This was sent to my friend in reply to a bulletin she posted regarding how stupid our government is for sending the people over to die for an unjust cause, or something like that. It was written by an angry Marine (woman) who was on leave due to pregnancy whose husband was killed in Iraq (also a marine).

Haha. People complain about how sooooo many people are dying over in Iraq when that number is a drop in the bucket in deaths of Americans due to car accidents or even smoking. The Iraq War (Project Iraqi Freedom) up to present day has claimed 3867 Americans. That, over the 6 years we've been there equates to about 1.76 deaths a day. That's less than .001% of the Americans who die from cigarette related deaths a day, that number being around 1205; 440,00 deaths a year. Heck, even vehicle collisions generate almost 100 times the amount of deaths, 102 a day, from an average from the last 12 years of 37,500 a year. All those deaths, those from cigarette smoking and car accidents do what, just make statistics? Those 1.76 deaths a day of American Soldiers have reduced the number of Iraqi civilian deaths from well over 2400 in 2003 to just under 250, present day, a week, a 96% reduction. The only reason it's not lower is because of the ever increasing civilian suicides in car bombs, from less than 1 a day in 2003 to around 16 per day currently.

These people didn't die for nothing, they are helping Iraq find peace.

Sources:
http://www.cancer.org/docroot/PED/content/PED_10_2X_Cigarette_Smoking.asp
http://icasualties.org/oif/
http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Main/index.aspx
http://www.iraqbodycount.org/database/

The negatives far outweigh the positive in the Iraq war.

Thousands are becoming violently ill from depleted uranium dust that WE put there through artillery and other nasty weapons of war. The most accurate estimate for dead Iraqis since the war started is over 600,000. That would have never happened if we found a better way to deal with the problem. The U.S. somehow has shown the ignorance necessary to let Bush and Cheney prepare for war in Iran, and do NOTHING about the horrible situation in Darfur. We've put a horrible strain on the economy, one the U.S. may never recover from, we've impacted the environment in disturbing ways, and we have utter impiety for things that actually matter.

I, a reasonable, intelligent and aware young man, could never find good reason to justify this war.

Proof?

It may be that the lives are not even comparable to the other wars, however those are the lives of 4000 American men and women. And people often overlook the fact that the Iraqi civilians are getting the most casualties. Just because the "casualties" are small doesnt mean that its not worth protesting about.

But I mean, if you're gonna protest about pointless deaths, there's more arguable cases...

But aren't you essentially saying "Don't mind Iraq cuz worse things have happened"?

Do you even know that you could have made your point 10x more potent if you even gave 1 example?

All those Americans volunteered. They gave their lives willingly to help other people. I don't think they would want their deaths to be trivialized and portrayed as pointless, used only as cannon fodder for protesters. I know I wouldn't.

He doesn't have any. He never does.

Because 2000 or so lives a week don't matter. Especially if they're not Americans. Only Americans matter, and Americans' money.

The car crash and cigarette arguement is AWFUL. It is quite pathetic, actually. The government doesn't tell people to smoke cigarettes, and the deaths in car addicents are accidental. They compare in no way to knowingly suiciding thousands of men into war. I highly doubt she was trying to prove a point that, "All the people dying in Iraq would have died anyways", which is probably her best arguement with those statistics of total irrelevance. Also, I'm fairly certain that stat on american deaths is false, and based on technacalities.


What they want their deaths to be considered is irrelevant. Although much more justafiable, it is no different than protesting against cigarette companies so people would stop smoking would be, in principle.

What's that supposed to mean? Seriously, I don't get what you're saying.

I really don't get what you're saying. Please elaborate.

Many people proclaim war is bad. But when war is on the edge, and the people are ticked off, they scream, "You want hell, we'll give you hell."
Than we send in troops, and they start dying....
... All the sudden no one is supporting the war because troops are dying... And the whole reason for fighting the war is completely irrelevant. So they look for someone to blame, in this case the president.
"IT WAS THE PRESIDENT'S FAULT TROOPS ARE DYING!" the people say.
Why not blame congress? Don't they have to ratify any decision to go to war? Most importantly all the blame lies on the people who wanted to go to war. They wanted war, now they don't want to reap the negative outcomes.

The President, as commander and chief of the military, has the power to send troops and invade countries without the approval of Congress. However, in order to get all potential national benefits, Congress must officially declare war on a country, which it has not done in Iraq. Congress has only officially declared war five times in the nation's history.

I don't? http://pstripes.com/jan01/ed011501d.html
This article is exactly what I did a pretty large research project on. We cannot "Prove" that the DU is doing anything. But thats like saying: We cannot prove that global warming is going to be disaterous. It is accepted that DU releases ionizing radiation WHEN INGESTED. DU also vaporizes (its pyrophoric). Therefore the thousands of tonnes of DU dust is being left in waterways, crops, and the air itself. Maybe if you did a little research on your own, you would understand how dumb you are for telling me I have no proof.


I'll do it for him: Vietnam

The truth hurts.

We shouldn't go in the first place. I met with a man named Admiral Crowe a couple months before he died. Look him up if you want to know how involved he was. He explained perfectly how this war can be won, and made something good if we only put the proper resources and time into it. We cannot go in and expect to be out immediately. However, he also agreed, we just shouldn't have gone in.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Nov 18 2007, 9:36 pm by yenku.

Did you even read the original post?

Note: 100% volunteer military, America has.

How do you figure?

I'm near 100% sure that the president can only have troops in foreign countries no more than 90 days without having it ratified by congress in order to keep those troops there. Every 90 days, it must be re-ratified.

Edited for clarity.

I tried message kow, overstaredit and it didn't work

it said "Future Splash"

SO DONT BLAIM ME:

KOWWWWWWWWWWW OMG U STILL PLAY SC?

i got into it like 3 days ago.

whats ur west/east acc?


Anyways.
I believe the war is stupid. Infact the whole thing is, concerning how much more important stuff is going on unnoticed.

Yeah... Well I read over some of that, and it seems like a pretty meager problem. 6 out of 75,000 for those French people? What did you say again?
Yeah, not so much. Maybe you should read the article before you claim statistics that aren't even in there.

I'm sorry. Are you saying that they were insignificant? Are you saying that 9 or 10 people giving their lives to protect 2000 more (on average) is insignificant and pointless? Did you not just make a topic proclaiming yourself the ultimate do-gooder? Or is self sacrifice not in your vocabulary?

Time to "publicly defame you" by pointing out how ill-logical you are, and why you shouldn't be debating in this topic (lol, ur funny Frazz ):


Yes he did, get over it. Instead of just asking a question to create a loop, why not give your retort? Which is something good debaters would do.


What relevancy does this have within this thread? Absolutely none. Therefore, you fail. Gg

I'm sorry. Can you for once, not Ad Hominem Abusive someone, or create a logical fallacy?

Kk, thx, gg.


Anyways, I like the little rant Kow, but honestly (I agree with Dapperdan for once) those two "valid" points she brings up are pretty damn horrible examples to use to justify a war that is killing thousands of our men/women to "protect" another country from itself.

Well, technicaly we are not protecting them from anyone or anything. We are the insurgents. We are the invading force. For what? Oh yeah, a president that almost choked himself to death. DING DING DING!! We have a winner!!!!

You did not rebut any of my points, Kellimus. You merely criticized the form of my rebuttal. It was a rhetorical question. That's when you ask a question that you don't expect an answer too. In this case it was used to make a statement, by pointing out the lack of validity in saying what I asked if he said.

I really don't appreciate these harassing posts and the pms you're sending me. If you have an argument to make, ok. If you want to use that as an excuse to insult me, I guess I can't stop you. But what you're doing now is harassing me, nothing more.

1. WMDs? Fabricated intelligence.
2. Ousting Saddam? Right, because it's so much safer there now. While I'm sure there was no way to know what it would turn into (/sarcasm), this was still a fallback excuse. Not only that, but there are far worse tyrants in the world. Why didn't we go after them.
3. Spreading freedom! Um, don't democracies work because the people want them? Educated people want democracy (you can usually tell when they march in the streets for it). It's too dangerous for the Iraqis to do that? Well, just look at any number of freedom marches in the past. People have faced plenty of danger in the name of freedom.
4. Oil? We don't even get most of our oil from the Middle East. Maybe this was the reason, but our president has exhibited such an unprecedented level of sheer retardedness that I do not believe anyone can ever understand his thinking.