RCT2 Questions

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TeknoScorpion said:
and this, btw, is all hypothetical

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Are you sure it is?

Or are you an Australian spy finding out information ;)

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Jeff said:
Can you show me where Kerry said he'd raise taxes for people that "sit on their ass all day?" I missed that in his campaign speeches.

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That's what democrats do. Taxes for middle class are supposed to go up to 45% for middle class and up to 70% for People who make over 500,000 a year. Most people don't make that much so it doesn't affect them. But still that is NOT right.

According to who? Do you vote based on these kinds of ridiculous generalizations? My taxes have decreased... but only because the majority of tax cuts made by Dubya and his Congress favor people that make six figures or better. The middle class and poor haven't got much of anything out of it.

No one is going to increase taxes on the middle class (what's left of it). However, you don't start offering tax cuts when you can't balance the budget. That's stupid, and most macroeconomists will tell you that harms the economy.

There are, of course, many reasons why the whole thing happened in the first place. Placing our military bases on what is considered holy land was a biggie. Also is our neverending support for Israel. Whether you or I believe these actions to be right or wrong is inconsequential. Whether we had permission for our bases from the Saudis is also irrelevant. It pisses people off. I'm not saying what they did is justified. It shows nothing but a lack of moral fiber, and an utter disregard for their own religion.

What I am saying is that you can't trapse all over and do whatever you want and not expect consequences from these people. They hate us and they are bat-sh*t insane. That ain't a good combination.

They don't want our freedom, they don't want our culture. If we'd just leave them alone, I really don't think they'd give a flying crap about us.

Ahh yes, they WANT us to leave them alone. Then it'll be easier for them, meaning terrorists, which yes I know is a small percent, to join to together and figure out how to get us back.

Of course, if we'd have left them alone in the first place, there'd be nothing for them to "get us back" for.

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Jeff said:
... but only because the majority of tax cuts made by Dubya and his Congress favor people that make six figures or better. The middle class and poor haven't got much of anything out of it.

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Speaking for myself and my wife (middle class, sub-$100K combined income), we received surprisingly nice tax cuts from the Federal government. Then Ohio's governor (who made fun of his opponent during the election as "Taxin' Tim") and the state government raised taxes all over the place which negated anything we received from the Feds.

Thanks for the tax breaks Dubya, too bad we live in the state with the 3rd highest tax-burden in the country.

Now Jeff and the rest of you mansion-dwellers just need to back off, K? ;)

Oh, those bling days are over for me. Working for The Man and hating your job is not worth the money. I'm done with that scene!

No more champagne wishes and caviar dreams, eh? (well, at least not until your book goes into its 12th printing and 3rd edition ;))

Someday I wont have to work for The Men (Mr.Corley and Mr.Corriveau) - until then, I'll take any tax-cuts I can get!

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kpjb said:
They hate us and they are bat-sh*t insane. That ain't a good combination.

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You never cease to amuse me. :)

I disagree that Iraq has nothing to do with terrorism. Some want to make the claim that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 specifically, so thus they have nothing with terrorism. Unfortunately, it's not that simple.

Even the Clinton administration understood that Iraq was a threat. Kerry himself said last month he would have still voted 'yes' knowing what we know now.

It's a great debate, but perhaps futile. Most people have already made up their mind. It's kind of like arguing for or against abortion.

What really irritates me is the accusation that those who believe like me are mindless, flag-waving followers who only think the way George and Rush tell them to think. How insulting! I'm voting for George Bush because I have looked at all the issues, done the research, and made up my own mind.

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'cause everywhere I go & see... it's all anti-Bush

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You see what you want to see.

But now that we've gone in there, we can see now that it was not a threat. Certainly North Korea is more dangerous. Why don't we go there? If the answer is because there's no oil, I'm fine with that, but in the case of Iraq let's call it like it is.

We live in a global economy and a global culture, and this administration causes us to be isolated. It also has a wacko for an attorney general (not sure how Republicans of all people stand behind him). We've dropped out of important environmental treaties. He wants to mess with the Constitution for a social and religious issue. He wants to irresponsibly cut taxes while trying to finance a war and allow the worst defecit in history.

Yeah, I might be voting against Bush more than I'm voting for Kerry, but it's not much of a choice for me.

I would have been ALL for taking Saddam from power...still would be, even with the TOTAL lack of WMDs. He needed to be taken out for the safety and security of his OWN people.

But didn't we go on a humanitarian mission and take out an *evil dictator* recently in another country WITH the help of the UN (both during the "war" and during cleanup). And now THAT guy is on trial for crimes against humanity. Slobodan Milosevic was a BAD guy, and he got taken down WITH international cooperation and agreement.

Americans don't have to LIKE it, but the bottom line is that the US cannot unilaterally pursuemisguided foreign policy without consequences. One of those consequences is that we no longer HAVE the *staunch allies* we once had, another is that we are stuck footing the bill for rebuilding Iraq, where we NEVER should have been without the UN...

Just my take....good thing this thread got linked to the *regular* forums...;)

How is RCT2 anyway? :)

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Why not N. Korea?

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Different situations call for different strategies. Just because the answer for Iraq was regime change doesn't mean that's the answer for all dangerous countries. Perhaps there's a diplomatic answer for N. Korea. Goodness knows it was tried in Iraq for 12 years.

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it was not a threat

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I disagree. I believe, given enough time, Saddam would have done everything in his power to continue his WMD program and remain a threat. Al Gore thought so ("Iraq’s search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."), Sandy Berger thought so ("He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."), and John Kerry thought so ("He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation. And now he has continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction.")

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It also has a wacko for an attorney general

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I don't think he's a wacko. He's not perfect, but I happen to agree with him enough for that not to affect my choice for President.

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We've dropped out of important environmental treaties.

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That isn't relevant to me because I think human-caused global warming is a myth (though there are natual cycles).

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He wants to mess with the Constitution for a social and religious issue.

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While I disagree with making gay marriage legal, I also disagree that there should be a constitutional amendment to prevent it. See, I don't agree with him on everything. :)

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He wants to irresponsibly cut taxes

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Without going into why the graduated tax system is unfair, I appreciate having more money in my pocket. Economics is a tough one to argue. For every stat and story from the left about how Bush is running us into the ground, there's a story like this from the right showing how it's the Dems fault. I guess it's who you choose to believe.

*** Edited 9/15/2004 2:49:27 PM UTC by Gemini***

I don't think anyone would argue that Saddam Inasne was a dangerous person. I think it would be to his advantage to lie about what WMD's and the quantities he had just to keep his people in line. And, when is this country going to learn? What I mean is, we have helped many people get in to power over the years only to have them stab us in the back...i.e. Saddam Hussein (given the key to the city of Detroit), Manuel Noriega, Fidel Castro, the list goes on. Obviously, those in power are really poor judges of character.

From what I understand, most foreign countries dislike our foreign policies more than us. *** Edited 9/15/2004 2:53:38 PM UTC by Dragster Freak***

Castro was, and could be, a threat, but we're not taking him out either. Tony Blair could be a threat. I could be a threat. The world is not The Minority Report.

Any attorney general that's OK with limitless capability to spy on his own people, or worse, hold them indefinitely without trial, is a wacko.

And come on Walt... that yellow haze you see on your way into Cleveland in the morning is not a myth. That's real pollution.

You can't seriously quote the GOP site, can you? They have the majority in Congress and a guy in the White House. How do you blame democrats for the deficit when they have the absolute power to pass anything, provided they can keep the party members in line? Remember who had the last balanced budget...

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That's real pollution.

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Which has little to do with global environmental treaties. We didn't have pollution between 1992 and 2000?

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You can't seriously quote the GOP site, can you?

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Are you saying the article is not true?

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They have the majority in Congress and a guy in the White House.

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Having the majority doesn't mean you can pass whatever you want. Spending comes from both sides.

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Remember who had the last balanced budget...

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Remember who wanted (and who fought against) a balanced budget amendment.

*** Edited 9/15/2004 3:33:04 PM UTC by Gemini***

"And come on Walt... that yellow haze you see on your way into Cleveland in the morning is not a myth. That's real pollution."

And that greyish-black haze you saw over NYC for a few months after Sept 11, 2001 was not a myth either. That was from the smouldering ruins of what was once the World Trade Centers, brought down courtesy of your friendly neighborhood fanatical Islamic terrorists.

Was there a direct link to Hussein and AlQueida(sp?). I don't know. Does it matter? Nope, not in the least. A regime that is known to harbor and aid terrorists is fair game.

The people responsible for the continuing violence in Iraq are not the Iraqi people and they are not the ALLIED troops... they are the same type of fanatical Islamic terrorists imported from places like Iran or Syria... teh same Syria where Hussein's WMD's were probably shipped... after all, we gave him 14 months warning that we were going to finally move in and enforce the numerous UN resolutions that he was ignoring.

And yes, people are selective about who we go in after and who we don't.

It is amazing that the many of the same people who said we were wrong for going into Iraq in the first Gulf War (with a coalition of MANY countries and UN sanctioned) and wrong now in the War on Terror, are the very same people who were all in favor of going in after Malosovic under the guise of a "humanitarian" effort.

I can give you 100 reasons why we should be in Iraq now (and in the early 1990's) and you will not listen to one of them because nothing is going to change your minds and your claims that it is a "War for Oil" and a "distraction from the War on Terror". You can give me 100 reasons why you think we should have been in Kosovo in the mid 1990's, and you are not going to change my mind that was simply a distraction by the most corrupt presidential adminstration in this country's history to get the public's mind off of the legal problems that the then president was facing as well as a little "legacy" building.

This is a useless argument, because both sides are so convinced that they are right and the other is wrong.

(Yeah... I know that I said I was done with this thread... but hey... I flip-flopped. According to some, that is perfectly acceptable behavior in political debate)

I was watching a program on tv last night. It had something to do with a military tracking device or satellite or something similar. The point being that they could zoom a camera in on a fly on someone's shirt. We can do this, but somehow we can't find Bin Laden. That is absolutely ridiculous.

BTW, Bin Laden loves this situation with Iraq. It is distracting our attention from him, whom was the real threat to begin with. Not saying that we wouldn't have to have dealt with Hussein eventually, but we went about it in the wrong way.

Why can't we find the WMD's? Because practically that whole country is one big mo-fo desert. If Saddam can bury 30-50 Mig fighter jets and have them escape detection for years, why couldn't he have buried the weapons somehwere too?

And in my opinion the reason some of the countries that are not backing us now who backed us in Kosovo is due to FEAR of the terrorists targeting _them_ next. Their decisions were not based on whether or not Saddam should have been removed but instead was based of the fear of these Islamic radical terrorist organizations.

And besides...

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JOHN KERRY

Voted against the Iraq war ...

Before he was for the Iraq war ...

Before he voted for the Iraq war ...

Before he was against the Iraq war ...

Before he voted for funding the Iraq war ...

before he voted against funding.

BEFORE HE WAS FOR THE IRAQ WAR.

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Pancakes anyone...Kerry's flipping! You can see the video there of him and his amazing flipping technique over the past decade *** Edited 9/15/2004 4:09:41 PM UTC by redman822***