Come on, give me your opinion.....

[Guest 01]

I have posted on another forum re this matter of attitudes when out of one's nest,The ability to laugh at oneself is most important and not to take constructive criticism too seriously or be too thin skinned.
LG

[noel]

If I can return to the original thread, with every day things seem to be at best not improving.
I think even Americans are now questioning the wisdom of declaring war on a non agressor.
I don't have any answers. It's difficult to know how to deal with evil people sice as Bin Laden.
Certainly if he's ever found shooting would be too good for him.

[Sandieh]

[]War doesn't determine who is right, war determines who is left. []

[noel]

And to add to it, 11 Iraqi policemen shot dead this morning, by of course the gun happy American soldiers. What must this do to the morale of those Iraqi's who are trying to work with the occupying forces.

[noel]

A leaked CIA document today has said there is no sign of any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. No traces of nuclear or biological weapons.
How good do Bush and Blair look now.

[Bill Rigby]

Noel, the Bush Administration refuses to publicly admit there are no WMDs, but maintains stupidly (so what's new?) that not finding any does not mean there aren't any!
The UN refuses to pull Bush's irons out of the fire, though yesterday on page 24 of the local paper was a report that a White House official who wishes to remain anonymous is quoted as saying that Bush is now prepared to hand over poltical power to the UN. Chirac in his UN speech stated that the military power ahould remain under US command, but that the political power should be vested in the UN. Also yesterday, Putin at Camp David told Bush the same thing, in spite of Bush's cajoling and bribes.
US foreign policy is in ruins, the economy is worse than ever in spite of the reassuring noises from the Right, civil liberties are under attack and we are headed for the greatest deficit in history and a massive national debt, expected to reach $14 trillion by 2005. In short, we are in deep doo doo and getting deeper with a president and Administration so dumb they should be in the Deaf and Dumb Society (my apolgies to the handicapped). Imagine, reducing taxation of the rich (a $ millionnaire will get a tax break of $93,500, a family earning $50,000 will get less than $200! Go figure!) while asking for an additional $87 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan of which $67 billion is for the military who already have an annual budget of $480 billion! Suggest a single payer health care system costing $5 billion and the richest nation in the world says "we can't afford it!". As I said, go figure!

[noel]

Well said Bill. On this side of the pond Tony Blair is facing his biggest challenge yet. The Labour Party Conference starts tomorrow at Bournemouth, he has a negative popularity of -29 his credibility is in ruins, 50% of the electorate thinks he should go now. His policies on Foundation Hospitals and University Top up fees are hated by members of his party members . Taxation is a major factor now, rocketing council taxes, increased NH contributions, petrol tax, numerous stealth taxes too many to list. Labour have just lost a safe seat in a by-election for the first time since 1987.
He's in a mess yet still he says he did the right thing in invading pre-emptively Iraq.
The man clearly is never wrong. He is a great orator, no doubt he will give a resounding speech at the conference.
Yet there is no credible opposition. Says a lot for Charles Kennedy and Ian Duncan Smith.

[Bill Rigby]

What is astonishing, Noel, is the hubris of both Blair and Bush as they both maintain, all evidence to the contrary, that they and only they were right! The key to Blair, it seems to me, is that he has tried to do a "Clinton" in the UK, meaning implmenting a centralist policy that if anything is what the Republicans/Tories should be doing if they were not so ideologically driven to absurd policies that harken back to the 19th C. Clinton has been called 'the best Republican president for decades" and not for nothing!

What gets me is that being Bush's lapdog has no percentage; the population here could not care less about the UK or Blair. The myth that Blair could have a beneficial influence on Bush is so much hogwash it smacks of wilfull deceit. The obvious fact is that this Administration will carry out the neocon 'New American Century' plan to dominate the world militarily, including the overturning of all regimes they do not like, and that includes any that aspire to popular government with social programs. We are indeed back to the 19th C. and since we have no historic sense of interest are fated to make the same errors which brought about regulation of corporations and legislation to curb the power of the immensely rich.
I agree that Blair is very quick on his feet and able to respond to any question more or less plausibly; the more the pity he cannot be his own man, but plays second fiddle to a moron!

[Guest 01]

I agree wholeheartedly with the use of the word "Hubris" as applied to these two gentlemen.It was a word that W.J.Downer, my Classics teacher at Balshaws, was keen that we learned the meaning of very early in our studies.
LG