NDR: stirring the pot - is the war on terror worth it


Clearly you don't work in the an industry that isn't supported by the Government and the War.....

Take a look at the new car market and the housing market......take a look at the ever rising cost of gas......take a look at what anybody other than the Foxx Network is saying about 4th Quarter Consumer Spending projections....take a look at the ever increasing number of fore closures in the US......and while I'm sure you'd call the Economists "Socialists", or worse, who are saying it take a look at the fact that a good number of them are saying that we are "one more record price per barrel of oil" from a recession....

"Humming along"? I hardly think so....

Steve
 
Where are all these people going to get their water from?
Well, I can tell you that most places with burgeoning populations, especially coastal areas and all of Florida, are going to be in a real bad situation at some point when it comes to water. Atlanta is just one example of the classic "rob peter to pay paul" solution that is untenable in the long run. Floridas dependence on groundwater and no place to build resevoirs is another one that will bite them in the butt. You can pick just about any state and find a place with water problems. What' the answer? Who knows. Ground water can't hold out against increasing withdrawal forever. Resevoirs just rap water that was really needed some place down stream. You can only pull out so much before you damage an estuary somewhere. Look at the Owens Valley in CA or the fact that the Colorado River doesnt even make it to the ocean anymore.
Some one famous once said that sooner or later we'd no longer fight wars over land or oil but we would fight them over freshwater. They may be right.
 
Salination plants.I don't know why southern California didn't start building them decads ago.The ocean is apparently the only hope to satisfy the demand of population growth.The water cost per thousand gal has gone up tremendously the past decade.There is only so much fresh water in a given area.Salination plants should be built on the coast of every state on salt water.
 
Joe,

That is "desalination" as in take out the salt. My employer is in the business of selling the equipment to do that and it is a growth business all around the world. There just is not enough potable water and it is a scarce resource. Whod'a thunk it...

Charlie
 
Thanks for the correction,I knew that.Drank a good bit of the water on Johnson Island in the early 70s.
 
which is just about all that I can afford with gas now at $3.25 a gallon and heading for $4.00......not to mention that I just got my credit card bill from Cd. and am loooking at a .06 DEFICIT against our 51st States dollar......

Yep I can hear that old economy just a humming......sounds like its missing on most of its cylinders though and I'm betting that its going to throw a rod before it gets better....

Steve
 
You didnt breath the fumes from the incinerator while you were on Johnson Isl, did you????

De-salination has only two problems, it takes a lot of energy & you end up with a really salty discharge that you have to get rid of. But I do agree, it probably will end being the solution for most coastal cities.
 
I wouuld have used the "F" word but I'm told "kids are watching" so deferred.....

As recently as two days ago Atlanta was still allowing yards to be watered......and while they do have a "yard watering schedule" it primarily relies on neighbor turning in neighbor before anything is done.....

For my money until the idiots that are in charge there realize that the health of the eco-system that supplies them with their water, and that will supply not only towns but the very health of the Gulf of Mexico itself is more important that green grass in yards they can go pound sand, (I understand that there is plenty of it around the banks of the dewatered Lake Lanier), before they should get one drop that wasn't already allocated to them......

My apologies to the morons if they have realized they have to look to themselves for help before stealing it from someone else in the last two days....

Steve
 
Lee,maybe we can hook up your Governor with Sonny Purdue,and they could have a pipeline from the lakes to Atlanta,so the dumb asses can continue to water their lawns.
 
OK Charlie you wanted to stir the pot so here it goes:

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Your perception of the available information shapes your opinion as does mine. I happen to disagree with you on the war thing but that's mostly because I have a different take on the entire situation than most, having spent a good deal of time in the service, knowing the situation then, and watching various people screw things up until we are where we are. And I don't mean the President. At least not only him. But that's all largely irrelevent.

What makes me question the validity of your opinion is that you claim to be a social liberal and a fiscal conservative. That's not possible. The cornerstone of social liberalism is creating a program, with an accompanying bureaucracy, to combat a perceived social problem. That takes money. Lots of money. The program seldom solves the problem, and therefore grows bigger, requiring more money. You can't stop or restrict the program because it's now become and ENTITLEMENT. How can you be a fiscal conservative if you subcribe to a social theory that only truly exists to spend money? Answer: You really can't.

So, in the interests of stirring the pot, I will; say that I don't question your right to have an opinion, just the validity of it due to the fact that you claim a belief system that doesn't exist. That makes you insane or a BS artist. Take your pick. I suppose you could look at it as the two halves of your pretend belief system cancel each other out. Leaving you with nothing to believe in which would make you a political atheist?

In response to the original question I can say that as long as we kill off many thousands of islamic fundementalists I consider the war money well spent. Better we should do it there than have to do it here. The happy by-product of the Iraq War is that the terrorists have flocked there to fight, making it easier to find and kill them. That being the opinion relayed to me by my former coworkers.

Anyone who thinks the War on Terror started on 9/11 simply wasn't paying attention before that.

Anyone who believes that there was not a connection between international terrorism and the Hussein government is ignoring facts that have been in evidence for years. Heck, when our troops took Baghdad they captured the #2 guy from Abu Nidal. Achille Lauro? Hello?

Anyone who believes that WMD never existed in Iraq is either in denial, or so agenda driven that they can't think straight. Saddam Hussein had WMD. They were there. He said he had them. He used them against the Kurds and the Iraninans. THE US SOLD HIM THE WEAPONRY. Every intelligence agency in the free world said he had WMD. Kerry, Clinton, Kennedy, et al all said that they had seen the intelligence and believed the WMD were there. So they exist. Whether they are now buried in the desert, trucked to Syria, or carried by camel to a chicken coop outside Tehran, they exist.

If any part of this post comes across as harsh it's because there are no smilies available for me to strategically place to make you think I'm not really as mean as I am, or that I didn't really mean to offend anyone who probably had it coming and would certainly be the case in any event.

Best

Nick
 
Hi,

You're right Nick, I don't exist, like Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the other 60+% of Americans that think that the War in Iraq is a farce.

Thanks for your service to the country. I guess that we can agree on that, if nothing else.

The cornerstone of social liberalism is caring about people and taking care of them to the best of one's ability within the constraints imposed by society.

Fiscal conservatism is not about "not spending money" - it is about spending money on the right things. Spending money on the things that have the lowest opportunity cost and make the most sense.

Investing in health care of our youth has a long term net positive payback. Healthy kids become healthy adults and they contribute back to society.

Investing in war has a long term cost - and I'm not just talking about the financial cost - the long term cost to society of the ruined lives of soldiers and families, and lost productivity and illness and mental trauma of our veterans and their families. These things are all indirect costs of our going to war.

If we had to do it to defend our country, that'd be one thing, and I'd be right there volunteering my sorry butt to help. This war never was and never will be about defending our country.

I appreciate your perspective though, well, I would appreciate it if I existed that is...

Charlie
 
I've been following this thread for awhile now, and I wondered when it would get to the point that you would start hitting the violin music and the waterworks. That last post was so beautiful I just might cry.

Last I heard it was closer to 75% against. I guess the American people are waking up. Either that or most of those "opinion polls" are BS. Sort of like when they broadcast the President's ratings at an all time low of 33% but fail to mention that Congress is in the low 20's.

I've got a buddy who is going back over for his third tour next month. He lost a leg on the second tour. I don't doubt that some people's lives are ruined by the experience of war or the results of it. You want to make it sound like it's legion and it's not. One more vote for BS artist.

Free and complete medical care is mandated by the government for those citizens who earn up to the poverty level. Many states go beyond that. In Maine it is mandated up to 175% of that benchmark. The bottom line is that if you are willing to make the slightest effort you can get treatment. The days of "no insurance there's the door" have been over for a long time. You say you can afford health care but many you know can't. Wrong. Unless you have tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars squirrelled away you mean that you can afford health insurance, and they can't. Regardless, you'll get treated the same as them. You're premiums are high because you're paying for them too.

The single largest health concern for children, especially in the lower income brackets is obesity. That's parenting. Funny how no program gets funded to make parents get off their ass and parent. Show me the hordes of children who are being left to die. Just because a person is uninsured doesn't mean they aren't being treated. But we're supposed to blindly support anything that "for the children".

Police Officer: "I'm going to have to arrest you for selling that pot there."
Druggie: "It's for the children officer."
Police Officer: "Sorry to bother you. Drive safely"


The war in Iraq is currently at 463 billion. You can't calculate a monthly cost becasue many things are a one time expense and last much longer than a month. March 2003 - October 2007 is 55 months. You were only off by about 100 billion. Fiscal conservative. Right.

From where I'm sitting social liberalism seems to be about taking money from those of us who produce an income, and giving it to those who do not. Many of those people need to be supported or need a helping hand; a "leg up" so to speak. I'm all for that. Many of those who don't produce fail to do so by choice. The system of social programs in this country is organized in such a way that it rewards those who work the system and punishes those who have a legitimate need and who try to play it straight. That's the result of social liberalism. I did the math a year or so ago. Assuming 30% of those on welfare programs could be making it on their own abilities the cost of the war would be a wash, with quite a bit left over "for the children".

Furthermore, in the course of reading one of your previous posts I must say that I'm appalled that you support the troops while they are violating Iraqi civil rights every day.

I have birds to clean. Please consider my default response to any other postings on this thread to be that which would be made by a Big Meanie. You asked for it.


Nick
 
I just gotta say, the phrase[font=Verdana,Arial,Helvetica] 'political atheist' is the best thing Ive read on the net tonight..... [/font][font=Verdana,Arial,Helvetica]Leaving you with nothing to believe in which would make you a political atheist? Now THAT'S sumthing to ponder. travis
[/font]
 
Before Iraq I felt that we were on the road to WWIII, that eventually a terrorist attack would occur so grievous that our unified goal would be to stomp out Islam as a religion everywhere in the world. Mushroom clouds over Washington, New York, Chicago, LA or Houston, etc, would unite us in the goal of killing or converting all of the practitioners of the religion of Submission. We would succeed too for at this point the emphasis would be on the killing part.

Our mission in Iraq is lately showing signs of success. Pelosi so much fears success in Iraq that she has intentionally provoked the Turks in order to undermine our efforts there and to preserve her personal political power. To me she is a traitor.

The president of Iran told Mike Wallace (60 Minutes reporter) that we would not be killed if we became good. Mikey had so many stars in his eyes that he let that go by without challenge. This is what it means- either convert to Islam (become good) or die. The great senior reporter just let it go by. Most of the people in Iran do not agree with this extremist view and there have been protests, very courageous in Iran.

Success in Iraq will embolden those opposed to extremism in Iran. I think Iran is capable of getting nuclear weaponry and that the crew currently in charge would use those weapons thinking we are weak. Success in Iraq might stop this WWIII scenario from happening. Failure in Iraq, on the other hand, does not make it more likely.

I feel nothing but revulsion for those who have put so much political capital into anti war activities that they now are in a position that they hope we lose. Even worse are those like Pelosi who are actively working to ensure defeat.

I'm not absolutely sure about all of this but I am sure that those with their feet on the ground believe that they are fighting evil and that our goals are good.

I am opposed to any of the current proposals about socialized medicine. If it is done it should be done to cut out the insurance companies, reduce drug costs, and have different levels of convenience depending on the taxes paid by the household. In other word chop the overhead and preserve the benefits of employment by rewarding taxpayers with more medical choice. This will not happen because all people are the same, it is not PC and too many people with power are invested in the insurance and drug overhead.

I will repeat - while I am following this thread, it is WAY, WAY, WAY off topic in a duck boat forum.

Bob
 
Robert,

I couldn't diagree more, but I suppose you probably knew that before I typed this.

I'm not sure how long you've been around the DBHP, but one of the things that makes it interesting is that we talk about a lot more than ducks. And usually, with an exception here and there, we're pretty civil about things, even when we disagree.

Have a good evening.

Charlie
 
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