Wikileaks

[FireStorm_]

Also, the US failure to create working democracies in that region is due to the population's inability to grasp democracy.

Lifting this out of context is awesome fun.

[zwzsg]

These are not people who are familiar with the concepts of freedom of speech, voting, human rights and so forth.

Trolololol, and the american reaction to wikileak shows that neither are american apparently!

What is immoral about defending your home soil?

The Iraq is not your home soil.
The Iraq is the home soil of Iraqii insurgents.

The afghanistan is not your home soil.
The afghanistan is the home soil of the taliban.

[BaNa]

Especially considering Iran (under Mosaddegh) and Palestine (HAMAS), two places where democratically elected leaders where/are shunned by the west.

[Cheesecan]

I think it stands nicely on its own too Bringing democracy to the part of earth most famous for inventing the alphabet roughly 3000 years ago. Then made famous for smoking tobacco from huge water pipes.

HAMAS is democratically elected if you call someone going into your home and holding a gun to your head, telling you what to vote, democracy. Favorite HAMAS past time: Launching rockets at Israeli settlers.

[BaNa]

HAMAS is democratically elected if you call someone going into your home and holding a gun to your head, telling you what to vote, democracy. Favorite HAMAS past time: Launching rockets at Israeli settlers.

After polls closed, officials and observers called the vote "peaceful"; Edward McMillan-Scott, the British Conservative head of the European Parliament's monitoring team described the polls as "extremely professional, in line with international standards, free, transparent and without violence". His colleague, Italian Communist MEP Luisa Morgantini said there was "a very professional attitude, competence and respect for the rules." [13] All polling stations closed on time (7 p.m.) except for East Jerusalem, where voting was extended by the permitted two extra hours. Hamas protested this extension, claiming it only served Fatah; the Central Elections Committee stated that voting hours were "extended upon the approval of the Israeli authorities due to lengthy queues as a result of obstructions by post office workers." [14]

[FireStorm_]

@cheesecan (assuming you where responding to me)

The only part of earth mentioned in that quote is the US, as far as I can tell.
Ever heard of lobbyists?

[Cheesecan]

HAMAS is democratically elected if you call someone going into your home and holding a gun to your head, telling you what to vote, democracy. Favorite HAMAS past time: Launching rockets at Israeli settlers.

After polls closed, officials and observers called the vote "peaceful"; Edward McMillan-Scott, the British Conservative head of the European Parliament's monitoring team described the polls as "extremely professional, in line with international standards, free, transparent and without violence". His colleague, Italian Communist MEP Luisa Morgantini said there was "a very professional attitude, competence and respect for the rules." [13] All polling stations closed on time (7 p.m.) except for East Jerusalem, where voting was extended by the permitted two extra hours. Hamas protested this extension, claiming it only served Fatah; the Central Elections Committee stated that voting hours were "extended upon the approval of the Israeli authorities due to lengthy queues as a result of obstructions by post office workers." [14]

The Palestinians really tried to show off to the world how morally superior they could act, they showed some public restraint to western observers(while telling their women to stay at home), but what did they do afterward?

From 2000 to 2004, Hamas was responsible for killing nearly 400 Israelis and wounding more than 2,000 in 425 attacks, according to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From 2001 through May 2008, Hamas launched more than 3,000 Qassam rockets and 2,500 mortar attacks into Israel.

Do you dispute that HAMAS is a terrorist organization?

FireStorm_: Lol right, have a stab at the US, I don't disagree with you really, although I think their legal system with juries is superior to the one in my country, but the rest of that country is pretty much crap.

[zwzsg]

If killing people with rockets makes you a terrorist organisation, then the US army is the biggest terrorist organisation ever!

[BaNa]

I am disputing the fact that the election was rigged. For all the talk of spreading democracy, it was a fine example of how noone really cares about democratic elections if the wrong guy (i.e. the one we dont like) wins.

[Cheesecan]

If killing people with rockets makes you a terrorist organisation, then the US army is the biggest terrorist organisation ever!

The US isn't kill our dudes though.

[hoijui]

yeah.. they only kill those stupid, uneducated, eating their own children for breakfast, stupid, incompatible with democracy, stone age, tabbaco smoking, ... aehh aehh... stupid people!

while they kill freedom loving patriots, trying to bring peace to the world.

The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: "This way of settling differences is not just." This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

.. but what did he know, really?!

[PicassoCT]

You can not bring democracy to country were people would sell there (abstract) right to vote, to buy things for there daily demands, like food, petrol. A swiss study i posted a year ago, showed that you need to be at least carefree on the basic levels (Food, Shelter, medicals supplys) to take part in a election, also you need to have a basic level of education, or your country will slip into a sort of internal civil war of religions.

[Gota]

yes...Dumb people cant rule their country...
You have to go through some sort of a phase that is "rougher".

[Hoi]

FireStorm_: Lol right, have a stab at the US, I don't disagree with you really, although I think their legal system with juries is superior to the one in my country, but the rest of that country is pretty much crap.

A system where the one who can influence the jury the best (read: who can afford the best lawyer) is NOT a good system. This only makes it easier for the government / rich people / companies to exploit the poor people.

The best system is a system with multiple judges, people who have the least prejudice as possible and who won't be influenced by the lawyers that much.

Did you know that a black man who kills a white man in America has a 9x bigger chance to get convicted (death penalty / life in prison) than a white man who kills a white man? Did you know that a white man who kills a black man in America has a 5x smaller chance to get convicted than a black man who kills a black man?

[bobthedinosaur]

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newswar/view/

White House 2003 - Oops, leaks happen

White House 2010 - Can we charge him on rape accounts?

[Gota]

Wait wait...i thought he was charges with rape in sweden....

[Soul]

I don't see how a gun or an army could fight terrorism, sure they could kill those who terrorize them, but in doing so aren't they a terror in themselves?

Besides "terrorism" is't limited to a specific person, what do you think will happen if you kill all the parents to thousands of children, and break the countries infrastructure?

The children won't have an education and terrorist factions like the Al-Qaeda will have free room to take these children and raise them as instruments of this so called "terrorism" that was created by foreign opression in the first place.

Not that i aprove of their retaliation and their acts of terrorism, but you cannot have a "war on terror" where you utilize weapons and plant the seed to even more terror.

Oppression only breeds more ill-feelings, and in this case regression of the targeted populance.
Retaliation is ensured.



On a completly other note that concerns this thread about wikileaks:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11965864
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v9gQueP2Pw

[Johannes]

Wait wait...i thought he was charges with rape in sweden....

No, it wasn't rape, but "surprise sex".

[pintle]

Jst to reply to Forb: Let me rephrase my loling at your isolationism comment "LOL Cold war, LOL south America, LOL read some political history, I suggest googling "bay of pigs" might be a good start"

I am not a patriot, and I am just as disgusted by the military actions of Britain as I am by America. I have repeatedly protested and lobbied against such actions.

My point about the UN seems to have gone completely over your head. The USA holds a permanent seat on the security council, giving it veto rights which it frequently uses to further its own interests. American military rhetoric speaks of freedom and liberation, but ignores the democratic international lawmakers if it conflicts with their interests. This is crass and blatant hyopcrisy; a cynical manipulation of the veneer of respectability provided by the UN to give carte blanche for illegal international conquest (because that is was Iraq is right now).

The UN is an impotent organisation preserving the status quo precisely because of the actions of such key players as the USA. Your government (and mine) either need to defer to its authority or leave the organisation. You asked for a positive step forwards, I gave you one.

This thread= funny joke. People aren't even keeping up to date with Assange's legal woes. It wasn't forced non-consentual sex, it was sex without a condom, then sex where the condom split= lol £20k bail which is withdrawn 2 hours later because Swedish politicians got upset.

[Sleksa]

Do you dispute that HAMAS is a terrorist organization?

By same grounds;
Do you dispute that israel is not a terrorist organization?