john m.

suitcase, bomb, walk across the border. that’d do it, right?

Sure .. and that’s why the DHS was created, and why the borders are a real pain, and why they make you take off your shoes and turn in your toothpaste at the airport .. things, for example, the Brits have lived with for 30 years with Northern Ireland.

2, 3, 5, 20 or even 20 terrorists with a few bombs .. even a dirty bomb … is hardly a large-scale invasion of the Muslim hordes.

please don’t get me wrong. I do understand that the world is a more dangerous place today than it was five or ten years ago. Arguable the USA has played a reasonably significant role .. and yes, not the only role .. in creatiing the new, more dangerous, terror-related conditions and environment.

It will be a very very long haul (speaking figuratively) to kill or imprison every angry oppressed person who feels wronged by the imperialist occupiers their perspective. My sense is that this general approach .. clamping down on everyone and creating a big brother fascist total surveillance and security state is exactly what “the terrorists” had hoped the USA would do.

I also sense that we are soon going to be into th dynamic where it will become clear that we will never ever convince each other of anything other than what each of us respectively believes.

My bottom line is that the USA has had an important role over the past 50 years, in various countries and in various ways, in creating the conditions that have spawned the kind(s) of terrorism we are seeing and experiencing. It (the USA) bears some significant responsibility in this worldview, and I believe that killing and occupying (democracy and freedom at the point of a tank barrel or in the sights of a jet fighter) is not the way to “solve” the problem on a worldwide scale.

Your bottom line I don’t know, but I am guessing that it would be along the lines of “get ‘em before they get us”. If so, I’m not sure we have much left to talk about.

how would they attack here?

suitcase, bomb, walk across the border. that’d do it, right? disagree with crazy as a fox, if he’s talking about supernatural light him while he speaks. that’s called real live psychiatric disorder. sounds delusional with antisocial personality disorder. great i’ve already typed more than i had time for just now. i’ll be back later.

john e. mack

http://www.juancole.com/2006/09/israel-to-launch-war-on-syria-iran.html#comments

And yes, I agree that Ahmadinejad can and does use the media just as easily as anyone else.

in this particular case, i have been reading many sources and viewpoints over thep ast year or so, and no i don’t trust everything i read that support my ideological leanings.

That said .. I DO indeed trust professor cole’s point of view. I find him to be very careful and thorough, and I have seen his writings where he can be harsh . severe on both “sides”.

And in this specific case he has (from about the same time as the quote which I provided above) a detailed exploratilon and interpretation of the possible meanings of the phrase “must vanish from the page of time”, along with reinforcing observations that the Iranians would be crazy to suggest vaporizing Israel / Israelis just for the hell of it (and yes, I am not nearly as careful with my words as is Cole).

Even jopurnals are tricky, I think .. my guess is these days they reflect (mainly) the views that are desired by the bodies that fund them.

I think Ahmadinejad is somewhat of loose cannon, and only crazy as in “crazy like a fox”. as for what i believe, I believe the analyses that I have read that state the Ayatollah in Iran is the Supreme Leader .. he;s the one who says what goes and what does not go … and from everything I have read he is much more circumspect than is Ahmadinejad (who I take to be a figurehead / puppet).

I think most Iranians would think it nuts to attack the USA and Americans unprovoked .. but some days it seems like the USA is doing its fair share of trying to provoke .. no ?

And how in hell would they attack over here anyway ?

As for the article you referenced — I assume Ahmadinejad can use the media just as easily as anyone else. He’s certainly trying to, at least. I don’t have any good reason to “trust” your informationclearinghouse news anymore than you trust US newspapers. Yes, you can’t trust the news. I get that. How do you think I stumbled upon this website? What you’re basically saying is the news I read is wrong and the news you read is right. Too bad the news doesn’t require references like a journal article or something. Then maybe we’d know who’s right. Until then, all you can prove is that there are people in some media outlets saying different things than people in other media outlets. Imagine if CNN wrote the article you posted and the news source you posted wrote what CNN is saying. Who would you believe then and why? You trust the minority. Perhaps you believe in conspiracy theories. But why?

PS — I’m pretty sure the US media isn’t saying all Muslims want to wipe Israel off the map. Just that Iran’s president does, and he is mentally ill — and yes, I do believe that he is crazy. (for example, http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2005/11/184cb9fb-887c-4696-8f54-0799df747a4a.html)

The Presdident of Iran saying “wipe Israel off the map” factoid is a well-known story .. in fact, an urban myth by now … which has been throughly debunked by several Middle east scholars and linguists who actually translated what he said CORRECTLY.

But the news media in the USA … the newspapers and the television networks … very conveniently seem alwyas (somehow) to forget to mention that, or run out of time just before they get to it .. whatever.

Specifically, a reknowned Middle east scholar at U of Michigan said:

“So, I have a suggestion for my readers. Every time you see a newspaper article that alleges that Ahmadinejad said that Israel should be wiped off the face of the map, please write the editor. Say that this idiom does not exist in Persian, and that what Ahmadinejad actually said was, “This occupation regime over Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time.” And you can cite me.

If enough people do this often enough, the press will get tired of the propaganda line they are carrying, which is intended to whip up a manufactured war, and drop it. And that would be the most fitting response to Hitchens and his Neocon puppeteers.”

Here’s another whack at it …

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14720.htm

But I guess whatever serves to keep the rubes believing that the President of Irans says .. and therefore all Muslims want … to wipe Israel off the face of the map. Which therefore extrapolates just as a = b that Muslims want to kill all of us.

Do abiy more research … there’s a reason why what you get is “all the same news”, because it all comes from pretty much the same place and has pretty much the same purpose .. to keep you and your colleagues / fellow citizens believing what you are told.

hear hear

best regards,

john e. mack