http://homepage.mac.com/mjohnson1/.P...-explosion.jpg A proud moment in American military history.
What's your point.

The FFL are like the Marines. First in, last out. Bah, i honestly don't get this whole thing, I don't get the logic and the arguements seem childish at best.

Aw c'mon Jag, you come from a country that worships its tough guys and has a ton of 'em. In fact, are there any sensitive metrosexual types in Aussieland?

How convenient (to promote hate) that some forget the recent French military action (Ivory Coast) to save hundreds of American lives. Jaguar is correct. So much hate expressed against the French as if they were black and should be called niggers. Ironic since as we now know the French about one year ago were better patrioitic Americans that George Jr. French told the truth about Iraq.

Patriotic Americans don't let silly emotions manipulate their thinking. Too many (the emotional) back then forget: war first must be justified by a smoking gun. As we all know - and there is no dispute about this - there was no smoking gun in Iraq. France was saying so which is why the French were acting as better patriotic Americans than many Americans.

We had a president with a pre-conceived agenda- facts be damned. An agenda that even justified outright lying and outing a CIA agent. That feared to send the 10th Mountain Division into Tora Bora to get bin Landen. An agenda that caused many fools in America to instead insult the French. Every week Americans come home missing limbs - a tribute to Americans who foolishly want to save the entire world even where it does not want to be saved. Same people who would than insult the French.

Why not insult the Italians who gave us the lies about Iraqi uranium from Niger? Or the British who gave us Tony Blair's lies about WMD that could be launched in minutes? These emotional types should instead be insulting the British and Italians who helped get us into war - and therefore protected Osama bin Laden. Why do we not go after bin Laden for years? We must attack Saddam only because he is Saddam - as proven by lies from the British and Italians. At least that would be hate (of British and Italians) that was justified by facts.

Eh, there's enough fact out there to justify American dislike of the French.

I think if I hear one more thing about the nobility of the French in opposing the Iraq invasion, I shall puke.

*No one* in the world does anything out of a sense of justice or altruism. There's always either a financial or political motive.

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-break...4014-7323r.htm

Tom Friedman, the NYT author who is the source of most of tw's information, instructs you: "Things do not cease to be true just because George W. believes in them."

Freidman skewered [France's foreign minister] de Villepin for saying there was "no terrorism in Iraq before the war". Skewered him good with example after example of how Iraq was a center for terrorism. The only way to say there was no terrorism in Iraq before the war was to say that all of it was justified because it was done in the government's name.

If the French wanted to prevent war they should have put the screws to Hussein. They might have convinced him to step down without a battle at all. But they didn't, because they were in on the deal, for billion$ in contracts and fetid oil-for-food corruption deals which swayed their interests. So, instead, they helped convince him he could stay in power.

Don't for one second thing I think the french objected to the war purely on moral grounds. I'm still glad they did. Ditto for Germany.

That's as bad as me calling all american's fatassed slobs.
Trust me, Melbourne has to be the metrosexual capital of the Southern Hemisphere. Was one of the places they first started releasing makeup for guys for crying out loud.

Ep, I wouldn't put too much stock in that. I don't trust the Moonies, and can't find that story from any other "reliable" source.

This is simply wild unjustified speculation and best described as an outright lie. We now know the screws were so strongly applied to Saddam that he voluntarily eliminated in 1996 any last program that clearly met the WMD definition.

There were no screws that could have made Saddam step down voluntarily. But then who cares? He was not even a threat to his neighbors. And he would never be a threat to the US - since that was his policy throughout his entire carrer. Saddam did everything possible to avoid conflicts with the US. Unfortunately for Saddam, he made a mistake in Kuwait after we all but let him believe he could invade Kuwait.

It is silly to the point of brain deficiency to think that the French could have caused Saddam to step down. It is naive to say the French encouraged Saddam to remain in power. It was responsible to take the same position as the French did - which is why most all the world opposes the US invasion of Iraq.

BTW, Tom Friedman is not a source of information. But since number of sources tend to be fairly large, then a Tom Friedman source certainly could have been in among the thousands. In the mentime, hate of France for opposing war is akin to hate of the black man - both based upon unjustified and emotional biases.

I think the only point why Americans don't like French is the fact that France is the only nation in Europe who has the bullocks not to follow America. Gremany doesn't really want to do it because they have a minority-complex because WW, UK is an american colony, Italy isn't worth talking (the worst army in Europe). Poland , Spain and Netherlands only follow the big brother because they fear some punishment from US...

Yeah. No reason they should take sides with the US...not until some despot rears up their ugly head and starts rolling through the EU Nations. Then, I imagine, they'll have a little more appreciation for our military power and policies. At least, that seems to have been the formula so far.

What's that saying ... you know, the one about "Those who do not remember the past ..."

And so only 30 some years later, we again forget the past and invade another sovereign nation for no good reason. A major lesson from history - the smoking gun must exist before going to war. Because of Pearl Harbor, American was a far more virile nation and a much greater threat to the Axis powers. Spies in America. No way, because a powerful smoking gun existed. It is the repeated lessons of history and even a concept found in the teachings of Sun Tzu (before Christ). A clear reason must exist to go to war so that the army and nation can be effective. Those are the brutal lessons of history. The only war lost by the US is VietNam because we went to war 1) on a lie and 2) with no smoking gun.

Could the WTC attack be avoided? Maybe. But no thanks to efforts by the George Jr administration. This latest accusation from a 30 year professional who was right there watching an agenda be more important than reality. Or the three FBI investigation teams who were outrightly ordered not to investigate what we now know to be the WTC attackers. There is another lesson of history. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. In this case, top management had more interest in a political agenda than in protecting America - even to the point of making loyalty to the boss more important than the truth or loyalty to the nation.

French Policy Still Vigorously Criticized By Iraqis

Even in Peter Jennings reports last week from Iraq, the people are no better off than under Saddam. That is the short term. People assume things will get better. They assume their life that is currently worse will, in the long term, get better. But those comments about France, et al can be found anywhere if one just searches the internet long enough. Those comments about France are typical of Rush Limbaugh journalism. Peter Jennings better described what is important.

Bottom line - Iraq even has less electricity than it did under Saddam. There was one day where the electric supply exceeded pre-war production. You know that day because the George Jr administration made sure it was reported.

All that looting is directly traceable to Rumsfeld, et al who knew better than experts. Rumsfeld et al who did not provide enough troops, mocked the generals for claiming a need for more troops, and even had no - nada - not one plan for a post war Iraq. In his great knowledge, Rumsfeld knew mocked the experts claiming widespread looting did not exist. As a result, Iraq is still is recovering from damage directly traceable to a total disbanning of the Iraqi Army and Police. That disbanning is a violation of principles stated even in SunTzu's famous pre-Christian work - the Art of War.

OK. We have created a worse life style for Iraqis. At least they have the oppurtunity to make things better than in Saddam's day. That point specifically made by Peter Jennings. But here is the problem. We must worrying about Civil War. We are pulling out on 1 July no matter what (N Korea should worry they are next). Good news is that Civil War is listed as a possibility meaning that Civil War probably will not happen. That is good news for Iraqis. In the meantime, folks - expect to subsibize another country at the expense of our standard of living and more budget deficiets - for probably the next 5 or ten years. We created this mess. Now we must pay BIG TIME. We will pay more to rebuild Iraq than the entire US budget to help every African nation. And Iraq is an oil rich nation!

A mental midget president said Iraq would pay for its reconstruction with $2billion from oil revenues. 1) Oil is not even bringing in $2billion. 2) It will cost America $400billion plus to fix the mess we made. How did $2billion become $400 billion? A lying president.

Thank god at least someone talks politely about the mental midget president. He needs some friends who don't mind another welfare nation on our payroll.

How often are his lies? Only one day did Iraq equal the electric production of Saddam's Iraq. Geroge Jr made sure you knew when that one day happened. Best we can do is provide Iraq with 90% to 95% of the electricity they once had. But George Jr would have you believe otherwise so that his friends will praise him.