Wouter,
<br>
<br>I was in the middle of responding to your post piece by piece until I came to your statement: "Somebody once said: "we both have truth, is mine the same as yours?"
<br>
<br>I am taking it that you find some substance in that statement. Congratulations, you can now count yourself among the many followers of the German Philosopher Immanual Kant. His philosphies came to their greatest fruition in Nazi Germany. The notion that we can't know "reality" and that all things are somehow grey and "mystical" was the basis of the worst totalatarian regime in history.
<br>
<br>"I must say that I fail to see how freedom is harmed by this attack. I know it sounds great and mystical but honestly; a few terrorist can not in any way harm my freedom of speech and willingness to do so."
<br>
<br>(I'm so aghast by this statement that It makes me wonder why I am wasting the time discussing this with you.)
<br>
<br>It is for the very reason of your inability to understand how this WAS an attack on Freedom that your nation wasn't attacked and America was!
<br>
<br>The very reason America was attacked and not Germany or any number of other countries, is BECAUSE of the philosophic basis of our country, which includes freedom of speech. Anyone who thinks that anything less than the Rights of Man came under attack on September 11th isn't paying attention to the very words that the terrorists use to defend their actions.
<br>
<br>The very reason your own country is not presently under attack is because they've already won the war there...a nation of individuals like you could never stop an evil regime, you have gone down a philosophic road so dark and mind-numbing that you can't even recognize that a fight for freedom is required and that it would be worthwhile.
<br>
<br>As I stated to you earlier though, you're lucky, because most Americans will come to your aid and do the "dirty work" of defending freedom and you will continue to be "free" to post your idiotic diatribes that make feeble attempts to attach some moral equivalency between the United States and the Taliban. No such equivalency exists.
<br>
<br>"In his speech to the joint session of Congress, President Bush was emphatic when he said that demands on the Taliban were non-negotiable. Potential enemies and allies alike, who wish to impose conditions, insert limitations or determine the manner in which this war is waged, have been put on notice.
<br>
<br>Exactly what I'm talking about."
<br>
<br>EXACTLY - you just don't get it! There is RIGHT and WRONG in the world...what you seem to be doing is attacking some mis-guided attempts on the part of the United States to rid the world of a greater evil by utilizing a lesser evil as some sort of justification to take no action against evil.
<br>
<br>To be clear, personally I am for the unilateral use of force against the Talaban and their government of Afghanistan. I don't want our country to use bases in Pakistan or any other non-democratic country; but, I don't have the military intelligence to know what it will take to "get" Ben Laden and the government that harbors him, so I have to defer to our ELECTED president to make the proper decision in this matter. If I don't like it, I'll vote him out in the next election...you see - in America we don't accept that we are "innocent" from the actions of our Governement, we hold them responsible for their actions each election, and we are "responsible" for their actions as well.
<br>
<br>"Once again, WE are on the same side. I'm NOT in favour of the terrorists. I AM condemming the attack in the strongest words possible and I AM only using my god given mind to make this Quest to rid the world of terrorism (NOT WAR) an EFFECTIVE one where we eventually win more than we loose."
<br>
<br>What you don't get is that you are IN FACT in favour of the terrorists. Your words to the contrary are only at the end of a long list of ideas that our in line with "terrorist" principles. Your attempts to transfer the responsiblity for the initiation of force from the terrorists to failed US policies is ludicrous.
<br>
<br>Think about it: Ben Laden claims that the war on America is based in some part on the American presence in Saudi Arabia. If not for our requested presence there today, Saudi Arabia would have been acquired long ago by Iraq...who INITIATED force on it's neighbor Kuwait.
<br>
<br>**********
<br>
<br>I would like to end this thread (for my part) with the following very hopeful quotation:
<br>
<br>"...Those who do not grasp the ESSENCE of historic events cannot discover their relationship to similar but superficially varied events in other nations and eras...A dictator is not a self-confident person. He preys on weakness, uncertainty, fear. He has no chance among men of self-esteem. But in an age of self-doubt, he rises to the top: men who do not know their own course or value have no means to resist his promises and demands...Men cannot know their course or value without the guidance of principles. A nation does not learn from disaster - only from discovering its cause...A country with a philosophic base, freed from fundamental uncertainty and guilt, would not tolerate leaders who evade every choice, crawl down the middle of every road, and wait for the deluge. It would not tolerate any deluge by the waves of self-righteous, man-hating evil, foreign or domestic. It would not apolgize for greatness to the worshipers of weakness. It would not watch in dispair while its youth turned in despair to cults, communes, and coccaine...A country with a philosophic base would know it's ideals and it's direction: conviction would replace paralysis...Then the kind of man who loves his life-the kind who still feels hope and pride-the man who loves this country, would teach it to love itself...And then the country, and the world, would be safe...In 1787, one of the members of the Constitutiional convention, asked by a bystander what kind of government the framers were giving to the new nation, answered: "A republic-if you can keep it."
<br>
<br>**********
<br>
<br>Let's roll,
<br>
<br>ScaredyCat<br><br>