Progress in Iraq!
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http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE4AA3VP20081111
"Baghdad bridge of death becomes bridge of hope"QUOTEBAGHDAD (Reuters) - Sunnis and Shi'ites made an emotional reach across the sectarian divide on Tuesday, reopening a Baghdad bridge between the two communities closed since a 2005 stampede, the deadliest incident of the war.
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It had been closed since 2005 when rumors of a suicide bombing panicked thousands of Shi'ites crossing the bridge for a pilgrimage to the Kadhimiya shrine. About one thousand people died in that stampede, clogging the river below with corpses.
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"When the faces met, the lips smiled, hands shook, bodies hugged, the tears flowed out of joy. This is the Iraqi citizen," said Sheikh Ahmed al-Samaraie, head of Iraq's Sunni Endowment, which runs Sunni religious offices and mosques in Iraq.
A banner across the bridge read: "The bridge of love and reconciliation between the people of Adhamiya and Kadhimiya."
Officials said the event was a sign that the sectarian hatred that fueled years of violence in Iraq is ebbing away. The number of Iraqi civilians and U.S. troops killed last month was the lowest monthly toll since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
"This day is a remarkable day, a day of a great Iraq. The day of meeting, love, brotherhood, affinity ... The day we proved to the whole world that we are one nation," Sayyid Salih al-Haidari, Samaraie's Shi'ite counterpart said in a speech. Delegations accompanying the two officials then went to pray together at a nearby mosque.
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Sheikh Ihsan al-Tamimi, whose three sons and a nephew had been kidnapped and killed, had come to bury the hatchet.
"I am here today to show that an Iraqi can forgive a brother Iraqi, even if there is blood between them," he said.
I never knew about the stampede which sounds devestating, but I am glad Iraqis are making progress toward reconciliation between Sunni and Shiite communities. -
so the fragile gains exemplified by the story have a chance to reverse course? Seems like working toward a democratic Iraq is a good investment for our future (can be a stable country in the Middle East providing oil, can separate church and state to make Islam less susceptible to radicalism, can influence other countries in the region to follow its example, can be at peace with other democracies [notion of the democratic zone of peace], can show our willingness to follow-through on helping those who step up on our behalf [Iraqi translators, Iraqis that buy into their national government under threats of death due to American influence]) v. not following through on making a democracy in Iraq being a bad investment as we might have to go in again later at an increased cost to secure the world's oil supply.
p.s. Don't hate the messenger of truth! ;x -
QUOTE (Evestay @ Nov 11 2008, 06:55 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Seems like working toward a democratic Iraq is a good investment for our future (can be a stable country in the Middle East providing oil, can separate church and state to make Islam less susceptible to radicalism, can influence other countries in the region to follow its example, can be at peace with other democracies [notion of the democratic zone of peace], can show our willingness to follow-through on helping those who step up on our behalf [Iraqi translators, Iraqis that buy into their national government under threats of death due to American influence]) v. not following through on making a democracy in Iraq being a bad investment as we might have to go in again later at an increased cost to secure the world's oil supply.
p.s. Don't hate the messenger of truth! ;x
Do you even live on this planet? Iraq is selling oil all right... to China. Democracy has done a terrible job keeping church and state separate here, and it's one of our democratic tenants. And it's not a necessarily democratic ideal. Iraq being democratic isn't going to make anybody like us more. The notion that democracies won't fight each other because their democracies is kind of naive. We destroyed their country... rebuilding isn't so much a sign of good-will as it is a way to not make more enemies... and these people are smart enough to see that.
Iraq produces a whopping 2.6% of the worlds oil. Iraq is therefore not necessary in the effort to "secure the world's oil supply". Which is a foolish sentiment in and of itself on a number of ways. First off, you don't mean "the world's oil supply", you mean ours. And ours comes from Saudi Arabia, which is where the 9/11 hijackers actually came from.
I am glad to hear there's progress being made over there though. But seriously, we need to start leaving that shithole right away.
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QUOTE (ANunes @ Nov 11 2008, 08:52 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Do you even live on this planet? Iraq is selling oil all right... to China. Any selling of oil in the world is taken into account by the world oil market that determines the prices for everyone. Democracy has done a terrible job keeping church and state separate here, and it's one of our democratic tenants. I simply don't agree with this- maybe only France has done a better job of separating church and state than us. Being guided by moral principles of your religion and legislating in such a way IS NOT the same as only living by the laws your religion gives you (ie sharia law). And it's not a necessarily democratic ideal. The Reformation directly led to Democracy in the Western World. It delegitimized Kings, it made the law of man more important, it meant people could live under the rule of law that everyone agreed on irregardless of religious beliefs because being spiritually saved was not tied to the progress of your nation following God's orders, etc etc. Iraq being democratic isn't going to make anybody like us more. It'll make Iraq like us more, it'll make anybody who makes use of Iraq operating under capitalist ideas to make money like us more for giving them opportunity. The notion that democracies won't fight each other because their democracies is kind of naive. No, it is a very well outlined theory by political scientists all over. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_peace_theory, "since such a very great many wars have been fought since democracies first arose, we might expect some proportionately large number of wars to have occurred between democracies; however the historical record reveals this number to be either at or near zero, depending on interpretation[10], with the finding that no wars at all have taken place between well-established liberal democracies being common[11]. One review (Ray 1998) found that, in probabilistic terms, the correlation between democracy and peace is statistically significant. In broader terms, Jack Levy has famously characterized the strength of this correlation as being "as close as anything we have to an empirical law in international relations" (Levy 1988)." In addition, the writer/semi-economist Thomas Freidman (author of book Freakonomics) wrote an academic article proposing the theory that no two countries with McDonalds have ever fought a war with each other. That fits into the democratic zone of peace idea. We destroyed their country... or gave it back to them rebuilding isn't so much a sign of good-will as it is a way to not make more enemies... agreed! and to reassure our friends that we will be there for them and these people are smart enough to see that. I hope they appreciate our troops sacrifices.
Iraq produces a whopping 2.6% of the worlds oil. Iraq is therefore not necessary in the effort to "secure the world's oil supply". I could look up that 2.6% number (edit its correct) but I will say that a country ravaged by war needs time to build up its oil infrastructure again. Also Iraq has the world's third largest proven oil reserves behind Saudi Arabi and Iran. Knowing future oil supply is secure definitely affects speculation in world markets. Which is a foolish sentiment in and of itself on a number of ways. First off, you don't mean "the world's oil supply", you mean ours. And ours comes from Saudi Arabia, which is where the 9/11 hijackers actually came from. Actually ours doesn't mostly come from Saudi Arabia (%s of imports- 19% Canada, 10% Mexico, Saudi Arabia 10%, 9% Venezuela, 9% Nigeria, 5% Iraq). I will say that the income Saudi Arabia is generating off of oil is greater due to our huge demand that translates into a higher world market price. And yeah Saudi Arabia is a pain in the ass. Wahhabism is just one of the radical strains of Islam that needs to get delegitimized when Islam goes through its own Reformation, which better happen.
I am glad to hear there's progress being made over there though. But seriously, we need to start leaving that shithole right away.
But yeah I don't even live on this planet because my ideas are so off base. =\
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All I have to say is, I appreciate seeing some good news every now and then. God knows not enough of it gets reported. This war is defeating us emotionally and psychologically as much, if not more then, it is in physical tolls.
I had hoped this thread wouldn't turn like every other thread posted regarding the war so far. Oh well. -
By selling oil to China I mean, signed a 3.5 billion dollar deal for China to develop oil fields in their country. Basically, Iraq stuck it's middle finger up at us, then asked us if we'd enjoy it if it were lodged firmly in our buttocks.
As for church&state... I think you just told me that it's okay for the line between church and state to be thin if it's Christianity, but when it's not, you have a problem with it. And the history of democratic reform has nothing more to do with modern democracy than the history of medieval art has to do with modern cubism.
Democracy is not some magical form of government that makes people happy. It does not work for everybody and the sooner you and the rest of the crusaders like you realize it the sooner we can get on with doing important things like paying back China so they stop sending us toys full of lead. As a matter of fact, based on your own assertion, democracy fuels a democratic crusade. Democracies feel the compulsion to turn other countries into democracies by any means necessary. That they don't fight amongst themselves much is no justification, and is more than likely unrelated to the governmental style so much as the manners in which democracy has spread prior to being artificially planted places. Countries with similar ideals and movements and history becoming democracies seems as likely an explanation for the phenomenon as any.QUOTEThomas Freidman (author of book Freakonomics) wrote an academic article proposing the theory that no two countries with McDonalds have ever fought a war with each other. That fits into the democratic zone of peace idea.
No it doesn't. This is the same logic that leads you to think that the stone paper weight on your desk is keeping tigers away. It is both foolish and dangerous.
You seem to believe that we have the right to go anywhere in the world, do anything we want, and destroy whatever is necessary so long as at the end we have a nice democratic friend. I happen to believe this is a dogshit approach to foreign policy, and history has a tendency to agree with me.
I hope they appreciate our troops sacrifices too, but that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. There is a HUGE galaxy of difference between our troops actions and our foreign policy strategy.
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QUOTE (ANunes @ Nov 12 2008, 05:08 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>By selling oil to China I mean, signed a 3.5 billion dollar deal for China to develop oil fields in their country. Basically, Iraq stuck it's middle finger up at us, then asked us if we'd enjoy it if it were lodged firmly in our buttocks.
As for church&state... I think you just told me that it's okay for the line between church and state to be thin if it's Christianity, but when it's not, you have a problem with it. And the history of democratic reform has nothing more to do with modern democracy than the history of medieval art has to do with modern cubism.
Democracy is not some magical form of government that makes people happy. It does not work for everybody and the sooner you and the rest of the crusaders like you realize it the sooner we can get on with doing important things like paying back China so they stop sending us toys full of lead. As a matter of fact, based on your own assertion, democracy fuels a democratic crusade. Democracies feel the compulsion to turn other countries into democracies by any means necessary. That they don't fight amongst themselves much is no justification, and is more than likely unrelated to the governmental style so much as the manners in which democracy has spread prior to being artificially planted places. Countries with similar ideals and movements and history becoming democracies seems as likely an explanation for the phenomenon as any.
No it doesn't. This is the same logic that leads you to think that the stone paper weight on your desk is keeping tigers away. It is both foolish and dangerous.
You seem to believe that we have the right to go anywhere in the world, do anything we want, and destroy whatever is necessary so long as at the end we have a nice democratic friend. I happen to believe this is a dogshit approach to foreign policy, and history has a tendency to agree with me.
I hope they appreciate our troops sacrifices too, but that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. There is a HUGE galaxy of difference between our troops actions and our foreign policy strategy.
http://weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printe...mp;R=13CD82CB12
"No Oil for Blood
Thanks to three American senators, China will be pumping Iraqi oil."QUOTEWhy, after all the assistance we've given to Iraq over the past five years, was the first major Iraqi oil deal signed with China and not with an American or even a western company? The answer is, in part, because three Democratic senators intervened in Iraqi domestic politics earlier this year to prevent Iraq from signing short-term agreements with Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total, Chevron, and BP.
The Iraqi government was poised to sign no-bid contracts with those firms this summer to help make immediate and needed improvements in Iraq's oil infrastructure. The result would have been significant foreign investment in Iraq, an expansion of Iraqi government revenues, and an increase in the global supply of oil. One would have thought that leading Democratic senators who claim to be interested in finding other sources of funding to replace American dollars in Iraq, in helping Iraq spend its own money on its own people, and in lowering the price of gasoline for American citizens, would have been all for it. Instead, Senators Chuck Schumer, John Kerry, and Claire McCaskill wrote a letter to Secretary of State Rice asking her "to persuade the GOI [Government of Iraq] to refrain from signing contracts with multinational oil companies until a hydrocarbon law is in effect in Iraq." The Bush administration wisely refused to do so, but the resulting media hooraw in Iraq led to the cancellation of the contracts, and helps to explain why Iraq is doing oil deals instead with China.
Senators Schumer, McCaskill, and Kerry claimed to be acting from the purest of motives: "It is our fear that this action by the Iraqi government could further deepen political tensions in Iraq and put our service members in even great danger." For that reason, presumably, Schumer went so far as to ask the senior vice president of Exxon "if his company would agree to wait until the GOI produced a fair, equitable, and transparent hydrocarbon revenue sharing law before it signed any long-term agreement with the GOI." Exxon naturally refused, but Schumer managed to get the deal killed anyway. But the ostensible premise of the senators' objections was false--Iraq may not have a hydrocarbons law, but the central government has been sharing oil revenues equitably and there is no reason at all to imagine that signing the deals would have generated increased violence (and this was certainly not the view of American civilian and military officials on the ground in Iraq at the time). It is certain that killing the deals has delayed the maturation of Iraq's oil industry without producing the desired hydrocarbons legislation.
Nor is it entirely clear what the senators' motivations were. Their release (available along with their letter to Secretary Rice at the New York Observer quoted Senator McCaskill as follows: "'It's bad enough that we have no-bid contracts being awarded for work in Iraq. It's bad enough that the big oil companies continue to receive government handouts while they post record breaking profits. But now the most profitable companies in the universe--America's biggest oil companies--stand to reap the rewards of this no-bid contract on top of it all,' McCaskill said. 'It doesn't take a rocket scientist to connect these dots--big oil is running Washington and now they're running Baghdad. There is no reason under the sun not to halt these agreements until we get revenue sharing in place,' McCaskill said." So was this about what's best for Iraq and American interests there or about nailing "big oil" in an election year?
Before you say how right they were that big oil getting no bid contracts in Iraq is proof this is a war for oil consider that the Iraqi govt actually ended up giving the contracts to that Chinese company even though Bush and big oil wanted the contracts for themselves. The Iraqis got to make their own decision. They were initially going to pick American big oil companies for the no bid contract because they had been providing free advice to the Iraqi oil dept for 2 years and they had the current technology and capability to get the oil industry up and running quickly (http://patdollard.com/2008/06/4-western-oil-companies-in-final-stages-of-signing-deals-in-iraq/).
Can't anybody back me up on the separation of church and state thing? Back in the day Kings got to rule countries because they were picked by God. Thus, there was no separation of church and state in these Christian countries since the Kings were ruling on behalf of God. Cue Reformation. Your personal salvation is not tied to what your country does. Cue American and French Revolutions. You can live freely and practice religion as you see fit. Cue nationalism triumphing over religion in 19th century (think of all the nation states created in Europe according to ethnicity (Germany, Italy) even though they had similar religions to those around them) and triumphing over communism in 20th century (poor workers fought for their countries instead of uniting against the bourgeois). No need for state religions. So yes, I cannot think of any predominately Christian countries that currently let religious laws dictate how political life will be led. You either have separation of church and state or you don't. Show me how it can be fuzzy. Will there be a point at which freedom to practice other religions will be limited? If the US was 99% Christian, would we be willing to limit 1% of our population from following other religions? In Islam, sharia law is supposed to be how to govern the state. It says other religions can build no new places of worship. It says converting from Islam to another religion is punishable by death. It says non-Muslims must pay an extra tax (jizra) for their own protection since they arent trusted and are barred from serving in the army. These things very definitely intrude on peoples' ability to practice their religion freely. Do Christian nations do anything remotely close to that? What, we put up Christmas decorations in public and don't put up decorations for the other religions? That sure intrudes on their ability to practice their religion freely...
Yes, I think everybody in this world can live under democracy. You don't? Why not, they have different cultural backgrounds? Because they have different cultures they should be forever doomed to live under religious figures, dictators, warlords?
And if I thought the US could do whatever the fuck we wanted to mold the world to our liking I would be one demonic bastard. -
me: Thomas Freidman (author of book Freakonomics) wrote an academic article proposing the theory that no two countries with McDonalds have ever fought a war with each other. That fits into the democratic zone of peace idea.
you: No it doesn't. This is the same logic that leads you to think that the stone paper weight on your desk is keeping tigers away. It is both foolish and dangerous.
me: His theory was that having a McDonalds was a good representation of countries that had a high level of economic interdependence with the world. Being integrated into the world market places constraints on economic and political actions of a country. Your citizens don't want to lose their newfound wealth and access to incredibly cool goods and they will punish the politicians if they fk with it by going to war and cutting off access to wealth and goods. Even if the country isnt a democracy, this punishment of an unpopular decision is semi-democratic. This fits into the democratic peace theory that says citizens are reluctant to support wars- especially when they are with nations they have a lot of ties to and when severing those ties would disrupt their quality of life. Please stop automatically telling me I'm an idiot! -
Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Even if we accept the theory as fact, there is no benefit until all nations are democratic. Therefore a democratic nations only concerns are with non-democratic nations. Therefore all democratic nations should wage pre-emptive war on non-democratic nations to make them democratic and then there will be no war. This is the logical conclusion of the theory, and it's why I fundamentally reject it as either a sound theory or a good justification of nation building. Waging war for peace is ignorant.
I don't think any form of government is inherently incompatible with any group. I do however think that democracy is incompatible with nation building. By telling them they will be a democracy we aren't exactly letting them be democratic, now are we? The RIGHT way for a nation to become democratic is to do it on their own, and maybe ask for help.
Now. Because kings were all god-appointed, and the people hated their kings, and the people overthrew their kings, they therefore made it a point to insist on a number of provisions to their government that were intended to prevent those shenanigans from happening again. Note that it was the people who formed the democracies decision, and that those people lived in the nation that was becoming democratic. This is not what is going on now.
And I've never cared what the war in Iraq is about. I am of the same mind as Court on the matter, with some pragmatism thrown in the mix. I think we should never have gone, and that we should start leaving right away to put some pressure on the Iraqis by letting them know we can't be there holding their hand forever. It wouldn't matter if we were killing Iraqis to bring back Elvis, Lennon and Hendrix, I still understand it's a tremendous waste of money and life. You brought up that Iraq was important to secure the worlds oil supply. I said they produce a whopping 2%, and that right now China's making all the cash from it. The means by which that occurred are irrelevant to my argument, though they are duly noted and well researched.
I don't mean to come off as talking down to you, but for a guy (guy right?) who I've seen being very cynical, you seem to have a really rosy take on a war that the vast majority of the world has recognized as a boondongle from start to present, this inconsistency confuses me.
Actually after reading some more about fallacies of logic (a past-time of mine) it seems that you are committing an extra special case of post hoc ergo propter hoc called a joint effect fallacy. This diagnosis relies on me committing fallacies of my own, but I still believe it to be the case. -
QUOTE (ANunes @ Nov 12 2008, 09:08 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Even if we accept the theory as fact, there is no benefit until all nations are democratic. Therefore a democratic nations only concerns are with non-democratic nations. Therefore all democratic nations should wage pre-emptive war on non-democratic nations to make them democratic and then there will be no war. This is the logical conclusion of the theory, and it's why I fundamentally reject it as either a sound theory or a good justification of nation building. Waging war for peace is ignorant.
I don't think any form of government is inherently incompatible with any group. I do however think that democracy is incompatible with nation building. By telling them they will be a democracy we aren't exactly letting them be democratic, now are we? The RIGHT way for a nation to become democratic is to do it on their own, and maybe ask for help.
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I don't mean to come off as talking down to you, but for a guy (guy right?) who I've seen being very cynical, you seem to have a really rosy take on a war that the vast majority of the world has recognized as a boondongle from start to present, this inconsistency confuses me.
I literally read that phrase "post hoc ergo propter hoc" for the first time yesterday in my law book =). You can use it to prove negligence in certain instances such as when a stored tire underneath the car in front of you falls out, bounces on the road, crashes through your windshield and injures you. It can be assumed that without negligence on the part of the driver in front of you, such a thing would not have occurred. (the tire is normally chained to the spot and held in place by its own weight). He must be able to prove that some intervening force (ie maybe a bump in the road) was the more probable cause of the accident to avoid being held liable/negligent. Basically, strong correlations do have meaning unless there are good reasons not to ascribe meaning to them.
The theory doesn't go on to promote preemptive war, and I don't even think its the logical conclusion of the theory. Mature democracies give their people good quality of life and give them freedom to pursue their goals. This is supposed to be attractive to people stuck in nondemocratic nations. Slowly, those people will demand democracy and the democratic zone of peace will grow to include them. So I think the conclusion is that democracy can spread without intervention.
I agree that the right way to become a democracy is through self-help. But that doesn't mean its the only way (ie your idea of them asking for help), and so it doesn't mean that our adventure in Iraq won't succeed.
And yes I 100% agree the war was bungled. Presenting a false reason to invade (wmds) to make it more palatable to the American people was totally wrong. I would have been okay if Bush had outlined intentions that had actual reasoning behind them such as to liberate Iraqis and spread freedom to the Middle East. That probably wouldn't have garnered support, but I would be okay with not invading Iraq because the reasoning wasn't agreed to by Americans. Next, we had a very successful military invasion, props for that. However, we didn't have enough troops and plans in place to secure the whole country at once and to keep law and order in place (such as no looting!). The dismantling of the Iraqi armed forces was the absolute biggest mistake. It made Iraqis lose their jobs and have nothing to do and made them susceptible to falling into the sunni insurgency. It also forced us to rebuild the army from scratch = cost us more money and especially cost us precious time. Then we slogged along hoping things would get better by maintaining the status quo. It took us WAY too long to reverse strategy. Good things that happened = Iraqis liberated, Iraqi government set up by the Iraqi people through voting on the constitution and voting on their representatives, some areas prospered (Kurdistan), respect for the American soldier in the Arab world skyrocketed (no longer the paper tiger that OBL said we were), etc. Now that we changed strategy, good things are happening ALL over the country.
Despite the misrepresentations by Bush and the failures in running the war, I never wanted to come home immediately. Instead, I wanted us to follow a strategy that could lead to success since success could do so much good. Saying Bush sucks so we need to come home helps nothing. Saying Bush sucks but his mistakes can be remedied can solve something. If you personally could have come up with a strategy for success back when things were shitty, why wouldnt you advocate for Bush to follow that strategy? Instead people said Bush sucks and can't do anything right (even if he would follow your strategy) so we should come home since all is for naught.
**edit: saying Bush sucks and there is no path to victory and we should never be engaged in such wars is a cogent argument for why we should come home. i just dont think saying bush sucks so we should come is fair and some people (no one here) thought that.**
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