Hmmm.

Normally when you post an insane rant, I get baited into responding in kind.

I could respond to your assertions. Case in point the Niger yellowcake issue. But why bother? You're full of yourself.

This time, all I have to ask is: what the hell are you talking about? The only thing you missed this time around is how the "leftists" want to destroy your religion.

"There can be no reasonable dissent from the anti-war position. Anti-war is moral perfection, pro-war is moral depravity at all times. Given this attitude, the amount of invective the anti-war left will pour on anyone who disagrees is astounding."
Mark,
I think you hit the nail on the head. This is exactly what the American left identifies with in Islamic fundamentalism, extremism. They don't see black and white, and anyone who gets in their way or is ever wrong (notice the comment just posted) has made not just one error but all the errors ever made by the other side. They don't see shades of gray like that Saddam was bringng down sanctions to start his WMD programs again, or that he was building medium range missiles in violation of the UN resolutions. It's all about identification, which I find strange for all the grief they love giving Bush for saying you're either with us or against us, but it's the same thing. Violence in self defense is taken out of context. It's sad because it builds identity out of the negative, defining them by what their against rather than by what they love.

The liberal left believes that the war on terrorism is indeed pointless. They have always publicly stated and even implemented the policy that terrorism is a LAW ENFORCEMENT problem.

Well, that is the exact policy implemented in the '92 - '00 presidential administration....

....and look where it got us.

In those 8 years, terror groups have been able to build their ranks and financial networks. The "peace" negotiations (Isreal and Arafat, Hezbollah) were used to buy time to allow this to happen. Any aggressive action taken against these groups would threaten said "peace" talks.

AND most importantly, the terror attacks against our troops, Mogadishu, Khobar towers and the USS Cole, were unanswered, despite vows to "LEAVE NO STONE UNTURNED".

The anti-war groups are the terrorists' best propaganda weapon they have.

You've been pushing these straw-man constructs of Democrats for so long that you've completely lost touch with reality, Mark. Paranoid, vague, impervious to argument, and mean? Pot calling kettle black, I think.

Paranoid: "The MSM is out to get George Bush! Gays want to destroy marriage! There's an epidemic of flag burning! Orange Alert! Red Alert!" Does that sound familiar?

Vague: "We will stay the course. What's the course? Victory. How do we achieve it? By staying the course."

Impervious to argument: "Bad news? Its made up by the MSM!"

Mean and nasty: Ann Coulter. Rush Limbaugh. Bill O'Reilly. Michelle Malkin. Many of the posters at this very site.

Need I say more?

Great post, Mark, and this statement really, to use Morris' description, "hits the nail on the head":

Secondly, it is vague about both the ends it seeks, and the means it would use to attain its ends. Oh, to be sure, it tells us it wants peace - but it doesn't define what peace is. It also tells us that it would use negotiations and the good offices of our alienated allies, but it doesn't tell us just what negotiating position it would take, nor does it consider a set of circumstances in which negotiation is exhausted.

To the best of my knowledge, there has never been a case where two ideological adversaries abandoned a solution of military force, laid down their arms, negotiated a lasting peace; and everyone went home and lived happily ever after. Hopefully someday mankind will evolve to that point, but it hasn't happened yet, and as long as their are people like Kim Jong Il and Amadinejad around, it't not like to happen anytime soon. Winnowhead, if you or one of your crackpot Leftist buddies can describe such a scenario, I'd love to hear about it. If you can't, then, for all your meaningless rhetoric, you're just pissin' into the wind.

Violence in self defense is taken out of context. It's sad because it builds identity out of the negative, defining them by what their against rather than by what they love.

Profound statement, Morris. If you go back through the archives of this site, which I occasionally do, you'll find examples of this over and over again. I think it is the single greatest reason that the Left no longer controls either house of Congress. They can fool some of the people some of the time, but they can't fool enough of the people enough of the time. Does any conservative here really believe that people like winnowhead, axis, maf and CO give a rats rear end about our military casualties in Iraq? They hate the military. If they were in complete charge, they wouldn't have a military. So their supposed concern for the 2,500 dead and thousands wounded in Iraq continues to fall on deaf ears, because it's nothing more than hollow rhetoric, designed to convince as many people as possible that they "care". In less than 90 days I think we'll see their message fail to resonate yet again.

Is there any possibility of debating the actual issues without all the name-calling. I'm a liberal, and an advocate for peace. But that does not mean I support terrorists. Quite the opposite.

If violence could actually fix the problems an this planet, then everything would have been resolved thousands of years ago.

Is there any possibility of debating the actual issues without all the name-calling.

Since you have such a piss-poor grasp of the issues -- probably not. My deepest apologies if being called an "anti-war Leftist" and a "crackpot Leftist" hurts your feelings. Matt would ban me for saying how I actually feel about people like you.

I'm a liberal, and an advocate for peace.

Just exactly what does a Liberal peace advocate do? It seems as though Mark already nailed people like you when he said:

"Oh, to be sure, it tells us it wants peace - but it doesn't define what peace is."

So, PM, enlighten us. How would you achieve peace?

If violence could actually fix the problems on this planet, then everything would have been resolved thousands of years ago.

Actually, the same could be said for diplomacy. In the most recent cases of global conflict, whereby Nazi fascism and Japanese imperialism were utterly and soundly defeated militarily, "the problems have been solved". As I said in my previous comment, can you cite even one historical example of where peace was achieved through diplomacy? Actually, as I pointed out a couple months ago, there is ONE. Just Google "historic + negotiated + peace", and you'll see what I mean, heh.

Spook: "can you cite even one historical example of where peace was achieved through diplomacy?"

I don't know if you're just asking for examples following some kind of global or quasi-global conflict, but assuming any example will do here's a few I can think of just off the top of my head...

Angola (although that may be too recent to tell for sure, but things are definitely looking up whereas they were absolutely horrible for more than 30 years, with more than 1,000,000 people killed). Chile (they're doing very well after years and years of guerilla war). El Salvador. Nicaragua. South Africa. Algeria (they're actually trying to get the French back to vacation there). More historical examples would include Portugal and the Netherlands, both of which gained their independence through the Treaty of Westphalia that ended the 30 Years War (Holland, of course, has been overrun many times since by various sides because they're kind of in the way, but they have always returned more or less in the same configuration established in 1648; Portugal has been more furtunate). Croatia. Slovenia. Even the Korean armistice was successful in preventing further bloodshed for the last 60 years, and has been very good for the South (the North is a different story entirely). Interestingly though, South Korea is the entity most in favor of reaching some sort of peaceful accommodation with the north, even though they are the ones most imperiled.

I could probably rattle off just as many examples where peace WAS NOT achieved through diplomacy (I guess from an American perspective, Viet Nam would head the list there). But the point is that diplomacy does work sometimes. Each one of the instances I mentioned are examples where lots of people were getting killed yet neither side were successful in obliterating the other. They settled their differences peacefully, and in such a way that the peace lasted for a substantial time. Likewise, I could rattle off many examples where war, instigated to complete capitulation, didn't lead to long-lasting peace, as well as several examples where it did.

In short, both diplomacy and war sometimes work in achieving long-lasting peace, and both sometimes fail. Peace is not always the answer, and neither is war. It all depends upon the circumstances, the players, the agility of the negotiators, and sometimes sheer luck. To frame the debate into some kind of war/anti-war dichotomy is erroneous, IMHO. And I doubt whether most Republicans, and even most Democrats, hold such a simple view.

Rico, well done. I was hoping for a similar answer from PM, but I suspect he/she is either not a serious "peace advocate" or simply a drive-by "peace advocate".

Most of the examples you cite were internal conflicts, and most, as you note, were preceded by years of killing. I guess I was thinking more along the lines of larger conflicts or potential conflicts that were avoided or nipped in the bud by diplomacy. Someone once said that those who wage war are not good at making peace, and those who are good at making peace could never successfully prosecute a war. Clearly it takes both kinds.

I could probably rattle off just as many examples where peace WAS NOT achieved through diplomacy (I guess from an American perspective, Viet Nam would head the list there).

Many on the American Left would disagree with you on Viet Nam, but I'm sure the 2 or 3 million Vietnamese and Cambodians that were slaughtered in the aftermath wouldn't consider it a successful diplomatic solution.

Rico, well done. I was hoping for a similar answer from PM, but I suspect he/she is either not a serious "peace advocate" or simply a drive-by "peace advocate".

Most of the examples you cite were internal conflicts, and most, as you note, were preceded by years of killing. I guess I was thinking more along the lines of larger conflicts or potential conflicts that were avoided or nipped in the bud by diplomacy. Someone once said that those who wage war are not good at making peace, and those who are good at making peace could never successfully prosecute a war. Clearly it takes both kinds.

I could probably rattle off just as many examples where peace WAS NOT achieved through diplomacy (I guess from an American perspective, Viet Nam would head the list there).

Many on the American Left would disagree with you on Viet Nam, but I'm sure the 2 or 3 million Vietnamese and Cambodians that were slaughtered in the aftermath wouldn't consider it a successful diplomatic solution.

Oh, and Rico, as I am not a big fan of the Dutch, I got a chuckle out of this:

Holland, of course, has been overrun many times since by various sides because they're kind of in the way...

Spook: "Most of the examples you cite were internal conflicts, and most, as you note, were preceded by years of killing. I guess I was thinking more along the lines of larger conflicts or potential conflicts that were avoided or nipped in the bud by diplomacy."

I forgot to mention the Camp David accords between Israel, Egypt, and Jordan. You gotta give Jimma Cahtah credit for that. As complicated as things remain in the ME, things could be much worse if it weren't for that. Also, one wonders how different things might have been now if Rabin hadn't been assassinated, if Netanyahu hadn't ascended to power, and if the Clinton administration had leaned more heavily on Arafat. Alot of "ifs" there. At any rate, Camp David helped, and continues to help.

But back to your new "nipped in the bud" conditions... Let's see... Korea would still apply I think. As ugly as it was, it could have gotten really, seriously ugly without an amistice. South Africa could have gotten seriously ugly as well. That one was definitely nipped in the bud. Then there was the Berlin blockade. The Cuban missile crisis. Israel's invasion of the Suez back in 1956 (that one was arguably as close as the Middle East has yet come to provoking a nuclear confrontation). Greece and Turkey over Cyprus. That one was shaping up to be very ugly. India vs. Pakistan on several occasions (although that may be an instance of neither war nor diplomacy working). How about Bosnia? I suppose that's a "tweener".

Of course, the trouble with citing examples of situations which MAY have gotten out of hand if diplomacy didn't work is the fact that you never really know whether they would have if it didn't. Ireland? Scotland? Slovakia and the Czech Republic? Lithuania? Hong Kong? Taiwan? Singapore? Albania?

Have I convinced you yet?

All of those places had potential to be serious hot spots if cooler heads failed to prevail. But in some cases the "potential" is questionable. That's part of the issue, IMHO -- cooler heads early on can prevent situations from getting to the crisis stage. Cooler heads, through diplomacy, can also guide an impending crisis into a more manageable form. It's not diplomacy vs. war. To think in those terms is ridiculous. They are not polar opposites, but rather different weapons in the same quiver.

Have I convinced you yet?

Yeah, you did good.

They are not polar opposites, but rather different weapons in the same quiver.

That's a great point.

One last question -- do you see even the remote possibility of a permanent, negotiated peace between Israel and either Hezbollah or Hamas in the foreseeable future?

Have I convinced you yet?

Not me. I'm more difficult than RS, though. For example, were Israel and Egypt fighting when the "Camp David Accords" were signed? Seems to me they weren't. And how did the deal work out for Sadat?

That agreement did not end fighting. It prevented future fighting - sort of like a non-aggression pact. If I understood RS's original thrust it was related to stopping an ongoing conflict with diplomacy. Korea was like Viet Nam and doesn't qualify. A cease-fire is no peace.

....

If violence could actually fix the problems an this planet, then everything would have been resolved thousands of years ago.

Well, lib, if diplomacy could actually fix the problems, we would have never had to defeat Hitler and Hirohito in WWII. And Israel would not be fighter for her life right now.

So, lib, how do you solve the problem in the Middle East? War

Retired spook -

I guess not, huh?

I should have checked with you before stating my opinion. I just didn't realize you already know everything.

P.S. Nice try with the "hurt you feelings" bit.

Not me. I'm more difficult than RS,

Rev, are you being difficult again; and on a Friday afternoon, no less? Actually, I think Rico made a good effort, which is more than I can say for the Lib trolls at which the challenge was originally aimed. I actually had not thought about all the minor conflicts that have been ended by negotiations without one side totally obliterating the other. I do think, however that many, like the 30 years war were ended by diplomacy because the sides simply got tired fighting. And I do suspect that the GWOT will not be ended by diplomacy.

If violence could actually fix the problems an this planet, then everything would have been resolved thousands of years ago.

Well, lib, if diplomacy could actually fix the problems, we would have never had to defeat Hitler and Hirohito in WWII. And Israel would not be fighter for her life right now.

So, lib, how do you solve the problem in the Middle East? War

So, lib, how do you solve the problem in the Middle East? War

Didn't really expect to get an answer, did you, keefer?

Keefer -

You make valid points re: WWII. I'm not a pacifist, and I have no problem with us defending ourselves (and our allys then), or Israel defending itself from Hezbollah now. I also don't claim to have any answers. I just think rational discussion is better than continuing to snipe.

RS,
Thanks. I do wonder about your discussion with Rico. Almost all of the conflicts listed were in the last century and didn't involve religious teachings that a certain group of people were evil, should be hated, and deserve the Hell they'll be sent to as Allah's warriors go to Heaven. What I mean is, our enemies in the GWOT aren't fighting in our world, they're fighting five or ten centuries ago.

My question is whether to use the diplomacy arrow or the war arrow when neither have yet brought an end to the Crusades from their point of view. While in the case of the Klan, our media and schools were able to teach racial equality and civil liberties so that the KKK's beliefs were successfully marginalized, I don't see the Muslim world doing that, at all, and in fact they're going the other direction in their schools, and our MSM is going the other direction, focusing on America the bad guy and its big boss George Bush.

A diplomatic solution would seem to entail leaving the Saudis and others to continue teaching hatred to their children which their children will probably find that hatred to be a frame of their future perception as much as guilt is to the children of certain Catholic traditions. I'll admit there won't be much in the way of popular support for holding the media responsible for their "objectivity" (as though that's what we want when American lives are being lost) until a major terrorist attack on our country that makes 9/11 look like a firecracker. I for one would welcome a more American media to replace the neopolitan sophists.

Ultimately, I think we have to consider changing our situation such that extremist Muslims and others who advocate anti-American violence or are even "objective" in their attitude towards it are held accountable for the effects of those actions just as they would be in American courts of law for reckless endangerment and murder when the killing they instructed or turned a blind eye to comes to be.

My point isn't that we should get our moral panties bound up judging them, but that if we do not stop them from continuing their acts of hatred and murder that are the foreseeable consequence of their continued existence, aren't we the ones who are responsible for the acts they commit by our negligence?

Spook: "And I do suspect that the GWOT will not be ended by diplomacy."

Neither do I. I don't think it's that kind of war. You can't kill them all and you certainly can't sign some sort of paper to end hostilities. IMHO, you have to starve them out in every way possible. You can't allow them safe havens, you have to find ways to turn off the funding, and most of all you have to breed conditions where it becomes difficult for terrorist groups to recruit members. Wars can help with the safe havens part, and sometimes with the funding part. But it generally has the opposite effect on the recruitment part.

"do you see even the remote possibility of a permanent, negotiated peace between Israel and either Hezbollah or Hamas in the foreseeable future?"

The short answer is: no. I don't have time for the long answer right now. But I think the single most important factor is whether the Lebanese government has both the will and the ability to reign in Hezbollah and other groups of its ilk. And considering the state of the Lebanese government, coupled with the devastation wreaked upon the country recently, I think that is going to be very unlikely. The action (or inaction) of the international community will also be very important. And I don't think a heavy, direct involvement by the US would be very constructive.

Scaramonga: "Not me. I'm more difficult than RS, though. For example, were Israel and Egypt fighting when the "Camp David Accords" were signed? Seems to me they weren't. And how did the deal work out for Sadat?"

I'm sure you consider any untimely death a tragedy. But as tragedies go, I'm guessing Sadat's death was not up there on your top ten list. But fortunately, his successor Mubarak shared his attitude, so Sadat's death didn't derail things. And actually, the Camp David Accords sprang out of simmering tensions left behind by the Yom Kippur war in 1973, which left Israel in control of the Sinai, all of the West Bank, and Golan. Kissinger had been working on some kind of solution since that time (remember his famous shuttle diplomacy?), but couldn't pull it off.

"That agreement did not end fighting. It prevented future fighting - sort of like a non-aggression pact. If I understood RS's original thrust it was related to stopping an ongoing conflict with diplomacy. Korea was like Viet Nam and doesn't qualify. A cease-fire is no peace."

Actually, I think RS's thrust was pretty clear -- he was asking whether anyone could come up with examples were diplomacy promoted a lasting peace. And as it turned out, he preferred examples where diplomacy prevented hostile action or nipped it in the bud. So I understand his thrust to be exactly what you understand it not to be. And doesn't "cease-fire" mean you stop shooting at each other? That certainly sounds more peaceful than not.

I'm sure you consider any untimely death a tragedy.

Untimely death? How again was it that Sadat died? A sudden illness? Did he eat some spoiled food and develop food poisoning? Or was he a victim of lead poisoning?

The agreement with Israel brought peace to Egypt but not prosperity. With no real improvement in the economy, Sadat became increasingly unpopular. His isolation in the Arab world was matched by his increasing remoteness from the mass of Egyptians. While Sadat's critics in the Arab world remained beyond his reach, increasingly he reacted to criticism at home by expanding censorship and jailing his opponents. Sadat subjected the Egyptians to a series of referenda on his actions and proposals that he invariably won by more than 99 percent of the vote. In May 1980, an impressive, nonpartisan body of citizens charged Sadat with superseding his own constitution.

In the months leading up to the assassination Sadat had lost much of his support at home and in the West due to a brutal crackdown on fundamentalists. In June 1981 tensions between Muslims and Copts in Egypt exploded into a gruesome round of violence in the overcrowded Cairo slum of al-Zawiyya al-Hamra, precipitated by intense summer heat coupled with frequent cutoffs in the water supply. Men, women, and children were slaughtered.

I guess that was phase I of Sadat's "peace." Then...

Egypt and the world were horrified by these events. Tensions continued to mount as Muslims and Christians blamed one another in inflammatory press accounts. In September, Sadat cracked down on both sides with mass arrests and brutal police tactics. The powerful Islamic student associations were banned on September 3; their leaders were arrested and roughed up. The head of the Coptic Church, Pope Shenuda III, was banished to a monastery.

On October 6, 1981, President Anwar al-Sadat was attending an annual military parade celebrating the "successful" campaigns during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. He was saluting the troops when an assassination team ran from one of the parade vehicles and began firing weapons and throwing grenades into the reviewing stand. Sadat was killed and 20 others, including four American diplomats, were injured. Also in the reviewing stand with Sadat were future UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali and Hosni Mubarek, the Air Force officer who succeeded Sadat as President. Neither Mubarek nor Boutros-Ghali were injured.

So Sadat's "untimely death WAS due to lead poisoning. Lead and shrapnel. So Mubarek took over and we have peace, right?

Following Sadat's assassination, the killers were identified as Muslim radicals, members of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad. They opposed Sadat's landmark peace treaty with Israel and hoped to impose Islamic rule in Egypt. Hosni Mubarak and General Fouad Allam, head of Egypt's security service, waged a campaign against radical Islam that featured unlawful arrests, detention without trial, and torture to force confessions. Thousands of suspected terrorists were rounded up and jailed, among them Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who was later convicted of conspiring to blow up New York City landmarks, and Ayman al-Zawahiri, one of Osama bin Laden's two top lieutenants.

This looks and smells exactly like a Jimmy Carter-brokered "peace." YMMV.

And actually, the Camp David Accords sprang out of simmering tensions left behind by the Yom Kippur war in 1973, which left Israel in control of the Sinai, all of the West Bank, and Golan.

Which put Israel in the driver's seat, until the US "helped."

Actually, I think RS's thrust was pretty clear -- he was asking whether anyone could come up with examples were diplomacy promoted a lasting peace.

I guess you'll have to ask him about the "thrust" because I read his post to say that wars are not normally ended and resulting in long-lasting peaces unless there is a victor (and a loser). Then, and only then, is peace possible. These silly negotiated cease-fires always end up as hot spots again sooner or later - and usually sooner. Remember the most frequent overnight guest in the Clinton White House? Yasser Arafat. Remember how we were going to have peace with Palestine? Heh.

And doesn't "cease-fire" mean you stop shooting at each other? That certainly sounds more peaceful than not.

The boxing match is not over because the bell rings between rounds. That is what a cease-fire is and I suspect that you know it and are just playing rhetorical games for some reason. The hates, bitter feelings, forces, and weapons are always one click away from full-on fighting at any moment during any cease-fire. The most common words heard after a cease-fire is agreed upon? Cease-fire violations. Doesn't sound like peace to me.