4000

[Local Democrat]

I, for one, am sick and tired of hearing talk about "the poor Iraqis" and the problems with their self-governance.  The way I look at it, if after five long years, 4,000 American lives and Trillions of American dollars, they cannot provide for their own security, then too bad for them.

How about taking care of American Citizens for a change? 

It's high time we got out of there.

Well voting for John McCain is voting for a continuation of the Bush Plan - just keep sending soldiers and money into Iraq for as long as it takes - even if it takes 100 years.  Just one more reason to vote Democratic this year.

LD

[Paxton Quigley]

Or, better yet, don't vote at all this year.

[deano]

If you choose not to vote, will you still post your feelings about how screwed up the govt is? If you don't vote when you are able to, then your opinions aren't even interesting. How can your opinions even be considered if you don't make the effort to have a say?

And I am also sick of hearing about the poor Iraqis, especially when they fail to stand up for themselves. But given our govt's history of starting something and then bailing out, I can understand the hesitance on their part. Once we leave, anyone who even smiled towards our troops will be "re-educated".

My son came home from his tour there (U S Army) with stories of Iraqis who helped them at their base, did odd jobs at the base and basically just attached themselves to our troops, talking to them about their hopes for the future of their country.
Several times they found some of these same young Iraqis floating down the river with their throats cut, or holes drilled into their skulls.
We broke it, we need to fix it.

[Paxton Quigley]

I look at voting for someone as an endorsement of their values.  I simply cannot support any of the leading three candidates with their values. If a good third party candidate announced, I would vote for that person, knowing fully well he/she wouldn't have a prayer of getting elected President. I don't see that as throwing away my vote.  It is a "protest vote", if you will.

I also think not voting is a good way to protest the current two-party system. I think we need at least one more major national party.

[deano]

Ah, but you rant against Obama (as do I), yet how many Obama supporters will use their vote to protest?  All of them, as a vote for Obama.
So, by not voting, you hand the election to the one least qualified to lead this country.

That is why I vote, and why I will vote for McCain. The only way Obama can win is if enough people who aren't satisfied with the candidates stay home. Obama's supporters include a lot of young people who are probably eligible to vote for the first time. They aren't going to stay home and protest by not voting.

[Paxton Quigley]

Nobody knows what motivates others to vote for a particular candidate.

I refuse to hold my nose and vote for someone simply to offset other votes.

My personal integrity will not allow me to vote for McCain. The straw that broke that camel's back was when he appointed Juan Hernandez as his "Hispanic Outreach Director".  That slimy illegal alien promoter (Hernandez) is the epitome of latino racism.  If you want California to become part of Mexico, vote for McCain.

[Phil Ellis]

PQ, based on the flags I see in marches here, I thought we were part of Mexico   

[Paxton Quigley]

PQ, based on the flags I see in marches here, I thought we were part of Mexico   

I hear that!

 

[Phil Ellis]

All military deaths are tragic - whether in wartime or peace time.  The following from Wikipedia is a comparison of death counts for our wars.  For those of you who do not trust Wikipedia, please provide any conflicting data you might have.    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_casualties_of_war

[edit] Wars ranked by total deaths
Rank   
War   
Years   
Deaths   
Deaths per Day   
Deaths per Population   

1   American Civil War
1861–1865   625,000   599   1.988% (1860)
2   World War II
1941–1945   405,399   416   0.307% (1940)
3   World War I
1917–1918   116,516   279   0.110% (1920)
4   Vietnam War
1964–1973   58,151   26   0.003% (1970)
5   Korean War
1950–1953   36,516   45   0.002% (1950)
6   American Revolutionary War
1775–1783   25,000   11   0.899% (1780)
7   War of 1812
1812–1815   20,000   31   0.345% (1810)
8   Mexican-American War
1846–1848   13,283   29   0.057% (1850)
9   Philippine War
1899–1902   4,196   5   0.006% (1900)
10   Iraq War
2003–present   4,000   2.35   0.001% (2007)
"Deaths per day" are the total number of US military deaths, divided by the number of days between the dates of the commencement and end of hostilities, or until 31 December 2007 in the case of the Iraq War. "Deaths per population" are the total number of US military deaths, divided by the US population of the year indicated.

[SCVDem]

The numbers may be low but there was no reason for ANY casualties in Iraq!

Does anyone remember our government say anything about 'regime change' not being a valid reason to invade?

[Paxton Quigley]

And, how can our Government criticize China's invasion of Tibet?

[SCVDem]

This is not a war!

In a war we would be using 100% of our resources to secure victory.

Are we doing that?

This is a shooting gallery and our guys are the ducks!

[funnybunnie]

can we also add wounded to that little chart, today's medicine  and ability to transport wounded soldiers off the battlefield, has kept the body count down, but in terms of wounded soldiers, the count is extremely high...

[funnybunnie]

this post might fit better here....

this morning amy goodman interviewed robert dreyfuss from the nation magazine, regarding what mccain's foreign policy might be...

seems that mccain is a shoot now, ask questions later kind of a guy, not someone we'd want overseeing our foreign policy the next four years...

maybe the Christians are coming to their senses with regards to all this war talk...

robert dreyfuss:  "McCain has an instinctive preference for using military power to solve problems overseas. And when you couple that with a kind of hotheaded temperament, with a kind of arrogance and really a tendency to fly off the handle, I think we have a lot to fear, if he were ever to have his finger on the button, because he’s a man who I think would try to solve a lot of the very delicate foreign policy problems that we have around the world by a show of force. And, of course, you start with Iran in that context, but I think you could include many other problems, as well."

robert dreyfuss:  "McCain looked around the world, and he said, OK, our job is basically to force regime change in all of these countries. And he signed on early to the issue of going into Iraq and forcing a regime change there, long before anybody really had any kind of concerns about al-Qaeda, long before Iraq’s connection to terrorism seemed important. It was simply a principle that any state that didn’t conform to an American view of democracy was liable to be rolled over or rolled back, in McCain’s view."

here's the complete interview:
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/3/26/a_century_in_iraq_replacing_un

[Paxton Quigley]

I sure hope this report isn't true, because if it is, I pity those poor soldiers.

http://www.roadstoiraq.com/2008/03/25/news-mahdi-army-arrested-17-american-soldiers/