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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

rshowalter - 12:27pm Sep 13, 2001 EST (#8934 of 8975)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

md2088 rshowalter 4/8/01 8:30am

Almarst , discussions of the need for a free, fair, effective, accountable press, we had -- and that included concerns about US press patterns, seem worth considering here. To win a "war on terror" that is practical and balanced -- that involves all forms of terror, we need to have common bodies of fact, and mechanisms by which we can check each other, and ask questions of each other.

The "culture of lying" in journalism and more broadly, is part of the problem - - part of the reason we cannot become well enough informed to protect each other, and collaborate with each other -- when now, too often, we misunderstand and hate each other.

mazza9 - 01:01pm Sep 13, 2001 EST (#8935 of 8975)
Louis Mazza

Ah.."The Culture of Lying" Last night at the TWA 800 site George Stephanopolus, Sen Kerry of Mass, and FBI Agent Kalstrom (The Lead FBI investigator) were all quoted as saying, "TWA was the First terrorist action". So the center fuel tank explanation was a cover up. Who was covering up what? Was it, as I suspect, an artifice so that Pres Clinton could avoid the issue and win re-election?

Now it's reported that on Tuesday that the White House received a warning, after the Pentagon strike, that AF One was next. The code words that accompanied the threat demonstrates that the highest level codes were compromised. The reports of "lost" laptops from the State Department and FBI last year demonstrate that the lax security of the Clinton years is coming home to roost. Rob Lowe is reported to have watched his sons play with the football, (the nuclear code briefcase), while Rob was visiting the White House. I was a crypto security officer when I was in the Air Force. I blanche when I hear these tales.

Comments????

LouMazza

logician3 - 01:52pm Sep 13, 2001 EST (#8936 of 8975)
Bush is an idiot.

mazza9 9/13/01 1:01pm

Bush et al were asleep at the wheel on this one.

mazza9 - 02:23pm Sep 13, 2001 EST (#8937 of 8975)
Louis Mazza

logician3

How stupid are you? Is there a scientific measure of your ridiculous quotient? On a scale of 1 to 10 what is the color of you grey matter? Blue you say? Of course Bush was asleep at the wheel in 1996 when TWA 800 was shot down and we can also blame hime for the loss of the Alamo and the fall of the Roman Empire. Your ignorance is only surpassed by your .... ignorance.

gisterme - 03:10pm Sep 13, 2001 EST (#8938 of 8975)

Lou Mazza wrote ( mazza9 9/13/01 1:01pm ): "...The reports of "lost" laptops from the State Department and FBI last year demonstrate that the lax security of the Clinton years is coming home to roost..."

"Coming home to roost" is a kind term, Lou. I expect we will all expreience the full Clinton legacy first-hand before this is all over. Still, now doesn't seem a good time to be worried about cause but rather to repair whatever damage can be repaired to mitigate effect. There will be plenty of time for truth about the past administration later.

According to one source I looked at, the number of Americans who died in combat in the Viet Nam War was a bit over 47,000 with another 11,000 dying from other related causes. That's a total of about 58,000 dead over all those years.

I have heard estimates that the American dead resulting from this past Tuesday's mass murders, just one day during "peacetime", may surpass 30,000.

I believe that Tuesday's atrocity is the worst loss of life resulting from a deliberate attack during peacetime anywhere in the world throughout all history. Except for a couple of Civil War battles, this is the greatest loss of American life in a single day in either peacetime or wartime.

In my view Teusday's atrocity is justification for whatever the president decides to do to preempt such acts in the future. If those "jihadists" think they can hide in and fight from those remote Afghan mountains as they did so successfully against the Russians, they'd better think again. At that time the Russians had no such provocation as the US has today and the world was a different place in those days. This time those "mountain fighters" will have no savior...and this time they've taken on and enemy who has the power to say to this mountain "be thou removed" and it will be removed...

...and nobody in the responsible world community will blink an eye because they'll know that the cause is just and the result will be prevention of future "wonders" like those witnessed last Tuesday in NYC. They'll know that the destruciton of evil will ultimately save lives in their own countries. And those who do not wish to participate in and receive the benefits of a responsible world community will find themselves living in isolation. Those who wish to prevent others from participating in and receiving the benefits of a responsible world community will undoubtedly receive the fruits of their criminal choice.

The removal of this kind of evil from the world is a worthy cause, and in spite of what some may say, it is not an impossible task. It is a task that must be accomplished for the benefit of all mankind.

rshowalter - 03:16pm Sep 13, 2001 EST (#8939 of 8975)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Everyone lies, or decieves, or shapes facts in various ways, from time to time.

Psychologists, when giving tests, know to be particularly suspiscious of people who deny that they lie.

When the phrase "culture of lying" has been used on this thread, I've meant something more specific, and have hoped others have, too. I've been speaking of

" news and the culture of lying."

MD1294 rshowalter 3/22/01 8:11am ... MD1295 rshowalter 3/22/01 8:22am
MD1296 rshowalter 3/22/01 8:37am ...

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