summary of opinions.

[grinninfoole]

I have been pondering my opinions about the current war for some time, and I have come to a few conclusions, one of which surprised me.

1) I don't believe that the US government is motivated by a concern for world peace, the safety of US citizens, or the suffering of the Iraqi people. These are fig leaves covering otherwise naked imperialism and greed.

2) I think that this war will trigger a wave of devastating terrorist attacks--some of which will be here in the USA.

3) Some of these attacks will come from home-grown assholes like Timothy McVeigh.

4) My vision for the foreign policy the US should be pursuing looks a lot like the prime directive from star trek. I don't know if these means Gene Roddenberry was a deeper thinker than I realized, or if I'm just a putz.

5) The Daily Show is the only news program I trust. And that's just sad.

Comments

[sydneycat.livejournal.com]

I sincerely hope you are wrong about #'s 3 & 4.

I know exactly what you mean about #5. John Stewart (wonderful though he is) should NOT be the person we turn to for our world news. We should be able to get it from watching/reading say "the news". Alas this is not so. I'm even getting sad about the BBC online. SIGH.

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

Why are you scared about #4 and not #2?

The International Herald Tribune also has its moments, as does Le Monde (though its a slow read for me) (they have a neat article on arms proliferation in their economy section right now).

One sight I haven't checked out much but which may hold some promise is the Tokyo Asahi Shimbun site, which even has an English edition.

http://www.asahi.com/english/english.html

[sydneycat.livejournal.com]

Ok...so I'm totally not feeling well today... I guess third time's the charm...I DID mean #'s 2 & 3. GRRR. My head is really fuzzy and I think I have a fever.

[macropixi.livejournal.com]

Sad isn't it. John Stewart is the only news anchor I trust

Re:

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

On the plus side, I added the Daily Show as an interest, and I discovered that I was the 1000th person to do so.

[crouchback.livejournal.com]

Considering how partisan and slanted pretty much all new organizations have become (if only to their corporate interests..although some of them *cough* FOX *cough* have political agendas), it's not surprising.

One of the things I like about the show is that it is properly skeptical of its guests, something lacking in most news nowadays.

And he's better at elicitng information for the public from his guests than most people. The interviews he had in the weeks after September 11 (where his guests included Richard Holbrooke and Fareed Zakaria) were incredible.

I've been impressed with NPR's coverage, which has seemed pretty evenhanded to me.

I was astounded by http://discover.npr.org/features/feature.jhtml?wfId=1199840, for instance, since all news coming from Baghdad gets vetted by Iraq's Information MInistry (and has for some time).

If you aren't reading Salman Pax (http://dear_raed.blogspot.com/), it's definitely worth reading.

Re:

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

I agree about the agendae of various organizations. What really steams me about them isn't that they have them, it's that they don't acknowledge them. Of course, I realize that if NBC, Fox, CNN or whoever were to admit "we're gonna show you whatever will keep most of you watching, so we can sell advertising" it might seriously cut their viewership, I'd at least respect the openness of it. I read Newsweek not because I think it's a particularly good news source, but because it's a handy little window into mass culture. (useful since I don't own a TV.)

NPR is better than some, though it has its lapses. I remember the BBC devoting some time back in 96 or 97 to a coup d'etat in the Central African Republic that NPR didn't mention at all.

Thanks for the tip about Salman Pax. Filthyassistant put me onto that only a few days ago. I agree that more should be reading it. (and how the hell does that guy get away with it? Are Saddam's hatchet men not screening the net?)

Oh, and I should add more generally that, now that we actually have started the war, I think we should win it as soon as possible. The only foreign policy worse than thuggery is ineffective thuggery. Since I feel fairly confident in the ability of the powers that be to accomplish that, however, I'm going to keep harping on the larger issue, that blowing shit up does not solve all our problems.

[crouchback.livejournal.com]

Salman Pax did stop blogging when Reuters covered him, feeling that the risk was too much. He came back when things calmed down. From his writings, I don't think that there is much computer savvy in Iraq, which probably makes it harder for the Mukhabarat to find him.

To be fair to NPR, the Central African Republic has coups fairly frequently (they had one last week, and I haven't seen any coverage on that from anyone!).

Yeah, I wouldn't mind so much if they stated their biases.

The Beeb is very nasty about people who want to end the telly tax, for instance. I can;t help but think that is because the Beeb would have to compete in the open market if the local constabulary wasn't forcing peopel to fork over the dough to keep them going. A little note when the Beeb covers the movement of people who are refusing to pay their telly tax that the Beeb gets funded bu that tax would make me like them better.

I agree with you totally that ineffective thuggery is worse than thuggery (although I think that's the wrong word.) You get all the resentment for using force, plus contempt for looking weak.

I also agree that we can't solve all of our problems by force alone.

I'm not worried about the outcome of the war, but the peace does worry me.

Omigosh

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

I just remembered: you're still in the armed services, aren't you? (I don't recall which one.) Are you OK? Are you deployed to the Gulf?

I hope it's understood, but just in case:
my problem with this war is with the people who have ordered it and their motives for doing so, not with the men and women who have signed up to defend the rest of us, and follow the orders of those lying bastards in office. I hope that you and all your comrades come home safe and sound. I appreciate your willingness to kill and die so that I can keep spouting nonsense on LJ. I hate that it might be necessary, and in the case of this war I don't think it is, hence my anger about it.

Thank you for your service.

M

Re: Omigosh

[crouchback.livejournal.com]

I'm not allowed to say where I am specifically, but I can say I'm deployed in a Coalition nation that is not in the Gulf.

It was totally understood...one of the things I do like is that people can protest. I've been slightly annoyed by some people (like the ones who chucked a rock at me while I was coming into work last week), but the vast majority of protest has simply been citizens expressing their right to dissent.

I'm very happy to be in a country where those who dissent don't have to hide out for expressing their views.

Thanks for your thanks..and thank you for being willing to debate intelligently. I think it's been sadly lacking from both sides of the war/anti-war continuum.

[crouchback.livejournal.com]

One thing I did want to say: from my viewpoint, even with all the biases in various media, the US public is being kept *very* well informed. Which is great by me.