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Originally written by Zeviz:

These threads remind me of the mother in the movie "Good Bye, Lenin!" (News flash: The Cold War has been over for 15 years. No extra points will be awarded for goals scored after everybody has left the stadium.)

And even if the game was still going, introduction of non-native species was the least of the things Stalin did. Even if severe environmental damage is the only thing you care about, you have better examples, like [former]Aral Sea.

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Originally written by radix malorum est cupiditas:

Karate, Tai-Kwon-Do, American football, football, basketball. I did gymnastics earlier, but that ended.

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Originally written by Pez:

Your second pic, shouldn't that read "Jeff Vogel is..."?http://www.cusd.claremont.edu/~mrosenbl/spamcrate.gif

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Originally written by Mouthpiece:

or were installed as rulers by the people they freed.

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Originally written by Yours Sincerely, The Boogyman.:

We all know what will happen if I sit here and tell everyone a specific person involved in world war II could kick their gods asses.

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Originally written by Ephesos:

You know, it's become standard practice for so many people to try and skirt around big issues in today's world, particularly in the media and politics. It's refreshing to see someone who can confidently and openly assert their opinion on something which happened decades ago.

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Originally written by Miya:

My god takes on many forms, and in essence is everyone/everything. I doubt your god could battle all my gods at once.

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Originally written by Mouthpiece:

Direct communion with God.

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Originally written by d3m0n5L4y3r:

I'm just curious why it took so long.

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Originally written by Molybdenum:

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I'd seriously question the motives of a Jesuit publishing that kind of nonsense - might he perhaps have credentials in culture war / clash of civilization garbage? I'd be genuinely surprised if he didn't have an agenda to peddle.

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At least he is a historian with refereed publications to his credit what are your qualifications?

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I'm getting craptired of arguing with people who refuse to substantiate their claims even when they are asked to. Frankly, Infernal, it makes me inclined to take everything you say with several extra grains of salt. Cite sources or go away.

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I'm now firmly in this camp. Except I use the whole damn shaker.

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The Crusades were motivated to some degree by religious fervor, but calling it a defensive, culture-based war is ridiculous. The political and economic motivators at work are far too heavy to discredit altogether.

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This is a load of bolshoi. The crusades were incredibly expensive endeavours which cost many noblemen their fortune and ultimately their lives. A few people got rich but the vast majority (that returned) got nothing.

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Originally written by Jewels:


If by 'not much of a stretch' you mean the repeal of the first ammendment. Then sure, I can agree with that. I see that very likely to happen in the forseeable future. :rolleyes:

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Individuals will continue to abuse power, and they will continue to be brought to justice for it. But the chances of the government really turning into a dictatorship are about as good as TM being born again.

Not that I won't keep hopin...

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Originally written by Molybdenum:

Has anyone read "A Concise History of the Crusades" by Thomas Madden (there is a revised edition out now, not sure of the differences) - he is a University professor - Jesuit? who writes that the crusades were a response to 400 years of Muslim expansion (often violent) that had claimed much of what had been previously Christian - for instance Palestine prior to Muslim conquest was one of the most Christianized places in the entire world. The Crusades started as a defensive war against muslim expansion and a rescue mission for Middle East Christians.

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Originally written by Student of Trinity:

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Originally written by The Worst Man Ever:

[The ideology of the free market is fundamentally opposed to conceptualizing what you refer to as 'damage'. To the free-market economist, the market turning down, people losing their job, and a few hundred thousand more homeless cropping up in the streets is a natural and healthy part of the economy.

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You learned this in a recent audience with the Pope of Free Market Economics, perhaps? Sure looks like a straw man to me.

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Originally written by PoD person:

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Originally written by Khoth:

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Originally written by PoD person:

I do think, though, that Western Europeans were not committing some horrible crime against humanity in taking the Native Americans' land.

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So if you want something someone else has, and you don't like the way they're using it, it's okay to take it for yourself by force?

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Well, yeah. Isn't that the moral principle behind the graduated income tax? Heh, I was waiting to be called on that; however, if it's ethically acceptable to redistribute conspicuously consumed wealth, it's the same to redistribute conspicuously unconsumed wealth.

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Originally written by radix malorum est cupiditas:

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Originally written by Kelandon:

The Crusades, in theory, were a territorial grab, not an attempted genocide. They weren't trying to wipe out Jews and Muslims; they were just trying to get them out of the Holy Land.

The supposed purpose of the Crusades and the actual purposes of the individuals involved were often at variance, as in the Fourth Crusade, which never actually made it to Israel and ended up sacking Constantinople instead.

I was under the impression that the Turks in the Middle East at the time of the Crusades were overwhelmingly Muslim.

If anyone has any information to contradict any of this, it'd be worth citing sources, because what I've just said is the way the story is normally told in the books that I've read.

EDIT: That book is not new. The copyright date on it is 2000.

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It was a response to the rise of the muslim population in Europe, the first ones weren't called by the Pope, but rather by the church (priests, etc.), and therefore aren't counted among the crusades.

The Seljuk Turks were not muslim.

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Originally written by Jewels:

Basic theme of the movie-

It is a chronological pictation of 'what happened when' on United 93, in the Air Traffic Control rooms, in whatever office is in charge of overseeing all airspace flight over the US(and where the order to stop all flights came from), in the news, and in the military command centers in charge of scrambling fighters on the east coast. It ended when U93 crashed.

Of course most of what happened on United 93 is left to the movie producers discression, but there were many real phone calls made from the plane which they based it on.

I would think that everything else that happend on the ground is reasonably accurate and verifiable within 'poetic license'. But I am taking it all with a grain of salt.

**SPOILERS?**
According to the movie, the military attempted to scramble fighters soon after (forgive my memory) the first or second plane hit the towers but were refused clearence by the FFA, they then scrambled their planes anyway in defiance of the order, but the planes took off on a standard scramble coordinate by mistake heading east over the ocean and then had to get clearence to even turn around. It did say that the military were not even notified that U93 was a hijacked plane untill 4 minutes after it crashed.
/end spoilers

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Originally written by Drew:
Feel good about the NSA having the calling records for all phonecalls made in the US from three out of the four major phone carriers? Kind of tramples our right to privacy under the Ninth Amendment. But of course, those people outside of any public oversight would never use those records for purposes other than fighting terrorism, right? Of *course* you can trust the current administration, right? Right...

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I, in truth, do not care that the government has my phone records. I'm an open person by demeanor, and would probably enjoy being on a show like Big Brother(actually Survivor's more my type). I am not concerned with my privacy and I have nothing to hide anyway. What 'other purposes' should I be worried about?

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Originally written by TM:
With 9/11, it's true that a few evil men are responsible for the grievous acts.

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At first I was surprised that you agreed that the terrorists were 'evil men'. Then I remembered that you think I'm evil. :P The movie does a beautiful job of portraying the hijackers, not as evil, but as devout men of the Muslim faith. They did not believe they were evil or doing evil, instead they thought they were doing the will of God. It does not make what they did any less horrific, but their motivations, imho, were not as malicious as it seems. Their actions are not that surprising considering they hold to the Old Testament, but not the New. God calling for the death of nations was not unheard of.

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Originally written by Thuryl:

<lyrics to Rock Me Amadeus removed>

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Originally written by Drew:

By design, the US military is almost never allowed to engage in actions on or over US soil. This is a part of maintaining civilian control of the military, which in my opinion is crucial to maintaining our form of government. Nations whose militaries turn their attention to what goes on inside their borders, as opposed to outwards, become dictatorships real quick, and I'm not for that.

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Originally written by Jewels:

After experiencing this powerful movie last night, it got me thinking about how unprepared we were for an attack.

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Something I thought a little about immediately after 9/11, but seeing the portral of our millitary unable to even get clearence for it's fighter jets to take-off brought it much more to light how bad the situation was.

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