War in Iraq, is there a point?

I find this to be the most telling:

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Let theirs be the children who are not safe in their beds at night....

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That FairWitness has to resort to the following accusation against me is even more telling:

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You would prefer to have MORE American children killed?

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I have no desire to list them all here, so you can pick them apart....

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Let me guess -- you are really anti-war and are purposely trying to make the pro-war side look foolish, right?

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so if that means that the evil-doers' offspring must endure war wrought by their parents, so be it.

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That is not what you said in your first post; in your first post you were expressing that it is justice that "evil doers" should witness their children being killed.

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We are the VICTIMS of Islamic terrorism, not the perpetrators of it.

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Actually, we ARE the perpetrators of a global imperialism that functions as a kind of terrorism. Chickens coming home to roost and all of that. Since you are saying that it is inevitable for children to be harmed in a war, then you are condoning the harming of the children of the not-so-innocent Americans.

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You sound like a page straight out of the New Left Handbook for Blaming America First.

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Well, I am a communist after all. What did you expect?

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...copious coastlines, and abundant natural resources and farmland.

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And don't forget, those copious coastlines, abundant natural resources and farmland used to belong to someone else.

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There is also the inescapable, indisputable fact that the United States of America is the ultimate defender of democracies the world over.

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Actually, it is neither inescapable nor indisputable. The US has been involved in the overthrow of several democratically elected regimes (Arbenz, Allende, the Sandanistas, probably Chavez), while supporting some of the worst dictatorships (Guatamala, Chile, El Salvador). I'm not sure where you get the idea that the US is the ultimate defender of democracy.

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What have you ever done for this country other than bash it?

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And again, it appears that your main points of argument are jingoistic slogans devoid of any rationality.

What talking points? You have consistently made statements that basically boil down to:The United States is always right.Even if it were wrong, we should still support it.Perhaps that isn't what you meant to say, but that is certainly what your posts sound like. Americans are not the smartest people in the world, they are not the most moral people in the world, nor are they the greatest people in the world. Americans are just like anyone else in the world, and are just as capable of acting in their self-interest as anyone else in the world, and are just as capable as anyone else of deluding themselves and confusing their own self-interests with the good for all humanity.I'm sorry; beyond the fact that the United States is more capable of exercising raw power on a global scale than any other nation in history (not something to be proud of if it's only used for the benefit of its social elites), there is nothing special about the United States or Americans.

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We are unique among the world's populations.

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Even the claims of uniqueness aren't particularly unique, I'm afraid.-

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What other nation on Earth says to its government....

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Everyone says that.-

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HOw many aggressors have we repelled over the decades, then given the nations back to their people?

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Actually, during the expansion west, the United States was the aggressor. And we never gave it back to the Native Americans, either.-

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You need to go back to school & study.

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Actually, this all a matter of basic history that I did learn in school. I'm surprised that you seem unfamiliar with it. Were you homeschooled?

Hi Tal.I would be more impressed if the reservations weren't such tiny portions of North America, usually located on lands considered economically marginal, and weren't managed by the US government "on behalf" of the natives.It reminds me more of South Africa bantustans (only without even the pretense of independence) than an actual returning of territory wrongfully taken.

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(why do liberals always try to attack conservatives on intellectual grounds, anyway?)

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What are you talking about? I was answering your post: I was only answering you in kind. If you don't like these kind of remarks, then maybe you shouldn't initiate these kinds of attacks.By the way, I am in my 40's, and I have an MS in physics and an MS in mathematics, not that I think it has any relevance to the discussion.

Hi, Faith.I would dispute that my communism was a conscious choice. I feel that I was compelled to communism based on what I know; I could no more choose to become a capitalist than I could choose to be a flat earther. If the facts were otherwise, I would probably be compelled to become a capitalist despite what I would choose.But issues of free will (as well as epistemology) are probably beyond the scope of this thread, heh. Just had to disagree with one of your points (and probably not the one you were expecting, either, heh.)

By the way, I have nothing against home schooling. I'd be tempted to consider it myself if I had kids.