Are you really arguing that Democrats have voted fiscally responsibly until Obama came to office when they all voted for the trillion dollar pork/stimulus bill? You can't sit on both sides of the fence. They were there and they voted for it. What else do you need to assign responsibility? Again, how many Democrats voted against the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill? Can you even name one? Both Democrats and Republicans are fiscally irresponsible. I am neither. It seems you are just like Rush Limbaugh only on the other side of the finger pointing fence. When these war funding bills and huge social programs come up for a vote both sides of the aisle votes for them most of the time. A war in Afghanistan will not end until we leave defeated like the Soviets did in the 1980's. If Obama wants to fight harder there he's in for a harder fight. As for Iraq, we are still there and don't seem to be leaving anytime soon. Wars should be fought for good reason. The Taliban is deposed. They are now partisan fighters. It would be like if China attacked us and deposed the Democrats, and then stuck around. How long do you think it would take for China to win the war if it continued to fight here? So long as Americans have guns they would never win.
The only place I am sitting on both sides of the fence is in your mind. I have been and remain very consistent. The Afgan war will end and it will end in success under Obama. And the reason it will end where the Soviets ran in terror, is because the opposition/enemy does not have a super power supplying them with advanced weapons. And because Obama knows you have to improve the lives of the Afgans and offer them something better than the Taliban. I think you need a little refresher on the history of the Medicare Prescription drug bill. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Medicare_Prescription_Drug_Bill_Vote_Scandal,_2003 Dems tried to get the noncompete clause out of the bill in 2005 but the Republicans in the Senate would not let it out of committee. You want to know just one Democrat who voted against the bill..how about all but sixteen Democrats voted against the bill...take a look at the voting record: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=h2003-669 So please take a walk on the side of fact one day, it really is not that scary...much less scary than the Republican/conservative imaginary world. It really strikes me as odd that conservatives no longer want to call themselves Republican. They now want to be independents or anything but Republican. Yet they retain the same old Republican leaders and tactics used by those that brought them to this space in time and history. So what you have left is the same old rotten apple, it is just you dont want to call it a rotten apple anymore...call it a peach Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Further your analysis of the war in Afganistan is so classic of "conservative" reasoning. You took two facts; - Soviets fought in Afganistan - Soviets lost - Americans are fighting in Afganistan - Therefore Americans will loose too. You never looked at why the Soviets failed (e.g. US supplied advanced weapons) or differences in tactics or quality of military. You "conservatives" or whatever you are calling yourselves now days just have no need for reason of fact. You are going to believe whatever the hell you want to believe.
It's my understanding that Afghanistan has NEVER been conquered by a foreign power. Why do you think this war will be any different?
Your understanding is not correct, it has been conquered many times by many different people throughout history and most recently by The United States. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan The war in Afganistan is not against the Afgans but against radical Muslims who want to use terror to further their goals. In order to successfully wage that war a stable government must be created...that stable government does not yet exist because the George II administration has been saying one thing and doing another...alienating a lot of Afgans and understandably so. The United States actions in Afganistan are more police like as they are not fighting a standing army....but groups of criminals.
I wouldn't call it conquered. The only difference in them within the last several thousand years is language and religion. Otherwise they are essentially themselves. The Afghanis believe that the only people they cannot win against is themselves.
You hit on it SAM, the so called war in Afganistan is not going to be won with bullets, but with the hearts and minds of the Afganis. When the Afganis can stand on their own with out support and not be a threat to others, then they will have arrived and there will no longer be a need for US support. But when they pass laws like they recently did which allows husbands to rape their wives, I think we still have a lot of work to do. Women should be honored and respected, no matter how crazy we men think they maybe.
So you're going with the US strategy in Vietnam, eh? I am so glad I'm no longer in the military with starry eyed dreamers like you calling the shots over there.
Yeah, I am glad you are not in the military too. It is not the Vietnam strategy. It is a strategy derived from lessons learn or should have been learned from Vietnam. But again you in typical "conservative" fashion never answered my rebutals...too painful is it?
And who do you suppose supplies the enemy there with 7.62 caliber bullets, RPG's and spare AK-47 parts? Whether its China or Russia the result is a flip of how it was in the 1980's. Afghanistan is a sink hole for every invading army that has ever been there, sort of like Russia. You're right. The Republicans did get that monstrosity passed by and large on their own.
Where does your enthusiasm and blind trust in Obama to fix all these problems come from? The guy speaks well in front of a teleprompter and like a retard without one. Other than that what does anyone really know about him? We can't even find a hand full of witnesses that were around when he was born. The guy came out of nowhere and there he is.
You are going ever farther out on the whacko scale Desi. Who ever mentioned anything about communism? No one but you. Do you know what communism is or is not? And how does that apply?
He does just fine without a teleprompter. People who debated with him on a state level can attest to that. That is a nice myth. They would have lost against the soviets without American assistance.
Last I checked, AK47s and bullets were not advanced weaponry. They have been around in large quanties for decades. Stingers are advanced weaponry.
I have no blind faith in anyone. So you are leaping to unfounded positions again. Two you are about one president behind the times. George II is no longer the president. He sometimes could do ok with the teleprompter, but get him without a telepromter and I was embarased for the country. The man could not utter for that two words before he interjected an duh or huh. His impormptu talks were an absolute disaster. We even have a new term in our lexicon to describe George IIs verbal blunders, Bushisms. No such blunder dictionary exists for Obama. He speaks well in a scripted or unscripted environment. Obama has accomplished a lot in a short space of time. Why am I impressed with him, because I have seen a lot of executives in my long career in management, and he is a good one. Will he make mistakes, definately. I think he has already made mistakes. But the measure of a good executive is how he manages his mistakes, and this guy is very good. Show me an instance in which Obama spoke like a retard in an unscripted event. Just one, lets keep it simple. I can show you lots of instances in which George II spoke like a retard and it didnt seem to bother you then.
I see. You really don't think they have such weapons now from whoever supplies them? They've been beating the US military for how many years because?