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[pmcd9]

I come to you for education. My depth of knowledge of the Syrian situation includes seeing headlines, but not reading the articles. What I'm wanting to know, is Obama framing Syria for WMD or is this just right wing hossshit trying to paint Obama as another Bush heading the country to war on a false pretense?

[Arachno-capitalist]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/08/29/9-questions-about-syria-you-were-too-embarrassed-to-ask/

I think it is tragic that we were burned so bad on the story of Iraq having WMD, that now no one wants to hear it again no matter how true it may be.

[wombat]

That link is really great, thanks.

[KeithHernandez]

Yeah, that article is awesome.

[pmcd9]

That was a very good article, thank you for posting it. It did answer my initial question. It made no mention of any conspiracy on the part of the US or Obama administration as being behind the chemical attacks. It's as I originally thought, some ginned up bullshit. And the situation in general is exactly what I thought as well, that it's like every other Muslim country, full of crazy people that hate one another and can't get along.

[theinevitable]

Kinda like how the south is full of crazy racists.

[pmcd9]

Kinda like how the south is full of crazy racists.

[rant deleted]

The situation in Syria bears very little resemblance to racism in the United States.

[theinevitable]

no, I'm talking about how outsiders like to look at a region and paint it with a broad brush.

[pmcd9]

Ah!

[pmcd9]

So how do y'all feel about this? Should we stay the hell out of there or dive in head first?

[AugustWest]

So how do y'all feel about this? Should we stay the hell out of there or dive in head first?

Stay the hell out.

[Choop]

in theory, i'm against joining a civil war. but then, if france hadn't backed us 237 years ago we wouldn't be debating it.

a major difference though is that our leaders were deists and secular humanists attached to religious freedom, whereas those in syria trying to throw off the yoke of tyranny all seem to be of one theocratic identity or another.

considering that, and that syria's closest allies are iran and russia, and that the whole goddamned region defines "powderkeg," i'm against any kind of involvement that isn't in direct defense of a treaty holder.

i get that obama's angling the strike as singular, surgical, and specifically punitive, but it feels like a trap laid by a team of sociopaths intent on breaking the dominant international position the u.s. holds in economic and defensive relations, to tear down our state from the outside and replace it with their own or none whatsoever.

tribalism is our downfall, and it typically stems from corruption. both are always going to exist. i just wish there was a solution. i'm certainly not smart enough to discover it, and even once discovered, it's going to be impossible to implement.

[littlefallsmets]

Horrible as things are in Syria and as much I'd like to imagine our country would have the ability to save a bunch of lives, it seems like every time we get involved in anything in the Middle East, we make things worse and kick more suffering down the road as we're doing it.

So I'd say no.

[jaydub]

I'd like to think we could learn from our last 40 years of history.  There is no possible upside to this.  The actors around the chemical weapons issue are pretty murky.  Even if it was the Syrian State, if the nuts in the wings see that a chem weapons attack will bring us in to smash some Syrian State weaponry, the next one could well be a false flag op to take advantage of our knee jerk belligerence.  Surgical, limited, and quite useful whether or not the jihadis get to kill any American boots on the ground.

[Arachno-capitalist]

My grandfather, James William Wilson (1845-1923), was an accomplished hossman who enjoyed cantering about the woods and fields of the rural Virginia countryside. One day, he happened to be riding by the backyard of a small farmhouse, where he saw a neighbor savagely beating his wailing wife.

Vaulting from his hoss in a cloud of dust, Grandpa laid the villain low with one mighty blow. He turned too slowly to the object of his rescue, however, to duck the heavy stick of firewood she had aimed at his head.

When he slowly recovered his senses, there was no one in the yard but himself — the door to the farmhouse was closed and the window shutters drawn.

Groggily, Grandpa staggered to his feet, mounted his waiting hoss and rode away, a bruised and saddened but wiser man.

I do not recall the name of the battered wife. It sounded something like “Syria.”

Lt. Gen. Samuel Vaughan Wilson, U.S. Army, retired