>And if anything like the 70,000 number is >true - divide it by 5 if
>you want, and it's still a big number of >people hellbent on
>destruction - what do you pacifists and >fatalists and revolutionary
>defeatists suggest be done? Just let >them be? Act nice? Invite them
>over for coffee?
>Doug
Are you to the point of believing, like Chip 'Big Balls' Berlet, that clerical fascism and fanaticism are in the pork-free combat rations they got or something? I would bet USMC basic training at Parris Island turns out more fanatics.
Most of them are not motivated enough long term to die in suicide missions. Look at the motivation level of the boys and young men in the Taliban. Were most of them or their leaders willing to fight to the death once the US started bombing them and mowing them down with the flying fortresses?
Most of them do not fit the profile of the 9-11 perps even. Most of them will never get to the US. Most of them, if they do anything, will try to raise hell against the repressive regimes installed in their own countries--including Israel-Palestine. And most will be repressed or bought off with an oil-financed welfare state.
As dangerous as the world may seem at times, anti-social pathology is not a viable equilibrium state for most societies or individuals.
Just trying to follow the implied reasoning here. I still can't see these 'facts' as justifying the bombing of Afghanistan anymore than it justifies the US bombing itself or its so-called 'moderate' Arab allies.
It's also hard for me to say I should waste time with an argument based on evidence that you yourself admit may well be a complete crock. FT? Sure the FT doesn't need to lie to its busy bourgeois readers. Just select the facts to fit the agenda (liberalized trade, political freedom as a western ideal, etc, ad nauseum), and pull the punches when it's time to analyze.
Why don't you try real journalism Doug? Pilger, Fisk, Escobar. None of them write for FT, but they still manage to do some great work. No doubt the last dog hasn't been wagged in this sorry tale, but so far Doug, for someone who always asks for position statements, yours are getting to be monotonously forgettable. What are you going to think of your current positions two years from now? I don't even think anyone will remember them.
Charles Jannuzi