The Logic Off Topic list

At 1:49 PM -0500 10/11/01, denizen@... wrote:
>On Fri, 12 Oct 2001, Dennis Gunn wrote:
>
>>  At 5:03 PM +0100 10/11/01, Mark at Enduser wrote:
>>  >
>>  >Dennis!
>>  >
>>  >The story glosses over the facts in hand.
>>
>>  Really?  I thought it was a rather accurate metaphor.
>>
>>  >You cannot deny the subtle
>>  >interplay between nations over centuries.
>>
>>  There was nothing subtle about the attack.  Or the Taliban harboring
>>  bin Laden and his camps.  Or their constantly changing and totally
>>  conflicting stories about their relationship with him.
>
>Nobody doubts the lack-of-subtlety in the 9-11 attack.  I think what Mark
>meant by 'subtle interplay' was the complex history of interrelations
>we've had with the middle east (and that they've had with each other) over
>the centuries.  Not to mention the varied perspectives on those
>interrelations.
>
>To discount all the other possible political motives for the actions
>against the Taliban, how they might be a small part of a much larger
>American agenda in the middle east (not explained to the press for
>political reasons), or how the grossly oversimplified popular version of
>the story (the one which your metaphor fits perfectly) may just be
>political spin, does a disservice to the complexity of the situation.

To blindly assert that whatever the US does *no matter what that is* 
does more disservice IMHO.  More than one party in this forum has 
berated the US for the failure of its intelligence in Afghanistan and 
ironically they were the same people who were berating US policies as 
basically being too evil and interventionist.  Either someone is 
attacking us for being too involved or someone is attacking us for 
being too little involved and it seems that often they are the same 
someone.   In this case it seems to me the US was doing exactly what 
our bitchiest critics are always screaming for us to do.  Leaving the 
Afghans alone to sort out their own problems.  I personally was not 
of the opinion that that was such a bad approach to dealing with them 
either.  But it didn't work out.  Now something else is necessary. 
Too bad but that's the way it goes.  Under those circumstances to 
call us evil interventionists and the berate us fools for a lack of 
military intelligence that was the direct result of a "hands off" 
policy is just too unfair and unkind.

>  > Again I think it was an accurate metaphor.  What fact has been disregarded?
>>
>>  How so?   What did I miss.  Yoonchi says what I see as reasonable
>>  point of view is stupid.  And so I beg to differ and use a
>>  metaphorical story to illustrate my point.  What is the fact I have
>>  ignored.
>
>Well, for one, the fact that this is not even about Afghanistan
>(represented by the guesthouse in your analogy).

There is no guest house in my analogy.  There is a guest in a house. 
And nothing in my analogy indicates any interest in the house (the 
territory) whatsoever.  The house is fact not the issue either in the 
analogy or in the real life situation.  One thing I did gloss over in 
my analogy is that Mr T is a violent and crazy bastard himself.


>Afghanistan just happens
>to be the stage on which the bloody part of this long conflict begins to
>unfold.  If it were another country that was taken over by a
>fundamentalist Islamic regime after it was destabilized by Russian
>invasion and civil war, we'd be bombing it instead.

Hypothetical and irrelevant.

>
>I don't necessarily disagree with what we're doing in Afghanistan right
>now, but I have a serious problem with what amounts to blind agreement
>with national policy, especially against an enemy this determined,
>ruthless, and intelligent... and arguing the official point of view so
>vehemently in an international forum is a very telltale symptom of that
>blind agreement... as well as absence of objective thought.

Agreement?   Yes.  Blind?  What kind of heightened visual perception 
is it that makes it easy to see and debate about the ants in grass 
and difficult to see that what is making your foot hurt is the 
elephant standing on it?
-- 


                                 Dennis Gunn
                                 Mightyjohn@...

                  check out  MIGHTY JOHN HENRY's album "hot air head"
                                                    info at
                        http://www.twics.com/~mightyjo/home.html