Bear with me - I have an idea. It's a controversial one, but maybe a good one. About pirates.

[Rabrrrrrr]

And about other American-related stuff around the world.

What if the United States - it's citizenry - decided to hold to a more Samurai/Klingon/Viking/whatever notion of honor and freedom, and were all willing to die for the good of others, and die for a good cause -

and then, when something like an Iranian hostage crisis, or a ship being pirated, or other form of hostage-based blackmail, we announce to the world "Americans will die rather than bow down to pirates/terrorists/hostage-takers" and "Sorry, we don't deal with criminals" and "I'm not going to tie up the Oval Office worrying about this shit for the next 30 days or year, fuck it, it ends right fucking now", and then entirely blow the fuck out of whatever building/ship/airplane/cave it is the bad guys are using.

Do that a few times, and the rest of the fuckers are gonna think twice about fucking with the US or, hopefully, anyone else.

It would take all of us to agree to it, of course.

Or maybe have a form that we can fill out to say that we are willing to die in such a way if it means the bad guys get fucked over, and then in a hostage situation, the feds can check out the hostages and if they all have their forms filled out, bingo! BA-CATASTROPHIC-DEATH-FROM-ABOVE-BOOM!

Maybe it's just me, but hostage takers and pirates have just always seemed like the lowest, most awful scum on the earth. Well, next to Reaganites, of course, but that's just a given.

[ghostsofgiants]

1. Or...OR...

The U.S. could work harder to alleviate the gross uneven development that arises from the exploitation of resources and labour in places that tend to lead to such situations in the first place.

Just a thought.

[Rabrrrrrr]

2. That would be even better!

If we spent a tenth of what we spent on the Iraq war building up the infrastructure, internal legal systems and police forces, education of the people, and industry of Mexico, Iraq, and a good half of Africa - most of our problems would be gone.

And if we'd spent ALL the money we spent on the Iraq war, we could have likely done this for every poor/struggling country in the world.

The best way to fight terrorism is to make the life situations of the people so good that they don't feel the need to be terrorists.


But, in the meantime, we still have REAL criminals who need to be dealt with; and even if the world were way more closer to perfect, there'd still be the occasional psychotic asshole who needs to be dealt with.

[ghostsofgiants]

4. I'm sayin'.

If there is one thing I have learned in all those highfalutin' books I've read over the years, is that people do fucked up things when they are desperate enough.

[MajorChode]

5. Sure

All we have to do is end world poverty and then all crime will cease and we can all sit around in our communes and sing Kumbaya all day as all the children gather around and play because no bad shit will every happen again.

I'm really surprised nobody has thought of this before. It's a great idea.

[ZombieNixon]

6. Yeah, whatever.

Why should we listen to Canadians who can't even spell "labor" right? :eyes: :P

[Kali]

18. ...

:thumbsup:

some good info over at crooks and liars this morning

[Duer 157099]

3. Kinda the Kaiser Soze approach?

Sure!

[sammythecat]

7. Hasn't that been Israel's approach?

The only real remedy is the one you and ghostofgiants discussed. Anything else, no matter how aggressive or fearsome, is little more than just a further tightening down on the lid of a pressure cooker. The solution is to turn off the heat.

[XemaSab]

8. Its

n/t

[Rabrrrrrr]

9. Its?

:shrug:

[XemaSab]

11. "What if the United States - it's citizenry..."

n/t

[Rabrrrrrr]

12. So I typed it correctly a bunch of other times, and you feel the need to point out one mistake?

:wtf:

[XemaSab]

13. Happy Easter!

:hi:

[Kali]

17. oops

[Kali]

16. zing!

[Sky Masterson]

10. Bad Idea IMHO

Imagine if it was your mom or dad being held hostage.
I wouldn't mind them blowing up my bag of shit father But I'd have a problem with them blowing my mom into a zillion pieces.
They need to bomb them with knockout gas or something. Put them all asleep and then disarm them

[no name no slogan]

14. Let's send them Joe Liebermann instead.

Problem solved.

[Rabrrrrrr]

15. I love it! And let's include Carrot Top, too.

"You better let those hostages go, or we're sending Lieberman and Carrot Top to your country!"

:rofl: