No accounting for taste, really

[cryowizard]

I'm all for free speech. I believe people should be able to say what they think without prosecution. Sometimes what they say is wrong and disgusting, but having a mindset is not a crime.

There is, however, no accounting for taste. Columbia University has invited President Ahmadinejad of Iran to speak at their "World Leaders Forum". Why would an American university invite an America-hating, terrorism-supporting, Iraqi guerrilla-training Iranian President to speak, of all places, in New York City? I mean, it's a well-established fact that our universities lean heavily to the left, but is it really necessary to invite our lethal venom-spewing enemies to talk to our students? "Kids, let's give a round of applause to Mr Ahmadinejad, who sponsors people who will kill every one of you infidel pigs". Columbia University President should turn back on his sense of good taste. NYPD had refused Ahmadinejad to visit Ground Zero, although he only wanted to lay a wreath and "pay tribute to the victims". Why did they do that? Because Ahmadinejad represents the people who perpetrated this atrocity, and NYPD seems to see his visit to the grave site as inappropriate. NYC government and Senator McCain are now urging the university to cancel Ahmadinejad's invitation because, well, they also see it as inappropriate. Why doesn't Columbia?

Update: Let me clarify something. I'm not against inviting our ideological enemies in for a speech. However, enemies with our blood on their hands are across the decency line for me. We should use the instruments of foreign policy to deal with them, but we don't have to cozy up to them and pretend they are all nice and fuzzy.

Comments

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

Hm, so you'd rather invite a person who sings praise to Americans but lets his government reduce pensions and medical benefits to soldiers and their families, installs former private education finance manager in charge of federal education financing institution and boosts nepotism and corruption to unprecedented levels, authorizes a no-bid no-competition procurement of aircraft by the army, and sneakely takes away constitutional and human rights from Americans?

At least one is open about how he wants to screw Americans. But i guess for me deeds are important than empty words.

[cryowizard.livejournal.com]

I don't know what your reply was about and what it has to do with Ahmadi. Let's stay on point.

I know one thing. Ahmadi is our enemy. He represents a country that has been our enemy since 1979. He represents people who'd like nothing better than to see us dead or converted to Islam. And more to the point -- besides vehemently anti-American rhetoric, he supplies weapons to people who kill our citizens. It doesn't matter whether Iraq war was justified or not. It doesn't matter whether Bush is an idiot or not, and it doesn't matter how corrupt his administration is. If Ahmadi helps insurgents kill our soldiers, he's an enemy. And given the fact that it was Islamic fundamentalists that bombed NYC, I find having their representative with the blood of our citizens on his hands invited for a "Q&A" on American soil inappropriate. I'm not saying he should be legally prevented from attending or that Columbia should be legally prevented from inviting him, yet his presence in NYC outside of UN is a travesty. If, for example, Columbia decided to invite Chavez, I wouldn't mind. Chavez is very anti-American, but he mostly fucks with his own people (as of now). It would be fun to counter his stuff in a debate. President Ahmadinejad is far beyond the fun debate point (outside of US-Iran summits) by having the blood of our soldiers on his hands.

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

i guess we should agree to disagree.

1. If Ahmadi helps insurgents kill our soldiers, he's an enemy.

There is a WAR in Iraq. America sent soldiers to fight a war, to defend something, to destroy something. Whatever. America chose to send soldiers, weapons and other resources to fight a war. Iran is also involved in this war and Iran supplies soldiers and weapons. So yes, in IRAQ, Ahmadi IS our enemy. i have not fought a war with him. i am not at war with him. He has not done anything bad to me, yet. The moment American troops leave Iraq and America ends its participation in the war, Ahmadi will no longer be at war with America. So i don't really see him at fault. It's like two friends in a fight - i don't pick sides. Stupid war, stupid people, stupid enemies.

Bush comes to Iraq for visits. Bush gives talks there. If any of the locals would want to invite him to talk to them, he would. Despite the war and despite being an enemy. So Ahmadi comes to UN, but he is INVITED to speak. He doesn't go around talking to people. American people don't see him as an enemy and invite him to speak to them. i guess those people disagree with your classification of him as an enemy. Bad taste? No. Disagreement - yes.

2. And given the fact that it was Islamic fundamentalists that bombed NYC
As you may know, i completely disagree with you here. However, instead of going into a pointless argument, i suggest this - name 3 things that will reverse your view here. Name 3 pieces of evidence that will convince you that at least some conspiracy theories have merit?

Here is an example of what i am talking about. i do not believe that a commercial plane hit Pentagon. i am convinced that it was a rocket. Now, there were security tapes confiscated from Sheraton across the highway from Pentagon. FBI NEVER released them. If i see that tape and see a plane on it, i will reverse my view. If you give me that 1 (ONE) piece of evidence, i will admit that i am wrong.

NOW, what evidence are you willing to acknowledge to accept that you are wrong?

3. he supplies weapons to people who kill our citizens
And Bush unilaterly SENT those soldiers to Iraq, after having fabricated a cause for this quasi-war. As far as i am concerned, Bush has blood of our soldiers on his hands. And he started the war, so if it wasn't for Bush, Ahmadi wouldn't have blood on his hands. Therefore, i'd rather listen to Ahmadi than to Bush.

[cryowizard.livejournal.com]

oh man. so you are into the conspiracy theory. let's not waste our breath then. we really will not understand each other.

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

Let's not argue over the first level issues. Answer this, tho:

What evidence do you need to see to accept that you are wrong?

[cryowizard.livejournal.com]

I'd need the piles of evidence to the contrary collected on this sites to disappear, I'd need to see a top-secret executive order signed by the President authorizing this nonsense, and scores of people who executed it providing mountains of hard evidence beyond a shadow of a doubt.

In the absence of such data Occam's razor holds.

You need to google "debunk 9/11 conspiracy". Or look at Popular Mechanics debunk report: http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military_law/1227842.html (see the last page for the list of PM contributors who sign their names under it), or look at nonsense dubunk here http://www.loosechangeguide.com/LooseChangeGuide.html.

My problem with this whole thing is that you seem to hate Bush and everything he does so much you are willing to believe anything at all so you could justify your attitude toward him. I personally can't stand the guy, or his policies, or his administration. I think he was a disaster for this country, the worst ever President at the time of a national crisis. And yet I draw a line between him and his policies and paranoid conspiracy theories that are not really supported by anything.

Honestly, let's stop here.

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

you are not correct in evaluating my beliefs.

i honestly see a lot of upside and virtually no downside for this administration to have fabricated the 9/11 attack. My view is not related to Bush - it is related to what happened as a result - PATRIOT ACT, . Same thing happened in Moscow in 2002 when a specialized unit of militia was formed after a big riot as a result of Russia-Japan game. 9/11 fits PERFECTLY in the neo-con plan for America, and i truly honestly believe that 9/11 was executed locally. It has nothing to do with Bush. It was proven that Roosevelt knew about Pearl Harbor and that Louisitania was bound to be sunk.

As interesting as this discussion is, i think what's far more significant is that you need PILES of information and HARD evidence to prove that your views might be mistaken. All i need is one piece. Anyone who is so entranched in his/her views is very unlikely to critically evaluate those views, and is inevitably limited by them.

Unless you actually have an interest in learning a new viewpoint, expanding your views or maybe coming closer to discovering a more accurate interpretation of reality (be it discussion of 9/11, soldier refusing to fight or Ahmadi), i think i am wasting your time and i should stop. Personally, i enjoy your ability to formulate certain views and find seemingly credible support for them, even if i ultimately disagree with you or do not find the support sufficiently credible. In the end, my views are permanently flexible and change based on the most credible information i possess. i highly doubt you operate the same way.

[cryowizard.livejournal.com]

It's not about my personal views.

If you want me to believe my own government perpetrated such an atrocity to advance, as you say, its neo-con agenda, there better be piles of hard irrefutable evidence to support it.

So far, despite the 9/11 "fitting perfectly into the neo-con plan for America", hard evidence found at the sites, as well as declassified intelligence from 9/11 commission report (including statements of 9/11 architect Khalid Sheikh Mohammed) does not offer any support to the conspiracy theories. As long as this stands, I will remain of my original opinion despite hints of my mental inflexibility ;)

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

What hints of your mental inflexibility? my, you are the most open-minded person i've ever met! :-)

Did their own government put gays, criminals and jews in concentration camps in Germany? Did their own government put hundreds of thousands of people in Siberia camps? Did their own government put japanese-american citizens in concentration camps?

How is YOUR government any different from my government? My government breaks its own law on a daily basis, denies human rights to detainees, etc. And what is so atrocious about 9/11? It's just 4 buildings and some measly 3,000 people. Letting McDonalds over-feed the nation with synthetic food kills more each month.

What am i missing in this "i love America no matter what" mentality?

[cryowizard.livejournal.com]

You are mixing everything in one pot. Yes, our government screws us on a daily basis and has screwed us in the past, and we can talk about it until the cows come home.

However, we are not generalizing here about government acts in general. You are telling me that the government has perpetrated 9/11. This is a topic at hand.

Just because it MAY HAVE happened that way, doesn't mean IT DID happen that way.

Sane people look at hard evidence at hand to confirm or deny things. As of today there is not a shred of hard evidence to support this allegation, but a mountain of evidence to support the allegation that Islamic terrorists planned and carried out the attack on their Great Satan.

To conclude that our government indeed blew up WTC in the absence of any supporting hard evidence is lunacy.

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

Then, i guess, we disagree on what we consider to be hard evidence. Classified materials from the 9/11 commission are not convincing for me. Alleged statements of 9/11 architect Khalid Sheikh Mohammed are not convincing either. Have you actually spoken to him? Have you heard him say it to you, or did the government tell you he said it? Have you actually seen any independent source of hard evidence?

i spoke, personally, to one of the leading structural engineers in the country (who works for DeSimone Consulting Engineers) and he told me that he and ALL of his colleagues and peers were DENIED access to the structural steel at WTC site to examine how steel melted. The steel was taken away to a governmental lab where it was examined, then removed to a yard in NJ and melted. Considering that only 3 (THREE) buildings in the history of skyscrapers collapsed as a result of "intense fire", don't you think it would be prudent to have every steel engineer in the country examine the steel and understand how to avoid it in the future?

All of your "hard" evidence comes from one source, the source that has a very clear motive to mislead you and hide the truth. No, there is no hard evidence that US government DID it. But there is plenity of HARD evidence that they withheld that would convince me that they didn't do it. Makes me wonder what happened to that hard evidence. Or whether it even existed.

Btw, photos of Pentagon ARE hard evidence. Show me a single photo with a piece of a 757 plane engine. Plane engines can evaporate? Really? That's a shred sufficient to support an allegation. Unless you are so overwhelmed by that "mountain of evidence"...provided by...ahm...the government? Right. Cause you saw it with your own eyes and heard with your own ears.

[cryowizard.livejournal.com]

http://www.loosechangeguide.com/lcg2.html

Scroll down to where the extensively discuss (with pictures) all the pieces of the engine found at the scene and engine types and all that stuff, including whey the hole was small, and windows in the Pentagon weren't all broken and all that. I'm not going to regurgitate it.

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

Sorry, your debunking source is simply ridiculous. Let's assume, for a second that an honest and responsbile government is faced with such terrible allegations as the conspiracy theorists put on. Wouldn't a responsible government do everything in its power to put together a credible response to give comfort to people who may be concerned about such conspiracy theories? Riiight. Instead we have a bunch of meatheads write obsceneties. Here are my favorites:

1. I don't have a reliable source for this...

2. He is also a conspiracy theorist who does not believe that ANY aircraft hit the Pentagon, which makes him stupid or insane. i mean, who could EVER suspect that Nazional-socialists would set Reichstag on fire themselves? Only a madman!

3. How about a citation to the article and date of publication for the "quote" from AFP? Proper research and copyright laws require that. Could it be that the "debunker" was BSing?

4. If 6 tons of steel and titanium slammed into the Pentagon at 530 MPH, they would bury themselves inside the building, leaving two very distinct imprints. Speculation. One wing hit the ground first. There is visible wing damage on the building. See below. You want a cookie-cutter shape in a reinforced concrete building? Sorry. Convincing.

5. This is what Slobodan Milosevic's residence in Belgrade looked like after a Tomahawk cruise missile had hit it. See any similarities? See any differences? Heard of any? Like the huge amount of 757 debris and the remains of the passengers, all but one of whom were identified? But you're not concerned with victims, are you? WTF? Even more convincing!

6. The government doesn't need to "prove" that. The wreckage and remains were recovered. ALL it would take would be to release a single one of these tapes. Ahm, yeah. Your government is REALLY interested in helping you find the truth.

i am done reading this crap. You believe what you want to believe, and i will believe what i want to believe. But i think it is a duty of any rational human being to QUESTION the versions presented to us, the "official" stories", and the labels of "madmen" that the media and government invites us to put on people. Thinking implies thinking critically, and blindly trusting the ONLY side that could benefit from 9/11 attack doesn't exhibit such thinking from your side.

Since 9/11, i have flown with metal objects, liquids and a KNIFE in my carry-on. Clearly it's not our esteemed security forces that have saved America from other attacks initiated by people who hate us so desperately. If not them, then who saved you and me so far?

Finally, here is one more paragraph that does just enough to raise my eyebrow and not rush to dismiss it. i assume you will have the opposite response:

Recall that when the first airliner was flown into a World Trade Center tower on September 11- before it was known that the "accident" was really part of a deliberate terrorist attack - newscasters were speculating that a small plane had accidentally flown into the side of the tower, because the visible exterior damage didn't seem as extensive as what people thought a large airliner would cause. Even though the two airplanes that hit the World Trade Center towers were travelling faster at the time of impact than the Pentagon plane was (400 MPH vs. 350 MPH), hit aluminum-and-glass buildings rather than reinforced concrete walls, and didn't dissipate much of their energy striking the ground first (as the Pentagon plane did), they still barely penetrated all the way through the WTC towers.
Taken here (http://911review.org/Wiki/snopespentagonrumor.html)
3 rings of old-style concrete buildings? i'd be happy to STAND behind the second ring if you fly a plane into it to prove that it's not possible to penetrate it. What are YOU willing to do to stand up for your "beliefs"?

[mhmeln-57.livejournal.com]

Also, points # 1 and # 3 do not relate to # 2 at all.