<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; "><BR><DIV><DIV>On Jan 28, 2006, at 7:11 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><BR><DIV><SPAN class="gmail_quote">On 1/26/06, <B class="gmail_sendername">Samantha Atkins</B> <<A href="mailto:sjatkins@mac.com">sjatkins@mac.com</A>> wrote:</SPAN><BLOCKQUOTE class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> <BR>How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry<BR>little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. The<BR>historical record doesn't make your case. Now, if we decide to<BR>declare an all out conflict targeted at one or more major religions, <BR>that would be a dangerous and foolish thing to do. Let's not go there.</BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><BR>Samantha, I agree with your points, sp. regarding the magnitude of the conflicts and how it would be undesirable to "make war" on religion. However, if you have been watching recent news programs on Al Queda it seems clear that they *have* declared "war" on the U.S. and that seems *largely* for ideological (faith) based reasons. <BR></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>Then they are very ineffectual to date. Why exactly are we making the entire world's politics revolve around one loudmouth relatively inconsequential group that once in a while does something really nasty but really is rather limited? We face things of much more consequence it seems to me. Thus I surmise that the terrorism is an excuse and that the "war on terror" is cover for something else. That Al Qaeda tries to wrap itself in religion says very little to support the notion that this is about religion. </DIV><BR><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV><DIV>As far as I can tell in my limited reading on Islam (mostly in Wikipedia) suggests there is a substantial amount of support behind bringing back the Caliphate. [I believe the debate over who the Caliph should be and what power/authority they have is a significant part of the Sunni/Shia split so it is already the source of significant animosity in the Middle East.] One could speculate that the entire debate over allowing Iran to develop the means for creating nuclear weapons revolves around the problem of allowing nuclear weapons to be under the control of irrational people (unless you view someone who claims the holocaust is a myth as a "rational" thinker). <BR></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>You mean like Bush and many NeoCon elements? I certainly agree there is a BIG problem with pro-Apocalypse folks wielding real power. But the scariest of those guys are unfortunately right here in the good old U.S. of A. This certainly is a very real danger. It is also a very real danger that the US economy is seriously out of balance. Economic instability plus over the top military superiority is a nasty and volatile mixture. My unhappy prediction is for an Energy War within the next five years. Underneath the "war on terror" are real concerns over energy and economics. Bush gave some credence to the energy part in his last speech.</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>BTW, I have seen studies that it would take Iran at least four years, even without inspections and such, to devise a fully operational nuclear capability. So what is this particular smokescreen about really? Personally I think it has more to do with the Euro based oil bourse they plan to open on March 20 than it does with supposedly nuclear ambitions.</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><BR><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV><DIV>The question would be how dangerous to transhumanist or extropic goals is someone having control over nuclear weapons, lacking the Pope's current scruples (mind you Popes were not always particularly scrupulous) and possibly wanting to regain a position of combined faith-based & political power which has largely been missing from the world for ~300+ years? <BR></DIV><BR></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>Do you really in your heart of hearts think that Iran, even if it had a few nukes, would be any match for Israel? Not a chance. So what are we talking about?</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>- samantha</DIV><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>