TMF

You are excusing attacks from foreign governments due to policy decisions which "provoke" them. We fundamentally disagree there. We also disagree on your concept of isolationism. We cannot be total isolationists and expect that we will continue our standard of living or won't be invaded and overrun. Our isolationism allowed for evil to murder its way across Europe and Asia in the 30s and 40s. You think they would have stopped there? Are you kidding? If we button up like we did before, it would absolutely allow evil to flourish. We are the only country in the world with the power and moral fabric to stand in the way of evil. There is an inherent responsibility that comes with that. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

And might I add, there are folks, maybe a couple here on this site, who absolutely risked their lives by flying into enemy held territory in Syria to rescue those captured reporters. You think that wasn't an extreme risk? You think they all got back without a scratch? You think a single one of them wouldn't do it again for one American? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It most certainly is. They have land, taxes, borders, a military and government. They will continue to be a country for quite a while too. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yes. I would risk my life and the lives of all those I served with to avenge or rescue even one American held captive or murdered by a rogue regime. You try to measure this by amounts of lives and ignore the intangibles. The murder of Americans by foreign governments and extremists going unanswered only makes us look weak and invites that behavior from other regimes. The bully on the playground doesn't stop when he senses weakness; he is only emboldened by it. Plus, as a matter if honor, an attack on an American simply for being an American is an attack on all of us. You may not see it that way, but know that if it were you being held and awaiting slaughter, I would absolutely risk death to come liberate you. This isn't something measured in lives. If that were so we would look at everything from that perspective. Why go after Japan when they bombed Pearl Harbor? They only killed 3,000 Americans. How many Americans did we lose fighting them in the pacific? Lot more than 3,000. Why send hundreds of police officers to risk their lives for one hostage being held by a bad guy? After all, it's only one person; no need to put so many other lives at risk. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It is easy to say that if we had left Saddam in power the region would be more stable, but that is to believe we can predict the future. Saddam had invaded two of his neighbors in the 80s. He had two psychopathic sons who were lining up to make daddy look like a saint. The history of Iraq's leaders in the past 70 years is a tale of multiple coups and murder. If folks think that country would have remained stable if Saddam remained indefinitely they either don't know the history, political and ethnic makeup of that country or they're just being disingenuous. Saddam wasn't going to live forever, and the only reason he was able to hold that country together is due to ruthless tactics and a genius system of checks and balances amongst his military, law enforcement and intelligence agencies. He had them constantly spying on one another to detect potential coups and political threats. If one armed service came after him he had 5 more at his disposal. Once Saddam died or became to old to hang onto office (think Ghaddafi) the country would have split apart much the way it is now. There would be a civil war between the Sunni and Shia Arabs, and the Kurds would have held what they could in the north. But yeah, Iraq was full of rivers of chocolate, rainbows and gumdrop smiles before we invaded (to quote my favorite actor). Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Repeated murder of kidnapped Americans by that government? Is that not good enough? The Islamic State is a country. While I agree that putting boots there will solve nothing if their intention is to hold land, nonetheless, other countries should be held accountable when they commit extrajudicial killings of Americans. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I think it depends on what you're intending to use it for and get out of it. My wife dragged me into it when my son was born, and I love it for what I use it for. Having spent so many years geographically separated from the rest of my family, it is a great dissemination tool for keeping in touch with loved ones and sharing pictures of the kids. I know, the common response is "that's why I have phone and email", but back when that's all I had a hardly talked to my extended family at all. It isn't easy to stay caught up individually on so many people who you would otherwise see regularly if you still lived close. Between mom and dad, cousins, aunts, uncles grandparents and friends of the family, I'd be keeping up with 30-40 people. That's hard to do. I know because I've tried to do it. What happens is you grow distant. Emails are more formal than friendly and phone calls become forced and awkward. Once I got Facebook I've been able to keep in touch much more informally and naturally, just as when I was back home. Everybody gets to see pictures of the kids, I get to see pics of the family and what they're up to and we talk informally. I love it. Now, I get that many people use it as a way to document their meals, or make a big deal about how much they don't care about haters, but those folks can be blocked and unfriended. I'll admit, I accepted every friend request from high school acquaintances at first because I'd feel guilty if I didn't.... like I'd be snubbing them or something. I got over that quick. Of course, there are friends that probably complain about how much I post pictures of my kids and how they don't care, but they could just block me. I'm not doing it for them or to show off how perfect my life is and how much their lonely life sucks. Now that I've talked that through, I think I have a whole bunch of folks I'm gonna unfriend because we really don't talk. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  I think where I differ from the majority of folks, to include yourself, is I don't believe the errors were made with ill intent, such as increasing wealth or power.  I realize that is generally the goal of 99% of politicians, but I just don't believe it is the case here.  I believe there were good intentions, good being a relative term, which had a really bad outcome.  I reject the notion that Bush did this out of some kind of daddy related issues though.  I think that is a low blow that folks take because they're sore about having father/son presidents.  I don't like that idea either, which is why I voted for McCain in the primary back then.  He was a war hero, after all.   To believe that any action by Dubya against Iraq was motivated by efforts of his father, or the attempt on his father's life by Saddam, does not explain Bill Clinton's military action against Saddam's regime, does it?  Why can Slick Willy do it but not Georgie?  If you recall, Clinton is the one who sent cruise missiles into Saddam's intelligence service headquarters, killing a bunch of the very folks who were masterminding the plot against George Sr.  He specifically did this in retaliation for the failed plan.  In 1998, it was the UK and US (headed by Clinton) who said enough was enough with the stonewalling of UN/IAEA inspectors, right?  They bombed Iraq for days.  There are folks on this very site who were deployed to that region during that mess who were on standby to put boots on Iraqi soil.  I don't see Bush or Cheney's evil, oil grubbing hands on that, do you?   So why is it nuts that only four years later we started putting Saddam on notice again?  We hit him in '91, 93, 95 and '98.  Each time with a message from the POTUS to not screw with us and toe the line.  If you ask me, Bush gave more time to start spanking Saddam than his predecessors.  In fact, wasn't there some famous quote that Bill Clinton said to Dubya in 2000 on Clinton's way out the door?  Said something about Saddam is going to give him all kinds of trouble or something?     Just prior to upping the rhetoric on Saddam, the chief inspector who left Iraq in '98 had a lot to say about unaccounted for WMDs.  He later on decided to do a 180, perhaps because he saw how his words were being used, but the damage had been done.  Add to that the Iraqi exiles and defectors who were reporting on Saddam's WMD programs.  Granted, the veracity of these claims should have come into question, because these folks wanted the US to force regime change (and put them in power), but they were paraded across LIBERAL networks such as CNN and PMSNBC, which was enough to convince the American public that Saddam had WMDs and was violating the UN resolution.  I don't think Saddam was doing much for his case considering he was on record as saying he'd never allow inspectors back in.  By the time he decided to soften his tone it was too late; we had troops on the border ready to go.  Any President, even Obama, wouldn't have turned back at that point knowing full well that once the war dogs were back in their kennel, Saddam would go back to what he did best, which is ignore the terms of his surrender in '91.   Getting back to what I was saying earlier, regarding good intentions, I suppose that there came a point where there was no turning back for the administration.  A "now or never" time, and I believe the prospect of injecting a democracy into the middle east was attractive.  I remember a bunch of quotes back then regarding how democratic nations don't attack each other and such.  I'll admit, back then I would have felt the same; I believe I did.  The idea that a democracy could take hold and spread throughout the region would be death to radical Islam, and would reduce threat of terrorism and stabilize a region which has a huge impact on the market price of a barrel of oil.  It sounds pretty good, don't it.  Of course, back then we were ignorant of how things actually worked in Iraq, and the possibility of second and third order effects which would end up being the exact opposite of what we wanted.  I don't think anyone saw the insurgency coming until the gloomy predictions regarding the de-Ba'athification and disbandment of Saddam's army started to come true.  At that point it was too late and we had the tiger by the tail.    As far as the intelligence goes, I still refuse to believe that Georgie was able to pull the wool over so many people's eyes all by his lonesome.  There were a lot of folks; really smart folks who had access to the same information who had the ability to influence a decision.  Some of those folks were elected to the seats they held, and now try to wash their hands of blame because they claim that they were just going along with it so they'd not get destroyed in a reelection campaign.  The fact that you, or anyone else, could accept that as a reasonable excuse for authorizing a war in which thousands of Americans were killed is beyond my comprehension.  I'd rather have an idiot say he went to war because he had rose colored intentions than hear a "smart" person say they went to war because they wanted to get reelected, don't you agree?   More than most, I have good reason to be emotional about what happened there, and what continues to happen there as I type this.  I spent over three years of my life there.  I lost friends of mine.  I spent a lot of time away from my wonderful wife.  I met a lot of good people there who have met horrible deaths at the hands of ISIS, and even more who have been displaced and are living as refugees, with no hope of ever returning home.  So, I do have good reason to be upset about a few things.  With that, I yet try to be rational.  It is easy to assume there is good and evil, and to simplify another's actions as evil to solidify your opinions.  I don't believe that George Bush is evil.  While I've never met him, I know a lot of folks who have.  I could be wrong, of course, but I won't base my opinion on cherry picked information without considering all the other facts out there.    My opinions on the matter don't fit on a bumper sticker, and anyone who does has not taken the time to critically think on the matter.

Anyone else use a strap wrench for their buffer tube, or just me? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The assumptions I'm referring to would be thinking you absolutely know the intentions of the actors involved. Hell, as much as I despise Obama, I can only speculate as to what his intentions are. Could be that he really hates America or he is just that incompetent that he runs the country based on MTV polls. I don't know. You throw a lot of emotional stuff in there to suggest that this was nothing more than a Texan erection, avenging (?) Bush Sr., or a master plot to get rich on military contracts. I've heard all that stuff, but it can't be all of them together. Has to be one or the other. Which one is it? And to attribute that near-decade long abortion to the Bush/Cheney omnipotent criminal mastermind team, and ignore the thousands of military, intelligence, diplomatic and elected officials involved in the lead up to such a decision is disingenuous. I never thought Bush was stupid, but in order to be so intelligent and manipulative to have pulled off what you and others are saying would mean he is the smartest man ever, ever. I don't believe that. Hindsight is 20/20. I think it is easy to cherry pick certain information while ignoring so much quantifiable and intangible influence which led to the invasion to end up at a predetermined conclusion. There are still folks able to convincingly put together short documentaries on how Pearl Harbor was masterminded by our own government, along with 9/11 and the Kennedy assassination. I'm sure, given enough time, I can develop a compelling argument that the Canadian government is responsible for the downfall of the Detroit economy for the purpose of lowering property value in Windsor in order to scoop it up at a greatly reduced price and turn it into a resort town for government elite. All I have to do is leave out all the parts which are actually responsible. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I never thought I could make a joke that would go over your head. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sleep easy. I'm sure Eric Holder will be all over this once he has lynched... errr, aggressively investigated the shooting death of a low level criminal in Missouri. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

So you're saying that all other elected leaders, that were not George Bush or Dick Cheney, are not responsible for their own vote? Nope. I don't buy that. Each person had a choice. If they made their choice based on whether or not they could hang on to power rather than right vs wrong, it doesn't matter. In fact, I'd say it's worse. Bush isn't the only elected person with access to the intel at the time of the invasion. Unless Bush was such a mastermind that he was to manipulate every echelon in the CIA, from source handler to director, as well as all those folks in Congress who read the same reports as he did prior to invasion, I call BS. What I can't understand is at the same time people are saying Obama isn't solely responsible for our current status in the series of international blunders we've suffered, are also claiming that Bush/Cheney were solely responsible when they had more combined support from Congress, Americans and the international community (in 2003) than Obama has at any point in his presidency. I'm no mathematician, but I can see that does not add up to what you or the other people here are saying. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Bush is as diabolically genius as Cobra Commander. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I read a different article on this and the sooper-expert claimed that there is little chance these are LE for various reasons. Considering that many of these were detected near military bases and major cities, I'd say there are three main culprits to look at: domestic intelligence; foreign intelligence; identity thieves. Take your pick, or perhaps it's a combination of two or three. Either that or some folks are turning on equipment they're not supposed to while in the US and its territories. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I never cared for her anti-Semitic jokes. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Have you ever met a criminal before? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

What's your point? This drunk driver is innocent simply because he says he is? He pled guilty. Case closed. He's a grown man who made a choice, not his lawyers. He is not a man if he whines about living with the choices HE made and blames them on someone else, end of story. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sounds like a lot of assumptions which have been made. Bush didn't generate intelligence. If the administration gets intelligence reports which are bad, yet presented as good, they can only make choices based on that. For as much as Bush has been made out to be an idiot, for him to accomplish this massive operation and manipulate the whole of the intelligence community is either unlikely, or Bush is the smartest guy ever. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Well in that case let's empty all the prisons! They all must be innocent, right? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

There is no information in the story. Bringing up that the officer could have lied, simply because it could happen, is to negate testimony of all law enforcement everywhere all throughout history. Yes, the officer could have lied. In a parallel universe the officer might be a potato. I don't see how there is any evidence to make that argument relevant. Also, on the surface of this, I'd be more apt to take the word of a law enforcement officer, sight unseen, than a crazy man carrying a shotgun through the streets and hollering obscenities. But that's just me. I base my judgement on a wealth of experience dealing with dishonest people. The thing that makes all of this moot to me is that he pled guilty to a crime. One might argue that he took a plea deal because he was facing a more serious charge and hedged his bets. That doesn't matter. It is still your word before God and men. If you are willing to give false testimony, your word means nothing. So, he either committed the offense he pled to, or he is a man whose word means nothing. Either way, he remains at fault. Perhaps this is just me, but I will never admit to doing something I didn't do. I don't care what the stakes are. If there are folks willing to do that, then that is their problem. I refuse to feel sorry for them. We all get to make choices. He made his. So **** him. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Says you. I believe it depends on where you work and what art we're talking about. If a guy shows up to a job interview for a factory position and he's got a Mike Tyson face tattoo, I'm going to question his ability to make well thought out decisions. I'm not going to hire that person when there is someone comparably qualified that presents a more mature and professional appearance. Likewise, I doubt that if I went to biker bar or hipster joint to look for a job and I came dressed as if I walked off the set of Ozzie & Harriet they'd be looking to hire me. Most friends I have and folks I work with are tattooed. Many with visible tats (sleeves/forearms). I don't think twice about it and neither does anyone else. I suppose if they went to interview at a toddler daycare though, their tats would be noticed. This is reality, and folks who make the choice to have visible body art must realize that they are potentially compromising certain opportunities when they do that. That's up to the individual to decide, but I think it is absolutely preposterous to place blame on the business for considering visible body art during the hiring process. We all make choices, and we are beholden to those choices. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If he was innocent then he shouldn't have pled guilty. Whether or not he was drunk, he is the one who pled to reckless driving. He said he wanted the officer fired for arresting him for being drunk. He failed a sobriety test and the officer smelled alcohol on him. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that is enough to meet the criteria for an arrest, so the officer did his job properly. The article doesn't mention why he wasn't given a breathalyzer. For all we know he refused to. Either way, he admitted guilt in front of a judge and that is why he lost his pilot's license. He has no one but himself to blame. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Typical whiny American cry baby; he is absolutely responsible for the negative ramifications of his actions, yet he blames everyone else but himself. Wants a cop to be fired for arresting him for driving drunk? C'mon. I'm tired of hearing people complain about the circumstances THEY created. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Hindsight is 20/20. Granted, many in the intelligence community predicted Iraq fracturing into three states with a lack of a strong central government, but what are the opinions of a few experts over a President and the majority if Congress? Now, while we fault Bush for Iraq, let's not forget that he had the support of Congress and a majority of Americans at the time he invaded. Obama has neither. In fact, he tried dragging us into Syria last year when there was an overwhelming lack of support from the plebeians, republicans and democrats. I can fault Obama for doing the exact opposite of what Americans and Congress want. He would be solely responsible in that case. I don't see how folks can place so much blame on Bush when there was such an overwhelming support for the course of action he took. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sure, he can think that all he wants. It seems to make him feel better about being broke and dependent on mommy. Point is, I could care less if someone had a penis tattooed I their face. I just think it's ridiculous that folks believe the rest of society should conform to them when they are in no position to require things of other people. A business doesn't have to hire you. If you do something to your outward appearance that is perceived to be unprofessional, whether you interact regularly with customers or not, I would not hire you. A lot of folks feel that way. That doesn't make them ignorant. That makes them more concerned with their business than the feelings of someone who would rather "express himself" than be employed. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk