5 Years Ago Today...

[Stan187]

They listen to revolutionary music, adore "revolutionaries" and their sex symbol is Ernesto Guevara. Some of them are ready to fight, but most of them just sit on the couch with a joint and post angry messages at boards.

Then again, who are we to chide other for pisitng angry messages on messageboards?

[bonehead]

Ahh, but you're changing the terms to erect a false argument. Bluesman didn't imply he would "freely" vote for a Dem, especially Hillary, if she produced Magic Carbuncle Of Success from under her witches' robes, he just implied he'd vote for them.

-dale

I know. It is just that until the situation arises and he does actually vote her way, I am not buying his argument.

[bonehead]

I was not necessarily "brought up" in a certain way, but I was definitely influenced by my stature (very short and slight of built) to gradually realize that letting others pick on me was a one-way ticket to more bullying.

Thus, at a certain point in my life early on, I didn't give a damn who was doing what to me...if I didn't like it, I fought back...the consequence be damned.

There are many others that have the same frame of mind, but according to Bluesman, we all would have sat on our hands and done nothing because we are brainwashed to do just that.

[bonehead]

I didn't underestimate you; I don't really think that's possible. You think I'm talking about something else, when I was answering your original post, which was complete tripe.


No, you silly man, we would follow FAA guidelines, or at least we USED to, back on 9/11, so don't give me a bunch of BS about how YOU wouldn't have just sat there like EVERY SINGLE PERSON did, you'd have DONE something, by Gawd. You would NOT have, and don't claim anything different, because that makes every single person on the first three jets a coward, and YOU a HERO.


You really are an idiot. YEAH, I'd have sat there, thinking, 'This is going to come out okay; the Feds can get us outta this.' And I'd have the same incorrect expectation as everybody else about the nature of the hijackers. Same as YOU.


Nice rant, but it doesn't bear on what I've been trying to explain to you, so I'll leave this part.



TOTALLY SERIOUS: if she can win the war, I'll hold my nose and send her a check, work down at her campaign HQ, and proudly cast my vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton, and think I'd done a huge service to the country. Won't happen, but there it is: I'm a single-issue voter, and my issue is THE WAR.

We've done this before, you and I, where you post something dense, I tell you a fact that you haven't considered or didn't know, and you think I'm talking about something else.

You're doing it again.

YOU posted THIS:


And I posted THIS:

And backed it up with an excellent comment from an even more excellent column by the most excellent Mark Steyn:

AND:

Appended with this note, specifically for you:


So, you see, the fact is, you did NOT understand EITHER thing I was telling you: 1) you would NOT have acted in any way whatsoever, because that's not how we did these kinds of things on 9/11, and 2) you didn't understand that what I was telling you that you didn't understand was that your original post was bunk. And you went off on a tangent that had nothing to do with anything I was trying to get across to you.



Americans are not 'P U S S I F I E D', they're doing what they have been told is the best way to handle a hijacking, which, up until then, resulted in hijackers demanding something, negotiations take place, and either we give in or we kill 'em all, usually at immense risk to the hostages, which was the whole point of taking them in the first place; it gives the terrorists something to bargain with AND to hide behind.

Well, not anymore, and now we KNOW that, so YEAH, nobody's going to get away with it AGAIN. But we didn't back then, and as butch as you think you are, you'd have stayed in your seat, too, right up until 1) impact, or 2) somebody informed you what was REALLY going on. THEN and ONLY then would the passengers rise and do whatever they thought they could. NOT BEFORE, which was the point of me pointing out to you that outnumbering a handful of nutters with cutters wasn't at all relevant.

See, if the boneheads of the world were to have even a remote possibility of, you know, swarming the vastly-outnumbered and poorly-armed hijackers like Flight 93 did, then this plot would have ALL been about airliners crashing into empty fields, and it would've been a stupid, poorly-conceived, unsuccessful goat-rope. THE POINT OF THE WHOLE PLOT is that they KNEW how the people would react, and if the Flight 93 hijack team had gone into action just an hour earlier, that plane, too, would've hit its target. The only reason it did NOT was by then, we knew the new rules of the game: there weren't going to be any demands from the hijackers; NObody could save the people on the plane then, and the only thing they COULD do then was fight back.

But NOT BEFORE, so back off the chest-thumping and THINK for a minute before you post crap like that again.

Do you GET that?

First of all, you can leave the hero crap on the manure pile. By stopping the terrorist, my motivation would be SAVING MY OWN ASS instead of waiting for somebody else to do it for me. If you had any clue about me you would know how low I believe the odds are that the feds could have would have been able to do anything. The mentality I have is that one gets when you have lived where the sheriff would take the better part of an hour to respond to a 911 call. You take care of threats yourself or wait for the authorities to pick you up in a body bag. You may think you know what makes other people tick, but unless you walked in that person's shoe's awhile you have no idea so you are simply talking out of your ass when you tell me what I would or would not do in a situation because you do not know me at all. Lastly, there are many people who are not about to give a hoot about FAA guidlines when it is their ass is on the line.

Had the passengers kept the terrorist out of the cockpit, there would not have been any planes crashing anywhere. Any "idiot" would know this, but from your post even this escapes you. Hmmm.
Furthermore, I have been around some muslims before 911 so even if you were nieve (as well as the general population), I already had a hint of their arrogance, deep hatred of our country, and the depth of their will. Muslims have been terrorist in recent history and have done the suicide bombing before, so in retrospect, there really is not much of a stretch to think they might crash a plane into a building. I am not proclaiming I know everything about our war, but I can tell you that I was not surprised by 911, only saddened by it and more than a little pissed off by the bungling of our own intelligence agencies, and I am still fuming that there are people on this earth that would even consider such an act of terrorism let alone carry it out.

Bluesman. You really should get out more and pay attention to what the public school system is teaching our youth. For our next generation, standing up and defening themselves is no longer an option. These kids are indeed being p u s s i f i e d. This is also happening in PC workplaces where if you do anything but run from your attacker or call security, you are in trouble, and if you dare fight back, you are fired as well. The goverment policies you so proudly defend put the general population into two groups. One "ghetto" group that violently defends against any disrespect no matter how trivial, and the "civilized" group that politely gets the crap beat out of them while they patiently waits for the cops to come and save the day.

[dalem]

There are many others that have the same frame of mind, but according to Bluesman, we all would have sat on our hands and done nothing because we are brainwashed to do just that.

Yes, we would have, especially while the plane was still in the air. Maybe after a few days of stinking it up on the tarmac I'd've been ready to play hero, but no way I'm endangering the whole plane at that point. Once I was informed what the alternatives were I would hope I'd try something, sure, but until that minute I'd do what I had been told to do all my life - sit and wait for the pros to handle it.

-dale

[Bluesman]

Guy's a total tool, man; he thinks EVERYbody on all three planes were pussies. He thinks he'd have been out of his seat and rushing to the attack as soon as somebody wanted an extra bag of pretzels. Because he thinks he'd have known that's the only thing that would've saved everybody's lives, knowledge that nobody else had, until Beamer and Glick and the Flight 93 General Militia reported for duty.

There's no explaining anything to this guy. He's DENSE.

[astralis]

james,

Jesus Bluesman remind me never to disagree with you (I usually dont anyway).

naw, man, ENJOY it! past airing of opinion, ain't everyday one gets to disagree with a senior NCO and live to tell about it...

and you learn so many new and interesting ways to get your point across in a forceful manner too

[Bluesman]

james,



naw, man, ENJOY it! past airing of opinion, ain't everyday one gets to disagree with a senior NCO and live to tell about it...

and you learn so many new and interesting ways to get your point across in a forceful manner too

Nothing wrong with disagreeing with me, REALLY there's not, and if I snap at somebody, it's usually because they're being sloppy: either they didn't read what I wrote, misunderstood it, aren't in possession of facts they should have known, or their analysis is sloppy (and by that, I don't mean 'different from mine', either).

The reason bonehead got both barrels is because he's continuing to hang on to the claim that HE would've done something butchly, while everybody that just sat there - on each of the three planes that hit their targets, that's HUNDREDS of people - were just brainwashed robots without bonehead's enormous testicles.

Well, that's CRAP. He would've thought that this is another hijacking, like all the other hijackings that came before, and the plane would've been diverted to another field, where it would land, the hijackers would make outrageous demands, and either it is negotiated down to something innocuous so the hijackers can give up, or the plane is stormed and MOST hostages get out alive.

But to think, on 9/11, that there was NOTHING that could save your life just wasn't part of the calculus, and he is just too dumb to GET that. So...I tee off on him, because after explaining it twice, he still thinks he'd have been Glick or Beamer, before even THEY would have.

It's an insult to those people.

But if somebody disagrees with me AFTER they've read what I wrote, understood what I meant, have a fact-based argument that they've analyzed...I can dig that, man. Tell me where you think I got it wrong, and I'm going to listen, but probably disagree (and sometimes not; I've changed my point-of-view on here before), and that's just fine.

[bonehead]

Yes, we would have, especially while the plane was still in the air. Maybe after a few days of stinking it up on the tarmac I'd've been ready to play hero, but no way I'm endangering the whole plane at that point. Once I was informed what the alternatives were I would hope I'd try something, sure, but until that minute I'd do what I had been told to do all my life - sit and wait for the pros to handle it.

-dale

That is where you and I differ Dale. My take is that if the situation even occured, the "pros" failed. Again it is not about playing hero. It is about taking responsibility for ones own safety coupled with the fact that there is not a chance in hell am I ever going to be a hostage for an Islamic terrorist.

[bonehead]

Guy's a total tool, man; he thinks EVERYbody on all three planes were pussies. He thinks he'd have been out of his seat and rushing to the attack as soon as somebody wanted an extra bag of pretzels. Because he thinks he'd have known that's the only thing that would've saved everybody's lives, knowledge that nobody else had, until Beamer and Glick and the Flight 93 General Militia reported for duty.

There's no explaining anything to this guy. He's DENSE.

Wrong again son! There were people on one of the planes that did the right thing. They simply acted too late for their own good. They did however most likely saved many lives on the ground as the plane was not able to reach its intended target. Your sarcasm and name calling only showcases your weak argument. I fully understand what you and your beloved columnist wrote and to say that pre 9/11, out of the hundreds of millions of Americans, absolutely everyone would have stayed in their seats, is dead wrong. By and large that is what most of the people would have done, but not all. If that fact goes against your line of thinking then so be it. Finally, Unless you are God, and you are not, you really have no clue as to what a total stranger would have done in such a circumstance. The best you can do is play the odds.

[Indirect Fire]

I had just come home from 3rd grade in Pune, India, when I turned on the TV and heard about it.

[indus creed]

Nothing wrong with disagreeing with me, REALLY there's not, and if I snap at somebody, it's usually because they're being sloppy: either they didn't read what I wrote, misunderstood it, aren't in possession of facts they should have known, or their analysis is sloppy (and by that, I don't mean 'different from mine', either).

The reason bonehead got both barrels is because he's continuing to hang on to the claim that HE would've done something butchly, while everybody that just sat there - on each of the three planes that hit their targets, that's HUNDREDS of people - were just brainwashed robots without bonehead's enormous testicles.

Well, that's CRAP. He would've thought that this is another hijacking, like all the other hijackings that came before, and the plane would've been diverted to another field, where it would land, the hijackers would make outrageous demands, and either it is negotiated down to something innocuous so the hijackers can give up, or the plane is stormed and MOST hostages get out alive.

But to think, on 9/11, that there was NOTHING that could save your life just wasn't part of the calculus, and he is just too dumb to GET that. So...I tee off on him, because after explaining it twice, he still thinks he'd have been Glick or Beamer, before even THEY would have.

It's an insult to those people.

But if somebody disagrees with me AFTER they've read what I wrote, understood what I meant, have a fact-based argument that they've analyzed...I can dig that, man. Tell me where you think I got it wrong, and I'm going to listen, but probably disagree (and sometimes not; I've changed my point-of-view on here before), and that's just fine.

Case in point, the Richard Reid (shoe bomber) affair which was post-911. Passengers pitched in and were instrumental in helping cabin crew in subduing Mr Reid.

But then again, in Virginia Tech only the Israeli Prof had some success(barricading the door against the attacker and in the process losing his life). I guess not everybody is cut out to hit back.

[indus creed]

What makes me angry?

About three days ago I watched a BBC programme called 'Hard Talk'. In this episode the auto-cue reader had four guests for a debate along with a studio audience.
The motion was 'should we negotiate with Al Qaida'.
Speaking for the affirmative was Terry Waite of Lebanon hostage fame along with the former head of Pakistans ISI. Speaking for the negative was a British conservative mp and a Muslim man whom I didn't recognize.
The audience was comprised of an even balance between British Muslims and non-Muslims.
The loudest and most vociferous members of the audience arguing against the motion were the young muslims, the mostly middle-aged non-muslim audience were the ones speaking of negotiation and compromise.
The motion to negotiate was passed by 56% to 44%. As the most opposed seemed to be the younger Muslims, I guess that most of the non-muslims were for the motion.

Yesterday I watched various Senators question General Petraeus over his report, and almost universally expressing disappointment with his report and finding inventive ways of calling him a liar to his face.

Those of you who know me will have realised through my often seemingly conflicting opinions and ramblings that I'm not the quickest person around and I take a long time to make up my mind over most things, if at all, but there are some things I know.

I know that I could never be a General in the American army because I would be unable to prevent myself punching those senators in the nose, but their abuse of Petreaus isn't why I'm angry.

I know that the mufsiduun must be hunted down and killed without mercy.

I know that given the support, time and resources the military and police can achieve this, as those they battle are at the end of the day mere moral vacuums, approximations of humans, flesh without soul, basic evils with no true character.

I know that the fight isn't just on the battlefield, that an equally important
fight is the one for the minds of our people.

I know this battle of ideas is my battle, and I know that at this time I am loosing it, and the viral ideas of the mufsiduun are being viewed by my people as something that can be 'accommodated': that if we just reach out to them everything will be all right: that the virus that infects them is 'something we can live with'. But this current loss is just a small part of the war and this is not why I am angry.

I know that it is not a battle against Islam, and that many of my fellow word warriors, the surviving immune system of the human race, come from within Islam as well as the other great schools of thought.

I know that apart from the Irhabi who must be killed, sanitised, wiped from the face of the earth with extreme prejudice, my main enemy is my own generation.

I know this from my life experiences, and I am reminded of it by both the BBC programme, and Patreaus's 'grilling'.

Both of us (Blues) grew up at the tail end of the baby boomers, in fact technically we both are baby boomers, and we both know that in the main, we are a generation without morals.
For those reading who are too young to have seen this, the baby boomers were a generation who were treasured, who, because of the terror and pain their parents went through, were denied nothing.
Growing up we were gifted with more earlier than any other generation, and came to expect this coddling as of right. For the longest time we were protected from all ill by our parents, until many were no longer able to face adversity.
They do it still. They take no responsibility. They demand that someone else protect them. In the past it was their parents, now that they can't, they expect their children to.

This is what makes me angry: the lazy cowardice of the bulk of my generation, where hard decisions are to be avoided by sleight of mind; where if you ignore something for long enough it becomes someone elses problem; where if you ignore or debase the messenger the problem is solved; where a basic moral vacuity allows any action no matter how base to avoid responsibility.

And what truly makes me angry is that because of this, and if I fail in my battles, instead of continuing the legacy of my ancestors and making the world a better place for the next generation, I will in sixteen years time be farewelling my beautiful baby boy as he goes off to fight a far greater war because of the cowardice and perfidy of my generation, a generation who will sacrifice their parents legacy and their childrens future for their own comfort.

What makes you angry Blues?

Very good post. However I disagree in that by no strecth of imagination do I believe young muslims in UK are moderate. Those are just TV faces.

They take no responsibility. They demand that someone else protect them. In the past it was their parents, now that they can't, they expect their children to.

Baby boomers in US have lived off on the greatness accumulated over the generations(They have some achievements as well). Now expect inter-generational wars over pensions and other entitlements they are demanding.

[TopHatter]

But then again, in Virginia Tech only the Israeli Prof had some success(barricading the door against the attacker and in the process losing his life). I guess not everybody is cut out to hit back.

You are comparing mostly adults on an airplane with absolutely no choice but to fight back to mostly kids on a college campus thinking that somebody might come to rescue them or that they could hide until it was all over.

Slightly different circumstances.

However, I do agree with you. Not everybody is cut out to hit back. You have to be willing to throw yourself into a situation when most people's reaction is self-preservation.

Doing so (throwing yourself into danger instead of away from it) generally requires either training or a "no-hope" situation.

And even in that "no-hope" situation, you're probably correct. Not everybody will hit back.

[dalem]

That is where you and I differ Dale. My take is that if the situation even occured, the "pros" failed. Again it is not about playing hero. It is about taking responsibility for ones own safety coupled with the fact that there is not a chance in hell am I ever going to be a hostage for an Islamic terrorist.

So it's before 9/11, 4 M.E. guys jump up, 2 storm the cockpit and lock themselves in, the others cut a stewardesses throat right in front of you and claim they have a bomb which they'll detonate if you f*ck with them.

What do you do then?

-dale