On May 14, 11:48pm, Erik Moeller wrote:
} Yes. The war in Bosnia was a product of western capitalist countries,
} designed to change power structures in that region and to push arms
} industry.
Well, "we" (the US and West Germany?) did exacerbate things by quickly
recognizing the freedom of the Croats and Bosnians to secede from
Yugoslavia, a right not granted by most gov'ts to their own people
(officially granted by the Soviet constitution, I think, but do we
believe them?) "To push arms industry" seems like an odd goal to
allege, however, considering the nice arms embargoes we imposed.
} That's simply not the case. Many tourists are disappointed after their
} travel to Cuba because there was no single prostitute. Even in Havana
Doesn't prove much. A lack of prostitutes could mean that there are no
desperate women. It could also mean that Cuba's police is much nastier
than our own, and thus more effective at getting rid of public
prostitution.
} > sanctions. Of course, Cuba isn't *really* isolated -- the government
} > is free to buy anything it likes from Canada, Europe, and South
} > America. Sanctions there are astoundingly porous -- Americans can even
}
} A good economy is not only characterized by its growth or size, but also
} by the distribution of wealth and the inequality. That's what
Is this supposed to address Perry's refutation of your claim that Cuba
is woefully isolated? Seems rather like a non-sequitur to me.
} deeds. The US aggression against Vietnam and other communist countries
} was simply wrong (although a war can never be justified).
And the Soviet agression against Afghanistan? The North Korean or
Vietnamese agressions against their southern halves? China's agression
against Tibet, and soon probably-nasty-things done to Hong Kong? The UK
started being nice to Hong Kong rather late, yes; this hardly lets China
off the hook.
War can never be justified? Hitler should have been allowed to run
Europe?
Never answered my note about Communist pollution being far worse than
Western, in most places. Not that we don't have toxic dumps, but they
are localized dumps, not all of Prague, or Poland. And do you really
think the US has a more concentrated power elite than the Soviet Union
did? Or North Korea? That Kohl has as much power as Gorbachev had?
And if we did, so what? Life's still happier, freer, and cleaner here
than over there, for ye average person. But perhaps I've just been
brainwashed by the media, along with all the Cubans risking drowning and
Vietnamese boat people and high-level Soviet defectors (the West doesn't
get to have defectors. The West has emigrants.) You of course are
immune to anyone's influence or brainwashing, the noble intellectural
defender of the mindless hoi polloi...
Ok, I can stop. Ugh.
Merry part,
-xx- Damien R. Sullivan X-) <*> http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~phoenix
And even priests were coming to spend some time in it, because of the
collection of religious books. There were one thousand, two hundred and
eighty-three religious books in there now, each one--according to
itself--the only one any man need ever read. It was sort of nice to see
them all together. -- Terry Pratchett, _Small Gods_