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america doesn't suck
And it doesn't blow either! Honestly! If I had to choose between living in America and living in an old refrigerator box, I would very easily choose America.
I just can't always agree with the decisions our elected (and unelected) officials choose to embark upon the rest of the world. For the elected officials, I do my part in protesting by employing my right to vote. But for the unelected ones, my voice doesn't really matter, so I get long-winded on the wrong forums.
Does our military intentionally blow up innocent people? No, that's the CIA's job. Our fine servicemen and women aren't being told by an evil empire to go out and rape the rest of the world for the benefit of George II's public ratings.
But in non-hippie-b.s., yes the Taliban is a repressive govt and even though we've been giving it money, now that it is unwilling to distance itself from the al-Qaeda and Mr. bin Laden, it does deserve to be put down. The faster the better. However, as the result of "damned if you do, damned if you don't", now that we've (almost) got rid of the Taliban, we (or, rather, our military personnel) need to spend a couple years over there making sure another crazy nuthouse government doesn't take over. The war on terrorism (if this really does become an honest term and not just a soundbyte) will have to be fought in a manner different from the war on communism, which didn't really cause much except the construction of a few extra thousand nuclear missiles. Since terrorism is an ideological concept (being taught at by schools in such places as Pakistan, nuclear-armed military-despotism) we need to fight a war in the minds and hearts of our enemies. We need to tell Saudi Arabia to STOP funding these schools that are producing tomorrow's bin Ladens.
But to do so will risk alienating a country that helps us get much of our oil.
Is the American govt willing to do this? Because if it's not, then it doesn't really matter if we get rid of the Taliban, because similar groups will just keep on reappearing. The main money-maker for these "Islamic" fundamentalist nutjobs is oil, and so to remove them, we have to remove the market for oil.
Or replace the government of every country between Israel and India with a democratically-elected pro-freedom anti-terrorist government.
...neither of which is likely to happen, but either of which is NECESSARY to make this war on terrorism successful in any long-term sense of the word.
But that's just my hawkish attitude.
And it doesn't blow either! Honestly! If I had to choose between living in America and living in an old refrigerator box, I would very easily choose America.
I just can't always agree with the decisions our elected (and unelected) officials choose to embark upon the rest of the world. For the elected officials, I do my part in protesting by employing my right to vote. But for the unelected ones, my voice doesn't really matter, so I get long-winded on the wrong forums.
Does our military intentionally blow up innocent people? No, that's the CIA's job. Our fine servicemen and women aren't being told by an evil empire to go out and rape the rest of the world for the benefit of George II's public ratings.
But in non-hippie-b.s., yes the Taliban is a repressive govt and even though we've been giving it money, now that it is unwilling to distance itself from the al-Qaeda and Mr. bin Laden, it does deserve to be put down. The faster the better. However, as the result of "damned if you do, damned if you don't", now that we've (almost) got rid of the Taliban, we (or, rather, our military personnel) need to spend a couple years over there making sure another crazy nuthouse government doesn't take over. The war on terrorism (if this really does become an honest term and not just a soundbyte) will have to be fought in a manner different from the war on communism, which didn't really cause much except the construction of a few extra thousand nuclear missiles. Since terrorism is an ideological concept (being taught at by schools in such places as Pakistan, nuclear-armed military-despotism) we need to fight a war in the minds and hearts of our enemies. We need to tell Saudi Arabia to STOP funding these schools that are producing tomorrow's bin Ladens.
But to do so will risk alienating a country that helps us get much of our oil.
Is the American govt willing to do this? Because if it's not, then it doesn't really matter if we get rid of the Taliban, because similar groups will just keep on reappearing. The main money-maker for these "Islamic" fundamentalist nutjobs is oil, and so to remove them, we have to remove the market for oil.
Or replace the government of every country between Israel and India with a democratically-elected pro-freedom anti-terrorist government.
...neither of which is likely to happen, but either of which is NECESSARY to make this war on terrorism successful in any long-term sense of the word.
But that's just my hawkish attitude.
I'll always remember him for the quote he allegedly made to a mob of peasants who were rioting after he made them change from their national dress to Western garb (including shaving off their beards.) 
hey crazyroach I got a question. How do I make Stalin my permanent leader without having to load a scenario? I downloaded your Hitler a while back and he is now my permanent leader. I placed the Stalin FLC. in my custom directory in the art/Flics/Custom file with my Hitler Flic. Where am I supposed to put the Civ3 edit document included in the Stalin zip. I want it permanent.
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