Catawba, welcome back. I thought you had conceded these last few points! We have put a lot of sweat into it! We are reaching points which we will not resolve so it may be best to say "we don't agree". I would like to take this opportunity to point out that it is a lot of work on me to sort out your lack of correct multi-quotes in your responses. Please start multi-quoting, or I will have to end my participation this interesting debate.
You will be missed.
No concession, just life.
It has nothing to do with "the effort made to prevent civilian casualties. In stark contrast was the terrorists intentional targeting of civilians." in
Operation Iraqi Freedom.
You need to ackowledge that!
I
see no difference in us knowingly bombing civilian infrastructure that we knew would result in the deaths of tens of thousands.
The Islamic extremists certainly saw it that way, hence their attack on 9/11!
Not one bit. My analogy was that we have previously built democracies successfully and that has nothing to do with how we went in. Our reason for being there is not invalid. We are there.
We are there for immoral reasons which some try to validate by saying we killed thousands for their own good.
Yes, indeed. This is another good thing. The US oil companies won their contracts through open bidding. What you consider a good thing I consider an immoral trading of human lives for future oil.
You are right, I will never agree with you on this.
It is all not up in the air. Only the amount of Iranian influence is in question and that is a question for the Iraqis to answer. They are not "likely to evaporate after our troops are removed". Prove that.
Just as soon as our military occupation ends, I will! Until that happens all that you can say for sure is that we have a successful occupation. We outgun Iraq. We knew that before we attacked them.
Yes, you are correct. That is the meaning of my "True" above. My point still stands: we didn't install him, he was placed in power through the Iraqi democratic process.