Subject:
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Re: Medical Marijuana
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Fri, 23 Nov 2001 21:42:21 GMT
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Viewed:
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982 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler writes:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Larry Pieniazek writes:
> > Arguably focus groups and the media had convinced successive administrations
> > that the american populace wanted painless, casualty free, no collateral
> > damage wars...
> I see your point, and in those cases I would agree that public opinion has
> a beneficial effect on the methods of war.
Whoops! Hoist by my own petard. Drat.
I was trying to say that the putative public opinion (which we have
discovered is actually false, at least currently it seems to be) is
DETRIMENTAL to the effective prosecution of war. War is messy and wanting
non messy wars means you get to fight them over and over and over. Standing
off far at sea and firing 10M USD missiles at 10 USD tents accomplishes
nothing except generating media froth at the collateral damage when one misses.
No, Hanson (in my ref upthread) makes the point (far more eloquently than I
did) that this is the wrong approach. Decisive, forceful wins are what is
needed, followed by nation building of the right sort (1)
1 - and he again makes the point about Patton having had the chance to
pretty much prevent the Iron Curtain from forming by moving forcefully into
Czechoslovokia and crossing the Rhine instead of holding off as his prez
wanted so the Stalin deal could be kept... (2)
2 - and THAT again ties nicely into the question: Were we more moral by
keeping a deal with a madman/dictator and ensuring 50 odd years of darkness
for half a continent or would we have been more moral by breaking the deal
and letting the tanks roll, ensuring that all of europe had a better chance
to be free... said question a variant of my assertion that it's not always
immoral to lie, if you lie to a liar.
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Medical Marijuana
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| (...) While the manner in which wars are executed is influenced by these institutions, I don't think they're responsible for the wars themselves, which is what I hoped to say. The fact that they're the current flavor of the month for influencing war (...) (23 years ago, 23-Nov-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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