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Originally Posted by mburbank
Okay, I'm going to go out on a limb and ask if Brandon is enaged in some sort of parodic excercise.
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After listening to both sides of the argument, I'm unconvinced that the liberal approach (if there's any at all) to the "War on Terror" is going to be adequate. That's not to say that I'm a conservative, a Bush-supporter, or a Republican, but that I've merely changed my position on an issue.
I'm sure I'm going to get ridiculed anyway.
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The 'plain fact'? That's just Vinth minus the communication disorder. Who made you privy to plain facts versus personal opinions? I think there are a few people out there who may have enjoyed not blowing up at LAX on the Millenium. And if you mean since 9/11, you're aware that ever-so-complex, liberal diplomacy with all its sophisticated little grey areas (which I'm sure I do prefer, thanks) hasn't been tried, so we have no idea what sort of a job it would do, unless we're psychic or in some other way privy to plain facts.
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Ouch, Max. Very ouch.
Ok, fine. I'll rephrase it. "I have yet to see convincing evidence that liberal diplomacy has done anything to make us safer from terrorism." The point I'm trying to make is that a softer approach to terrorism and terrorist states
has been tried. It was used many times during the Clinton administration, and it prevented nothing.
Clinton's administration put absolutely zero pressure on Iran or Syria, fingerfucked with Saudi Arabia (but then, most recent administrations have), and even bribed North Korea. Prudent as ever, he put just enough pressure (unilaterally, I might add) on Hussein to look tough but balked at actually removing him from power. (I'm only going over policy in the Arab world, BTW, and I'm aware he's used force elsewhere) Clinton consistently refused to take decisive action after every major terrorist attack, including the first WTC bombing. He turned down capture of Osama bin Laden at least three times.
Yes, clearly cutting back on our "imperialist" tendencies has done wonders for national security.
Did this diplomacy stop 9/11? No. The rogue states we avoided offending relished the fact that we were such pushovers while they went ahead and did what they planned to do anyway. They play Eddie Haskell, claiming to be our allies while making contributions to Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, etc. and providing asylum to terror suspects. North Korea and Iran happily go about acquiring nuclear arsenals.
We can't negotiate with countries like that anymore. We never could. You'd think more people would have learned that by now. Military strikes are still a last resort, but it's time that we strapped our spine back on and backed these assholes up against the wall. War isn't the solution to everything, but it is a solution to some things.