A 'Duh' statement by US army general

[bbchris]

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl...894231.stm



The US army's senior ground commander in Iraq, General William Wallace, warned that long supply lines and Iraqi guerrilla-style tactics had reduced the chances of a swift military victory.



"The enemy we're fighting is different from the one we'd war-gamed against," he told The Washington Post, in comments reported to have caused some unease in the Pentagon.



I thought that was a very silly comment to be making!

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[MIKE BURN]

[Phil Frazier]

Either he is stupid or he thinks the people his msg is getting to are stupid. Well, most of the American public is either stupid, ignorant or both. would they have been duped into this illegal invasion in the first place if they weren't?



This illegal war will bring dire consequences to not only Iraq but many cuountries.

Phil on Artistlaunch



Phil on 1Sound



IntoMusic.co.uk



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[RonOnGuitar]

<<This illegal war >>



Sorry, Phil, but that doesn't make any more sense than like meaningless buzz phrases lifted from anti-everything protestor placards. About as silly as the "no blood for oil" chant, since it also has no basis in fact. While you're certainly welcome to believe something like that, I think it is important to make the internal notation that is a personal opinion and not validated externally.



==Ron==

[RonOnGuitar]

<<I wish the whole world could vote. Stands to reason. If the whole world is going to be affected by one man's actions, then everyone should have a say in who that man is. There'd be no chance of him winning the next elections then.>>



Not a bad idea, Debbie - but do you think that Hussein would leave office that easily?



==Ron==

[RonOnGuitar]

Debbie -



I didn't see anything that indicated it to be "world opinion" at all, Debbie.



The only accurate thing that can be stated for certain from it is: people can go to a website and click a button (who knows how many times)!



I would find it odd to think that all of the Congo are voting at a U.S. mag's website, unless providing everyone with a PC has replaced clean water and medicine as a priority. The thought of the Mali or Zambian populace just itchin' to get a sneak peek at Time's "Person Of The Year" kinda gives me giggles.



==Ron==

[debbie mannas]

I dont know which countries responded to the poll, but what we've seen so far is that the opinions of millions of people outside of the US don't count.



If you can discount a TIME poll of 500,000 people from different parts of the world, 87.5% of whom say the US poses the greatest threat to world peace in 2003 (not counting the 200,000 discounted votes by "robot protection" software [not sure what that means ], then I'm not sure you should be believing any polls at all.



Anyway, speaking for myself, most people I know think this war is a farce.



But its your prerogative to go on thinking that people around the world think that the US is NOT a threat to world peace.

[Phil Frazier]

Accoring to International Law this invasion is Illegal. The Neo-conservs, neo-fascists, imperialst,warmongers of the USA will reap the whirlwind for this.



Does my statement mean that I am pro Sadam? No!!!



The inspections were starting work but the US regime didn't want that. They want regime change in order to dominate the Middle East and the oil.



I will work toward the Impeachment of GW Bush & Cheney.

Phil on Artistlaunch



Phil on 1Sound



IntoMusic.co.uk



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[debbie mannas]

Halliburton is making a killing, and I wonder if Cheney is making a killing alongside.



The whole thing sucks big time.



It amazes me how silent they are on Zimbabwe - Mogabe's attrocities. Also, they've been silent for a long time on Pakistan's sponsoring of terrorism in India. Its only now that Powell and Blair are speaking out against it and putting pressure on Pakistan. But now the attention has been diverted with the war and the terrorism has started again.



It appears sponsoring terrorism is alright for some and not alright for others. Unfortunately for the bush administration, people are not stupid. They can see double standards a mile away and have zero trust or respect for them.

[MIKE BURN]

In the main German news yesterday, it was reported in the first minute (8p.m.) that nearly 90% of the German population at least consider the USA to be the biggest threat to world peace nowadays.



The same number is true for people not agreeing with

this war.

[lasherite]

read the whole damned statement...not just the tv spin!! there were several more words...jebus, do you people believe everything spouted by paula on cnn?? open your fecking eyes.

[bbchris]

Lasherite, I know you're a former vet and that's why you get so emotional. It's good to hear from all sorts of people and various opinions.



Don't know who paula from cnn is though.....



I read the news online as I don't have a TV aerial - when I have tried to view video news from cnn.com, they ask me for pay a monthly fee so I've only been feeding videos from BBC & asian newspapers.



I appreciate this war forum that Mymp3board has created as it gives me another perspective on the sad situation in Iraq.

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[RonOnGuitar]

<<Accoring to International Law this invasion is Illegal>>



You're not being very specific at all, Phil.



*What* "international law" is that? *When* was it invoked by *what* recognized authority?



I think what ya got there is wishful thinking rather than anything tangable!



==Ron==

[RonOnGuitar]

Debbie, it's just that the "poll" doesn't validate the conclusions that you're drawing from it.



Look at two of your sentences here:

"I dont know which countries responded to the poll"

and

"a TIME poll of 500,000 people from different parts of the world"



!!blink!!(scratching head)



Either you do know or do not know who was responsible and where they're located . Since even Time couldn't make that call of "whom voted", then wouldn't you have to rethink making any like claims?



Also, you might want to become more informed on web-shenanigans. As Time noted, they caught 200,000 robotcast "votes", in geekspeak they;re called "bots". Time cannot even offer a guarantee that the vote tally isn't comprised mostly of bots that got through! This is just one reason why, if you look at the results page, the disclaimer is given that it is not at all "scientific". Fact is, with a bot kicking out 200,000 votes it would only take 5 bots cranked up to hit one million votes! So much for the vox populi!!



I know of many groups that launch well organised campaigns to rig such things so the outcome is to their preference. In fact, below an interesting recounting of how a group did just that with another Time "poll".



And I think that, even if it were true and it could be determined all of the earth's 9 billion people (or whatever, but it seems like the "poll" missed a few) felt a certain way, that it would make the anything right or wrong. In fact, I would opine doing the right thing is probably more often unpopular as not.



And,of course, to be consistent you would have to defer to all of the results of Time's online polls - and they've had quite a few of these "pont & clickers". Not something I would wanna cast in stone! Now, if effective web savvy shenanigans are seen as speaking for the entire populace of the world, then the few hackers who have brought down al-Jazeeras' website are making an overcoming statement on behalf of the world!



==Ron==



www.rediff.com/news/1998/aug/25dilip.htm



Say Hello, Or Click Here, To Support The Motherland



I heard it, yes. Not on my phone, I don't know why, but I picked up the phone at my in-law's home and heard it loud and clear: a metallic voice, may have been female once upon a year, saying a hurried, nasal "Vande Mataram."



Then the phone went dead.



OK, so it didn't. But that's not really so far-fetched a thought. In The Times of India on August 12, a hapless VP Unnikrishnan Nair of Mankhurd writes to say that "ever since I got the [phone] connection in June 1997, the phone has stopped working on a number of occasions." Below him, poor Blaise Miranda writes from Vasai that she "applied for a new telephone connection in February 1988" -- over ten years ago -- but "till date I have not received my telephone."



I noticed the letters from these two only because it was on just the previous day -- August 11 -- that I read a report titled "Telephones go patriotic to ring in Independence Day." That report first told me about what was called our "BJP-led coalition government's way of promoting patriotism": the metallic "Vande Mataram" on the phone.



Now you might think that if our BJP-led government wanted a "way of promoting patriotism," at least as far as phones go, that way might be to give us working phones. Or even just phones, working or not. Or even just that one phone Blaise Miranda applied for ten years ago, the one that remains a mirage, she says, because of the "corruption that has besieged the telephone department."



Instead, we get plastic patriotism. Leave aside the politics of it -- but have no doubt, making our phones sing out "Vande Mataram" was a decidely political move -- and think, if you will, about the strain of patriotism that was promoted through the phones. I tried. I was reminded, oddly enough, of the great Time poll of some months ago.



You remember it, surely. Across the wires of the Internet in the days following India's nuclear tests, a curious phenomenon spread its wings. It flitted from one Indian email account to dozens and hundreds of others, chain letter style. Also chain letter style, it might have been ignored and deleted -- except for one thing. "Stand Up For India!", it said, or words to that effect: words guaranteed to make you sit up, take a second look.



When you did, you found it was an appeal to visit Time magazine's Web site and vote in a poll Time conducts on the Internet every week. On May 12, the day after India's first three nuclear blasts, the question Time asked was: "Observers say that the testing of atomic devices by India was calculated to help India achieve power parity with China in Asia. If tensions between the two countries should seriously escalate, which course do you think the US should take?"



The options were "Support India", "Support China" or "Promote a standoff between the two."



Apparently, in the hours after the poll began, "Support China" opened up a massive lead in the voting. That severely distressed Indians. When I got the message, I read these worried words: " nderline">nfortunately China is leading at 69% of the votes to a low 28% in India's favour." This gap was the reason for the frenzied flood of forwarded email. "PLEASE take a minute, REGISTER your vote," the message went on. "[T]his is about winning the poll on US supporting India instead of China. Your single vote WILL make a DIFFERENCE. ... ENCOURAGE ALL your friends to VOTE NOW (SURELY TODAY). Friends, the public opinion battles rage on."



If that wasn't enough to spur me into mouse-clicking patriotism, another bit of email urged: "Support the motherland!"



As a result of these widely circulated appeals, the gap closed rapidly. By May 21, when I visited the site, "Support India" had charged ahead of "Support China", 52% to 45%.



Just what happened here?



There are several curious aspects to this whole episode. To begin with, the sentiment most evident after the bombs exploded was an overwhelming joy. That was particularly true of Indians with access to the Internet. One reason for that joy: we have thumbed our noses at the USA, we stood up to the bullies of the West! ("For once India showed a backbone. I am elated!" an Indian wrote from Arizona). In fact, we don't really care what the USA says or thinks!



Brave words, I'm sure. But why, then, the mad rush to influence public opinion in the USA? If we were thumbing our noses at that country, why were we so anxious to vote in a poll conducted by the largest newsmagazine there? We are desperate to "win" the "public opinion battles", but we also profess not to care what Americans think: what's the truth, really?

Besides, what kind of "victory" did India "win" anyway, if massive voting by net-savvy Indians did the job? What opinion did Time measure except that of a large number of Indians? All the poll proved was that in those frantic days, more Indians than Chinese clicked their mouse buttons at Time's site. Exactly what public opinion battle was won?



There's an Alice-in-Wonderland quality to all this. None of these voters, none of those who so feverishly forwarded the email message around the world, stopped to think: in what way does my vote here support India? What has India gained by this "victory"? After all, if India and China do come to nuclear blows tomorrow, it is hard to imagine Bill Clinton flipping through the electronic back-issues of Time, looking for a poll whose result will tell him what course he should follow.



Even if he did, what was all that again about paying no attention to what the USA thinks and does?



Not that the Chinese were any less frenzied. When I first visited the site, it carried a stern warning from Time that "robot voting" would be detected and disregarded. It explained that right after the poll went on air, there was large-scale "robot voting" that fattened the lead "Support China" established over "Support India". All those spurious votes had been discarded, but even so, genuine votes for China continued to pour in. "Somebody is holding up that side," Josh Quittner, the editor of Time Daily, told the Wall Street Journal.



So in the end, about 140,000 people -- presumably largely Chinese -- said the USA should "support China"; about 160,000 -- likely largely Indian -- opted for "support India." A miserable 10,000 miserable fence-sitters chose "promote a standoff between the two." "t may turn out," wrote Jonathan Karp in the Wall Street Journal, "that all [the poll] has gauged is the networking skills of the global Indian and Chinese communities."



The entire incident baffles. I'm fascinated by the vision of Indians voting solemnly in this poll -- "supporting the motherland", of course -- and then urging all their friends to vote in turn. Does the Indian diaspora, largely the source of the votes, feel the need every now and then to proclaim its "support for the motherland"? Is this patriotism, as awoken by the bomb?



If so, it also raises some more intriguing questions. Is Indian patriotism pumped up solely by such shouts of "support" for India? Is India improved solely by gestures -- like rushing to vote in a Time poll, like signing off email with "Jai Hind" or "Mera Bharat Mahaan"? Like, come to think of it, listening to "Vande Mataram" on our telephones?



Can patriotism go beyond those things? Are we interested in a patriotism that goes beyond such gestures? Do we have one? Do you want one?



Or is patriotism today best left to lifting a phone? To clicking a mouse and letting Time crunch some numbers?

[debbie mannas]

Ron, ultimately both sides can pull the same internet stunts, and ultimately, whoever can get the greater numbers will prevail. I find it strange that 87% cite the US as the largest threat to world peace. I mean the gap between the figures is just too huge, seeing as how the pro-war propaganda machine could've tried the same stunt.



I've never heard of the India vis China poll you speak about, and I wouldnt have bothered to participate if I had. But with an issue as weighty and topical as world peace, I'm sure all sides are bound to get their networks going. The same system that benefits one can benefit the other too. So where were all the pro-war types then?



In any event, if you watch or read most news stations (besides fox), it is very clear that world public opinion is against this war. Just as they say that the UK public opinion in the UK changed around when Blair put the troops on the ground. Yes, that got reported too. Where is anybody getting any of this information from?? Would you discount it all? In that case, why should we believe anything a bunch of lying thieving murderous thugs in the whitehouse tell us, just because they said so?



Whichever way you cut it, at the end of the day people are not fools, this is not an age when the public rely on only one source for their information (at least those outside of the US). When a picture is corroborated over and over again by several different sources, you'd have to really be brainwashed to not see through the BS.



And don't believe for a second that the people of Iraq are going to elect their next government. The US already are planning a puppet government, if not an outright occupation. I think that's going to be another mess, but we shall see.



The US has lost the hearts and minds of not only the Arab world. It's about time the whole disgusting terrible history of US regime changes that has resulted in the mess this world is in today was exposed. The only way we will ever have peace is if the whole US policy of interference in other nations' governments stops RIGHT now. And that includes arms, military training and financial support to pro-US govts.



The US demands that other countries stop supporting anti-US govts, well, it cuts both ways. In my opinion, all governments should stop trading arms immediately.



But where's the profit in that???



Anyway this is my opinion, and doubtless the opinion of a number of people who know about US sponsored regime changes. Feel free to cut it down.