Betcha a paycheck there's a whole bunch of God-fearing-Republicans out there that are pro-choice. Or does that make them God-hating-liberals because they don't agree with your theologic views.

And how does 40 million LESS people (many that probably would have been on welfare) negatively affect Social Security? Oh, unless you're strictly looking at a loss of revenue. There's a great worth to put on humanity.

I swear some of you singing the battle hymn of freedom only see freedom as necessary to agree with your views.

skydriftin

I would bet cha that most of these BB Chest beater's and Knuckle draggers are miggets with a big mouse.

All you war mungers please wear a "I Hate Peace Protesters" buttons so that when I am on the water I can steer clear and avoid the potential of violence and ignorance that can spoil a good day of fishing.

Didn't someone kill Dr. Martin Luther King because he was a peace protester? When he was advocating freedom and equality for all American's, there were those that wanted him dead then too. Strange how easy it is to forget. He was advocating for the rights of a lot of American now fighting in Iraq... so many of you claim to support and love. Just hope that other Great Americans such as him, won't have their lives shortened by such stupid and misguided assassins, while they are working for peace.

When I see some of you with so much disdain for protesters.. it scares me.

People-

The point of my post was to bring up the fact that it appears most peace activists act as if blind to the fact that our government must act with aggression, in some cases, in order to react and suppress those who threaten the United States and our country's allies or interests.

How can these people think that every terrorist cell or militant group that hates the US can be dealt with peacefully?

Any one of these groups would jump at the chance to blow up a group of Americans, including a group of gathered peace activists, in support of their beliefs. People like this cannot be dealt with lightly.

I fully believe in our right to speak freely, and would support an activist's right to exercise that constitutional right, just as any other.

Skydriftin, there is a BIG difference between suppressing someone constitutional rights versus arguing that their heads are in the wrong place, and that they don't have a clue on how do deal with these groups of people.

I've been trying to stay out of this argument, but I thought I'd interject to point out that some people seem to think that just because others don't support the war effort means they're both anti-American and stupid.

I'd also like to point out that:

A - So far the Bush administration has _failed_ to link terrorist activity to Iraq. Whereas some of our 'allies' have aided Al Queda.

B - They have also _failed_ to find any evidence that Saddam has or was developing either chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons, or that they were any direct threat to the US whatsoever.

My opposition to the war stems from my cynacism on exactly why we are going to war with Iraq at this moment in time. Is Saddam a ******* who kills his own people? Yes. but there's lots like him in the world, and I don't see Bush mongering to go to war anyone else. Take North Korea, who is actually actively persuing nuclear weapons (and may have them already) and has the capability to launch them to the west coast via intercontinental missiles, AND has fired said missiles over Japan, which has the Japanese scared spitless to the point where they're actually starting to rebuild their own standing army. And they have CIA photographs of concentration camps and eyewitness testimony stating people are sent there to work until they die.

Why did Bush push us to war with Iraq? Why, to wag the dog by getting peoples' attention away from the rotten state of the economy at home, and finish the task dear old dad failed to mop up in the 90s. Do either of these reasons sound good enough to send American soldiers to die? I don't think so. This whole business is a waste of money and human life, and I'm betting that the US will be stuck with the cost of rebuilding Iraq once this is all over. I haven't gone out and marched in any street and blocked traffic or done anything else illegal. I don't blame soldiers for doing their job. It's their duty to carry out the orders that were handed to them. But I do blame the President for getting us into this mess to begin with. I sure as hell didn't vote for him, and I'm sure as hell not going to vote for him next time either. I'm personally hoping Bush Jr also follows his dad as a one term President.

Now can we get back to talking about fishing?

ARklier

I don't have time to dig up the links now. There was a story on MSN the other day where they found traces of ricin and some other poisen at one of Saddams facilities. There was another story I think I saw it on the Drudge report where they had captures Al Queda fighters fighting with the Iraqis. Then there was that terrorist group that had camps and was funded by Saddam living in northern Iraq. The information is out there, if you are interested in finding it.

Sorry I wasn't able to elaborate more I am waiting for my ride to go fishin. When I get back I will see if I can dig up some links to these stories.

Now, don't be thinking politics when you're out there fishing, Vic.

Good luck........

Arklier

Hal-a- Lou-yah! Can't wait until the majority of voters are allowed to have a president that they elected and not one that's appointed. Impeachment would be excellent but that is a long shot. It will be a Joyous day when we can cut our losses by watching him ride off into the sunset, side by side, with his pardoned Enron pal's and the tons of Oil & crime $ they preyed on us to get. He is a one termer all the way baby.

You don't get much farther right than the Drudge report, so let's shine a little relativity and fairness to all that:

There may have been al Quedas fighting in Iraq, lately, but there's also been Jordanian, Sirian, Pakistani, etc. The point is that the Arab Nations are all joining in to fight against the invaders.

They didn't actually find any poison in that captured area. They found documents and evidence that it MAY have been manufactured years ago. There is no proof that any has existed recently.

Again there is no proof that Saddam was actively funding any terrorist camps in northern Iraq. For example, the fact that Timothy McVeigh lived in the US doesn't mean he was funded by our president.

JohnLee.....you black? You sure like to harp on the race issue.....is it pertenent?

Sky-Guy, nice " spin" on the point of your post. Sorry , the intent was to advocate violence against people that have different political views. You can edit, backup, do an end run, whatever, it is clear what you were trying to accomplish. It does give some credence to Darwin's theory of evolution

Harley if you knew anything about the Drudge report you would know that his website is full of links to news storys from other news organizations around the world. But then again the whole world is conspiring with Drudge and we can't believe anything they have to say can we?


This is the Ricin story I mentioned earlier

Source: MSNBC
Article:Positive test for terror toxins in Iraq
Evidence of ricin, botulinum at Islamic militants’ camp

www.msnbc.com/news/895185.asp

Here is a story about a captured terrorist training base just outside of Bagdahd

Source: RAVI NESSMAN, Associated Press Writer
Article: Marines capture camp suspected as Iraqi training base for terrorists

www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/04/06/international1554EDT0566.DTL


Here is an interesting article that shows a link between AlQueda and Saddam through a former Iraqi intelgence agents who now heads Ansar al-islam. I doubt this is the picture of Osama and Saddam french kissing (don't you love the France reference) that most of the anti-war/anti Bush folks will want to see but it is interesting none the less

Source:WorldnetDailey
Title:dence links
Saddam, bin Laden
Iraqi intelligence agent liaison between Baghdad, al-Qaida?

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=29927


John Lee

If Bush gets impeached and he rides off into the sunset do you think he will be able to catch up with the other impeached President and his pardoned drug dealer friend?

Vic,

Interesting comment in the Ricin story - "The territory of northern Iraq where the traces of ricin were detected is not under the control of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein."

In regards to the Salman Park article - There is some real possibilities here, I notice the dateline of 12:54PM PST today. One thing I have noticed in reporting on this war, there is such a rush to get the "scoop", that facts sometimes get lost. I would agree that this site, more than any other found to date, might prove the link between Sadaam and terrorists.

The last article you cite is talking about the same location spoken of in your first citation. The interesting thing here is that I would hardly call the World News Daily a paragon of journalistic standards. They seem to play pretty fast and loose when they feel they have the "goods" on some left-wing scandal or their closely held belief that the media is under the control of a liberal conspiracy.

My fervent hope, as a patriotic American and one firmly opposed to this war is that we do find Chemical Weapons and a verifiable link between Sadaam and Osama. I hope that we do this with the help of the United Nations so that we can convince the majority of the Arab people that we were right to take this action. My biggest fear and the biggest reason that I'm against this war is that we are providing the inspiration for a new generation of terrorists. And unfortunately, they do not need tens of thousands of recruits, they need maybe a thousand to truly increase their power.

Eddie

There are several articles that parallel the World News Daily story. Do a search on Abu Wael and you will find a whole slug of them.

Certainly anyone opposed to the war would have to think that one of Saddam's former intelligence officers leading a terrorist group with ties to Al Queda is a little more than a coincidence.

Vic,

Thanks for the links; good reading, all. However, I read all war reports with a bit of skepticism because I think a lot of the reporters have lost some of their objectivity after traveling with the US Forces the last two weeks. That's in addition to what Eddie said above about the rush to get the scoop. Plus there's a lot of words slipped in there that go unnoticed, like "may be," "may have," "we think," "suspect," etc. What's often missing is fact.

That being said, one could just as easily explain away all the equipment at the Salman Pak site as a typical military training base. They mentioned nothing that Ft. Lewis or McCord doesn't have. We also have some pretty intense chemical and biological training facilities in the US, also.

Personally, I don't put a lot of credence on the information gathered by exhiled Iraqis. I'm sure they'll tell you whatever you need to hear because they've got an ax to grind.

By the way, you catch any fish today?

The war in Iraq is strange to me. I never heard any real evidence Saddam had any part in 9/11. Aren't we after him because he supposedly has "WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION" hmm, now given the "how to deal with peace..." concept, shouldn't Iran be defending itself? That's the only country I'm aware of who has been the recipient of the preverbal punch in the nose from Iraq, right? Or are we the police men of the world? But Iran doesn't want us there on their behalf. But what about the Kurds and Kuwait? Kuwait is now a sovereign country again and the Kurdish people our of the same country as there attackers. You can make an argument we should be there to defend the Kurds, I wont argue that. So what is the right answer? I don't know. What I do know is this, Iraq didn't invade our country, they didn't attack any US embassy, or sink one of our ships or assassinate our leader. I believe it's simply an unjust war.

I'm a peace activist. The problem I have with this war and war in general (beside a fundamental problem with killing other humans) is that in never seems to solve the problem. Here is just one of many examples. Israel has now had 50 years of war because they were awarded a country as reparations for war atrocities. The atrocities were perpetrated by a country at war because they were going bankrupt trying to pay reparations for a war in which another countries prince was killed by a guy whose ancestors were murdered and raped in a war 200+ years earlier etc. I'll stop here but I could run it back a great deal further.
And the peace activist are silly idealist?

I believe 25 years ago this would have been a secret CIA lead rajime change. It wouldn't have dared been made public because the American public never would have supported it, not without 9/11 and the spin campaign from the White House. Now we have a supported, unjust war.

regards,
Skeeter

Harley:

What would it take to convince you and the other anti's?

Went Sturgeon fishin today. We got skunked.


Skeeter:

First of all it was a war that gave all of us our freedom form a tyranical government. It was a war that ended slavery. A war stoped the senseless slaughter of millions of jews. Wars do solve things, the part you missed is that with every solution there is a whole new set of problems.

Fun5acres

Only trying to illustrate that peaceful protest was a major vehicle for civil rights and justice for a whole group of people that contributed greatly before it's inception(civil rights bill) and still do to this very day. A large percentage of our military is represented by the people that those protesters( Martin Luther King and the peace movement) were advocating for. I am sure that they don't want you(pro war mungers) cheering them on as they risk their lives while you sit behind a key board and advocate violence toward people that exercise these same constitutional rights that have helped them to gain their freedom.

Would you want these people to serve our country and still not be allowed to vote? The reason that it change was because people took to the streets in protest . You can bet that in those days there were guys just like yourself that hated protesters and some that would go as far as taking their lives because of their hatred and ignorance. Some wore sheets and hoods and couldn't go to the internet to rally the forces. This was long before Cyber hate.

I hope that you can now understand why bring up civil rights or race is important in a discussion about peace protesting in today's America. Use to be in the news all the time in the 60's and 70's. This was my first experience with a peace movement and continued through college and Viet Nam. After some investigating and research I educated myself to what their message was. In time it started to make sense to me and a lot of others who initially had no idea what all the noise was about. I see that now there is a holiday named in the honor of this great man of peace( Dr. Martin Luther King). How soon we forget.

To answer your question...believe it or not, there are whites that love what he stood for too!

fun5acres

Would I be correct in assuming that you are not black?

Vic,

I cannot be convinced that war is a good thing, but I agree it is a necessary thing at times. Right now I'm just not convinced this is the time.

If the US does indeed find credible, no doubt, objective evidence that Iraq was an imminent threat, then we are doing the right thing. However, all the evidence thus far has proven that we could have handled this better. A lot of people are pointing out that they've had 12 years to comply, yada yada yada. So what? So what if it took another 12? The entire time Iraq was under a microscope and couldn't fart without us hearing it. And imagine how far 80 BILLION dollars could have gone to beef up OUR borders instead of tear down Iraqs. That's not even considering the millions to keep the peace over there for the next few years; if we can. Look at Afganistan right now. We left a pretty big mess over there.

But if we can find some truely credible evidence, then this will be worth it. Evidently the 101st found a really suspicious site yesterday, and the labyrinth of tunnels in Bahgdad may just lead to the evidence. Let's hope so, so we can get on with re-building our foreign relations.

Found this a little later. It could be what we need, but it was a pretty fresh report without Command's verification:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. forces near Baghdad found a weapons cache of around 20 medium-range missiles equipped with potent chemical weapons, the U.S. news station National Public Radio reported on Monday.



NPR, which attributed the report to a top official with the 1st Marine Division, said the rockets, BM-21 missiles, were equipped with sarin and mustard gas and were "ready to fire." It quoted the source as saying new U.S. intelligence data showed the chemicals were "not just trace elements."


It said the cache was discovered by Marines with the 101st Airborne Division, which was following up behind the Army after it seized Baghdad's international airport.


U.S. Central Command headquarters in Qatar had no immediate comment.


The United States and Britain launched the war against Iraq (news - web sites) to rid the country of weapons of mass destruction. Iraq denies having such weapons.

I have mixed feelings on the war. I was under the impression we took action because we were 100% sure Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. If in fact he does, we know he's crazy enough to use them. If thats the case then I feel we did the right thing. That said, if these weapons don't exist(and so far it looks like they don't), then if I had a loved one that died for this cause, then war mongers like bush would find me hard to live with. As for liberating the Iraqi people goes, one American GIs life is worth more to me than the whole lot of them

Reuters
Monday, April 7, 2003; 10:25 AM

WMD found

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. forces near Baghdad found a weapons cache of around 20 medium-range missiles equipped with potent chemical weapons, the U.S. news station National Public Radio reported on Monday.

NPR, which attributed the report to a top official with the 1st Marine Division, said the rockets, BM-21 missiles, were equipped with sarin and mustard gas and were "ready to fire." It quoted the source as saying new U.S. intelligence data showed the chemicals were "not just trace elements."

It said the cache was discovered by Marines with the 101st Airborne Division, which was following up behind the Army after it seized Baghdad's international airport.

U.S. Central Command headquarters in Qatar had no immediate comment.

The United States and Britain launched the war against Iraq to rid the country of weapons of mass destruction. Iraq denies having such weapons.


Also:
Nerve agents detected in Iraq