The Gray Zone

[Rat Faced]

longboneslinger, we may be closer in our beliefs than it seems...im just not as elequant as Biggles and J2k4 in trying to put my points across.


Look at any educational, tourist or history site regarding what Iraq was like, in the 70's and 80's...

The Iraqi peope are shown as friendly and welcomig to visitors and the country as forward looking with the best Education and Health Care in the Middle East including Israel..

It falls down, and always has (always will IMHO) on how it treats Political Opposition.

Like every other country the leadership invented "enemies" to focus its populations anger when it had problems. Due to the culture in the Middle East, this leads to Killings and Torture...just like in the UK it leads to the rise of Political Movements such as the BNP.

Its only our culture that makes the politicians in our countries grow up knowing that Torture/Killings for political means is not allowed. I have no doubt that Bush, Blaire and any other political leader brought up in the same culture as the Middle East would be murderers too.

No matter which country your in, you must be "hard" and must have stabbed a lot of people in the back (metaphorically speaking) to have risen to the political top...our cultures define the limits of what is acceptable.

Creating a democracy in Iraq is a lovely Principle, however it takes more than a few months to change a culture...


It reminds me of Cuba... A Communist State that has elections (dont ask me why).

There is only one party to vote for, so you'd think there would be no turnout.... however there is a 70% turnout voting Communist.

If there comes a time that under 50% of the population vote Communist, maybe i would listen to the USA saying its sanctions are fair... when they impose those sanctions on China too...

[Voetsek]

Hum sounds like south africa one party state sir take a good long look very bad in the long term see who her friends are big trouble down the road

[Rat Faced]

Who said a one party state was good?

I think a 2 party state is bad, never mind 1 party


The point i was making is that the turnout is very high, when there is no need to be... endorsing the Government in power.

If the turnout was as low as 49% even, it would mean the majority of voters were not actively supporting the Government in power...

Anyone over 16 can vote, and a high turnout is encouraged..

The voters can either stay at home, cast a blank vote or spoil the vote and the voting system is secret ballot.....

So 3 ways to vote against the Government and only one to vote for it.... and they still consistantly get an endorsement in excess of 70% (Conservative Figures).


The One Party system is about the only thing that is, strictly speaking, communist there now: They have Freedom of Religion and an Open Market Economy is encouraged....

Even the US Chamber of Commerce wants the blockade lifted...its pure Dogma, and the same would happen if Porto Rico decided they didnt want to be controlled by the USA and threw the Business' that were exploiting them out...

[longboneslinger]

The point i was making is that the turnout is very high, when there is no need to be... endorsing the Government in power.

From what I've heard of Castro, voting against him might not be to bright. Leaders like him don't like dissension. There's probably a bit of positive/negative reinforcement going on. The positive being that you didn't get the negative police busting in and kicking your ass for not voting. It makes Castro look good to get a high turnout.

As for China, I totally agree. That Bill Clinton sold us out to the Chinese is a whole new thread, though. But how else does an unknown go to the White House? That's a long road. Bill got a short cut and a lot of cash somewhere. But as I said, that's a whole new thread. I personally believe that Most Favored Nation Trading Status with a country like China that has as horrible a record on human rights as they do not to mention the multi-billion dollar trade defficit, slave labor(oops, sorry, 'political prisoners' ), and the patent infringements they indulge in is sickening to say the least.

As for the mess in Iraq, I never agreed that we should police the world. Never. That we should push our beliefs on others is anathema to all that America stands for. Or at least used to stand for. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see the people of Iraq have the freedoms that we do. I don't see it happining in one or even two generations. Can we as a nation afford that or even should? No. My main problem is that I totally agree that Saddam should have been neutralized if no other reason than the mass murders he was responsible for. I just don't think that war was the best alternative. What was the best alternative? Sigh.

If I figure it out maybe I'll run for President. It'd be one hell of an interesting campaign, that's for sure!