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<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000><FONT color=#000000>On July 5, J. Ford Wrote</FONT> (in
red):</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000>If the Iraqi people are amenable to allowing their
life-time enemy to come in and take over, who are we to say they shouldn't
be?</FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2>Do you really believe the
majority of the Iraqi people want to be under the control of Iran? Do you
really think it would be wise to turn over control of Iraq to Iran, giving
Iran the ability to pressure other OPEC nations? Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and
the UAE would be in great peril from such a formidable foe. Should these
other OPEC nations come under the control of Iran, either directly or
indirectly, it would put a great deal of the world's oil supply at risk.
This would likely result in collapse, or near collapse, of all the world's money
markets. </FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>OPEC controls 78% of the entire world's oil
reserves. Who, in their right mind, would advocate allowing such a thing
to happen? Who would just assume the majority of the Iraqi people would be
in favor of living under the direct control of Iran?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial> <FONT face="Times New Roman" color=#ff0000>The ONLY
reason we are in the area is that Bush's friends and family have oil interests
there.</FONT> </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><FONT face="Times New Roman"
color=#ff0000></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><FONT face="Times New Roman">Do you have proof of this
inane statement, or is it just one of your ridiculous, idiotic, groundless
beliefs? If you have proof of this, please be so kind as to share it with
the rest of us. Also, please inform the rest of us just how many barrels
of oil the United States is getting from Iraq at this time, or even in the
past. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><BR><FONT color=#ff0000>We have NO business telling other countries how
they should be run.</FONT> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>Using this sort of logic, we have no business interfering in
the civil strife of any of the African nations. We should just stand back
and allow the senseless slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent people to
continue. Many people believe we not only should make it our business to
intervene in such matters but in fact it is our OBLIGATION to do so. Did
you object to our intervention in Bosnia? Are you certain you really
believe what you are saying? Or, perhaps you would just rather let the
great United Nations handle it all. Using that strategy, by the time
anyone intervenes in any of these problems there will be no one left to
save.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000>Unless they are a confirmed and bonafide threat to the
rest of the world (which <BR>Iraq was NOT at the time we did this) then we have
no right to march in there and say "Do things my way or else."</FONT><FONT
color=#000000> </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>I suppose we could all argue for eternity about whether Iraq,
under Saddam, was a threat to the rest of the world. I would doubt that
Israel would agree with you, given the fact Saddam was financing sucicide
bombings of innocent Israelis. The ethnic cleasnsing of the Kurds and the
political killings of any who resisted, the imprisonment and torture of young
children....... the list goes on and on... </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>In spite of all this, let's assume, for the sake of argument
you are correct. <FONT color=#ff0000>Iraq was NOT a bonafide threat to the
rest of the world</FONT> at the time of our invasion. Assuming you are
correct in this assumption, let's consider if it is a threat to the rest of the
world now. If we cut and run, Murtha style, from Iraq and allow the
insurgency to force the rest of the population into a massive civil war, the
threat to the rest of the world should be obvious to even you.
</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>If you believe George W. Bush is guilty of war crimes for
invading Iraq, that is an issue for the ballot box and legal action. It
does not mean we should just pull out, leaving thousands, perhaps millions, of
innocent people to fend for themselves, knowing most of them would surely
die. Priorities dictate that we should deal with the problems as they
exsist right now, at this time. We can not keep bitching and whining about
the past while allowing the innocent to die in the present. Whether we
were right or wrong in our past actions, we do definately have an obligation to
millions of people not to just let them die now. Cries of "Bush
Lied!, Children Died! and other rhetoric are not going to help anything in the
present.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000>We would fight it if another country did that to us -
why should we be allowed to do it to others? The only reason we should come into
another area is if we are asked by the government of the country or if there is
a real, that's REAL, threat to the world if we don't. </FONT> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>Of course we would fight another country invading ours.
So would any other country, regardless of whether it was justified or not.
As I stated above, whether or not Iraq, under Saddam, posed a real threat to the
rest of the world may be debatable. If you don't believe it was, take it
up at the ballot box. Surely you are not naieve enough to believe for a
moment that any rogue government, killing its own citizens and exporting
terrorism abroad would ever ask another government to step in and straighten the
mess out. Once again, we must concentrate on the immediate problem right
now. The time to argue the rights or wrongs of the past must wait until
the present is secure.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000>Where in all that is written does it say "America, the
Babysitter of the World"? I always thought it was "America the
Beautiful".</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000><FONT color=#000000 size=2>Most Americans still believe
in "America the Beautiful". They are not naieve enough to start hating
their own country just because they disagree with their President or the actions
of their elected officials. Most of us still believe the United States is
still the greatest nation in the world. We laugh at those philosophy
professors who continually hold up some third world dictorate as the role model
for Americans, over their own country.</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000><FONT color=#000000 size=2></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV>As for America being the babysitter of the world, many believe the U.S.
should finance the world, or most of it, through the United Nations, while
giving up the right to have any more say in world affairs than any third world
nation operating under whatever rogue government they happen to be laboring
under at any given moment.</DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT><FONT size=2></FONT><BR><FONT color=#ff0000>Mayhap if
we were to stop trying to beat everyone over the head with our way of doing
things, the "third world" countries would actually get down to the business of
developing and we'd actually have new partners to do trade
with. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV>And, perhaps, if we just stayed home and let the third world countries
eliminate each other, kill off their own people through ethenic cleansing, and
figure out how to support their own citizens, using their own resources and
wealth, there would be no third world countries left to trade with.
Hey! Maybe you have hit on something here!</DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#ff0000>As long as we continue to carry the big stick of "I'm
right - you're not" we are going to just continue in the circle of
war/hate/intolerance that we <BR>seem stuck in.<BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>I</FONT><FONT size=3> just love it when people of your
persuasion speak of hate and intolerance. You hate the President, you hate
anyone who does not agree with you politically. You even transfer your
hate of others to your own country. You are totally intolerant of anyone
who believes differently from you and get totally millitant toward them.
Your spokespeople are misfits like Michael Moore or that poor pathetic Cindy
Sheehan. You accuse your own country for the problems of the entire rest
of the world. You carry so much guilt over being born an American you
can't enjoy the privileges and rights you have because of it.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT><BR><FONT color=#ff0000>Thoughts of a war-weary Vet
that has seen too much violence in too short a period of
time.</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>And you somehow believe the violence will just magically
end if we just cut and run and leave the innocent at the mercy of the
insurgents? Do you really belive there will be less violence if that
happens? Are you really that naieve?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" color=#ff0000
size=3>J :]</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><BR>Dick S.</DIV></FONT></BODY></HTML>