Socialist doctor wins Uruguay's sunday election

[klusener]

Self-defense is a human right, sure. But Malcolm didn't preach peaceful self-defense. By all means, if someone is trying to hang you, fight back. Thats not the same as going out and hanging the KKK member who lynched a black man the week before.

Franz, explain what "peaceful self-defense" is.. How do you defend yourself peacefully when someone is trying to kill you?

 

[Bartholomew]

Hardly anybody would be crazy enough to invade a country with even two or three big ICBM nukes. I doubt Saddam Hussein would have done it, even if he had a very good reason to--he'd have to evacuate himself and all his friends from his country during the attack, and he'd probably be out of power within a week after his action.

 

[russ_watters]

If Japan gives money to foreign militaries, this is not included in Japan's foreign aid total. Foreign aid is defined to only apply to developing countries, and it must have a main purpose of promoting the economic development of those countries.

And that is my point. Why is this money not included?

The "war on terror" as foreign aid is a joke.

I could have worded that better: I don't mean the war itself, I mean the rebuilding of those two countries.

As to our army allowing other countries to reduce the size of their armies, that's ridiculous. China has a huge army, you might as well credit them with the same.

China is not a member of NATO. What do you think the debate sounds like in European countries (and Canada) when they discuss miliary funding? They come right out and say it: 'we don't need a military: the US will protect us.' (yeah, I'll look for a quote). But even if you don't buy the military funding itself, the uses of the military are straightforward: when the UN or NATO does a major military action, its the US doing most of the work.

http://heartofthematter.typepad.com/the_heart_of_the_matter/2005/01/canadas_militar.html is a Canadian blog on the subject:

I feel that the reason why Canada constantly harps on its peacekeeping role has everything to do with ideology and nothing with the rational defense of a country.

This is the mindset that befalls a country that has lived for too long under the wing of a far superior country. They get smug and self-righteous thinking they can sudenly dictate to others how war should be avoided and how we all need simple diplomacy to ease pains. They seem to forget that if it wasn't for the US, we'd be bowing either to Hitler, Stalin or Allah.

As much as certain Canucks like to claim Canada is not beholden to the US for anything -- is in fact under threat by America -- the fact of the matter is we all know that if a terrorist bomb goes off in Ottawa tomorrow, it will be US soldiers on the ground with canucks following them.

 

[Bartholomew]

The USA plays fast and loose with international law. We do what we want. If according to NATO we should do something or other, but it's in the interests of those in power to do something else, we're not going to follow NATO. The USA is a huge dangerous animal. By the way, your Canadian blog seems to be from someone on the political fringe.

--and it's not as if you need a big army to fight terrorists. You need a big police force and intelligence network to do that; the USA's huge army can't protect anyone, not even itself, from terrorist attacks. We can invade places, but we can't find the terrorists. If terrorists attack Canada, yes, the USA's troops will be right there in a few hours. So they mill around and "secure the perimeter." But the attack's already over; it's not as if we'd be "protecting" them from anything.

--and it's not as if terrorists are much of a threat anyways. Deaths to terrorists are miniscule. Every 7 hours as many people die in the USA as died in the 9/11 attacks.