I supported most of what he said aside from the conpiracy theory part about Jordanian oil.

Regarding Africa, I am glad Africa is somewhat more free than it used to be. However the European colonies in Africa didn’t go because of any African unity. Each one had to be fought for individually. In the end the Europeans left it because the resources to maintain their presence weren’t providing enough income in return. finally please note the great amount of debt several African nations are under, and the fact that even with this debt they continue to buy weapons to suppress their people, and each other. Part of the blame goes to the countries that are selling them these weapons.

The other difference is that in most almost all African countries, the occupation was by a foreign army, wheras the Israeli soldiers actually consider Palestine their home, and many of their families have been there for several generations. So it’s much more complicated.

Moreover, Africans are no more united than we Arabs are. Sure we voice verbal objections (istinkar) every once in a while, but that’s it. This is what mab3oos and I are objecting to.

I suggest keeping the discussion in mab3oos’s post since he took the time to write about it.

You supported an argument by Ana Garfaan that the Palestinian cause is a drain on Arab development. I am glad Africans have pride and don’t think like some Arabs, or else South Africa and ex-Rhodesia would still be White settlements.

http://mab3oos.blogspot.com/2008/02/blog-post_22.html

The book club has been discussing 1984 (George Orwell’s book) recently, and it’s very relevant. Some of them took it too literally thinking it refers to life in the USSR or to two superpowers. Really the concepts outlined in that book are being applied in democracies as well as dictatorships throughout the world.

Notice the themes:
1. Unite against an enemy (whether communism or terrorists). Use the fear from that enemy to drive the people and quash all dissent.
2. Sacrifice freedom and privacy using security as an excuse
3. Keep the populace either only aware of the facts you provide or otherwise too preoccupied or indifferent to see the big picture. The first part can be done by controlling the media. Now in a democracy they have to get creative about censoring the media, but they still do it. For example, the white house decides who to invite to their press conference, who to give an exclusive to, and who to keep out of the loop. Someone who writes what the administration wants will be more likely to be invited, given an exclusive, an interview etc. So they force the mainstream media to walk the line and not deviate too far away regardless what the truth is. The second part (keeping people too indifferent and preoccupied) is easy. People are naturally lazy and self absorbed, so as long as you’re not directly hurting them they won’t bother pushing back, or to be inquisitive as N.A.P. mentioned above most of them don’t know what happened. Those that do, well with the right spin-doctors you can make them sound like lunatics. I mean can you believe people with the power to impeach their president just sit their after he lied to them and took them to war for a private agenda ? The majority obviously don’t know what is happening. US voter turnout percentages are quite low, particularly for a country at war. Who knows if it will be different this election.

First of all, what IS democracy? Google says:

# Democracy (literally “rule by the people”, from the Greek demos, “people”, and kratos, “rule”) is a form of government. While the term democracy is typically used in the context of a political state, the principles are also applicable to other groups and organizations.
# the political orientation of those who favor government by the people or by their elected representatives
# a political system in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them
# majority rule: the doctrine that the numerical majority of an organized group can make decisions binding on the whole group

Now sticking with this literal sense of democracy, how is the US enforcing democracy on other nations? Are these nations WELCOMING the US-imposed rules?

Case in point: Democracy is actually an abstract philosophical argument and not a scientific fact. In terms of programming, Democracy is a class and the US is an instance of the class. How people want to implement democracy is different from how the US people want to implement democracy.

Since democracy by definition is a government as wanted by the people’s country, not another country’s people.

Let’s see the definition of dictatorship:

A system of government in which a country is ruled by a single person with absolute power.

Rings any bells?

Here is the analogy: If one person rules a country, then it is dictatorship. Then my transition, if one country rules other countries, it is also dictatorship (euphemism is occupation).

So what we are seeing here is the US “super-power” (again, an abstract term created by two separate words: super and power, all of which are defined subjectively) which is imposing its OWN rules and ideas onto OTHER countries. How does this mean that it is spreading democracy? From what I understand, the Iraqis (or any country in the world) called up Bush and asked him to send over his troops to kill everyone, destroy the country’s infrastructure, so that they can elect someone else.

In philosophy, democracy is the worst type of government second only to dictatorship, and the US is practicing both: The latter internally and the former externally.

OK my comment got a bit too long now, so I will leave it at that

Like Qu said, I am just surprised they invest so much money on military equipment. I have been watching some Discovery Channel podcasts and some of the weapons they developed are just fascinating, especially pre-programmed ammunition that explodes depending on how you configure it.

If they can configure ammo, can’t they configure satellites to deal with their own demise? Like, if it has a few hour’s energy left, it could alter its orbit so it can go and plummet in some neighboring planet for aliens to pick up :P

1. I am not American
2. What you call (American Power) has not only destabilized the region, but killed hundreds of thousands of civilians, and the resulting rise in oil prices has and will cause so much price inflation in every product category that people will be economically ruined.
3. Being not only the inventor of nuclear weapons, but the only country to use them in an actual war, and to make the technology available to its allies, the US is currently not only the biggest threat to world peace (as an international poll confirmed), but the most likely to annihilate human civilization as we know it.

In a nutshell, I am unhappy they are now also bringing their weapons to space, and that is the “value” behind this post.

Mashkalji, if you really thought this post was an advertisment for the US military, you obviously haven’t read it. Thank you.

I’ve read about research on lasers like the ones you mentioned, but they’re not the stuff we see in Sci-Fi yet. Over $9Billion was spent on a gigantic one mounted on a Boeing 747 jet. It was supposed to be able to zap scud missiles, but it’s nothing more than a prototype.