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Obama: 'I Have Not Made a Decision' on Syria
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Post by
Izikiel
Off topic but, can someone from another country join the american military?
Post by
Monday
If they immigrated legally, yes. In fact, it's one of the faster paths to citizenship.
Post by
Skreeran
Guess what. The US makes up the majority of the UN Security Council's military force.
What? And these US troops aren't neutral? What type of neutral organization is that?The UN isn't neutral. The UN is composed of hundred of component countries with their own wants and needs, and when the majority decide to take action, they do.
The US, Russia, China, France, and the UK are all permanent members of the UN Security Council, and have the power to veto any military action taken by the UNSC. Russia would naturally veto any military action taken against Syria, which is one of their satellites, and thus the UNSC isn't going to be able to do anything as a whole. If military action were to be taken, it'd have to be taken by individual states.
Post by
Lordplatypus
But we rely too much on the Middle East, without the Middle East we wouldn't have any oil and the West loves oil. And say Syria turns into another Afghanistan or Iraq and we hear that a soldiers died every single day on the news? And we just start wasting soldiers. Or Assad goes out with a fight and bombs the West, hitting some innocent people who are just going to work or something.
30% or so of the US's oil comes from itself, another 20% comes from the psychoticly unstable country of.................Canada. The Saudis are the big boys in the middle east and 3 guesses who they buy all their military hardware from? That's right the U S of A. So no, I doubt they'd want to stop having replacement parts for their jets all of a sudden.
Snake........... Are you seriously afraid of people carbombing your house if the US supports assad?
You do realize terrorists are so mentally inept they regularly blow themselves up
hugging
while in bomb vests.
Post by
134377
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Snake387
Snake's essential position is one of the mindset that says "My neighbour's house is on fire, but I won't do anything about it because it isn't MY house.
What, of course I'd help my neighbour, because if their house is on fire, then my house could go on fire too.
There's a person getting beaten up in the street, but I'll let them get put in the ICU because I'm scared of getting thumped myself.
Aren't you supposed to get a safe distance away and call the police?
There's a child in the water. I'm not jumping in because it isn't MY child, and I might drown."
I'm not
that
self-centered and cowardly.
You do realize terrorists are so mentally inept they regularly blow themselves up hugging while in bomb vests.
You do realize that they take a whole load of people down with them?
Post by
Gone
There's a child in the water. I'm not jumping in because it isn't MY child, and I might drown.
No, that example would only apply if he actually had to go over to Syria himself. It's more like he's saying "There's a child in the water, but I won't save it, nor should anybody else, on the slight off chance that I might need medical attention but the emergency workers are wasting their efforts on the child."
And yes he is a selfish coward. I can't believe anybody would actually admit to having feelings that pathetic.
Post by
Monday
So I saw this and thought it rather amusing
. Colbert tears apart Rand Paul's views on Syria.
Post by
Lordplatypus
You do realize that they take a whole load of people down with them?
The ones that get on the news do.
The majority don't even get that far as to get near their victims.
Post by
Gone
Pretending that terrorists are all a bunch of incompetent rubes is a dangerous fallacy. They were smart enough to knock our towers down, and to basically take over several Middle Eastern countries. They're smart enough to brainwash and recruit new generations of terrorists every year. They were able to resist the Red Army during the Cold War, and were surprisingly effective at resisting the U.S. invasion. Let's not forget that Osama Bin Laden himself was supposedly trained by the CIA to resist the Russians. It's true they don't have the same level of training and technology that the west does, but pretending they're all a bunch of harmless dupes is an extremely foolish and ignorant perspective.
Post by
134377
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Gone
I agree with Ryja, except semantically. A terrorist is somebody who deliberately murders civilians in the hope of achieving a political or strategic end. Somebody who acts as part of a militia (non-governmental) force targeting the forces of an occupying army, or rising against their own government, as is the case in Syria, is a guerrilla. Thus, the Mujihadeen were guerrillas fighting the Soviets. People who attack coalition troops in Afghanistan or Iraq are behaving as guerrillas. If they target reporters, aid workers etc, they are behaving as terrorists. I also consider bombs and artillery aimed at areas in which civilians are known to be, (Hamas, Israel, UK/US, Sri Lanka, the list is endless) as terrorist acts.
I was referring to, in some cases, the same group of people committing two different acts. Many of the guerrilla who fought against the soviets became leaders for Al-Qaeda and then used what they learned to murder 3000 Americans on 9/11.
Post by
Snake387
And yes he is a selfish coward. I can't believe anybody would actually admit to having feelings that pathetic.
Telling the truth is bad now. Wow.
No, that example would only apply if he actually had to go over to Syria himself. It's more like he's saying "There's a child in the water, but I won't save it, nor should anybody else, on the slight off chance that I might need medical attention but the emergency workers are wasting their efforts on the child."
There's a difference between hearing something on the news and seeing it for yourself. It's psychological. If one person is dead, you feel sorry for them, but when loads of people have died, they just become numbers.
Post by
Monday
Telling the truth is bad now. Wow.
Telling the truth itself is not bad, but the truth admitted.
Post by
Skreeran
There's a difference between hearing something on the news and seeing it for yourself. It's psychological. If one person is dead, you feel sorry for them, but when loads of people have died, they just become numbers.And the compassionate people make an effort to remind themselves that those statistics of those innocent people murdered with poison gas aren't just statistics, but actual people, including children.
You could very well say that the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust is just a statistic and that it doesn't really affect you in any way, but that doesn't change the fact that those were real people who were really murdered. It is the compassionate person who actually tries to look beyond the statistic and imagine what those real people went through.
Post by
Squishalot
And yes he is a selfish coward. I can't believe anybody would actually admit to having feelings that pathetic.
I didn't see this earlier. Aside from the ad hominems, I'd like to draw your attention to every single instance of bystander inaction whenever someone is hurt / drowning / getting shot / etc.. There is a documented crowd phenomenon that people are less likely to take action when there are more people around, expecting someone else to act.
Cowardice is a very natural reaction to hostile stimuli. If there is a gunman running around shooting people, do you crash tackle him or do you call 911? Would you feel it was fair if someone judged you as a coward for not taking him on personally? What if Snake can't swim? Would that be a fair reason not to jump in to try to save a child? Is he a coward for acknowledging that he may not have the capacity to save the child?
Armchair bravery is completely meaningless. For every person who may jump into icy waters to save a drowning child, there will be 99 more who will be standing on the dock documenting it on Facebook. I think that it is a bit much to claim that you would always be part of that 1%.
Edit: Just realised the example was an ad hominem in itself. The point still stands. It's all well and good to claim moral superiority when you're sitting in a chair in front of your computer, but only Skree here can claim to have actually stepped up to take action.(##RESPBREAK##)8##DELIM##Squishalot##DELIM##
Post by
Gone
Just realised the example was an ad hominem in itself. The point still stands. It's all well and good to claim moral superiority when you're sitting in a chair in front of your computer, but only Skree here can claim to have actually stepped up to take action.
That's bull@#$% man. It's not like he said he was afraid to go into action, in which case I would have no right to claim moral superiority sitting in front of the computer. What he said was that nobody should go into action, because it might have a chance of inconveniencing him, or that there's a slight chance that his life might somehow be put in danger, even while he's sitting at home in front of his computer. You understand the difference right? It's not like he's actually out there in the action, he's sitting in front of his computer just like the rest of us. And yes calling those gassed in Syria and holocaust victims meaningless is extremely selfish.
And no Skreeran is not the only person who can claim to have stepped up in a moment of crisis. Since you don't know many of our situations, don't make blanket judgments about who has and has not stepped into action before, I find that a little offensive.
Cowardice is a very natural reaction to hostile stimuli. If there is a gunman running around shooting people, do you crash tackle him or do you call 911? Would you feel it was fair if someone judged you as a coward for not taking him on personally? What if Snake can't swim? Would that be a fair reason not to jump in to try to save a child? Is he a coward for acknowledging that he may not have the capacity to save the child?
Go back and read his posts. He's not saying that he would be afraid to take action, he's saying that he doesn't want anybody to, since it might affect his quality of life, or that it might cause some hypothetical war with the middle east that puts him in danger. First of all, if your so scared that out of three hundred million Americans, terrorists will choose your car to bomb, then you are a coward, it is absurd how unlikely it is that his life will be put in danger. Second of all, prioritizing his own life above that of basically everyone else's on the planet is selfish. He didn't say that he didn't want action taken because
people
would die, he said he didn't want action taken because
he
might die. Essentially valuing your own live drastically above that of all others is selfish.
Post by
Squishalot
And you know what? There are millions of people out there who feel the same way. It's unreasonable to tear someone a new one for being completely normal.
You're coming from a country that is perhaps the most paranoid about security in the Western world. Your government has essentially created an environment where people are being assured that they should be scared. I think it's perfectly reasonable that people have those sorts of thoughts.
And while we're being clear - he said that the UN should be sorting it out. Quote here:
Isn't that what the UN is for? To sort out conflicts like these?
Look, I know you guys are patriotic and all, but suppose Russia and China decided that Obama's treatment of the unemployed was unreasonable. Would that justify an attack on the US? The whole point of the UN Security Council is to make a call on whether international intervention is justified. Going it alone makes the US an aggressor, and does make you more of a target, absolutely. The fact that the UN forces are strongly US-filled doesn't change the fact that internationally sanctioned action is safer in the long-term for the US.
I go back to my previous point about the use of the chemical weapons. There is not sufficient evidence to prove beyond reasonable doubt that it was the Assad regime's doing. You talk about lives being meaningful, even in large quantities. Have you considered the number of innocent people who would die in an intervention strike? Syrian military forces who have done nothing wrong other than being born in Syria and joining a career in the military? Researchers at the chemical weapons facilities? Random civilian casualties from misguided attacks? Is it fair to put their lives at stake on the back of inconclusive evidence?
Edit: As for feeling offended, I'm sorry you feel that way, and I'll happily concede that anyone else who has been / volunteered to be deployed can stand up for that position. I fail to see an apology from you for all the personal attacks on Snake's character, however.(##RESPBREAK##)8##DELIM##Squishalot##DELIM##
Post by
Gone
And you know what? There are millions of people out there who feel the same way. It's unreasonable to tear someone a new one for being completely normal.
First of all, I don't think that's normal. And even if the feeling is normal, that doesn't mean one should unapologetically defend that position, and what's worse, say that other people should avoid taking action based on that position. By his own admission he would have had the US stay out of WW2 had he been alive at the time.
You're coming from a country that is perhaps the most paranoid about security in the Western world. Your government has essentially created an environment where people are being assured that they should be scared.
I have never experienced anything like that. There's a big difference between a society that popularizes survivalism and disaster preparedness, and assuming that terrorists are going to come bomb the suburbs.
Look, I know you guys are patriotic and all, but suppose Russia and China decided that Obama's treatment of the unemployed was unreasonable. Would that justify an attack on the US? The whole point of the UN Security Council is to make a call on whether international intervention is justified.
Several issues with this:
1) There's a big difference in murdering civilians with chemical weapons and fining the unemployed for not having health insurance.
2) The chemical weapons ban was supported almost unanimously by the UN to begin with. The US here would simply be enforcing a rule already established by the United Nations.
3) It's because of Russia that the UN hasn't already taken action in regards to Syria. There's only so much they can do when one of the permanent seats is bootstrapping the rest.
You talk about lives being meaningful, even in large quantities. Have you considered the number of innocent people who would die in an intervention strike? Syrian military forces who have done nothing wrong other than being born in Syria and joining a career in the military? Researchers at the chemical weapons facilities? Random civilian casualties from misguided attacks? Is it fair to put their lives at stake on the back of inconclusive evidence?
And all of these are arguments I can respect more than "it might affect me, therefor we shouldn't get involved."
As for feeling offended, I'm sorry you feel that way, and I'll happily concede that anyone else who has been / volunteered to be deployed can stand up for that position. I fail to see an apology from you for all the personal attacks on Snake's character, however.
Serving in the military isn't the only thing that can give one moral advantage over somebody they consider to be selfish or a coward. And I won't even pretend to apologize until he takes back every post he made along the lines of:
As long as I'm alive and have a good life, I don't care who dies as long as their nobody close to me.
Post by
Squishalot
I have never experienced anything like that. There's a big difference between a society that popularizes survivalism and disaster preparedness, and assuming that terrorists are going to come bomb the suburbs.
Have you not flown on a plane in the last dozen years? You've not been interrogated by border officials when visiting or leaving the country for work / holiday.
Several issues with this:
1) There's a big difference in murdering civilians with chemical weapons and fining the unemployed for not having health insurance.
2) The chemical weapons ban was supported almost unanimously by the UN to begin with. The US here would simply be enforcing a rule already established by the United Nations.
3) It's because of Russia that the UN hasn't already taken action in regards to Syria. There's only so much they can do when one of the permanent seats is bootstrapping the rest.
Again - beyond reasonable doubt. Burden of proof is on the US, not Syria. Having chemical weapons is not the issue. The use of chemical weapons
by the Syrian regime
has not been proven beyond reasonable doubt.
What definition of 'bootstrapping' are you using there, by the way? None that I've ever heard of, anyway.
Serving in the military isn't the only thing that can give one moral advantage over somebody they consider to be selfish or a coward. And I won't even pretend to apologize until he takes back every post he made along the lines of:
As long as I'm alive and have a good life, I don't care who dies as long as their nobody close to me.
No. The issue is not about his personal view point, or even about you calling him selfish. It's this here:
"There's a child in the water, but I won't save it, nor should anybody else, on the slight off chance that I might need medical attention but the emergency workers are wasting their efforts on the child."
Unless you somehow find that offensive now and are happy to retract it, you've got no real position to be offended at anything I've said. It's equally / more offensive than anything I've implied.
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