wrote in message
...
On Sun, 13 Jun 2010 10:42:44 -0700, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:

Again, there's no expectation of "global" war. Who exactly are we going
to
fight that's capable of any kind of sustained major campaign??

Some might very well argue that we are already in the early stages of
a global war against religious extremists. Unfortunately I don't see
that situation getting better any time soon. How long did the
crusades last in the middle ages, and how/why did they end?

They don't have the capacity to do much damage, not even with a nuclear
device. We (and Obama is trying to do this) need to change how we look at
who we're fighting. There have always been religious extremist and always
will be.

The bad thing about nukes is you don't need many to change life on
earth.

The chance that a bin laden would be able to get more than one (or a tiny
one) is infinitesimally small. Even delivering it is a major undertaking.


The Crusades? Where Christians hacked people up with sharpened crosses?

Sure, at first, then like our crusade, the tables turned and it was
the crusaders who were being hacked up. Of the 7 or 8 crusades
(depending on how you count), the Europeans really only won the first
one decisively.
We are having our Vietnam moment now. We win every battle and we are
still losing the war because the other side will not accept defeat.
Eventually we will come home but not until we have a president with
the integrity of Jerry Ford.

We had our VN moment during the VN war. We are dealing with the situation in
Afg., and it's possible to solve at least most of the problem.

Not sure about Ford. He pardoned Nixon, which I suppose was the right thing
to do. I believe Obama has plenty of integrity, esp. compared to recent
presidents. Bush II was a conniving *******. Clinton was obviously flawed
personally, but did a lot of good for minorities, the economy and the
environment (not enough for all of those). Bush I was, at least intelligent,
unlike his son. Carter was a good, honest man, but a lousy president (he's
an amazing ex-pres, however). Reagan was a decent guy. I don't like a lot of
things he did, but he wasn't' dishonest. Nixon, besides being a crook, was a
smart guy and didn't let his crookdom get in the way of policy. Johnson was
a conniving ****heel, but did many things right (and some big things wrong,
and will never be forgiven for some of them). Kennedy was basically decent,
but was flawed personally. When pressed, he had good instincts, but make
major mistakes during his brief presidency. Eisenhower was a decent guy, but
gave us Nixon and allowed McCarthy to blather on.