[Heineken]

Although I'm with you gw, IMO the capacity of the American masses to absorb quasi-fascist propaganda bullshit is INFINITE.

[Aaron]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('clueless', 'I') am interested in this "HawkMan"..

Can you tell me more ?

[horsestoaster]

I was sitting on my horse in the dressage ring with my daughter on her horse and the only Olympic rider for India on a horse he was working with.We were taking a lesson from the British woman who had taught him to ride who was visiting.Another friend pulled up to the ring and told us someone had flown a plane into one of the Towers.Like most folks at that moment we assumed it was a freak incident.God we were so innocent in those last few moments!Then we decided to head into the barn to see if there was anything on the radio about it.Then the other plane hit.The British lady who is a resident of the London area immediately said"Those damned bloody fanatic Arabs!" It was chilling.Until that moment it never occured to me anyone would purposefully do such a thing.I remember the plane that hit the Pentagon.I remember the brave souls on the plane in PA.My father fought 4 long years in Europe to keep an evil man from taking our freedom.Every male in my family since the 1700's have served this country's military.I am proud of that.What should of happened after 9/11 is so very far from the war for oil we are playing out now.All those souls.All that continuing pain for the living left behind.As a nation it haunts us.History will prove that it always will.The correct moment to react is so long gone.It makes those of us who love our country simply weep with sadness and frustration.9/11 is a private continuing moment of pain obviously not just for myself,but Pops and the rest of America as well.It doesn't matter what political beliefs you ascribe to.What matters is all of us sitting on this bit of land and remembering.Thanks for being the brave one to start this thread Pops.

[Jack]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', '
')
Crush your enemies with your powerful "beak of justice", around the world. Chitter with joy as your nest-mates tremble with fear. You are the choosen ones... strong & fierce.

So join our great movement... under HawkMan's protective wing.

Spread to the 4 corners of the Earth & smite the weak... they are but food & nest lining.

Peck their weak eggs, and suck out the tender yolk.

[gg3]

For those who might still be wondering about Holmes, he's not evil, he's disturbed. His rants sound exactly like what occurs in the mixed-mood phase of bipolar disorder, where mood is low and energy level is high. This phase can last for months or even years depending on how fast an individual cycles through the various phases.

Problem is, this is also a case of "danger to self or others." People in this state are also well known to commit "suicide by cop," i.e. deliberately threatening a cop with plausible serious harm, and getting shot as a result.

I'm not being sarcastic, this stuff is for real. And it can take on any available content, i.e. from a major historic event to a day's news story to a phone call with a friend or family member, etc. etc.

Holmes, listen up: You need to get treatment. And if you don't like doctors, then you can treat it yourself with one or two small daily doses of marijuana and one or two moderately-large daily doses of fish lever oil, and yes I'm serious about that. It may take a while for these things to take effect, during which time you should stay home as much as possible for your own safety.


---

Re. American exceptionalism: I see this in a more pragmatic sense. We haven't been attacked on our own ground very often throughout our history because we have two oceans to protect us. And going to war isn't about crusades or spreading democracy in the Middle East, it's about the simple matter of taking out whoever is responsible for the attack so they can't do it again.

I would have far preferred a more law-enforcement-oriented approach to this. But the Taliban weren't about to hand over Al Qaeda, and that makes them co-responsible, therefore we have to treat them as a party to the attack.

The saddest part is how the Regime has totally destroyed the nearly limitless good will that existed among almost all nations at that point, botched almost every response it has made, and used this thing as an excuse for a limitless exercise in tyranny.

[galacticsurfer]

They gave the memorial services full coverage here in Germany on Monday(Reading off all the names of the dead half the day). Watching the news in the evening together I just bitched to my wife about how Bush and company(oil men/Military industrialist complex) were manipulating the public by using a (possibly planned) tragedy to further their own ends, and my wife being Russian and remembering all the chechen attacks in Russia killing hundreds of innocents(beslan,etc) said I should shut up as the fanatics could hit us any time and deserved what they got and the poor people who died deserved respect. I think she is basically more racist and intolerant than I am(like against muslims, Arabs,etc), maybe she as a Russian(I am American) or just personally, but it shows how I have changed from being naively uninformed in 2001 and supportive of my own govt. and the system of consumerism / patriotism into being like many Americans now, very suspicious of the motives of a small clique who rules the country(and attempts to rule the whole world by force or influence) for their own benefit through my reading in internet as opposed to MSM. My wife's reaction and that Of German TV shows also that everyone in Europe, Russians, Germans, Brits did and still do feel for the victims of 911. It is only a shame such bastards were in power at the time who basically had long since had a plan on the drawing board to take out the Middle East unilaterally on the cheap(too bad it didn't work, ha ha ha)- according to latest European opinion polls which show loathing for Bush. If this whole arrogant attitude on part of US is not due to just Bush, but rather as many suspect, more systemic of US colonial policy over the last couple of centuries(see Latin America-Pinochet, etc. or Overthrow of govt. in Iran to install Shah) then I would have to have a generally antiamerican stance but actually one must be much more cynical than that. Every leading circle in whatever country represents their own best interests generally against their own people and against other countries(Kissinger's Realpolitik). Everyone is evil. Too bad.

I guess the idea of not getting tooo wrapped up in your emotions is a good idea. As long as I indetify myself as an Ameircan or as a Christian or non-muslim and identify some enemy being the Arab terrorsts or possibly as a peacenik, see the USA as an enemy, I make a problem for myself. I am just myself and have to get on with my life. The media and industry or government or the church manipulates us to get us to rally around a cause and die or fight for it. They get to reap the benefits and we bite the dust. I like a leader like Putin who seems honest and rational successfully fighting as an underdog an uphill battle against terminal national and demographic decline, not a lying populist like Bush, who obviously only represents own interests of a certain upperclass, and does not really care what happens to his country which he steers more and more into the abyss of debt destruction and the position of being an international pariah state like Hitler in the 30s, working himself into a lion in corner situation who can only lash out. Just wait what he does as a lame duck after the elections. God help Iran and the world.

[holmes]

I gots your treatment right here in my hand. Your a twisted and weak seed. Better your out of it. and it looks like u will be especially if your teaching your seed to be like u. Good for me and my gene pools. Hawk man thanks u. so do my children. I appreciate it. now go and side with the ones that will flay u alive and decappitate u. oh and cut your balls off as well.
semper fidelis!

I love personal attacks! Please give me more! The strength in me grows!

Your so twisted you want to kill off the poeple who will never kill u and your family. Yet support the ones that will have no problem wiping your pitiful ass off this planet. Weirdos.
hahahahahaha. I love it all!
OOOrah!
Hawkman is all powerful!

[clueless]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')awkman is all powerful!

[holmes]

I dont really care! who cares? I dont care. I dont care.
Hey this country been sold off and whored out years ago.
I dont give a fuck about anything mainstream. I gots my little peice of heaven with my ladies and bros and family. and I couldnt care less if every fucking big city in the world was nuked to the fucking ground. billions dead.
There was so much potential and we pissed it away with zero discipline.
profits and material possessions are more important than anything else.
Fucking communism is a stinking wretch. capitalism is not far behind.

Hawkman! Hawkman! Hawkman!

fk em all and fk it all. sluts.

[Aaron]

Errrrr... Ummmm.... HawkMan fades slowly into the background hoping to avoid more of Holmes agreeing with him...

[clueless]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'E')rrrrr... Ummmm.... HawkMan fades slowly into the background hoping to avoid more of Holmes agreeing with him...

[clueless]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')here was so much potential and we pissed it away with zero discipline.
profits and material possessions are more important than anything else.
Fucking communism is a stinking wretch. capitalism is not far behind.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('holmes', 'I') gots your treatment right here in my hand. Your a twisted and weak seed. Better your out of it. and it looks like u will be especially if your teaching your seed to be like u. Good for me and my gene pools. Hawk man thanks u. so do my children. I appreciate it. now go and side with the ones that will flay u alive and decappitate u. oh and cut your balls off as well.
semper fidelis!

I love personal attacks! Please give me more! The strength in me grows!

Your so twisted you want to kill off the poeple who will never kill u and your family. Yet support the ones that will have no problem wiping your pitiful ass off this planet. Weirdos.
hahahahahaha. I love it all!
OOOrah!
Hawkman is all powerful!

[cmlek]

On Sept. 11, I was on Purdue campus, heading to class, and realized there were no planes in the sky. On the way to the physics building, I ran into a friend and remarked on how weird that was, only to be told that terrorists had flown into and toppled one of the two buildings.

I felt nothing.

Classes were cancelled, and I went around helping said friend organize people on campus to go give blood. I watched the whole thing on TV that night, and the only time I felt people's pain was while listening to a thousand collective throats scream as the 2nd tower came down.

I mostly felt glad that day to be one of the Have Nots that no one cares enough to bother with. To some extent I'm sure people realize, and accept the risks of, the fact that they work in a famous place, and that makes them a target, but they're just peons like me and they never asked for this to happen. These are facts - what am I supposed to feel?

I couldn't watch TV for months afterward, because there was no news on that didn't pertain to rehashing the event. (Yay bbc.co.uk!) I never trusted that our government would "get it right" and either fix the situation or punish its transgressors, but I'm appalled speechless by how terribly far they've gone. But patriotism, ... that's a problem. I have a terribly negative association with that word. Bush and friends are Patriots, there's the Patriot Act, anyone who says "stop buying foreign oil" doesn't support the troops and is NOT a patriot. I don't like patriotism - it makes people act stupid, it seems. I believe that both parties are there to give us the illusion we have a choice and a hand in government, which we don't. Thusly, every time I hear the hippies and the Boomers talking about changing something, I *want* *to* *know* *how*. Protests haven't worked since Viet-frickin-nam. Changing a law or two in a massively corrupt structure accomplishes nothing your Masters don't want/can't already get around. So *HOW* are you going to fix things? I *want* to help, but I want *Something* *That* *Works*. (And before you say it, yes, I vote, as much of a waste as it sometimes seems.)

Corporations kick me around, adults look down on us, and now you spit on me. I don't feel anything. Its oversentimentalized for someone else's gain, and I have better things to do than be milked with anyone else. To end this ramble, I don't have any patriotism. I have loyalty - to my family, my friends, my little community, and my geographical area. My efforts go to help us, here, now and later.

I value the ideas you've shown me on this site so far, Pops. What would you have me doing differently?

Peace,
Melissa

[smallpoxgirl]

I rememeber 9-11-01 pretty clearly. I was on call in the cardiac ICU at St. Joeseph hospital in Ypsilanti, MI that day. I didn't have time to watch TV that day, didn't have one at home, and really didn't see any news coverage of it then or since. At that point I was pretty accustomed to hearing reports of a thousand people here or there killed for the benefit of American business. Honestly I can more or less understand where a Nicaraguan peasant or a Mexican campessino is coming from. The idea of someone willingly moving to NYC or wanting to work as a stockbroker, that is beyond my comprehension. So I guess my attitude was somewhere between appathetic and an uninvovled "Well, they got what they deserved."

The next day people came in to work with all these crazy stories. Gas had gone up to $5/gal overnight. Anyone who looked arab was getting beat up on the streets of Detroit. A c130 flies over the building and one of the nurses says "Ohh my god! I hope they're not going to crash into the hospital!" At that point I felt like A: Americans hadn't the slightest inkling of the death and destruction they were raining around the world everyday and B: They had no interest in understanding the world and would beat/rape/kill anyone who tried to explain it to them.

The last five years have more or less confirmed both of those conclusions. Since 9/11 it has been more and more clear to me that I have almost nothing in common with 95% of Americans and that most of them would be more than happy to lynch me if they knew that. Within a couple of months after 9/11 I bought my first gun. I fear other Americans WAY more than I fear Arab terrorists.

[Heineken]

I can do ya one better, SPG.

I remember where I was and what I was doing when John F. Kennedy was shot.

I was an eight-year old boy standing in the hall of an apartment in Vienna, Austria, when there was a sharp knock on our door. I opened the door and our neighbor, a Polish woman, was babbling about "Kennedy, Kennedy!" My mother came to investigate and we learned of the assassination. A very silly and hyperactive boy, I feigned fainting and collapsed on the floor. I recovered as soon as I sensed that my act had had the desired effect.

Then, too, the world opened its arms to us. We responded with the Vietnam War.

How America has squandered its opportunity to lead the world to brighter days! Now we're headed squarely for a new Dark Age.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', ' ') Since 9/11 it has been more and more clear to me that I have almost nothing in common with 95% of Americans.