Fear

[??????????]

More lives will be saved by researching stem cell research than our current and inadaquote protection against terrorists.

I would rather die at 35 with a clear conscience, than live a life extended as a result of harvesting human beings to be used as lab rats.

I say this as someone who may well end up with Alzheimer’s.  Adult stem cell research only, please.

My question for liberal democrats would be. If we go ahead with stem cell usage should we also use the research the Nazis did when they committed their atrocities?

[Inverted Things]

You'd be a fool to dismiss terrorism as just a "minor" threat.

Um, terrorism *is* a minor threat. I'm not saying we should do nothing about it, but I can't help but think we're going about it the wrong way.

There is a fundamental difference between declaring war on Japan in 1941 and war on terrorism in 2001. In WWII, we knew just where our enemies were. Here we do not. In WWII we were fighting a centralized power, and when they surrendered, the war was over. The idea of terrorism surrendering is nuts, since terrorism is a concept, not a country.

So, how are we going to know when this war is over? Will it ever be over? If not, is our society going to live in a permanent state of war?

[MarkDel]

You'd be a fool to dismiss terrorism as just a "minor" threat.

Um, terrorism *is* a minor threat. I'm not saying we should do nothing about it, but I can't help but think we're going about it the wrong way.

There is a fundamental difference between declaring war on Japan in 1941 and war on terrorism in 2001. In WWII, we knew just where our enemies were. Here we do not. In WWII we were fighting a centralized power, and when they surrendered, the war was over. The idea of terrorism surrendering is nuts, since terrorism is a concept, not a country.

So, how are we going to know when this war is over? Will it ever be over? If not, is our society going to live in a permanent state of war?

Your criticsim of the War on Terror has much support in left wing circles, but it sounds painfully similar to some of the other rhetoric that came out of the left wing from 1946 to 1990, and the rhetoric was clearly proven to be wrong. The Left Wing told us for four decades that the Cold War could not be won, and that a war against an ideology (Communism) was foolish and could never be won. The Cold War, was of course, won by the West. And the victory was sealed by an aggressive foreign policy shift in the 1980's that changed the US emphasis from one of containment to one of "winning"

The problem with your theory is that the general premise is wrong. You claim that a War against Terror cannot be won because it is a War on a "concept" or an "idea"...

But you are ignoring the FACT that World War II at its core was a War against an IDEA...fascism...The Cold War at its core was a War against an IDEA...communism...and the War on Terror is a WAR against an IDEA...Islamic Extremism. There is really no difference at the fundamental level of what we really fought for and what we really defeated. Hitler was an IDEA, Japanese miltarism was an IDEA, the Soviet Union was an IDEA....it's the same with Islamic Extemism...

[khirkhib]

I am not saying terrorism is a minor threat.  I do think that we should do what we can to stop terrorists but we are not going about it the right way.  

In World War II we were United with the world.  the allies against the axis.  
Communism, Socialism and Capitalism united against Fascism

In the Cold War we were united with the world.  The 1st world against the second world (with most of the violence and death happening in the third)  Capitalism and Socialism against Communism

We are not united as a world against terrorists.  The coalition of the willing is a joke.   It isn't strong countries the enemy can change and like a hydra our attacks can make it stronger.  The US needs to unite the world against terrorism if we are going to win this war.  And if we don't we will only suffer more attacks.

[MarkDel]

I am not saying terrorism is a minor threat.  I do think that we should do what we can to stop terrorists but we are not going about it the right way.  

In World War II we were United with the world.  the allies against the axis.  
Communism, Socialism and Capitalism united against Fascism

In the Cold War we were united with the world.  The 1st world against the second world (with most of the violence and death happening in the third)  Capitalism and Socialism against Communism

We are not united as a world against terrorists.  The coalition of the willing is a joke.   It isn't strong countries the enemy can change and like a hydra our attacks can make it stronger.  The US needs to unite the world against terrorism if we are going to win this war.  And if we don't we will only suffer more attacks.

Khirkhib,

The world was united during the Cold War??? Try again. During the 1980's when Reagan hastened the destruction of the Soviet Communist bloc, the only European leaders to agree with US policy were Margaret Thatcher (England) and Helmut Kohl (West Germany). The rest of the major world leaders portrayed Reagan as a "dangerous Cowboy" who would lead to a more dangerous world (does that sound vaguely familiar?) than he inherited. There are FAR MORE nations in the "Coalition of the Willing" than there were supporters of Reagan's arms buildup and plans to implement SDI which were in fact the final nails in the Communist bloc coffin.

And besides, what is the US to do if the rest of the major nations won't accept the threat posed by Terrorism? We can't MAKE THEM protect themselves, we can't MAKE THEM see the danger that we KNOW is out there, so we either act unilaterally (and with coalitions) or we subvert US foreign policy to the will of appeasement minded nations like France and Germany...and now Spain as well...not to mention England and Italy if those current governments ever fall.

[khirkhib]

Well I kind of would like to let this topic die now as we have other topics going on but I have to say that I have a very different take on how we won the Cold War.

First off it was NATO against the Eastern Bloc.

NATO was chatacterized by shared intelligence and decisions it was touchy at times but it was unified where as the Eastern Bloc was forced and only kept together by the USSR muscling Eastern Europeon countries.  Or more accurately Russia strong arming the other "nations" of the USSR and also the Eastern Europeon Countries.  Russia's biggest mistake was ruining their relationship with their strongest ally China. Russia was over-extended and forcing countries and their hopeful territories (much of the ME)  which only resulted in stagnating those econmies.  Independence and capitalism strengthened the economies on our side Japan and later South Korea, Western Europe and the US ecomonies went gang busters.  This create resentment in Eastern Europe and with USSR itself to through off the system.  Russia fell apart not because we threatened to build star wars (which doesn't work and I think puts us at a bigger risk because it makes us more likely to use nukes) but because they all wanted Levi's and Big Macs.  Free Trade beat Communism.  Free Capitalism with Socialistic Controls trounced a state that try to control industry with-out regard to the health and needs of its people.  

NATO was really Socially Progressive and Economically Consevative.

The USSR was very Socially Conservative in a way because they did not think of the Social needs  and using Econmically LIberal ideas that were not ready for prime time.  

They tried to start Marx's ideas about 200 years too early.  They tried to jump from a pre-industrial society to a post-post-post capitalistic democracy.

America learned a lot of lessons in the Guilded Age 1880 - 1900s.  The lessons that we learned were some of the lessons that helped us win the cold war.

[Niles Caulder]

'Major'/'Minor' are relative terms, I guess...

Pearl Harbor seemed pretty major...major enough to move an isolationist country into WWII.

More civilians were killed on 9/11 than were military personnel at Pearl Harbor.

So wherever you draw the line, 9/11 is more "major" than Pearl Harbor, however "minor."

Because of it, we're permentantly committed to the empire-killer called Afghanistan.  So I'm going to call it "major," myself.

The War on Terror will last a generation or more.  It won't be won by arms, or by creating a Roman Empire to police the planet, or by a shouting match at the UN over spy satellite pictures.  This war is only capable of being won by the art of war...the even higher moral contest.  The battleground is the planet's 1.3 billion Muslims, and competing for their benevolence.

In World War Two we perservered with a military augmented by a state department thorough enough to shape foreign economic policies to augment the effort.  The Cold War was primarilly won by the State Department's cohesion of allied nations strategically bound together economically.  This war, it will be economic development that leads the charge, diplomacy trying to serve it, and being lulled into the absolute minimum of warfare required as not to delay it.  ("Where traders cross borders, armies seldom do.")

We were at war for 50 years with the Soviets, on all fronts at one time or another.  This war will be no different.  Nor less important.  Slowly earning a benign attitude from those we've helped oppress for decades (Iraqis aren't a bad start) in order to check the Soviets will determine whether we deserved to win the Cold War to begin with.

[Shira]

What Bush needs is some attack on US soil with enough casualties (300 will be good) so the people will rally behind him.
Kerry, on the other hand, needs two or three American casualties in Iraq each and every day until the election.

[khirkhib]

Shira don't say shi* like that.  Niether Kerry nor Bush need nor want an attack either here or abroad.  Just saying that is sick.

[??????????]

What Bush needs is some attack on US soil with enough casualties (300 will be good) so the people will rally behind him.
Kerry, on the other hand, needs two or three American casualties in Iraq each and every day until the election.

You have repeated this three times already. Either that or I am completely losing my mind!

[MarkDel]

Shira don't say shi* like that.  Niether Kerry nor Bush need nor want an attack either here or abroad.  Just saying that is sick.

Khirkhib,

For once, we completely agree. But there are LOTS of people like Shira out there...just go check out www.democraticunderground.com and you will see thousands of them.