In 2004, the US military burned many people alive.

[redgreenandblue]

Last edited Tue Feb 3, 2015, 02:29 PM - Edit history (2)

US used white phosphorus in Iraq -
US troops used white phosphorus as a weapon in last year's offensive in the Iraqi city of Falluja, the US has said.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4440664.stm

ISIS is a horrible group, but the USA doesn't have a high horse to sit on.

"For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' and behold, the log is in your own eye?…"

Matthew 7:3

[LanternWaste]

1. Did anyone say that condemnation of the one denies condemnation of the other?

Did anyone say that condemnation of the one denies condemnation of the other?

[redgreenandblue]

4. You will find many people condemning the one but not the other.

[LanternWaste]

6. You will find that not all condemnations are within your own hearing range...

You will find that not all condemnations are within your own hearing range...

[msanthrope]

8. Since you joined in 2012, how, precisely, do you know what posters here had to say in 2004? nt

[redgreenandblue]

13. Did I cite DU in particular?

No, I did not.

[msanthrope]

16. I'd back down, too. Consider deleting. nt

[redgreenandblue]

18. What the hell are you talking about?

I did not refer to DU at all in the OP.

[stevenleser]

33. Combine msanthrope's #16 with Dreamer Tatum's #31. nt

[sabrina 1]

61. Why would you suggest deleting facts? It is well known that Cheney/Bush used WP in Fallujah.

I remember the devastating photos of the children's bodies. I remember the outrage, worldwide, including here in the US.

What I don't remember is anyone ever being held accountable, so far.

I also know for a fact, that there are those in this country, who condemn 'the one but not the other'. You could start with the Corporate Media.

[SidDithers]

23. Yup...

Sometimes they forget themselves.

Sid

[msanthrope]

27. Indeed. nt

[msanthrope]

5. Some people cannot morally multitask. nt

[Man from Pickens]

76. no but the relative volume

speaks volumes

[tridim]

2. BushCo and ISIS should both face severe consequences for their actions. nt

[msanthrope]

3. OFFS....are you actually trying to defend putting a human being in a cage, setting him alight, and

then posting the video?

[redgreenandblue]

7. OFFS ... are you actually trying to defend the use of white phosphorous?

[msanthrope]

11. Since you joined in 2012, how do you know what posters wrote in 2004-2005 about Fallujah?

Some of us can morally multitask, and be outraged about more than one thing at a time.

[redgreenandblue]

15. Then where is all the effort that is being directed at putting Bush et al. in prison?

I don't see it. They are still on free foot.

[msanthrope]

19. Yeah..let me know how your personal efforts are faring. nt

[DreamGypsy]

48. Here is some of what DU said about Fallujah and white phosphorus in February 2006...

...in an (archived) by G_j entitled Willy Peter (white phosphorus) (archived, so can't link to it; do site search to find it ).

2. So change the "definition" and get away with using illegal CWs.

Saddam can do that at his trial for "gassing the Kurds".

bush & Cabal;

IMPEACH

INDICT

IMPRISON

4. so let me see, only the USA is allowed to use WMD?but

and not be bombed and invaded over it? I get it, we're number one

5. I`d like someone in the cheerleader media

explain to me why our use of White Phosphorus is not as important a story as The Missing Bridegroom or Valentine Gifts Under $1,000.

The Pentagon can change definitions all it wants. Swapping around a group of words does nothing to diminish the horror of someone lying on the ground with his skin burned down to the bone. It`s a consistent Bush administration trick....do A and call it B.

6. this is just horrible

No, this is not about our national feelings of moral fortitude. This is about civilians and “enemies” alike having chemicals dropped on them like rain and their skin bubbling, melting, wasting away with no way to scrape off the pain of oxidizing phosphorus and no way to cauterize the slow, painful melting into the nervous system and bloodstream. No, for those getting “smoked out of their holes,” there is very little, if anything, psychological about Willy Peter.

7. spiraling down, down, down

death, torture, lies, war crimes

it will take a quantum change in leadership to even begin to change America's horrific, criminal image.

Democrats who stayed silent or supported the crimes will not do it.
Only a 180% change in course and attitude will work.

9. Change it...... interesting optimism..... did you ever think it may

be too late to change anything?? We are on a course now.... it takes miles to turn a tanker.... it's gonna take decades to undo what we have done.

BTW 2006 was well before I began me tenure on DU. Nice to look at history and see the names of some who are still fighting for truth and justice.

[sabrina 1]

62. Thanks, we all remember the use of WP in Fallujah, except for those who were on the wrong side of

history back then.

[JaneyVee]

9. Yes the USA does have a high horse to sit on.

George Bush and ilk don't.

[TheKentuckian]

64. Nonsense. Bush wasn't just some yahoo individual criminal but rather the President.

A President and his ilk that are not beyond our reach nor even under indictment. Their actions as government officials sanctioned and at most deemed "bad policy" and cheered on and even celebrated in significant quarters not just of the public but government officials at the highest levels.

How do you think you can individualize crimes perpetrated by people acting in official capacity with no accountability for the crimes.
You "look forward" you become an accomplice and a hypocrite therefore have no high horse.

You want to be able to hop up on soapboxes and tall equines? Stop covering, protecting, rationalizing, and excusing war criminals in our own house.

[KingCharlemagne]

83. The CIA tortured detainees to death. Are you sure about that 'high horse'? - nt

[roody]

84. The USA did it in Vietnam too. nt

[Ramses]

85. George Bush walks free because Obama refused to prosecute war criminals

The USA has been murdering people in many countries for decades, so unfortunately you have no point to make.

[DonViejo]

10. Thanks for posting this....

my husband and I will now tell our four sons that contrary to what we've taught them for the last 24 years; two wrongs do make a right!

[DonViejo]

14. BTW...

He Was Already Dead By Josh Marshall

Let's set aside the horrific nature of the killing of the Jordanian pilot in the video released today. But why did it happen? The Jordanian government was apparently quite willing to trade the imprisoned suicide bomber in exchange for their pilot. They only wanted a proof of life from ISIS. So did they not want a trade? Was the value of the public killing greater than the return of one of their own? Or was the whole thing a sham - and as the Jordanians feared - their pilot was already dead. According to Jordanian state TV it was latter. Jordanian state TV is saying the pilot was killed a month ago.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/he-was-already-dead

[redgreenandblue]

17. Where did I say that burning people was right?

Point to it, I don't see it.

[Ykcutnek]

12. ...

[stevenleser]

20. The answer to another group or country doing something wrong is not "US BAD" nt

[redgreenandblue]

21. Well, according to Christianity:

"For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' and behold, the log is in your own eye?…"

Matthew 7:3

[stevenleser]

22. Since I believe in separation of church and state, that is meaningless to me. nt

[SidDithers]

25. Yeah, that's relevant...

in a thread about religious extremists setting a prisoner on fire.



Sid

[leftynyc]

51. Well, that's all Glenn Greenwald

does. After this and Charlie Hebdo - it's the US's fault, not the terrorists.

[stevenleser]

53. Yep, and that's why he deserves no respect at all. nt

[SidDithers]

87. For some DUers, that's all they got...nt

Sid

[Dreamer Tatum]

24. So how many more people do you think ISIS is entitled to incinerate?

1? 10? 1000? 100000?

[redgreenandblue]

26. None. nt

[Dreamer Tatum]

28. All right, then which country on earth is entitled to not like what ISIS is doing?

Since the US clearly LOVES incinerating people, and has no room to talk, then which country does?

[redgreenandblue]

30. Actually, every country is entitled to that.

But at the same time they should be working towards putting Bush & Cheney behind bars. I don't see that happening anywhere. And our president says we should look forward, not behind.

[Dreamer Tatum]

31. You just dismantled your OP. Good on you. nt

[TheKentuckian]

65. Talk all you like but acting should start with the one in the mirror.

No country pigheadedly "looking forward" on its own atrocities has any basis for policing the same as it is by definition incapable of doing so even with the lowest hanging fruit within its reach.

[onenote]

72. So because the US locked up Japanese Americans during WWII

it had no basis for liberating concentration camps?

Or because the US treated Native Americans horrifically (and still treats them poorly), it has no basis for policing against anything bad done by anyone else?

[TheKentuckian]

94. Our basis for liberating death camps is wrapped up in the war effort to me.

We didn't just go liberating camps. Germany declared war and was allied with a nation that attacked us. It was not and cannot be conflated with policing anything.

We have no basis for policing the world at all regardless of how natives were treated, how we treat(ed) natives just makes such actions hypocritical and probably a phony cover for doing dirt for some fucker's profits.

[NuclearDem]

29. OFFS

[Peacetrain]

32. I have seen some awful ops in my time here

but this takes the cake..

Trying to condone the burning of a pilot..

I am physically ill..

[redgreenandblue]

34. Too bad you are unable to grasp that I am criticizing the lack of consequences for one action...

... rather than condoning another.

People see what they want to see I guess.

[Peacetrain]

37. Don't even begin to try that tactic with me

Just don't...you know you did.. and I sure as heck know what you did..

[redgreenandblue]

47. Congratulations to your mindreading skills then.

I know what I did and it was not to condone the burning of a person.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

42. If it were up to me (and I'm sure most DU residents) Bush and Cheney would face criminal proceedings

I joined this site in 2003 and almost everyone here was opposed to the Iraq war. I'm positive that most DUers are not hypocrites in condemning the tactics of ISIS and are consistent, having also strongly condemned what our troops did in Iraq.

[stevenleser]

35. Burning of country D's citizen by group A is OK because Country B did something bad to Country C.

[redgreenandblue]

36. Point to where I said that burning people is ok?

I didn't, as much as you wish that I did.

[stevenleser]

40. This OP is obfuscation aimed at doing just that. "Don't be mad at ISIS, be mad at the US!"

That is what your OP means, reading between the lines.

[redgreenandblue]

45. No, it doesn't.

It means that in light of present crimes the, to date unresolved, crimes of the past should not be forgotten.

ISIS is a horrible group.

[stevenleser]

46. Yes, it does, and I think you know that. nt

[redgreenandblue]

93. Maybe when viewed through the lens of American exceptionalism.

I for one have not "gotten over" Fallujah unlike some apparently.

[Bonx]

38. Ok. The USA doesn't have a high horse to sit on

Do you feel better now that you've told us this ?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

39. What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy? Gandhi

[redgreenandblue]

41. Thanks.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

44. ...

[whatchamacallit]

50. The liberals on this board will ignore that wisdom with impunity :/ n/t

[NCTraveler]

43. Hot damn.

Foolishness and a bible quote all in one op. Impressive.

[Act_of_Reparation]

49. I've never burned anyone alive.

So I guess I can comfortably criticize them both.

[elleng]

52. There really is no comparison AND we ALL know

that 2 wrongs don't make a right. We DO know that, don't we?

[whatchamacallit]

54. Yes, but while other's wrongs bring fire from the sky

ours go ever unpunished.

[Nye Bevan]

55. After the Oklahoma City bomb did you say "horrible, but look what they did to the Branch Davidians"?

Quite illuminating when someone's reaction to an atrocity is "yes, but someone else did something really bad on some other occasion".

[Snow Leopard]

56. but what if the WP

was used on ISIS type @ssholes? :^)

[TheKentuckian]

60. Then it would be a war crime.

[Snow Leopard]

70. don't think so

they were combatants

[TheKentuckian]

95. The Bush logic, huh? That's how you become a war criminal.

Invent a class and claim the rules don't apply to them or you.

Sick.

[Telcontar]

97. Combatants fight in wars

Their classification is defined by the G.C.

What the fuck are you talking about?

[One_Life_To_Give]

57. Was the use of Napalm on Okinawa bad?

We have burned lots of people alive. Usually we make a self justifying reason as to why our own use of something is moral. US Policy as of late has been that it's use on Combatants is acceptable and moral while use of White Phosphorous on Civilians is not. During Vietnam we were much less opposed to the use of Napalm. And going back to it's development in WW2 we found it very effective at clearing fortifications. But also useful in obliterating Dresden and Tokyo. Going back further you have the use of FireShips against the Spanish Armada, heated shot used in coastal fortifications and the use of Greek Fire in ancient times.

In my humble opinion it's conditionally justified when used against combatants in a manner where alternatives are not very effective.

[Maedhros]

63. It may have been justified, but it is still bad. [n/t]

[outside]

58. "In 2004, the US military burned many people alive".

I can't find anything in your link that said anybody was harmed by white phosphorus used in Iraqi let alone burned alive. I do know the flamethrowers and incendiary bombs were used in WW2. The incendiary bombs were dropped on the German city of Dresden killing 25,000 civilians.

[polly7]

103. Look here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6193508

[FSogol]

59. Unrec.

Disgusting Op.

[BainsBane]

66. Telling people not to "judge" a horrendous atrocity

Is itself a judgment, a judgment that says such behavior is acceptable. All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing, but doing nothing is not sufficient for you. You seek to legitimate it. That the US did something atrocious doesn't excuse something else a decade later. Your argument is unconscionable, shows complete and absolute contempt for human rights and human life. I find repulsive such apologies for the furthest right-wing, murderous, authoritarian groups on the planet.

By your analysis, we shouldn't judge Hitler because the allied powers in WWI committed atrocities. One can always look back and find past grievances, but they are only justifications for the morally bankrupt, for those who look to excuse and perpetuate murder and violence.

I am ashamed to see your post on this board and to see you pass yourself off as a leftist. Your argument is vile.

[whatchamacallit]

67. And you're doing what

about US crimes?

[BainsBane]

69. If you want to create a thread asking people to mobilize to force prosecution for war crimes

to talk about protests for the war, or something like that, I'm all in. Using that to excuse burning people alive and beheading is repugnant. This OP is about ISIS, which the original poster wants to argue is justified. So by all means, you people go volunteer to be their next victims since you think they are so justified.

What exactly is it you are doing other than trying to explain away murders? Because I have seen fuck all, and in fact every time I mention taking action about something, anything, people have a million excuses for why they shouldn't have to lift a finger.

[whatchamacallit]

71. I'm not excusing anything

I wish I could say that kind of dirty bullshit framing was beneath you. Pointing out the hypocrisy of the morally outraged is not an endorsement of crimes. But you knew that.

[BainsBane]

74. Hypocrisy of people mourning for the death of their loved ones?

They should realized they are hypocrites for caring? There is nothing hypocritical about any outrage to an atrocity. When you come on a day someone is killed and say, oh well, the US killed people ten years ago, that most certainly is an excuse. It is possible to be outraged by ISIS and the Iraq War. You choose to call outrage to the former "hypocrisy." I would say the opposite. I would say that claiming to oppose human rights violations by one country or party and not another is what is hypocritical, as it using one to try to explain away the other.

And predictably, not a word about what you are doing.

[whatchamacallit]

75. Such silly slop...

"Hypocrisy of people mourning for the death of their loved ones?"

I commented on the hypocrisy (selective outrage) of saber rattlers on this site. Unless you are related to the Jordanian victim, this yet another stupid conflation.

"When you come on a day someone is killed and say, oh well, the US killed people ten years ago, that most certainly is an excuse."

Right, we are doing nothing today that would engender hate for the US, it was all "ten years ago".

"And predictably, not a word about what you are doing."

What are you doing, beside foaming at the mouth on an internet forum?

[BainsBane]

77. Which saber rattlers are those?

The ones who actually think burning someone alive is bad? I frankly don't understand how anyone can call concern for human life "hypocrisy." I find that chilling.

You are the one who demanded to know what I was doing.
I went to dozens of protests in the lead up to the Iraq War and contacted my representatives to oppose the invasion. I joined the Democratic Party to oppose George Bush and his party. Before I had been a pretty squishy socialist, vacillating between the Dems and third party candidates. I led GOTV efforts in four precincts in 2004 to try to get us out of Iraq. I did similar things in 2008, despite having no car or job at the time, and again four years later. I've done a lot for an out of shape middle-aged woman with a herniated and four degenerative discs. I've registered hundreds of voters and canvassed long distances on foot, from enormous lots spaced long ways apart in god-forsaken suburbs to miles of urban blocks. I've done what I can to make a difference. But that wasn't what this thread was about. It was about how anyone who gives a shit about ISIS killing people are hypocrites because the only crimes that matter are committed by the US.

Meanwhile, I have a suspicion I'm going to see your name among the apologists for the invasion in the Ukraine.

[whatchamacallit]

78. All over the map

Of course your not-all-that-impressive activist resume has nothing to do with the question of what you're doing about ISIS, or whatever you were calling people out on earlier, but thanks for trotting it out.
Do you honestly believe that the only purpose one would have to point out US moral hypocrisy is to absolve and endorse ISIS? I don't think you're that dim. I think you know making that leap is an effective way to get people to shut up.

Oh, and thanks for closing with a preemptive smear about an opinion I've never expressed.

[BainsBane]

82. You ask a question

Then behave rudely when it's answered. Actually you didn't ask. You invoked personal assumptions as a substitution for an argument, when the fact is you have none. There is no moral hypocrisy in condemning murder. The hypocrisy is in failing to condemn it, in scoffing at outrage over a current set of murders because some others happened years earlier. Either one opposes violence and human rights abuses or one does not. You have left little doubt where you stand on the issue.

[whatchamacallit]

89. Lol

All I did was turn your weird question about what I'm doing about ISIS back on you, and was treated to a laundry list of unrelated bs. Anyway, because you are of the opinion that comparatively mentioning similar US war crimes makes one an "ISIS Lover", or some such shit, I will state unequivocally that I condem ISIS and their violent acts. I hope they get double what they give. That goes for our military psychos too.

[redgreenandblue]

79. The choice to interpret my OP as an "excuse" is your own.

"Your argument is unconscionable, shows complete and absolute contempt for human rights and human life."

As is the argument that Fallujah doesn't matter anymore because "a decade has passed". This is literally the same war.

[BainsBane]

80. If it's not an excuse, why post it?

What is your purpose? According to you, no one should speak out against horrific murders because of past atrocities. You think we should remain silent, not judge when other human beings are burned alive and beheaded. What purpose can that possibly serve other than to excuse?

Why should Europeans have spoken out against the Rwandan genocide when Germany staged it's own earlier in the century? The only possibly road that argument leads to is more human rights atrocities. To fail to speak out is to be complicit. To tell others they have no right to speak out is even worse.

[redgreenandblue]

90. To remind people of crimes that went unpunished.

"Excuses" for the use of white phosphorus in Iraq are being made in this very thread. And just last month America (and some on DU) celebrated "Chris Kyle appreciation week". That tells me that this is a discussion that needs to be had. If current events in Iraq, which unquestionably are connected to events of the past decade in a very direct way, can serve as a pretext for having that discussion then so be it. I for one have not "gotten over" Fallujah (unlike some people in this thread apparently) and intend to remind the world of the event whenever I see fit, until the day on which there are actual consequences (which will likely be never).

[Matrosov]

68. Intent does not matter

Many won't understand the link between these events and will argue that it was never the intent of the US military to murder civilians in a cruel way.

Intent does not matter.

Back in World War 2, the US military firebombed cities in Germany and Japan and let tens of thousands of civilians burn to death. The justification was these civilian casualties would break the will of the axis powers and would bring about an end to the war more quickly.

You can argue that intent was somehow more noble, but it does not matter. The US military knew exactly its actions would results in tens of thousands dying a cruel death and it followed through with those actions anyway.

In all cases, the victims died unnecessary and cruel deaths that were completely preventable.

Besides, the civilian casualties in Germany didn't help the allies in any way and the war there didn't end until the Soviet Union fought its way into Berlin. The civilian casualties in Japan didn't help the allies either and it took even more deliberate killing of innocents in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end the war there.

[onenote]

73. So does that mean the US didn't have "high horse"

to sit on when it prosecuted Nazi war criminals?

And is it okay if we just abhor, criticize and condemn the murderous shitholes that are ISIS without climbing on a high horse. Because I'm fully okay with calling out those rat bastards while sitting down.

[MillennialDem]

81. I hate to say this because of the Chris Kyle bullshit

I do support our troops and the troops of anyone in a democracy as well as those who were forced to join an army against their will... but the Chris Kyle crap of treating like special snowflakes and always heroes and never bad...

Nevertheless, let's not forget BushCo had many US troops (and Iraqis) burned alive in tanks. That's one of the most common ways of dying for a tank crew.

[NuclearDem]

86. So in the space of a week, we've had

"the Japanese deserved to lose their journalists because they rewrite their history books" and "US used white phosphorous, so ignore the Jordanian being lit on fucking fire and killed."

Sometimes, I just think fuck this place.

[Yorktown]

88. Apples and oranges: not same degree of guilt.

No idea if white phosphorus was used in Iraq (which would be wrong), but even if it has been, I think I can safely assume that US troops used it against a concentration of enemy forces. Even if we assume some civilians were nearby, the intent was to fight enemies, and the debate would be about the morality of weapon A (phosphorus) vs weapon B (cluster bombs? Napalm?)

While burning alive a prisoner ishows the intent to kill a defenceless prisoner in one of the most painful ways imaginable.

I would suggest that if you are bringing specks and logs in eyes to the debate, the log isn't the phosphorus.

[outside]

101. Well said.

I can't find anything in the OP link that said anybody was harmed by white phosphorus used in Iraqi let alone burned alive. The OP should have used the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas as the comparison.

[Vattel]

91. Obviously you are not excusing what ISIS did.

So don't worry about those accusing you of that. But you don't really make your case unless you can show that the white phosphorus that was used actually did burn many people alive and that those people were innocent bystanders. I believe that what the US did in Fallujah was horrific and did involve knowingly killing lots of innocent bystanders. So I agree with you that the US government, like ISIS, has innocent blood on its hands.

[malaise]

92. But but but

that was for 'freedumb and democracy'.
Oh wait no - that was the illegal invasion and occupation.
We kill, we torture, we demean and when others react we call them barbarians.

Physician heal thyself!!!

Great post - and I'm an atheist.

[TheKentuckian]

96. If you are raising hell about "having to do something about ISIS" and you are or are tolerant of

"Looking forward" then you are a warmongering hypocrite AT BEST.

I also think that even the few seriously consistent folks on this are still being dense. I don't get how it is possible to not see that our "doing something" not only is ineffective but has a fairly overwhelming tendency to exacerbate even the seemingly worst situations and creating new definitions of fucked up for all involved except the few that always seem to get rich as entropy spreads.

The only argument outside of emotional appeals seems to be "this time it will be different" which is a pretty damn familiar refrain through the decades and the basis for why it will supposedly be different is always the same...because President X is not President Z and this time it really is as being presented and for real for real this time it won't morph into mission creep and creating bigger problems than we set out to "solve".

Never because such and such strategies will be employed or because anything particular has been learned about the region or we won't be doing A, B, or C. Not this and that technology corrects for previous issues. Nor is the house ever scrubbed and the gremlins removed from the works.

There is no plan but to further destabilize region by playing whack a mole in the sand forever, ever increasing foot print and resources wasted along with animosity and blow back to generate a self perpetuating clusterfuck to justify blowing the tax receipts on pocket padding while making our own country become a dump of an occupied territory it's self as the nation falls into disrepair, mean-spirited dismantling of services and support, and civil liberties are gutted in the name of "security" reducing the fortunate to be downgraded into consumers and the rest serfs or worse.

If you want to "do something" help pack up our shit, get the fuck out of there, stop the flow of weapons and money to random crazies in a vain search for "moderate allies", quit the oil acquisition scams and the pissing contests with Russia, get real for real with Turkey up to and including pushing for them to be thrown out of NATO all the way to "us or them" (withdrawing from the pact if need be), and inform the regional powers they will need to get serious about cleaning up their own yards or ISIS will likely have their heads on pikes.

When wealth, power, posterity, life, and limb are truly on the line and they know great father across the sea won't be "doing something" they local powers will not only shut this bullshit down but will do so quickly and decisively.
This threat is of extraordinary low capacity in modern terms, essentially marauders.

If by some chance the capacity is too great then we can discuss involvement in a NATO effort.

[polly7]

104. +1,000,000! nt.

[Telcontar]

98. If you dont understand the difference between combat and an execution

You don't have a.basis for making a moral argument

[Arugula Latte]

100. But we invaded Iraq on lies and mass murdered tens of thousands of innocents

for absofuckinglutely no reason other than U.S. corporate profit. Had Iraq sent its soldiers to take over the U.S., okay, I get that we would have had to have some massive military operation that would have perhaps justified the killings of many Iraqi civilians.

This was "combat" just because we decided it was combat and that we were allowed to murder and bomb the shit out of brown people because there was big $$ to be made for the CEOs who bought the Bush presidency.

So, we don't exactly have a "moral" argument about Iraq, now do we.

[Telcontar]

102. Case in point

[Blue_Tires]

99. You go back far enough in history, *nobody* has a high horse to sit on...

So what's your point??