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Snowball

28-Jul-2007
7:27:06 PM

On 28/07/2007 GravityHound wrote:
>
>i dont understand what is going on there but there was the thought that
>the US went in there so they could take it over and put a gas pipline from
>up north to the ocean. the taliban is a more legit 'enemy'?

Afghanistan is land locked, but if you are refering to the 1999 negotiations between the Taliban and the US regarding the explotation of the Caspian Basin oil fields and piping it through Afghanistan to a deep water port in Pakistan, negotiations broke down and Taliban told them to piss off. Kind of conveniant the 9/11 incident which they used as a pretext to invade even though the majority of the supposed highjackers were Saudis.
On a different note, Afghanistan will harvest it's biggest ever opium crop this year and now exports heroin produced incountry. Overseen by the corrupt government officials the US has put in place.


Zebedee

28-Jul-2007
8:30:17 PM

On 28/07/2007 Snowball wrote:
Afghanistan will harvest it's biggest ever opium
>crop this year and now exports heroin produced incountry. Overseen by the
>corrupt government officials the US has put in place.
Ahh cheap smack, at last.


BigMike

30-Jul-2007
10:43:32 AM

On 27/07/2007 bluey wrote:
>hey guys, the ombudsman is my mum, you could be a little kinder......

and you cracked a mention!

:-)

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/face-of-workchoices-takes-flak/2007/07/29/1185647743473.html


bluey

30-Jul-2007
11:34:59 AM

On 30/07/2007 BigMike wrote:
>On 27/07/2007 bluey wrote:
>>hey guys, the ombudsman is my mum, you could be a little kinder......
>
>and you cracked a mention!
>
>:-)
>
>http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/face-of-workchoices-takes-flak/2007/07/29/11856477434

Yes, life as a teenage girl climber is awesome in Canberra. I love to take walks with the PM in the morning. I have my own green and gold parachute tracksuit. I wear it while training at the climbing gym in Mitchell, before hitting my local crag.....Booroomba??
>3.html
>


gordoste

30-Jul-2007
12:30:15 PM

Left-wing strategy #1: Quote a bunch of loosely-linked, unsupported factoids and pretend it is a logical, factual argument.

Of course it's better than Right-wing strategy #1: Quote only sources that support your agenda, slander those who disagree and use the fears of your audience to scare them into believing you.


billk

30-Jul-2007
1:03:30 PM

On 28/07/2007 Snowball wrote:
>Kind of conveniant the 9/11 incident which they used as a pretext to invade
>even though the majority of the supposed highjackers were Saudis.

I don't see any reason to doubt that the hijackers were who the authorities said they were and that they were mostly from Saudi Arabia and north Africa. Militant Islam probably has its deepest roots in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, because those are the two places where it started. It was just the case that Afghanistan under the Taliban and Sudan prior to that were both sufficiently unstable to allow bin Laden to set up camp there.

>On a different note, Afghanistan will harvest it's biggest ever opium
>crop this year and now exports heroin produced incountry. Overseen by the
>corrupt government officials the US has put in place.

This is a crazy trade-off. Because Iraq is such a huge drain on funds and Afghanistan has been deemed lower priority, the US in particular is trying to fight the Afghanistan war on the cheap. Keeping sweet with warlords who are big players in the heroin business has been one way to try and do it.

Snowball

30-Jul-2007
2:12:12 PM

On 30/07/2007 gordoste wrote:
>Left-wing strategy #1: Quote a bunch of loosely-linked, unsupported factoids
>and pretend it is a logical, factual argument.
>
Sorry, would you like me to reference my sources? They would include pentigon reports, ex CIA operatives, ex British High Commissioners, documents released under FOIA, Colin Powell etc etc. But you summed it up nicely.

>slander those who disagree

Pull your head out of your own arse and stop believing everthing Little Johnny, Downer and Murdoch tell you.

On 30/07/2007 billk wrote:
>It was just the case that Afghanistan under the Taliban and Sudan prior to that were >both sufficiently unstable to allow bin Laden to set up camp there.

Wrong. The CIA through the ISI (Pakistan intelligence/secret police) funnelled $5.6 Billion into the Taliban and Al Qaeda to fight to Soviet occupation. Al Qaeda was set up and named by the good old USofA.

According to Ahmed Rashid, a correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review, in 1986 CIA chief William Casey committed CIA support to a long-standing ISI proposal to recruit from around the world to join the Afghan jihad. At least 100,000 Islamic militants flocked to Pakistan between 1982 and 1992 (some 60,000 attended fundamentalist schools in Pakistan without necessarily taking part in the fighting).


GravityHound

30-Jul-2007
2:26:20 PM

>On 27/07/2007 bluey wrote:
>hey guys, the ombudsman is my mum, you could be a little kinder......
>

can you pls ask your mum to explain how making me sign an AWA next time i go for a job at a uni is providing me with more flexibility.

flexibile - able to be persuaded easily. so the governments idea of persuasion is "if universities want their funding they must employ people on AWA's" or to a staff member (sorry, mushroom spigot) "if you want the job, you must sign this AWA".

i swear this government cant look at itself objectively anymore and think "now what am i doing that is p!ssing so many people off, that i can stop to improve our image and chances of re-election?". they think "we are the government and you will do as we say". just like stugang's sh!tty construct, this stuff sucks ar$e big time.....


billk

30-Jul-2007
2:46:30 PM

On 30/07/2007 Snowball wrote:
>On 30/07/2007 billk wrote:
>>It was just the case that Afghanistan under the Taliban and Sudan prior
>to that were >both sufficiently unstable to allow bin Laden to set up camp
>there.
>
>Wrong. The CIA through the ISI (Pakistan intelligence/secret police) funnelled
>$5.6 Billion into the Taliban and Al Qaeda to fight to Soviet occupation.
>Al Qaeda was set up and named by the good old USofA.
>
> According to Ahmed Rashid, a correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic
>Review, in 1986 CIA chief William Casey committed CIA support to a long-standing
>ISI proposal to recruit from around the world to join the Afghan jihad.
>At least 100,000 Islamic militants flocked to Pakistan between 1982 and
>1992 (some 60,000 attended fundamentalist schools in Pakistan without necessarily
>taking part in the fighting).
>

Interesting. The CIA made some seriously bad moves during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. No wonder Alexander Downer and the Murdoch opinion writers don't want to hear a word about blowback.


gordoste

30-Jul-2007
3:53:27 PM

Snowball, the "Right-wing strategy" I alluded to is the one used by Howard, Bush et al. And I certainly don't believe everything they tell me. Just because I criticise your argument doesn't mean I agree with your "enemies".

You are correct that the US foreign policy in the 80's included fighting the (significant at the time) Russian threat by arming the mujaheddin (Afghan guerilla soldiers). This was largely successful however had unforeseen long-term consequences (creating a network of organised militant religious institutions that are perfect for terrorist recruitment). I would have to question that Al Qaeda was set up and named by the USA... what is the source for that?

The latest in the news is that Congress is considering a proposal to sell arms to the Saudis to help mitigate the Iranian threat. The more things change, the more they stay the same.


BigMike

30-Jul-2007
4:24:33 PM

On 30/07/2007 gordoste wrote:
>The more things
>change, the more they stay the same.

Yup!


IdratherbeclimbingM9

30-Jul-2007
6:59:31 PM

On 30/07/2007 BigMike wrote:
>http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/face-of-workchoices-takes-flak/2007/07/29/11856477434

From the link above ...

One labor MP said re Ms Bennett
>"Obviously you only get such a leg-up if you give something in return."

...Political guttersniping at its best?

Snowball

30-Jul-2007
8:39:14 PM

On 30/07/2007 gordoste wrote:
>because I criticise your argument doesn't mean I agree with your "enemies".
Unfortunately they are the people that lead this country not my "enemies"

>You are correct that the US foreign policy in the 80's included fighting
>the (significant at the time) Russian threat by arming the mujaheddin (Afghan
>guerilla soldiers).
And training.
> This was largely successful however had unforeseen
>long-term consequences (creating a network of organised militant religious
>institutions that are perfect for terrorist recruitment). I would have
>to question that Al Qaeda was set up and named by the USA... what is the
>source for that?

As far as setting up, you have to look at the history of Al Qaeda. You have answered that yourself although the many groups that have since come under this umbrella were known by many different names.

As for the name it's self:
"'The US intelligence community used the term "al-Qaeda" for the first time only after the 1998 embassy bombings', he says, when suspected bin Laden followers detonated bombs at the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, killing 224 people. Dolnik says al-Qaeda was used as a 'convenient label for a group that had no formal name'."
Al-Qaeda: Casting a Shadow of Terror, Jason Burke, IB Tauris, 2003

Robin Cook, British Foreign Secretary from 1997 to 2003, will later say that “al-Qaeda” was originally the name of a database. In a 2005 article, Cook will write that bin Laden was “a product of a monumental miscalculation by western security agencies. Throughout the ‘80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda, literally ‘the database,’ was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujaheddin who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians.” Cook will give no explanation as to how he might know this. [Guardian, 7/8/2005]

Global Terror is a Con Job.

>The latest in the news is that Congress is considering a proposal to sell
>arms to the Saudis to help mitigate the Iranian threat. The more things
>change, the more they stay the same.

All the middle eastern despots are getting a hand out! Any Shiites getting weapons?


gordoste

31-Jul-2007
9:59:22 AM

You're correct, but to say "Al-Qaeda was set up by the US" is a little bit misleading, as it suggests that it was intentional. But as you say, it was a mistake - in fighting one threat, they created another.

Also, I may not agree that "global terror is a con job". It all depends on what you mean by "global terror". Although the threat comes from a variety of sources (they may or may not be immigrants, may or may not be part of a larger organisation), it is definitely global and is definitely real. If you mean that there isn't a single organised community of terrorists then I do agree. The problem is a difficult one for any government to face as there is tremendous public pressure to do something about it, but practical step is going to reduce civil liberty and cause some sectors of the community to scream loudly about police states. However, the invasion of Iraq was the wrong response. The only effective way to address the problem is to remove the motivations for people to dedicate their life to terrorist organisations - and there are many.


BigMike

31-Jul-2007
10:03:28 AM

I'd agree with much of what Gordoste says here.

As for "removing the motivations for people to dedicate their lives to terrorist organisations", I'd say one of the bigger motivations at present is the situation in Iraq.


bluey

31-Jul-2007
10:08:04 AM

I feel a nostradamus moment coming on and I'd like to make a prediction.....

So far in the last month or so, Chockstone has covered 2 of the 3 main conversation no-no's....religion (in the beleaguered "brunswick room for rent" thread) and politics (in this thread obviously).

There's only one taboo topic left....sex. And I predict a massive discussion on this subject soon.....probably in the "Who's got the biggest cam?" thread.


BigMike

31-Jul-2007
10:10:19 AM

On 31/07/2007 bluey wrote:
>I feel a nostradamus moment coming on and I'd like to make a prediction.....
>
>So far in the last month or so, Chockstone has covered 2 of the 3 main
>conversation no-no's....religion (in the beleaguered "brunswick room for
>rent" thread) and politics (in this thread obviously).
>
>There's only one taboo topic left....sex. And I predict a massive discussion
>on this subject soon.....probably in the "Who's got the biggest cam?" thread.

How about:

"If the Libs win and Howard steps down, we're going to be screwed by the Hillsong-attending Peter Costello?"

Trifecta!!!!

james

31-Jul-2007
1:04:57 PM


Eduardo Slabofvic

31-Jul-2007
2:00:46 PM

On 31/07/2007 bluey wrote:
>There's only one taboo topic left....sex. And I predict a massive discussion
>on this subject soon.....probably in the "Who's got the biggest cam?" thread.

Wadda bout drugs?

So from now on, in order to have your 1st ascent/red point/flash/pink point/head point/w@nk point
recognised, you will have to submit a urine, semen and stool samples........but to make it easy, you can
just give them your underpants.


anthonyk

31-Jul-2007
3:40:49 PM

On 31/07/2007 gordoste wrote:
>You're correct, but to say "Al-Qaeda was set up by the US" is a little
>bit misleading, as it suggests that it was intentional. But as you say,
>it was a mistake - in fighting one threat, they created another.

wweeelllll.... on the other hand you could say that they "created" them as part of their little game to chase the bad terrorists wherever they pop up and replace the standing government with a pro-western democracy. "created" in the sense that the period post 9/11 was very much dominated by bush, rumsfeld and buddies implanting the al-qaeda brand name on anything and everything in sight. as a marketing exercise the number of times the name al-qaeda was used was far above and beyond that necessary to communicate what was going on, it seemed a very much deliberate act to make the name firmly established, likely so they could use it as an excuse for anything they wanted to do. all part of their little "project for a new american century" http://www.newamericancentury.org/ .

..and no i don't really think that is michael-moore style p-p-paranoia, more like the best fitting description of what has been going on.

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