Marines in
vietnam. The final total was over 14,000
http://www.marzone.com/7thMarines/usmc_cas_stats.pdf

Vince




How many dead had we accumulated in 1965?

[George Shirley]

El *******o wrote:

> On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 21:26:18 +1000, Aerophotos >
> wrote:
>
>
>>hey sonny
>>
>>youve never heard of the famous anti vietnam war protest song in the 60s
>>obviously..
>>
>>that send up was quite famous, obviously your so PTSD wound up you cant
>>remeber it...
>>
>>and obviosuly sonny aka skip cant understand the relation between
>>vietnam and iraq... both were quagmires started by the us foreign
>>policies which are in no way useful to the worlds health
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> Can somebody please supply with the "moron" cipher key so I can
> decrypt this message?

Usually a whack with a number 3 loon mallet will straighten them up.

George

[[email protected]]

George Shirley > wrote:


>>
>> Can somebody please supply with the "moron" cipher key so I can
>> decrypt this message?
>
>Usually a whack with a number 3 loon mallet will straighten them up.
>
>George

George!...surely you're not licensed on a level 3 LM?...I'm
impressed!...I've owned one for a long time, but can't pass the
exams. Just have to struggle along with my rickedy old level 2
unit.

(...aaaaand sorry about that other thing there...couldnt resist)

:)
--

-Gord.

[Ed Rasimus]

Vince Brannigan > wrote:

>
>
>Ed Rasimus wrote:
>>
>> And, doesn't quote the song correctly either.
>>
>> "And it's one, two, three, what are we fightin' for?
>> Don't ask me, I don't give a damn.
>> Next stop is Vietnam.
>> And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates.
>> Well, there ain't no time to wonder why,
>> Whoopie! We're all gonna die!"
>>
>> Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
>> between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
>> between 58,000 dead and less than 200; can't tell the difference
>> between an occupied country and an ongoing Communist insurgency.
>>
>
>However, given that the Song was released in 1965 Country Joe McDonald
>certainly qualifies as a brilliant political/military analyst. As just
>one example even by the end of 1965 we had lost only 528 Marines in
>vietnam. The final total was over 14,000
>http://www.marzone.com/7thMarines/usmc_cas_stats.pdf
>
>Vince

While I find the song entertaining, and the lyrics poetic, I don't
agree that it qualifies at any level as "brilliant political/military"
analysis.

It doesn't address involvement, international relations, tactics,
understanding of SEA culture, the efficacy of the Truman
Doctrine/containment, or a raft of relevant topics. It's great social
commentary and brilliant populism expressed before a receptive
audience.

Is the issue simply number of deaths? Is there a specific number you'd
like to put forth that relates to acceptability? Is there, or is there
not, something worth fighting and dying for?

As for the date, Country Joe might have penned it in '65, but I don't
think it got much notice until Woodstock.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

[Vince Brannigan]

Ed Rasimus wrote:
> Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>
>>
>>Ed Rasimus wrote:
>>
>>>And, doesn't quote the song correctly either.
>>>
>>>"And it's one, two, three, what are we fightin' for?
>>> Don't ask me, I don't give a damn.
>>> Next stop is Vietnam.
>>> And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates.
>>> Well, there ain't no time to wonder why,
>>> Whoopie! We're all gonna die!"
>>>
>>>Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
>>>between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
>>>between 58,000 dead and less than 200; can't tell the difference
>>>between an occupied country and an ongoing Communist insurgency.
>>>
>>
>>However, given that the Song was released in 1965 Country Joe McDonald
>>certainly qualifies as a brilliant political/military analyst. As just
>>one example even by the end of 1965 we had lost only 528 Marines in
>>vietnam. The final total was over 14,000
>>http://www.marzone.com/7thMarines/usmc_cas_stats.pdf
>>
>>Vince
>
>
> While I find the song entertaining, and the lyrics poetic, I don't
> agree that it qualifies at any level as "brilliant political/military"
> analysis.
>
only in the sense of its timing. Sort of like the Star Spangled banner,
its always more imp0ressive when a poet sees things before others.


> It doesn't address involvement, international relations, tactics,
> understanding of SEA culture, the efficacy of the Truman
> Doctrine/containment, or a raft of relevant topics. It's great social
> commentary and brilliant populism expressed before a receptive
> audience.

Fair enough, although the same coudl be said of "green berets" with john
wayne
>
> Is the issue simply number of deaths? Is there a specific number you'd
> like to put forth that relates to acceptability? Is there, or is there
> not, something worth fighting and dying for?

not the issue see below

> As for the date, Country Joe might have penned it in '65, but I don't
> think it got much notice until Woodstock.

I certinaly remember it vividly when he sang it in 1966 I was there. By
Woodstock it was already an Icon.

Vince

[Leslie Swartz]

There is indeed an obvious difference between "quoting a relevant excerpt"
and "reproducing the entire document."

Your point is entirely irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

As a personal aside, what would drive a person to do this? I've never
understood that phenomenon- the use of an inappropriate counterargument in
refutation of a position- but I do agree it is effective, as many people are
too weak-minded or are inattentive to the discussion to notice. I, for one,
have never even considered the use of such misdirection to state a case. I
just fundamentally don't understand how anyone would consider using such a
ploy. Was it an accident?

Steve Swartz


"Prof. Vincent Brannigan" > wrote in message
...
>
>
> Alan Lothian wrote:
>
> > In article >, John
> > Mullen > wrote:
> >
> > > Richard Bernstein, NYT
> > > Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
> > >
> > > U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
> >
> > <snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
> > copyright>
>
> On this point I have to disagree. It is clealry being distributed for the
> purpose of comment and reaction, which is classic "Fair use" under the
> copyright law.
>
> BERNE CONVENTION FOR THE PROTECTION OF
> LITERARY AND ARTISTIC WORKS (Paris Text 1971)
>
> Article 10
>
> (1) It shall be permissible to make quotations from a work which has
already
> been lawfully made available to the public,
> provided that their making is compatible with fair practice, and their
extent
> does not exceed that justified by the purpose,
> including quotations from newspaper articles and periodicals in the form
of
> press summaries
>
> Vince
>

[Leslie Swartz]

Diogenes Weeps.

Steve Swartz

"John Doe" > wrote in message
...
> > This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> > policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> > the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> > important than the War against Terrorism.
>
>
> Maybe a bit less of Fox News biased propaganda and a bit more listening of
> the worldwide opinion would help the USA in dealing with foreign
countries.
> You're so self-centered and buried in your own pro-US propaganda that you
> have no real contact with the rest of the world, so how can you pretent to
> bring peace and stability (with weapons!!!) throughout the world without
> knowing it, and without wanting to know it.
> It's not american people fault, it's all propaganda and biased
information,
> of the same kind germans invented at national socialism time and which is
> still used at each crisis (please, I'm not saying US people are Nazis!).
> It's the same kind of propaganda that was used by soviets and of course by
> extreme islamists.
> You should know, especially you in this "military" forum, that at war
time,
> misinformation and propaganda play a major role. So, do you really swallow
> every word, all the bull****, that your puppet of president Bush says?!
>
> The tv news we have in Europe are not the same as US ones, we have another
> point of view of the world from where things don't look the same. So in
> example it's better to put US and European news in the balance to get an
> opinion that should me more correct. You should do the same in the US,
> before things to get worse. This article isn't bull**** (at least you
think
> the others opinion always is bull****...) and you should have the
> intelligence to pick some good points in it.
>
> Not being single minded and keeping a critical spirit is a good thing,
> whatever the situation is...
>
> Yours, John
>
>

[T3]

"Vince Brannigan" > wrote in message
...
>
>
> Ed Rasimus wrote:
> > Vince Brannigan > wrote:
> >
> >
> >>(snipped)
> >
> > >
> >> > As for the date, Country Joe might have penned it in '65, but I don't
> > think it got much notice until Woodstock.
>
> I certinaly remember it vividly when he sang it in 1966 I was there. By
> Woodstock it was already an Icon.
>
> Vince
>
Oh yes, it was popular long before Woodstock. It hit home to me in '68,
when I was drafted!!
........Be the first person on your block, to have your boy come home in a
box....

T3

[Vince Brannigan]

Leslie Swartz wrote:
> There is indeed an obvious difference between "quoting a relevant excerpt"
> and "reproducing the entire document."

its not the entire document. its a single story in a newspaper



>
> Your point is entirely irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
>

Dont think so

> As a personal aside, what would drive a person to do this? I've never
> understood that phenomenon- the use of an inappropriate counterargument in
> refutation of a position- but I do agree it is effective, as many people are
> too weak-minded or are inattentive to the discussion to notice. I, for one,
> have never even considered the use of such misdirection to state a case. I
> just fundamentally don't understand how anyone would consider using such a
> ploy. Was it an accident?
>

Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.

im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
copyright law

Vince


> Steve Swartz
>
>
> "Prof. Vincent Brannigan" > wrote in message
> ...
>
>>
>>Alan Lothian wrote:
>>
>>
>>>In article >, John
>>>Mullen > wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>Richard Bernstein, NYT
>>>>Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>>>>
>>>>U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>>>
>>><snip of loads of stuff distributed around the Net in gross breach of
>>>copyright>
>>
>>On this point I have to disagree. It is clealry being distributed for the
>>purpose of comment and reaction, which is classic "Fair use" under the
>>copyright law.
>>
>>BERNE CONVENTION FOR THE PROTECTION OF
>>LITERARY AND ARTISTIC WORKS (Paris Text 1971)
>>
>>Article 10
>>
>>(1) It shall be permissible to make quotations from a work which has
>
> already
>
>>been lawfully made available to the public,
>>provided that their making is compatible with fair practice, and their
>
> extent
>
>>does not exceed that justified by the purpose,
>>including quotations from newspaper articles and periodicals in the form
>
> of
>
>>press summaries
>>
>>Vince
>>
>
>
>

[Chad Irby]

Vince Brannigan > wrote:

> Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.

If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
apostrophe key.

> im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
> copyright law

And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
something spouting obvious falsehoods...

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Tex Houston]

"T3" > wrote in message
om...
> Oh yes, it was popular long before Woodstock. It hit home to me in '68,
> when I was drafted!!
> .......Be the first person on your block, to have your boy come home in a
> box....
>
Since Woodstock was held August 15,16,17 1969 I find 1968 a long way from
"long before".
Aside...I was already at Takhli.

Tex

[Sunny]

"Aerophotos" > wrote in message
...
> youve never heard of the famous anti vietnam war protest song in the 60s
> obviously..

Only famous to those who always sit back and let others do the job.
JGG go buy yourself a clue, study it for 10 years, then check back here for
updates

[phil hunt]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 16:57:21 GMT, Ed Rasimus > wrote:
>Cub Driver > wrote:
>
>>
>>>>> what are we fighting for i dont give a damn cause george bush sent us to
>>>> die in vietnam
>>
>>Isn't that amazing? A product of which demented school system? He
>>can't spell, can't punctuate, and thinks George Bush was prezdint
>>during the Vietnam War!
>>
>>all the best -- Dan Ford
>>email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9
>
>And, doesn't quote the song correctly either.
>
>"And it's one, two, three, what are we fightin' for?
> Don't ask me, I don't give a damn.
> Next stop is Vietnam.
> And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates.
> Well, there ain't no time to wonder why,
> Whoopie! We're all gonna die!"
>
>Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
>between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
>between 58,000 dead and less than 200;

These statistics aren't the most important. More important, IMO,
are opinion polls of US support for the occupation of iraq.

From <http://www.greenleft.org.au/current/547p14.htm>:
A Detroit News poll, published on July 23, found that 48% of voters
believe the White House misled the US people about the need to
invade Iraq, while 47% didn't believe they were misled. Seventy-one
per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
"expensive, long and deadly".

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Vince Brannigan]

Chad Irby wrote:
> Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>
>>Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.
>
>
> If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
> apostrophe key.
>
>
>>im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
>>copyright law
>
>
> And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
> something spouting obvious falsehoods...
>

Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C. Where are you licensed?

Vincent Brannigan

[ArtKramr]

>Subject: Re: U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>From: Vince Brannigan
>Date: 9/12/03 4:38 PM Pacific Daylight Time
>Message-id: >
>
>
>
>Chad Irby wrote:
>> Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.
>>
>>
>> If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
>> apostrophe key.
>>
>>
>>>im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
>>>copyright law
>>
>>
>> And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
>> something spouting obvious falsehoods...
>>
>
>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C. Where are you licensed?
>
>Vincent Brannigan
..

What is your position on Barron vs Baltimore? Was justice done?. Did John
Marshall fail in light of the Commerce Clause?

Arthur Kramer
2nd year student History of Constitutional Law UNLV

[ArtKramr]

>Subject: Re: U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>From: Vince Brannigan
>Date: 9/12/03 4:38 PM Pacific

>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C. Where are you licensed?
>
>Vincent Brannigan

If John Marsshall had refused to hear Madison vs Marbury and judicial review
had never been establishe, would Gore v. Florida been possible?

Arthur Kramer
2nd year student Con Law UNLV

[Ed Rasimus]

(phil hunt) wrote:

>On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 16:57:21 GMT, Ed Rasimus > wrote:
>>
>>Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
>>between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
>>between 58,000 dead and less than 200;
>
>These statistics aren't the most important. More important, IMO,
>are opinion polls of US support for the occupation of iraq.
>
>From <http://www.greenleft.org.au/current/547p14.htm>:
>A Detroit News poll, published on July 23, found that 48% of voters
>believe the White House misled the US people about the need to
>invade Iraq, while 47% didn't believe they were misled. Seventy-one
>per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
>"expensive, long and deadly".

I'd have to question the efficacy of conducting foreign policy by
opinion poll. Based on the poll quoted from "greenleft" (wonder what
their particular political bias might be) at ".au" (wonder how many
polls taken in the US they had access to and why they choose this
one,) I'd say a 1% difference is within the margin of error.

I'd also say that the much larger sampling of polls that gets
published within the US indicates about 55% (lowest of seen) support
for the Bush administrations conduct of the war on terror, and about
70% support for Iraqi Freedom.

The issue isn't, however, what was under discussion here--it was the
likening of Iraqi Freedom to Vietnam. The use of the value-laden term
"quagmire" for this very brief engagement isn't appropriate.

It took more than five years of involvement for the US in Vietnam
before David Halberstam attached the term to the policy.

In five months, we clearly don't have "the making of a quagmire",
we've barely gotten started.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

[Gene Storey]

"ArtKramr" > wrote
>
> If John Marsshall had refused to hear Madison vs Marbury and judicial review
> had never been establishe, would Gore v. Florida been possible?

Yes. It was a purely Constitutional issue, that only a Supreme Court would
have jurisdictiction in.

[ArtKramr]

>Subject: Re: U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>From: "Gene Storey"
>Date: 9/12/03 6:36 PM Pacific Daylight Time
>Message-id: >
>
>"ArtKramr" > wrote
>>
>> If John Marsshall had refused to hear Madison vs Marbury and judicial
>review
>> had never been establishe, would Gore v. Florida been possible?
>
>Yes. It was a purely Constitutional issue, that only a Supreme Court would
>have jurisdictiction in.
>
>

But without judicial review it would have been unconstitional for the Supreme
Court to have ruled on a states right issue. Barron v Baltimore makes that
clear.


Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer

[Aerophotos]

Maybe ed sometime it takes men of courage and ability to see beyond the
silver lining of the present..

Have you after 40yrs of been trained as a TAC trained killer changed
your ways?


i dont think so...

Military people like me who is in training at present are cut off from
the world in initial training... so we have no knowledge or interaction
as we learn how to kill others...this is done to isolate us and make us
brainwashed and do what the military aka govt of day requests us to do.

This is a reason why vietnam and other war vets can not adjust to life
is cause thy are still in a military mindset. they have no idea how to
adopt to a civil world...

That is the simple aim of being in a military force... and funny notice
how we in australia generally except for current period of under
"howardism" defend the country or help defend others...not go and murder
people aka iraq.... the us mil other hand is never structured to defend
but only to attack other countries...hence nukes and chemical and bio
weapons and etc etc..


Alot of the world can see the us is dragging it self into a modern day
revised epic of the vietnam era. hence term - quagmire... when you
loose more people dead after the war , then in a war something is
seriously wrong..


could be maybe arabs dont like americans ...? and americans dont like
arabs, much same as most americans didnt like Vietnamese and vice versa
40yrs ago.

Deny all you want currently iraq is a quagmire .. but it may change..
elections are not long off... bush will do something... we wants to stay
in power...gota slow down the coffins in a box returnin home on the
block abit more...


But tell me why is the leader of your ****ry scrambling as we speak to
get other countries who had no such involvement in invading iraq to take
over from it.. bizzare foreign policies he we come again ..sigh

The us FP is so twisted and distorted they never see the impact until
long after and they then deny it was ever created...


I know a well respected friend of mine who flew BUFFs over nam ... he
QUIT the usaf cause of the bull**** the govt was doing in 1972.. he
couldnt handle it how they had ROEs and killing of civilians etc...

I was surprised to hear this come from a BUFF driver but then he totally
hated the US govt .. after 4yrs of flying in a ****ed up warzone...

So in iraq if this war is so popular why is nearly ever us troop so
desperate to leave the country? maybe says they went into the wrong
one...

If loosing 10 troops a day either dead or a mix of injured every day in
iraq doesnt concern you, maybe the thought that the war and peacekeeping
is not ending anytime soon might ...... this is where a quagmire is
formed and sticks to the issue...

Vietnam started off been a illegal war, remember in order to have war u
must declare it. remember ed... you guys bombed the north vietnamese a
fair bit...

Vietnam wasnt declared a war at any time tho it lasted 17yrs - gota
wonder why.. cheap way of cutting the weaklings from the us popualation
aka death in combat and same time helped the mil complex make record
profits...

So issues just keep going around and around....arabs are just as stupid
as americans... and vice versa

both want death and fame.. until one side actually thinks - the whole
shamble will just continue the same


If im ever asked to be deployed to fight a war with the US military i
am going to object in my unit and say no,regardless of the consequences
- i joined to defend Australia. and that what i will do, not defend
some other pathetic superpower who cant even hold its own ground.




Ed Rasimus wrote:
>
> (phil hunt) wrote:
>
> >On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 16:57:21 GMT, Ed Rasimus > wrote:
> >>
> >>Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
> >>between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
> >>between 58,000 dead and less than 200;
> >
> >These statistics aren't the most important. More important, IMO,
> >are opinion polls of US support for the occupation of iraq.
> >
> >From <http://www.greenleft.org.au/current/547p14.htm>:
> >A Detroit News poll, published on July 23, found that 48% of voters
> >believe the White House misled the US people about the need to
> >invade Iraq, while 47% didn't believe they were misled. Seventy-one
> >per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
> >"expensive, long and deadly".
>
> I'd have to question the efficacy of conducting foreign policy by
> opinion poll. Based on the poll quoted from "greenleft" (wonder what
> their particular political bias might be) at ".au" (wonder how many
> polls taken in the US they had access to and why they choose this
> one,) I'd say a 1% difference is within the margin of error.
>
> I'd also say that the much larger sampling of polls that gets
> published within the US indicates about 55% (lowest of seen) support
> for the Bush administrations conduct of the war on terror, and about
> 70% support for Iraqi Freedom.
>
> The issue isn't, however, what was under discussion here--it was the
> likening of Iraqi Freedom to Vietnam. The use of the value-laden term
> "quagmire" for this very brief engagement isn't appropriate.
>
> It took more than five years of involvement for the US in Vietnam
> before David Halberstam attached the term to the policy.
>
> In five months, we clearly don't have "the making of a quagmire",
> we've barely gotten started.
>
> Ed Rasimus
> Fighter Pilot (ret)
> ***"When Thunder Rolled:
> *** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
> *** from Smithsonian Books
> ISBN: 1588341038

[phil hunt]

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 00:37:15 GMT, Ed Rasimus > wrote:
(phil hunt) wrote:
>
>>On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 16:57:21 GMT, Ed Rasimus > wrote:
>>>
>>>Also it seems our incendiary Aussie friend can't tell the difference
>>>between ten years of war and five months; can't tell the difference
>>>between 58,000 dead and less than 200;
>>
>>These statistics aren't the most important. More important, IMO,
>>are opinion polls of US support for the occupation of iraq.
>>
>>From <http://www.greenleft.org.au/current/547p14.htm>:
>>A Detroit News poll, published on July 23, found that 48% of voters
>>believe the White House misled the US people about the need to
>>invade Iraq, while 47% didn't believe they were misled. Seventy-one
>>per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
>>"expensive, long and deadly".
>
>I'd have to question the efficacy of conducting foreign policy by
>opinion poll.

Oh, so would I. But it cannot be denied that politicians who want to
be re-elected pay attention to such factors; and that if public
policy on major issues strays too far from public opinion, leaders
get kicked out.

>Based on the poll quoted from "greenleft" (wonder what
>their particular political bias might be)

It's unlikely that they'd make up precise figures that can be
easily checked -- I know if I was writing a political polemic, I
wouldn't, since there is little to be gained from it and much to be
lost.

>at ".au" (wonder how many
>polls taken in the US they had access to and why they choose this
>one,) I'd say a 1% difference is within the margin of error.

Typically polls use a sample of 1000, which means individual figures
have a 95% confidence interval of +/- 2%. So clearly the 1%
difference is within it. But the figure I found more interesting was
the 71% one.

>I'd also say that the much larger sampling of polls that gets
>published within the US indicates about 55% (lowest of seen) support
>for the Bush administrations conduct of the war on terror, and about
>70% support for Iraqi Freedom.

What precise question is being put to them?

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Gene Storey]

"ArtKramr" > wrote
>
> But without judicial review it would have been unconstitional for the Supreme
> Court to have ruled on a states right issue. Barron v Baltimore makes that
> clear.

The State of Florida ruled that Bush had won the vote, and no amount of
recounts would ever create a condition where Gore could win. Where else
would Gore go to hear his federal petition against the state?

[ArtKramr]

>Subject: Re: U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>From: "Gene Storey"
>Date: 9/12/03 7:12 PM Pacific Daylight Time
>Message-id: >
>
>"ArtKramr" > wrote
>>
>> But without judicial review it would have been unconstitional for the
>Supreme
>> Court to have ruled on a states right issue. Barron v Baltimore makes
>that
>> clear.
>
>The State of Florida ruled that Bush had won the vote, and no amount of
>recounts would ever create a condition where Gore could win. Where else
>would Gore go to hear his federal petition against the state?
>
>
You miss the issue entirely..You are talking about politics. I am talking about
jusidical law. If not for Madison vs. Marbury the Supreme Court would have had
no jurisdiction in Gore vs. Florida.
See Barron vs. Baltimore.



Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer

[Gene Storey]

"ArtKramr" > wrote
>"Gene Storey" wrote
> >
> >The State of Florida ruled that Bush had won the vote, and no amount of
> >recounts would ever create a condition where Gore could win. Where else
> >would Gore go to hear his federal petition against the state?
> >
> You miss the issue entirely..You are talking about politics. I am talking about
> jusidical law. If not for Madison vs. Marbury the Supreme Court would have had
> no jurisdiction in Gore vs. Florida.
> See Barron vs. Baltimore.

I'm not talking about politics?? I'm talking about the Supreme Court.

Even without Marbury, and all the case-law which follows, and even without
the 15th Amendment, the Supreme Court would still have to decide whether the
state of Florida did not have the power to block infinite recounts by counties
within its jurisdiction.

Barron is purely about a top-down process, while Gore v Florida was about a
bottom-up process.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
Vince Brannigan > wrote:

> Chad Irby wrote:
> > Vince Brannigan > wrote:
> >
> >>Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.
> >
> > If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
> > apostrophe key.
> >
> >>im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
> >>copyright law
> >
> > And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
> > something spouting obvious falsehoods...
>
> Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C.

Well, since you claim to be a lawyer, you should know by now that even a
layman can find out things about laws that most lawyers don't bother to
find out. Like the basic ins and outs of copyright laws. And what
"fair use" is (or is not).

You, obviously, need to have one of your associates look this up for you
and prepare a short brief.

> Where are you licensed?

I'm not. I just learned how to read and write at an early age.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Vince Brannigan]

Chad Irby wrote:
> In article >,
> Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>
>>Chad Irby wrote:
>>
>>>Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.
>>>
>>>If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
>>>apostrophe key.
>>>
>>>
>>>>im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
>>>>copyright law
>>>
>>>And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
>>>something spouting obvious falsehoods...
>>
>>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C.
>
>
> Well, since you claim to be a lawyer, you should know by now that even a
> layman can find out things about laws that most lawyers don't bother to
> find out. Like the basic ins and outs of copyright laws. And what
> "fair use" is (or is not).
>


Well chow down on this

TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > Sec. 107. Prev | Next

Sec. 107. - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
> Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A,
the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by
reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other
means specified by that section, for purposes
such as criticism, comment, news reporting,
teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use),
scholarship, or research, is not an infringement
of copyright. In determining whether the use made
of a work in any particular case is a
fair use the factors to be considered shall include -
(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
whether such use is of a commercial
nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
(3) the amount and substantiality of the
portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the
copyrighted work.

Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are. so on all of
the above the copying news stories for the purpose of criticizing the
reporting is fair use.

Oh, and if you do your homework, the Courts of appeal in Md. and DC
maintain lists of those licensed to practice.

Vincent Brannigan








> You, obviously, need to have one of your associates look this up for you
> and prepare a short brief.
>
>
>>Where are you licensed?
>
>
> I'm not. I just learned how to read and write at an early age.

[Brett]

"Vince Brannigan" > wrote:
| Chad Irby wrote:

<...>

|
| Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are.

Do you think AP/Reuters/.... would agree with your definition?

[Brian Allardice]

In article >, says...

>(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
>whether such use is of a commercial
>nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

This could be fun... what about public schools run by for profit education
companies? Is it Philadelphia, among others, where such a thing is going on?

Cheers,
dba

[Sunny]

"Aerophotos" > wrote in message
...
> Military people like me who is in training at present are cut off from
> the world in initial training... so we have no knowledge or interaction
> as we learn how to kill others...this is done to isolate us and make us
> brainwashed and do what the military aka govt of day requests us to do.

You are an absolute idiot, the sooner the RAAF wake up what a fruitcake they
have on their hands the better.

> This is a reason why vietnam and other war vets can not adjust to life
> is cause thy are still in a military mindset. they have no idea how to
> adopt to a civil world...

Bought that clue yet ?


> I know a well respected friend of mine who flew BUFFs over nam ... he
> QUIT the usaf cause of the bull**** the govt was doing in 1972.. he
> couldnt handle it how they had ROEs and killing of civilians etc...

Why do I have this lingering doubt that you have any "friends" especially
American?

> Vietnam wasnt declared a war at any time tho it lasted 17yrs

What history book are you quoting ? (that the war started in 1958) ?

> If im ever asked to be deployed to fight a war with the US military i
> am going to object in my unit and say no,regardless of the consequences

Good with idiots like you in our RAAF we don't need enemies.
btw, enjoy your time in prison.

> - i joined to defend Australia. and that what i will do, not defend
> some other pathetic superpower who cant even hold its own ground.

You still haven't got a clue why you joined. Do everyone a favour, and put
your name on everything you touch, so that someone can check it for safety.

[Chad Irby]

Vince Brannigan > wrote:

> >>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C.
> >
> Well chow down on this
>
> TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > Sec. 107. Prev | Next
>
> Sec. 107. - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
> Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A,
> the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by
> reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other
> means specified by that section, for purposes
> such as criticism, comment, news reporting,
> teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use),
> scholarship, or research, is not an infringement
> of copyright. In determining whether the use made
> of a work in any particular case is a
> fair use the factors to be considered shall include -
> (1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
> whether such use is of a commercial
> nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
> (2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
> (3) the amount and substantiality of the
> portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
> (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the
> copyrighted work.
>
> Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are.

Nope. Each story in a joint work is copyrighted separately. If your
point were true, then the Washington Post could use entire stories from
competitors' papers, verbatim, without having to pay syndication costs.

Under your definition, a rival paper could use an entire story. For a
parallel example, one song off of an album is still covered under
copyright, whereas your example would suggest that it would not.

By posting the entire story that started this thread in its entirety,
the first poster broke copyright, since that breaks the "substantiality"
part of the law you so kindly cited for us. A sentence or so, up to a
paragraph (if necessary), but not the whole story.

> so on all of the above the copying news stories for the purpose of
> criticizing the reporting is fair use.

Nope. Using *excerpts* from a story might be okay, if you hadn't posted
the entire story. And as far as "criticism" goes, there wasn't any
criticism attached to the first post.

So you're completely wrong about copyright on at least two points. Note
that the law does *not* say "pick one of these reasons and completely
ignore the rest," it says "shall include."

The "purpose and character" part *might* have a bearing, but since it's
trivially easy to include a link to the full story, that would probably
fall through, too.

The "potential market" part could be a loophole, but since you
effectively "published" a few thousand copies to the Internet (and
therefore the world), you missed out on that, too.

> Oh, and if you do your homework, the Courts of appeal in Md. and DC
> maintain lists of those licensed to practice.

There are a lot of people licensed to practice law. There are a lot of
people licensed to practice medicine. There are a lot of people
licensed to fly planes. That doesn't mean they're all good at all of it.

It's like the old joke: "What do you call someone who graduated last in
his class at the worst medical school?" "Doctor."

(You should have noticed by now that "argument from authority" doesn't
fly too well on Usenet. But I've noticed that many lawyers rely on that
when they have a really weak case.)

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Jim McLaughlin]

> > - i joined to defend Australia. and that what i will do, not defend
> > some other pathetic superpower who cant even hold its own ground.
>

Seems you missed the bali incident, and than this week's lovely
rant in Djakarta from the convicted bomber to the effect of "Kill all
Australians". Thats at least what the BBC showed in its video.

And the reason why you think Oz is less a taget of the Saudi royal
funded Wahabbist crazies than the US is.....?

And the reason you think its a better course for Oz to go it alone and
divorce itself from the US with respect to the Saudi royal funded Whabbist
crazies is.....?



Just wondering.

[El Bastardo]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 05:18:50 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>> >>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C.
>> >
>> Well chow down on this
>>
>> TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > Sec. 107. Prev | Next
>>
>> Sec. 107. - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
>> Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A,
>> the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by
>> reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other
>> means specified by that section, for purposes
>> such as criticism, comment, news reporting,
>> teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use),
>> scholarship, or research, is not an infringement
>> of copyright. In determining whether the use made
>> of a work in any particular case is a
>> fair use the factors to be considered shall include -
>> (1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
>> whether such use is of a commercial
>> nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
>> (2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
>> (3) the amount and substantiality of the
>> portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
>> (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value
>> of the copyrighted work.
>>
>> Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are.
>
>
>Under your definition, a rival paper could use an entire story. For
>a parallel example, one song off of an album is still covered under
>copyright, whereas your example would suggest that it would not.
>
>By posting the entire story that started this thread in its
>entirety, the first poster broke copyright, since that breaks the
>"substantiality" part of the law you so kindly cited for us. A
>sentence or so, up to a paragraph (if necessary), but not the whole
>story.
>
>> so on all of the above the copying news stories for the purpose of
>> criticizing the reporting is fair use.
>
>Nope. Using *excerpts* from a story might be okay, if you hadn't
>posted the entire story. And as far as "criticism" goes, there
>wasn't any criticism attached to the first post.

"for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching"
does not mean it has to be all three, it means one will satisfy.
There is no language indicating that the the material has to be used
for all the mentioned purposes. The "purposes such as" language
clearly implies that they are followed by a nonexclusive list of
"purposes" to be used as guidance by a court.

You seem to try to draw a bright line between quoting a whole story
and a part of it. Where in the law do you find such a bright line?
Yes, the quoted section lists "substantiality" as a factor among
other factors in its analysis of a use as being fair or not.

If the law were as you view it, there would be no need to discuss
"substantiality" in the case of a work being wholly reproduced. There
would be a fifth factor, or a sentence in the current four factors,
which would read something like "complete reproduction of a work is
strictly a violation of the law in all cases."

The law could easily have been written in such a manner. Why doesn't
it say this? Were the legislators trying to hide the true nature of
the law?

Brannigan was kind enough to cite the law upon which he bases his
beliefs, lets see the law which supports your "bright line"
intrepretation of current intellectual property law.

>
>So you're completely wrong about copyright on at least two points.
>Note that the law does *not* say "pick one of these reasons and
>completely ignore the rest," it says "shall include."

It says "the factors to be considered shall include..." Of course it
means all the listed factors are relevant. This argument is about how
the law is applied to this factual situation.

>
>The "purpose and character" part *might* have a bearing, but since
>it's trivially easy to include a link to the full story, that would
>probably fall through, too.

I don't see anything in the law making an exception for how
"available" the work is in it's original copyrighted medium. The law
focuses on the nature of the defendant's activities, and the nature
of the work itself, not the availability of the work in another
medium. I don't see the law as requiring the defendant to tell the
reader to stop reading her message, go to the website, then come back
and read the rest of the message. Sounds a bit awkward.

>
>The "potential market" part could be a loophole, but since you
>effectively "published" a few thousand copies to the Internet (and
>therefore the world), you missed out on that, too.
>
>> Oh, and if you do your homework, the Courts of appeal in Md. and
>> DC maintain lists of those licensed to practice.
>
>There are a lot of people licensed to practice law. There are a lot
>of people licensed to practice medicine. There are a lot of people
>licensed to fly planes. That doesn't mean they're all good at all
>of it.
>
>It's like the old joke: "What do you call someone who graduated last
>in his class at the worst medical school?" "Doctor."
>
>(You should have noticed by now that "argument from authority"
>doesn't fly too well on Usenet. But I've noticed that many lawyers
>rely on that when they have a really weak case.)

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[Cub Driver]

>> Military people like me who is in training at present are cut off from
>> the world in initial training... so we have no knowledge or interaction
>> as we learn how to kill others...this is done to isolate us and make us
>> brainwashed and do what the military aka govt of day requests us to do.
>
>You are an absolute idiot, the sooner the RAAF wake up what a fruitcake they
>have on their hands the better.

Sunny, aren't you making a huge assumption when you believe that the
poster is actually in military training? Sounds to me like a ****** in
front of his flight simulator.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

[Vince Brannigan]

Chad Irby wrote:
> Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>
>>>>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C.
>>>
>>Well chow down on this
>>
>> TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > Sec. 107. Prev | Next
>>
>> Sec. 107. - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
>>Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A,
>>the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by
>>reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other
>>means specified by that section, for purposes
>>such as criticism, comment, news reporting,
>>teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use),
>>scholarship, or research, is not an infringement
>>of copyright. In determining whether the use made
>>of a work in any particular case is a
>>fair use the factors to be considered shall include -
>>(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
>>whether such use is of a commercial
>>nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
>>(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
>>(3) the amount and substantiality of the
>>portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
>>(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the
>>copyrighted work.
>>
>>Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are.
>
>
> Nope. Each story in a joint work is copyrighted separately.

but not sold separately. This newspaper is the "copyrighted work as a
whoel" that is what has a market.

If your
> point were true, then the Washington Post could use entire stories from
> competitors' papers, verbatim, without having to pay syndication costs.

nonsense. teh washington psot is a commercial publisher and competitor
of wother newspapers. I can do things that they cannot
>
> Under your definition, a rival paper could use an entire story. For a
> parallel example, one song off of an album is still covered under
> copyright, whereas your example would suggest that it would not.
>

it is "covered under copyright" but at least in traditonal analysis the
album not the song is the work as a whole. the development of digital
media and the capability of selling individual songs hs arguably changed
this argument.

> By posting the entire story that started this thread in its entirety,
> the first poster broke copyright, since that breaks the "substantiality"
> part of the law you so kindly cited for us. A sentence or so, up to a
> paragraph (if necessary), but not the whole story.
>

Nonsense.
Factual works are simply less protected, since thereis no copyright in
the underlying facts.
>
>>so on all of the above the copying news stories for the purpose of
>>criticizing the reporting is fair use.
>
>
> Nope. Using *excerpts* from a story might be okay, if you hadn't posted
> the entire story. And as far as "criticism" goes, there wasn't any
> criticism attached to the first post.

Except that psoting here can be for the purpose of inspiring criticism.

>
> So you're completely wrong about copyright on at least two points. Note
> that the law does *not* say "pick one of these reasons and completely
> ignore the rest," it says "shall include."

Its a common 4 factor test. How a court weighs one factor agsint another
depends on the Court. I dont think you will find any apellate decisons
holding that such a posting is a violation by the individual.

>
> The "purpose and character" part *might* have a bearing, but since it's
> trivially easy to include a link to the full story, that would probably
> fall through, too.

that is not part of the purpose and character element, but the "effect
on the market" element.

>
> The "potential market" part could be a loophole, but since you
> effectively "published" a few thousand copies to the Internet (and
> therefore the world), you missed out on that, too.
>

This is actually a respectable issue, if they sell individual articles
in the aftermarket.

>
>>Oh, and if you do your homework, the Courts of appeal in Md. and DC
>>maintain lists of those licensed to practice.
>
>
> There are a lot of people licensed to practice law. There are a lot of
> people licensed to practice medicine. There are a lot of people
> licensed to fly planes. That doesn't mean they're all good at all of it.

Sure, but you Suggested I was not. I psot under my real name and its
easy to check.


>
> It's like the old joke: "What do you call someone who graduated last in
> his class at the worst medical school?" "Doctor."
>
> (You should have noticed by now that "argument from authority" doesn't
> fly too well on Usenet. But I've noticed that many lawyers rely on that
> when they have a really weak case.)

As you point out, internet is an excellet palce for textaul analysis and
commentary.
that is why users has a correspondingly large right to "fair use"

Vince Brannigan

[TMOliver]

phil hunt vented spleen or mostly mumbled...

Seventy-one
> per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
> "expensive, long and deadly".
>

I seem to remember that the occupation of Germany was expensive, long and
deadly...

From the personnel lost in the airlift, to all those folks who died in
everything from training accidents to car wrecks between 1945 and 1990, the
human toll may have been relatively less awesome than 45 years and the
cumulative expenditures, but tiresome and objectionable though they may be,
"our" Germans remain somewhat preferable to what would have been created
had we simply sailed home in '45.

While I doubt we can conytibute any more than a semblance of a Western
democracy in Iraq, I am sure that we'll manage in a half century to produce
there a generation of the same historically mis-educated escapists from
reality who carp and moan about US evils as are found in Germany today.

From back in '45, I remember my grandmother's loud cries to get my young
uncle back from Germany before September so he could re-enroll and finish
his degree, interrupted by a couple of years as a LT of the Armored Corps.
They got him home for Sep., '46....

I'm sure public opinion was strongly on Gran's side back in '45, but wars,
my uncle's, the later one I briefly visited, or this one, have a way of not
conforming to some optimal process curve. The mindless mindset which has
grown since the end of the USSR, that we can downsize and not maintain a
large military force, since all our technology allows precision strikes or
highly skilled specialist actions remains a recurring "bull****" theme
throughout history....the "By God, we'll have no more of these sorry massed
levees. I'll hire a troop of mercenaries who provide their own weapons and
gear!" school of thought, proved wrong on a repetititve basis for 3000+
years.

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, Cub Driver
> wrote:

> >This post should not be understood as implying support for any US
> >policy, past, present or future, but merely as a small contribution to
> >the War against Bull****, which is both more pressing and more
> >important than the War against Terrorism.
>
> I don't entirely agree with your closing idea

Think it through.

> , but thank you for the
> fight that led you to it.

My pleasure entirely. You're welcome.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Ed Rasimus]

Aerophotos > wrote:

>Maybe ed sometime it takes men of courage and ability to see beyond the
>silver lining of the present..

Before addressing some specifics, I feel obliged to note that while
lack of capitalization served e. e. cummings well and lack of
punctuation and a stream of consciousness that is almost
indecipherable made James Joyce a lot of money, it doesn't work to add
credibility to your postings. Take a moment after composition to
proof-read.
>
>Have you after 40yrs of been trained as a TAC trained killer changed
>your ways?

No, I've changed little, other than to gain a bit of maturity. Years
of experience, it should be noted have some value in the
interpretation of events.
>
>i dont think so...
>
>Military people like me who is in training at present are cut off from
>the world in initial training... so we have no knowledge or interaction
>as we learn how to kill others...this is done to isolate us and make us
>brainwashed and do what the military aka govt of day requests us to do.

It shouldn't be a surprise that the military is an instrument of
national policy. That's clear in the charter and clear in the oath you
take upon joining. Basic training to become a cohesive fighting force
requires that your life be modified. Without that isolation, you'll
seldom become a part of the unit.

Most Western world governments conduct an enlightened form of military
indoctrination that is a long way from brain-washing.
>
>This is a reason why vietnam and other war vets can not adjust to life
>is cause thy are still in a military mindset. they have no idea how to
>adopt to a civil world...

If you consider that the war ran from minimal involvement in '62
through total withdrawal in '75, and that during the peak years had
500k people in-country and more in Thailand and in the Gulf, then add
in rotations you'll quickly conclude that the number of participants
in the Vietnam conflict numbers in the 10 million range. The greatest
majority of these have absolutely no problem at all adjusting to life.
The few bearded, dirty, drugged-out homeless that are stereotypically
used to illustrate "Vietnam vets" are exceptions. Don't make the
mistake of thinking that they are representative.
>
>That is the simple aim of being in a military force... and funny notice
>how we in australia generally except for current period of under
>"howardism" defend the country or help defend others...not go and murder
>people aka iraq.... the us mil other hand is never structured to defend
>but only to attack other countries...hence nukes and chemical and bio
>weapons and etc etc..

If your premise is correct (which it isn't) and the US military is
purely offensive, why have we not built an empire? Why did we withdraw
after Desert Storm? Why haven't we taken over all the places we've
been? Why don't we still hold Panama? Why aren't we still in the
Phillipines? Why do we tolerate Cuba? Why don't we exploit the oil we
controlled after we took Kuwait?

BTW, did you notice how effective our nukes were in deterring nuclear
war for the past 58 years?
>
>
>Alot of the world can see the us is dragging it self into a modern day
>revised epic of the vietnam era. hence term - quagmire... when you
>loose more people dead after the war , then in a war something is
>seriously wrong..

Vietnam's losses were DURING the war--the basic error in your analogy.
When the war is so successful with so few losses in such a short
period, it is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy that there will be
more losses in the aftermath. We lose more people to traffic accidents
each day than we do to the war in Iraq.
>
>
>could be maybe arabs dont like americans ...? and americans dont like
>arabs, much same as most americans didnt like Vietnamese and vice versa
>40yrs ago.

Sorry, Americans aren't particularly racist anymore. The low-grade
emotionalism of national stereotyping that was used in WW II, hasn't
been acceptable in this country since the '50s. We've probably got
more Arab-Americans in this country today than the entire population
of Australia. (Notice the courtesy of capitalizing your country? Try
it yourself!)
>
>Deny all you want currently iraq is a quagmire .. but it may change..
>elections are not long off... bush will do something... we wants to stay
>in power...gota slow down the coffins in a box returnin home on the
>block abit more...

Combat is inherently dangerous. If you aren't ready to accept that,
you might consider an early resignation. There are things worth
fighting for. There are even some things worth dying for. The
President's popularity is consistently high and at this point, his
re-election is close to a sure thing.
>
>
>But tell me why is the leader of your ****ry scrambling as we speak to
>get other countries who had no such involvement in invading iraq to take
>over from it.. bizzare foreign policies he we come again ..sigh

No, what we are seeking to do is avoid the bad implications of
hegemony. We are seeking to retain the existing coalition of nations
and enlarge it for the benefit of the Iraqi development effort. It
isn't bizarre to seek cooperation in international peace-keeping
efforts.
>
>The us FP is so twisted and distorted they never see the impact until
>long after and they then deny it was ever created...

Sounds more like your interpretation rather than any demonstrable
fact.
>
>
>I know a well respected friend of mine who flew BUFFs over nam ... he
>QUIT the usaf cause of the bull**** the govt was doing in 1972.. he
>couldnt handle it how they had ROEs and killing of civilians etc...

All wars have ROE. No policy of the US in Vietnam involved killing of
civilians. The ROE restrictions, while often unpalatable for the
crews, were specifically implemented to minimize civilian casualties.

If your friend flew B-52s for four years and decided that it was
suddenly "bad" in '72, might I suggest that his rationale wasn't
driven by policy, but by the change in mission from puking bombs on
the undefended jungle to suddenly taking the B-52 Downtown where there
were SAMs and MiGs and guns. I suspect a bit more cowardice than
policy disagreement going on here.
>
>I was surprised to hear this come from a BUFF driver but then he totally
>hated the US govt .. after 4yrs of flying in a ****ed up warzone...
>
>So in iraq if this war is so popular why is nearly ever us troop so
>desperate to leave the country? maybe says they went into the wrong
>one...

Do you have some reference for the assumption that "nearly ever (sic)
us (sic) troop" is against the policy? I've seen some great on-scene
reports from AF, Marine and Army types in-country on the reception
they are getting from the Iraqi people as well as the successes they
are having. Maybe you aren't completely in the loop? You did say at
the top of this post that you are isolated so that you can be
brain-washed. It appears to be working.
>
>If loosing 10 troops a day either dead or a mix of injured every day in
>iraq doesnt concern you, maybe the thought that the war and peacekeeping
>is not ending anytime soon might ...... this is where a quagmire is
>formed and sticks to the issue...

Read Halberstam to understand what the quagmire metaphor is about.
>
>Vietnam started off been a illegal war, remember in order to have war u
>must declare it. remember ed... you guys bombed the north vietnamese a
>fair bit...

Declaration doesn't make a war "legal". In international law there are
more sophisticated criteria. There are issues of exhaustion of
alternatives, appropriate force, minimization of collateral damage,
legitimacy of the government, etc. Declaration, such as Hitler's
declaration of the annexation of Czechoslovakia or the Rhineland,
don't make it legal.
>
>Vietnam wasnt declared a war at any time tho it lasted 17yrs - gota
>wonder why.. cheap way of cutting the weaklings from the us popualation
>aka death in combat and same time helped the mil complex make record
>profits...
>
>So issues just keep going around and around....arabs are just as stupid
>as americans... and vice versa
>
>both want death and fame.. until one side actually thinks - the whole
>shamble will just continue the same
>
>
>If im ever asked to be deployed to fight a war with the US military i
>am going to object in my unit and say no,regardless of the consequences
>- i joined to defend Australia. and that what i will do, not defend
>some other pathetic superpower who cant even hold its own ground.
>
My advice would be to object earlier. Do it tomorrow. You'll save
yourself a lot of years of hypocrisy, drawing a paycheck and paying
lip-service to an obligation you pledged but have no intention of
keeping.

Then, go back to school and take a course in basic English--spelling,
grammar, punctuation and capitalization. If you pass, you can then
move up to some military history, political science and international
relations.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
El *******o <El *******o@El *******o.com> wrote:

> You seem to try to draw a bright line between quoting a whole story
> and a part of it. Where in the law do you find such a bright line?
> Yes, the quoted section lists "substantiality" as a factor among
> other factors in its analysis of a use as being fair or not.
>
> If the law were as you view it, there would be no need to discuss
> "substantiality" in the case of a work being wholly reproduced. There
> would be a fifth factor, or a sentence in the current four factors,
> which would read something like "complete reproduction of a work is
> strictly a violation of the law in all cases."

"Substantiality" keeps people from trying the "I quoted everything
except the last sentence" loophole.

> >> (3) the amount and substantiality of the
> >> portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole;

> The law could easily have been written in such a manner. Why doesn't
> it say this? Were the legislators trying to hide the true nature of
> the law?

It wasn't written like this because it wasn't necessary. Once you've
covered substantiality, you've covered reprinting the whole thing.

> Brannigan was kind enough to cite the law upon which he bases his
> beliefs, lets see the law which supports your "bright line"
> intrepretation of current intellectual property law.

It's the one he quoted. Substantiality covers it quite nicely.

The rest of your arguments are in the same vein. Trying to make the law
say what it clearly does *not* say isn't a good defense.

What it boils down to, for this case: quoting entire news stories to
Usenet is breaking copyright.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
Vince Brannigan > wrote:

> Chad Irby wrote:
> > Vince Brannigan > wrote:

(the relevant law is attached to the end of this post)

> >>Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are.
> >
> > Nope. Each story in a joint work is copyrighted separately.
>
> but not sold separately.

Actually, yes, sold separately. This story is available for the
syndication market, by itself. And since you obviously don't know this:
a work does not even have to be *published* to be covered under
copyright.

> This newspaper is the "copyrighted work as a
> whoel" that is what has a market.

Sorry, that's not how copyright works.

> > If your point were true, then the Washington Post could use entire
> > stories from competitors' papers, verbatim, without having to pay
> > syndication costs.
>
> nonsense. teh washington psot is a commercial publisher and
> competitor of wother newspapers. I can do things that they cannot

....but not republish entire stories from their paper. That's why
there's "fair use," which you broke quite nicely. That's also why most
honest college professors, when collecting large numbers of complete
pieces for their class handouts, get permission fromm the copyright
holders. Many don't, but that doesn't make them right

> > Under your definition, a rival paper could use an entire story.
> > For a parallel example, one song off of an album is still covered
> > under copyright, whereas your example would suggest that it would
> > not.
>
> it is "covered under copyright" but at least in traditonal analysis
> the album not the song is the work as a whole. the development of
> digital media and the capability of selling individual songs hs
> arguably changed this argument.

Nope. This has *never* been the case, and you're deeply wrong about
this. A work in a compilation is still a work in itself, and is covered
by copyright. A single poem out of a volume of poetry would not be
covered under your interpretation, and that's certainly not the case.

> > By posting the entire story that started this thread in its entirety,
> > the first poster broke copyright, since that breaks the "substantiality"
> > part of the law you so kindly cited for us. A sentence or so, up to a
> > paragraph (if necessary), but not the whole story.
>
> Nonsense.
> Factual works are simply less protected, since thereis no copyright in
> the underlying facts.

*Facts* are not covered, but *works* are.

You can write your own story, using the same facts, but reprinting an
article by someone else is, plain and simple, a copyright violation.

> Except that psoting here can be for the purpose of inspiring criticism.

Posting less-substantial pieces, maybe. Posting the whole article,
without previous permissions from the owner, is a copyright violation.

> > So you're completely wrong about copyright on at least two points. Note
> > that the law does *not* say "pick one of these reasons and completely
> > ignore the rest," it says "shall include."
>
> Its a common 4 factor test. How a court weighs one factor agsint another
> depends on the Court. I dont think you will find any apellate decisons
> holding that such a posting is a violation by the individual.

RIAA versus all of those people swapping MP3s. Since you contend that a
single song is not covered like a whole album, then someone bootlegging
songs on Napster would have been free and clear.

But they weren't.

> > The "purpose and character" part *might* have a bearing, but since it's
> > trivially easy to include a link to the full story, that would probably
> > fall through, too.
>
> that is not part of the purpose and character element, but the "effect
> on the market" element.

See below. "Purpose and character' covers why you're posting someone
else's work. If you had a good purpose, posting a link would show that,
plus moderate the "character" guideline.

> > The "potential market" part could be a loophole, but since you
> > effectively "published" a few thousand copies to the Internet (and
> > therefore the world), you missed out on that, too.
>
> This is actually a respectable issue, if they sell individual articles
> in the aftermarket.

They do. It's called "syndication." It's been the standard for longer
than I've been alive. If you're interested in posting entire stories to
Usenet, call the newspaper involved and ask them for rates. If you want
to reprint a New York Times story in your school paper, you can buy it -
and often even get it for free, if you ask them nicely.

But you have to get *permission*, either way, from the copyright holder.

> >>Oh, and if you do your homework, the Courts of appeal in Md. and DC
> >>maintain lists of those licensed to practice.
> >
> > There are a lot of people licensed to practice law. There are a lot of
> > people licensed to practice medicine. There are a lot of people
> > licensed to fly planes. That doesn't mean they're all good at all of it.
>
> Sure, but you Suggested I was not. I psot under my real name and its
> easy to check.

You seem to think I care. I don't. Even if you're really a lawyer,
you're obviously not well informed about copyright laws.

> As you point out, internet is an excellet palce for textaul analysis
> and commentary. that is why users has a correspondingly large right
> to "fair use"

"Fair use" would have been a paragraph, or a summary of the story
involved, with a link the the original. What you do is pretty much just
laziness.








> >>Well chow down on this
> >>
> >> TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > Sec. 107. Prev | Next
> >>
> >> Sec. 107. - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
> >>Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A,
> >>the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by
> >>reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other
> >>means specified by that section, for purposes
> >>such as criticism, comment, news reporting,
> >>teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use),
> >>scholarship, or research, is not an infringement
> >>of copyright. In determining whether the use made
> >>of a work in any particular case is a
> >>fair use the factors to be considered shall include -
> >>(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
> >>whether such use is of a commercial
> >>nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
> >>(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
> >>(3) the amount and substantiality of the
> >>portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
> >>(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the
> >>copyrighted work.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Ed Rasimus]

Aerophotos > wrote:

>Maybe ed sometime it takes men of courage and ability to see beyond the
>silver lining of the present..

Before addressing some specifics, I feel obliged to note that while
lack of capitalization served e. e. cummings well and lack of
punctuation and a stream of consciousness that is almost
indecipherable made James Joyce a lot of money, it doesn't work to add
credibility to your postings. Take a moment after composition to
proof-read.
>
>Have you after 40yrs of been trained as a TAC trained killer changed
>your ways?

No, I've changed little, other than to gain a bit of maturity. Years
of experience, it should be noted have some value in the
interpretation of events.
>
>i dont think so...
>
>Military people like me who is in training at present are cut off from
>the world in initial training... so we have no knowledge or interaction
>as we learn how to kill others...this is done to isolate us and make us
>brainwashed and do what the military aka govt of day requests us to do.

It shouldn't be a surprise that the military is an instrument of
national policy. That's clear in the charter and clear in the oath you
take upon joining. Basic training to become a cohesive fighting force
requires that your life be modified. Without that isolation, you'll
seldom become a part of the unit.

Most Western world governments conduct an enlightened form of military
indoctrination that is a long way from brain-washing.
>
>This is a reason why vietnam and other war vets can not adjust to life
>is cause thy are still in a military mindset. they have no idea how to
>adopt to a civil world...

If you consider that the war ran from minimal involvement in '62
through total withdrawal in '75, and that during the peak years had
500k people in-country and more in Thailand and in the Gulf, then add
in rotations you'll quickly conclude that the number of participants
in the Vietnam conflict numbers in the 10 million range. The greatest
majority of these have absolutely no problem at all adjusting to life.
The few bearded, dirty, drugged-out homeless that are stereotypically
used to illustrate "Vietnam vets" are exceptions. Don't make the
mistake of thinking that they are representative.
>
>That is the simple aim of being in a military force... and funny notice
>how we in australia generally except for current period of under
>"howardism" defend the country or help defend others...not go and murder
>people aka iraq.... the us mil other hand is never structured to defend
>but only to attack other countries...hence nukes and chemical and bio
>weapons and etc etc..

If your premise is correct (which it isn't) and the US military is
purely offensive, why have we not built an empire? Why did we withdraw
after Desert Storm? Why haven't we taken over all the places we've
been? Why don't we still hold Panama? Why aren't we still in the
Phillipines? Why do we tolerate Cuba? Why don't we exploit the oil we
controlled after we took Kuwait?

BTW, did you notice how effective our nukes were in deterring nuclear
war for the past 58 years?
>
>
>Alot of the world can see the us is dragging it self into a modern day
>revised epic of the vietnam era. hence term - quagmire... when you
>loose more people dead after the war , then in a war something is
>seriously wrong..

Vietnam's losses were DURING the war--the basic error in your analogy.
When the war is so successful with so few losses in such a short
period, it is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy that there will be
more losses in the aftermath. We lose more people to traffic accidents
each day than we do to the war in Iraq.
>
>
>could be maybe arabs dont like americans ...? and americans dont like
>arabs, much same as most americans didnt like Vietnamese and vice versa
>40yrs ago.

Sorry, Americans aren't particularly racist anymore. The low-grade
emotionalism of national stereotyping that was used in WW II, hasn't
been acceptable in this country since the '50s. We've probably got
more Arab-Americans in this country today than the entire population
of Australia. (Notice the courtesy of capitalizing your country? Try
it yourself!)
>
>Deny all you want currently iraq is a quagmire .. but it may change..
>elections are not long off... bush will do something... we wants to stay
>in power...gota slow down the coffins in a box returnin home on the
>block abit more...

Combat is inherently dangerous. If you aren't ready to accept that,
you might consider an early resignation. There are things worth
fighting for. There are even some things worth dying for. The
President's popularity is consistently high and at this point, his
re-election is close to a sure thing.
>
>
>But tell me why is the leader of your ****ry scrambling as we speak to
>get other countries who had no such involvement in invading iraq to take
>over from it.. bizzare foreign policies he we come again ..sigh

No, what we are seeking to do is avoid the bad implications of
hegemony. We are seeking to retain the existing coalition of nations
and enlarge it for the benefit of the Iraqi development effort. It
isn't bizarre to seek cooperation in international peace-keeping
efforts.
>
>The us FP is so twisted and distorted they never see the impact until
>long after and they then deny it was ever created...

Sounds more like your interpretation rather than any demonstrable
fact.
>
>
>I know a well respected friend of mine who flew BUFFs over nam ... he
>QUIT the usaf cause of the bull**** the govt was doing in 1972.. he
>couldnt handle it how they had ROEs and killing of civilians etc...

All wars have ROE. No policy of the US in Vietnam involved killing of
civilians. The ROE restrictions, while often unpalatable for the
crews, were specifically implemented to minimize civilian casualties.

If your friend flew B-52s for four years and decided that it was
suddenly "bad" in '72, might I suggest that his rationale wasn't
driven by policy, but by the change in mission from puking bombs on
the undefended jungle to suddenly taking the B-52 Downtown where there
were SAMs and MiGs and guns. I suspect a bit more cowardice than
policy disagreement going on here.
>
>I was surprised to hear this come from a BUFF driver but then he totally
>hated the US govt .. after 4yrs of flying in a ****ed up warzone...
>
>So in iraq if this war is so popular why is nearly ever us troop so
>desperate to leave the country? maybe says they went into the wrong
>one...

Do you have some reference for the assumption that "nearly ever (sic)
us (sic) troop" is against the policy? I've seen some great on-scene
reports from AF, Marine and Army types in-country on the reception
they are getting from the Iraqi people as well as the successes they
are having. Maybe you aren't completely in the loop? You did say at
the top of this post that you are isolated so that you can be
brain-washed. It appears to be working.
>
>If loosing 10 troops a day either dead or a mix of injured every day in
>iraq doesnt concern you, maybe the thought that the war and peacekeeping
>is not ending anytime soon might ...... this is where a quagmire is
>formed and sticks to the issue...

Read Halberstam to understand what the quagmire metaphor is about.
>
>Vietnam started off been a illegal war, remember in order to have war u
>must declare it. remember ed... you guys bombed the north vietnamese a
>fair bit...

Declaration doesn't make a war "legal". In international law there are
more sophisticated criteria. There are issues of exhaustion of
alternatives, appropriate force, minimization of collateral damage,
legitimacy of the government, etc. Declaration, such as Hitler's
declaration of the annexation of Czechoslovakia or the Rhineland,
don't make it legal.
>
>Vietnam wasnt declared a war at any time tho it lasted 17yrs - gota
>wonder why.. cheap way of cutting the weaklings from the us popualation
>aka death in combat and same time helped the mil complex make record
>profits...
>
>So issues just keep going around and around....arabs are just as stupid
>as americans... and vice versa
>
>both want death and fame.. until one side actually thinks - the whole
>shamble will just continue the same
>
>
>If im ever asked to be deployed to fight a war with the US military i
>am going to object in my unit and say no,regardless of the consequences
>- i joined to defend Australia. and that what i will do, not defend
>some other pathetic superpower who cant even hold its own ground.
>
My advice would be to object earlier. Do it tomorrow. You'll save
yourself a lot of years of hypocrisy, drawing a paycheck and paying
lip-service to an obligation you pledged but have no intention of
keeping.

Then, go back to school and take a course in basic English--spelling,
grammar, punctuation and capitalization. If you pass, you can then
move up to some military history, political science and international
relations.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

[Vince Brannigan]

Chad Irby wrote:
> In article >,
> Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>
>>Chad Irby wrote:
>>
>>>Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>>
>
> (the relevant law is attached to the end of this post)
>
>
>>>>Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are.
>>>
>>>Nope. Each story in a joint work is copyrighted separately.
>>
>>but not sold separately.
>
>
> Actually, yes, sold separately. This story is available for the
> syndication market, by itself. And since you obviously don't know this:
> a work does not even have to be *published* to be covered under
> copyright.
>
It si still sold as aprt of a newspaper.


of course since this was the harpur and roe decsion involving the Nixon
pardon.


>
>>This newspaper is the "copyrighted work as a
>>whole" that is what has a market.
>
>
> Sorry, that's not how copyright works.

It depends on where the copying took place.


>
>
> Posting less-substantial pieces, maybe. Posting the whole article,
> without previous permissions from the owner, is a copyright violation.
>

nonsense. There is also the test of immediacy.


>
>>>So you're completely wrong about copyright on at least two points. Note
>>>that the law does *not* say "pick one of these reasons and completely
>>>ignore the rest," it says "shall include."
>>
>>Its a common 4 factor test. How a court weighs one factor agsint another
>>depends on the Court. I dont think you will find any apellate decisons
>>holding that such a posting is a violation by the individual.
>
>
> RIAA versus all of those people swapping MP3s. Since you contend that a
> single song is not covered like a whole album, then someone bootlegging
> songs on Napster would have been free and clear.

I siad in the tradtional view. it is clear that electronic copying has
changed both the technolgy and the law with regard to music.

>
> You seem to think I care. I don't. Even if you're really a lawyer,
> you're obviously not well informed about copyright laws.
>
>
>>As you point out, internet is an excellet palce for textaul analysis
>>and commentary. that is why users has a correspondingly large right
>>to "fair use"
>
>
> "Fair use" would have been a paragraph, or a summary of the story
> involved, with a link the the original. What you do is pretty much just
> laziness.
>

its simply not required. if tehre was a respectable appellate cite
supproting your positon Im sure you would have presented it.

Vince

[Alan Minyard]

On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 22:10:10 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>Vince Brannigan > wrote:
>
>> Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.
>
>If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
>apostrophe key.
>
>> im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
>> copyright law
>
>And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
>something spouting obvious falsehoods...

Much as I hate to say it, Vince is absolutely correct on this issue.
There is also an academic exemption. Fair use has been around for many
years.

And Vince, I know that you do not need me to support your thesis, but
I just wanted to stick my two cents worth in :-)

Al Minyard

[Alan Minyard]

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 04:33:18 GMT, (Brian Allardice)
wrote:

>In article >, says...
>
>>(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
>>whether such use is of a commercial
>>nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
>
>This could be fun... what about public schools run by for profit education
>companies? Is it Philadelphia, among others, where such a thing is going on?
>
>Cheers,
>dba

Not a problem. Private universities have been using the academic
exemption for many years without a conflict.

Al Minyard

[Chad Irby]

Vince Brannigan > wrote:

> Chad Irby wrote:
>
> > Actually, yes, sold separately. This story is available for the
> > syndication market, by itself. And since you obviously don't know this:
> > a work does not even have to be *published* to be covered under
> > copyright.
> >
> It si still sold as aprt of a newspaper.

And it still doesn't invalidate the copyright for the individual article.

> of course since this was the harpur and roe decsion involving the Nixon
> pardon.

Actually, the Harper and Row case was on the right of first publication
("confidentiality and creative control"), and went to use, not
substantiality (even though there was a good substantiality argument
because of the relevance of the quoted pieces). And even at that, the
quoted piece was less than 400 words out of an entire *book*, much less
than the 100% of a newspaper article quoted here.

> It depends on where the copying took place.

According to US law it doesn't as long as you're in the US when you did
it.

> > Posting less-substantial pieces, maybe. Posting the whole article,
> > without previous permissions from the owner, is a copyright violation.
>
> nonsense. There is also the test of immediacy.

Nope. As long as it's still under copyright, it's covered.

> > "Fair use" would have been a paragraph, or a summary of the story
> > involved, with a link the the original. What you do is pretty much just
> > laziness.
>
> its simply not required. if tehre was a respectable appellate cite
> supproting your positon Im sure you would have presented it.

Princeton University Press versus Michigan Document Services, Inc.

A company that made "coursepacks" for teachers got dinged on this one,
despite only using bits and pieces of many smaller works.

And I'm sure that if you really knew what you were talking about, being
a lawyer and all, you'd be able to find a case that *didn't* go in favor
of the plaintiff in fair use, instead of one that supports *my* point...

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
Alan Minyard > wrote:

> On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 22:10:10 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>
> Much as I hate to say it, Vince is absolutely correct on this issue.

Not according to the law that he quoted.

> There is also an academic exemption. Fair use has been around for many
> years.

But not for entire articles, except under very specific constraints (in
libraries and similar collections). Republishing the contents of an
article on the Internet is completely out of that area.

Under the academic exemption, he could probably get away with a
more-substantial quote in an academic journal than if he was printing it
in a local paper as part of a critique, but it's still very clear that
reproducing an entire piece breaks substantiality.

You'll also note this is a "rec" newsgroup, not an "ed" or "sci" one.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Chad Irby]

Alan Minyard > wrote:

> On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 04:33:18 GMT, (Brian Allardice)
> wrote:
>
> >In article >, says...
> >
> >>(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
> >>whether such use is of a commercial
> >>nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
> >
> >This could be fun... what about public schools run by for profit education
> >companies? Is it Philadelphia, among others, where such a thing is going on?
>
> Not a problem. Private universities have been using the academic
> exemption for many years without a conflict.

....under very specific restrictions, and they have to retain some
control of the work. They're also restricted in the number of copies
they can make at any one time.

Some of them have been caught with this, too, in making "sourcebooks"
for teachers with large numbers of copyrighted works in a compilation.
Many of the smart ones ante up the fee for reprinting the pieces
(usually a nominal fee for this use), and pass the costs on to the
students. Often, a local bookstore will make the arrangements for
printing and fees.

Read this, for a start:
<http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-c
..html#1>

The Religious Technology (Scientology) Center vs Lerma case is one of
the most famous examples of someone getting in trouble for republishing
materials on the Internet. The Religious Technology Center vs
Pagliarina case is an example of *not* exceeding fair use.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[IBM]

"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
binary.blueyonder.co.uk:

> Richard Bernstein, NYT
> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>
> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

Do we give a rat's hinder?

"Come the three quarters of the world in arms
And we shall shock them"

Shakespeare

IBM

__________________________________________________ ____________________
Posted Via Uncensored-News.Com - FAST UNLIMITED DOWNLOAD - http://www.uncensored-news.com
<><><><><><><> The Worlds Uncensored News Source <><><><><><><><>

[Coridon Henshaw]

"Jim McLaughlin" > wrote in
news:S2A8b.431325$Ho3.69216@sccrnsc03:

> Saudi royal funded Wahabbist crazies

Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?

--
Coridon Henshaw / http://www3.sympatico.ca/gcircle/csbh

[Fred J. McCall]

Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:

:"Jim McLaughlin" > wrote in
:news:S2A8b.431325$Ho3.69216@sccrnsc03:
:
:> Saudi royal funded Wahabbist crazies
:
:Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
:rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?

Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?

I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
Pakistan, right?

--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn

[Jim McLaughlin]

Not quite sure what your syntax was meant to convey ("...just why are you
doing asking...") as it seems quite meaningless.

Can you try again in a language actually understandable by other
humans?



--
Jim McLaughlin
************************************************** **************************
************************************************** **************************
I am getting really tired of spam, so the reply address is munged.
Please don't just hit the reply key.
Remove the obvious from the address to reply.
************************************************** **************************
************************************************** **************************
Special treat for spambots:
, ,

************************************************** *************************
"Coridon Henshaw @ (T<H+ESE) sympatico.ca)>" <(chenshaw<RE<MOVE> wrote in
message ...
> "Jim McLaughlin" > wrote in
> news:S2A8b.431325$Ho3.69216@sccrnsc03:
>
> > Saudi royal funded Wahabbist crazies
>
> Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
> rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
>
> --
> Coridon Henshaw / http://www3.sympatico.ca/gcircle/csbh
>
>
>

[Peter Skelton]

On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:

>"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
>binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
>
>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>>
>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> Do we give a rat's hinder?
>

We've been treated to the spectacle of the Shrub approaching the
Germans, French et al on bended knee for help in Iraq.

Meanwhile the UN resoultion on Iran goes forward with European
sponsorship.

Apparently you do.
____

Peter Skelton

[Mike Marron]

>Peter Skelton > wrote:
>>IBM > wrote:
>>"John Mullen" > wrote:

>>>U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world

>>Do we give a rat's hinder?

>We've been treated to the spectacle of the Shrub approaching the
>Germans, French et al on bended knee for help in Iraq.

Yet another America-hater from Canada speaks up. Look at it this
way, Peter -- we had to take a knee in order to lower ourselves to the
level of the Germans, French et. al.

>Meanwhile the UN resoultion on Iran goes forward with European
>sponsorship.

The Iranians and their young population (70-percent of whom are
younger than 30) want the opportunities and freedoms that America
represents and they believe that better relations with the U.S. would
revitalize Iranian life and help their country shed its pariah status.

Meanwhile, all the Europeans and the rest of the world who couldn't
care less about Iran desperately want is to put some prestige back in
the UN for their own needs.

>Apparently you do.

Nah, though we may politely ask, if you won't give us your help
as usual we'll still be doing it all ourselves.

-Mike Marron

[phil hunt]

On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:
>"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
>binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
>
>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>>
>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>
> Do we give a rat's hinder?

Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[William Black]

"Fred J. McCall" > wrote in message
...
> Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:
>
> :"Jim McLaughlin" > wrote in
> :news:S2A8b.431325$Ho3.69216@sccrnsc03:
> :
> :> Saudi royal funded Wahabbist crazies
> :
> :Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
> :rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
>
> Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?
>
> I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
> Pakistan, right?

They know why.

Pakistan is a nasty military dictatorship that needed friends and was for
sale. It was bought for less than the cost of an invasion.

North Korea got nukes.

--
William Black
------------------
On time, on budget, or works;
Pick any two from three

[Alan Minyard]

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 21:14:12 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>Alan Minyard > wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 04:33:18 GMT, (Brian Allardice)
>> wrote:
>>
>> >In article >, says...
>> >
>> >>(1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
>> >>whether such use is of a commercial
>> >>nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
>> >
>> >This could be fun... what about public schools run by for profit education
>> >companies? Is it Philadelphia, among others, where such a thing is going on?
>>
>> Not a problem. Private universities have been using the academic
>> exemption for many years without a conflict.
>
>...under very specific restrictions, and they have to retain some
>control of the work. They're also restricted in the number of copies
>they can make at any one time.
>
>Some of them have been caught with this, too, in making "sourcebooks"
>for teachers with large numbers of copyrighted works in a compilation.
>Many of the smart ones ante up the fee for reprinting the pieces
>(usually a nominal fee for this use), and pass the costs on to the
>students. Often, a local bookstore will make the arrangements for
>printing and fees.
>
>Read this, for a start:
><http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-c
>.html#1>
>
>The Religious Technology (Scientology) Center vs Lerma case is one of
>the most famous examples of someone getting in trouble for republishing
>materials on the Internet. The Religious Technology Center vs
>Pagliarina case is an example of *not* exceeding fair use.

The URL that you give is for "Fair Use", a different section of the
(excellent) web site cover "educational use". For instance, video
taping an entire program for use in the classroom is allowed, as is
the copying of entire poems, short stories, etc.

Al Minyard

[Alan Minyard]

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 21:03:17 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>In article >,
> Alan Minyard > wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 12 Sep 2003 22:10:10 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>>
>> Much as I hate to say it, Vince is absolutely correct on this issue.
>
>Not according to the law that he quoted.
>
>> There is also an academic exemption. Fair use has been around for many
>> years.
>
>But not for entire articles, except under very specific constraints (in
>libraries and similar collections). Republishing the contents of an
>article on the Internet is completely out of that area.
>
>Under the academic exemption, he could probably get away with a
>more-substantial quote in an academic journal than if he was printing it
>in a local paper as part of a critique, but it's still very clear that
>reproducing an entire piece breaks substantiality.
>
>You'll also note this is a "rec" newsgroup, not an "ed" or "sci" one.

I agree that making multiple copies of an entire book to avoid buying
the book would be a violation, however reproducing an article in a
newspaper/magazine is subject to the academic exemption. That
particular exemption is rather liberally applied.

Al Minyard

[Ugly Bob]

"Ed Rasimus" > wrote in message
...
> Aerophotos > wrote:
>
> >Maybe ed sometime it takes men of courage and ability to see beyond the
> >silver lining of the present..
>
> Before addressing some specifics, I feel obliged to note that while
> lack of capitalization served e. e. cummings well and lack of
> punctuation and a stream of consciousness that is almost
> indecipherable made James Joyce a lot of money, it doesn't work to add
> credibility to your postings. Take a moment after composition to
> proof-read.

Amen! And learn how to conjugate! Damn, this 'Jolly Green'
character is evidently too ignorant to know that he's humiliating
himself (in this _very_ public froum).

-Ugly Bob

<snip>

[Fred J. McCall]

(phil hunt) wrote:

:On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:
:>"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
:>binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
:>
:>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
:>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
:>>
:>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
:>
:> Do we give a rat's hinder?
:
:Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
:soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.

How would that work again? Are you suggesting the Leftist Eurowienies
are shooting American troops?

--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn

[Kevin Brooks]

Peter Skelton > wrote in message >...
> On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:
>
> >"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
> >binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
> >
> >> Richard Bernstein, NYT
> >> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
> >>
> >> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
> >
> > Do we give a rat's hinder?
> >
>
> We've been treated to the spectacle of the Shrub approaching the
> Germans, French et al on bended knee for help in Iraq.

Hmm? And where do you see us acquiescing to giving up command, or for
that matter just *how* are we on "bended knee"?

>
> Meanwhile the UN resoultion on Iran goes forward with European
> sponsorship.

Iran?

>
> Apparently you do.

He did what? Couldn't possibly be anything you have not already
done...let's see, what is the total now for your claims of personal
expertise and experience, like personal attendance at briefings where
we allegedly acknowledged war crimes, attendance of the 10th LID's
BUB's, and having supposedly done so much for the 24th MEU that had
they killed a bunch of taliban your past twelve months of work would
have been "wasted", right? Have you made up any new ones lately?

Brooks

> ____
>
> Peter Skelton

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
Alan Minyard > wrote:

> The URL that you give is for "Fair Use", a different section of the
> (excellent) web site cover "educational use". For instance, video
> taping an entire program for use in the classroom is allowed, as is
> the copying of entire poems, short stories, etc.

But making a lot of copies and distributing them randomly around campus
is, most certainly, not.

Like making a copy of a complete newspaper story and dumping it on
Usenet.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
Alan Minyard > wrote:

> I agree that making multiple copies of an entire book to avoid buying
> the book would be a violation, however reproducing an article in a
> newspaper/magazine is subject to the academic exemption. That
> particular exemption is rather liberally applied.

....except that it's really not. Most schools have very strict codes
about what can and cannot be used, and how liberal that use is. Some
successful lawsuits by publishers put an end to that at most schools.

And, once again, making a few copies of one article from the Times for
your Business 101 class is very different from publishing the entire
article over the Internet, for thousands of readers who are *not*
enrolled in any classes, formally or otherwise. There are specific
rules about this (more sections of the Copyright code).

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
(phil hunt) wrote:

> Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
> soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.

The per capita fatality rate of US soldiers in Iraq is about equal to
that among tuna fishermen in Alaska... should we withdraw from
Anchorage, too?

Meanwhile, the Iraqis *hate* the UN, are generally welcoming American
soldiers with open arms, and are completely ****ed off at the
Jordanians, Syrians, Saudis and Iranians who are causing all of the
trouble in some parts of Iraq.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Paul J. Adam]

In message >, Fred J. McCall
> writes
>Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:
>:Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
>:rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
>
>Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?
>
>I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
>Pakistan, right?

Pakistan is more fungible, but 9/11 came from Saudi. They paid for it,
they provided the personnel, they made it happen.

Then they watched the US miss the point.

What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia for funding and enthusing
the 9/11 crew?


Since then, Iraq had no WMEs. They claimed so, they were invaded, and
still no WMEs emerge.

North Korea says they _do_ have WMEs and the missiles to deliver them.

One gets invaded, the other doesn't. Clear lesson? WMEs make you safe as
long as your claim is credible. North Korea is believed, Iraq was not..



Why are Righties so unutterably stupid?

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[phil hunt]

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 18:41:33 GMT, Fred J. McCall > wrote:
(phil hunt) wrote:
>
>:On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:
>:>"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
>:>binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
>:>
>:>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
>:>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>:>>
>:>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>:>
>:> Do we give a rat's hinder?
>:
>:Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
>:soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.
>
>How would that work again? Are you suggesting the Leftist Eurowienies
>are shooting American troops?

No, I'm saying that some Iraqis hate Americans, and most (the vast
majority if opinion polls are accurate) have extreme doubts about
the American occupiers' intentions.

If Iraqis had a moree favourable opinion of Americans, there would
be less attacks on them, partly because less people would be
willing to take part in attacks, but mostly because they would not
be a large number of people prepared to turn a blind eye to
suspicions that their neighbours/friends/co-workers are involved in
guerilla activity.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[phil hunt]

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 19:40:02 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>In article >,
> (phil hunt) wrote:
>
>> Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
>> soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.
>
>The per capita fatality rate of US soldiers in Iraq is about equal to
>that among tuna fishermen in Alaska... should we withdraw from
>Anchorage, too?

Idiot question.

>Meanwhile, the Iraqis *hate* the UN, are generally welcoming American
>soldiers with open arms, and are completely ****ed off at the
>Jordanians, Syrians, Saudis and Iranians who are causing all of the
>trouble in some parts of Iraq.

Cite? That is to say, do you have an opinion poll of iraqi opinion
that backs up your viewpoint. I have of mine, so put up or shut up.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Kevin Brooks]

"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message >...
> In message >, Fred J. McCall
> > writes
> >Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:
> >:Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
> >:rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
> >
> >Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?
> >
> >I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
> >Pakistan, right?
>
> Pakistan is more fungible, but 9/11 came from Saudi. They paid for it,
> they provided the personnel, they made it happen.
>
> Then they watched the US miss the point.
>
> What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia for funding and enthusing
> the 9/11 crew?

You are claiming that Saudi Arabia, as in their government, sanctioned
the 9-11 attack? I don't think so... So it must be those Saudi
individuals who have supported AQ that you are carping about.
Otherwise, because the infamous "shoe bomber" was a Brit, we should
"punish" the UK?

>
>
> Since then, Iraq had no WMEs. They claimed so, they were invaded, and
> still no WMEs emerge.

You really think they had no WME, as you call it, programs? The mere
existance of such programs would be in violation of the various UN
resolutions, not to mention the ceasefire agreement from ODS.
Justification does not require the finding of a horde of prepped and
ready chem rounds.

>
> North Korea says they _do_ have WMEs and the missiles to deliver them.

So?

>
> One gets invaded, the other doesn't. Clear lesson? WMEs make you safe as
> long as your claim is credible. North Korea is believed, Iraq was not..

WME's are not making the DPRK "safe". It would seem that the
possibility of defanging the DPRK without resorting to armed conflict
is a reasonable one; twelve years of piffling about with Saddam, his
refusal to comply with disarmament requirements, and various
unenforced UN resolutions indicates that avenue was leading nowhere in
the case of Iraq.
>
>
>
> Why are Righties so unutterably stupid?

I believe the extremes of both sides are rather stupid, just as I am
none to impressed with the less-than-cerebral machinations of those
who seem to think that all foreign policy has to be done with a cookie
cutter (the "you went into Iraq, but not the DPRK" blathering being a
fine example). Better to use a diplomatic version of METT-T and
develop an optimal COA for each independent situation.

Brooks

[Peter Stickney]

In article >,
"Paul J. Adam" > writes:
> In message >, Fred J. McCall
> > writes
>>Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:
>>:Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
>>:rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
>>
>>Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?
>>
>>I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
>>Pakistan, right?
>
> Pakistan is more fungible, but 9/11 came from Saudi. They paid for it,
> they provided the personnel, they made it happen.
>
> Then they watched the US miss the point.
>
> What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia for funding and enthusing
> the 9/11 crew?
>
>
> Since then, Iraq had no WMEs. They claimed so, they were invaded, and
> still no WMEs emerge.
>
> North Korea says they _do_ have WMEs and the missiles to deliver them.
>
> One gets invaded, the other doesn't. Clear lesson? WMEs make you safe as
> long as your claim is credible. North Korea is believed, Iraq was not..

But, then, the DPRK hasn't been invaded in the last 50 years that they
_didn't_ claim to have WME (That would be weapons of Mass Effect?),
either. Quite frankly, I'd much rather wait for the North Koreans to
implode/starve/start digging escape tunnels than to have anybody
invade them. I'm not trying to pass the buck here, but if I were a
DPRK General worrying about an invasion, I'd be more concerned about
the 1,000,000 ROKs on th eother side of the 38th parallel, with a
modern combined arms army suppoerted by a self-sufficent agricultural
and industrial economy (By and large the Koreans make their own
stuff), or teh huge and now aloof at best adn unfriendly at worst
Russian and PRC forces to their North. Whether causing Japan to
reconsider the "Homeland Defence Only" is a Good Thing or a Bad Thing
is another bucket of worms. In the short term, Japan won't be a major
land and air player, but I suspect that those whale-shaped Diesel
Boats od theirs would do quite nicely for sewing up th DPRK's
coastlines. I don't think they're really all that concerned with 2
understrength Infantry Brigades and a U.S.A.F> FIghter Wing, with all
that going on.

The DPRK is a walking corpse. It has been for years. It might have a
highly destructive spasm left in it, like a mortally wounded
rattlesnake, but all everybody has to do is wait.

--
Pete Stickney
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many
bad measures. -- Daniel Webster

[Fred J. McCall]

(phil hunt) wrote:

:On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 18:41:33 GMT, Fred J. McCall > wrote:
(phil hunt) wrote:
:>
:>:On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:
:>:>"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
:>:>binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
:>:>
:>:>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
:>:>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
:>:>>
:>:>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
:>:>
:>:> Do we give a rat's hinder?
:>:
:>:Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
:>:soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.
:>
:>How would that work again? Are you suggesting the Leftist Eurowienies
:>are shooting American troops?
:
:No, I'm saying that some Iraqis hate Americans, and most (the vast
:majority if opinion polls are accurate) have extreme doubts about
:the American occupiers' intentions.

This doesn't seem to relate to losing "the sympathy of the world".

:If Iraqis had a moree favourable opinion of Americans, there would
:be less attacks on them, partly because less people would be
:willing to take part in attacks, but mostly because they would not
:be a large number of people prepared to turn a blind eye to
:suspicions that their neighbours/friends/co-workers are involved in
:guerilla activity.

Again, this doesn't seem to relate to the original remarks. I
understand why we might care what the IRAQIS think is going on,
although I'm frankly at a loss for how to affect that in the short
term. However, I'm still awaiting an answer for why we should give a
**** what the WORLD (as in Eurotrash Europe) thinks.

--
"It's always different. It's always complex. But at some point,
somebody has to draw the line. And that somebody is always me....
I am the law."
-- Buffy, The Vampire Slayer

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
(phil hunt) wrote:

> On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 19:40:02 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
> >In article >,
> > (phil hunt) wrote:
> >
> >> Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
> >> soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.
> >
> >The per capita fatality rate of US soldiers in Iraq is about equal to
> >that among tuna fishermen in Alaska... should we withdraw from
> >Anchorage, too?
>
> Idiot question.

No, just making fun of an idiotic statement.

> >Meanwhile, the Iraqis *hate* the UN, are generally welcoming American
> >soldiers with open arms, and are completely ****ed off at the
> >Jordanians, Syrians, Saudis and Iranians who are causing all of the
> >trouble in some parts of Iraq.
>
> Cite? That is to say, do you have an opinion poll of iraqi opinion
> that backs up your viewpoint. I have of mine, so put up or shut up.

Here's mine:
<http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=734>

If you were correct, then why do almost 70% of Iraqis think they're
going to be better off in five years? If "the majority" of them are
suspicious of the motives of the US "occupiers," they should be much
more pessimistic, right?

Where's your poll, now that you mention it?

Oh, that's right, you don't have one.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Peter Skelton]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 02:09:35 +0100, (phil
hunt) wrote:

>On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 18:41:33 GMT, Fred J. McCall > wrote:
(phil hunt) wrote:
>>
>>:On 14 Sep 2003 03:03:04 GMT, IBM > wrote:
>>:>"John Mullen" > wrote in news:KMd8b.5371$YL.2063@news-
>>:>binary.blueyonder.co.uk:
>>:>
>>:>> Richard Bernstein, NYT
>>:>> Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
>>:>>
>>:>> U.S. is losing the sympathy of the world
>>:>
>>:> Do we give a rat's hinder?
>>:
>>:Well, if the USA had a better public reputation, less American
>>:soldiers would be coming back in body bags from Iraq right now.
>>
>>How would that work again? Are you suggesting the Leftist Eurowienies
>>are shooting American troops?
>
>No, I'm saying that some Iraqis hate Americans, and most (the vast
>majority if opinion polls are accurate) have extreme doubts about
>the American occupiers' intentions.

I wonder how these opinion polls are conducted. The only one I
checked into was a survey of memebers of an association of Iraqi
landed immigrants to Canada, interesting but hardly conclusive.

____

Peter Skelton

[Leslie Swartz]

"Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"

Since when?

Steve Swartz

(By the way, *programs" were in violation of the accords, with or without
stockpiles. Are you claiming that we have demonstrated no evidence of
*programs*?)


"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
...
> In message >, Fred J. McCall
> > writes
> >Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:
> >:Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
> >:rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
> >
> >Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?
> >
> >I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
> >Pakistan, right?
>
> Pakistan is more fungible, but 9/11 came from Saudi. They paid for it,
> they provided the personnel, they made it happen.
>
> Then they watched the US miss the point.
>
> What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia for funding and enthusing
> the 9/11 crew?
>
>
> Since then, Iraq had no WMEs. They claimed so, they were invaded, and
> still no WMEs emerge.
>
> North Korea says they _do_ have WMEs and the missiles to deliver them.
>
> One gets invaded, the other doesn't. Clear lesson? WMEs make you safe as
> long as your claim is credible. North Korea is believed, Iraq was not..
>
>
>
> Why are Righties so unutterably stupid?
>
> --
> When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
> W S Churchill
>
> Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, Leslie Swartz
> wrote:

> "Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
>
> Since when?

Since the beginnings of logical thought. One reason why I am reasonably
certain there are no fairies at the bottom of my garden is the utter
absence of evidence for their presence. Which I take, pro tem, as
"evidence of absence". Not *proof* of absence, mind you, but it will do
for the moment. Carl Sagan should never have come out with that one.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[phil hunt]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 06:38:27 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>
>> >Meanwhile, the Iraqis *hate* the UN, are generally welcoming American
>> >soldiers with open arms, and are completely ****ed off at the
>> >Jordanians, Syrians, Saudis and Iranians who are causing all of the
>> >trouble in some parts of Iraq.
>>
>> Cite? That is to say, do you have an opinion poll of iraqi opinion
>> that backs up your viewpoint. I have of mine, so put up or shut up.
>
>Here's mine:
><http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=734>
>
>If you were correct, then why do almost 70% of Iraqis think they're
>going to be better off in five years?

Because they're in a ****ty condition now.

> If "the majority" of them are
>suspicious of the motives of the US "occupiers," they should be much
>more pessimistic, right?

Of course, if you'd used a sensible dataset, rather than the poxy
3-question one you quoted, you'd know that 77% of Iraqis (or at
lest Baghdadis) think the invasion wasn't motived by a desire to
liberate Iraqis. Iraqis think the main reason for the American
invasion was to secure oil. From the poll (URL below):

What do you think were the main reasons for America and Britains
actions (all numbers are %ages):

Secure oil supplies 47
Help Israel 41
Liberate Iraqis 23
Protect Kuwait 7
Destroy WMDs 6
Other reason 10
Don't know/not stated 8

About 1/2 of Iraqis think the Americans are as bad as Saddam; of the
others, more prefer the Americans to Saddam.

If you had to choose would you rather live under Saddam or the
Americans:

Saddam 9
No preference 47
Americans 29
Not stated 15

Iraqis are mostly neither friendly nor hostile to the occupiers.

What is your view towards the American and Britian force currently
stateioned in Iraq:

Very friendly 8
Fairly friendly 18
Neither friendly nor hostile 50
Fairly hostile 9
Very hostile 9
No opinion/not stated 6

Not quite "welcoming Americans with open arms", is it?

There were not questions in the survey on Iraqi views towards the
UN, Jordanians, Syrians, etc, but its reasonable to assume that the
assuracy of your thoughts on that issue is about the same as the
accuracy of your thoughts on the issue of Iraqi sentiment towards
Americans, i.e. not very.

>Where's your poll, now that you mention it?
>
>Oh, that's right, you don't have one.

<http://www.yougov.com/yougov_website/asp_besPollArchives/pdf/OMI030101018_2.pdf>

I think you owe me an apology for calling me a liar.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[phil hunt]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 07:37:43 -0400, Peter Skelton > wrote:
>
>I wonder how these opinion polls are conducted. The only one I
>checked into was a survey of memebers of an association of Iraqi
>landed immigrants to Canada, interesting but hardly conclusive.

The one I'm using was done in Baghdad.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
(phil hunt) wrote:

> >Where's your poll, now that you mention it?
> >
> >Oh, that's right, you don't have one.
>
> <http://www.yougov.com/yougov_website/asp_besPollArchives/pdf/OMI030101018_2.p
> df>
>
> I think you owe me an apology for calling me a liar.

Okay, I'm sorry for being suspicious of this poll that you never quoted
before.

Now, if you'd just quote something current, instead of the two month old
one... the Zogby poll was from last *week*.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
(phil hunt) wrote:

> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 07:37:43 -0400, Peter Skelton > wrote:
> >
> >I wonder how these opinion polls are conducted. The only one I
> >checked into was a survey of memebers of an association of Iraqi
> >landed immigrants to Canada, interesting but hardly conclusive.
>
> The one I'm using was done in Baghdad.

....two months ago.

Things have changed.

People get less suspicious when they start getting power and food.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Leslie Swartz]

. . . but thanks for playing . . .

Steve Swartz


"Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
...
> In article >, Leslie Swartz
> > wrote:
>
> > "Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
> >
> > Since when?
>
> Since the beginnings of logical thought. One reason why I am reasonably
> certain there are no fairies at the bottom of my garden is the utter
> absence of evidence for their presence. Which I take, pro tem, as
> "evidence of absence". Not *proof* of absence, mind you, but it will do
> for the moment. Carl Sagan should never have come out with that one.
>
> --
> "The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun
>
> My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
> If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Leslie Swartz]

Hmmm . . .

The website of the for-profit "YouGov" site is a little "iffy" about
how/what they do.

The impression one is left with is that they "commissioned" a news
organization to do "man on the street" interviews back in 8-10 July.

The results are therefore somewhat "interpretable" at best.

And your "interpretations" are somewhat a stretch in many of the cases you
cite, even if the results were reliable for the limited sub-sub-sample. . .

(how on earth do you convert a 9% "rather live under Saddam" result into a
"1/2 think the Americans are as bad as Saddam?")

Steve Swartz



"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 06:38:27 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
> >
> >> >Meanwhile, the Iraqis *hate* the UN, are generally welcoming American
> >> >soldiers with open arms, and are completely ****ed off at the
> >> >Jordanians, Syrians, Saudis and Iranians who are causing all of the
> >> >trouble in some parts of Iraq.
> >>
> >> Cite? That is to say, do you have an opinion poll of iraqi opinion
> >> that backs up your viewpoint. I have of mine, so put up or shut up.
> >
> >Here's mine:
> ><http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=734>
> >
> >If you were correct, then why do almost 70% of Iraqis think they're
> >going to be better off in five years?
>
> Because they're in a ****ty condition now.
>
> > If "the majority" of them are
> >suspicious of the motives of the US "occupiers," they should be much
> >more pessimistic, right?
>
> Of course, if you'd used a sensible dataset, rather than the poxy
> 3-question one you quoted, you'd know that 77% of Iraqis (or at
> lest Baghdadis) think the invasion wasn't motived by a desire to
> liberate Iraqis. Iraqis think the main reason for the American
> invasion was to secure oil. From the poll (URL below):
>
> What do you think were the main reasons for America and Britains
> actions (all numbers are %ages):
>
> Secure oil supplies 47
> Help Israel 41
> Liberate Iraqis 23
> Protect Kuwait 7
> Destroy WMDs 6
> Other reason 10
> Don't know/not stated 8
>
> About 1/2 of Iraqis think the Americans are as bad as Saddam; of the
> others, more prefer the Americans to Saddam.
>
> If you had to choose would you rather live under Saddam or the
> Americans:
>
> Saddam 9
> No preference 47
> Americans 29
> Not stated 15
>
> Iraqis are mostly neither friendly nor hostile to the occupiers.
>
> What is your view towards the American and Britian force currently
> stateioned in Iraq:
>
> Very friendly 8
> Fairly friendly 18
> Neither friendly nor hostile 50
> Fairly hostile 9
> Very hostile 9
> No opinion/not stated 6
>
> Not quite "welcoming Americans with open arms", is it?
>
> There were not questions in the survey on Iraqi views towards the
> UN, Jordanians, Syrians, etc, but its reasonable to assume that the
> assuracy of your thoughts on that issue is about the same as the
> accuracy of your thoughts on the issue of Iraqi sentiment towards
> Americans, i.e. not very.
>
> >Where's your poll, now that you mention it?
> >
> >Oh, that's right, you don't have one.
>
>
<http://www.yougov.com/yougov_website/asp_besPollArchives/pdf/OMI030101018_2
..pdf>
>
> I think you owe me an apology for calling me a liar.
>
> --
> A: top posting
>
> Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?
>

[Leslie Swartz]

Man on the street interviews conducted by a news organization, 8-10 July, in
Baghdad . . .

Somewhat problematic methodology, generalizability-wise.

Steve Swartz



"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 07:37:43 -0400, Peter Skelton >
wrote:
> >
> >I wonder how these opinion polls are conducted. The only one I
> >checked into was a survey of memebers of an association of Iraqi
> >landed immigrants to Canada, interesting but hardly conclusive.
>
> The one I'm using was done in Baghdad.
>
> --
> A: top posting
>
> Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?
>

[Grantland]

"John Keeney" > wrote:

>
>"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
>> These statistics aren't the most important. More important, IMO,
>> are opinion polls of US support for the occupation of iraq.
>
><snort>
>
>> From <http://www.greenleft.org.au/current/547p14.htm>:
>> A Detroit News poll, published on July 23, found that 48% of voters
>> believe the White House misled the US people about the need to
>> invade Iraq, while 47% didn't believe they were misled. Seventy-one
>> per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
>> "expensive, long and deadly".
>
>Buying a house is enormously expensive, comes with unique &
>substantial risk and is only maintained with continuous outlays.
>Yes, I'm concerned that the occupation will be "expensive, long
>and deadly.
>
>I own my home.
>I support the occupation.

Facile and moronic analogy. Another imbecile.

>I hate the French.

There you go.
>
>
>Perhaps I should have simply asked "So?"
>
d'oh would be more appropriate. Cretin.

Grantland

[phil hunt]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 23:31:30 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>In article >,
> (phil hunt) wrote:
>
>> >Where's your poll, now that you mention it?
>> >
>> >Oh, that's right, you don't have one.
>>
>> <http://www.yougov.com/yougov_website/asp_besPollArchives/pdf/OMI030101018_2.p
>> df>
>>
>> I think you owe me an apology for calling me a liar.
>
>Okay, I'm sorry for being suspicious of this poll that you never quoted
>before.

Apology accepted.

>Now, if you'd just quote something current, instead of the two month old
>one...

Unfortunately YouGov don't have a more recent one. I have to take as
I find.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[phil hunt]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 19:54:09 -0400, Leslie Swartz > wrote:
>Man on the street interviews conducted by a news organization, 8-10 July, in
>Baghdad . . .

YouGov is an opinion polling organisation.

>Somewhat problematic methodology, generalizability-wise.

Because they used street polling? Or because it was in Baghdad?

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[phil hunt]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 19:52:24 -0400, Leslie Swartz > wrote:
>Hmmm . . .
>
>The website of the for-profit "YouGov" site is a little "iffy" about
>how/what they do.

In what sense? They are an opinion polling organisation, mainly know
for conducting Internet-based polls in the UK. What's iffy about
that?

>The impression one is left with is that they "commissioned" a news
>organization to do "man on the street" interviews back in 8-10 July.

"Why" "are" "you" "quoting" "every" "other" "word"?

>And your "interpretations" are somewhat a stretch in many of the cases you
>cite, even if the results were reliable for the limited sub-sub-sample. . .

That's right, ignore any evidence that contradicts your preconceived
notions.

>(how on earth do you convert a 9% "rather live under Saddam" result into a
>"1/2 think the Americans are as bad as Saddam?")

I don't, it's not the 9% figure that counts, it's the 47%: the relevant part of the poll was:

If you had to choose would you rather live under Saddam or the
Americans:

Saddam 9
No preference 47
Americans 29
Not stated 15


If 47% have no preference between the two, then the two choices must
be as good (or bad) as each other.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Fred J. McCall]

Alan Lothian > wrote:

:In article >, Leslie Swartz
> wrote:
:
:> "Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
:>
:> Since when?
:
:Since the beginnings of logical thought.

Wrong. One of the underpinnings of logical thought is that you CANNOT
prove a negative.

:One reason why I am reasonably
:certain there are no fairies at the bottom of my garden is the utter
:absence of evidence for their presence. Which I take, pro tem, as
:"evidence of absence". Not *proof* of absence, mind you, but it will do
:for the moment. Carl Sagan should never have come out with that one.

So one assumes you also do not believe in neutrinos, tachyons, the sun
during the evening, or any other number of outre and fantastic
concepts?

--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn

[John Keeney]

"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
> These statistics aren't the most important. More important, IMO,
> are opinion polls of US support for the occupation of iraq.

<snort>

> From <http://www.greenleft.org.au/current/547p14.htm>:
> A Detroit News poll, published on July 23, found that 48% of voters
> believe the White House misled the US people about the need to
> invade Iraq, while 47% didn't believe they were misled. Seventy-one
> per cent were concerned that the US occupation of Iraq would be
> "expensive, long and deadly".

Buying a house is enormously expensive, comes with unique &
substantial risk and is only maintained with continuous outlays.
Yes, I'm concerned that the occupation will be "expensive, long
and deadly.

I own my home.
I support the occupation.


Perhaps I should have simply asked "So?"

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, Fred J. McCall
> wrote:

> Alan Lothian > wrote:
>
> :In article >, Leslie Swartz
> > wrote:
> :
> :> "Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
> :>
> :> Since when?
> :
> :Since the beginnings of logical thought.
>
> Wrong. One of the underpinnings of logical thought is that you CANNOT
> prove a negative.

You will note that I quite specifically pointed out that absence of
evidence does not amount to proof. It is exactly what it says it is:
absence of evidence.
[FX: stropping sound as a certain razor acquires a keen edge]

> :One reason why I am reasonably
> :certain there are no fairies at the bottom of my garden is the utter
> :absence of evidence for their presence. Which I take, pro tem, as
> :"evidence of absence". Not *proof* of absence, mind you, but it will do
> :for the moment. Carl Sagan should never have come out with that one.
>
> So one assumes you also do not believe in neutrinos, tachyons,

Excellent examples. Both are particles predicted by theory, in the one
case as a necessity to balance all manner of energy equations, in the
other because the mathematics of general relativity do not actually
prohibit them. It took a good deal of effort to overcome the "absence
of evidence" problem for the neutrino, but the job was eventually done.
Tachyons, however, remain in much the same state as those fairies at
the bottom of my garden: perhaps they are there, but simply refusing to
interact with the rest of the universe. In the absence of any evidence
for their existence, that'll do fine.

> the sun
> during the evening,

As any fule kno, the sun in full flame clearly sinks beneath the Earth
to return the next morning. Travellers assure us that the farther west
they go, the later the sun sinks, providing at least some evidence for
a round Earth and a strong presumption that the sun goes around it.
Whether the Sun is drawn along its trajectory by chariots or some other
motive force must remain, for the moment, a matter of conjecture.

> or any other number of outre and fantastic
> concepts?

"Absence of evidence" remains quite sufficient for me to retain a
certain scepticism as to the likely existence of Little Grey Men who
stick curious objects up people's recta. No, I can't *prove* that LGM
don't exist, or don't indulge in such peculiar habits, or indeed that
Evil Creatures from Zeta Reticulae do not climb into George Bush's left
ear every night after supper to program him for the coming day. Or any
other number of "outre and fantastic concepts", for which the absence
of evidence is total.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
(phil hunt) wrote:

> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 23:31:30 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

> >Now, if you'd just quote something current, instead of the two month old
> >one...
>
> Unfortunately YouGov don't have a more recent one. I have to take as
> I find.

But you ignored the more-recent Zogby poll...

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Gernot Hassenpflug]

In science hypotheses are often only "working hypotheses" which cannot
be proved per se, but whose predictions and consequences can be tested
and the theory judged significant or useless. Finally all scientific
reasoning is inductive, only the theory, based on some set of axioms,
can be made deductive. At least that's what I have been taught...
--
G Hassenpflug * IJN & JMSDF equipment/history fan

[Leslie Swartz]

Excellent.

So now you are ready to agree that the mountains of evidence we have
accumulated to demonstrate that Iraq had WMD programs, and WMDs themselves,
overwhelms the absence fo evidence that he destroyed them?

That is what you are saying, right?

If not, it would assist your position if you stated your fundamental
assumptions and took us from there.

In all this hoopla over not finding a "hihg enough" mountain of deployable
WMDs, I have yet to hear a cogent argument as to how that leads us to the
inescapable conclusion that they never existed or were somehow "trumped up."

Steve




"Alan Lothian" > wrote in message
...
> In article >, Fred J. McCall
> > wrote:
>
> > Alan Lothian > wrote:
> >
> > :In article >, Leslie Swartz
> > > wrote:
> > :
> > :> "Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
> > :>
> > :> Since when?
> > :
> > :Since the beginnings of logical thought.
> >
> > Wrong. One of the underpinnings of logical thought is that you CANNOT
> > prove a negative.
>
> You will note that I quite specifically pointed out that absence of
> evidence does not amount to proof. It is exactly what it says it is:
> absence of evidence.
> [FX: stropping sound as a certain razor acquires a keen edge]
>
> > :One reason why I am reasonably
> > :certain there are no fairies at the bottom of my garden is the utter
> > :absence of evidence for their presence. Which I take, pro tem, as
> > :"evidence of absence". Not *proof* of absence, mind you, but it will do
> > :for the moment. Carl Sagan should never have come out with that one.
> >
> > So one assumes you also do not believe in neutrinos, tachyons,
>
> Excellent examples. Both are particles predicted by theory, in the one
> case as a necessity to balance all manner of energy equations, in the
> other because the mathematics of general relativity do not actually
> prohibit them. It took a good deal of effort to overcome the "absence
> of evidence" problem for the neutrino, but the job was eventually done.
> Tachyons, however, remain in much the same state as those fairies at
> the bottom of my garden: perhaps they are there, but simply refusing to
> interact with the rest of the universe. In the absence of any evidence
> for their existence, that'll do fine.
>
> > the sun
> > during the evening,
>
> As any fule kno, the sun in full flame clearly sinks beneath the Earth
> to return the next morning. Travellers assure us that the farther west
> they go, the later the sun sinks, providing at least some evidence for
> a round Earth and a strong presumption that the sun goes around it.
> Whether the Sun is drawn along its trajectory by chariots or some other
> motive force must remain, for the moment, a matter of conjecture.
>
> > or any other number of outre and fantastic
> > concepts?
>
> "Absence of evidence" remains quite sufficient for me to retain a
> certain scepticism as to the likely existence of Little Grey Men who
> stick curious objects up people's recta. No, I can't *prove* that LGM
> don't exist, or don't indulge in such peculiar habits, or indeed that
> Evil Creatures from Zeta Reticulae do not climb into George Bush's left
> ear every night after supper to program him for the coming day. Or any
> other number of "outre and fantastic concepts", for which the absence
> of evidence is total.
>
> --
> "The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun
>
> My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
> If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Leslie Swartz]

- Non Random sample
- In an inherenlty biased sub-population
- Using subjective collection
- Prone to "Socially Desirable Responding"

Hire a preacher to do a poll on abortion; send him to a tent revival to ask
people face to face about hteir attitudes toward abortion. In public.

The preacher will seek out those who will give the answers he wants, in a
crowd that already agrees with him, he will recieve answers the respondent
thinks are "socially desirable," and after all that he will "spin" the
answers he gets to best fit his desired outcome.

The for-profit polling organizations know all of this, of course, and they
know they will not be called to account like a scientist trying to publish
in a peer-reviewed journal would be. Therefore, they can pretty easily give
their client whaht they are paying for- which is support for one position or
another; not some objecitve "truth."

That's why the results of these "polls" are generally never to be trusted-
whether Zogby, Roper, CNN, whomever.

Steve Swartz


"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 19:54:09 -0400, Leslie Swartz
> wrote:
> >Man on the street interviews conducted by a news organization, 8-10 July,
in
> >Baghdad . . .
>
> YouGov is an opinion polling organisation.
>
> >Somewhat problematic methodology, generalizability-wise.
>
> Because they used street polling? Or because it was in Baghdad?
>
> --
> A: top posting
>
> Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?
>

[Leslie Swartz]

Yes, Phil, but the timing and location of that poll creates a tremendous
bias in the results.

Steve


"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 23:31:30 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
> >In article >,
> > (phil hunt) wrote:
> >
> >> >Where's your poll, now that you mention it?
> >> >
> >> >Oh, that's right, you don't have one.
> >>
> >>
<http://www.yougov.com/yougov_website/asp_besPollArchives/pdf/OMI030101018_2
..p
> >> df>
> >>
> >> I think you owe me an apology for calling me a liar.
> >
> >Okay, I'm sorry for being suspicious of this poll that you never quoted
> >before.
>
> Apology accepted.
>
> >Now, if you'd just quote something current, instead of the two month old
> >one...
>
> Unfortunately YouGov don't have a more recent one. I have to take as
> I find.
>
> --
> A: top posting
>
> Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?
>

[Leslie Swartz]

For profit polling organization (purpose is to make money by making clients
happy) with a core competency in "Web Based" polling? Yes, that's "iffy"
from a standpoint of trying to get at any kindf of objective approach.

Big-Time "Iffy."

I use the quotes to offset words for which common usage is unrealiable and
subject to misinterpretation. Commonly used in the United States. When
speaking, the use of "Air Quaotes" implies that the common usage of the word
strays quite far from generally accepted interpretation; as when a
politician tries to spin a word.

Like when you reported that half of the Iraquis preferred Saddam, since by
"half" you meant 9%, your use of the word "half" should have been in quotes.

Steve



"phil hunt" > wrote in message
. ..
> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 19:52:24 -0400, Leslie Swartz
> wrote:
> >Hmmm . . .
> >
> >The website of the for-profit "YouGov" site is a little "iffy" about
> >how/what they do.
>
> In what sense? They are an opinion polling organisation, mainly know
> for conducting Internet-based polls in the UK. What's iffy about
> that?
>
> >The impression one is left with is that they "commissioned" a news
> >organization to do "man on the street" interviews back in 8-10 July.
>
> "Why" "are" "you" "quoting" "every" "other" "word"?
>
> >And your "interpretations" are somewhat a stretch in many of the cases
you
> >cite, even if the results were reliable for the limited sub-sub-sample. .
..
>
> That's right, ignore any evidence that contradicts your preconceived
> notions.
>
> >(how on earth do you convert a 9% "rather live under Saddam" result into
a
> >"1/2 think the Americans are as bad as Saddam?")
>
> I don't, it's not the 9% figure that counts, it's the 47%: the relevant
part of the poll was:
>
> If you had to choose would you rather live under Saddam or the
> Americans:
>
> Saddam 9
> No preference 47
> Americans 29
> Not stated 15
>
>
> If 47% have no preference between the two, then the two choices must
> be as good (or bad) as each other.
>
> --
> A: top posting
>
> Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[phil hunt]

On Tue, 16 Sep 2003 07:11:26 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>In article >,
> (phil hunt) wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 23:31:30 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>
>> >Now, if you'd just quote something current, instead of the two month old
>> >one...
>>
>> Unfortunately YouGov don't have a more recent one. I have to take as
>> I find.
>
>But you ignored the more-recent Zogby poll...

Because it -- or at least the public bits of it -- weren't useful in
finding out what Iraqis think of the USA.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Tex Houston]

"Leslie Swartz" > wrote in message
...
> The for-profit polling organizations know all of this, of course, and they
> know they will not be called to account like a scientist trying to publish
> in a peer-reviewed journal would be. Therefore, they can pretty easily
give
> their client whaht they are paying for- which is support for one position
or
> another; not some objecitve "truth."
>
> That's why the results of these "polls" are generally never to be trusted-
> whether Zogby, Roper, CNN, whomever.
>
> Steve Swartz

How about one of those organizations being hired to ask the question:

Should this forum return to talking about military aviation?

Tex

[Alan Minyard]

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 15:43:55 +0000 (UTC), "William Black"
> wrote:

>
>"Fred J. McCall" > wrote in message
...
>> Coridon Henshaw )> wrote:
>>
>> :"Jim McLaughlin" > wrote in
>> :news:S2A8b.431325$Ho3.69216@sccrnsc03:
>> :
>> :> Saudi royal funded Wahabbist crazies
>> :
>> :Since they are *Saudi* funded crazies, just why are you doing asking the
>> :rest of the world to march on Iraq rather than on Saudi Arabia?
>>
>> Why are Lefties so unutterably stupid?
>>
>> I suppose you also wonder why we don't invade North Korea and
>> Pakistan, right?
>
>They know why.
>
>Pakistan is a nasty military dictatorship that needed friends and was for
>sale. It was bought for less than the cost of an invasion.
>
>North Korea got nukes.

No, the DPRK is "working on" a nuclear weapon, there is no evidence
that they currently have one. One also has to take into account the
sensibilities of the PRC regarding the DPRK.

Al Minyard

[Alan Minyard]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 18:22:36 +0100, Alan Lothian >
wrote:

>In article >, Leslie Swartz
> wrote:
>
>> "Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
>>
>> Since when?
>
>Since the beginnings of logical thought. One reason why I am reasonably
>certain there are no fairies at the bottom of my garden is the utter
>absence of evidence for their presence. Which I take, pro tem, as
>"evidence of absence". Not *proof* of absence, mind you, but it will do
>for the moment. Carl Sagan should never have come out with that one.

For thousands of years there was no evidence (that could be observed)
for the existence of molecules, atoms, neutrinos,etc. That was not
very good "evidence of absence".

Al Minyard

[Alan Minyard]

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 19:32:22 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>In article >,
> Alan Minyard > wrote:
>
>> The URL that you give is for "Fair Use", a different section of the
>> (excellent) web site cover "educational use". For instance, video
>> taping an entire program for use in the classroom is allowed, as is
>> the copying of entire poems, short stories, etc.
>
>But making a lot of copies and distributing them randomly around campus
>is, most certainly, not.
>
>Like making a copy of a complete newspaper story and dumping it on
>Usenet.

I would tend to agree with that, although the law as it pertains to
the internet is, IMHO, still evolving.

Al Minyard

[Alan Lothian]

In article >, Leslie Swartz
> wrote:

> Excellent.
>
> So now you are ready to agree that the mountains of evidence we have
> accumulated to demonstrate that Iraq had WMD programs, and WMDs themselves,
> overwhelms the absence fo evidence that he destroyed them?
>
> That is what you are saying, right?

WTF?

I was harmlessly attacking the foolish concept that "absence of
evidence does not equal evidence of absence", and pointing out that
absence of evidence is indeed evidence (although assuredly not proof)
of absence.

Iraq, or any other country with a name beginning somewhere between A
and Z, had nothing to do with it.

Go, and grind your axe in peace.

--
"The past resembles the future as water resembles water" Ibn Khaldun

My .mac.com address is a spam sink.
If you wish to email me, try alan dot lothian at blueyonder dot co dot uk

[Paul J. Adam]

In message >, Leslie Swartz
> writes
>"Absence of Evidence" = "Evidence of Absence?"
>
>Since when?

Prove that there are no fairies living at the bottom of your garden (or
any other damnfool claim). Don't just say "there's no evidence" that you
are the lost love child of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley, show me the
_proof_ or else I'll take the claim as true :)

Evidence may emerge, but it hasn't yet despite being eagerly sought.
When it emerges, it gets evaluated.

>(By the way, *programs" were in violation of the accords, with or without
>stockpiles. Are you claiming that we have demonstrated no evidence of
>*programs*?)

Nope. But they were pretty poor affairs (equipment for nuclear research
buried in a garden for twelve years is not exactly what I call a clear
and present danger). No production facilities worth a damn (a couple of
canvas-sided trailers is the best anyone's come up with), no stockpiles
of bulk agents or precursors, no filled weapons.

What _is_ interesting is the complete lack of actual weapons. I'm coming
around to the belief that Iraq's WME program had a distinct Potemkin
feel to it: like the Soviet Five-Year Plans that proudly boasted of
record harvests even as most citizens nursed hungry bellies. _Declaring_
vast production of grain, meat and milk is easy for bureaucrats who get
promoted for production; but try finding them when they're actually
called for.


Trouble is, Iraq did its best to act like it _was_ a serious threat and
seems to have lied comprehensively to do so. (And would quite certainly
have resumed active research and production, once able).

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[Paul J. Adam]

In message >, Kevin
Brooks > writes
>"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
>...
>> What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia for funding and enthusing
>> the 9/11 crew?
>
>You are claiming that Saudi Arabia, as in their government, sanctioned
>the 9-11 attack? I don't think so...

Did Iraq?

Saudi funded the madrassas, gave them passports, threw money at them,
and whined that the end result was nothing to do with them.

What, precisely, did Iraq do? (Mildly exasperated by claims that 'Iraq
backed 9/11')

>So it must be those Saudi
>individuals who have supported AQ that you are carping about.
>Otherwise, because the infamous "shoe bomber" was a Brit, we should
>"punish" the UK?

Did we fund his particular sect?

>> Since then, Iraq had no WMEs. They claimed so, they were invaded, and
>> still no WMEs emerge.
>
>You really think they had no WME, as you call it

Weapons of Mass Effect. Chemical, biological, radiological weapons don't
_destroy_ much of anything unless it's ruined by decontamination: but
they produce major effects (evacuations, mass casualties, isolation,
decontamination...) Nuclear does mass _destruction_, the others don't.

Blame JDCC, not me.

>, programs?

Programs aren't weapons - and what programs did they have?

They had plans on hold for when sanctions lifted and would have made a
hard charge for WME once they could get hold of equipment, precursors,
skills,

> The mere
>existance of such programs would be in violation of the various UN
>resolutions, not to mention the ceasefire agreement from ODS.

So, where are the programs? "Bury this in your garden" in 1991 isn't a
program for 2003.

>Justification does not require the finding of a horde of prepped and
>ready chem rounds.

I'll settle for pretty much any WME at this stage. Still none to be had.

>> North Korea says they _do_ have WMEs and the missiles to deliver them.
>
>So?

It was a major problem when Iraq were unable or unwilling to prove this
wasn't true: why is it trivial that North Korea has thus tooled up and
stated their intent to use?

>> One gets invaded, the other doesn't. Clear lesson? WMEs make you safe as
>> long as your claim is credible. North Korea is believed, Iraq was not..
>
>WME's are not making the DPRK "safe".

The Stars and Stripes flies over Baghdad but not over Pyongyang. Iraq
didn't have findable WMEs, Pyongyang apparently does (and the missiles
to deliver them to sensitive spots) Kim Jong-Il still runs his country
into the ground for personal gain, Saddam Hussein is either dead or
hiding hard.

I'd say WMEs are showing a definite advantage: Kim's claim is credible,
Hussein's was either not credible or an acceptable risk.

>It would seem that the
>possibility of defanging the DPRK without resorting to armed conflict
>is a reasonable one; twelve years of piffling about with Saddam, his
>refusal to comply with disarmament requirements, and various
>unenforced UN resolutions indicates that avenue was leading nowhere in
>the case of Iraq.

The US has been piffling around with North Korea since 1953: I don't see
any prompt resolution in sight. That doesn't seem to be a problem - why
not?

>> Why are Righties so unutterably stupid?
>
>I believe the extremes of both sides are rather stupid, just as I am
>none to impressed with the less-than-cerebral machinations of those
>who seem to think that all foreign policy has to be done with a cookie
>cutter (the "you went into Iraq, but not the DPRK" blathering being a
>fine example).

It's just curious that one scenario can sit and simmer for fifty years
and still be "not a problem", while a dozen years makes the other into a
crisis.


>Better to use a diplomatic version of METT-T and
>develop an optimal COA for each independent situation.

Funny, even that doesn't lead to unanimous agreement.

(eyeball-deep in how to turn doctrine about 'effects based operation'
into useful facts)
--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[Charlie Whitaker]

In article >,
Alan Lothian > wrote:

> Excellent examples. Both are particles predicted by theory, in the one
> case as a necessity to balance all manner of energy equations, in the
> other because the mathematics of general relativity do not actually
> prohibit them. It took a good deal of effort to overcome the "absence
> of evidence" problem for the neutrino, but the job was eventually done.

But of course it was. Say all that very quickly, with earnest enthusiasm
(and maybe also a Punjabi accent) and you have a fine piece of gentle
stereotype character comedy. Well, with a few glasses of vino, you do ...

C.

[phil hunt]

On Tue, 16 Sep 2003 10:24:08 -0600, Tex Houston > wrote:
>
>How about one of those organizations being hired to ask the question:
>
>Should this forum return to talking about military aviation?

Good idea :-)

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Kevin Brooks]

"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message >...
> In message >, Kevin
> Brooks > writes
> >"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
> >...
> >> What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia for funding and enthusing
> >> the 9/11 crew?
> >
> >You are claiming that Saudi Arabia, as in their government, sanctioned
> >the 9-11 attack? I don't think so...
>
> Did Iraq?

Come now--you know as well as I do that the Iraqi situation had been
boiling long before 9-11.

>
> Saudi funded the madrassas, gave them passports, threw money at them,
> and whined that the end result was nothing to do with them.

So, would you therefore sanction "punishing" the Republic of Ireland
because some (misguided) Irish citizens have funded, supported, etc.,
violence in Northern Ireland?

>
> What, precisely, did Iraq do? (Mildly exasperated by claims that 'Iraq
> backed 9/11')

If you can't comprehend that Iraq broke the ceasefire agreement, not
to mention repeated UN resolutions, then I have misjudged you.

>
> >So it must be those Saudi
> >individuals who have supported AQ that you are carping about.
> >Otherwise, because the infamous "shoe bomber" was a Brit, we should
> >"punish" the UK?
>
> Did we fund his particular sect?

Of course you did--he attended a mosque in the UK, right? Kind of like
a madras in a manner of speaking... He made his money in the UK,
right? Gee, sounds very sinister to me.

>
> >> Since then, Iraq had no WMEs. They claimed so, they were invaded, and
> >> still no WMEs emerge.
> >
> >You really think they had no WME, as you call it
>
> Weapons of Mass Effect. Chemical, biological, radiological weapons don't
> _destroy_ much of anything unless it's ruined by decontamination: but
> they produce major effects (evacuations, mass casualties, isolation,
> decontamination...) Nuclear does mass _destruction_, the others don't.
>
> Blame JDCC, not me.

Whatever JDCC is...?

>
> >, programs?
>
> Programs aren't weapons - and what programs did they have?

The mere maintenace of an ongoing effort to sustain their chemical
weapons potential; interesting article in the paper here last week
that indicated there is evidence that Saddam was pursuing the
development/maintenance of "dual use" facilities beyond any domestic
need in order to allow for rapid manufacture of chemical weapons. That
sounds like a "program" to me.

>
> They had plans on hold for when sanctions lifted and would have made a
> hard charge for WME once they could get hold of equipment, precursors,
> skills,
>
> > The mere
> >existance of such programs would be in violation of the various UN
> >resolutions, not to mention the ceasefire agreement from ODS.
>
> So, where are the programs? "Bury this in your garden" in 1991 isn't a
> program for 2003.

In a manner of speaking it is, since it is just a continuation of
various violations of both the ceasefire agreement and UN resolutions
requiring complete WMD disarmament and *complete" disclosure. That
latter requirement alone justifies action--he *never* gave full and
complete disclosure (even though each successive "full and complete"
disclosure used that exact wording, and yet each listed a few more
things that we forced them to acknowledge). The fact that their AS
missiles exceeded the mandated range limit is another violation.

If you are gonna try and portray Saddam as being blameless, you have a
tough row to hoe, as we say. Likewise, if you are going to try to cast
the Saudis in the same light as a regime that routinely butchered
masses of its own citizens (what is the current count of mass graves
up to, some 150 or more?), you are gonna have to invest in a whole new
line of farm implements.

>
> >Justification does not require the finding of a horde of prepped and
> >ready chem rounds.
>
> I'll settle for pretty much any WME at this stage. Still none to be had.

So you claim that there were no programs in violation? How about that
missile?

>
> >> North Korea says they _do_ have WMEs and the missiles to deliver them.
> >
> >So?
>
> It was a major problem when Iraq were unable or unwilling to prove this
> wasn't true: why is it trivial that North Korea has thus tooled up and
> stated their intent to use?

Firstly, the DPRK has a history of being long on wind and short on
action, whereas Saddam had a somewhat different reputation when it
came to using WMD's. Secondly, the DPRK in terms of its WMD program is
not in flagrant violation of a recent ceasefire agreement. Lastly,
other methods are currently being used to handle the DPRK; different
solutions to different problems. You are the only person I know of who
seems to think that foreign policy has to have some kind of
"playbook", where you must stick to Plan A when situation X, or any
situation involving WMD's, pops up. Sounds a bit clumsy to me.

>
> >> One gets invaded, the other doesn't. Clear lesson? WMEs make you safe as
> >> long as your claim is credible. North Korea is believed, Iraq was not..
> >
> >WME's are not making the DPRK "safe".
>
> The Stars and Stripes flies over Baghdad but not over Pyongyang. Iraq
> didn't have findable WMEs, Pyongyang apparently does (and the missiles
> to deliver them to sensitive spots) Kim Jong-Il still runs his country
> into the ground for personal gain, Saddam Hussein is either dead or
> hiding hard.

Please show where WMD's are what has kept the US out of the DPRK. Kind
of hard to do, given that we have been sort of eyeball-to-eyeball for
many decades *prior* to their development of WMD's, and never stormed
back across the DMZ during all of those years. So how have these
magical WMD's all of a sudden accounted for their "security"? I
believe GWB and his cabinet are smart enough to realize that the DPRK
is already imploding--and besides, the DPRK does not have France and
germany rooting for them on the sidelines, as we saw recently in Iraq.

>
> I'd say WMEs are showing a definite advantage: Kim's claim is credible,
> Hussein's was either not credible or an acceptable risk.

Bad logic (post hoc, ergo propter hoc) you are using here.

>
> >It would seem that the
> >possibility of defanging the DPRK without resorting to armed conflict
> >is a reasonable one; twelve years of piffling about with Saddam, his
> >refusal to comply with disarmament requirements, and various
> >unenforced UN resolutions indicates that avenue was leading nowhere in
> >the case of Iraq.
>
> The US has been piffling around with North Korea since 1953: I don't see
> any prompt resolution in sight. That doesn't seem to be a problem - why
> not?

Rather different situation. Since 1953 our objective on the Korean
peninsula has been to secure the ROK from aggression--which we have
done, along with growing (and now majority) effort from our ROK
allies. Even with those magical WMD's, ahve you seen Kim invade across
the DMZ? Gee, it looks like our efforts are actually working after
all...

>
> >> Why are Righties so unutterably stupid?
> >
> >I believe the extremes of both sides are rather stupid, just as I am
> >none to impressed with the less-than-cerebral machinations of those
> >who seem to think that all foreign policy has to be done with a cookie
> >cutter (the "you went into Iraq, but not the DPRK" blathering being a
> >fine example).
>
> It's just curious that one scenario can sit and simmer for fifty years
> and still be "not a problem", while a dozen years makes the other into a
> crisis.

Different situations entirely, and I suspect that deep down you
realize that as well as I do. If you disagree with our going into
Iraq, fine--but don't tether it to this ridiculous "why aren't we
going into Korea" crap.

>
>
> >Better to use a diplomatic version of METT-T and
> >develop an optimal COA for each independent situation.
>
> Funny, even that doesn't lead to unanimous agreement.
>
> (eyeball-deep in how to turn doctrine about 'effects based operation'
> into useful facts)

Actually, I find "effects based" operations to be no more than common
sense, and if you look into writings as old as Sun Tzu I believe you
will find evidence of "effects based" operations. One example: you
want to stop production at factory X (effect equals no production) in
Lower Armpitia; the classic solution has (all too frequently) been to
bomb factory X, first with multitudes of HE and incendiaries that also
happen to blot out the surrounding village, and later with a few PGM's
that take out just the factory, except for the 10% that may also
clobber part of the village. But if you are seriously effects-based,
you instead take out the power transformer stations that supply
factory X, maybe even using those nifty graphite warheads, and leave
the factory intact and ready to go back into production after you kick
the nasty Armpitian dictator out of office. I believe one could argue
that the oil campaign instituted by 8th AF and BC during the latter
part of WWII was also "effects based", in a manner of speaking, though
no to the level that we are now applying that term at the tactical
level in terms of targeting.

Brooks

[phil hunt]

On 16 Sep 2003 20:34:55 -0700, Kevin Brooks > wrote:
>> >So it must be those Saudi
>> >individuals who have supported AQ that you are carping about.
>> >Otherwise, because the infamous "shoe bomber" was a Brit, we should
>> >"punish" the UK?
>>
>> Did we fund his particular sect?
>
>Of course you did--he attended a mosque in the UK, right?

Not only that, he was introduced to Islam while in prison.


--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[El Bastardo]

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 17:31:27 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>In article >,
> El *******o <El *******o@El *******o.com> wrote:
>
>> You seem to try to draw a bright line between quoting a whole story
>> and a part of it. Where in the law do you find such a bright line?
>> Yes, the quoted section lists "substantiality" as a factor among
>> other factors in its analysis of a use as being fair or not.
>>
>> If the law were as you view it, there would be no need to discuss
>> "substantiality" in the case of a work being wholly reproduced. There
>> would be a fifth factor, or a sentence in the current four factors,
>> which would read something like "complete reproduction of a work is
>> strictly a violation of the law in all cases."
>
>"Substantiality" keeps people from trying the "I quoted everything
>except the last sentence" loophole.

The word "substantiality," as used here means "portion used." Which
would be the amount used relative to the whole. So the more
"substantial" the defendant reproduces or uses the original work, the
more this factor favors the plaintiff.

But this is just one in four factors. The law does not dictate how
much weight each factor has, that would be for the court to decide.
Courts interpret the law because laws can't be written to cover all
possibilities.

>What it boils down to, for this case: quoting entire news stories to
>Usenet is breaking copyright.

You seem to think this one factor outweighs all the rest. That is
possible, but common sense would dictate that each has equal weight,
since the legislature did not indicate otherwise.

Can you show judicial precedent indicating that this one factor should
outweigh all the rest when substantially all the article is copied?

[Paul J. Adam]

In message >, Kevin
Brooks > writes
>"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
>...
>> >You are claiming that Saudi Arabia, as in their government, sanctioned
>> >the 9-11 attack? I don't think so...
>>
>> Did Iraq?
>
>Come now--you know as well as I do that the Iraqi situation had been
>boiling long before 9-11.

True, but not what I asked. How much involvement did Iraq have in the
9/11 attacks?

>> Saudi funded the madrassas, gave them passports, threw money at them,
>> and whined that the end result was nothing to do with them.
>
>So, would you therefore sanction "punishing" the Republic of Ireland
>because some (misguided) Irish citizens have funded, supported, etc.,
>violence in Northern Ireland?

Depends. Are the Irish flinging funds at the terrorists? Are they
willing to co-operate with us? Will the Gardai share information with UK
law enforcement on cross-border crimes?

The more accurate example is "Irish republicans set off some bombs, so
we invade Portugal. They're all Catholics aren't they?"

>> What, precisely, did Iraq do? (Mildly exasperated by claims that 'Iraq
>> backed 9/11')
>
>If you can't comprehend that Iraq broke the ceasefire agreement, not
>to mention repeated UN resolutions, then I have misjudged you.

True, but completely irrelevant to their alleged (and apparenly widely
held) sponsorship of 9/11.

>> Did we fund his particular sect?
>
>Of course you did--he attended a mosque in the UK, right?

Did we pay the mosque, or just allow it to run (damn that 'freedom of
expression' and 'freedom of religion'...)

That's a key distinction: tolerating it because they haven't been proven
to break the law, is not the same as paying their bills at home or
overseas.

>He made his money in the UK,
>right?

How much money did he make? This is a guy who thinks that carrying
exploding shoes onto an airliner is a cool idea, and thinks he can set
them off in a crowded cabin without interference.

I'm willing to hazard that he isn't an intellectual or financial
powerhouse.

>Gee, sounds very sinister to me.

Any need to censor reports on where he came from, who funded him, how he
got into the mess he inflicted on himself?

>> Weapons of Mass Effect. Chemical, biological, radiological weapons don't
>> _destroy_ much of anything unless it's ruined by decontamination: but
>> they produce major effects (evacuations, mass casualties, isolation,
>> decontamination...) Nuclear does mass _destruction_, the others don't.
>>
>> Blame JDCC, not me.
>
>Whatever JDCC is...?

Joint Doctrine and Concepts Centre. Based at Shrivenham; one of the
'head sheds'.

>> Programs aren't weapons - and what programs did they have?
>
>The mere maintenace of an ongoing effort to sustain their chemical
>weapons potential; interesting article in the paper here last week
>that indicated there is evidence that Saddam was pursuing the
>development/maintenance of "dual use" facilities beyond any domestic
>need in order to allow for rapid manufacture of chemical weapons. That
>sounds like a "program" to me.

Hasn't aired here yet.

>> So, where are the programs? "Bury this in your garden" in 1991 isn't a
>> program for 2003.
>
>In a manner of speaking it is,

It's not going to produce much result, is it? The scientist is the
useful part: the equipment isn't going to be much use after a dozen
years or more in the mulch.

Trouble is, knowledge is hard to eliminate unless you seize or kill the
scientific staff.

>since it is just a continuation of
>various violations of both the ceasefire agreement and UN resolutions
>requiring complete WMD disarmament and *complete" disclosure. That
>latter requirement alone justifies action--he *never* gave full and
>complete disclosure (even though each successive "full and complete"
>disclosure used that exact wording, and yet each listed a few more
>things that we forced them to acknowledge).

And yet for all the discrepancies in the paperwork, with literally
hundreds of trailerloads of chemical and biological agents or precursors
"unaccounted for", nobody has been able to find them.

Sort of like looking for the huge quantities of grain and meat that
flooded from Soviet collective farms every year... the paperwork says
they existed and the leadership swears blind that the only dietary
problem in the USSR is people exploding from overeating. Yet walk the
markets and see if you can find the food.

>The fact that their AS
>missiles exceeded the mandated range limit is another violation.

Yep, that one rang the bell. The Al-Samoud, wasn't it? (Much quibbling
about payload and whether the ranges achieved were representative, but
the Iraqis were stupid to risk it and got caught)

>If you are gonna try and portray Saddam as being blameless, you have a
>tough row to hoe, as we say.

Not a chance. More that he wanted to pose and posture as being the
mighty leader who defied the US, inflated his capabilities in the belief
that the US would bluster, threaten and back down... and got caught when
his bluff was called.

No sympathy at all for Hussein. I think we should have gone in autumn
rather than spring, with more effort made to make it a UN-sanctioned
operation; but I'm mostly concerned about the problems incurred by the
US (and UK) having to hold onto Iraq having won the war. (Which is why
having it be a UN problem from the start is preferable)

>Likewise, if you are going to try to cast
>the Saudis in the same light as a regime that routinely butchered
>masses of its own citizens

The Saudis aren't into killing prisoners that anyone can prove (meaning
if it happens it's few and hidden) but you would not want to be accused
let alone imprisoned under their system. "Innocent until you can't bear
another stroke of the cane across your feet, or until you come up with
enough cash".

You're not going to find many admirable systems of criminal justice in
the region.

>> I'll settle for pretty much any WME at this stage. Still none to be had.
>
>So you claim that there were no programs in violation?

Nothing fielded, or capable of mass production anytime soon, from the
evidence.

>How about that
>missile?

Clear violation, but a rather thin cause for war.

>> It was a major problem when Iraq were unable or unwilling to prove this
>> wasn't true: why is it trivial that North Korea has thus tooled up and
>> stated their intent to use?
>
>Firstly, the DPRK has a history of being long on wind and short on
>action, whereas Saddam had a somewhat different reputation when it
>came to using WMD's.

He cheerfully used them on Iran and on his own people when there was no
danger of retaliation in kind. He refrained from using them against the
Coalition in 1991 when his programs were in much better shape: suggests
that he's not irrational. (Evil, not crazy or stupid.)

How strongly do you believe that Kim Jong-Il is a rational actor?

>Secondly, the DPRK in terms of its WMD program is
>not in flagrant violation of a recent ceasefire agreement.

Either the UN is relevant or it isn't, Kevin. If the UN is a useless
talking shop and its resolutions just waste paper... then its
resolutions are waste paper.

Iraq violated UN agreements - so what, the UN is useless anyway?

>Lastly,
>other methods are currently being used to handle the DPRK; different
>solutions to different problems.

What's the timescale for eliminating the very clear threat of DPRK WMEs?

>You are the only person I know of who
>seems to think that foreign policy has to have some kind of
>"playbook", where you must stick to Plan A when situation X, or any
>situation involving WMD's, pops up. Sounds a bit clumsy to me.

Not at all. I'm just comparing the response. Saddam Hussein fails to
prove he completely dismantled his WME program and gets caught testing a
missile with a range under 200km and gets invaded.

Kim Jong-Il has a WME capability that would make Hussein weep bitter
tears of envy, has lofted missiles over Japan to make a point, and
remains in power and continuing to develop his nasty toys apace. What's
the difference? No UN resolutions against North Korea?

>> The Stars and Stripes flies over Baghdad but not over Pyongyang. Iraq
>> didn't have findable WMEs, Pyongyang apparently does (and the missiles
>> to deliver them to sensitive spots) Kim Jong-Il still runs his country
>> into the ground for personal gain, Saddam Hussein is either dead or
>> hiding hard.
>
>Please show where WMD's are what has kept the US out of the DPRK.

I've given up trying to fathom US motives: they change like the colour
of oil on water (and I do not mean to impugn the US posters who try to
explain them). Was it about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction? It seems
not, because other nations develop and even flaunt them. Was it about
defying UN resolutions? Who cares about defying an irrelevance? Was it
about supporting terrorism? North Korea will sell anything to anyone as
long as they pay hard cash.

>Kind
>of hard to do, given that we have been sort of eyeball-to-eyeball for
>many decades *prior* to their development of WMD's, and never stormed
>back across the DMZ during all of those years.

For a lot of them you lacked spare forces.

>I
>believe GWB and his cabinet are smart enough to realize that the DPRK
>is already imploding--and besides, the DPRK does not have France and
>germany rooting for them on the sidelines, as we saw recently in Iraq.

I'd be wary of assuming Chinese support, however.

>> I'd say WMEs are showing a definite advantage: Kim's claim is credible,
>> Hussein's was either not credible or an acceptable risk.
>
>Bad logic (post hoc, ergo propter hoc) you are using here.

Show me something better.

>> The US has been piffling around with North Korea since 1953: I don't see
>> any prompt resolution in sight. That doesn't seem to be a problem - why
>> not?
>
>Rather different situation. Since 1953 our objective on the Korean
>peninsula has been to secure the ROK from aggression--which we have
>done, along with growing (and now majority) effort from our ROK
>allies. Even with those magical WMD's, ahve you seen Kim invade across
>the DMZ? Gee, it looks like our efforts are actually working after
>all...

And the US objective in the Middle East was to stop Hussein attacking
his neighbours, which has been an even more complete success than the US
work in South Korea (no Iraqi mini-subs trawled up off the Kuwaiti
coast, or found grounded on Saudi beaches with the landed commandos
fighting suicidally)


>> It's just curious that one scenario can sit and simmer for fifty years
>> and still be "not a problem", while a dozen years makes the other into a
>> crisis.
>
>Different situations entirely, and I suspect that deep down you
>realize that as well as I do. If you disagree with our going into
>Iraq, fine--but don't tether it to this ridiculous "why aren't we
>going into Korea" crap.

Similar issues apply. One reason there aren't "unsatisfied UN
resolutions" from Korea is that there was no formal surrender, for
instance.

And again, North Korea has much more WME, longer-ranged missiles, more
demonstrated willingness to sell to cash buyers than Iraq: what's the
difference? UN resolutions?

>> Funny, even that doesn't lead to unanimous agreement.
>>
>> (eyeball-deep in how to turn doctrine about 'effects based operation'
>> into useful facts)
>
>Actually, I find "effects based" operations to be no more than common
>sense, and if you look into writings as old as Sun Tzu I believe you
>will find evidence of "effects based" operations.

It's like systems engineering: it's "what works". The best have always
done it, others have struggled with it, and it ends up a named
discipline simply so it can be codified and taught as an aid to
practicioners. Trouble is, the key is informed flexibility... it's a
good concept but implementing it is less easy.

In the process it gets distorted, and some jump on a passing bandwagon.
"Hey, if we say this is an 'effects oriented' system we might get
funding this time!"

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
El *******o <El *******o@El *******o.com> wrote:

> On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 17:31:27 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>
> The word "substantiality," as used here means "portion used." Which
> would be the amount used relative to the whole. So the more
> "substantial" the defendant reproduces or uses the original work, the
> more this factor favors the plaintiff.

Exactly. And if the infringement is substantial enough, like 100%, it
can outweigh the other factors completely, even if they're nonexistent
in that case. In *this* example, though, the other factors have some
weight, too.

> But this is just one in four factors. The law does not dictate how
> much weight each factor has, that would be for the court to decide.
> Courts interpret the law because laws can't be written to cover all
> possibilities.

But you can look at the guidelines and use some common sense, and figure
out that it's not a hard question.

> >What it boils down to, for this case: quoting entire news stories to
> >Usenet is breaking copyright.
>
> You seem to think this one factor outweighs all the rest. That is
> possible, but common sense would dictate that each has equal weight,
> since the legislature did not indicate otherwise.

Except that in the case we're talking about, some of the other factors
are also included. Number of copies, for example. It's just that the
most obvious part is fulfilled 100%.

> Can you show judicial precedent indicating that this one factor should
> outweigh all the rest when substantially all the article is copied?

I already did cite the Scientology case, where the substantiality part
was the trigger.

And it's nearly impossible to infringe 100% on one part, while getting
zero on the rest of your "score."

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[phil hunt]

On Wed, 17 Sep 2003 22:09:55 +0100, Paul J. Adam > wrote:
>In message >, Kevin
>Brooks > writes
>>"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
>...
>>> >You are claiming that Saudi Arabia, as in their government, sanctioned
>>> >the 9-11 attack? I don't think so...
>>>
>>> Did Iraq?
>>
>>Come now--you know as well as I do that the Iraqi situation had been
>>boiling long before 9-11.
>
>True, but not what I asked. How much involvement did Iraq have in the
>9/11 attacks?

AFAIK, none.

>The more accurate example is "Irish republicans set off some bombs, so
>we invade Portugal. They're all Catholics aren't they?"

Indeed.

>>> Did we fund his particular sect?
>>
>>Of course you did--he attended a mosque in the UK, right?
>
>Did we pay the mosque, or just allow it to run

The latter, probably.

>>He made his money in the UK,
>>right?
>
>How much money did he make?

We wasn't rich. He had a troubled background, his parents split up
when he was young, he went into a life of crime and turned to Islam
while in prison.

>This is a guy who thinks that carrying
>exploding shoes onto an airliner is a cool idea, and thinks he can set
>them off in a crowded cabin without interference.

I'm surprised he didn't do it in the loo.

--
A: top posting

Q: what's the most annoying thing about Usenet?

[Kevin Brooks]

"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message >...
> In message >, Kevin
> Brooks > writes
> >"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
> >...
> >> >You are claiming that Saudi Arabia, as in their government, sanctioned
> >> >the 9-11 attack? I don't think so...
> >>
> >> Did Iraq?
> >
> >Come now--you know as well as I do that the Iraqi situation had been
> >boiling long before 9-11.
>
> True, but not what I asked. How much involvement did Iraq have in the
> 9/11 attacks?

None that we know of--but that is immaterial. Or do you think that,
along with having a "Foreign Policy Standard Playbook", we should also
only act if something is directly related to 9-11?

>
> >> Saudi funded the madrassas, gave them passports, threw money at them,
> >> and whined that the end result was nothing to do with them.
> >
> >So, would you therefore sanction "punishing" the Republic of Ireland
> >because some (misguided) Irish citizens have funded, supported, etc.,
> >violence in Northern Ireland?
>
> Depends. Are the Irish flinging funds at the terrorists?

I believe some were.

Are they
> willing to co-operate with us?

A lot apparently were not. And who is this "they"? You are out for the
blood of the Saudis because some individuals doubtless supported OBL,
so are you now shifting the Irish analogy to a collective "they"? Or
is it OK for *some* Irishmen to have supported the PIRA, but not OK
for some Saudis to have supported AQ? Either you want to punish the
entire nation for the actions of a few citizens, not representing the
government, or you don't--which is it?

And BTW, from what I have read, the Saudi government has been
assisting the US.

Will the Gardai share information with UK
> law enforcement on cross-border crimes?

Doesn't matter--you are all fired up to slam Saudi Arabia because of
the actions of a few, yet you now only think of the *governmental*
response when the Irish analogy is posed? Put them on the same scale.

>
> The more accurate example is "Irish republicans set off some bombs, so
> we invade Portugal. They're all Catholics aren't they?"

You seem to be missing my point. The Saudi government did not
perpetrate 9-11, just as the Irish government did not support the PIRA
in the seventies/eighties--same-same.

>
> >> What, precisely, did Iraq do? (Mildly exasperated by claims that 'Iraq
> >> backed 9/11')
> >
> >If you can't comprehend that Iraq broke the ceasefire agreement, not
> >to mention repeated UN resolutions, then I have misjudged you.
>
> True, but completely irrelevant to their alleged (and apparenly widely
> held) sponsorship of 9/11.

I have not said they did. I am just not impressed by your redirection
efforts, either at Saudi Arabia or the DPRK, with your "why not them?"
Simply put, in the case of Saudi Arabia, because their government was
not behind 9-11 (unless you fall into the alt-conspiracy.whacko
class), and in the case of the DPRK, because other methods are working
(not to mention their own self destruction).

>
> >> Did we fund his particular sect?
> >
> >Of course you did--he attended a mosque in the UK, right?
>
> Did we pay the mosque, or just allow it to run (damn that 'freedom of
> expression' and 'freedom of religion'...)

But it is not OK for Saudis to support their religious institutions?
Same-same, again.

>
> That's a key distinction: tolerating it because they haven't been proven
> to break the law, is not the same as paying their bills at home or
> overseas.
>
> >He made his money in the UK,
> >right?
>
> How much money did he make? This is a guy who thinks that carrying
> exploding shoes onto an airliner is a cool idea, and thinks he can set
> them off in a crowded cabin without interference.
>
> I'm willing to hazard that he isn't an intellectual or financial
> powerhouse.

Doesn't matter by your argument--he was a Brit, he was supported by
Brits, and he is a terrorist; how does this differ from what you are
condemning the entire Saudi nation for?

>
> >Gee, sounds very sinister to me.
>
> Any need to censor reports on where he came from, who funded him, how he
> got into the mess he inflicted on himself?

There is that political thing again. And golly gee, that censorship
must be rather porous, as we all do know that some Saudis did/do
support AQ, huh?

>
> >> Weapons of Mass Effect. Chemical, biological, radiological weapons don't
> >> _destroy_ much of anything unless it's ruined by decontamination: but
> >> they produce major effects (evacuations, mass casualties, isolation,
> >> decontamination...) Nuclear does mass _destruction_, the others don't.
> >>
> >> Blame JDCC, not me.
> >
> >Whatever JDCC is...?
>
> Joint Doctrine and Concepts Centre. Based at Shrivenham; one of the
> 'head sheds'.

Last I heard we still use "WMD".

>
> >> Programs aren't weapons - and what programs did they have?
> >
> >The mere maintenace of an ongoing effort to sustain their chemical
> >weapons potential; interesting article in the paper here last week
> >that indicated there is evidence that Saddam was pursuing the
> >development/maintenance of "dual use" facilities beyond any domestic
> >need in order to allow for rapid manufacture of chemical weapons. That
> >sounds like a "program" to me.
>
> Hasn't aired here yet.

Here are a few:

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/08/28/us_says_iraq_arms_plan_relied_on_deceit/

http://www.msnbc.com/news/962866.asp?cp1=1

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20030906_1020.html



>
> >> So, where are the programs? "Bury this in your garden" in 1991 isn't a
> >> program for 2003.
> >
> >In a manner of speaking it is,
>
> It's not going to produce much result, is it? The scientist is the
> useful part: the equipment isn't going to be much use after a dozen
> years or more in the mulch.
>
> Trouble is, knowledge is hard to eliminate unless you seize or kill the
> scientific staff.

Read the articles.

>
> >since it is just a continuation of
> >various violations of both the ceasefire agreement and UN resolutions
> >requiring complete WMD disarmament and *complete" disclosure. That
> >latter requirement alone justifies action--he *never* gave full and
> >complete disclosure (even though each successive "full and complete"
> >disclosure used that exact wording, and yet each listed a few more
> >things that we forced them to acknowledge).
>
> And yet for all the discrepancies in the paperwork, with literally
> hundreds of trailerloads of chemical and biological agents or precursors
> "unaccounted for", nobody has been able to find them.

Apparently he destroyed a lot of the paperwork after 95 when his
son-in-law carried out his short-term defection. Regardless, he was
obligated to "full and complete" disclosure, and he did not
comply--too bad for him.

>
> Sort of like looking for the huge quantities of grain and meat that
> flooded from Soviet collective farms every year... the paperwork says
> they existed and the leadership swears blind that the only dietary
> problem in the USSR is people exploding from overeating. Yet walk the
> markets and see if you can find the food.
>
> >The fact that their AS
> >missiles exceeded the mandated range limit is another violation.
>
> Yep, that one rang the bell. The Al-Samoud, wasn't it? (Much quibbling
> about payload and whether the ranges achieved were representative, but
> the Iraqis were stupid to risk it and got caught)
>
> >If you are gonna try and portray Saddam as being blameless, you have a
> >tough row to hoe, as we say.
>
> Not a chance. More that he wanted to pose and posture as being the
> mighty leader who defied the US, inflated his capabilities in the belief
> that the US would bluster, threaten and back down... and got caught when
> his bluff was called.
>
> No sympathy at all for Hussein. I think we should have gone in autumn
> rather than spring, with more effort made to make it a UN-sanctioned
> operation; but I'm mostly concerned about the problems incurred by the
> US (and UK) having to hold onto Iraq having won the war. (Which is why
> having it be a UN problem from the start is preferable)

I believe the "problem" is a bit exaggerated, both by opposing
politicians, and by the media. We now have the Wesley Clark telling us
how screwed up everything is (the same Clark who predicted doom and
gloom for the initial offensive, and the same Clark who apparently
told the Clinton Whotehouse that Milosevic would cave in after only a
few days of air attacks); gee, the fact that he has been running for
President himself (yeah, he just declared, but no mistake about it, he
has been running for a while now) might have something to do with it.
The endgame of military operations is frequently less than tidy; but
all Iraqi schools, universities, and hospitals are now open, and the
infrastructure is healing. The major threat seems to be those
disenfranchised by the allied action (namely, Saddam's thigs).

>
> >Likewise, if you are going to try to cast
> >the Saudis in the same light as a regime that routinely butchered
> >masses of its own citizens
>
> The Saudis aren't into killing prisoners that anyone can prove (meaning
> if it happens it's few and hidden) but you would not want to be accused
> let alone imprisoned under their system. "Innocent until you can't bear
> another stroke of the cane across your feet, or until you come up with
> enough cash".
>
> You're not going to find many admirable systems of criminal justice in
> the region.
>
> >> I'll settle for pretty much any WME at this stage. Still none to be had.
> >
> >So you claim that there were no programs in violation?
>
> Nothing fielded, or capable of mass production anytime soon, from the
> evidence.

The mere failure to ever accomplish that "full and complete"
disclosure is a violation; the attempts to hide the "dual use"
approach is another.

>
> >How about that
> >missile?
>
> Clear violation, but a rather thin cause for war.

That would be three violations by my book; one is enough reason to
have taken that scumbag down.

>
> >> It was a major problem when Iraq were unable or unwilling to prove this
> >> wasn't true: why is it trivial that North Korea has thus tooled up and
> >> stated their intent to use?
> >
> >Firstly, the DPRK has a history of being long on wind and short on
> >action, whereas Saddam had a somewhat different reputation when it
> >came to using WMD's.
>
> He cheerfully used them on Iran and on his own people when there was no
> danger of retaliation in kind. He refrained from using them against the
> Coalition in 1991 when his programs were in much better shape: suggests
> that he's not irrational. (Evil, not crazy or stupid.)
>
> How strongly do you believe that Kim Jong-Il is a rational actor?

Well, since the open source data has speculated that he has actually
had a nuclear capability (i.e., actually had weapons) for about ten
years or so (and I have noted no mushroom clouds on that horizon as
yet), he seems to have at least as good a grasp as ol' Saddam did.

>
> >Secondly, the DPRK in terms of its WMD program is
> >not in flagrant violation of a recent ceasefire agreement.
>
> Either the UN is relevant or it isn't, Kevin. If the UN is a useless
> talking shop and its resolutions just waste paper... then its
> resolutions are waste paper.

Pretty much that is the case.

>
> Iraq violated UN agreements - so what, the UN is useless anyway?

They also violated the ceasefire agreement that ended the offensive in
91. Face it, the US was acting before UN authorization *routinely*
during GWII--if you doubt that, check out the timeline of US actions
versus UN resolutions.

>
> >Lastly,
> >other methods are currently being used to handle the DPRK; different
> >solutions to different problems.
>
> What's the timescale for eliminating the very clear threat of DPRK WMEs?

Not my place to know. Why, do you have a pressing engagement that
requires action *this day*?

>
> >You are the only person I know of who
> >seems to think that foreign policy has to have some kind of
> >"playbook", where you must stick to Plan A when situation X, or any
> >situation involving WMD's, pops up. Sounds a bit clumsy to me.
>
> Not at all. I'm just comparing the response. Saddam Hussein fails to
> prove he completely dismantled his WME program and gets caught testing a
> missile with a range under 200km and gets invaded.
>
> Kim Jong-Il has a WME capability that would make Hussein weep bitter
> tears of envy, has lofted missiles over Japan to make a point, and
> remains in power and continuing to develop his nasty toys apace. What's
> the difference? No UN resolutions against North Korea?

Nope, different threat, different region, different neighbors,
different internal situation, etc. Hint--there are really no
*identical* situations like this, so trying to make them so is a
fruitless endeavor.

>
> >> The Stars and Stripes flies over Baghdad but not over Pyongyang. Iraq
> >> didn't have findable WMEs, Pyongyang apparently does (and the missiles
> >> to deliver them to sensitive spots) Kim Jong-Il still runs his country
> >> into the ground for personal gain, Saddam Hussein is either dead or
> >> hiding hard.
> >
> >Please show where WMD's are what has kept the US out of the DPRK.
>
> I've given up trying to fathom US motives: they change like the colour
> of oil on water (and I do not mean to impugn the US posters who try to
> explain them). Was it about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction? It seems
> not, because other nations develop and even flaunt them. Was it about
> defying UN resolutions? Who cares about defying an irrelevance? Was it
> about supporting terrorism? North Korea will sell anything to anyone as
> long as they pay hard cash.

Answer the question--if WMD's are what has kept the DPRK safe, why
were they secure *before* they had them?

>
> >Kind
> >of hard to do, given that we have been sort of eyeball-to-eyeball for
> >many decades *prior* to their development of WMD's, and never stormed
> >back across the DMZ during all of those years.
>
> For a lot of them you lacked spare forces.

That's a cop-out, Paul. Either they were secure without their WMD's,
proving that possession of same is not a simple defense against US
action, or they were not--which is it?

>
> >I
> >believe GWB and his cabinet are smart enough to realize that the DPRK
> >is already imploding--and besides, the DPRK does not have France and
> >germany rooting for them on the sidelines, as we saw recently in Iraq.
>
> I'd be wary of assuming Chinese support, however.

I would not be, in this case, as the PRC has reportedly held some
frank discussions with Kim to discuss the realities of the situation
(one report included the claim that they told the Koreans that unlike
the last time, no screaming hordes of PLA "volunteers" would be
streaming to their assistance if it comes to armed conflict with the
US), and has been working with the US in the recent talks. This is an
opportunity for the PRC to engender soe goodwill from the US, at no
real cost to themselves.

>
> >> I'd say WMEs are showing a definite advantage: Kim's claim is credible,
> >> Hussein's was either not credible or an acceptable risk.
> >
> >Bad logic (post hoc, ergo propter hoc) you are using here.
>
> Show me something better.

I don't have to--you are making the illogical claim here.

>
> >> The US has been piffling around with North Korea since 1953: I don't see
> >> any prompt resolution in sight. That doesn't seem to be a problem - why
> >> not?
> >
> >Rather different situation. Since 1953 our objective on the Korean
> >peninsula has been to secure the ROK from aggression--which we have
> >done, along with growing (and now majority) effort from our ROK
> >allies. Even with those magical WMD's, ahve you seen Kim invade across
> >the DMZ? Gee, it looks like our efforts are actually working after
> >all...
>
> And the US objective in the Middle East was to stop Hussein attacking
> his neighbours, which has been an even more complete success than the US
> work in South Korea (no Iraqi mini-subs trawled up off the Kuwaiti
> coast, or found grounded on Saudi beaches with the landed commandos
> fighting suicidally)

Well, at least Mr. Kim has not tried to assassinate a former US
President, nor is he sitting astride a resource that the rest of the
world depends upon. Like I said, different situations.

>
>
> >> It's just curious that one scenario can sit and simmer for fifty years
> >> and still be "not a problem", while a dozen years makes the other into a
> >> crisis.
> >
> >Different situations entirely, and I suspect that deep down you
> >realize that as well as I do. If you disagree with our going into
> >Iraq, fine--but don't tether it to this ridiculous "why aren't we
> >going into Korea" crap.
>
> Similar issues apply. One reason there aren't "unsatisfied UN
> resolutions" from Korea is that there was no formal surrender, for
> instance.
>
> And again, North Korea has much more WME, longer-ranged missiles, more
> demonstrated willingness to sell to cash buyers than Iraq: what's the
> difference? UN resolutions?

If you cannot comprehend the difference, then I have seriously
misjudged your reasoning ability--and I doubt that is the case. You
know that each situation is different, but you choose to cling to the
single common thread (WMD capability) in an attempt to...well, I don't
really know exactly *what* you see as an objective in this case, to be
honest.

>
> >> Funny, even that doesn't lead to unanimous agreement.
> >>
> >> (eyeball-deep in how to turn doctrine about 'effects based operation'
> >> into useful facts)
> >
> >Actually, I find "effects based" operations to be no more than common
> >sense, and if you look into writings as old as Sun Tzu I believe you
> >will find evidence of "effects based" operations.
>
> It's like systems engineering: it's "what works". The best have always
> done it, others have struggled with it, and it ends up a named
> discipline simply so it can be codified and taught as an aid to
> practicioners. Trouble is, the key is informed flexibility... it's a
> good concept but implementing it is less easy.
>
> In the process it gets distorted, and some jump on a passing bandwagon.
> "Hey, if we say this is an 'effects oriented' system we might get
> funding this time!"

Sounds like the even larger "transformation bandwagon" (which is now
more aptly a complete train...).

Brooks

[El Bastardo]

On Wed, 17 Sep 2003 21:36:40 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:

>In article >,
> El *******o <El *******o@El *******o.com> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 17:31:27 GMT, Chad Irby > wrote:
>>
>> The word "substantiality," as used here means "portion used." Which
>> would be the amount used relative to the whole. So the more
>> "substantial" the defendant reproduces or uses the original work, the
>> more this factor favors the plaintiff.
>
>Exactly. And if the infringement is substantial enough, like 100%, it
>can outweigh the other factors completely, even if they're nonexistent
>in that case. In *this* example, though, the other factors have some
>weight, too.
>
>> But this is just one in four factors. The law does not dictate how
>> much weight each factor has, that would be for the court to decide.
>> Courts interpret the law because laws can't be written to cover all
>> possibilities.
>
>But you can look at the guidelines and use some common sense, and figure
>out that it's not a hard question.
>
>> >What it boils down to, for this case: quoting entire news stories to
>> >Usenet is breaking copyright.
>>
>> You seem to think this one factor outweighs all the rest. That is
>> possible, but common sense would dictate that each has equal weight,
>> since the legislature did not indicate otherwise.
>
>Except that in the case we're talking about, some of the other factors
>are also included. Number of copies, for example. It's just that the
>most obvious part is fulfilled 100%.
>
>> Can you show judicial precedent indicating that this one factor should
>> outweigh all the rest when substantially all the article is copied?
>
>I already did cite the Scientology case, where the substantiality part
>was the trigger.
>
>And it's nearly impossible to infringe 100% on one part, while getting
>zero on the rest of your "score."

I worked at an IP firm, not as a lawyer (I am not an IP lawyer) but
as a temp. Patent firms submit huge quantities of literature with
their applications to substantiate their claims.

One day I saw an article completely photocopied out of a magazine
being submitted with a patent. I asked the lawyer in charge if this
was right. We have a copyrighted work being used by a for-profit law
firm to make money by furthering their client's interests and
supporting their "inventor's" patents. Shouldn't the law firm have to
get permission and even pay the original authors for this?

He said "fair use."

Maybe he was wrong. But he was submitting it to the Patent Trade
Office. A place which knows something about intellectual property
rights. If he was wrong, every day a US governmental office (the PTO)
gets tons and tons of paper of illegally copied articles, and doesn't
say a word. Is this what you believe is going on?

I suspect he was right. And that, although the articles are copied in
their entirety, the "use" of the articles is what makes it "fair." In
this case, even though the law firm is "for-profit," the use
encourages freedom of information to encourage people to patent
things. And the government considers that a good thing.

Another exception would be "newsworthiness." If somebody wrote an
enflamatory article, and a group of people read the article. The group
consequently murdered a Senator. That article would be publishible in
its entirety in news stories about the murder without paying the
author a cent.

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
El *******o <El *******o@El *******o.com> wrote:

> One day I saw an article completely photocopied out of a magazine
> being submitted with a patent.
>
> Maybe he was wrong. But he was submitting it to the Patent Trade
> Office. A place which knows something about intellectual property
> rights. If he was wrong, every day a US governmental office (the PTO)
> gets tons and tons of paper of illegally copied articles, and doesn't
> say a word. Is this what you believe is going on?

No, and it's different (yet again) from what we've been discussing.

> I suspect he was right.

He might have been, But, once again, you're postulating a different
situation than the one we're talking about here.

I've said, two or three times, that the argument is not solely based on
one part of the copyright code, but you keep trying to insist otherwise.

Stop that.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Paul J. Adam]

In message >, Kevin
Brooks > writes
>"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
>...
>> True, but not what I asked. How much involvement did Iraq have in the
>> 9/11 attacks?
>
>None that we know of--but that is immaterial.

So what terrorism against the US _did_ flow from Iraq?

>Or do you think that,
>along with having a "Foreign Policy Standard Playbook", we should also
>only act if something is directly related to 9-11?

Iraq was allegedly "sponsoring terrorism" - I'm curious as to what that
was.

>> Depends. Are the Irish flinging funds at the terrorists?
>
>I believe some were.

Government bodies?

>Are they
>> willing to co-operate with us?
>
>A lot apparently were not. And who is this "they"?

The government. The group that runs the country.

>You are out for the
>blood of the Saudis because some individuals doubtless supported OBL,

"Some individuals" being the House of Saud.

>so are you now shifting the Irish analogy to a collective "they"?

Where's the Irish ruling family?

>Either you want to punish the
>entire nation for the actions of a few citizens, not representing the
>government, or you don't--which is it?

"Punish the entire nation" is your invention. Most of its inhabitants
get no say in what their management do.

Why is democracy and freedom from repression a Good Thing in Iraq, but a
dangerous threat in Saudi?

>And BTW, from what I have read, the Saudi government has been
>assisting the US.

>Will the Gardai share information with UK
>> law enforcement on cross-border crimes?
>
>Doesn't matter

Only because you're inventing claims and then saying they're mine.

>--you are all fired up to slam Saudi Arabia because of
>the actions of a few,

Remind me again where I said that?

>yet you now only think of the *governmental*
>response when the Irish analogy is posed? Put them on the same scale.

Why? One's a democracy, the other's a repressive autocracy. If you have
power and authority in Saudi, it's because you comply with the monarchy.
You can get rich in Ireland (just like in the US) without having to sign
up to government policy.

>> The more accurate example is "Irish republicans set off some bombs, so
>> we invade Portugal. They're all Catholics aren't they?"
>
>You seem to be missing my point. The Saudi government did not
>perpetrate 9-11,

No, they just paid for it and provided the manpower.

>> True, but completely irrelevant to their alleged (and apparenly widely
>> held) sponsorship of 9/11.
>
>I have not said they did.

You haven't; it seems many of your countrymen think so.

>I am just not impressed by your redirection
>efforts, either at Saudi Arabia or the DPRK, with your "why not them?"
>Simply put, in the case of Saudi Arabia, because their government was
>not behind 9-11

Neither was Iraq. Didn't stop them being invaded as "sponsors of
terrorism" (or was it "building stockpiles of WME?")

>(unless you fall into the alt-conspiracy.whacko
>class), and in the case of the DPRK, because other methods are working
>(not to mention their own self destruction).

Other methods in the DPRK are working?

Remember that six months was considered too long a wait for Iraq; but
fifty years is "it's working, give it time" for North Korea?

You don't see _any_ inconsistency there?

>> Did we pay the mosque, or just allow it to run (damn that 'freedom of
>> expression' and 'freedom of religion'...)
>
>But it is not OK for Saudis to support their religious institutions?

If Richard Reid had been an ecumenical Anglican you'd have more of a
point, because he'd have been a member of the State religion. Similarly,
if the 9/11 hijackers had been !NOT WAHABBI then the Saudi link largely
goes away.

Where does the Wahabbi sect come from, again? And who bankrolls it?

>> How much money did he make? This is a guy who thinks that carrying
>> exploding shoes onto an airliner is a cool idea, and thinks he can set
>> them off in a crowded cabin without interference.
>>
>> I'm willing to hazard that he isn't an intellectual or financial
>> powerhouse.
>
>Doesn't matter by your argument--he was a Brit, he was supported by
>Brits, and he is a terrorist; how does this differ from what you are
>condemning the entire Saudi nation for?

Where's the State involvement?

>> Any need to censor reports on where he came from, who funded him, how he
>> got into the mess he inflicted on himself?
>
>There is that political thing again.

If the Saudis are blameless, what's to hide?

>And golly gee, that censorship
>must be rather porous, as we all do know that some Saudis did/do
>support AQ, huh?

Sure, but 15 of 19 is apparently statistically insignificant.

>> Hasn't aired here yet.
>
>Here are a few:
>
>http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/08/28/us_
>says_iraq_arms_plan_relied_on_deceit/
>
>http://www.msnbc.com/news/962866.asp?cp1=1
>
>http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20030906_1020.html

In other words... Iraq allegedly _didn't_ have WME, _had_ trashed its
stockpiles, _had dispersed and scattered its development efforts...

Pretty much what I said before the war, then.

>> It's not going to produce much result, is it? The scientist is the
>> useful part: the equipment isn't going to be much use after a dozen
>> years or more in the mulch.
>>
>> Trouble is, knowledge is hard to eliminate unless you seize or kill the
>> scientific staff.
>
>Read the articles.

I did. Iraq destroyed, dismanted and scattered equipment; dispersed
scientists; and disposed of materials and feedstocks.

This is supposed to _increase_ their threat level?

Yes, _if_ sanctions are fully lifted, and _if_ they're allowed to buy
everything they want, and _if_ they're left alone without interference
or surveillance, they can then produce WMEs. So what? Applies to every
nation state and not a few other actors. Why does this require an
immediate invasion of Iraq?

>> And yet for all the discrepancies in the paperwork, with literally
>> hundreds of trailerloads of chemical and biological agents or precursors
>> "unaccounted for", nobody has been able to find them.
>
>Apparently he destroyed a lot of the paperwork after 95 when his
>son-in-law carried out his short-term defection. Regardless, he was
>obligated to "full and complete" disclosure, and he did not
>comply--too bad for him.

Can't say I have any sympathy for Hussein or his mob, just regret that
he may still be wasting good air.

Still, what has the US got itself by invading Iraq? I don't see much
threat eliminated, much advantage gained, and some visible costs (chief
among which being a very heavy commitment of your Army that's going to
seriously limit your flexibility for a while)

>> Not a chance. More that he wanted to pose and posture as being the
>> mighty leader who defied the US, inflated his capabilities in the belief
>> that the US would bluster, threaten and back down... and got caught when
>> his bluff was called.
>>
>> No sympathy at all for Hussein. I think we should have gone in autumn
>> rather than spring, with more effort made to make it a UN-sanctioned
>> operation; but I'm mostly concerned about the problems incurred by the
>> US (and UK) having to hold onto Iraq having won the war. (Which is why
>> having it be a UN problem from the start is preferable)
>
>I believe the "problem" is a bit exaggerated, both by opposing
>politicians, and by the media.

Define "exaggerated". If you mean the portentious blather that "Iraq is
the new Vietnam", or most users of the word "quagmire", then I agree.
The casualties, while individually tragic, are hardly serious at the
strategic level.

On the other hand, you're now committed to Iraq for an undecided period,
have been saddled with responsibility for the outcome, and are decidedly
short on deployable troops.

>The endgame of military operations is frequently less than tidy; but
>all Iraqi schools, universities, and hospitals are now open, and the
>infrastructure is healing.

"Healing" is too strong a word, in many cases. Power generation and
distribution is particularly strained, and not amenable to rapid or easy
reconstruction (the plants are a _mess_ and every failure adds further
stress).

>The major threat seems to be those
>disenfranchised by the allied action (namely, Saddam's thigs).

Not enough information to be decisive. I've heard stories of generic
criminals using attacks on the US to gain status, revenge attacks by
family or friends of Iraqi casualties, and it's been alleged that many
of the attacks are by foreign terrrorists (the so-called 'flypaper
strategy')

>> Nothing fielded, or capable of mass production anytime soon, from the
>> evidence.
>
>The mere failure to ever accomplish that "full and complete"
>disclosure is a violation; the attempts to hide the "dual use"
>approach is another.

Okay, so how many people can you kill with an incomplete declaration?
(Maybe a few, if you wrap it around a nail-studded cricket bat and use
it to beat brains out with... otherwise you're relying on paper-cutting
people to death)

The "hidden dual-use technology" is alleged but not shown yet. (Sort of
like the stockpiles of WMEs)

>> Clear violation, but a rather thin cause for war.
>
>That would be three violations by my book; one is enough reason to
>have taken that scumbag down.

You're remarkably fond of the UN all of a sudden, Kevin :)

>> He cheerfully used them on Iran and on his own people when there was no
>> danger of retaliation in kind. He refrained from using them against the
>> Coalition in 1991 when his programs were in much better shape: suggests
>> that he's not irrational. (Evil, not crazy or stupid.)
>>
>> How strongly do you believe that Kim Jong-Il is a rational actor?
>
>Well, since the open source data has speculated that he has actually
>had a nuclear capability (i.e., actually had weapons) for about ten
>years or so (and I have noted no mushroom clouds on that horizon as
>yet), he seems to have at least as good a grasp as ol' Saddam did.

....in July 1990 when he hadn't invaded any neighbours for a while.

You'd have got a different answer in July 1991, perchance.

>> Either the UN is relevant or it isn't, Kevin. If the UN is a useless
>> talking shop and its resolutions just waste paper... then its
>> resolutions are waste paper.
>
>Pretty much that is the case.

Then why waste time justifying actions in terms of UN resolutions?
Nations can invade anyone they want to, with the only issue being "can
they get away with it" - makes life a lot simpler. (And probably
shorter).

>> What's the timescale for eliminating the very clear threat of DPRK WMEs?
>
>Not my place to know. Why, do you have a pressing engagement that
>requires action *this day*?

Might be an idea to prevent them being fielded, rather than trying to
neutralise them once assembled and ready to fire. The track record of
finding and killing mobile ballistic missiles isn't inspiring.

>> Not at all. I'm just comparing the response. Saddam Hussein fails to
>> prove he completely dismantled his WME program and gets caught testing a
>> missile with a range under 200km and gets invaded.
>>
>> Kim Jong-Il has a WME capability that would make Hussein weep bitter
>> tears of envy, has lofted missiles over Japan to make a point, and
>> remains in power and continuing to develop his nasty toys apace. What's
>> the difference? No UN resolutions against North Korea?
>
>Nope, different threat, different region, different neighbors,
>different internal situation, etc. Hint--there are really no
>*identical* situations like this, so trying to make them so is a
>fruitless endeavor.

Are you claiming that there's no rational strategy, Kevin?

I'm trying to isolate the factors that cause a nation to be considered a
threat. Development of (or possession of) WME doesn't count as a threat:
threatening neighbours with various flavours of lethal harm isn't
threatening: infiltrating your neighbours with commando teams isn't
threatening... so what _is_ a threat?

>> I've given up trying to fathom US motives: they change like the colour
>> of oil on water (and I do not mean to impugn the US posters who try to
>> explain them). Was it about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction? It seems
>> not, because other nations develop and even flaunt them. Was it about
>> defying UN resolutions? Who cares about defying an irrelevance? Was it
>> about supporting terrorism? North Korea will sell anything to anyone as
>> long as they pay hard cash.
>
>Answer the question--if WMD's are what has kept the DPRK safe, why
>were they secure *before* they had them?

Lack of will? Lack of vendetta? Lack of threat? Fear of foreign
retaliation? Inertia?

>> I'd be wary of assuming Chinese support, however.
>
>I would not be, in this case,

The Chinese standing aside, perhaps (they know where their interests now
lie), but not active support.

>> Show me something better.
>
>I don't have to--you are making the illogical claim here.

WMEs alone aren't a cause for war - we've got that proved. Being
generally obnoxious and on the Axis of Evil has got one member invaded:
the other two may actually have WME (Iran) and almost certainly do
(DPRK).

Of course, this presupposes that there _were_ rational reasons for
invading Iraq.

>> And the US objective in the Middle East was to stop Hussein attacking
>> his neighbours, which has been an even more complete success than the US
>> work in South Korea (no Iraqi mini-subs trawled up off the Kuwaiti
>> coast, or found grounded on Saudi beaches with the landed commandos
>> fighting suicidally)
>
>Well, at least Mr. Kim has not tried to assassinate a former US
>President, nor is he sitting astride a resource that the rest of the
>world depends upon.

Hey, "it's not about oil", remember? Lots and lots of determined
rhetoric on that subject.

>Like I said, different situations.

So allegedly trying to kill an ex-President is now grounds for invasion?

>> Similar issues apply. One reason there aren't "unsatisfied UN
>> resolutions" from Korea is that there was no formal surrender, for
>> instance.
>>
>> And again, North Korea has much more WME, longer-ranged missiles, more
>> demonstrated willingness to sell to cash buyers than Iraq: what's the
>> difference? UN resolutions?
>
>If you cannot comprehend the difference, then I have seriously
>misjudged your reasoning ability--and I doubt that is the case. You
>know that each situation is different, but you choose to cling to the
>single common thread (WMD capability) in an attempt to...well, I don't
>really know exactly *what* you see as an objective in this case, to be
>honest.

Trying to determine the reasons for invading Iraq. There are many people
willing to say what they weren't... but nobody willing to go firm and
stay there on what they _were_.

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[Chad Irby]

In article >,
"Paul J. Adam" > wrote:

> Iraq was allegedly "sponsoring terrorism" - I'm curious as to what that
> was.

Millions of dollars to Hamas and similar groups. Hussein used to give
huge rewards to the families of suicide bombers. It was one of his
favorite propaganda bits, and not any sort of secret at all.

--


Remember: Objects in rearview mirror may be hallucinations.
Slam on brakes accordingly.

[Jim]

"Chad Irby" > wrote in message
. ..
> In article >,
> "Paul J. Adam" > wrote:
>
> > Iraq was allegedly "sponsoring terrorism" - I'm curious as to what that
> > was.
>
> Millions of dollars to Hamas and similar groups. Hussein used to give
> huge rewards to the families of suicide bombers. It was one of his
> favorite propaganda bits, and not any sort of secret at all.
>
> --
>



Unfair unfair your not allowed to use truth, facts or logic in this NG...


:)

Jim

[Paul J. Adam]

In message >, Chad Irby
> writes
>In article >,
> "Paul J. Adam" > wrote:
>> Iraq was allegedly "sponsoring terrorism" - I'm curious as to what that
>> was.
>
>Millions of dollars to Hamas and similar groups. Hussein used to give
>huge rewards to the families of suicide bombers. It was one of his
>favorite propaganda bits, and not any sort of secret at all.

Okay, what did he do that was unusual for the region? :)

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBox<at>jrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

[Stephen Harding]

"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

> In message >, Kevin
> Brooks > writes
> >"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
> >...
> >> True, but not what I asked. How much involvement did Iraq have in the
> >> 9/11 attacks?
> >
> >None that we know of--but that is immaterial.
>
> So what terrorism against the US _did_ flow from Iraq?

None that I know of.

> >Or do you think that,
> >along with having a "Foreign Policy Standard Playbook", we should also
> >only act if something is directly related to 9-11?
>
> Iraq was allegedly "sponsoring terrorism" - I'm curious as to what that
> was.

I think they were aiding the Ansar al-Islam group up in northern Iraq.
Of course, this group was Sunnis primarily interested in blowing up
Shiite Kurds, not Americans. Terror against Kurds was in Saddam's
direct interest for obvious reasons.

> >You are out for the
> >blood of the Saudis because some individuals doubtless supported OBL,
>
> "Some individuals" being the House of Saud.

I think that's an over statement.

The Saudi leadership is a spineless bunch, with lots of money. They
rely on paying off those who threaten them, and much of OBLs money
has apparently come from shakedowns of Saudi businesses and public
persons. Basically pay him off. Not exactly co-conspirator types.

The fact of course is this policy has somewhat backfired on the Saudis.
They sound good to Fundamentalists (in country and next door), and to
the cause of Arab solidarity WRT the "Palestinian problem", and the
Americans tolerated it.

Now suddenly, the Americans are no longer willing to let the rhetoric,
and monetary support for fundamentalist schools pass. And the radical
Islamic crowd still doesn't think well of the House of Saud. Time for
some heavy duty statement of principles that may require more spine
than the Saudis actually have!

This still doesn't make Saudi Arabia or its leaders, "terrorist sponsors".

> Why is democracy and freedom from repression a Good Thing in Iraq, but a
> dangerous threat in Saudi?

I'd say democracy and freedom is considered a "dangerous threat" by all
parties in the mideast.

> >--you are all fired up to slam Saudi Arabia because of
> >the actions of a few,
>
> Remind me again where I said that?

You seemed to me to say that the Saudis were a terrorist nation because
of the lip service, and money and lack of cooperation by them. Perhaps
your comment was more rhetorical or I simply misread it.

> >You seem to be missing my point. The Saudi government did not
> >perpetrate 9-11,
>
> No, they just paid for it and provided the manpower.

You are saying the Saudi government was in on the 9/11 attack??? I have
never heard this and don't believe it. It's mere guilt by association.
[i]
> >> True, but completely irrelevant to their alleged (and apparenly widely
> >> held) sponsorship of 9/11.
> >
> >I have not said they did.
>
> You haven't; it seems many of your countrymen think so.
>
> >I am just not impressed by your redirection
> >efforts, either at Saudi Arabia or the DPRK, with your "why not them?"
> >Simply put, in the case of Saudi Arabia, because their government was
> >not behind 9-11
>
> Neither was Iraq. Didn't stop them being invaded as "sponsors of
> terrorism" (or was it "building stockpiles of WME?")

I think the reason was WMD. Seems it wasn't as valid a reason as thought,
perhaps by design, or perhaps by bad decision-making or by bad information.

> >(unless you fall into the alt-conspiracy.whacko
> >class), and in the case of the DPRK, because other methods are working
> >(not to mention their own self destruction).
>
> Other methods in the DPRK are working?

It seems so.

> Remember that six months was considered too long a wait for Iraq; but
> fifty years is "it's working, give it time" for North Korea?
>
> You don't see _any_ inconsistency there?

Can you see anything beyond blind following of a rule? There are *contexts*
to decision-making. I can think of a whole host of reasons that counter an
"invade N. Korea" decision because they have WMD/support terrorists/threaten
US interests reasonings.

Perhaps invasion causing a shreading of our S. Korean ally *irrespective* of
who ultimately wins a war might be a good consideration in NOT following the
invade rule?

> >> Did we pay the mosque, or just allow it to run (damn that 'freedom of
> >> expression' and 'freedom of religion'...)
> >
> >But it is not OK for Saudis to support their religious institutions?
>
> If Richard Reid had been an ecumenical Anglican you'd have more of a
> point, because he'd have been a member of the State religion. Similarly,
> if the 9/11 hijackers had been !NOT WAHABBI then the Saudi link largely
> goes away.
>
> Where does the Wahabbi sect come from, again? And who bankrolls it?

I don't think it comes from the Saudis does it. It's simply a very strict,
conservative and intolerant implementation of Islam, no? They live in other
places too. They bankroll it to keep the members off their backs; part of
their "buy off the enemy" national policies.

> >> Any need to censor reports on where he came from, who funded him, how he
> >> got into the mess he inflicted on himself?
> >
> >There is that political thing again.
>
> If the Saudis are blameless, what's to hide?

They're not blameless. They're simply trying to play both sides of
a fence. In the long run, it doesn't work.

> >And golly gee, that censorship
> >must be rather porous, as we all do know that some Saudis did/do
> >support AQ, huh?
>
> Sure, but 15 of 19 is apparently statistically insignificant.

I'd say so, for a single incident.

> In other words... Iraq allegedly _didn't_ have WME, _had_ trashed its
> stockpiles, _had dispersed and scattered its development efforts...
>
> Pretty much what I said before the war, then.

It would seem so, although I still believe they were attempting to maintain
the *capability* to produce them as soon as the watchdogs had gone home.

> I did. Iraq destroyed, dismanted and scattered equipment; dispersed
> scientists; and disposed of materials and feedstocks.
>
> This is supposed to _increase_ their threat level?

No, simply maintain it for another day. Gulf War II was going to happen
in the spring of this year, or some season 10 years from now. We're done
with it and we can move on.

I think it is unfortunate for our leadership and image that all the claims
have not been proven to be true about Saddam's government. But it's good
he's been removed (if only for the moment).

We can very possibly see the Iraqi War II film from an alternative universe
in 5-10 years. At that time, the US will NOT invade Iraq after the UN (France)
forced American withdrawl from Iraq in 6 months, leading to the return of
Baathist government in Iraq (who has all the weapons, the money, the
organization, the leadership, the ruthlessness? Who still has Saddam?).
Then we can see what Saddam does with his renewed power and unfettered
access to lots of oil money...and how well a UN resolution keeps him in check.

> Yes, _if_ sanctions are fully lifted, and _if_ they're allowed to buy
> everything they want, and _if_ they're left alone without interference
> or surveillance, they can then produce WMEs. So what? Applies to every
> nation state and not a few other actors. Why does this require an
> immediate invasion of Iraq?

Because Saddam isn't like most leaders of other countries I'd say. There's
something truly evil about the guy. He's a servant of Satan, with all the
power that gives him. He's not to be trifled with!

> Still, what has the US got itself by invading Iraq? I don't see much
> threat eliminated, much advantage gained, and some visible costs (chief
> among which being a very heavy commitment of your Army that's going to
> seriously limit your flexibility for a while)

In the short term, trouble. In the long term, if things work out, more
influence in the middle east. A demonstation that a free society can
lead to a prosperous society. That open, transparent markets is the fastest
way to personal and national wealth. An entirely new paradigm of economic
and political operation.

Does it mean that Iraqis will love Israelis? Probably not. That they'll
like Americans? Probably not, although hopefully it will show that our
national interests are not solely in tow to Israel, and can have favorable
outcomes for Arabs as well.

Maybe an entire rethinking of what sort of leaders Arabs have, *by Arabs*!
No more "push the Israel button" to distract a harassed, oppressed population
from focusing on their leaders.

> On the other hand, you're now committed to Iraq for an undecided period,
> have been saddled with responsibility for the outcome, and are decidedly
> short on deployable troops.

Yes. I wish US leadership was more direct about the challenges a rebuild
of Iraq presented. The cost, in lives and wealth, and the time it would take.
I still think this can turn out to be a very favorable result, with history
saying good things about the effort. But the Saddam demon is going to die
very, very slowly (if at all) and not without a lot of effort.

> "Healing" is too strong a word, in many cases. Power generation and
> distribution is particularly strained, and not amenable to rapid or easy
> reconstruction (the plants are a _mess_ and every failure adds further
> stress).

Has been for 30 years. The war did very little to hurt infrastructure. The
US was downright inept in occupation duties immediately on arrival in Baghdad.
If the looting could only have been curtailed, things might be a lot better
now. Water over the dam. At least occupation leadership seems to be
learning from past mistakes and adapting. Success is still very possible.

> Then why waste time justifying actions in terms of UN resolutions?
> Nations can invade anyone they want to, with the only issue being "can
> they get away with it" - makes life a lot simpler. (And probably
> shorter).

Having a UN resolution with you is a points gain. The US is hardly unique in
using the UN when it's a plus; ignoring it when uncooperative.

> Are you claiming that there's no rational strategy, Kevin?
>
> I'm trying to isolate the factors that cause a nation to be considered a
> threat. Development of (or possession of) WME doesn't count as a threat:
> threatening neighbours with various flavours of lethal harm isn't
> threatening: infiltrating your neighbours with commando teams isn't
> threatening... so what _is_ a threat?

NK is very definitely a threat. To US interests if not directly to the US (at
the moment). Dealing with that threat could be simply ignoring it, hoping it
will go away (perhaps because it isn't real), not recognizing it to begin with,
the multi-lateral game currently in vogue and I'd say the method of choice,
and direct intimidation or beligerency.

Beligerency seems out of the question in NK given the region. Japan, China,
SK all end up being de facto involved by a US decision to invade. How many
artillery peices,/rockets are aimed at Seoul by the north? What sort of damage
can even a hungry, politically indoctrinated all their lives, million man army
do, even in a losing effort?

Something to consider seriously.

> >> I'd be wary of assuming Chinese support, however.
> >
> >I would not be, in this case,
>
> The Chinese standing aside, perhaps (they know where their interests now
> lie), but not active support.

The Chinese seem to finally understand this is in their interest as well. This
is an important change in the region, and Bush deserves some credit for it.

> WMEs alone aren't a cause for war - we've got that proved. Being
> generally obnoxious and on the Axis of Evil has got one member invaded:
> the other two may actually have WME (Iran) and almost certainly do
> (DPRK).
>
> Of course, this presupposes that there _were_ rational reasons for
> invading Iraq.

I think the reasons were rational. Just mostly wrong, for whatever reasons
you wish to assign.

> >Well, at least Mr. Kim has not tried to assassinate a former US
> >President, nor is he sitting astride a resource that the rest of the
> >world depends upon.
>
> Hey, "it's not about oil", remember? Lots and lots of determined
> rhetoric on that subject.

I have to think anyone who thinks it's "all about oil" is in a dogmatic rut.

> >Like I said, different situations.
>
> So allegedly trying to kill an ex-President is now grounds for invasion?

Well it could very well be. Not certain on legal issues concerning this.

> >> Similar issues apply. One reason there aren't "unsatisfied UN

> >misjudged your reasoning ability--and I doubt that is the case. You
> >know that each situation is different, but you choose to cling to the
> >single common thread (WMD capability) in an attempt to...well, I don't
> >really know exactly *what* you see as an objective in this case, to be
> >honest.
>
> Trying to determine the reasons for invading Iraq. There are many people
> willing to say what they weren't... but nobody willing to go firm and
> stay there on what they _were_.

I think it could easily have been perceived threat from WMD or terrorism.
I personally have never believed those reasons were compelling enough
*immediate* reasons.

I supported it, despite now being firmly in neo-isolationist political
camp, because I believed Saddam was an *ultimate* threat. Not today
or tomorrow, but a serious threat ~5 years after sanctions lifted. It
was going to cost more then than now. Let's be done with it and move on.

I don't feel that way about NK, or Iran. I don't favor US troops in
Liberia. I want them out of SK and Japan and Kosovo and Bosnia. I want
them out of NATO. I want them home.

And I want them home from Iraq *after* the country is truly rid of Saddam
and his ilk, and on the road toward stable self-governance...or within
2-3 years at the most, come hell or high water.

All other nations will be considered a threat when one of their missiles
hits NYC or DC or LA.


SMH

[Kevin Brooks]

"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message >...
> In message >, Kevin
> Brooks > writes
> >"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message
> >...
> >> True, but not what I asked. How much involvement did Iraq have in the
> >> 9/11 attacks?
> >
> >None that we know of--but that is immaterial.
>
> So what terrorism against the US _did_ flow from Iraq?

Firstly, it does not have to be directed *at the US*; note that we
have been involved with the fight against Abu Sayif in the PI. Second,
we have one attempt at assassinating a former US President (I assume
you do remember that one). Add in some rather direct threats of use of
terrorists against US targets by both Saddam (during the ramp up and
beginning of ODS), and later by his son Uday this past year. Throw in
the discovery of at least one training camp on the outskirts of
Baghdad, which reportedly served Palestinian needs. But again, this
does not bear upon the wisdom of the US taking action to rid the
Middle East, and the world at large, of Saddam's rule of Iraq.

>
> >Or do you think that,
> >along with having a "Foreign Policy Standard Playbook", we should also
> >only act if something is directly related to 9-11?
>
> Iraq was allegedly "sponsoring terrorism" - I'm curious as to what that
> was.

See above. Saddam himself was crowing about sponsoring a meeting with
various terrorist leaders during the period immediately preceeding
ODS--sounds like he set a poor precedent. Then there were those
meetings with the AQ leader from the Sudan (the one that the media
reported finding memos from Iraqi intel regarding?). And again--there
is no need to establish direct linkage with 9-11 for all US foreign
policy decisions (gee, you are the guy claiming that by golly we
should go into the DPRK with guns blazing, right? and what is Kim's
tie to 9-11??).

>
> >> Depends. Are the Irish flinging funds at the terrorists?
> >
> >I believe some were.
>
> Government bodies?

OK, so when it comes to the Irish, it has to involve government bodies
providing the funds and support, but with Saudi Arabia only a few
individuals are sufficient? You don't like even playing fields, do
you?

>
> >Are they
> >> willing to co-operate with us?
> >
> >A lot apparently were not. And who is this "they"?
>
> The government. The group that runs the country.
>
> >You are out for the
> >blood of the Saudis because some individuals doubtless supported OBL,
>
> "Some individuals" being the House of Saud.

You have proof that the King was directly supporting AQ?

>
> >so are you now shifting the Irish analogy to a collective "they"?
>
> Where's the Irish ruling family?

My point is that in *neither* case is the *government* supporting the
respective groups. If you want to claim otherwise because some
individulas in the widespread Saudi royal family, then I guess we
should call all of your *own* royals "nazi sympathizers" because of
the manner in which ol' Edward behaved?

>
> >Either you want to punish the
> >entire nation for the actions of a few citizens, not representing the
> >government, or you don't--which is it?
>
> "Punish the entire nation" is your invention. Most of its inhabitants
> get no say in what their management do.
>
> Why is democracy and freedom from repression a Good Thing in Iraq, but a
> dangerous threat in Saudi?

BZZZ! Now you want to turn this into a "we have to fight for freedom
everywhere" schtick? Not gonna fly very far. You asked why we had not
punished Saudi Arabia (which is the "entire nation" last I
heard)--don't change your spots now (your exact words were, "What
_did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia"). So, what exactly *are* you
advocating? Punishing Saudi Arabia, or not?

>
> >And BTW, from what I have read, the Saudi government has been
> >assisting the US.

I guess that little factoid has little bearing, huh?

>
> >Will the Gardai share information with UK
> >> law enforcement on cross-border crimes?
> >
> >Doesn't matter
>
> Only because you're inventing claims and then saying they're mine.

"What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia". Those were your words,
right?

>
> >--you are all fired up to slam Saudi Arabia because of
> >the actions of a few,
>
> Remind me again where I said that?

"What _did_ the US do to punish Saudi Arabia".

>
> >yet you now only think of the *governmental*
> >response when the Irish analogy is posed? Put them on the same scale.
>
> Why? One's a democracy, the other's a repressive autocracy. If you have
> power and authority in Saudi, it's because you comply with the monarchy.
> You can get rich in Ireland (just like in the US) without having to sign
> up to government policy.

So if its a monarchy, it is OK to assume that the entire nation, or
even the ruling family, is guilty if one, two, some number of them are
guilty? And to then punish the entire nation? Egads, what does that
say about the members of your own royal family, and the family as a
whole, who played footsie with Hitler?

>
> >> The more accurate example is "Irish republicans set off some bombs, so
> >> we invade Portugal. They're all Catholics aren't they?"
> >
> >You seem to be missing my point. The Saudi government did not
> >perpetrate 9-11,
>
> No, they just paid for it and provided the manpower.

The government did? You need to write a book, because that is news to
me.

>
> >> True, but completely irrelevant to their alleged (and apparenly widely
> >> held) sponsorship of 9/11.
> >
> >I have not said they did.
>
> You haven't; it seems many of your countrymen think so.
>
> >I am just not impressed by your redirection
> >efforts, either at Saudi Arabia or the DPRK, with your "why not them?"
> >Simply put, in the case of Saudi Arabia, because their government was
> >not behind 9-11
>
> Neither was Iraq. Didn't stop them being invaded as "sponsors of
> terrorism" (or was it "building stockpiles of WME?")

There were a number of reasons; his dalliances with terrorists being
one of them (those fellows in the North who Saddam allied himself with
were apparently rather nasty fellows in their own right--what was it,
Al As Salaam or something similar?), his refusal to meet the
requirements set forth in the ceasefire agreement (and seconded in the
UN resolutionns you are so proud of), and his continued threat to a
commodity vital to most major economies (you do recall his little
feint back south that resulted in a US brigade and additional airpower
being deployed back into Kuwait, right?). And his adnmitted desire to
maintain a WMD capability is icing on the cake. With a candle in the
form of the tens of thousands of civilians he slaughtered within his
own borders (what, its OK to attmpt to reign in "ethnic cleansing" in
the Balkans, but nowhere else?).


>
> >(unless you fall into the alt-conspiracy.whacko
> >class), and in the case of the DPRK, because other methods are working
> >(not to mention their own self destruction).
>
> Other methods in the DPRK are working?

Yeah. If you don't believe it, tell me how many times that the DPRK
has reinvaded the ROK, or has used those WMD's they have. Then tell me
that the DPRK is not self-destructing as we speak from within.

>
> Remember that six months was considered too long a wait for Iraq; but
> fifty years is "it's working, give it time" for North Korea?
>
> You don't see _any_ inconsistency there?

Nope. Because unlike you, I see each situation as independent and
unique; you are the only guy I know who seems to think that foreign
policy has to be made with a cookie cutter.

>
> >> Did we pay the mosque, or just allow it to run (damn that 'freedom of
> >> expression' and 'freedom of religion'...)
> >
> >But it is not OK for Saudis to support their religious institutions?
>
> If Richard Reid had been an ecumenical Anglican you'd have more of a
> point, because he'd have been a member of the State religion. Similarly,
> if the 9/11 hijackers had been !NOT WAHABBI then the Saudi link largely
> goes away.
>
> Where does the Wahabbi sect come from, again? And who bankrolls it?

Who really cares? The fact is that the government of Saudi Arabia was
not behind 9-11; claims otherwise should be directed to that
conspiracy group...

>
> >> How much money did he make? This is a guy who thinks that carrying
> >> exploding shoes onto an airliner is a cool idea, and thinks he can set
> >> them off in a crowded cabin without interference.
> >>
> >> I'm willing to hazard that he isn't an intellectual or financial
> >> powerhouse.
> >
> >Doesn't matter by your argument--he was a Brit, he was supported by
> >Brits, and he is a terrorist; how does this differ from what you are
> >condemning the entire Saudi nation for?
>
> Where's the State involvement?

Where is the state involvement in Saudi Arabia?

>
> >> Any need to censor reports on where he came from, who funded him, how he
> >> got into the mess he inflicted on himself?
> >
> >There is that political thing again.
>
> If the Saudis are blameless, what's to hide?

Well, when we have folks like you, who point to one-of-many saudi
royals and claim, Hey, why have we not punished Saudi Arabia?!", then
it is understandable that diplomacy may require some degree of
discretion. I find it amazing that you are so vehement in your
argument that we should make war on Saudi Arabia, but despite your
claims that you are just peachy with the fall of Saddam, you always
seem to be telling us that, well, he was evil, but not that evil...you
should go kick some other asses!"?

>
> >And golly gee, that censorship
> >must be rather porous, as we all do know that some Saudis did/do
> >support AQ, huh?
>
> Sure, but 15 of 19 is apparently statistically insignificant.

Fifteen of nineteen what?

>
> >> Hasn't aired here yet.
> >
> >Here are a few:
> >
> >http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/08/28/us_
> >says_iraq_arms_plan_relied_on_deceit/
> >
> >http://www.msnbc.com/news/962866.asp?cp1=1
> >
> >http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20030906_1020.html
>
> In other words... Iraq allegedly _didn't_ have WME, _had_ trashed its
> stockpiles, _had dispersed and scattered its development efforts...

I guess, given that you like to make these continuous attacks on the
very idea of taking Saddam out, that you take from them what you
choose to. But I do find it interesting that after repeatedly claiming
that there were *no* Iraqi WMD programs, you summarize here that
" had dispersed and scattered its development efforts"; sounds
like you are having a problem in realizing that there had to be
*programs* that were so scattered and dispersed. How do you explain
this disconnect in your theory?

>
> Pretty much what I said before the war, then.

So you are saying they did, as we claimed, maintain programs of this
ilk? Then what are you arguing about?

>[i]
> >> It's not going to produce much result, is it? The scientist is the
> >> useful part: the equipment isn't going to be much use after a dozen
> >> years or more in the mulch.
> >>
> >> Trouble is, knowledge is hard to eliminate unless you seize or kill the
> >> scientific staff.
> >
> >Read the articles.
>
> I did. Iraq destroyed, dismanted and scattered equipment; dispersed
> scientists; and disposed of materials and feedstocks.
>
> This is supposed to _increase_ their threat level?
>
> Yes, _if_ sanctions are fully lifted,

Like IIRC France was arguing, or at least solidly in that direction?

and _if_ they're allowed to buy
> everything they want,

Like the Germans, along with other nefarious individuals from around
the world, including in some cases the US, were selling them?

and _if_ they're left alone without interference
> or surveillance, they can then produce WMEs.

Like that NFZ thingie they continued to try to defeat?

So what? Applies to every
> nation state and not a few other actors. Why does this require an
> immediate invasion of Iraq?

Gee, it sounds like all of those conditions you posed were plausible,
at least in terms of their intent...

>
> >> And yet for all the discrepancies in the paperwork, with literally
> >> hundreds of trailerloads of chemical and biological agents or precursors
> >> "unaccounted for", nobody has been able to find them.
> >
> >Apparently he destroyed a lot of the paperwork after 95 when his
> >son-in-law carried out his short-term defection. Regardless, he was
> >obligated to "full and complete" disclosure, and he did not
> >comply--too bad for him.
>
> Can't say I have any sympathy for Hussein or his mob, just regret that
> he may still be wasting good air.
>
> Still, what has the US got itself by invading Iraq? I don't see much
> threat eliminated, much advantage gained, and some visible costs (chief
> among which being a very heavy commitment of your Army that's going to
> seriously limit your flexibility for a while)

How seriously do you think it will limit it? Less than what, thirty
percent of AC combat brigade equivalents being deployed into Iraq will
"seriously" limit our flexibility? And you are aware that we are now
activating RC combat units for duty in Iraq, meaning that the
available pool increases, so now you are talking about maybe 15% of
the total force combat brigade strength, and an insignificant part of
our tactical airpower? Sounds like you have been listening to the
Chicken Little side of the story in this regard.

As to what we have accomplished...if you can't look at Iraq today and
figure it out for yourself, I can't explain it to you. The media may
like to concentrate on the Iraqis who bemoan how much rougher things
are now, but it is hard to forget the reception that the average Iraqi
gave to coalition forces when they deposed Saddam.

>
> >> Not a chance. More that he wanted to pose and posture as being the
> >> mighty leader who defied the US, inflated his capabilities in the belief
> >> that the US would bluster, threaten and back down... and got caught when
> >> his bluff was called.
> >>
> >> No sympathy at all for Hussein. I think we should have gone in autumn
> >> rather than spring, with more effort made to make it a UN-sanctioned
> >> operation; but I'm mostly concerned about the problems incurred by the
> >> US (and UK) having to hold onto Iraq having won the war. (Which is why
> >> having it be a UN problem from the start is preferable)
> >
> >I believe the "problem" is a bit exaggerated, both by opposing
> >politicians, and by the media.
>
> Define "exaggerated". If you mean the portentious blather that "Iraq is
> the new Vietnam", or most users of the word "quagmire", then I agree.
> The casualties, while individually tragic, are hardly serious at the
> strategic level.
>
> On the other hand, you're now committed to Iraq for an undecided period,
> have been saddled with responsibility for the outcome, and are decidedly
> short on deployable troops.

Really? Look at the numbers again, and then tell me that we are
"decidedly short" of deployable troops (and since we are deploying RC
combat forces to Iraq, and have an RC division handling KFOR now, you
have to include them in your tally).

>
> >The endgame of military operations is frequently less than tidy; but
> >all Iraqi schools, universities, and hospitals are now open, and the
> >infrastructure is healing.
>
> "Healing" is too strong a word, in many cases. Power generation and
> distribution is particularly strained, and not amenable to rapid or easy
> reconstruction (the plants are a _mess_ and every failure adds further
> stress).

And what was their condition before this conflict? Not so good IIRC.
ISTR reading within the last couple of weeks that one town was now
receiving power that had been unavailable for the past twelve years,
so your mileage may vary with "healing".

>
> >The major threat seems to be those
> >disenfranchised by the allied action (namely, Saddam's thigs).
>
> Not enough information to be decisive. I've heard stories of generic
> criminals using attacks on the US to gain status, revenge attacks by
> family or friends of Iraqi casualties, and it's been alleged that many
> of the attacks are by foreign terrrorists (the so-called 'flypaper
> strategy')

Well, the US military leaders seem to think that Saddam's thugs are
the primary culprits, and I place a bit more credability in them than
I do in the media's "conventional wisdom".

>
> >> Nothing fielded, or capable of mass production anytime soon, from the
> >> evidence.
> >
> >The mere failure to ever accomplish that "full and complete"
> >disclosure is a violation; the attempts to hide the "dual use"
> >approach is another.
>
> Okay, so how many people can you kill with an incomplete declaration?
> (Maybe a few, if you wrap it around a nail-studded cricket bat and use
> it to beat brains out with... otherwise you're relying on paper-cutting
> people to death)

So nations should not be held accountable for meeting ceasefire
agreements?

>
> The "hidden dual-use technology" is alleged but not shown yet. (Sort of
> like the stockpiles of WMEs)

Hey, you just agreed that they were dispersing and hiding, etc.; now
you change your tune?

>
> >> Clear violation, but a rather thin cause for war.
> >
> >That would be three violations by my book; one is enough reason to
> >have taken that scumbag down.
>
> You're remarkably fond of the UN all of a sudden, Kevin :)

Nope. You can trace those UN resolutions back to the ceasefire
agreement, in broader terms.

>
> >> He cheerfully used them on Iran and on his own people when there was no
> >> danger of retaliation in kind. He refrained from using them against the
> >> Coalition in 1991 when his programs were in much better shape: suggests
> >> that he's not irrational. (Evil, not crazy or stupid.)
> >>
> >> How strongly do you believe that Kim Jong-Il is a rational actor?
> >
> >Well, since the open source data has speculated that he has actually
> >had a nuclear capability (i.e., actually had weapons) for about ten
> >years or so (and I have noted no mushroom clouds on that horizon as
> >yet), he seems to have at least as good a grasp as ol' Saddam did.
>
> ...in July 1990 when he hadn't invaded any neighbours for a while.
>
> You'd have got a different answer in July 1991, perchance.

Your point being? In fact, the US has been acheiving its goals in the
ROK without armed conflict--sounds like we should continue to do so
for as long as we can to me. In Iraq, we were facing a gent who
refused to comply with the ceasefire agreement he had made, and was
positioned to deal a rather nasty blow to the world economic picture
just as soon as he could. Different situations, no cookie cutter
solutions required.

>
> >> Either the UN is relevant or it isn't, Kevin. If the UN is a useless
> >> talking shop and its resolutions just waste paper... then its
> >> resolutions are waste paper.
> >
> >Pretty much that is the case.
>
> Then why waste time justifying actions in terms of UN resolutions?
> Nations can invade anyone they want to, with the only issue being "can
> they get away with it" - makes life a lot simpler. (And probably
> shorter).

Only in an attempt to appease those like you who are squemish with the
idea of us using a big stick when we deem it necessary.

>
> >> What's the timescale for eliminating the very clear threat of DPRK WMEs?
> >
> >Not my place to know. Why, do you have a pressing engagement that
> >requires action *this day*?
>
> Might be an idea to prevent them being fielded, rather than trying to
> neutralise them once assembled and ready to fire. The track record of
> finding and killing mobile ballistic missiles isn't inspiring.

They have had them for ten years or more, and you think they are not
about as "fielded" as they are likely to get in the near term?

>
> >> Not at all. I'm just comparing the response. Saddam Hussein fails to
> >> prove he completely dismantled his WME program and gets caught testing a
> >> missile with a range under 200km and gets invaded.
> >>
> >> Kim Jong-Il has a WME capability that would make Hussein weep bitter
> >> tears of envy, has lofted missiles over Japan to make a point, and
> >> remains in power and continuing to develop his nasty toys apace. What's
> >> the difference? No UN resolutions against North Korea?
> >
> >Nope, different threat, different region, different neighbors,
> >different internal situation, etc. Hint--there are really no
> >*identical* situations like this, so trying to make them so is a
> >fruitless endeavor.
>
> Are you claiming that there's no rational strategy, Kevin?

Not a single one for each individual situation, no.

>
> I'm trying to isolate the factors that cause a nation to be considered a
> threat. Development of (or possession of) WME doesn't count as a threat:
> threatening neighbours with various flavours of lethal harm isn't
> threatening: infiltrating your neighbours with commando teams isn't
> threatening... so what _is_ a threat?
>
> >> I've given up trying to fathom US motives: they change like the colour
> >> of oil on water (and I do not mean to impugn the US posters who try to
> >> explain them). Was it about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction? It seems
> >> not, because other nations develop and even flaunt them. Was it about
> >> defying UN resolutions? Who cares about defying an irrelevance? Was it
> >> about supporting terrorism? North Korea will sell anything to anyone as
> >> long as they pay hard cash.
> >
> >Answer the question--if WMD's are what has kept the DPRK safe, why
> >were they secure *before* they had them?
>
> Lack of will? Lack of vendetta? Lack of threat? Fear of foreign
> retaliation? Inertia?

But hey, you have been saying that *WMD's* keep them safe--what are
all of these other things?

>
> >> I'd be wary of assuming Chinese support, however.
> >
> >I would not be, in this case,
>
> The Chinese standing aside, perhaps (they know where their interests now
> lie), but not active support.

They seem, based upon meager reports, to be generally with us on this
one right now. Not that they would hesitate to stick a knofe in our
back if they thought they could get away with it and it was to their
advantage, but right now they see greater value in improved relations
with the US than in the opposite. Works for us (and I have little
doubt we are keeping our eyes on our six).

>
> >> Show me something better.
> >
> >I don't have to--you are making the illogical claim here.
>
> WMEs alone aren't a cause for war - we've got that proved.

No, you don't. You keeping trying to over-generalize. In some cases
that *could* be reason enough alone (i.e., where we believed immenent
use was in the cards).

Being
> generally obnoxious and on the Axis of Evil has got one member invaded:
> the other two may actually have WME (Iran) and almost certainly do
> (DPRK).

Trying to develop that Playbook again? Ain't gonna work. All such
situatios are unique, and require unique solutions. Even the old
containment strategy did not result in the deployment of US troops en
mass to every troublespot--different solutions were crafted for each
situation, be it Greece after WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Western Europe,
etc.

>
> Of course, this presupposes that there _were_ rational reasons for
> invading Iraq.

There were.

>
> >> And the US objective in the Middle East was to stop Hussein attacking
> >> his neighbours, which has been an even more complete success than the US
> >> work in South Korea (no Iraqi mini-subs trawled up off the Kuwaiti
> >> coast, or found grounded on Saudi beaches with the landed commandos
> >> fighting suicidally)
> >
> >Well, at least Mr. Kim has not tried to assassinate a former US
> >President, nor is he sitting astride a resource that the rest of the
> >world depends upon.
>
> Hey, "it's not about oil", remember? Lots and lots of determined
> rhetoric on that subject.

Correct. What does that assassination attempt have to do with oil? Or
Saddam's bucking the ceasefire terms? But yes, the continued freedom
of the oil supply is a factor in the Middle East, and it is not in
Korea. Who'd have thunk it?

>
> >Like I said, different situations.
>
> So allegedly trying to kill an ex-President is now grounds for invasion?

When it is a governmental effort, yes indeed it can be. Likewise a
governmental effort directed at killing *any* US citizen can be
(though we both know that Presidents stand a bit apart from us common
folk in this regard). Just another factor in that whole "unique
situation" I keep telling you about.

>
> >> Similar issues apply. One reason there aren't "unsatisfied UN
> >> resolutions" from Korea is that there was no formal surrender, for
> >> instance.
> >>
> >> And again, North Korea has much more WME, longer-ranged missiles, more
> >> demonstrated willingness to sell to cash buyers than Iraq: what's the
> >> difference? UN resolutions?
> >
> >If you cannot comprehend the difference, then I have seriously
> >misjudged your reasoning ability--and I doubt that is the case. You
> >know that each situation is different, but you choose to cling to the
> >single common thread (WMD capability) in an attempt to...well, I don't
> >really know exactly *what* you see as an objective in this case, to be
> >honest.
>
> Trying to determine the reasons for invading Iraq. There are many people
> willing to say what they weren't... but nobody willing to go firm and
> stay there on what they _were_.

I have given you a number of reasons that I have stood on. I am not
going to repeat what I have already repeated to you again and again,
so hopefully you can recognize some of those reasons I have listed.

Brooks

[annemarie]

Though the Administration has slyly hinted (over and over again)that
Hussein supported Ansar al-Islam, it's just another one of their
rationalizations for invading Iraq that doesn't hold water. Is one to
assume that the Kurds supported the group or that the president
supported the Al-Qaeda cells in New Jersey and Florida? The
Administration has taken to bold faced lying without embarrassment.

"Secretary of State Powell in his February 5 address to the United
Nations Security Council accused Saddam Hussein of collaborating with
Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda.

Powell accused Baghdad of supporting Ansar al-Islam, a "deadly
terrorist network" based in the ethnic Kurd controlled region of
Northern Iraq. According to Powell, Ansar al-Islam has been
responsible for plotting terror attacks in a number of countries
including France, Britain, and Germany. US officials have also pointed
to the role of Iraq's embassy in Islamabad, which was allegedly used
as a liaison between Al Qaeda operatives and representatives of the
Iraqi government.

Baghdad has no jurisdiction in the ethnic Kurd controlled region of
Northern Iraq. In fact, the region is in the US sphere of influence.
"But the picture is neither complete nor conclusive. Ansar al-Islam
has its bases in the Kurdish-controlled area of Iraq, beyond the
control of Saddam Hussein." (NYT, 14 Febrauary 2003)

There are two regional governments in "liberated Kurdistan", both of
which are supported by Washington. The Kurdistan Democratic Party
(KDP) controls the West, whereas the eastern part is under the
jurisdiction of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). The two rival
governments have separate administrations and Armed Forces, which are
financed by US military aid under Clinton's 1998 "Iraq Liberation Act"
of 1998.

Ansar al-Islam, a pre-existing Islamist group, developed into a small
yet significant paramilitary organisation, shortly after the 9/11
attacks. It was largely involved in terrorist attacks directed against
the secular institutions of the Kurdish regional governments. It was
also involved in assassinations of members of the Kurdish PUK. In the
days following Colin Powell's statement, a senior military leader of
PUK forces General Shawkat Haj Mushir was murdered allegedly by Ansar
al-Islam. (The Australian, 11 February 2003) Surrounded in mystery,
the assassination of Shawkat was barely mentioned in the US press.

Since September 2001, Ansar al-Islam has grown in size, incorporating
Al Qaeda fighters who fled Afghanistan in the wake of the US bombings.
(Christian Science Monitor, 15 March 2002) Revealed by Seymour Hersh,
"an unknown number" of Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters "were flown to
safety" in a US sponsored airlift organised by Pakistan's Military and
Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of these Mujahideen fighters were
evacuated to Kashmir, where they joined Al Qaeda and ISI supported
Islamic terrorist groups. While there is no firm evidence, one
suspects that some of the Mujahideen fighters may also have fled from
Afghanistan to other countries (eg. Northern Iraq), with the tacit
approval of the Pentagon."

[Chris Manteuffel]

"Paul J. Adam" > wrote in message >...

> Okay, what did he do that was unusual for the region? :)

U.S. Department of State every year is required by law to publish a
report on the "Patterns of Global Terrorism".

The Iraq section of the latest report
(http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/2002/html/19988.htm)

<quote>

Iraq planned and sponsored international terrorism in 2002. Throughout
the year, the Iraqi Intelligence Services (IIS) laid the groundwork
for possible attacks against civilian and military targets in the
United States and other Western countries. The IIS reportedly
instructed its agents in early 2001 that their main mission was to
obtain information about US and Israeli targets. The IIS also
threatened dissidents in the Near East and Europe and stole records
and computer files detailing antiregime activity. In December 2002,
the press claimed Iraqi intelligence killed Walid al-Mayahi, a Shi'a
Iraqi refugee in Lebanon and member of the Iraqi National Congress.

Iraq was a safehaven, transit point, and operational base for groups
and individuals who direct violenceSuspected leader of Iraqi Kurdish
Islamic extremist group during a press conference (AFP copyrighted
photo) against the United States, Israel, and other countries. Baghdad
overtly assisted two categories of Iraqi-based terrorist
organizations—Iranian dissidents devoted to toppling the Iranian
Government and a variety of Palestinian groups opposed to peace with
Israel. The groups include the Iranian Mujahedin-e Khalq, the Abu
Nidal organization (although Iraq reportedly killed its leader), the
Palestine Liberation Front (PLF), and the Arab Liberation Front (ALF).
In the past year, the PLF increased its operational activity against
Israel and sent its members to Iraq for training for future terrorist
attacks.

Baghdad provided material assistance to other Palestinian terrorist
groups that are in the forefront of the intifadah. The Popular Front
for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, HAMAS, and the
Palestine Islamic Jihad are the three most important groups to whom
Baghdad has extended outreach and support efforts.

Saddam paid the families of Palestinian suicide bombers to encourage
Palestinian terrorism, channeling $25,000 since March through the ALF
alone to families of suicide bombers in Gaza and the West Bank. Public
testimonials by Palestinian civilians and officials and cancelled
checks captured by Israel in the West Bank verify the transfer of a
considerable amount of Iraqi money.

The presence of several hundred al-Qaida operatives fighting with the
small Kurdish Islamist group Ansar al-Islam in the northeastern corner
of Iraqi Kurdistan—where the IIS operates—is well documented. Iraq has
an agent in the most senior levels of Ansar al-Islam as well. In
addition, small numbers of highly placed al-Qaida militants were
present in Baghdad and areas of Iraq that Saddam controls. It is
inconceivable these groups were in Iraq without the knowledge and
acquiescence of Saddam's regime. In the past year, al-Qaida operatives
in northern Iraq concocted suspect chemicals under the direction of
senior al-Qaida associate Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi and tried to smuggle
them into Russia, Western Europe, and the United States for terrorist
operations.

Iraq is a party to five of the 12 international conventions and
protocols relating to terrorism.

</quote>

Appendix G of that document
(http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/2002/html/19996.htm) is excerpts
from the speech that Colin Powell delievered to the UN Security
Council on Feb 5, 2003.

No one has seemed to doubt the Zarwaqi evidence, though it wasn't
really connected to September 11 (that seems to have been different
camps, in Afghanistan, rather then the one in Iraq), and they seem to
have bugged out before the hammer came down on Iraq.

Chris Manteuffel

[ZZBunker]

Vince Brannigan > wrote in message >...
> Chad Irby wrote:
> > In article >,
> > Vince Brannigan > wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Chad Irby wrote:
> >>
> >>>Vince Brannigan > wrote:
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>>Im a law professor. I teach this stuff.
> >>>
> >>>If you are, the students shold chip in and buy you a keyboard with an
> >>>apostrophe key.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>>im bothered by anyone who misuses the limited monopoly provided by the
> >>>>copyright law
> >>>
> >>>And the rest of us are bothered by someone claiming to be an expert on
> >>>something spouting obvious falsehoods...
> >>
> >>Im licensed to practice law in Maryland and D.C.
> >
> >
> > Well, since you claim to be a lawyer, you should know by now that even a
> > layman can find out things about laws that most lawyers don't bother to
> > find out. Like the basic ins and outs of copyright laws. And what
> > "fair use" is (or is not).
> >
>
>
> Well chow down on this
>
> TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > Sec. 107. Prev | Next
>
> Sec. 107. - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
> > Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A,
> the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by
> reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other
> means specified by that section, for purposes
> such as criticism, comment, news reporting,
> teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use),
> scholarship, or research, is not an infringement
> of copyright. In determining whether the use made
> of a work in any particular case is a
> fair use the factors to be considered shall include -
> (1)> the purpose and character of the use, including
> whether such use is of a commercial
> nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
>
> (2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
> (3) the amount and substantiality of the
> portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
> (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the
> copyrighted work.
>
> Remember news stories are not copyrighted newspapers are. so on all of
> the above the copying news stories for the purpose of criticizing the
> reporting is fair use.

We know. But we need to remind idiot lawyers daily to remember that
news stories are the intelligent property of the Judicial Branch
of Government, and not the morons in the Legislative Branch
of Government.

>
> Oh, and if you do your homework, the Courts of appeal in Md. and DC
> maintain lists of those licensed to practice.

True, but the US Supreme Court maintains no such list. And overrules the
DC Court Of Appeals more often than the Air Force overrules
the Navy.