My Son Died for Ramadi. Now ISIS Has It.

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Daily Beast:

Debbie Lee says she’s sickened that the city her son sacrificed his life defending has fallen—and furious at the Joint Chiefs chairman’s insistence Ramadi is ‘not symbolic in any way.’

Nine years after Marc Alan Lee became the first Navy SEAL killed in the Iraq War, his mother sat watching TV images of the black flag of ISIS flying over the city where her son died.

“Gut wrenching,” Debbie Lee said on Monday. “The sacrifices that were made, the blood that’s been shed.”

The city is Ramadi, and the mother had gone there herself in the year after her son was cut down in a ferocious firefight where he showed such courage that he was awarded a Silver Star.

His comrades had further honored him by naming their Ramadi base Camp Marc Alan Lee. His mother returned from her visit to the city in 2007 with some of its powdery soil in a clear plastic bag. The bag and its contents sat in her Arizona home as the news came that Ramadi had fallen to ISIS.

“That place where my son’s blood was shed,” she said.

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Perhaps a bit of anger should be directed toward the administration that unnecessarily sent U.S. forces into Iraq to begin with.

A violent despot the likes of Saddam Hussein had no trouble keeping the various factions within his borders under control. No al-Qaida, no ISIS, no Taliban to speak of. In that part of the world, where the “electorate” isn’t engaged in the Western sense, there really isn’t any other viable power structure up to the task. And experience has shown both the Russians AND the Americans that neither can just step into a power vacuum and “nation-build” at will. Bush had it and Obama gave it away? Bull! McCain was right that we’d need to be there in force for a hundred years, but he forgot to mention that once we finally left, it’d go right back to zero. Such FOLLY!

@Greg:
Lets see. Biden, Clinton and Kerry all voted to send in those troops. In 2010 Biden claimed Iraq would go down one of Obama’s greatest achievements. Obama called Iraq a success.

You just see the world in Bush colored eyes. It’s not good going through life in a fog.

@Mully, #3:

The White House built the case for a preemptive invasion of Iraq with Congress, our allies, and the American people by cherry-picking intelligence. They presented as factual information from sources both our own and foreign intelligence agencies had warned were totally unreliable. As it turned out, there was nothing to preempt. There was no imminent threat from Iraq of much of anything. The vision of a spreading mushroom cloud that Bush conjured up to scare the hell out of the American public had no basis in reality.

This is where had we known then what we know now comes in. If all information and opinions among our intelligence services had been heard by members of Congress, we probably never would have gone into Iraq. The case wouldn’t have been made. We would have stayed focused on al Qaeda and Afghanistan.

Are we really supposed to excuse that, and shift all the blame to the people the Bush administration managed to convince? To me, that sounds like part of the recipe for another serious miscalculation.

@Greg:
Your non answer shows your head is still in that liberal fog. HRC claimed to have done her own research before she voted for the authorization to use force in Iraq. Then we have Biden and Kerry both of which I’d say you believe are much smarter than GWB. The press spent 8 years telling us how dumb GWB is. So with that said I wonder how someone that stupid could fool all those super smart democrats into voting for war? By the way I don’t think GWB called Iraq an imminent threat as you are trying to “cherry pick” to make your point.
Ever hear Obama speak? He’s our new cherry picker in chief whom I’m sure you voted for. So would you say Iraq is a success as Biden and Obama claimed it would be?
You may not like how GWB handled the Iraq war but it surely was Obama who made a difficult situation worse by doing what was politically expedient and ignoring the military’s warnings and GWB own warnings about leaving too soon and creating a vacuum.

@Greg #1:
“Perhaps a bit of anger should be directed toward the administration that unnecessarily sent U.S. forces into Iraq to begin with.”

@Mully #3:
” Biden, Clinton and Kerry all voted to send in those troops.”

Aren’t you BOTH missing the most important fact? That it WAS a mistake to go into Iraq? Jeb Bush has at least ponied up to that much.
GW, Biden, Clinton and Kerry were ALL wrong… but we all know at whose desk the buck stops.

@George Wells:

That is one point, however there are others. Obama and Biden made a claim about their actions in regards to Iraq that are completely false. He has made things worse not better. The entire middle east is worse now under his watch. He didn’t solve or repair anything. As it gets worse all we see is it’s still Bush’s fault. As if Obama is helpless to do anything or anything he does if it turns out bad it’s still is not his responsibility. He gets a pass not matter what.
Obama was elected to clean up messes and all he has done is made more.

@Greg:

The White House built the case for a preemptive invasion of Iraq with Congress, our allies, and the American people by cherry-picking intelligence. They presented as factual information from sources both our own and foreign intelligence agencies had warned were totally unreliable.

I know you lefties love to claim that the intel was “cherry-picked” but that is as far from honesty as you can get, Gullible Greggie. The intel provided, at the time, was the best we, an the Brits, had at the time and your party went along with it.

As it turned out, there was nothing to preempt.

Hindsight is always 20-20. We can apply the same hindsight to FDR. Had the intel on Japan been accurate, Pearl Harbor would have never been bombed. But you will never hear a left winger unload on FDR for the faulty intel we had in the days preceding Pearl Harbor. For the left, the illusion of perfection in their chosen ones must be maintained at all cost. A practice you exhibit here on a daily basis.

You’re an idiot.

@George Wells:

GW, Biden, Clinton and Kerry were ALL wrong… but we all know at whose desk the buck stops.

And the fall of Iraq to ISIS, as well as the Syrian city of Palmyra, along with the disaster that is Libya, lands squarely on the shoulders of the man who currently sits at the Resolution desk.

There have been a few media reports when the Iraqi forces (those who didn’t run) ran out of ammunition in Ramadi, they resorted to what was left – beanbag rounds. And, we know beanbag rounds are not meant for combat. So, who is the chump now?

Certainly not Marc Lee and others who were killed in action, and the many others wounded. Nor, the many who served there.

I know you lefties love to claim that the intel was “cherry-picked” but that is as far from honesty as you can get, Gullible Greggie.

It was cherry picked. U.S. and foreign intelligence agencies raised serious doubts about the credibility and motives of critical informants, about the interpretation of information purportedly related to a continuing Iraqi nuclear program, and about the significance of al Qaeda contacts made with the Saddam Hussein regime. All of which was totally disregarded, and kept from Congress, the UN, and coalition leaders. Nothing that would raise doubts was allowed to become part of the decision-making process. It most certainly wasn’t allowed to become part of the public discussion.

The accuracy of pre-war intelligence has been exhaustively reviewed by the U.S. Senate’s Select Committee on Intelligence. They issued a 148-page report detailing their findings on September 8, 2006—a point at which Republicans controlled the Senate, the House, and the White House, whatever significance that might have. Their conclusions begin on page 105 of the document. Clearly there was significant doubt at the time about the accuracy of information that was used to sell the need for a “preemptive” invasion of Iraq.

People are simply refusing to acknowledge the fact that critical information casting doubt on the Bush administration’s public assertions was suppressed to further a neo-conservative objective that existed and was clearly and publicly stated before the Bush administration had even taken office: the removal of the Saddam Hussein regime. People want to ignore the existence of The Project for a New American Century, what its stated objectives were, and how many central figures of the Bush administration belonged to the group. They may have scrubbed their own website, but much was captured and remains available for examination in the Library of Congress internet archives.

Here’s a disturbing possibility: Democracy may not work so well in an environment where the populace is divided into antagonistic ethnic, religious, and tribal factions that have been at war with each other for centuries. It’s possible that the sudden removal of a dictatorial regime that imposed order through force might not have lasting positive consequences. Our own intelligence community warned the Bush administration of that likelihood. We removed the Saddam Hussein regime anyway, with little or no thought for what would happen afterward. Apparently the consequences we’re now seeing aren’t the fault of the people who brought about an ill-advised war to begin with, but of the subsequent administration for failing to keep what was predicted beforehand from happening.

@Greg –

I don’t know if you have walked the streets of Ramadi, or walked the roads of Anbar province. I have. @another vet has done his share of tours in Iraq. We know what it’s like. We’ve seen the bad scenes of war. By arguing the beginnings of the war, which you are entitled to do, does not change what has happened. It will not bring back anyone. What we are seeing now in Ramadi and elsewhere in Iraq, Syria, the larger ME, are the same mistakes that planted the seeds of WW1 and WW2.

If you wished Saddam had stayed in power for the sake of regional stability, then you forsake a people to a life of oppression. It’s saying they are incapable of living a life of freedom. Marc Lee and the many others who died in Iraq gave them that chance. It is not lost on the Iraqis of the opportunity we gave them. It is not lost on the Iraqis that we walked away, leaving them as lambs against wolves.

I’m sorry that Debbie Lee is in deep anguish. The loss of Ramadi says her son died in vain. He didn’t. She’s angry because we have given up so easily for the sake of expediency.

@David #12:
(and Mully)

“If you wished Saddam had stayed in power for the sake of regional stability, then you forsake a people to a life of oppression. It’s saying they are incapable of living a life of freedom.”

Take note of Greg’s explanation – AGAIN.
Taking out Saddam Hussein opened a hornets nest we cannot close. Hussein’s “regional stability” did not impose a life of oppression on everyone in Iraq – obedience of the law, however harsh, was rewarded with peace. The Iraqi people never had an ounce of appreciation of, or tolerance for a diversity of opinion, not then, not now, and certainly not if ISIS takes over. Living a “life of freedom” was never an option for the Iraqis. What some wishful thinkers in Bush’s administration hoped for – a Western style democracy – was never a real option in Iraq either. If we take enough of their lives (and bleed enough ourselves) we can temporarily contain their madness, but it will never go away. That was the dilemma that poisoned Obama’s options: he never had any chance of “Westernizing” the Iraqi people. No matter how many troops you put on the ground no matter where, the problem moves somewhere else, and more of them keep coming. Sound like Vietnam? It should. Both cases found an American president struggling to figure out how to withdraw without humiliation after a previous president had gotten his hands and feet embarrassingly stuck in this (or that) “tar-baby.” It’s a pity that so many American lives were needlessly wasted in both cases, but for the glory of self-sacrifice. But the World is now changed, and the clock can’t be reversed. It would be best for us to admit that we made the same mistake twice in the same lifetime, and stop meddling in this region we have so little understanding of. Maybe some day, they will welcome us the way Vietnam has – that country has been putting a lot of effort into attracting gay tourism recently – but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

@George Wells:

Taking out Saddam Hussein opened a hornets nest we cannot close.

While you ignore the mess caused by taking out Gaddafi.

Hussein’s “regional stability” did not impose a life of oppression on everyone in Iraq – obedience of the law, however harsh, was rewarded with peace.

Of course not. No oppressive government imposes a life of oppression on everyone. The oppressors are not oppressed. But then, you have to ignore the rape rooms, the mass executions in soccer stadiums, the men who had their hands and feet cut off, the throwing of people off tall buildings, the people who were rousted from their homes in the middle of the night never to be seen again, and last, but not least, the infamous prison system in Iraq.

The Iraqi people never had an ounce of appreciation of, or tolerance for a diversity of opinion, not then, not now, and certainly not if ISIS takes over.

Yeah, that explains all the purple fingers.

Living a “life of freedom” was never an option for the Iraqis. What some wishful thinkers in Bush’s administration hoped for – a Western style democracy – was never a real option in Iraq either.

Shall we compare 2015 Japan to 1935 Japan? How about 2015 German to 1935 Germany?

No matter how many troops you put on the ground no matter where, the problem moves somewhere else, and more of them keep coming.

Tell that to the boys of Normandy.

Sound like Vietnam? It should. Both cases found an American president struggling to figure out how to withdraw without humiliation after a previous president had gotten his hands and feet embarrassingly stuck in this (or that) “tar-baby.”

Ah, yes, the ever constant “Vietnam” reference. Just one difference; Iraq was moving into stability in January, 2009 and it took a Democrat president to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, just as it took a Democrat to make such a mess of Vietnam. Forget the inconvenient fact that the U.S. never lost a battle in Vietnam, and the war was lost on the streets of the U.S., fueled by people like John Kerry, Jane Fonda and the Communists in our midst.

Maybe some day, they will welcome us the way Vietnam has – that country has been putting a lot of effort into attracting gay tourism recently – but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Ah, yes, Communism is wonderful as long as it promotes queer tourism.

#14:

“Taking out Saddam Hussein opened a hornets nest we cannot close.”
“While you ignore the mess caused by taking out Gaddafi.”

You might as well mention that I also ignored alarming starvation rates among refugees, the disturbing uptick in reported cases of diseases once thought to have been eradicated, and the failure of Congress to address the illegal immigration issue. I ignored these issues and countless other ones because they are not the subject of this discussion. Coming from a master of pointing out the irrelevant, I take your criticism as a compliment.

“Shall we compare 2015 Japan to 1935 Japan? How about 2015 German to 1935 Germany?”

No we shall not. Both Germany and Japan sued for peace. They SURRENDERED. We unilaterally imposed the future on them, something we are in no position to do in Iraq.
Unless I missed something in the news this morning, nobody in Iraq has surrendered. The best we’ve been able to achieve is that our Iraqi enemies move out of our way when we come after them with overwhelmingly superior force. And while we were willing to nuke Japan, and implied that we could and would continue to do so indefinitely, we never were and still aren’t so “engaged” in the Middle East, not having the public support, the moral authority or the stomach to annihilate our enemies there. No, your comparison is once again as bogus as your other attempts to confuse irrelevant issues. Stay on topic.

“the war (in Vietnam) was lost on the streets of the U.S., fueled by people like John Kerry, Jane Fonda and the Communists in our midst.”

Just rankles you that ours is a democracy, doesn’t it? People like John Kerry, Jane Fonda and all of those other “Commies” in your back yard are your fellow citizens, and they get just as much of a vote and have just as much say in the course of events as you do. How stupid of your brilliant Republican War-Mongers to start wars that they cannot remain in office long enough to finish!

“Communism is wonderful…”

By any rational metric, Unified Vietnam and the people in it today are infinitely better off than they were during the decades of war that France and the United States visited upon them under the guise of containing Communism. Trade between Vietnam and the USA is flourishing (as is tourism) and the standard of living in that country is improving remarkably, now that we aren’t in the business of bathing their countryside with Agent Orange. Funny how historical hindsight bites us – and you in particular – in the hind quarters so often…

@George Wells:

I ignored these issues and countless other ones because they are not the subject of this discussion.

No, you ignore certain issues because you think that you should get to make the rules and everyone else must adhere to them.

Coming from a master of pointing out the irrelevant, I take your criticism as a compliment.

No we shall not. Both Germany and Japan sued for peace. They SURRENDERED. We unilaterally imposed the future on them, something we are in no position to do in Iraq.
Unless I missed something in the news this morning, nobody in Iraq has surrendered.

Right! And when Saddam was pulled out of his hidey hole, he fought like a tiger, right?

No, stupid. We destroyed the Saddam government, just as we destroyed the Reich. It ceased to exist. It was no more. And then, there was no government except for what we organized.

Just rankles you that ours is a democracy, doesn’t it?

No, what rankles me are morons like you that seem to think we are a democracy.

People like John Kerry, Jane Fonda and all of those other “Commies” in your back yard are your fellow citizens, and they get just as much of a vote and have just as much say in the course of events as you do.

People like John Kerry, Jane Fonda and all those other “Commies” should have been shunned for the trash they are. Instead, people like you voted for people like Obama who put a traitor, YES, A TRAITOR, like John Kerry in one of the highest offices in our land.

How stupid of your brilliant Republican War-Mongers to start wars that they cannot remain in office long enough to finish!

Yeah, it was really quite rude of FDR to die before he could finish off the Germans and the Japanese. Of course, since history is not your forte, you seem to have forgotten that the only war started by “Republican War-Mongers” was Iraq. WWI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam, all products of Democrats.

As to Vietnam, I’m sure a snowflake like yourself would be more than happy living under Communist rule. When can we expect your departure to the Communist Utopia of Vietnam?

Retire05 #16:
“WWI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam, all products of Democrats.”

WOW! What incredible, BEAUTIFUL ignorance!

WWI wasn’t a “Democratic product.” Democrat Woodrow Wilson did everything he could to keep us OUT of that War, winning reelection in 1912 with the slogan “he kept us OUT of war.” Germany did everything it could to draw the USA INTO its war, and when it finally succeeded, Wilson, the same Democrat who reluctantly took us INTO it, ENDED it.

WWII wasn’t a Democratic “product” either. It was initiated by Hitler and joined by Japan, both who did everything in their power to draw us into THEIR little World War. Like Wilson, Democrat Roosevelt held back – this time perhaps too long – with the apparent purpose of allowing the Nazis to exhaust themselves at Russia’s expense, and he took on Japan only after THAT country attacked Pearl Harbor. Roosevelt and fellow Democrat Truman both took us into AND ENDED WWII, something Republican presidents obviously don’t know how to do.

Unfortunately, the not-quite-ready-for-prime-time Truman came up with the so-called “Truman Doctrine” that expressed the importance of “Containing Communism,” a bit of intellectual mischief that snookered him into later getting us bogged down in Korea. Republican Eisenhower was critical of Truman’s Korean conflict, and campaigned on a promise to right that wrong. He got us out, but then went on to make the same mistake that Truman had made, this time in Indochina. The “Truman Doctrine” – that little bit of bad thinking – seemed to have compelled subsequent presidents of BOTH stripes to throw treasure and lives into the hopeless effort to contain an idea that doesn’t need to be contained. Republican Eisenhower morphed the idea behind the Truman Doctrine into his “Domino Effect” justification of getting us into what the French had already figured out was a hopeless cause. By the time Democrat Kennedy took the helm, the Vietnam “Tar-Baby” was engaged, and like Obama was later to discover, it is political suicide to appear weak in the conduct of international conflict. So Kennedy, followed by Johnson, followed by Nixon all escalated the Vietnam War, until finally Nixon threw in the towel and started to withdraw and disengage – something that Ford had to finish because, well, you know what happened to Nixon.

But your usual habit of grossly oversimplifying history to fit your bizarre agenda is in flagrante delicto this time.

I don’t find it all that surprising that a marginally literate octogenarian bumpkin in Louisiana can’t make the leap of logic necessary to put 2 and 2 together and see when he is dead wrong, but I DO wonder how someone such as yourself who DOES at least have the capacity to conjure up the occasional correct detail obviously lacks the intellectual GPS needed to discern that your position on so very many issues is far out in the boondocks of fanaticism and irrational conspiracy theory. What organic malfunction causes you to misevaluate so much correct information?
Or do you err intentionally just to incite a response? It does seem that way…

Case in point:

“We destroyed the Saddam government, just as we destroyed the Reich. It ceased to exist. It was no more. And then, there was no government except for what we organized.”

Uh, yeah, right. Except that this time, what we “organized” wasn’t worth a crap. Iraq isn’t Germany. Iraq doesn’t have talent for much beyond barbarism, the cornerstone of Saddam’s successful suppression of what blew up in OUR faces once we got rid of him. History will catch what you have missed – that Saddam’s box (the one he kept Iraqis in) was Pandora’s box, and we opened it. I’m wondering if we will ever stop paying for that mistake.
Nice vote in Ireland, eh?

@George Wells:

WWI wasn’t a “Democratic product.” Democrat Woodrow Wilson did everything he could to keep us OUT of that War, winning reelection in 1912 with the slogan “he kept us OUT of war.” Germany did everything it could to draw the USA INTO its war, and when it finally succeeded, Wilson, the same Democrat who reluctantly took us INTO it, ENDED it.

What an absolute piece of bastardizing history. The fact of the matter is that Germany was not in a position to hurt the United States (no ICBMs at the time) but Wilson, who claimed to be a “man of the people”, was playing to the Wall Street bankers who were on the hook for billions of $$ that we had lent the allies.
Wilson, like other Democrats, ran on a lie. He understood what was at stake (Wall Street money) when he was making promises to keep us out of WWI. But then the Lusitania happened, and he played on that outrage. His final lame excuse for getting the U.S. into WWI was the Zimmerman Note.

The cause for WWII can also be laid at the feet of Woodrow Wilson, who was not only a liar, but a racist, to boot.

WWII wasn’t a Democratic “product” either. It was initiated by Hitler and joined by Japan, both who did everything in their power to draw us into THEIR little World War. Like Wilson, Democrat Roosevelt held back – this time perhaps too long – with the apparent purpose of allowing the Nazis to exhaust themselves at Russia’s expense, and he took on Japan only after THAT country attacked Pearl Harbor. Roosevelt and fellow Democrat Truman both took us into AND ENDED WWII, something Republican presidents obviously don’t know how to do.

More fairy tale history. FDR wanted to enter WWII long before Pearl Harbor. Why do you think he violated the Constitution with the “lend-lease” program he gave to Great Britain? If we were not going to get into the war (which FDR wanted) why did he start building war supplies long before 1942?

I don’t find it all that surprising that a marginally literate octogenarian bumpkin in Louisiana can’t make the leap of logic necessary to put 2 and 2 together and see when he is dead wrong, but I DO wonder how someone such as yourself who DOES at least have the capacity to conjure up the occasional correct detail obviously lacks the intellectual GPS needed to discern that your position on so very many issues is far out in the boondocks of fanaticism and irrational conspiracy theory. What organic malfunction causes you to misevaluate so much correct information?

Gee, George, you seem upset. Is it because you understand that you don’t have the mental capacity to debate those that are so much more versed in history than yourself? So you resort to lobbing insults such as “marginally literate octogenarian bumpkin”. Coming from someone who has been bitch slapped so many times because you don’t know your butt from buttons is actually pretty funny.

Uh, yeah, right. Except that this time, what we “organized” wasn’t worth a crap.

Well, it was until Obama got involved. But then, and you profess your conservatives beliefs, you will defend to the bitter end the failures of Democrat presidents. Hypocrite, much?

#18:

“you will defend to the bitter end the failures of Democrat presidents”

LOLOL.
The Democratic administrations that got us into WWI and WWII won those wars.
The Republican administrations that got us into Vietnam and Iraq started messes that dragged on well beyond their, or anyone else’s capacity to win them.

What failures? Vietnam was a mistake. Iraq was a mistake. Who, again, started them? Republicans. You can’t see this? Why? Do you intend to blame all of this on dumb luck? Because that’s a pretty darned poor excuse for starting conflicts that you can’t stay in office long enough to finish.

@George Wells:

The Republican administrations that got us into Vietnam

Thanks for proving how totally void you are of historical events.

#20:

“The Republican administrations that got us into Vietnam”
“Thanks for proving how totally void you are of historical events.”

Not so, Sweetheart.
REPUBLICAN Eisenhower got us started in Vietnam, sending in “military advisers” in 1950. He stirred up the anti-commie pot with his famous “Domino Effect” speech, and his fellow Republican Joe McCarthy went on a hog-wild Commie witch-hunt. You probably think Joe was a hero… LOL!

There is nothing inherently wrong with communism any more than there is anything inherently wrong with capitalism, or socialism, or monarchies. ANY system succeeds or fails on the merits of its adherents, not on what they read in a book.

But I forgot. Everything in your world is either black or white, and the Democrats are responsible for ALL problems, and the Republicans are all saints.

I’m capable of owning up to the mistakes both Democrats AND Republicans make, you’re not.
I’m willing to compromise with members of BOTH parties to achieve some of the objectives of all Americans, you’re not.

And you accuse ME of distorting history? Incredibly, your #18 rant sounds like you object to our involvement in both World Wars. WOW!
I’m wondering if your preferred “solution” to the “Democrat Problem” isn’t to send them all back to Africa, like your preferred “Final Solution” to the “Homosexual Problem” is to send them all to Iran.

I wonder what part of the US Constitution you use to justify your rampant bigotry… or does it come exclusively from the Bible’s Old Testament?

@George Wells:

Not so, Sweetheart.

I am NOT your Sweetheart, nor am I your friend, your buddy, your neighbor.

REPUBLICAN Eisenhower got us started in Vietnam, sending in “military advisers” in 1950.

There were “military advisers” sent to South Vietnam in 1950, 128 of them to be exact. Except they were not sent by Eisenhower, since Eisenhower was NOT President in 1950. (oooops)

He stirred up the anti-commie pot with his famous “Domino Effect” speech, and his fellow Republican Joe McCarthy went on a hog-wild Commie witch-hunt. You probably think Joe was a hero… LOL!

Since I am aware of the Venona Papers, I am also aware, as are most historians who accept facts and not revisionism are now, that Joe McCarthy was more right than wrong.

There is nothing inherently wrong with communism

Really? So living in Vietnam, North Korea, Russia and Cuba is nothing more than a cake walk? You really are delusional, George.

I’m capable of owning up to the mistakes both Democrats AND Republicans make, you’re not.

Liar. Your entries on this thread, alone, disproves that. Frankly, I think both parties suck. The Republicans have no spine and the Democrats are nothing more than Socialists now.

I’m willing to compromise with members of BOTH parties to achieve some of the objectives of all Americans, you’re not.

And what objectives would that be, George, since you are a single issue voter?

And you accuse ME of distorting history? Incredibly, your #18 rant sounds like you object to our involvement in both World Wars. WOW!

Never said that, but then, you do have a nasty habit of trying to find new meaning in the words written here by others. You should work on correcting that.

I’m wondering if your preferred “solution” to the “Democrat Problem” isn’t to send them all back to Africa, like your preferred “Final Solution” to the “Homosexual Problem” is to send them all to Iran.

So you are saying that ALL Democrats have historic roots to Africa? WoW! You really do have a complete lack of historical information, don’t you? Oh, I know, you’ll come back and change what you said. But sorry, that horse has left the gate. And of course, you want to goad me into another senseless, useless debate about you queers. Sorry, not in the mood for that today.

Learn some real history, George. It will benefit you greatly.

#20:

“Sorry, not in the mood for that today.”

Glad to finally hear that coming from you, now that the rest of the World already beat you to the punch.
Your hate will die with you.

@George Wells:

Your hate will die with you.

Typical queer retort. If someone doesn’t agree with your sodomist life style, then there can be no reason except that that person is a hater.

Seems you are the one filled with hate, George. You ridicule anyone who doesn’t accept your mental illness as normal. That’s why all you queers are so angry. You know, down in the bottom of your heart, that you are mentally ill but you want to force acceptance on the rest of us.

It ain’t gonna happen, Bubba.

And I am anxiously waiting for you to give me another history lesson on what Eisenhower did when he was president in 1950.

#24:

I thought that you didn’t want to talk about homosexuality?

“And of course, you want to goad me into another senseless, useless debate about you queers. Sorry, not in the mood for that today.”

So what’s up?

I can understand why you WOULDN’T want to talk about homosexuality, given the way you get trounced every time you hate-monger against gay rights. IRELAND: 62% – in a remarkably HEAVY turnout – APPROVED GAY MARRIAGE!
Angry? Gays are ECSTATIC! EUPHORIC! LOL!
What on EARTH would gays be angry about????

No Sweetheart, I know that neither you nor I believe that I am mentally ill.
You’re CHRISTIAN, remember?
Christians don’t persecute the mentally ill.
You are Christian. Therefore, I’m not mentally ill.
We BOTH know that, “deep down in the bottom of our hearts.”

@George Wells:

News flash, Georgie; I don’t live in Ireland. It is far too socialist for me.

No Sweetheart, I know that neither you nor I believe that I am mentally ill.

I most certain do believe that homosexuality is a mental disorder and anyone who suffers from a mental disorder is, in fact, mentally ill.

You’re CHRISTIAN, remember?

So?

Christians don’t persecute the mentally ill.

No, they support getting the mentally ill the mental health care they need.

You are Christian. Therefore, I’m not mentally ill.

Sure you are, just like those who have other sexual disorders.

We BOTH know that, “deep down in the bottom of our hearts.”

What I know is that you are mentally ill, should be treated for your mental disorder. I don’t have to accept your mental illness is a normal human condition any more than I have to accept pedophilia (another mental illness) is a normal human condition.

Queer, or not, you’re still a a$$hole. But then, that’s because you know so much about them.

Hey, still waiting on that list of the other things Eisenhower did while president in 1950.

#26:

“I most certain do believe that homosexuality is a mental disorder”

Fortunately, your “belief” in this matter is a “deviant” one, an “abnormal” one, a “minority” opinion not held by the vast majority of Americans. As such, YOUR opinion doesn’t matter. It doesn’t influence the medical community, an authority on the subject that holds the opposite view: that homosexuality is a natural, albeit non-reproductive variation of the human condition. It doesn’t influence politicians, the vast majority of whom are concerned primarily with the opinions of the majority of voters that they need to get themselves re-elected. And it certainly doesn’t influence the courts, who have overwhelmingly agreed that most gays are law-abiding citizens who are NOT mentally ill.

I can’t help but wonder what informs your fantasy that gays are angry, in spite of them having such incredible success in their efforts to secure equal rights? What compels such bigotry to ignore the current consensus of the population, after having made the argument for so many years that the voice of the people is paramount?

“Queer, or not, you’re still a a$$hole. But then, that’s because you know so much about them.”

Thank you for acknowledging so clearly that you have no reasonable argument against gays or their civil rights. Your incorrect assumption about my sexual proclivities is a true and certain revelation of your profound bigotry.

Eisenhower sent military advisors to Vietnam.
But no, he wasn’t the first. Truman was.
They both felt that Communism needed to be “contained”.
And look at all the presidents after them who believed the same thing.
Were they all right, or all wrong?
In retrospect, it looks to me like they were wrong.

Regarding your CONFUSION over my ambivalence toward communism, let me explain.
There are good US presidents, and there are bad ones.
There are good communist leaders, and bad ones too.
It isn’t communism that makes them bad.
It isn’t democracy, or capitalism, or whatever you want to label us as being, that makes some of us – including presidents – bad.
Christianity isn’t bad. Some “Christians” are.
There’s a difference.
Give it some thought – maybe you can figure it out.
If you can’t, I probably can’t help you.

@George Wells:

your “belief” in this matter is a “deviant” one,

The only person in this conversation that is “deviant” is you.

I can’t help but wonder what informs your fantasy that gays are angry

,

You.

There are good communist leaders, and bad ones too.
It isn’t communism that makes them bad.

Are you out of your ever loving freaking mind? So there are those who subscribe to Communism that are just stand up fellows? Name them. Want to start with Putin, perhaps? Maybe Little Kim? Castro Brothers?

I probably can’t help you.

Your help, on any issue, is neither wanted or solicited.

#28:

Putin is a mess.
See what that says?
The MAN has a lot of problems.
RUSSIA has a lot of problems, too.
It has floundered under the “leadership” of a number of different types of governance, none of which have worked well because the culture is largely criminal. In this setting, communism cannot work any better than capitalism, socialism can work no better than representative democracy.

I view Iceland as an example of a country in which socialism works well. I spent two years there, and was repeatedly impressed by how well Icelanders did with their governance. They tended to be liberal, progressive, healthy (in spite of having a public health system and no PRIVATE hospitals or health “insurance”) and they take care of each other. They had a communist party, a socialist party, and a democratic party (among others) and none of them every gained a full majority, so that each successive government was a coalition that WORKED TOGETHER. They never had a congress that was crippled by a Republican Party that refused to compromise, and they never had much interest in what we consider “conservatism.”

There are a host of specific reasons why Iceland’s socialism works well, but the fact that it DOES proves that socialism itself isn’t inherently bad. Had Iceland opted for a more communist approach in their social contract, I have no doubt that they would have been equally successful. That’s because their culture is one of hard working, honest and caring people who basically lack the criminal instincts that poison Russia. Russia was bad off, rife with corruption and oppression, LONG before it became communist.

But you knew that. You just wanted to make pretend that “communism” and “socialism” themselves are bad, because categorically vilifying them and ignoring our own shortcomings makes your blind conservatism easier to justify. I may not bring to the table an overwhelming avalanche of irrelevant facts to swamp readers with, but I’m not stupid enough to think that problems are caused by ideas.
Problems are caused by PEOPLE.
Bad people.
Bad Russians.
Bad Americans.
Bad Muslims.
Bad Catholics.
Bad Jews.
Bad Texans.
Etc., etc., etc..