On Monday 25 October 2004 19:59, Z wrote: >Craig White wrote: >>Actually, I think Z is not an American. > >For the record, I am Brazilian, but acquired US citzenship this year >(without forfeiting my birth citizenship), >in order to be able to vote against that sociopath. >A very fine Brazilian diplomat died trying to help fix the > horrendous mess that The Srhub did in Iraq. >Sergio Vieira de Mello was there, facinf the danger, and paid the > price. The Srhub went in in out like a thief in the night, > literally. To deliver a plastic turkey. For photo purposes, it may well have been plastic. Very minor detail my friend. But it did wonders for moral of the troops because they, to a man or woman, knew full well just how much of a target the President of the United States would be to those zealots, whom we see as having a far worse case of "sociopath" than the shrub will ever be in his wildest west Texas dreams. I, like many others, do not feel as if the Iraqi scene has been played according to -the- script. Bush thought it was going to be a cakewalk, and found out those who follow Allah had other plans. In short, he way under estimated the power of the church in that part of the world, and still doesn't fully comprehend it a year+ later! But, let me point out that over the last 230 years, somewhere over 100,000 american lives have been forfeited in the name of this freedom we hold so dear. Your ambassador was there, in the face of the terror that probably kept him from getting a good nights sleep any night he was there, and did it because he was doing something he felt was the right thing to do, just like many of our all volunteer force are doing. You have lost a good man and I'll not argue with that, but we have now lost over 1000 mostly good men, and by all indications we'll lose another 1000, perhaps far more, before that piece of the world has peace. If indeed we can bring peace to a part of the world that knows only war on whatever scale the currently most radical cleric or strong man like Saddam decrees. The main difference I see is that here in the USA we have (supposedly, and I look for that to be re-inforced next tuesday in un-foreseen but loud messages sent by the size, and direction of the vote when its counted) a constitutional seperation of church and state, whereas there, the church naturally assumes it *is* the state, with freedom to commit mass genocide on those who don't follow the offical line from the likes of Al Sadre or whatever his name is next month after somebody knocks him off, unlike how we took Saddam out of power. He is still a functioning human being, eating, breathing and all that which normally defines signs of life. That, and damned if this doesn't look a bit like a modern day version of the Crusades from the so called Dark Ages. And if we do lose this one, all of humanity, including your beloved Brazil will pay the price by becoming slaves with c4 strapped to them, to be blown into pieces so small they won't be worth sweeping up, by the likes of the current version of Al Sadre. I for one wouldn't wish that kind of a world on my worst enemy, let alone you and yours, or my children, grandchidren and yes, great grandchildren, I do have a few of those too. If you don't want to help, thats your choice, and I'm fine with that, but you had better pray that we do succeed, regardless of whether a "shrub" is in the white house or not. Loseing what Bush seems to think is a minor skirmish in the desert is not something I want to contemplate. If you had a cancer, you would want it removed, and this is humanity's cancer. I don't think we are useing a sharp enough scalpal though, both the cutting edge and its guidance are too dull and slow, but the surgeon (Bush) somehow doesn't understand that it could be sharper, much sharper. His "I firmly believe" doesn't sharpen the knife for me... -- Cheers, Gene "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order." -Ed Howdershelt (Author) 99.28% setiathome rank, not too shabby for a WV hillbilly Yahoo.com attorneys please note, additions to this message by Gene Heskett are: Copyright 2004 by Maurice Eugene Heskett, all rights reserved.