He said a lot more than just that. He called for an upraise in arms and all this other junk I care not repeat for him. Esentially, This is similiar to the Iraqi who "pledged allegience to Al'quaeda" which was done, according to just about every iraqi expert to make American's think they are making the situation worse instead of better.

the problem with reverse pyschology is that if you assume he's saying because you'll think the opposite, then I know he knows that so I'll do the opposite, but he knows that I know that he knows.. etc etc.

One thing Usama bin laden has NOT done with all his evil things, is Lie in public. If you listen to everything his has said, he has not changed his view of the world nor said he was going to do something he didn't try to do. When he says 9/11 wasn't suppose to be so big, but because of our foregin policy it was. He's not lying, he's just delusional. He thought he was going to just damage the targets, and he thinks that god made them fall because of our foregin policy. He's a nut and a killer and has no feeling for the sanctity of human life, but one thing he isn't is someone who doesn't say what he means.

You're right Daganev, this obviously wasn't an attempt to get you to vote for Bush who is quite possibly al'qaeda's best recruiting agent. By the way, I also heard Osama say that any state who's citizens did not jump off cliffs en masse like lemmings would be targetted with terrorism. Better go show him who's boss eh?

lets look at the facts here. Al'qadea however you spell it, had -public- training camps in 3 countries and had the money to conduct a simetanesou three pronged attack in the U.S while Clinton was president. He also had the ability to blow up U.S embassies, U.S naval ships, Shoot missles at Civilian airlines, blow up dance houses in Indonesia. They also had the man power to do this...

Now al'qada is restricted to some hills on the boarder of some countries, and some car bombs in Iraq. International terrorism has fallen greatly since America went to war. To me, that doesn't sound like Bush is such a great recuriting agent.

International power to destroy any target any time, reduced to fighting a gurilla war in 2 isolated places. If this was internatinal business, you'd probabbly call that company bankrupt.

First of all, I dislike Bush very strongly. I don't hate him; I consider myself to be more conservative than most of my friends and classmates. They hate him. People I speak to hate him. Not all, but quite a lot. And the rest dislike him.

Second, I'm a bit offended that you claim my arguments to be hearsay and rumours. I have my sources, and as you apparently don't want to believe that, I've included several helpful links for you to peruse at your leisure.

First off, the torture on Guantanamo. I use the term torture as defined by the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. The treatment of the prisoners in Guantanamo bay clearly violates this convention, as well as the Third Geneva Convention, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, all of which have been ratified by the USA. The source of this information is Amnesty International, read more at http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGIOR410242004

Second, civil liberties and the Patriot act. This act inhibits the following civil rights: The freedom of Speech, The freedom of Association, the Right to legal representation, and the Freedom of Information, just to mention some. For an objective summary look here; the source of this information is the Associated Press, in an article published two years ago. This page is a summary, as the original is sadly removed from the homepage, being too old by now. http://www.truthout.com/docs_02/09.09C.ap.rights.p.htm

The plummeting dollar and weak economy can NOT be based solely on 9/11. While it is true that 9/11 amplified an already existing recession, it was actually several months underway. According to the Bureau of Economic research, the recession began as early as March 2001, which is obviously half a year before 9/11. Read more here: http://www.nber.org/cycles/november2001/recessnov.html

Damn right Bush failed to heed the warnings and prevent the attack. He received over 40 intelligence reports about Usama Bin Ladin between January 20 and September 10, 2001. True, the 9/11 commission describes failures within the Clinton administration AS WELL AS within the Bush administration. Right now, however, Bush is running against Kerry, not Clinton, right? Except from the last sentence, the source of this information is the 9/11 commission report, to be viewed online at http://www.npr.org/documents/2004/9-11/911Report.pdf Note that it is immense, so for those interested enough to take a look, I can recommend chapter eight as the most relevant in this particular debate. It should be noted that not all the blame can be laid on Bush for 9/11, but he has yet to accept any responsibility for failing to implement sufficient security measures prior to the terrorist bombings of WTC.

The budgets deficits have indeed been rising. Do you wish to argue that point? Of course, it may be partially due to war, but again, that explanation is a bit too simple and fails to take into account the massive tax cuts put into motion by the Bush administration. These deficits are a threat to the long-term position of the dollar, and the international trust in the American economy, according to many leading economists. It is true that economists disagree about this point, as I have experienced personally at the institute of social economics in Oslo. However, I stand by my point; the Bush administration is responsible for proposing budgets with the larges deficits in American history, dwarfing all other deficits, even wartime ones. What we may all agree about is that the simultaneous increases in spending and reductions in income as implemented by the Bush administration, is NOT a strategy that can be upheld for now. Read more here http://business.timesonline.co.uk/article/...1259404,00.html and here http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3430565.stm

I consider the UN to be the voice of the International community. The select few countries you mentioned are most certainly not representative of the world community. They are a part of it, but as a whole, the International community made its point clear via the UN: A war in Iraq would NOT receive broad popular support. In countries like Spain, Norway and Britain, we have seen a growing discontent with the administrations that pledged its support to the US military cause. Oh, and if Powell and the Bush administration had considered the UN resolution in the 90s to be sufficient for their war, why would they seek out a new resolution? Also note that the US have generally shown quite a lot of disregard for UN resolutions, and only ever paid heed to the ones that suited their plans. Never in history has a UN resolution stopped a President from enforcing his will, so why bother mentioning it at all? Obviously, as long as following resolutions is only viewed as an "added bonus", the resolutions means little, and there is little point in claiming to be doing the work of the UN when the US obviously only following its own agenda.

The part about Bush being a puppet is, of course, an opinion, although I have spent solid amounts of time researching the subject. For one thing, I’d refer to the book “Rise of the Vulcans”, as it gives a very good insight into the war council in the current administration- Cheney, Rice, Wolfowitz, Powell, Rumsfeld and Armitage. Buy it at Amazon, great reading, or read an article about it, taken from the Baltimore Sun, here: http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0405-02.htm

I would say that attempting to amend the constitution to ban gay marriage is anti-gay legislation. But that’s just a term I use, if you want to, just look at it the other way. The gay marriage issue is about more things than activist judges, and if you want to debate it, you should know a bit more about what we’re really talking about- a constitutional amendment. You can read about it here http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/07/30/bush.gay.marriage/ and here http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4360783/

Note that most of the crimes Halliburton committed under Clinton were committed when Cheney was chief executive officer of the company. Due to this fact it was him, not Bush, who received the most pepper for giving the contracts to Halliburton. Halliburton may have been the only company able to perform a selct few tasks, but later, they were awarded contracts on the pumping of oil, which is certainly no exclusive competence they possess. Also, part of the problem with the assigning of the contract was that the administration would not give the public insight into its details. There is a bucketload of articles around the net about this issue, but I found the following two to be of great interest: http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/050803C.shtml http://www.thedebate.org/thedebate/iraq.asp http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/2837477.stm

Finally, for the quagmire in Iraq, this is a common way to describe the current situation. The US troops are caught in a very tricky situation, where attacks on the guerrilla groups can easily trigger revolt in other places, due to the martyrdom of the defenders. Another problem is the balance between the two religious groups- the Shiites and Sunnis- that forces the troops to be very careful when attacking. Then we have the terrorism, of course. Although it has pretty much ceased to appear in western media it is still present, it’s just that we got so goddamn bored of it over here, hearing about new terrorist attacks every day. I think the US will find a way out, but in the process it has cost billions and billions of dollars, and pretty much wrecked the country. Oil production is at a fourth of what it used to be. Personally, I’m not of the opinion that the Americans should pull out, because it would probably lead to yet more surges of uproar and violence. Let’s just hopes that the elections work out fine, and that a passable candidate is chosen, to replace the current US-inserted government.

Well- iacta alea est. I’m really excited about what the next day will bring us.

International terrorism is on the rise currently, see Iraq, Afghanistan and Israel for just a couple of examples of increases terrorist attacks in recent years. I will concede he's done good things to prevent terrorism in the US since 9/11, thats his job and all he's ever said he'll do. I just don't agree that the US will be safer in the long run with such a unilateral attitude, you're only going to encourage more hatred against your country and thus more terrorists.

There has actually been a decrease in terrorist attacks in Israel, do to the new security boundry being built. The recent attack in Tel aviv was the first in months. As appose to the usual one terrorist attack a week. Although the truth is, I've heard that the Israeli army stops about an average of 5 terrorist attacks a day.

Second, Although I believe all terrorism is connected, not everybody does, and the attacks that happen in Israel are mostly commited by the PLO factions, Hamas and Hezbulah, each which have funding from countries like Iran and Syria.

Second, attacks in Iraq and Afganastan I don't think can be at all compared to attacks on clubs in indonesian, or missle attacks on civilian airlines. A good majority of the attacks in Iraq and Afganastan are against Military and State agencies such as the police.
This is in stark contrast to the attacks in Israel which tend to be on markets and clubs and busses where families ride.

To me, that is the diffference between a terrorist and a insurgant, or rebel or militant. A terrorist attacks and tries to kill people who have no connection to the state or military in any way except that maybe they are subjects of them. An insurgent or whathaveyou attacks the military, or the state.

To compare it to the muds, Terrorists attack newbies, insurgents attack elected heads of cities.

Ok, I just read the article on amnesty international, and so now torture is defined as "sending someone home" Amnesty international should be asking for a look into how a person's home country treats its own prisoners. To say that America has to be responcible for how Saudi arabia treats prisoners is a) ridiculous, and giving too much power to the U.S.

Ken Bigley and Nick Berg say they're terrorists.

This is just getting silly, and I'm not wanting to waste my time reading more of your sources. First of all, if you look at the charts on the economy you will see that most figures, except unemployment which is defined by the private sector and not the public sector, rise after march of 01 to be at the same levels in march as they are in sept of 01 where at which point they fall drastically.

And for the Patriot act. The lines about "librarians may be prosocuted" or the like, is the same as if someone has a wire tap and informs the person about it. For the Patriot act, you must get a warrant from a judge to apply the patriot act, and if the patriot act was in existance before sept 11. many of the highjackers could have been caught. I read the 9.11 report, actually bought the book, and it was interesting to me, how most highjackers were flag as being threats, but the law at the time, only allowed for a check that that persons's bags went on the flight with them. I'm going to stop responding now because its only us two talking, and I know how much people hate that.

can't wait for the daily show tonight... its live everybody!

well an engineer and an activist who has links to masoui (9.11 hijacker fame) arn't what I call random civilians. But again, theres a difference between kidnapping (which happens in South america all the time yet isn't put on the terrorist watch list) Its disgusting what they do with the kidnappings, and the way they do it and the fact that they exist. But I still can't compare a 15 children going to school or 22 teanagers at a dance club to the kidnapping of foregierners in a country in transition.

You don't need to compare them, you need to accept the fact that beheading civilians is a terrorist action.

It use to be that terrorism was limited to attacks that hurt or scared a group of people at a time, such as a bombing or airline hijacking or a killing of a team of people at the olympics.

I guess it just looks different to people who only became aware of terrorism in 2001 instead of living with it since the 1960s

I think is the point most people miss about Bush's plan/view. Just because he is not fighting a specific terrorist, does not mean your not fighitng terrorism.
For example, working on the way funds are handled in Syria, though not an attack on any terrorist, is a form of fighting terrorism, because funding is used to help a terrorist act. I would think people who lived closer to Ireland would understand these things better than me.

You mean like us Brits who lived with the largely American funded (even if they did not realise where there money was going) IRA terrorist attacks for several decades? Don't even talk to me about people who only became aware of terrorism in 2001.

I promised myself I would read and not respond... but ignoring the last line of my post... Ugh thats annoying.

Nice edit.

Ok I was just watching the news, and saw that my state was 1.1 million bush 1.2 million kerry, I go to the state's offical website, 1 million kerry, 900K bush.... Why does the news know this information before the state website does?

The internet is suppose to be more up to hte minute and stuff! *whine*

Kerry needs to win Ohio to win.

Not true- Tallies aren't finished, but Ohio, while a major factor, isn't the end all. it's still possible without it.

269 to 211, either Bush wins, or we have a tie.. I'm hoping for the tie.

edit: well a tie as long as bush wins the popular by 5% like my earlier post.

Urgh. Looks like Bush wins.

Well, still, I'll answer to your posts, Daganev, and if you don't want to reply again, no problem. Just to clarify two things. First, sending people home is of course not torture. If you read the link, you'd find out, as I'd hoped to clarify, that the OVERALL TREATMENT of the prisoners of Guantanamo bay that is described as inhuman, degrading, and cruel. Sending them home is also a problem due to the UN convention on refugees, as no country is allowed to send back prisoners when there are good reasons to believe they will be persecuted for whatever reason back home. Of course, criminals can still be arrested, but this general rule applies all over the world. The Norwegian government (where I live) gets a lot of pepper each year for sending back a number of refugees believed to have been persecuted in their home countries.

Oh, and the USA PATRIOT act is about more than librarians. I never said anything specific on that point. Again, if you'd read my link, you may discover there's a lot more to it.