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What in the hell does this debate have to do with Pearl Harbor !?!?!?
Japanese without provocation attacked Pearl Harbor thinking that they could walk all over the US just like they had done to the unfortunate countries and peoples in the Pacific. What the Japanese did is to royally fack up and draw the US into the war. If they had not, the Axis powers probably would have won WWII and still be in power today to some degree........although there is no way of knowing how long the US would have stayed out of the war even they had not been attacked by Japan as the Germans were already torpedoing their transports to the UK.
Since this has become a debate on the issue of war, politics and what is right and/or wrong in war, ect, ect.......
War is not pretty, not fun and once entered into should be done so with the mentality of winning said war. I'm personally against going to war for any reason other than to defend one's self and country, but if one does go to war, win it by any means necessary. Once you politicize war and stop letting the military dictate what should be done, the war is lost. You throw all the man power with the best training, weapons and equipment you got at the enemy to win, and if that means using nukes if you have them to shorten the war and reduce the causalities then so be it. Personally, I think the US has enough fire power to handle most threats without considering nuclear force, but I'm not against using them if necessary. The quicker the war is over, that is when peace, rebuilding and the healing can begin.
It’s unfortunate that we in the US have not learned anything from our history and what happened in the Korean and Vietnam "wars."
Japanese without provocation attacked Pearl Harbor thinking that they could walk all over the US just like they had done to the unfortunate countries and peoples in the Pacific. What the Japanese did is to royally fack up and draw the US into the war. If they had not, the Axis powers probably would have won WWII and still be in power today to some degree........although there is no way of knowing how long the US would have stayed out of the war even they had not been attacked by Japan as the Germans were already torpedoing their transports to the UK.
Since this has become a debate on the issue of war, politics and what is right and/or wrong in war, ect, ect.......
War is not pretty, not fun and once entered into should be done so with the mentality of winning said war. I'm personally against going to war for any reason other than to defend one's self and country, but if one does go to war, win it by any means necessary. Once you politicize war and stop letting the military dictate what should be done, the war is lost. You throw all the man power with the best training, weapons and equipment you got at the enemy to win, and if that means using nukes if you have them to shorten the war and reduce the causalities then so be it. Personally, I think the US has enough fire power to handle most threats without considering nuclear force, but I'm not against using them if necessary. The quicker the war is over, that is when peace, rebuilding and the healing can begin.
It’s unfortunate that we in the US have not learned anything from our history and what happened in the Korean and Vietnam "wars."
Very well said, Agrajag.
Agrajag, nukes can do many things, but reducing casualties ain't one of them.
Not all casualties are created equal, Shadoen--and whether a nuke will reduce one particular type is frequently the only relevant question.
But even granting your faulty premise, you're still wrong. A conventional campaign to surround, invade, and subdue the Japanese home islands would have cost hundreds of thousands--if not millions--more total lives than those poor souls consumed by the fires of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
But even granting your faulty premise, you're still wrong. A conventional campaign to surround, invade, and subdue the Japanese home islands would have cost hundreds of thousands--if not millions--more total lives than those poor souls consumed by the fires of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Lecter, that was then, this is now. If one country (no matter who) were to set a precedent and use nuclear weaponry first, I fear it might have the effect that other countries think 'the gloves are off', too, and act accordingly. And I don't think that would reduce casualties at all.
As usual PC, you purposely missed the point and obfuscated the issue to further your agenda.
And you really think they were all peaceful, in harmony with Earth, no crime or inequality communalists?
I didn't say that. I said they successfully utilized a form of communal living for thousands of years. I didn't say they were free of crime, nor free of human rights issues that contemporary society would find horrifying. For instance, the Haida Nation (I grew up in the Queen Charlotte Islands) were a society who waged (and usually won) war up and down the coast, taking slaves at will.
That said, many of the First Nations (a term more appropriate as it's clear that in recent, and even ancient history, they were the first groups in the area to organize into large social groups) practiced amazing successful communal customs. The Potlach for instance, the Long House, their manner of governance (concensus vs majority rules). Not all nations practiced the same customs, and the coastal nations were arguably more advanced than the landlocked ones, but there were some pretty amazing things going on in those societies. It would have been a different world if the British had won the war of 1812 as opposed to signing the treaty.
Edit: I had initially quoted your sentence about Iraq being a retaliation (for what?), but then on re-reading the paragraph, realized you have absolutely no connection to reality, and are therefore relegated to the psycho, half priced neo con bin at Walmart:
...Same with Saddam. We should have been the ones to take out Castro, rather than natural causes... We should nuke Iran. We should have nominated a conservative like Mitt Romney instead of a Democrat like John McCain, so we could have beat Barack Hussein Obama.
Sarah Palin 2012!
I'm sure you'll be El Presidente at the loony bin one day.
And you really think they were all peaceful, in harmony with Earth, no crime or inequality communalists?
I didn't say that. I said they successfully utilized a form of communal living for thousands of years. I didn't say they were free of crime, nor free of human rights issues that contemporary society would find horrifying. For instance, the Haida Nation (I grew up in the Queen Charlotte Islands) were a society who waged (and usually won) war up and down the coast, taking slaves at will.
That said, many of the First Nations (a term more appropriate as it's clear that in recent, and even ancient history, they were the first groups in the area to organize into large social groups) practiced amazing successful communal customs. The Potlach for instance, the Long House, their manner of governance (concensus vs majority rules). Not all nations practiced the same customs, and the coastal nations were arguably more advanced than the landlocked ones, but there were some pretty amazing things going on in those societies. It would have been a different world if the British had won the war of 1812 as opposed to signing the treaty.
Edit: I had initially quoted your sentence about Iraq being a retaliation (for what?), but then on re-reading the paragraph, realized you have absolutely no connection to reality, and are therefore relegated to the psycho, half priced neo con bin at Walmart:
...Same with Saddam. We should have been the ones to take out Castro, rather than natural causes... We should nuke Iran. We should have nominated a conservative like Mitt Romney instead of a Democrat like John McCain, so we could have beat Barack Hussein Obama.
Sarah Palin 2012!
I'm sure you'll be El Presidente at the loony bin one day.
I have to agree with Gav on that final point. While most of the Left's criticism of Palin is either overblown or downright irrelevant, she is far from the direction the Right should be looking to combat what is about to be a brutal New Deal progressive tilt. If the GOP wants to recover from this mess, it needs to take a more libertarian bent, not keep pandering to the evangelical segment. Seriously, do we think the God Squad is going to go vote democrat or something?
If you're hellbent on finding a woman for 2012, PC, go clone Ayn Rand. She'll represent a highly appealing ideal after four years of what the Left is about to unleash to "fix" our unfair existance.
If you're hellbent on finding a woman for 2012, PC, go clone Ayn Rand. She'll represent a highly appealing ideal after four years of what the Left is about to unleash to "fix" our unfair existance.
A month ago my dad went on a business trip to Japan. When he came back, he distributed the presents he had gotten from Japan to my family. I got a box of freaking awesome Japanese candies and a shirt that said "I <3 Nippon" on it. The funny thing is, due to this shirt being the last clean one since my last trip to the laundry, I ended up wearing the "I <3 Nippon" shirt on Pearl Harbor day. Lawl.
What angered the hell out of me, though, was that none of the networks had the classic Pearl Harbor movie "Tora! Tora! Tora!" on. I mean like... wtf? Where the hell is the History channel? It seriously needs to drop the whole UFOs and Big Foot theme it's been using lately. Like... the only reason it's been having Hitler night here and there again (Hitler night USED to be every night) is to promote the new Valkyrie movie they've been obviously sponsoring. Other than that, they must have reasoned that no Americans like real history anymore.
What angered the hell out of me, though, was that none of the networks had the classic Pearl Harbor movie "Tora! Tora! Tora!" on. I mean like... wtf? Where the hell is the History channel? It seriously needs to drop the whole UFOs and Big Foot theme it's been using lately. Like... the only reason it's been having Hitler night here and there again (Hitler night USED to be every night) is to promote the new Valkyrie movie they've been obviously sponsoring. Other than that, they must have reasoned that no Americans like real history anymore.
Haha, that's awesome ShankTank. Yes, if I'd had time I would have watched Tora! Tora! Tora! last Sunday instead of studying. Awesome movie.
Lecter: I definitely disagree. Palin was the only thing conservatives had to rally to this past election. She was drawing larger crowds than either presidential candidate. Just because she's been made the scapegoat for the McCain campaign doesn't mean she's actually awful. I'm not looking for a woman candidate, I'm looking for a conservative, and Palin is my favorite conservative at the moment. Palin/Romney 2012 would be cool, or even Romney/Palin. The only reason Obama won was because conservatives had no one to vote for, so they didn't vote.
Snax: My teachers in elementary school actually taught that until "white man" came, all the "native" Americans were peaceful, in perfect harmony with the Earth, etc. etc. It sounded like you'd absorbed that drivel and were spouting it back. Your earlier very generalized statement gives no indication you weren't in that camp, since all you said was basically "The Indians were peaceful communalists until the Pilgrims came." (paraphrasing)
Toshiro: The problem with nukes now is that there's no MAD, or at least there are groups that don't care about the consequences of using a nuke if they got one. Iran is one of those, they have told us what they'd do with it, and we'd better stand up for our little friend Israel because no one else will. They really want just a nukular power plant? Okay, fine, let's build them one ourselves (should cost less than a war, right?) and we will staff it and we will have 100% control over the plant, though they get the electricity. They don't like that, fine; we'll bomb every attempt they make at a nukular plant, and confiscate anything that even looks like nukular material. We can't let them have a bomb, period.
Lecter: I definitely disagree. Palin was the only thing conservatives had to rally to this past election. She was drawing larger crowds than either presidential candidate. Just because she's been made the scapegoat for the McCain campaign doesn't mean she's actually awful. I'm not looking for a woman candidate, I'm looking for a conservative, and Palin is my favorite conservative at the moment. Palin/Romney 2012 would be cool, or even Romney/Palin. The only reason Obama won was because conservatives had no one to vote for, so they didn't vote.
Snax: My teachers in elementary school actually taught that until "white man" came, all the "native" Americans were peaceful, in perfect harmony with the Earth, etc. etc. It sounded like you'd absorbed that drivel and were spouting it back. Your earlier very generalized statement gives no indication you weren't in that camp, since all you said was basically "The Indians were peaceful communalists until the Pilgrims came." (paraphrasing)
Toshiro: The problem with nukes now is that there's no MAD, or at least there are groups that don't care about the consequences of using a nuke if they got one. Iran is one of those, they have told us what they'd do with it, and we'd better stand up for our little friend Israel because no one else will. They really want just a nukular power plant? Okay, fine, let's build them one ourselves (should cost less than a war, right?) and we will staff it and we will have 100% control over the plant, though they get the electricity. They don't like that, fine; we'll bomb every attempt they make at a nukular plant, and confiscate anything that even looks like nukular material. We can't let them have a bomb, period.
You neglect to note that the "Indians" as you put it...lived quite successfully utilizing a form of communal living for possibly thousands of years before the good ol' pilgrims showed up.
vs
...all you said was basically "The Indians were peaceful communalists until the Pilgrims came."
How'd you get out of grade school, let alone into college, with such a low level of reading and comprehension skills?
vs
...all you said was basically "The Indians were peaceful communalists until the Pilgrims came."
How'd you get out of grade school, let alone into college, with such a low level of reading and comprehension skills?
I think I summarized your statement very well from memory without bothering to go get the quote. Sorry for the laziness, but other than the word "peaceful" I nailed the meat of your comment.
And I got out of grade school because they are afraid to hold anyone back, and I'm damn lucky the lies they told me didn't stick. Now I'm doing pretty well in college, at least I will if I stop checking this stupid thread and get to studying for my finals tomorrow... a ductile shear zone displays structures such as foliation and lineation that have a metamorphic aspect and record shearing by ductile flow... must stay focused...
And I got out of grade school because they are afraid to hold anyone back, and I'm damn lucky the lies they told me didn't stick. Now I'm doing pretty well in college, at least I will if I stop checking this stupid thread and get to studying for my finals tomorrow... a ductile shear zone displays structures such as foliation and lineation that have a metamorphic aspect and record shearing by ductile flow... must stay focused...
/me finished his finals and can fool around all he wants. Fuck physiology, biophysics, and biochemistry bitches! I'm free!!! At least until February...
PC, ye of little faith, what are these lies you speak of? Do you not believe in math or elemental sciences? Is this why you decided to study rocks? ;P
Now seriously, just curious, why geology?
PC, ye of little faith, what are these lies you speak of? Do you not believe in math or elemental sciences? Is this why you decided to study rocks? ;P
Now seriously, just curious, why geology?
Shadoen, you'll find this hard to believe, but this is literally all the math I was taught in fifth grade:
There's some Chinese folk tale about a guy who saves the Emperor's life and is offered all the rice in China, but he refuses. So the Emperor instead says "I'll give you one grain of rice today, two tomorrow, then four, and keep doubling it." So he ends up with all of it anyway. So... as a class we read this story then set out to count a million grains of rice. It took too long, so we ended up estimating a million grains of rice.
I'm not kidding. Math wasn't as important at this school as learning to work together and having a multicultural experience. All the math I learned in elementary school (the science, too) I learned at home.
Geology, to answer your question, is the only field that can reasonably offer me a good income and steady employment, and is also interesting. I started as a music major, but realized I'd always be poor and end up teaching high school at best, so I've decided to keep that as a hobby. But the oil industry is booming and geologists are in demand, and geology is a very interesting science. I love seeing how everything fits together, and geology does that. We have to integrate all the sciences, physics, chemistry, biology, etc. to get the big picture. It's great. Plus, geologists are fun people.
There's some Chinese folk tale about a guy who saves the Emperor's life and is offered all the rice in China, but he refuses. So the Emperor instead says "I'll give you one grain of rice today, two tomorrow, then four, and keep doubling it." So he ends up with all of it anyway. So... as a class we read this story then set out to count a million grains of rice. It took too long, so we ended up estimating a million grains of rice.
I'm not kidding. Math wasn't as important at this school as learning to work together and having a multicultural experience. All the math I learned in elementary school (the science, too) I learned at home.
Geology, to answer your question, is the only field that can reasonably offer me a good income and steady employment, and is also interesting. I started as a music major, but realized I'd always be poor and end up teaching high school at best, so I've decided to keep that as a hobby. But the oil industry is booming and geologists are in demand, and geology is a very interesting science. I love seeing how everything fits together, and geology does that. We have to integrate all the sciences, physics, chemistry, biology, etc. to get the big picture. It's great. Plus, geologists are fun people.
Rocks don't change as fast as the world on average >_>
Sorry PC, I have to poke fun at geologists, it's expected of me as an engineer-to-be. Some of my best friends are geologists!
Edit to your post: Engineering (basically regardless of the field) will continue to net a good income. And we synthesize solutions from all the scientific findings, too. My field of studies is more serious than yours! ;)
Sorry PC, I have to poke fun at geologists, it's expected of me as an engineer-to-be. Some of my best friends are geologists!
Edit to your post: Engineering (basically regardless of the field) will continue to net a good income. And we synthesize solutions from all the scientific findings, too. My field of studies is more serious than yours! ;)
Ever seen a landslide? Rocks can move pretty fast! Now, I am required to be condescending to the lot of you application-oriented fellows, as you're simply riding the coattails of us pure researchers :p
meh.
I just provide stuff.
Now it's just TV.. It used to be ...everything bought at any store in the usa...
break19
I just provide stuff.
Now it's just TV.. It used to be ...everything bought at any store in the usa...
break19
Heh, I could go on a rant on why nobody should choose their career based on the income they'd get, but I'm not one to talk since I'm not precisely studying med to "help" people >_>
I didn't choose my career based on the income! Honest!
Seriously, though, Robotics and MedTech is wicked :)
Seriously, though, Robotics and MedTech is wicked :)
I wont be interested in robotics until they start creating huge human controlled mecha.
And btw...
And btw...
Actually, huge human-controlled mecha would not be a big problem, technically, because you can build big. The problem is their applicability in RL situations, which is not a given. The most 'realistic' depiction I have seen so far was in FLAG (if you like semi-realistic Mecha design, this is a must-see anime), and even there, some things just did not add up (which is all fine and dandy, it's an animated TV series, not a scientific paper. But it proves my point).
And re: btw. On a sidenote:
And re: btw. On a sidenote: