MSNBC: Particle Beam Weapons Almost Ready for Battle

[forge]

american empire building?

Why in the world would we start in the middle east?

Think about it.

Canada and mexico and south america would be easier targets. Cuba woulda been our vacation spot by now.

I don't think so guys. Again, your perception of what is going is warped.

We didn't start this thing (we were attacked you know), but the philosophy of taking out rougue nations is their peril, not ours (as you can well see). Taliban, gone. Saddam, out. Al Qaeda, desperately trying to remain intact and losing every day.

Empire building? Let me just say that it is very much on our minds the dependence on oil that makes these regions (including Venezuela, btw) an achilles heel. Even Bush has stated that alternative fuel sources need to be created. There is too much money and influence floating around those regions that are ruled by fascists dictatorships.

You guys want to look for bad guys? You are looking in the wrong direction people.

Like I said, who wants to eliminate free speech? Who wants to eliminate the rights of women? who wants end religious tolerance? Who wants sharia law?

yep, you guessed it: radical islamists who use terrorist means to achieve their objectives.

This is also a war of ideas and right now, they are winning the smaller battles of ideas with people like yourselves because they have you convinced that their war is justified and the real enemy is the U.S.. That's too bad, IMO.

rob.

I don't post here much... but you're a fucking idiot

[forgie]

Just thought I'd ask folks here... how many of you are aware of our societies dependence on oil APART FROM as an energy source? Did you know that most chemical and all the plastics industries are completely reliant on oil? Without crude oil, there's no petrochemical industry. Using it in ridiculously innefficient ways as an energy source would seem a little bit short-sighted given the fact that EVERYTHING WE PRODUCE RELIES ON IT!

Hmmm so hands up who owns a SUV? (a Ute if you're in Australia)

By the way I thought I'd just open the floodgates and hijack this thread for all sorts of global political debate, since it hasn't proven to be constructive on it's current form. There's one dude who claims he wants a debate, but is so caught up in proving other peoples semantics to be incorrect that he's missing the fact that it was a subtle analogy which any History professor would understand. Your average Jo obviously doesn't. Subtle comparison does mean A = B... it means A is similar to B in X and Y ways. Which they are. If you want to learn, try and learn. Don't nitpick, because that means that you don't want to learn, you just want to prove people wrong, which makes debate pointless.

[forgie]

This is also a war of ideas and right now, they are winning the smaller battles of ideas with people like yourselves because they have you convinced that their war is justified and the real enemy is the U.S.. That's too bad, IMO.

rob.

I don't post here much... but you're a fucking idiot

Yeah, cutting back on the diatribe makes for a little more constructive debate.

[robtronik]

american empire building?

Why in the world would we start in the middle east?

Think about it.

Canada and mexico and south america would be easier targets. Cuba woulda been our vacation spot by now.

I don't think so guys. Again, your perception of what is going is warped.

We didn't start this thing (we were attacked you know), but the philosophy of taking out rougue nations is their peril, not ours (as you can well see). Taliban, gone. Saddam, out. Al Qaeda, desperately trying to remain intact and losing every day.

Empire building? Let me just say that it is very much on our minds the dependence on oil that makes these regions (including Venezuela, btw) an achilles heel. Even Bush has stated that alternative fuel sources need to be created. There is too much money and influence floating around those regions that are ruled by fascists dictatorships.

You guys want to look for bad guys? You are looking in the wrong direction people.

Like I said, who wants to eliminate free speech? Who wants to eliminate the rights of women? who wants end religious tolerance? Who wants sharia law?

yep, you guessed it: radical islamists who use terrorist means to achieve their objectives.

This is also a war of ideas and right now, they are winning the smaller battles of ideas with people like yourselves because they have you convinced that their war is justified and the real enemy is the U.S.. That's too bad, IMO.

rob.

I don't post here much... but you're a fucking idiot

Well, that's good. Apparently you don't have a knack for debate anyway.

BTW, appreciate the good word Mr. Phat Conductor. I think its important to way both sides of an issue. Many people are so dogmatic about the american administration that it borders on parody in my opinion.

But, hey - we are all artists born from the idea that free speech is ESSENTIAL to our artform. I don't see why that can't be applied to political arguments/debates as well. Some of you (er, Kompakt) should keep that in mind as you try to engage in the conversation. Last I checked, we were arguing on the merits of the ideas, not personal attacks (which is always the last bastion of those who don'really have a case to make)).

.02,

rob.

[nolus]

I'm begining to think that what we are seeing now is just the latest in the long sucession of conflicts between capitalism and anything that oposes it.

Having defeated fascism and communism in europe the next serious opposition to capitalism comes from islam. Islam and capitalism are about as fundamentally opposite as two things can be.

The current situation is just the begining of what could be the most terible war in history.

I'm fucked if I know the answer.

In my naive optimism I kind of hope that somehow ordinary people on both sides can be made to wake up, to see things rationally, think for themselves and look beyond the boundaries of thier own familly/job/home/religion/etc, act collectively to put a stop to the madness that there leaders are perpetrating in there names.

Then I remember that 60% of people believe in horoscopes, or look at the tv and see American Idol or Big Brother or some other such shite and I begin to think I can see where the islamists are coming from, change channel and there on the news are thousands of lunatics causing havoc because some cartoonist insulted their religion. change again, oh look Jerry Springer... (there should be an emoticon of someone being sick)

I could go on but I'm starting to make myself depressed, think I'll go and soak up some mindless entertainment for a while.....

[continuous]

This one looks like its about to hurl to me!

[Sharkcellar]

"Islam and capitalism are about as fundamentally opposite as two things can be."

Umm. I don't think that Muslims have a problem with making a buck. In fact, contributions of one's profits to the less fortunate is part of Islamic law.

The Middle East is a volatile place because of all the carving up the Europeans did after the fall of the Ottoman empire. People in that region have long memories, unlike us here in the states. Cultures around the world have plenty of reasons to despise the West, look at how screwed up Africa is. We here like to think that all of this stuff is new and that they're just bad sports or something. The Brits learned the price of maintaining Empire, and so will we. It's America's own fault for electing, twice, such a ridiculously unqualified ass as George W. Bush. These are dark days and it's gonna take a lot hard work to get us out of this shithole he's gotten us into.

[12micsn1]

The Third Riech wasn't defaeted, it just has a change of address.

Please send all letters of disapproval to:

The White House
c/o Third Riech
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Right. What a crock of crap that is. I can't begin to count the ways how ignorant that statement is. By making the White House a comparison to the third riech you do a disrespect to the severity of fascism and the holocaust's effect and how terrible it actually was. I won't comment on whether I should be offended as american because I don't really think it matters, but I HATE this kind of comparison. It's mentally lazy, doesn't hold factually, and is really meant to just incite. Its basically stupid.

No disprespect to you as a person, but you'd be better off finding some suitable totalitarian government to compare your worries against.

Hey, I have an idea - try Iran on for size.

rob.

I agree total left wing BS coming from another brainwashed crazy anti-American viewer who cant get it right even if they wanted to. Everything with these loons has to be about the so-called American Global New World Order or Imperialism but if they lived in this country called the United States an could follow the news they would be surprised how many Americans feel someone else outside this country has influential control over the media, government, stock market. education, jobs an a long list of others things that totally infuriate the average person of this country. The clueless minds of the left wing nuts dont have a clue about why a satelite like this would even come about but i will give you a clue. Its about defense from your enemies in which your enemies are always trying to gain the upper hand since the art of war began.

[DeadlyKungFu]

Why do political discussions turn people into assholes?


(that's not a comment on anyone inparticular)

[forgie]

Because politics = ideology, and everyone naturally believes that their ideology is superior to everyone elses. It's part of most peoples ideological make up. People feel important and righteous when they claim an opinion, no matter how short-sighted it is. People like feeling righteous. This is why there's so many righteous, ignorant fucks out there, it's because if you're like that, you feel good about yourself. The average Jo on the street knows jack shit about say, Quantum Mechanics. Most people will shut the hell up or ask for education if confronted with a situation where Quantum Mechanics. Politics is different though: it's flexible, and it's flexibility affects all of us. The problem arises here, where people who lack political intelligence, insight or education still feel that they have to have an opinion. Either they come up with an opinion on their own, or (more commonly) they will adopt whatever attitudes the media tells them to.

What happens next? You have a bunch of people with no idea what they're talking about who have political ideologies based on spin doctoring and untruths who have arguments with people who are actually interested in politics and study it and understand it.

I know that I for one am not about to go and have an argument with a Physicist about Quantum Mechanics. I'm not qualified to do so. I will, however, have an argument about politics with, well anyone who will be reasonable.


There's another problem, which is the use of forums. In a face-to-face conversation, people have a chance to respond to each point in turn and criticise it based on it's merit. On a forum, often a bunch of people will say some stupid shit, and someone will respond with 5 paragraphs of criticism. The person that was spinning shit, instead of thinking "hmm, they may have a point", they think "he's attacking my ideology, he's a stupid fuck, I'm smarter then him" and they find some small technically incorrect statement and use that as proof of the reasonable posters stupidity. Then the reasonable poster will criticise yet another point, but each time, the stupid poster isn't taking it on board, he's just finding new things to criticise. When people continually don't have to clarify individual points and can move on and attack other points, nothing constructive ever gets talked about. For these reasons, all it takes is one person to be ignorant and/or righteous, and the whole thread falls apart.

[forge]

Because politics = ideology, and everyone naturally believes that their ideology is superior to everyone elses. ................ For these reasons, all it takes is one person to be ignorant and/or righteous, and the whole thread falls apart.

well put

and it's not because your called forgie!

[forgie]

Haha thanks forge. How's the weather up there? We've had 30ºC here in Melbourne, and a few more days of 30ºC+...

There's well established rules for 'polite conversation', i.e. be reasonable, answer a persons direct questions, don't interrupt etc. Unfortunately, there's virtually nothing in the way of similar rules for online forums. Given how easy it is for a verbal political conversation to become abusive, it's no wonder that when such a clash of ideologies occurs in a "no holds barred" environment like a forum (and especially an un-moderated one such as this!), it's hard to hold a political thread together.

Personal abuse such as "left wing nuts" is just, well sad really. It's what ignorant people do in high school, they categorise people who know more then them as nerds, geeks, idiots, whatever. If you haven't grown up since leaving high school (and believe me, I know a few DJs, some of them are pretty fucking immature) then I'm sorry for you. In many countries outside America, we don't celebrate immaturity to the extent that you, seemingly, do.

[forge]

Haha thanks forge. How's the weather up there? We've had 30ºC here in Melbourne, and a few more days of 30ºC+...

There's well established rules for 'polite conversation', i.e. be reasonable, answer a persons direct questions, don't interrupt etc. Unfortunately, there's virtually nothing in the way of similar rules for online forums. Given how easy it is for a verbal political conversation to become abusive, it's no wonder that when such a clash of ideologies occurs in a "no holds barred" environment like a forum (and especially an un-moderated one such as this!), it's hard to hold a political thread together.

Personal abuse such as "left wing nuts" is just, well sad really. It's what ignorant people do in high school, they categorise people who know more then them as nerds, geeks, idiots, whatever. If you haven't grown up since leaving high school (and believe me, I know a few DJs, some of them are pretty fucking immature) then I'm sorry for you. In many countries outside America, we don't celebrate immaturity to the extent that you, seemingly, do.

it's been rainy actually, which up here is a really good thing!

so it's been nice and comfortable, not abusively hot.

yeah I agree, it's a personal pet hate of mine this recent trend of dismissing people as "liberal" or "left wing", it's unbelievably stupid and offensive.

And it amazes me that the "powers that be" and media seem to have done such a good job of polarising people - so it's actually satisfactory for some people to make an argument by dismissing anyone who doesnt agree with the current US administration that way.

"you're either with us or you're against us"

Only a Sith deals in absolutes!

[forgie]

"you're either with us or you're against us"

Only a Sith deals in absolutes!

It's interesting to note that many people don't realise that the large majority of movies about empires and their power are analogies to the real world... I wonder how many Star Wars fans actually realise that the whole story is about glorifying rebels against an oppressive, economically dominant empire. Just who do you think that empire was referring to in reality? It associates power and corruption with evil, and rebellion with freedom. Siths dealing in absolutes is reference to the fact that absolutes represent closed minds, which in turn leads to evil. The kind of people with the insight to see this are likely to have similar attitudes to begin with, (power corrupts, etc) needless to say that the sort of person who wouldn't pick up on this analogy may be lacking the insight required to understand politics....

[forgie]

And it amazes me that the "powers that be" and media seem to have done such a good job of polarising people - so it's actually satisfactory for some people to make an argument by dismissing anyone who doesnt agree with the current US administration that way.

It shouldn't amaze anyone that the media promotes simplifications and shallow attitudes. It is, after all, in their best interests to

a) keep people watching abbhorable quality news

and

b) keep people ignorant

All "that's ridiculous" calls aside, those two motives are what are in their best interests. If you really want me to explain WHY these two things are in the media conglomerates interests, then again, I'm not sure why you're taking part in this debate. If you actually want to discuss and learn (and help me learn ), that's fine, but if people are going to question and ridicule axioms that are blatantly obvious, then I don't see the point. I don't want to add this disclaimer to every post, but some people don't seem to get the message, so I figure that repeating it every post might help keep the thread civilised.