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Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 4,189
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 4,189 |
Thanks for that E-mail, wow. It really provides a very lucid account of what we're up against, and about the poor, helpless people who always get caught up as war fodder on the no-man's-land of these conflicts.
The saddest thing is, I really believe, that the karma of war precipitates further war, maybe not immediately, but decades or generations hence. For instance, bin Laden was incited to action by the Gulf War. And, unbelievably, but understandably, there's still the ancient residue of the so-called "Crusades." And, of course, the losses of war wreak havoc on the emotions and psyches of individuals creating a cycle of parental dysfunction that produces children who become driven, unbalanced "leaders". "War...what is it good for?...absolutely nothing."
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439 |
You were all so kind about other post you've gone and encouraged me  so I pass along another Email received the other day: (Quote:) The writer of the following piece is Kent Madin, part-owner of Boojum Expeditions who leads trips to Mongolia and other far-flung places. He wrote from Boojum Expeditions, Khovsgol Lodge Management somewhere in Mongolia. He is obviously a creative thinker! Perhaps the spirit of the proposal will find its way into the larger public debate. --------------------------- Bomb Them with Butter A military response, particularly an attack on Afghanistan, is exactly what the terrorists want. It will strengthen and swell their small but fanatical ranks. Instead, bomb Afghanistan with butter, with rice, bread, clothing and medicine. It will cost less than conventional arms, poses no threat of US casualties and just might get the populace thinking that maybe the Taliban don't have the answers. After three years of drought and with starvation looming, let's offer the Afghani people the vision of a new future. One that includes full stomachs. Bomb them with information. Video players and cassettes of world leaders, particularly Islamic leaders, condemning terrorism. Carpet the country with with magazines and newspapers showing the horror of terrorism committed by their "guest." Blitz them with laptop computers and DVD players filled with a perspective that is denied them by their government. Saturation bombing-with-hope will mean that some of it gets through. Send so much that the Taliban can't collect and hide it all. The Taliban are telling their people to prepare for Jihad. Instead, let's give the Afghani people their first good meal in years. Seeing your family fully fed and the prospect of stability in terms of food and a future is a powerful deterrent to martyrdom. All we ask in return is that they, as a people, agree to enter the civilized world. That includes handing over terrorists in their midst. In responding to terrorism we need to do something different; something unexpected..something that addresses the root of the problem. We need to take away the well of despair, ignorance and brutality from which the Osama bin Laden's of the world water their gardens of terror. (end quote)
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400 |
Shades of the Berlin Air lift..
a good idea. Yes, it could work. our enemy is not the afganistani people.
today's magazine section of the NY times, Caleb Carr suggest the problem is modern day luddites. or as was sung in US, after WWI, "How do you keep them down on the farm, after they have seen Paree?"
The Taliban wants to turn back the hands of time. they can't but, they are willing to die trying. It might be, with information, the people of afganistan, will chose not to be part of the modern world. (China made that decision once, and so did Japan) we can't be sure, given choices, they will chose the modern way.
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Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,605
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,605 |
Bomb them with information. ... Blitz them with laptop computers and DVD players filled with a perspective that is denied them by their government.
Wonderfully creative idea -- the above particular detail reminiscent of the ending of the most recent Tom Clancy novel, as I recall.
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Joined: Nov 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439 |
If you want to send the Butter Bomb approach- or any other note - to your Representative or Senator, here's a link with all the Email addresses by state: http://www.webslingerz.com/jhoffman/congress-email.htmlNote: the addresses are case sensitive
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467 |
wow:
On the surface it sounds very good, but the reality may be something else.
1. The Taliban will merely tell the recipients that the USA is paying them tribute in the form of food, etc., for the people of Aghansitan, which will further entrench them in power.
2. In the region Afghanistan has the lowest literacy rate (somewhere around 1/3 as opposed to 42 percent for Pakistan and almost 100 percent in the other countries thereabouts. Even Iran has 73 percent literacy. But that literacy is probably concentrated in the cities. Out in the country I would expect literacy to be so small that even widely distributed leaflets would only be evaluated in terms of their suitability for toilet tissue.
3. Laptop computers will only last as long as the batteries, and there are no 7-11s to buy more. Hell, there isn't electricity service in most of the country. And the Taliban will merely enforce a death penalty for possession of anything like that, saying it's an attempt to proselytize the people away from the Islamic faith and that the stuff is the work of the devil.
4. Though probably impossible to quantify, one has to accept the reality that the Afghanis may not want a world of TVs, department stores, swimming pools, autombiles. I like my lifestyle, and I wouldn't like theirs at all, but they may very well not seek to attain the material things that predominate elsewhere.
Notwithstanding, I think the risk is worth taking, particularly with food and medicine. I was horrified to see that the infant mortality rate is 16.7 percent. ONE in six dies during infancy. And one woman in 60 dies in childbirth. One child in four lives beyond the age of five in Afhanistan. That's abysmal. One website I looked at implied that there are, in the entire country, no reliable sources of safe water, including in the major cities, of which there are about six.
Certainly anything we can do to help their plight is humanitarian in nature, but I fear that the Taliban will turn our own good works against us.
TdE
TEd
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,981 |
If anyone is looking for information about Afghanistan (or any other country), then a (surprisingly) good source of up to date demographic information is given in the CIA World Factbook http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/. I have used it regularly for to help with school homework assignments and the information is significantly more up to date than information found in the local library. I would give the same warnings about the bias of information as I would from any source and I'm sure that it is possible to pull out innacuaracies and inconsistencies. Each country is listed alphabetically and data is the same for each country, so it is possible to compare demographic (such as population size and life expectancy) and economic information (such as exports). The site does include military information that I am surprised is made available to the public but information from the site seems to appear in a slightly modified form in several other websites. Is anyone aware of other sites with similar levels of information? Has anyone found any major innacuracies in the site? Jo Post Script (to save taking this thread up to the top) http://www.webarchivist.orgThis is an archive site relating to the events of September 11th. http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1589000/1589076.stm
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Joined: Jun 2001
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I, too, like the idea of "butter bombs". They are simply more life-affirming than the other kind. I also recognize the truth in the maxim "No good deed goes unpunished." Would that the same were true for bad deeds.
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Joined: Nov 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I suggested in another post over a week ago that the US should Marshall Plan Afghanistan rather than bomb it!
Mumble - mumble - mumble ...
... and they could use the crop dusters that the kneejerk kings in Washington has just put out of business according to this morning's news. They'll be banning the use of cars in case they're used to make car bombs and the use of reservoirs because somebody might drop a chemical agent in them next. Talk about paranoia!
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Joined: Aug 2001
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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WEED: the kneejerk king in Washington... paranoia
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