Who's the Terrorist?

[BigRob]

We're not in Korea because they don't have oil.

I do not buy that argument at all. But you are welcome to make it.

The Bush's and Bin Ladens have teamed up to strip this country of its revenue. Which is treasonous. And the GOP cries foul over Obama's brief time with Ayers.

That is quite the assertion with no real factual basis. Think about what you are saying, the Bush family teamed up with Bin Laden to organize bank failures. I don't buy it.

The GOP is nothing but organized crime. I find it funny when they point fingers of judgement at other people who they say have done the very crimes they themselves are the masters of.

You are asserting that Bush is in partnership with Bin Laden to collapse banks. Your evidence of this is the fact that Bin Laden's estranged half brother invested $50,000 in an oil company Bush owned? Hardly makes your case.

Or you are asserting that Bush teamed up with Bin Laden to somehow control the oil flow... none of which we have done.

You further assert North Korea has no oil so we are not there. North Korea is basically a failed state, an invasion was not needed to isolate them. They isolate themselves. We shut them out of the world financial system quite effectively, and they are all but collapsed. Further North Korea has a military over with over a million soldiers. Not the best trained or equipped, but still no cake-walk.

Further, China does not want the US in North Korea. There are plenty of reasons for the policy we follow towards North Korea that are not related to oil.

 

[Mr. Carpenter]

We're not in Korea because they don't have oil.

I hate to break it to you, but we've had a consistant military presence in Korea since before 1950! Kim knows quite well that if he gets stupid enough, it would take us no more than 3 weeks to overrun his entire country, all the way back up to the Yellow River, and there's not a damned thing he can do about it.

 

[BigRob]

I hate to break it to you, but we've had a consistant military presence in Korea since before 1950! Kim knows quite well that if he gets stupid enough, it would take us no more than 3 weeks to overrun his entire country, all the way back up to the Yellow River, and there's not a damned thing he can do about it.

Well, it would also risk a war with China in many people's minds.

 

[Mr. Carpenter]

Well, it would also risk a war with China in many people's minds.

At one time that was certainly the case, but given that their entire economy is based on trade with us, and the only thing that N. Korea represents to them is a drain on their economy, I seriously doubt that they'd have much to say about it.

 

[BigRob]

At one time that was certainly the case, but given that their entire economy is based on trade with us, and the only thing that N. Korea represents to them is a drain on their economy, I seriously doubt that they'd have much to say about it.

Well, their economy is based on trade with us yes, but the amount of debt they hold in reserve of ours can tank us right now should they call it in. I personally think neither happens.

North Korea is a drain on them a bit yes, but at the same time, they enjoy a buffer between American soldiers in South Korea and the Chinese border.

I think they might not have much to say about it, until after the fighting, then they would have a lot to say on what the new Korea is going to look like, which would cause a lot of problems for us because we would have just fought the war and would not be interested in making deals at that point.

Would also be interesting to see if they would give North Korea but respond in Taiwan instead.

 

[Mr. Carpenter]

Well, their economy is based on trade with us yes, but the amount of debt they hold in reserve of ours can tank us right now should they call it in. I personally think neither happens.

North Korea is a drain on them a bit yes, but at the same time, they enjoy a buffer between American soldiers in South Korea and the Chinese border.

I don't think it'll happen either, but mainly because China likes their little buffer, and so they're keeping Kim on a "short leash".

As for the foreign debt, China only holds $518 Bn total in our foreign debt (roughly 1/6th of our annual budget, and less than 1/2 of 1% of our GDP), which means that they could cash in every penny of it tomorrow and it wouldn't even be a hiccup to our economy. In fact, if they DID cash it all in tomorrow it would actually be better for us, because it would be cheaper than the $518 Bn, because most of those securities haven't matured yet!

 

[BigRob]

I don't think it'll happen either, but mainly because China likes their little buffer, and so they're keeping Kim on a "short leash".

As for the foreign debt, China only holds $518 Bn total in our foreign debt (roughly 1/6th of our annual budget, and less than 1/2 of 1% of our GDP), which means that they could cash in every penny of it tomorrow and it wouldn't even be a hiccup to our economy. In fact, if they DID cash it all in tomorrow it would actually be better for us, because it would be cheaper than the $518 Bn, because most of those securities haven't matured yet!

Yes, but there is debt, and then add another trillion or so in cash reserves that China holds. Flooding the market with them could cause a bit of an inflation problem, especially as we bail out banks. I don't see China doing anything but holding them however so they can continue to devalue the Yuan to make their exports more appealing.

Either way, as we seem to agree, most likely we do not see an invasion, and no use of debt or cash reserves by China.

 

[PLC1]

There is little to be gained by invading North Korea. That little failed state will collapse sooner or later, anyway, and most likely be taken over by the government of South Korea.

Of course, there was little to be gained by invading Iraq, but we didn't know that at the time.

 

[BigRob]

There is little to be gained by invading North Korea. That little failed state will collapse sooner or later, anyway, and most likely be taken over by the government of South Korea.

Of course, there was little to be gained by invading Iraq, but we didn't know that at the time.

I don't know if South Korea is going to just take it over. China wants a unified Korea, just not a unified Korea that resembles South Korea. Of course we will have to wait and see. People have been predicting the collapse of North Korea since 1994 or so.

 

[Sihouette]

The bin Laden family (Arabic: بن لادن‎), also spelled bin Ladin, is a wealthy family intimately connected with the innermost circles of the Saudi royal family. The family was thrown into media spotlight through the activities of one of its members, Osama bin Laden. The financial interests of the bin Laden family are represented by the Saudi Binladin Group, a global construction and equity management conglomerate grossing $5 billion U.S. dollars annually,..

..Salem bin Laden invested through James R. Bath, the sole U.S. business representative for Salem bin Laden, some money in Arbusto Energy, a company run by George W. Bush[2].

Several members of the Bush family are investors in the Carlyle Group, a defense contractor and investment fund with numerous interests in the Middle East, run by former Reagan administration Secretary of Defense Frank Carlucci.[3] The media noted that former President George H. W. Bush attended an investment meeting at the Washington, D.C. Ritz-Carlton hotel on September 10, 2001 and in particular a meeting with Shafiq bin Laden, representing joint interests of the Saudi Binladin Group and Carlyle...

..Salem bin Laden (born 1946) attended Millfield, the English boarding school; took over the family empire in 1967; an amateur rock guitarist in the 1970s; married an English art student, Caroline Carey, whose half brother Ambrose Douglas is the illegitimate eldest son of the Marquess of Queensberry in Scotland; during the 1980s he aided the Reagan Administration, which secretly arranged for an estimated thirty-four million dollars to be funnelled through Saudi Arabia to the Contras, in Nicaragua, according to French intelligence; was killed outside San Antonio, Texas in 1988, when an experimental ultralight plane that he was flying got tangled in power lines...

....Mahrous bin Laden was implicated in the Grand Mosque Seizure, carried out by dissidents against the Saudi ruling family at the Al-Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, on November 20, 1979. This event shook the Muslim world with the ensuing violence and killing of hundreds at the holiest of Islamic sites. Trucks owned by the family were reported to have been used to smuggle arms into the tightly controlled city. The bin Laden connection was through the son of a Sultan of Yemen who had been radicalized by Syrian members of the Muslim Brotherhood. Mahrous was actually arrested for a time, but in the Saudi government response, he was not beheaded along with 63 others who were, their public executions broadcast on live Saudi television. Later exonerated, he joined the family business, and became manager of the Medina branch of the bin Laden enterprises, and a member of the board...

..Shafig bin Laden (Arabic: شفيق بن لادن‎), half-brother of Osama's, was a guest of honour at the Carlyle Group's Washington conference at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel on September 11, 2001, and among the 13 members of the bin Ladin family to leave the United States on September 19, 2001 aboard N521DB...

..At least 13 relatives of Osama bin Laden, accompanied by bodyguards and associates, were allowed to leave the United States on a chartered flight eight days after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to a passenger manifest released on July 21, 2004.[15] The passenger list was made public by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), who obtained the manifest from officials at Boston's Logan International Airport...

..In mid-July 2007 Judicial Watch released new documents from the FBI related to the "expeditious departure" of Saudi nationals, including members of the bin Laden family, from the United States following the 9/11 attacks. According to one of the formerly confidential FBI documents, dated September 21, 2001, terrorist Osama bin Laden may have chartered one of the Saudi flights. This news garnered international headlines.[citation needed]

The document specifically states: "ON 9/19/01, A 727 PLANE LEFT LAX, RYAN FLT #441 TO ORLANDO, FL W/ETA (estimated time of arrival) OF 4-5PM. THE PLANE WAS CHARTERED EITHER BY THE SAUDI ARABIAN ROYAL FAMILY OR OSAMA BIN LADEN...THE LA FBI SEARCHED THE PLANE [REDACTED] LUGGAGE, OF WHICH NOTHING UNUSUAL WAS FOUND."

Even considering a possible direct bin Laden link to the flight, it was allowed to depart the United States after making four stops to pick up passengers, ultimately landing in Paris where all passengers disembarked on September 20, 2001, according to the document.

Overall, FBI documents uncovered by Judicial Watch include details of the six flights between September 14 and September 24 that evacuated Saudi royals and bin Laden family members. The documents also contain brief interview summaries and occasional notes from intelligence analysts concerning the cursory screening performed prior to the departures. Only 4 of 100 passengers on three Saudi flights leaving Las Vegas between September 19 and September 24 were questioned by agents...
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Laden_family

No questions asked and all-expense paid "evacuations" (as opposed to detainment and questioning). What else would one friend do for another? The GOP wanted to make sure the Bin Ladens were safe and made sure those flights made it abroad without incident...at a time when flights were grounded or heavily monitored for the rest of us...the Bin Ladens got the carte blanche. I wonder if they had first-class accomodations...

Wine and cheese anyone? Compliments of Uncle Sam..

 

[Sihouette]

Forgot to add.

In my mind I'm having a terrific time trying to defend (as devil's advocate) the actions of the GOP/Bush administration kid-gloving the Bin Laden family members out of the country, essentially without question or pat-down while other american citizens were being cavity-searched...

Was it just to make an impression that they were "doing something about it", while meanwhile they seemed to know who were the threats and who wasn't?

 

[primerib]

Several paragraphs from an IBD article. After reading would you vote for this person??

A careful reading of Obama's first memoir, "Dreams >From My Father," reveals that his childhood mentor up to age 18 - a man he cryptically refers to as "Frank" - was none other than the late communist Frank Marshall Davis, who fled Chicago after the FBI and Congress opened investigations into his "subversive, " "un-American activities." As Obama was preparing to head off to college, he sat at Davis' feet in his Waikiki bungalow for nightly bull sessions. Davis plied his impressionable guest with liberal doses of whiskey and advice, including: Never trust the white establishment. "They'll train you so good," he said, "you'll start believing what they tell you about equal opportunity and the American way and all that sh**."

After college, where he palled around with Marxist professors and took in socialist conferences "for inspiration, " Obama followed in Davis' footsteps, becoming a "community organizer" in Chicago. His boss there was Gerald Kellman, whose identity Obama also tries to hide in his book. Turns out Kellman's a disciple of the late Saul "The Red" Alinsky, a hard-boiled Chicago socialist who wrote the "Rules for Radicals" and agitated for social revolution in America.

The Chicago-based Woods Fund provided Kellman with his original $25,000 to hire Obama. In turn, Obama would later serve on the Woods board with terrorist Bill Ayers of the Weather Underground. Ayers was one of Obama's early political supporters. After three years agitating with marginal success for more welfare programs in South Side Chicago, Obama decided he would need to study law to "bring about real change" - on a large scale. While at Harvard Law School, he still found time to hone his organizing skills. For example, he spent eight days in Los Angeles taking a national training course taught by Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation. With his newly minted law degree, he returned to Chicago to reapply - as well as teach - Alinsky's "agitation" tactics.

(A video-streamed bio on Obama's Web site includes a photo of him teaching in a University of Chicago classroom. If you freeze the frame and look closely at the blackboard Obama is writing on, you can make out the words "Power Analysis" and "Relationships Built on Self Interest" - terms right out of Alinsky's rule book.) Amid all this, Obama reunited with his late father's communist tribe in Kenya, the Luo, during trips to Africa. As a Nairobi bureaucrat, Barack Hussein Obama Sr., a Harvard-educated economist, grew to challenge the ruling pro-Western government for not being socialist enough. In an eight-page scholarly paper published in 1965, he argued for eliminating private farming and nationalizing businesses "owned by Asians and Europeans."

His ideas for communist-style expropriation didn't stop there. He also proposed massive taxes on the rich to "redistribute our economic gains to the benefit of all." "Theoretically, there is nothing that can stop the government from taxing 100% of income so long as the people get benefits from the government commensurate with their income which is taxed," Obama Sr. wrote. "I do not see why the government cannot tax those who have more and syphon some of these revenues into savings which can be utilized in investment for future development." Taxes and "investment" . . . the fruit truly does not fall far from the vine. (Voters might also be interested to know that Obama, the supposed straight shooter, does not once mention his father's communist leanings in an entire book dedicated to his memory.) In Kenya's recent civil unrest, Obama privately phoned the leader of the opposition Luo tribe, Raila Odinga, to voice his support. Odinga is so committed to communism he named his oldest son after Fidel Castro.

With his African identity sewn up, Obama returned to Chicago and fell under the spell of an Afrocentric pastor. It was a natural attraction. The Rev. Jeremiah Wright preaches a Marxist version of Christianity called "black liberation theology" and has supported the communists in Cuba, Nicaragua and elsewhere. Obama joined Wright's militant church, pledging allegiance to a system of "black values" that demonizes white "middle classness" and other mainstream pursuits. (Obama in his first book, published in 1995, calls such values "sensible." There's no mention of them in his new book.) With the large church behind him, Obama decided to run for political office, where he could organize for "change" more effectively. "As an elected official," he said, "I could bring church and community leaders together easier than I could as a community organizer or lawyer."

 

[Sihouette]

Communism means, in it's literal definition, a government for the good of the commune or community.

Of course that has been bastardized, thanks to corrupt communist leaders, to mean "pure evil".

We run into problems with semantics in naming types of government. Capitalism also has been bastardized, thanks to corrupt business leaders, to mean "pure evil".

What to do?

I think we need to come up with new names to describe types of governance. I think we need to drop words like "socialism" and "communism" and "capitalism" because none of them exist in their pure form any more.

One word still applies though. "Treason" aptly describes the actions and relationship if the GOP/Bush administration to the Bin Ladens. So that's one you can still hang your hat on.

One thing is for sure, any government that employs truly democratic elections cannot ever be consider evil. The remedy exists for the common man to have his voice heard and that will offset any imbalance in power at the highest levels. Our nation under Bush/Cheney/GOP has come the closest it has ever been to a fascist state.

"Fascism" is another word that still holds its full meaning.

 

[Sihouette]

It looks like the cat's got GOP tongue here at "House"...

I admit, there isn't much to say in defense of the facts that unfurled around Bush's association with the Bin Ladens, their personal escort from the country in September 2001 without questioning, and our "inability" to find Osama or to get to him if we do know where he is...

If the CIA wanted Osama dead, he would've already been pushing up daisies long ago...

So I'll conclude that certain powers in our GOP administration are making sure he isn't found or killed. Personally, I think that was a deal they cut beforehand...but you know me...always extrapolating.. Kindof like he agreed to be the fall-guy...for...

...something...maybe an excuse to do something?

nah! What are the odds?....

It's not like the GOP was anxious to have an excuse to invade Iraq or anything...

...oh, ooops! That's right, they were...

Must've all just been a well-timed coincidence..

 

[BigRob]

It looks like the cat's got GOP tongue here at "House"...

Maybe that is because so far your accusations are baseless. Other than a half-brother (who disowned his brother long before this) invested some money through a third party, you have no evidence of anything you are stating.

I admit, there isn't much to say in defense of the facts that unfurled around Bush's association with the Bin Ladens, their personal escort from the country in September 2001 without questioning, and our "inability" to find Osama or to get to him if we do know where he is...

Maybe it was because people like you connect the groups, even though they had not spoken in years and disowned O. Bin Laden. If you had any clue about what the Afghan/Pakistani border looked like you would realize that it is indeed much harder to find anyone.

If the CIA wanted Osama dead, he would've already been pushing up daisies long ago...

Laughable.

So I'll conclude that certain powers in our GOP administration are making sure he isn't found or killed. Personally, I think that was a deal they cut beforehand...but you know me...always extrapolating.. Kindof like he agreed to be the fall-guy...for...

And maybe he was abducted by aliens and taken to Mars. There is just as much evidence of that as there is for any of your claims.

...something...maybe an excuse to do something?

nah! What are the odds?....

It's not like the GOP was anxious to have an excuse to invade Iraq or anything...

...oh, ooops! That's right, they were...

Must've all just been a well-timed coincidence..

Maybe if we were going to pay off someone to give us an excuse to invade Iraq we could have paid off an Iraqi instead.

So I will conclude by saying all your "evidence" is that a half-brother of Bin Laden's (who disowned him) invested some money through a third party connected to Bush. You somehow stretch that to mean that Bin Laden is the fall guy in some diabolical plot, and is not living in a penthouse in New York. Give me a break.