Re: [Osx-nutters] President Bush Vows Attacks “Across the World”

[Patrick Coskren]

On Oct 3, 2006, at 11:07 AM, Chuck Bennett wrote:
>
> On Oct 2, 2006, at 7:32 PM, Matt Johnston wrote:
>>
>> On 2 Oct 2006, at 22:55, Kevin Callahan wrote:
>>
>>> President Bush Vows Attacks “Across the World”
>>> On Saturday, President Bush vowed to continue waging attacks  
>>> across the world. His comment came during his weekly radio address.
>>> President Bush: “The only way to protect our citizens at home is  
>>> to go on the offense against the enemy across the world. When  
>>> terrorists spend their days working to avoid capture, they are  
>>> less able to plot, plan, and execute new attacks on our people.  
>>> So we will remain on the offense until the terrorists are  
>>> defeated and this fight is won.”
>>
>> Republicans must be so proud.
>
>
> So what better suggestion do you have?
>
> Reverse the sentence?

The problem is the formulation includes mistaken assumptions.  "The  
terrorists" is not an organization like "Russia".  It's a movement.   
You can't "defeat" a movement.  Sure, this part is obviously true:

> When terrorists spend their days working to avoid capture, they are  
> less able to plot, plan, and execute new attacks on our people.

Known terrorists should absolutely be harried, targeted, and searched  
for relentlessly.  Bush is, in some places, doing this.  The problem  
is, he's also attacking more people who aren't related to terrorism,  
calling them terrorists, and in the process creating more of them.

I personally think this is because he really doesn't understand that  
"the terrorists" aren't an organization the way a state is.  I think  
he believes he's fighting a Muslim SMERSH.  Or maybe he's just lying  
about it, but his supporters certainly seem to believe it.

-Patrick

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