RE: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] [MLUG][Politics] State of the Union

[Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Wed, 1 Feb 2006, Hargus, Diana wrote:

> You have been showing that you can be positive about things you don't 
> like, but this single-minded hatred of the president, is not healthy. 
> Please, consider saying something nice once in a while (that goes for 
> the other side in this discussion as well).

(1) I don't have a single-minded hatred of the President and all I did to 
evoke your accusation was to point out that one should be extremely 
skeptical of this administration and their claims.  If I say that I think 
the President is a liar, is that an expression of hatred or a statement of 
a theory about his behavior?

(2) I did just say something that I thought was pretty nice this morning 
when I said that I would give him an A for his speech last night (well, 
for the parts I heard anyway).


> Have you talked to anyone that has actually been there?  I have, I 
> watched him pull another piece of shrapnel out of his arm. Yet, there 
> have been no purple hearts or awards for him.  While he was there, he 
> was injures 3 times: IED to the humvee he was in, gun round to the 
> chest, and a mortar round to the wall behind his bunk. He said there was 
> no feeling like being thanked by the people over there; It is the reason 
> he will be going back in a few months again.

That's nice.  Whatever.  One man's views have almost no value when you 
consider that there are millions of people living in Iraq.  There are 
polls.  The polls show that they want us to leave.

Yes, I have talked to people who have been there.  But did your friend 
wait until he got home to pull a piece of shrapnel out of his arm or did 
you also go to Iraq.


> If, through computer modelling and facts, I could show you that killing 
> a child would prevent untold destruction, could you do it?

This is a common "ethical dilemma" kind of question.  The problem is that 
I cannot know for certain that your prediction is correct, but let's 
pretend that it is possible.  The answer then is "yes" I would kill the 
child.  If you were to say "no" then you might seem like a nice person, 
but you are the kind of nice person who just caused "untold destruction" 
through inaction.


> Or does a life mean something?  Before you rip at me, consider this:  I 
> would dearly love not to have to be in Iraq right now.  I would love to 
> be able to restore these people's lives whom you speak of in these 
> tragedies to have their lives restored to some semblance of order.  But 
> at what cost do we do this?  What price do we put on it?  Do we bring 
> food and medicines to a people suffering from the aftereffects of a 
> natural disaster at the cost of genocide?  I think the problem here is 
> one of ideology and not politics....

Everyone is entitled to his opinion about priorities.  It is important in 
any event to remember what we are missing by making a certain choices. 
Money spent on one thing is not available for other things.  Apparently 
the President just chopped $2 billion out of a college loan program of 
some kind, which has made many students unhappy.  If we spent 12 fewer 
days in Iraq we'd save $2 billion.  That's a lot of money.


> Yes, big money is part of the reason we are there, maybe a large part, 
> but I guess 100% humanitarianism is the only reason we should do 
> anything.  Almost all actions can be traced back to selfishness.  "It 
> makes me feel good!"  "It is for the best!" etc.,etc., ad nauseum

I don't know why we are there.  That's all I'm saying.

If all actions can be traced to selfishness, what selfish needs is our 
selfish President satisfying by having our military fight in Iraq?

Mike

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