If the Iraqi's sabotaging pipelines and shooting US soldiers ...

[GregW]

... hate us because of our 'freedoms' ... then are they, "Freedom Fighters?"

[KG]

1. seems the iraqi resistance movement isn't happy with the

american brand of 'freedom'.

can't blame them, tho. i'd be pissed if an empirical force invaded my country and commenced to steal my resources and subvert my culture.

[tom_paine]

2. America doesn't technically have freedom anymore

When you can't cast a trustworthy vote, everything else is illusory.

But would I give up this pleasant twilight in which the wretched remnants of the Old Republic are seemingly still in effect?

No way. I like pretend-freedom. It beats being hauled off to the Gulags.

On the other hand, history says that it's inevitable that the other shoe will dop, and our daily lives will eventually fall to the level where the Imperial Family already is.

[Clete]

3. Some are being hauled off to Gitmo and other undisclosed

locations. They have disappeared, have not been allowed lawyers, nor do their families know what happened to them or where they are. This has been happening in this country since 2001. The disappeared ones are not Jews, like in Nazi Germany, nor communists like in Pinochet's Chile. They are Arabs and because they aren't your usual white American, no one cares.

As long as it isn't happening to the ordinary white American, they believe as they are told that they are terrorists. Hitler did the same thing. When his thugs burned the Reichstag, Jews were rounded up and they disappeared. No one knew what happened to them, but they were Jews so who cared. It didn't affect the mainstream German citizen.

Americans, we need to have access to these people, provide them with lawyers and let their families know where they are. They need to be put on trial to prove that they are in fact terrorists. If there is anything wrong in the laundry list of things wrong with our country today with the Bushistas, this is the main one.

[mcaverly]

4. My question is

Investment in fixing the oil pipelines and electrical systems gives them more soft targets. More US soldiers give them more people to blow up. We are throwing $89 billion out for this doomed cause. What are we doing?