Way to try to put words in my mouht- nice try. Lets see how this fits you.

Slowguy thinks that our prewar intel was satifactory and needed no improvement

Just as much of a stretch as you saying I was justifying the war by saying that we did get some immidiate benefit from it.

Unless you disagree that was beneficial- do you?

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I'm just a 10 cent rider on a $2,500.00 Bike

"Way to try to put words in my mouht- nice try. Lets see how this fits you."

Not trying to put words in your mouth, just asking the question. Settle down. You said that we didn't know how little we knew until we went to Iraq and discovered the holes in our intel. You also suggested that finding out those holes was a positive thing. So what's your point? It sounds like you're saying that it was a good thing we went to Iraq because if we hadn't, we would still be stuck with the pre-war view of the quality of our intel.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

If we were not in Iraq, we would still be under the misguided idea that our intelligence was a-ok and producing top notch info

Despite being after the fact and clearly not our intent, this may turn out to be the single biggest value in the entire Iraq campaign.

Not surprisingly, but I had never thought of that. Very interesting.

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You sir, are my new hero! - Trifan 11/13/2008

Casey, you are a wise man - blueraider_mike 11/13/2008

Casey, This is an astute observation. - Slowbern 11/17/2008

'Now if you were living in a world where you thought Intel was strong and correct, would you still call for additional resources? Doubt it.'



I'm pretty sure that during the invasion of Afghanistan there were talks about a lack of native speaker and intelligence assets on the ground. Also, the 9/11 commission sited a lack of intelligence in there reports. I agree that Iraq highlighted some of the failures but I don't think they were hidden before that.

Do you disagree that finding weakness in our intel as a result of the Iraq war was a positive thing?

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I'm just a 10 cent rider on a $2,500.00 Bike

Hopefully, as time will tell, this will not be the only positive to come from Iraq, but as of today we do have this little nugget.

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I'm just a 10 cent rider on a $2,500.00 Bike

How would I fight the war on terror? Well, in the immortal words of Ann Coulter, I'd:

#1. Invade their countries.

#2. Kill their leaders.

#3. Force their citizens to convert to Christianity.



That'll do, for now. ;-)



T.

Absolutely not.

I don't think the gains we have made in the area of intelligence are worth the monetary and opportunity cost of the operations in Iraq.

(I'm not sure the preceding sentence makes complete sense to anybody but me, I'll try to word it better and edit the post)

I don't think the gains we have made in the area of intelligence are worth the monetary and opportunity cost of the operations in Iraq.

Hasbeenswimmer never really stated it that way. He suggested that one of the positives that may have resulted from our invasion (not that it was the reason for the invasion in the first place) was that we learned that our intelligence needs work.

Now, I think it is a good point despite being against the war from the get go but if we improve our intelligence to the point that more lives are ultimately saved, it can be a positive from a negative situation. Not a justification, just a result.

I'm not sure we can say yet that our intelligence has improved because of Iraq because it was clearly something that got our attention after 9/11, but without Iraq, we may have become more complacent as usual about our security. I think we have a long way to go but it was an interesting point.

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You sir, are my new hero! - Trifan 11/13/2008

Casey, you are a wise man - blueraider_mike 11/13/2008

Casey, This is an astute observation. - Slowbern 11/17/2008

LAck of a specific resource is far different than knowing your whole intel system is garbage. Also please keep in mind that the 9/11 commishs findings were done under the light of post Iraq war info.

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I'm just a 10 cent rider on a $2,500.00 Bike

Sometimes finding out you have a problem is harder to come by than the actual fix

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I'm just a 10 cent rider on a $2,500.00 Bike

This is what I'm saying. In 2002 the government passed the tax cuts (Congress not President I know). In January they started sending out check to everyone who had filed in the previous year. Taxpayer got this check ($250 for both my wife and I), when I filed my 2002 1040 form the IRS took $500 from my refund since they had given me that amount earlier in the year. This wasn't my withholding or anything but an advance.

Simple math to explain:

Refund: $1000

minus what we advanced you $500

what I got back $500

I'm not saying the tax rates weren’t changed but those tax cut checks sent out weren’t a refund they were an advance.

Take a look at your 2002 1040 if you don't believe me. I'm not against paying taxes since its the price I pay to live in a free society but I like to call a spade a spade.

I'm not complaining about the check but how everyone was falling all over themselves to get their tax refund check when it wasn't a refund.

If you want to PM me we can discuss this more since it is a little OT for this thread.