[extropy-chat] urban sprawl as defense

[Samantha Atkins]

On Aug 24, 2004, at 9:52 AM, Stephen J. Van Sickle wrote:

> On Tue, 2004-08-24 at 11:31, Mike Lorrey wrote:
>
>> Don't worry, she had claimed that the Iraqi invasion would take 
>> 100,000
>> lives. The occupation hasn't even taken a tenth of that.
>
> To be fair, that was not an unreasonable prediction, had Hussein used
> chemical weapons and deliberately targeted his own people in an attempt
> to scare off the Americans, a scenario I don't find altogether
> improbable.  A variation of the Blazing Saddles strategy.
>

Funny thing about that.  At the time we sent in a military group to 
check out the scene.  They came back with a report that the symptoms 
shown by the victims were actually consistent with the kind of gas, 
different from that used by Iraq, that was in use by Iran.    The 
official story in those days when we were behind Saddam  and his war 
with Iran, was that he *did not* gas his own people.  I don't know if 
he did or didn't.  But I do know that we can't assert it is so without 
some caveats.


> A sound argument against the war before it started.
>
>> Government being oppressive is a very rational behavior. Being 
>> rational
>> does not mean being ethical, moral, good, right, or honorable.
>
> Exactly.  There are many good arguments other than "irrational".
> Instead, I just hear "Bush is dumb", "it's the oil", "conspiracy", etc.
> Why doesn't the opposition get to the meat of the issue?
>
> _______________________________________________
>

What exactly are you referring to?  And do you always refer to those 
who disagree with you as "the opposition"?

- samantha