Posted on 09/12/2001 12:31:51 AM PDT by ouroboros
Wednesday, September 12, 2001
By Harry Browne
© 2001 WorldNetDaily.com
The terrorist attacks against America comprise a horrible tragedy. But they shouldn't be a surprise.
It is well known that in war, the first casualty is truth – that during any war truth is forsaken for propaganda. But sanity was a prior casualty: it was the loss of sanity that led to war in the first place.
Our foreign policy has been insane for decades. It was only a matter of time until Americans would have to suffer personally for it. It is a terrible tragedy of life that the innocent so often have to suffer for the sins of the guilty.
When will we learn that we can't allow our politicians to bully the world without someone bullying back eventually?
President Bush has authorized continued bombing of innocent people in Iraq. President Clinton bombed innocent people in the Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Serbia. President Bush, senior, invaded Iraq and Panama. President Reagan bombed innocent people in Libya and invaded Grenada. And on and on it goes.
Did we think the people who lost their families and friends and property in all that destruction would love America for what happened?
When will we learn that violence always begets violence?
Teaching lessons
Supposedly, Reagan bombed Libya to teach Muammar al-Qaddafi a lesson about terrorism. But shortly thereafter a TWA plane was destroyed over Scotland, and our government is convinced it was Libyans who did it.
When will we learn that "teaching someone a lesson" never teaches anything but resentment – that it only inspires the recipient to greater acts of defiance.
How many times on Tuesday did we hear someone describe the terrorist attacks as "cowardly acts"? But as misguided and despicable as they were, they were anything but cowardly. The people who committed them knowingly gave their lives for whatever stupid beliefs they held.
But what about the American presidents who order bombings of innocent people – while the presidents remain completely insulated from any danger? What would you call their acts?
When will we learn that forsaking truth and reason in the heat of battle almost always assures that we will lose the battle?
Losing our last freedoms
And now, as sure as night follows day, we will be told we must give up more of our freedoms to avenge what never should have happened in the first place.
When will we learn that it makes no sense to give up our freedoms in the name of freedom?
What to do?
What should be done?
First of all, stop the hysteria. Stand back and ask how this could have happened. Ask how a prosperous country isolated by two oceans could have so embroiled itself in other people's business that someone would want to do us harm. Even sitting in the middle of Europe, Switzerland isn't beset by terrorist attacks, because the Swiss mind their own business.
Second, resolve that we won't let our leaders use this occasion to commit their own terrorist acts upon more innocent people, foreign and domestic, that will inspire more terrorist attacks in the future.
Third, find a way, with enforceable constitutional limits, to prevent our leaders from ever again provoking this kind of anger against America.
Patriotism?
There are those who will say this article is unpatriotic and un-American – that this is not a time to question our country or our leaders.
When will we learn that without freedom and sanity, there is no reason to be patriotic?
Harry Browne was the 2000 Libertarian presidential candidate. More of his articles can be read at HarryBrowne.org, and his books are available at HBBooks.com.
Bush's Faustian Deal With the Taliban
By Robert Scheer
Published May 22, 2001 in the Los Angeles Times
Enslave your girls and women, harbor anti-U.S. terrorists, destroy every vestige of civilization in your homeland, and the Bush administration will embrace you. All that matters is that you line up as an ally in the drug war, the only international cause that this nation still takes seriously.
That's the message sent with the recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human rights in the world today. The gift, announced last Thursday by Secretary of State Colin Powell, in addition to other recent aid, makes the U.S. the main sponsor of the Taliban and rewards that "rogue regime" for declaring that opium growing is against the will of God. So, too, by the Taliban's estimation, are most human activities, but it's the ban on drugs that catches this administration's attention.
Wonder how much pilot training and supplies $43,000,000 bought?
But please do carry on with your policies of interventionism...
The spokesman for the ARI or Harry Browne?
You know that alas they are in conflict today....pity. Placing our country's future in the hands of you libertarian/contrarian arsewipes at this juncture is akin to believing in the tooth fairy. I have observed and argued with your kind on WOD, Dubya, prayer in schools and many other subjects from my traditional hard core conservative perspective and have found your collective fondness for the individual(devoid of God) determination of morality and your emphasis on personal desires or liberties as you call them at the expense of all others to be callow and foolish. I wish you would all go crawl back into the hole from whence you came and we'll tell you when it's safe to come back up so you can all start your self-obsessed drum beating all over again.
Libertarianism =Anarchy and Spiritual Vapidness
And stop getting into the personal attacks. Because you aren't even CLOSE to the founders.
Exactly WHAT refutation do you have to anything Uriel, Demidog...or even I have said?
You're 0 for 2. Want to try again?
So, is GW's administration as stoooooopid on Afghanistan as Al Gore's team was on Russia (re the loan rip offs)?
Or was the $43M payment for, as of last week, an as-yet-to-be-delivered service?
It's starting to look a lot like Arkansas ....
Since when did anyone care what goes on in these countries? Terrorists are about an audience. They go for the biggest target out there.
And since when were any of those countries big enough to worry or help anyone but themselves?
Presuming that you would refer to me of that number because I believe Harry Browne is speaking from the comfort of a dream world he knows will never happen, my eyes don't glaze over at the amount of text. I read the text, and after processing it, my eyes roll in disbelief.
Whenza last time one of the jackboot crowd picked up a book?
I picked up a book just hours ago.
Oh, sorry, I forgot. The Bible doesn't count with you folks.
Tex,
Even you can't be this naive. Terrorism is a military tactic. We don't have to use it, because we have fighter bombers, ICBMs and nuclear missiles.
Do you think Iraq or Bin Laid-To-Rest would have bothered with hijackings if they had access to ICBMs?
These people are striking at us the best way they know how. To the limits of the capabilities. They aren't choosing these tactics because they want a crowd.
If they could totally destroy Israel, don't you think they would?
There's a great French film "Mon Oncle d'Amerique", and it explores several folks' lives and their reactions to stress in them, all the while there is a narrative and nature shots about how critters deal with stress ... there are those who fight whatever is causing them stress ... straight-out; there are those who fight themselves; and then there are those who fight whoever is around them during stressful times.
You're in the group that likes to fight whoever is around them - friend, fellow countryman, or foe - it doesn't matter for you.
"Our kind" happens to grant themselves the freedom to think and to explore. "Your kind" happens to grant themselves the freedom to buy into the party line, and despise all who do not.
Funny ... "your kind" appears to have a great deal in common with the Taliban and Osama.
While I can mostly agree with that statement, do you really believe it was not in our national interests to stop Saddam from taking control of the oil reserves in his vicinity?
While I can mostly agree with that statement, do you really believe it was not in our national interests to stop Saddam from taking control of the oil reserves in the region? Most of the experts say Kuwait was just the first stop.
Best one yet ...
When can we expect to hear from your parents? Bring a translator for your mother, I don't speak skank.
Don't shoot the messenger.
Of Course, you are actually making my argument from another thread, where I asserted that we should Nuke these people, because if they were capable if a nuclear retaliation they would have already used it.
But that has nothing to do with what I am talking about. The question I addressed was, why were countries like Switz., Zurich, ect, not attacked.
In a time of war, which is what we are in, this is traitorous , sedition. If he has 3 working brain cells, he'd know better than to write this garbage. If this is what he stands for, then all who voted for him, should feel shame for having voted for him.
We killed " innocents " during both world wars. That happens during wars. We've killed " innocents " during necessary conflicts. We were NOT at war with a country/ countries now. We were invaded , and our innocents WERE murdered , because of a group of religious fanatics . There's a HUGE difference, that old Harry is far too blinded , by his UTOPIAN fog, to see.
What has just happened in NYC is a war crime. Those who are responsible are the persons who planned, supported, and carried out the operation. Justice requires that they be dealt with. This is not the time to fuss about the details of our foregoing foreign policy.
It is so important to the Libertarians to prove that they are right, and have always been right, that they studiously ignore Moslem violence throughout the world. Fine, then. Let us concede that the murder of over 5,000 people two days ago was justified by U.S. support of Israel. What is the justification for the continuing slaughter and enslavement of Christians and animists in the Sudan? What is the justification for the torture and murder of missionaries in the Philippines? I bet those dastardly Sudanese were shipping arms to Israel. And those Zionist Filipinos were desecrating Moslem holy sites.
While American foreign policy may be unduly meddlsome, the point is that Islamic Fundamentalism is violently aggressive, and its practioners do not need a real reason to go after you if you are an infidel. Nor have they ever been limited by the moral qualms of attacking only combatant targets. Is is their MO to go after "soft targets." So we could sit around and blame ourselves for this, or we could take a look at the history of Islamic brutality, expansion, and agression over more than a millenium. Given the way militant Islam works, they were bound to come for us sooner or later.
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