Regardless of his religious preconditions, PEPFAR was both an extremely generous foreign aid investment and highly effective at providing antiretroviral treatment against AIDS, although yes some of the funding did go to abstinence education. If anything Bush's still high favourability ratings in Africa are testament to that.

How was the election of a Muslim theocracy in Lebanon Bush's doing? He supported Israel's invasion post-occurance, but unless he exacted any direct control over Israel's foreign policy there I can't see the connection.

Olbermann infers connections to the Mumbai bombings, the killing of Benazir Bhutto, again where is the link? The US was never proposed to be the sole global guardian against terrorism.

Preventing Kim Jong-il from acquiring nuclear weapons again is a global failing. Applying more stringent sanctions, whether they would have had any effect or not was vetoed by China. You could argue more effective diplomacy was required, but as it stands it is not a failing specifically of his administration but more of an unrealised success.

As for the rest, there's little I can argue on. I'm no apologist, but I take offence to Olbermann and for that matter, much of MSNBC providing factually correct, but one sided news.

As for why I sifted it, I want to raise my star rating and no one likes my music >.<

When politicians take their religions seriously rather than pay political lip-service to it, that is the problem.
You can bring your own values to the presidency, but when your actual decisions are based on faith, as opposed to any other source (science, diplomacy, pragmatism, a reasoned debate with your cabinet members, the will of the governed), we get the last 8 years.
I blame faith specifically, yes I do. Or, if you like, I blame Bush for taking his faith so seriously.

Schmawy:

You can discuss mine, start a siftquisition if you like. The tags and channels right now are the way I made them. I'm glad you agree they're the way they should be. It was only by "abusing" my privileges that they are that way.

You can try to make this about whatever you like, but the fact is, this was sent for discussion because of the Islam tag. I think you're projecting.

It's really strange watching you come to his defense here. I mean here on this specific post (because you do it everywhere). This is exactly the same crap he pulled on you. Changing things after the fact. I get you want to be the guy that's above it all, but really, do you recognize that this is a problem for the site?

Lets say someone puts up a video of the Dalai Lama meeting with some foreign leader. They give it the title "Man of Peace". It has the channels humanitarian, world affairs. Tags are dalai,lama,diplomacy. You vote for it.

It hits top 15 and then the title is changed to "Dalai Lama - Biggest Scumbag On Earth". Tags and channels are similarly changed to things that have nothing to do with the video. Do you want to have your vote on that video? I personally think this is abusive to the site, abusive of the privileges afforded to it's members, and abusive to the people who vote on videos here.

Bottom line, tags and channels need to reflect the content of the video for the site to function properly. That's why this was discussed.

I must've misunderstood your comment, then.

In reply to this comment by deedub81:
For the record, I never advocated sending troops into North Korea and Sudan.


In reply to this comment by NetRunner:
I do know about it, but you were talking about sending troops onto new battlegrounds in N. Korea and Sudan.

I think before we start more wars, we need to do more diplomacy and foreign aid.

The answer to both North Korea and Darfur/Sudan is China. We have a relationship with them now, let's twist their arm a little.

If we invaded Sudan, what's the mission? If we invated N. Korea, what's the mission?

Toppling the existing regime and replacing it with one of our own design?

No thanks. Been there, done that.

In reply to this comment by deedub81:
Just saw this comment from back in the day.

Do you not know about all the help we have provided around the world that has nothing to do with violence?



In reply to this comment by NetRunner:
^ Can't the US do something around the world that doesn't involve the military?

For the record, I never advocated sending troops into North Korea and Sudan.


In reply to this comment by NetRunner:
I do know about it, but you were talking about sending troops onto new battlegrounds in N. Korea and Sudan.

I think before we start more wars, we need to do more diplomacy and foreign aid.

The answer to both North Korea and Darfur/Sudan is China. We have a relationship with them now, let's twist their arm a little.

If we invaded Sudan, what's the mission? If we invated N. Korea, what's the mission?

Toppling the existing regime and replacing it with one of our own design?

No thanks. Been there, done that.

In reply to this comment by deedub81:
Just saw this comment from back in the day.

Do you not know about all the help we have provided around the world that has nothing to do with violence?



In reply to this comment by NetRunner:
^ Can't the US do something around the world that doesn't involve the military?

I'm surprised by prop 8, and I am surprised a bit that such a thing could pass in California, but of all the myriad issues, gay marriage is pretty close to the bottom for me.

Yes, I think bans on it are backward and small minded, but there are plenty of people out there who think torture & no diplomacy should be permanent parts of US foreign policy.

There are people who think it's okay to kill doctors who work at abortion clinics, people who think tax cuts for the middle class are welfare, and that private citizens should be able to anonymously purchase military assault rifles.

There are people who think Democrats are Communists, and that anyone who doesn't believe every word of what Rush Limbaugh says is a mindless zombie brainwashed by the "liberal" media.

We lost one battle on one issue in CA, but Michelle Bachmann, who called for an investigation into which Congresspersons are "anti-American" got re-elected.

Alaska has very nearly re-elected a convicted felon as a Senator, and Sarah Palin is still a Governor of a state, with people hoping she'll run for President in 2012.

I want gay marriage rights to be granted, and with the name "marriage", not civil unions, but there are frankly bigger fish to fry right now.

We lost one battle, but we won 20. Prop 8 won't stand for long if we turn the tide of public opinion in this country, and I think we've started to do that.

I do know about it, but you were talking about sending troops onto new battlegrounds in N. Korea and Sudan.

I think before we start more wars, we need to do more diplomacy and foreign aid.

The answer to both North Korea and Darfur/Sudan is China. We have a relationship with them now, let's twist their arm a little.

If we invaded Sudan, what's the mission? If we invated N. Korea, what's the mission?

Toppling the existing regime and replacing it with one of our own design?

No thanks. Been there, done that.

In reply to this comment by deedub81:
Just saw this comment from back in the day.

Do you not know about all the help we have provided around the world that has nothing to do with violence?



In reply to this comment by NetRunner:
^ Can't the US do something around the world that doesn't involve the military?

^ Seriously, stop watching so many conspiracy theory movies or go join the Alaska Separationists who support and back Palin. They fear a NWO too . . .

And plus, don't liberal's oppose violence and war? You know, help the poor out so they don't rise up and kill the bourgeoisie, that kind of stuff? Diplomacy over guns? So, please do explain how liberals are going to conquer the world and make it such a horrible place to live? Better yet, do you really believe liberals want to conquer the world and suppress everything else with the NWO?

I thought this was a pretty good little trailer. I didn't realize there was diplomacy involved in this stage - I just blew up the enemy cities... oh wait, maybe there was, I forgot and just spent all my time blowing people up.

Playing with people in the cities, though? Is he serious? There's like nothing happening on that front. Hmph.

@bareboards: I'm voting democrat in this election, but I'm fairly non-partisan in general. To some extent, you're right, it IS quibbling over semantics, but those are some very important semantics. Both of them basically talk about being the president's voice to the senate, rather than being the tie-breaker vote, but Palin talks about not just being the president's voice, but also his arm. She believes she can literally run the senate. Biden, on the other hand, seems to be speaking much more about influence through diplomacy, rather than saying, "I'm the head of the senate, obey me!"

Sometimes semantics can be the most important part of a platform, because a person's choice of words can reveal things they may not have intended to reveal about their personal stance.

>> ^NetRunner:
^ Republicans are not moving left at all. They have done nothing but become more and more extreme during my entire lifetime.
They may be abandoning conservative values, but you're a fool if you think the Republican party was really interested in conservative philosophy after Reagan got elected.
In America, "right" doesn't imply conservative, small government, it just means government aimed at the rich, no willingness for diplomacy on the world stage, a denial of global warming, and god, guns, gays, and abortion.
On that scale, the Republicans have just gone further and further right.
news


If republicans have denied those last 5 things, they've denied them all along. They haven't become more extreme, because they haven't argued for the new and extreme laws that attempt to "fix" those things. And ya'll are the leftists who deny "god," so that one is especially confusing.

^ Republicans are not moving left at all. They have done nothing but become more and more extreme during my entire lifetime.

They may be abandoning conservative values, but you're a fool if you think the Republican party was really interested in conservative philosophy after Reagan got elected.

In America, "right" doesn't imply conservative, small government, it just means government aimed at the rich, no willingness for diplomacy on the world stage, a denial of global warming, and god, guns, gays, and abortion.

On that scale, the Republicans have just gone further and further right.

*news

God forbid this woman ends up being our president... and the Russians or Chinese or Iranians... etc... decide to play 'gotcha' diplomacy and apparently put our commander in chief into some kind of brain seizure where she is no longer able to think...

Yeah.. because i want a woman running the country who got stumped by... 'what magazines do you read'.

The title of this video is very misleading.

First of all, he didn't say "paramilitary", he said "civilian national security force". Don't try to make it out to seem he's starting some uber-secret, blackwater style force ready to patrol the streets and steal BillO's guns.

Second, he was obviously talking about diplomacy. The "civilian" part is the POTUS, Sec. State, and other administration officials.


So, to wrap up. Obama clearly stated that we can't just bomb the shit out of people we don't like, we also have to have direct diplomacy through the civilians who run our government.

Some vital context missing from the video: Obama isn't saying Iran isn't a threat. He was saying that Iran wasn't a threat compared to the Soviet Union during the cold war, and yet diplomacy was still employed. He's just making the case that diplomacy should be an option when dealing with Iran.