Letters to the Editor
Reality-based Liberal
Published Letters: 774 Editor's Choice: 100
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So what are we fighting for?
[Read the article: A miscarriage of justice, gagged babies and more]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]So while we fight to bring freedom to women overseas (forget the fact that Iraqi women had more rights and freedoms under secular Hussein than in the current religious civil war), at home we appear to be modeling our behavior on Saudi Arabia.
Judging from the recent stories of jailed women - one with an ongoing miscarriage and the other having just experienced rape - it looks like the "terrorists" don't have much freedom left to hate. Maybe that's Bush's new strategy?
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So what else could we have done with the $1 trillion...
[Read the article: The price of war]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]...we'll end up spending, once all is accounted for?
Wow. Just think, we could have no war in the Middle East right now AND have free healthcare. Or we could have no war in the Middle East now AND have well-funded inner-city schools with new textbooks and sound infrastructure. Or we could have new light rail, new energy initiatives, job training, public child care, cancer research, university scholarships, upgraded bridges, dams and railroads...
We could have any number of great things, no war in the Middle East, and be not one penny poorer that we are now.
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swilldog is right
[Read the article: The plane, the plane!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]This isn't right-wing echo chamber vs. White House -- it's collusion -- a win-win, as swilldog says. Create story; ignore story; story lives without WH fingerprints. What is amazing is how easy it is for them. This same stuff goes on in smaller doses all the time: gay baiting vs. Bush's "tolerant" verbal approach; attack on the middle class vs. Bush's populist rhetoric on tax cuts; clear war profiteering vs. Bush's clear bullshit about some kind of plan connected with democracy. Even the NYT takes the bullshit at face value. Why stop what always works?
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I'm confused?
[Read the article: Here we go again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]What about the other foreign fighters that are creating unrest in Iraq and exacerbating the civil war through their involvement? I guess the US has more of a right than Iran to get involved; after all, Iraq used to be our client state and Iran is only a neighbor.
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Don't buy the "what I knew at the time" line!
[Read the article: Hillary, Iraq and the nonadmission admission]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]There are two reasons why this excuse should disqualify a candidate:
1) I knew at the time that the reasons for war were a lie, and I am no intelligence insider. Press reports of experts from around the world indicated that the threats being presented were bullshit at the time. It is a flat out lie that "everybody thought there were WMD in Iraq at the time."
2) Regardless of the evidence on WMD, there was already plenty of evidence that trusting Bush with a blank check for war was akin to trusting Calvin of the comic strip with chain saw. Bush had already shown himself to be a reckless unilateralist with low regard for checks and balances, or democracy for that matter - whether in Iraq or here at home. Whatever problems face a legislator, real or imaginary, it is self-evident that giving George W. Bush a blank check is not a solution.
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I Don't Get It
[Read the article: Hillary, Iraq and the nonadmission admission]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Devil's Advocate:
Hating Bush is not enough reason to vote no when the country is in a crises. In fact, it is all the more reason to put your own feelings aside in the interest of protecting the country.
You're right. And Hillary didn't do any of the things you said.
Trying to appear tough isn't enough reason to give a totally untrustworthy man the right to kill hundreds of thousands of people, destroy a mostly civilized nation and ruin the economy and reputation of the United States.
We were in no crisis. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and everyone who cared enough to pay attention knew that (notice even Bush never said that exactly, because even his administration knew).
And you've got it backwards, Devil's Advocate, she put aside logic and the safety of the country to go with her feelings.
As another poster pointed out, either she's an idiot, or she's willing to allow thousands to die for her political expediency. Either way, she is not qualified for such an important job as President.
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Badger Blue writes:
[Read the article: Clinton's Iraq questioner: Her answer was "cold and calculated"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If any of you help get another Republican elected in '08 because you can't get off your high horse, than you are just as guilty as you accuse her of being because a Republican win in '08 is a guarantee for keeping the war going.
Do you mean "help get another Republican elected" by refusing to support a Democrat who in no way represents my values? I assume that's what you mean; you want me to vote for someone who is, in my own view, not much better than Bush on the issues that will determine whether civilization has a chance. That's a very rude thing to demand. Why not demand that people stop voting for the GOP before you attack people of conviction who don't want to vote candidates who, like Bush, support the corporate version of "globalization," big military budgets, Israel no matter what, deregulation, etc. etc.
And I might point out, with regard to your comment that no Republican will ever stop a war that Ford stopped Kennedy's/Johnson's Vietnam and Eisenhower stopped Truman's Korea. I can tell you fifty reasons why Chuck Hagel is a dangerous right-winger, but I have no doubt that he would be more effective than most Democratic candidates at stopping the war once elected.
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We have to reform our media
[Read the article: What Americans really think of Bush]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]That "honest" ranks 3rd and used to rank 1st through 2005 proves that we have the most uninformed electorate in the industrial world. That so much of the public has it backwards on their Executive Branch's defining characteristic (make up whatever shit up that gets you through the day) makes us a very dangerous nation - especially with a military budget equal to the rest of the world's that we are willing to deploy casually.