Matt C will appreciate this...

[IFBBwannaB]

Your comments clearly show you're missing the point of my posts in this thread.  Your remarks seem as though you think I'm taking the Palestinian's side in the conflict or something.  I'm not.  My ONLY point here is that Israel pulls the "racist" card on anyone in the west who does anything they don't like.  Nothing more, nothing less.

I thought you were an advocate of free speech? Isn't calling him a racist or anything else is just free speech?

Besides, like I said before if he associates with terrorist who are admittedly racists and antisemitic is guilty by association. You wont go for dinner at a know KKK leader house and expect no one to form some kind of opinion on you when you come out don't you?

[Moosejay]

1) If I post a YouTube clip of me solving the Rubik's cube will people stop being mean to me? 

2) Who here can solve it? 

I am never mean to you...and if you can do that that is outstanding. I can't. Really, the world needs more high-achievers...there is enough chafe out there.

[dr.chimps]

I'd give anything for IFBBwannaB to stop being mean to me.  Can you help me?

No. He is a Sabra...and I have real problems, politically, with the state of Israel and how they do things (as I do with the U.S. etc.). Not the Jews, mind you, the policies.   

[Bobby]

Hi little bitch, 12K posts....you are living the life arent you? 

a problem?

[G o a t b o y]

I thought you were an advocate of free speech? Isn't calling him a racist or anything else is just free speech?

How is this a free speech issue?  I never said they don't or shouldn't have the right to say whatever they want.  That doesn't mean I don't have the right to use my free speech to call them on their hypocrisy in this case. 

Besides, like I said before if he associates with terrorist who are admittedly racists and antisemitic is guilty by association. You wont go for dinner at a know KKK leader house and expect no one to form some kind of opinion on you when you come out don't you?

Although they are a terrorist organization (meaning they target civilians in their conflict), Hamas is hardly a "racist" organization... they are combatants on one side of a decades-long war over land.  It's about land, not race. Equating them with the KKK is ridiculous.  And Carter wasn't hanging our having a BBQ with them, he was talking in an attempt to reduce the violence in the Middle East.  Saying that Carter is a "racist" for "associating" with Hamas in this circumstance would be like calling a cop a criminal because they "associate" with criminals while conducting investigations. 

[The Master]

Thanks, GH15.

So...just how far will Arabs go to see, as you say, Israel and USA disappear?

And please check my photos a few posts above!

A lot of people in the west would love it if the Arab world was nuked back to the stone age. 

[IFBBwannaB]

How is this a free speech issue?  I never said they don't or shouldn't have the right to say whatever they want.  That doesn't mean I don't have the right to use my free speech to call them on their hypocrisy in this case. 



Although they are a terrorist organization (meaning they target civilians in their conflict), Hamas is hardly a "racist" organization... they are combatants on one side of a decades-long war over land.  It's about land, not race. Equating them with the KKK is ridiculous.  And Carter wasn't hanging our having a BBQ with them, he was talking in an attempt to reduce the violence in the Middle East.  Saying that Carter is a "racist" for "associating" with Hamas in this circumstance would be like calling a cop a criminal because they "associate" with criminals while conducting investigations. 

If you believe its land only dispute than you need to wake up.
They are a racist organization that like to hide behind the land claims, I wont go into a debate about the lands because its a topic on its own.

A better way to compare it with cops will be a hostage situation and as you know negotiating with kidnappers/terrorists is prohibited in general.

Besides....on what authority is he going? He is the head of what office now?

[Zaphod]

Although they are a terrorist organization (meaning they target civilians in their conflict), Hamas is hardly a "racist" organization... they are combatants on one side of a decades-long war over land.  It's about land, not race. Equating them with the KKK is ridiculous.  And Carter wasn't hanging our having a BBQ with them, he was talking in an attempt to reduce the violence in the Middle East.  Saying that Carter is a "racist" for "associating" with Hamas in this circumstance would be like calling a cop a criminal because they "associate" with criminals while conducting investigations. 

I agree that Carter is not a racist for meeting with Hamas, but there's no denying there are racial issues in the Palestinian movement. They do teach their children that jews are decendants of pigs and apes etc. etc.

[dr.chimps]

If you believe its land only dispute than you need to wake up.
They are a racist organization that like to hide behind the land claims, I wont go into a debate about the lands because its a topic on its own.

A better way to compare it with cops will be a hostage situation and as you know negotiating with kidnappers/terrorists is prohibited in general.

Besides....on what authority is he going? He is the head of what office now?

As are the Israelis who take an undue interest in archaeology because it buttresses their 'history' and land claims. Don't get me started on the Israel's hypocrisy....or I'll be here all night. And I'm really tired. 

[The Master]

Israel = gonna be around for a long time.

Jews = smart and tough people. Arabs = dumb and dirty.

[whateva]

Every country in the world should have nuclear  weapons .   No more bullies = lots of diplomacy.

[240 is Back]

Every country in the world should have nuclear  weapons .   No more bullies = lots of diplomacy.

no way.  That's like a room full of crazy people who speak different languages and they all have machine guns.

[The Master]

Every country in the world should have nuclear  weapons .   No more bullies = lots of diplomacy.

Are you crazy? Some people ain't rational, like Islam fundamentalists and other dictators. Give shitheads like that weapons and you run a huge risk, because they are willing to sacrifice what they've got for some stupid fantasy.

[dr.chimps]

Israel = gonna be around for a long time.

Jews = smart and tough people. Arabs = dumb and dirty.

Hehe. Abba Eben noted that the Palestinians 'never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity.' Sad, but true. 

[whateva]

no way.  That's like a room full of crazy people who speak different languages and they all have machine guns.

Are you crazy? Some people ain't rational, like Islam fundamentalists and other dictators. Give shitheads like that weapons and you run a huge risk, because they are willing to sacrifice what they've got for some stupid fantasy.

Can someone name, the only country that ever used nuclear weapons ? Thanks in advance

[The Master]

Can someone name, the only country that ever used nuclear weapons ? Thanks in advance

That's a historical fact.

The key issue here is rationality vs irrationality at the present time.

[whateva]

That's a historical fact.

.

HAHAAAhhAA,   I'm Done

[Zaphod]

Hehe. Abba Eben noted that the Palestinians 'never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity.' Sad, but true. 

They are their own worst enemy. Although their allies in the middle east will defend them passionately, I've heard that behind closed doors they can't stand them.  

[emn1964]

They are their own worst enemy. Although their allies in the middle east will defend them passionately, I've heard that behind closed doors they can't stand them.  

What do they really have to bring to the table?  Nothing.  That's why their allies reluctantly defend them.

[dr.chimps]

They are their own worst enemy. Although their allies in the middle east will defend them passionately, I've heard that behind closed doors they can't stand them. 

Probably true. The Saudis love having them in their backyard because it takes the heat off of their repressive regime. It's like the fuck-up sibling that makes any error you make relatively innocuous and quickly forgotten.   

[The Master]

Hehe. Abba Eben noted that the Palestinians 'never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity.' Sad, but true. 

This is the same in many parts of the arab world, the whole civilization has declined. As Debussey wrote before, all of the Arab world (200+ million citizens) exported less merchandise than Finland (4million citizens or something) last year, if we look away from oil. They have very little going for them, little industry, and a shitload of an-alphabets. Only a few percent of the people in the arab world has ever used a computer.

This is part of the reason for the religious radicalization, that they have stagnated, and turned to religion instead, as said by some arab scholar recently.

So yes, you = correct there. They are locking themselves in with this Islam bullshit, when they should be out there improving their lives. Having no schooling or real work activity for women is NOT very clever economically speaking. Home makers ain't included in the calculations of GNP/GDP.

Spending tons of time teaching kids shit from the Koran instead of teaching them mathematics and other useful subjects is a killer for their economy. It might help support their hateful bullshit culture, but its not helping them economically at all, and as we know: Those who has the gold makes the rules.

If the average arab individual did more with his/her life in terms of education and economic stimulation, they would not be that backwards, and now they are instead being weak while becoming more and more hated by the world every day.

Hopefully, they will come to their senses, because as we know: Jews NEVER miss an opportunity

[G o a t b o y]

If you believe its land only dispute than you need to wake up.
They are a racist organization that like to hide behind the land claims, I wont go into a debate about the lands because its a topic on its own.

You could say the same thing of the Zionists who hate the Arabs.  It's perfectly natural to "hate" your enemy in a conflict, and if the opposing sides in such a conflict are of different races or ethnicities, it's natural that a lot of racial epithets are going to get tossed around.  That doesn't mean that at base the conflict is a "race" or "hate" thing.  This war is about land, period.  In the mid 40's a bunch of Jews with the support of the British and the UN moved from Europe to Palestine and displaced the people who were already there (the Palestinians) stealing like 80% of their land.  The only problem now is, 60 years later most of the perpetrators as well as most of the victims of that act are long dead at this point.  An Israeli today who was born in Israel has as much right to be there as a Palestinian who was born there.  That makes it a difficult situation all around, but to act like it's a "race" thing on par with the KKK is stupid.

A better way to compare it with cops will be a hostage situation and as you know negotiating with kidnappers/terrorists is prohibited in general.

So does that mean that since the US negotiated with North Korea on the nuke thing, the US ambassador that did the negotiating is now as evil as Kim Jong Il since he "associated" with him? 

Besides....on what authority is he going? He is the head of what office now?

He's a private citizen who is a respected mediator worldwide...  he doesn't claim to speak for the US or anyone else.  Since when does a private citizen need permission to meet with anyone? 

[MB_722]

Every country in the world should have nuclear  weapons .   No more bullies = lots of diplomacy.

I agree man

Give nukes a chance


Can the spread of nuclear weapons make us safer?
By Drake Bennett  |  March 20, 2005

KENNETH N. WALTZ, adjunct professor of political science at Columbia University, doesn't like the phrase ''nuclear proliferation.'' ''The term proliferation' is a great misnomer,'' he said in a recent interview. ''It refers to things that spread like wildfire. But we've had nuclear military capabilities extant in the world for 50 years and now, even counting North Korea, we only have nine nuclear countries.''

Strictly speaking, then, Waltz is as against the proliferation of nuclear weapons as the next sane human being. After all, he argues, ''most countries don't need them.'' But the eventual acquisition of nuclear weapons by those few countries that see fit to pursue them, that he's for. As he sees it, nuclear weapons prevent wars.

''The only thing a country can do with nuclear weapons is use them for a deterrent,'' Waltz told me. ''And that makes for internal stability, that makes for peace, and that makes for cautious behavior.''

Especially in a unipolar world, argues Waltz, the possession of nuclear deterrents by smaller nations can check the disruptive ambitions of a reckless superpower. As a result, in words Waltz wrote 10 years ago and has been reiterating ever since, ''The gradual spread of nuclear weapons is more to be welcomed than feared.''

Waltz is not a crank. He is not a member of an apocalyptic death cult. He is perhaps the leading living theorist of the foreign policy realists, a school that sees world politics as an unending, amoral contest between states driven by the will to power. His 1959 book, ''Man, the State, and War,'' remains one of the most influential 20th-century works on international relations.

In recent weeks, however, the spread of nuclear weapons has taken on what might appear to be a wildfire-like quality. North Korea has just declared itself a nuclear power. Iran is in negotiations with the United States and Europe over what is widely suspected to be a secret weapons program of its own. Each could kick off a regional arms race. And North Korea in the past has sold nuclear technology to Libya and Pakistan, while Iran sponsors Hezbollah and Hamas. As the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the backbone of nonproliferation efforts for the past 35 years, comes up for review this May, there's an increasing sense that it is failing. In such a context, Waltz's argument may seem a Panglossian rationalization of the inevitable.

Still, although heads of state, legislators, intelligence officials, and opinion columnists are nearly united in their deep concern over the world's nuclearization, the scholars who spend their time thinking about the issue are in fact deeply divided over the consequences of the spread of nuclear weapons, even to so-called ''states of concern'' like Iran and North Korea. Few among Waltz's colleagues share his unwavering confidence in the pacifying power of nuclear weapons. But plenty among them see at least some merit in the picture he paints. In part, the disagreement between Waltz and his critics is over the meaning and value of nuclear deterrence in a post-Cold War world. But it's also an argument over the motives that drive some countries to pursue nuclear weapons and others to want to keep the nuclear genie to themselves.

. . .

Waltz spells out his theory most thoroughly in the 1995 book ''The Spread of Nuclear Weapons,'' co-written with the Stanford political scientist Scott D. Sagan in the form of an extended debate. Updated and republished two years ago to take into account the nuclearization of India and Pakistan, it contains the same arguments Waltz makes today in interviews. Put simply, a war between nuclear powers cannot be decisively won without the risk of total destruction. Since the risk of escalation in any conflict is so high, nuclear states grow cautious. ''If states can score only small gains because large ones risk retaliation,'' Waltz writes, ''they have little incentive to fight.'' When fighting does break out, it is likely to be a localized proxy conflict like the Korean War instead of, say, a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. Nuclear weapons, he adds, even blunt the urge for territorial expansion, since they contribute far more to a country's security than any geographical buffer could.

Even Graham Allison, a dean and professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and one of the country's most visible nonproliferation crusaders, concedes some of Waltz's argument. ''There's something known in the literature as a crystal ball effect,''' Allison says. ''With a nuclear war, probably most of the people living in the capital are going to be killed, including the leader and his family, so it brings it home. You have a positive effect, and you can certainly see that in the India-Pakistan relationship'' since both countries acquired their nuclear arsenals.

Yet Allison-whose latest book, the widely noted ''Nuclear Terrorism: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe,'' was published last August-dismisses Waltz's larger linkage between proliferation and security as ''perverse, but nonetheless interesting.'' In particular, Allison argues, the time period just after a country goes nuclear-in the case of North Korea, the present moment-is the most dangerous. This is partly because nascent nuclear nations don't have the best command and control systems for their weapons. More troubling is that historically, in every so-called nuclear ''conflict dyad''-US/USSR, USSR/China, India/Pakistan-the first of the two to go nuclear came close to launching a preemptive attack to profit from its nuclear advantage. And the precarious hold on power of the government in a nuclear nation like Pakistan only adds to the volatile mix.

Even today's long-established nuclear powers, Allison points out, may owe their continued survival as much to luck as logic. John F. Kennedy himself put the chance of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis at one in three-odds, Allison notes, that are twice as high as those in Russian Roulette.

To share Waltz's faith in the pacifying effects of proliferation, says David Goldfischer of Denver University's Graduate School of International affairs, is to subscribe to a sort of ''nuclear theology.'' (Goldfischer is himself a proponent of what he calls Mutual Defense Emphasis-a proposed treaty regime in which nuclear arsenals would be sharply reduced and mutually acceptable missile defenses installed by opposing nuclear powers.) Waltz, Goldfischer charges, ''is utterly convinced that there's a rational core in every brain similar to his own, which will act somehow at the critical moment, and that no one will be able to reach a leadership position in any society who will make the potentially suicidal decision to launch when a massive retaliation is a certainty.'' And that doesn't begin to account for the possibility of an accidental launch or an attack by an Al Qaeda operative whose effective statelessness and hunger for martyrdom make him undeterrable.

John J. Mearsheimer, a political scientist at the University of Chicago and another preeminent realist thinker, describes himself as closer to Waltz than to Allison on the issue. Mearsheimer agrees with Waltz, for example, that nuclear states, no matter how ''rogue,'' are unlikely to give their weapons to terrorists. Whatever its sympathies, Mearsheimer argues, ''Iran is highly unlikely to give nuclear weapons to terrorists, in large part because they would be putting weapons into the hands of people who they ultimately did not control, and there's a reasonably good chance that they would get Iran incinerated'' if the weapon was traced back to the regime in Tehran.

''Any country that gave [nuclear weapons] to terrorists who would use them against the US,'' Mearsheimer adds, ''would disappear from the face of the earth.''

. . .

The problem of ''loose nukes''-in particular, Russia's inability in the years since the Cold War to keep track of all its nuclear materials-shows that even a country's strong interest in maintaining control of its nuclear weapons is no guarantee that some won't fall into the wrong hands, raising the threat of nuclear terrorism. Nevertheless, thinkers like Waltz and Mearsheimer, with their dogged focus on the calculus of national advantage and interest, raise a question that tends to get lost in much of the news coverage of proliferation: Do nuclear states like the United States oppose proliferation simply out of concern for their citizens' safety, or is there something more strategic at work?

In Waltz's formulation, nations acquire nuclear weapons not to menace their neighbors but to protect themselves. And to the governments of North Korea and Iran, the primary threat is the United States. ''If you were making decisions for North Korea or Iran,'' Waltz asks, ''wouldn't you be deadly determined to get nuclear weapons, given American capability and American policy?''

Seen this way, the near-term proliferation threat is less to our homeland-neither North Korea or Iran, for example, has the missile technology to deliver a warhead to the continental US-than to our ability to project power and shape world affairs. The United States, in other words, worries as much about being deterred as being attacked.

''The truth is that countries that have nuclear weapons will be off-limits,'' says Mearsheimer, ''which is why [those countries] want them.''

The more nuclear nations, then, the less leverage America has. According to political scientist Robert Jervis, Waltz's colleague at Columbia, ''We can't threaten to invade them. We even will have less ability to launch really heavy covert operations.'' Even our allies, should they go nuclear, will start to distance themselves, Jervis predicts. ''If proliferation were to spread to Japan, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia-they will obviously still need us, but not as much, and it reduces our leverage in that way as well.''

By this logic, one option for the United States would be to play down the importance of nuclear weapons. As Jervis notes, Washington's deep and vocal concern over proliferation only enhances the perceived value of such weapons. ''But we have overwhelming conventional superiority,'' says Jervis, ''and we'd be much better off if [nuclear weapons] were abolished. We should be saying they're not such a big deal. What has France gotten from its nuclear weapons?''

Ultimately, however, no amount of military might allows a country to wish away the Bomb. Whether or not nuclear weapons make the world a more dangerous place, they certainly make it a more humbling one, and their spread only narrows the options of the world's sole superpower.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2005/03/20/give_nukes_a_chance/?page=full

[IFBBwannaB]

As are the Israelis who take an undue interest in archaeology because it buttresses their 'history' and land claims. Don't get me started on the Israel's hypocrisy....or I'll be here all night. And I'm really tired. 

You should check your history books to find out who built Jerusalem.
The Arabs need to be thankfull that Israel didn't destroyed their buildings there over a long time, they sit over the land of the great temple. I doubt the church would care if there was a Christian holy place filled with people that throw stones and Molotov cocktails over Christian prayers in the next courtyard.

The digs are too good for them, I would love to see that place destroyed but it will rise too many pussy voices.

[IFBBwannaB]

You could say the same thing of the Zionists who hate the Arabs.  It's perfectly natural to "hate" your enemy in a conflict, and if the opposing sides in such a conflict are of different races or ethnicities, it's natural that a lot of racial epithets are going to get tossed around.  That doesn't mean that at base the conflict is a "race" or "hate" thing.  This war is about land, period.  In the mid 40's a bunch of Jews with the support of the British and the UN moved from Europe to Palestine and displaced the people who were already there (the Palestinians) stealing like 80% of their land.  The only problem now is, 60 years later most of the perpetrators as well as most of the victims of that act are long dead at this point.  An Israeli today who was born in Israel has as much right to be there as a Palestinian who was born there.  That makes it a difficult situation all around, but to act like it's a "race" thing on par with the KKK is stupid.

So does that mean that since the US negotiated with North Korea on the nuke thing, the US ambassador that did the negotiating is now as evil as Kim Jong Il since he "associated" with him? 

He's a private citizen who is a respected mediator worldwide...  he doesn't claim to speak for the US or anyone else.  Since when does a private citizen need permission to meet with anyone? 

Forget about your ideas about the land stealing, you are filled with hype and like I said I'm not touching it now as its too big for this thread.

Hamas hates Jews not only Israeli's, have you missed that?

You just awnsered yourself, Jimmy is a private citizen that want to go meet SELF PROCLAIMED TERROR leaders, he ISNT an ambassador talking to a leader of a nation in a formal and approved manor.

And YES he needs permission to associate with terror group leaders since he is a private citizen, or do you think anyone should be allowed to deal and associate with terrorists?