upnorthkyosa said:
Your comment about me is an attack of its own. By saying that as usual I have no rational response and that the sniping is about to commence you have painted me as a troublemaker and attacked me and my reputation. In short, you are attacking me while trying to convince people that I am the guilty one.
I will point out your attacks on me whenever you make them. But I will not respond in kind. Instead I will deal with what you say instead of attacking your charecter.
And the whole problem with your theories is that they lack logic, facts and cohesion. Your theory is quite similar to one I saw on Japanese TV documentary last night where a North Korean made the argument that the US is behind the famine in his country.
First there is the Evil Intent. In the case of the North Korean, American capitalists are seeking to control the entire world and enslave the non-white races.
For you, it is that the US wants oil. You call it Peak Oil- a theory that I am familiar with.
In both cases of the Evil Intent (EI) there really does seem to be some benefit to the supposed hatcher of these conspiracies. But there is rarely anything that most of us would say is valid proof.
Then there is the Evil Statement of Intent. In North Korea's case, the guy was able to point to a lot of papers, groups and even some goverment folks that said that North Korea would be better off under a new goverment.
In your case, you are able to point to several papers and magazines like the New Republic as well as a private think tank written by people who think alike in many ways to some people in goverment.
In both the North Korean and your cases, the influence these sources have over the goverment is not laid out real well and taken as a matter of faith. The reason given in conspiracy theories like this is that there can't be a lot of proof since everything has to be secret. You really echoed something the North Korean said when you wrote,
The response for the North Korean when asked how America could cause the crop failures and such pretty much was along the line of, "do you think they are going to make it obvious?"
And it is clear that you make a huge leap of faith when you credit the neocons desire for a new goverment in Tehran with a desire to steal their oil. You overlook some much simpler explinations that make a lot more sense to cram your desired outlook on the facts at hand. The North Korean idea of people writing bad things about his country due to a desire to enslave them makes a similar leap over better explinations. I will deal this tendancy to ignore easier, more likely explinations later.
Finally there is the Evil Result. In the case of North Korea there is the famine they had. In your case it is the invasion of Lebanon. You can't dispute that these things happened. And thus the whole theory is "proved" in the minds of those that want to believe it.
But of course, at each point in these theories you have to make a leap of faith that the actual points are true and are conected. Since it is a conspiracy and since the attitude is, "Do you want a signed document that details that the US secretly urged Isreal to respond to Hizbollah's attacks by invading Lebenon? Don't be silly." you can generally cover over the lack and the over emphasizing and speculation that needs to go on to make these things come even slightly close to working. Sure the PNAC did all the things you say- but of course you can't really lay it all out do to their secrecy, eh?
At each point there is a lot of doubt as to whether the points are true, and there is even more doubt if there is any connection with the EI, ESI and ER on them. But if you don't accept that the points are true and they are connected, you are attacked for having a narrow point of view.
And there are always, in cases like this, explinations that are much easier to explain and believe than the huge conspiracy theory that never gets blown like Watergate was.
Lets look at the idea of a lot of people in Washington not liking Iran. Do you think that maybe, just maybe it could be because of all the things Iran has done that makes us so cool towards being buds with them? Things like them having 'death to the US' rallies, sponsoring groups that do suicide bombings, mining vital sea routes, that little thing with the embassy, their seeking nuclear weapons and causing trouble in a region that is of great interest to us? Do you think that maybe the guys that don't like Iran might do so for these types of reasons rather than some complicated plot to seize their oil by getting Isreal to attack Lebanon? Gee, you think?
And as for why we are not pressing Isreal to stop as much as we could, do you think that maybe, just maybe, it could be because we see it as a case of a country reacting to an enemy that keeps attacking them? Or maybe that we don't want to run counter to them unless there is good reason for it? Or how about this- we aren't attacking Isreal to make them stop hitting Hezbollah because Hezbollah is a group that does suicide bombings, it rabidly anti American and has killed hundreds of Americans? Gee, you think?
Or do you want to go with the more complicated explination that by somehow taking out Hezbollah Isreal will make it easier for us to get Iran's oil?
(and as an aside, considering the damage that this has done to the US efforts to wean the Lebanese goverment from Syria's control it seems to be another case of a well worked conspiracy that is competent enough to remain secret, but not enough to avoid doing more damage than good.)
How about this comment by you,
Gee, you think that maybe they are attacking now because a couple of thier soldiers were just grabbed? Hmmm?
Or do you want to say that they were all ready to invade just as their soldiers were grabbed?
I guess I am going to be accused of not having the brains to accept what is the truth because I go for the more likely, visible reasons rather than attribute things to something I can't see and really don't make a lot of sense.
