Hypothetical in the extreme.

If picking my butt would cure the world of AIDS I would double my activity.

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"Jelly-belly gigglin, dancin and a-wigglin, honey that's the way I am!" Janice the Muppet

I think the questions then are "Is Iraq an immediate concern"? and "Are it's people suffering, and, if so, what does the rest of the world do? Do we do anything, intervene? Or do we let the country run itself?"

I suppose many would say "no" to the first question, and that sounds reasonable, but what about the rest? Are they even valid questions? I dunno and am searching for illumination on all this stuff.

(Picks his butt in an attempt to clear up his nasal decongestion.)

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Ham-fisted ham fisting.

Well, considering that much of the suffering comes from continuous bombings and sanctions that came after the Gulf War... So hey, how about the suffering in Sierra Leone? Maybe a full-scale invasion of Colombia? Sure, there's no oil involved, but it's about ending the suffering after all, not the oil.

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Please remember to spay and neuter your elected representatives.

Hypothetical in the extreme.

If picking my butt would cure the world of AIDS I would double my activity.

Sure, it's hypothetical, but would you? Under what circumstances would you support military invention - or are you against it altogether?

You know, I find it kind of strange that everyone's making such a big deal out of this. Sure, it's very important and all, but bigger things have happened with a fraction of the public comment. A letter-writer in The Herald today spluttered that this would be "one of the most contrived, immoral and evil wars in history". And I thought it was the journalists who were supposed to make sensationalist overstatements.

This war is supposed to be putting Tony Blair's position at risk. Polls indicate that Labour's vote has collapsed to put them one point behind the SNP. Labour membership cards are reportedly being torn up all over the place. Why did it take Iraq to make everyone come to their senses? Did 9/11 just make people interested in war or what? Why did we not hear such outrage when Blair was kitting out Suharto and Wiranto as they turned East Timor into Auschwitz? Was that not a far greater crime? I mean, at least the dictator's on the other side this time.

Can I answer these questions andy has posed when I'm sober please?

Maybe its time we all referred to John Lockes Second Treatise of Government and thought "Is revolution really a viable idea?".

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My nuts look disturbingly like cooking apples. Should I see a doctor about it?

Time for some hilarious relief.

[Click to view comic: 'I'm just a stripper of simple strips']
[Click to view comic: 'I'm not a real political man']
[Click to view comic: 'I watch Al-Jazeera']
[Click to view comic: 'But I'm not sure I can tell you what WMDs Saddam has']

I think these are the most politically measured comics I've ever made.

I have an answer to that but its not even half as funny. Too bad I'm gonna make you all read it anyway.

[ Posted comic does not exist ]

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My nuts look disturbingly like cooking apples. Should I see a doctor about it?

Not.

Enough is being done to stop America from being a democracy that I have no faith that Bush wants to install a democracy elsewhere. And why start with Iraq? Why not liberate other oppressive regimes, like Texas?

And speaking of beating down your own people, how about those snipers in NYC or the gas in Colorado? Are these for protection against American police or foreign nutbags?

Anyway, the question is so far down the list of possibilities I didn't jump to answer. I suppose my answer to military force is when attacked, defend and then stop. Especially when you're the baddest mo' fo' on the planet. It's not a matter of never having been outraged before. I thought Elvis Costello was just peachy for wanting to tramp the earth down on old Maggy.

It's just good to see some momentum building for once.

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"Jelly-belly gigglin, dancin and a-wigglin, honey that's the way I am!" Janice the Muppet

Actually I stole that last strip from the Simpsons.

It is really time that we all started questioning our governments about all these things that they are doing "secretly" or otherwise in "our best interests" and for the good of "international peace and safety".

How is our "freedom and safety" really achieved?

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My nuts look disturbingly like cooking apples. Should I see a doctor about it?

By silencing people like you who dare to question. Now where's my sniper rifle...?

I'll make it easy for you. I'll paint a target on my massive, paranoid head for you.

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My nuts look disturbingly like cooking apples. Should I see a doctor about it?

Thanks, but first things first. Where's that blasted sniper rifle??? I swore I brought it with me this morning...

I found it. I stuck it in my ass for safe-keeping.

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My nuts look disturbingly like cooking apples. Should I see a doctor about it?

[Click to view comic: 'At the Peace March']

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"Jelly-belly gigglin, dancin and a-wigglin, honey that's the way I am!" Janice the Muppet

Spankling, you need to get a real quote for your sig. I dunno who this Clemens is, but his "quip" sounds like a typical example of the assinine and offensive stuff that passes as wit nowadays.

A suggestion: How about something classic like this; "Often it does seem a pity that Noah and his party did not miss the boat." (Mark Twain, 1835-1910)

Huh? Better, you think?

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Ham-fisted ham fisting.

You had me going with the first paragraph, but saved yourself with the second.

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Please remember to spay and neuter your elected representatives.

I just finished a bio on old SLC AKA MT. What a wild life. That quote comes from a letter to a friend, not one of his books. It was one of his off-the-cuff comments, which is why I like it.

Not to ruin the book for anyone, but he dies in the end.

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"Jelly-belly gigglin, dancin and a-wigglin, honey that's the way I am!" Janice the Muppet

Reasons I don't use

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"Jelly-belly gigglin, dancin and a-wigglin, honey that's the way I am!" Janice the Muppet

Hm, this guy seems to oppose war on sort of libertarian non-interventionist grounds, which I don't think makes a lot of sense either. If there is such a thing as national sovereignty, I don't see how a dictatorship can have a claim to it. Saddam is already infringing the sovereignty of the Iraqi people.

I agree with Foxbat on most points of fact, and his historical viewpoint is basically that of a good Marxist, but I can't agree that the answer to an imperialist world is to be the biggest imperialist on the block. Maybe if you're George Bush, but not if you're one of us. Aside from being just plain deplorable, fascists have a way of subjugating not just foreigners but also the domestic population-- us. Witness all the Ashcroft crap these days, plus the ongoing attack on workers' wages and benefits. An ordinary American who finds he can stomach the idea of conquest would still have to ask himself if he benefits from it. I think the answer is "no."

Even if you are Bush or one of his friends, I think the course we're on is suicidal. That may be the only argument that has any chance of swaying them. You won't get far telling these bastards that it's criminal. They know it is.

Foxbat is a sort of fantasy of mine in that he wants war not for the (patently bullshit) ostensible reasons like freedom, self-defense, humanity, and so on, but for what I agree are the real reasons, all of which have to do with self-interest. (They still fail on that score.) Listening to Bush and co., I'm thinking that what they're saying is stupid, but they're not stupid, and their agenda isn't stupid. I mean they couldn't be that stupid. It's just that the real reasons (the ones that make any sort of sense) can't be spoken. Foxbat speaks them, or seems to try. Sadly, the viewpoint is too ugly to look at, and the whole thing has put me in a bad mood.

Andy, two points:

One, there is virtually zero-point-zero-zero-zero chance that the Bush administration would ever permit anything resembling democracy in Iraq. If they did, Iraq would instantly become an Islamist state. They are likely to replace Saddam with another Saddam, equipped with the willingness to (among other things) commit atrocities against the Kurds, just like our NATO friend and leading recipient of military aid in the hemisphere (excl. Israel and Egypt), Turkey.

Two, your average Iraqi under Saddam was not too bad off in the years before the first Gulf War. If we were overthrowing regimes on humanitarian grounds, Iraq would be on the list, but not at the top. As you point out, Indonesia is worse, and it carried out its crimes with full US support and approval. In fact, aid seems to flow proportionately to the worst violators, and we'll probably continue the trend in the new Iraq.

So your "what if" scenario remains safely in the realm of fantasy.

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What others say about boorite!

Can't recall anyone pushing the Swiss around. Must be all those pocket knives.

Or maybe it's that their foreign policy consists of mountains. Plus they worked for the Nazis. "Swiss neutrality" seems to mean they don't mind where the gold gomes from, even if it's the teeth of Jews who died in the ovens. Anyway, a country like Poland could never follow the Swiss's example of a prosperous neutral country, because it's too easy to roll tanks through Poland.

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What others say about boorite!

What, because there's a Shi'ite majority? Is that not like saying that a democratic Ireland would become a Catholic state? You don't seem to be giving the Iraqis much credit. If they're given control over their own affairs, they'll immediately renounce it?

quote:

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What, because there's a Shi'ite majority? Is that not like saying that a democratic Ireland would become a Catholic state?

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I don't get it. The US is full of fundamentalist Christians, but they haven't yet elected a non-secular government. Are the Iraqis just dimmer?

Not as full as the south and north of Iraq are of fundamentalist Muslims who are really sick of having the crap kicked out of them by Satan's minion.

That reminds me: I missed the Attorney General's prayer breakfast this morning.

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What others say about boorite!