LIB-ertarian Johnson has Lib Meltdown

[quiller]

I'm not a pacifist.  I'm a non-interventionist.  I believe that violence is morally defensible in self-defense only.  Yes, I'd be willing to defend America against an invasion from a foreign military.  But our military is not being used to defend America.  It's being used to provoke conflicts in the Middle East.  The War in Iraq was an un-justified act of aggression by our military against a sovereign nation that posed no threat to our national security.

If I joined the military when I was 18 or 19, I would have certainly been deployed to Iraq.  I chose not to support this horrific invasion perpetrated by our military.  You should be commending me for refusing to support evil, not chastising me because I didn't go and kill a bunch of Iraqis that never threatened me.

Lying gutless puke, you didn't even TRY to serve your country. You served only yourself. I do not commend liars and cowards and you are both. Filth like you assume people will buy your lie that EVERY member of the military

(1) goes to Iraq
(2) gets killed by islamoanimals
(3) kills a bunch of islamoanimals

I can see you now lining up to serve as the American Vichy. You're too cowardly to fight.

[Solar]

The USSR fell because they had an economic system that was non-viable from the start.  They also fell because they foolishly put troops into Afghanistan and spread their resources too thin.  Austrian school economists predicted that Socialist Central Planning was always doomed to failure because without price signals in capital goods in a market, horrible inefficiencies result.  Eventual economic collapse is inevitable with Socialist nations. 

I can support Reagan's public denouncements of Communism and the USSR in particular.  It is an appropriate role for the President to use the bully pulpit to denounce evil. 

But Reagan also showed good judgment when he quickly "cut and ran" from Lebanon.

http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/02/07/when-reagan-cut-and-run/

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/larison/reagans-withdrawal-from-lebanon-and-hard-liners-misreading-of-history/


In this instance, Reagan showed better judgment than all of the neo-conservatives who followed him.  We could have recognized the complete failure of the Iraq War in 2005 or 2006 and promptly withdrew our military from the region.  Instead, the hard-liners instituted the so-called "surge" and we kept our troops there for another six or seven years.

If we understood the internal contradictions of the communist economic program, we never had to view them as a military threat to take over the world.  Their system was bound to collapse sooner or later.  They had nuclear weapons of course, so caution was warranted.  What wasn't warranted was the hysteria and arms buildup that our military industrial complex lobbied for throughout the Cold War.

This is exactly what I expected, regurgitating leftist rewritten history.
Son, I and most of this forum voted for Reagan, we remember the USSR, and the fact that it was always on the brink,  Reagan knew the formula to bring it to an end via geoplitical means and forcing it to spend and spread way beyond it's means.
You can read all the revisionist bull shit you want, but don't try and pull that crap on people that witnessed it firsthand, it's why you keep getting your ass spanked.

[supsalemgr]

This is exactly what I expected, regurgitating leftist rewritten history.
Son, I and most of this forum voted for Reagan, we remember the USSR, and the fact that it was always on the brink,  Reagan knew the formula to bring it to an end via geoplitical means and forcing it to spend and spread way beyond it's means.
You can read all the revisionist bull shit you want, but don't try and pull that crap on people that witnessed it firsthand, it's why you keep getting your ass spanked.

Not to mention the world knew Reagan meant business. His bombing of Khadafy's tent sent a message to the world, especially the USSR. We didn't know what good stuff Reagan purchased for the military until 1991 and the Gulf War. He showed why the US was respected, unlike today.

[Solar]

Not to mention the world knew Reagan meant business. His bombing of Khadafy's tent sent a message to the world, especially the USSR. We didn't know what good stuff Reagan purchased for the military until 1991 and the Gulf War. He showed why the US was respected, unlike today.

Friend of mine saw the classified video of the missile that hit the house.
He said it flew just above roof tops, and as it approached the house, dropped down to street level, aimed directly at the door, and you could hear the conversation from command center saying "Knock knock mother fucker" Booom, and all goes gray.

[Billy's bayonet]

Reagan knew how to deal with terrorists too. I particularly liked the instance where US navy jets were dispatched to intercept an airliner leaving Egypt with murdering Palestinian terrorists aboard who had hijacked the Achille Lauro, murdered US citizen Leon Klinghoffer who was wheelchair bound so the scum threw him off the ship.

They forced the airliner down at a US airbase in Italy and the Italian's went completely nuts, sent some idiot Carbinierri chief to stop them who threatened the special forces soldiers surrounding the aircraft with arrest...they told them....quote....go fk yourselves....which a former colleague of mine heard personally.

That and blowing up Khadaffy's house sent a message to the world they remembered for quite some time.

[supsalemgr]

Reagan knew how to deal with terrorists too. I particularly liked the instance where US navy jets were dispatched to intercept an airliner leaving Egypt with murdering Palestinian terrorists aboard who had hijacked the Achille Lauro, murdered US citizen Leon Klinghoffer who was wheelchair bound so the scum threw him off the ship.

They forced the airliner down at a US airbase in Italy and the Italian's went completely nuts, sent some idiot Carbinierri chief to stop them who threatened the special forces soldiers surrounding the aircraft with arrest...they told them....quote....go fk yourselves....which a former colleague of mine heard personally.

That and blowing up Khadaffy's house sent a message to the world they remembered for quite some time.

Point made. Strength is all these thugs respect.

[quiller]

Point made. Strength is all these thugs respect.

Instead, another foreign official openly mocks the limpwristed faggot providing cover for the most corrupt Secretary of State in American history.

[tac]

This thread is an excellent example why no one but a brain dead liberal should vote for the libertarian party. 

[jrodefeld]

It has been my contention that terrorist attacks against the United States are motivated primarily and overwhelmingly by resentment and anger over our military intervention, occupation and bombings of Middle Eastern nations.

Your contention is that this has nothing to do with it and the real motivation has to do with the religious teachings of Islam.

There is literally no evidence to support your contention while there is overwhelming evidence to support my claims.  And now, we have additional evidence to bolster my case.  I am asking that you read this carefully and respond to the information I am presenting you.  You've rejected Robert Pape's studies on the matter, but perhaps you'll consider the FBI's own internal reports.  The FBI commissioned internal studies into the causes of homegrown terrorism.  And what they found contradicts nearly everything that the media and politicians have claimed.

The Intercept recently reported it was given exclusive access to an internal FBI research study which surveyed FBI agents across the country, asking them their thoughts on homegrown terrorists. All of the agents surveyed were involved with over 200 open and closed cases of homegrown terrorism. Here's a brief summary of the findings from the study titled, "Homegrown Violent Extremists: Survey Confirms Key Assessments, Reveals New Insights about Radicalization."

1.  Anger over U.S. military operations overseas was the most often cited reason for individuals getting involved in cases of "homegrown" terrorism.
2.  Radicalization of homegrown terrorists follow no perceptible pattern.
3.  Radical terrorist believe the U.S. military commits atrocities in Muslim countries, and so homegrown terrorists justify their desires to retaliate.
4.  Online relationships with terrorists overseas (like Anwar Al-Awlaki) is a contributing factor driving extremism.
5.  Exposure to English-language militant propaganda is also cited as key factor driving extremism.
6.  Displeasure with U.S. military action was by far the most common factor in homegrown extremism found in 18 percent of the surveys taken.

The U.S. being perceived to be at war against Islam and other factors associated with discrimination were also factors.
All of the aforementioned factors may be why, as the study notes, 10 of the 16 terrorist attacks (achieved or attempted), committed between 2009 and 2012, targeted military personnel or facilities.

Read more at http://thefreethoughtproject.com/u-s-military-atrocities-homegrown-terrorism/#RpAp2XkKJdyHQ6Zz.99

Here is the original article at The Intercept that originally reported on these internal FBI reports:

https://theintercept.com/2016/10/11/us-military-operations-are-biggest-motivation-for-homegrown-terrorists-fbi-study-finds/



Ron Paul and his co-host Daniel McAdams covered the topic on their YouTube program yesterday:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDpXHAQoHtk


What is the mental block that is preventing you from acknowledging facts that are presented to you?  I've produced overwhelming evidence for the motivations for terrorist attacks against the United States and you've provided nothing to defend your position.

If there is an empirical issue that is being debated, we need to have recourse to studies which can ascertain which position is correct.  All the studies that have been done support my position on this debate and not yours.  There is no ideological bias in these studies either.  Experts who are conservative, liberal and libertarian come to the exact same conclusions.

Could you finally respond substantively to the evidence provided here? 

[quiller]

Troll, you are spewing trash to a blank brick wall.

[Billy's bayonet]

Your contention is that this has nothing to do with it and the real motivation has to do with the religious teachings of Islam.

There is literally no evidence to support your contention while there is overwhelming evidence to support my claims.

What is the mental block that is preventing you from acknowledging facts that are presented to you?  I've produced overwhelming evidence for the motivations for terrorist attacks against the United States and you've provided nothing to defend your position.

Could you finally respond substantively to the evidence provided here?

It isn't so much the 'evidence' you produce but the solution your and your sources cite that I contest. DISENGAGING FROM THE MIDDLE AND NOT RESPONDING TO TERRORIST ATTACKS WILL NOT STOP THE TERRORIST ATTACKS AND THE AGENDA OF RADICAL ISLAM

You still fail to see the facts the human side of the equasion. These people have been fighting "the west" since the time of the crusaders, since the time the Mongol hordes almost wiped out the Persian empire to a man. Since some British cartographer drew lines on a map a hundred years ago.

To them it has been insult after insult, road block after road block, "the west", the non Muslim world, specifically America is the only thing that stands in the way of a Muslim world .

They want REVENGE for insults and slights and transgression from 2,000 years back.  They will want it for another 2,000 years for what the US has done in the past 75 years.  Kill one Muslim and we have to kill infidels for 2,000 years, no other option. When you understand that attitude when you TRULY KNOW YOUR ENEMY AS YOU KNOW YOURSELF you may finally see the light. Until then you are thinking like a logical, Western Christian based societal raised Western man.

[Solar]

It has been my contention that terrorist attacks against the United States are motivated primarily and overwhelmingly by resentment and anger over our military intervention, occupation and bombings of Middle Eastern nations.

Your contention is that this has nothing to do with it and the real motivation has to do with the religious teachings of Islam.

There is literally no evidence to support your contention while there is overwhelming evidence to support my claims.  And now, we have additional evidence to bolster my case.  I am asking that you read this carefully and respond to the information I am presenting you.  You've rejected Robert Pape's studies on the matter, but perhaps you'll consider the FBI's own internal reports.  The FBI commissioned internal studies into the causes of homegrown terrorism.  And what they found contradicts nearly everything that the media and politicians have claimed.

Read more at http://thefreethoughtproject.com/u-s-military-atrocities-homegrown-terrorism/#RpAp2XkKJdyHQ6Zz.99

Here is the original article at The Intercept that originally reported on these internal FBI reports:

https://theintercept.com/2016/10/11/us-military-operations-are-biggest-motivation-for-homegrown-terrorists-fbi-study-finds/



Ron Paul and his co-host Daniel McAdams covered the topic on their YouTube program yesterday:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDpXHAQoHtk


What is the mental block that is preventing you from acknowledging facts that are presented to you?  I've produced overwhelming evidence for the motivations for terrorist attacks against the United States and you've provided nothing to defend your position.

If there is an empirical issue that is being debated, we need to have recourse to studies which can ascertain which position is correct.  All the studies that have been done support my position on this debate and not yours.  There is no ideological bias in these studies either.  Experts who are conservative, liberal and libertarian come to the exact same conclusions.

Could you finally respond substantively to the evidence provided here?

Walks, give this moron one final timeout, he was told to quit derailing threads.
This is your last chance Rodentfeeler, do it again and you're gone without explanation!

[jrodefeld]

It isn't so much the 'evidence' you produce but the solution your and your sources cite that I contest. DISENGAGING FROM THE MIDDLE AND NOT RESPONDING TO TERRORIST ATTACKS WILL NOT STOP THE TERRORIST ATTACKS AND THE AGENDA OF RADICAL ISLAM

You still fail to see the facts the human side of the equasion. These people have been fighting "the west" since the time of the crusaders, since the time the Mongol hordes almost wiped out the Persian empire to a man. Since some British cartographer drew lines on a map a hundred years ago.

To them it has been insult after insult, road block after road block, "the west", the non Muslim world, specifically America is the only thing that stands in the way of a Muslim world .

They want REVENGE for insults and slights and transgression from 2,000 years back.  They will want it for another 2,000 years for what the US has done in the past 75 years.  Kill one Muslim and we have to kill infidels for 2,000 years, no other option. When you understand that attitude when you TRULY KNOW YOUR ENEMY AS YOU KNOW YOURSELF you may finally see the light. Until then you are thinking like a logical, Western Christian based societal raised Western man.

This makes no sense.  What you are failing to recognize is that a Muslim could justifiably claim that the "west" and Christianity has been waging a largely unprovoked war against THEM over the past century and they feel themselves to be defending their people against Western Crusaders.

You say they want revenge for insults and slights from 2,000 years back.  No they don't.  I cannot make this any more clear.  You simply glossed over the information I presented to you.  We don't have the speculate about the motives of Muslim terrorists, we have tons of empirical studies that have assessed what the motivating factors are.  No terrorists decide to blow themselves up or shoot up a night club because of something that happened 2,000 years ago.  They are attacking largely for a few reasons:

1.  Revenge for US foreign policy.  If you had actually read anything I wrote, you'd notice that roughly 75% of homegrown terrorist attacks against the US have been perpetrated against military targets.  Having your family instantly killed in a drone strike or having your brother unjustly incarcerated and tortured at Guantanamo has the effect of creating resentment and anger.

2.  The feeling that Muslims are being persecuted by Christian crusaders.  They feel justifiably that there is growing bigotry against peaceful Muslims that has been fostered and promoted by Neo-Con think tanks, Likud Party officials, and influential members of the Military Industrial Complex.  They feel backed into a corner and a sense of obligation to defend their people from persecution.



Even putting all this aside, Muslims in the middle east are very, very weak.  Even with all the blowback that our military presence incites, Americans are more likely to be hit by lightning twice than to be killed by a terrorist attack.

If we are concerned with our national security, we have a realistically assess threats.  A bunch of misfits in third world nations have no possible ability to confront us militarily.  There will be no "worldwide caliphate".  Even stipulating that some of these terrorists are motivated for purely reasons of religious dogma, they have no possible chance of achieving their goals.  Are we to engage militarily in the Middle East in perpetuity, losing trillions of dollars and thousands of lives because some people have delusions about overthrowing Western governments and defeating Christianity?

The March, 2011, Harper's Index noted:

Number of American civilians who died worldwide in terrorist attacks last year: 8 — Minimum number who died after being struck by lightning: 29.

If you are worried that ISIS might strike the United States and want to prevent the loss of American lives, consider urging Congress to invest in diabetes and Alzheimer's research.

Terrorism is effective in doing what its name says: inspiring profound fear. But despite unremitting coverage of the Paris attacks, an objective examination of the facts shows that terrorism is an insignificant danger to the vast majority of people in the West.

You, your family members, your friends, and your community are all significantly more at risk from a host of threats that we usually ignore than from terrorism. For instance, while the Paris attacks left some 130 people dead, roughly three times that number of French citizens died on that same day from cancer.

In the United States, an individual's likelihood of being hurt or killed by a terrorist (whether an Islamist radical or some other variety) is negligible.

Consider, for instance, that since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Americans have been no more likely to die at the hands of terrorists than being crushed to death by unstable televisions and furniture.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-terrorism-statistics-every-american-needs-to-hear/5382818


Do you understand that there are opportunity costs to pouring all these resources into waging war in the Middle East?  If this money was freely available in the economy instead of being squandered by our government, we might be curing cancer or feeding the poor or any number of things that would save a lot more lives.

So even if you were right about radical Islam and the motivations for terrorist attacks (and you emphatically aren't), it would STILL be a catastrophic waste of lives and resources to fight these wars in the Middle East. 

Terrorism is a tactic that is used by weak people against a much stronger opponent.  Overwhelmingly, the motivations for terrorist attacks have to do with resentment over foreign occupation.  The goal of a terrorist attack is to provoke fear and an illogical and excessive response.

By bleeding ourselves dry financially in the Middle East over the past decade and a half, we've been doing Bin Laden's work for him.  He could never take us down by launching terrorist attacks.  But we can destroy our own economy through our own foolishness.

In fact, Osama bin Laden stated this goal quite clearly in 2004:

The Arabic-language network Al-Jazeera released a full transcript Monday of the most recent videotape from Osama bin Laden in which the head of al Qaeda said his group's goal is to force America into bankruptcy.

Al-Jazeera aired portions of the videotape Friday but released the full transcript of the entire tape on its Web site Monday.

"We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah," bin Laden said in the transcript.

He said the mujahedeen fighters did the same thing to the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s, "using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers."

"We, alongside the mujahedeen, bled Russia for 10 years until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat," bin Laden said.

He also said al Qaeda has found it "easy for us to provoke and bait this administration."

"All that we have to do is to send two mujahedeen to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al Qaeda, in order to make generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic and political losses without their achieving anything of note other than some benefits for their private corporations," bin Laden said.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/11/01/binladen.tape/

[Solar]

This makes no sense.  What you are failing to recognize is that a Muslim could justifiably claim that the "west" and Christianity has been waging a largely unprovoked war against THEM over the past century and they feel themselves to be defending their people against Western Crusaders.

You say they want revenge for insults and slights from 2,000 years back.  No they don't.  I cannot make this any more clear.  You simply glossed over the information I presented to you.  We don't have the speculate about the motives of Muslim terrorists, we have tons of empirical studies that have assessed what the motivating factors are.  No terrorists decide to blow themselves up or shoot up a night club because of something that happened 2,000 years ago.  They are attacking largely for a few reasons:

1.  Revenge for US foreign policy.  If you had actually read anything I wrote, you'd notice that roughly 75% of homegrown terrorist attacks against the US have been perpetrated against military targets.  Having your family instantly killed in a drone strike or having your brother unjustly incarcerated and tortured at Guantanamo has the effect of creating resentment and anger.

2.  The feeling that Muslims are being persecuted by Christian crusaders.  They feel justifiably that there is growing bigotry against peaceful Muslims that has been fostered and promoted by Neo-Con think tanks, Likud Party officials, and influential members of the Military Industrial Complex.  They feel backed into a corner and a sense of obligation to defend their people from persecution.



Even putting all this aside, Muslims in the middle east are very, very weak.  Even with all the blowback that our military presence incites, Americans are more likely to be hit by lightning twice than to be killed by a terrorist attack.

If we are concerned with our national security, we have a realistically assess threats.  A bunch of misfits in third world nations have no possible ability to confront us militarily.  There will be no "worldwide caliphate".  Even stipulating that some of these terrorists are motivated for purely reasons of religious dogma, they have no possible chance of achieving their goals.  Are we to engage militarily in the Middle East in perpetuity, losing trillions of dollars and thousands of lives because some people have delusions about overthrowing Western governments and defeating Christianity?

The March, 2011, Harper's Index noted:

Number of American civilians who died worldwide in terrorist attacks last year: 8 — Minimum number who died after being struck by lightning: 29.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-terrorism-statistics-every-american-needs-to-hear/5382818


Do you understand that there are opportunity costs to pouring all these resources into waging war in the Middle East?  If this money was freely available in the economy instead of being squandered by our government, we might be curing cancer or feeding the poor or any number of things that would save a lot more lives.

So even if you were right about radical Islam and the motivations for terrorist attacks (and you emphatically aren't), it would STILL be a catastrophic waste of lives and resources to fight these wars in the Middle East. 

Terrorism is a tactic that is used by weak people against a much stronger opponent.  Overwhelmingly, the motivations for terrorist attacks have to do with resentment over foreign occupation.  The goal of a terrorist attack is to provoke fear and an illogical and excessive response.

By bleeding ourselves dry financially in the Middle East over the past decade and a half, we've been doing Bin Laden's work for him.  He could never take us down by launching terrorist attacks.  But we can destroy our own economy through our own foolishness.

In fact, Osama bin Laden stated this goal quite clearly in 2004:

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/11/01/binladen.tape/

You stupid Fuck! I just gave you a final warning and you continue on derailing, so consider that your last post.
You're out of here!

[tac]

Thank you.