NEW XTC

I long for the good old days of Dictators (torture chambers and all) that would let people live a little and be tolerant of the various religions and sects...this murder-enforced-theocracy shit is the scariest mess we've ever faced.

ISIL poses maybe the worst conundrum for the US that I've seen in my lifetime. They are the ultimate catch 22 - they are a true grass roots movement of the people (crazy religious nuts) but still - the people.

To take them out will mean wholesale massacre of innocent women and children - ISIL is completely intertwined with the civilians and it's impossible to kill them without killing women kids...also many ISIL fighters are as young as 13. You kill one and it helps them recruit 10 new Jihadists. The US may irreversibly damage itself and pit the entire Muslim world against us if (when) we start slaughtering this movement.

Bush/Cheney fought an illegal trumped up war on bogus pretenses and took down Saddam Hussein who led a secular and tolerant government, this left a power vacuum that was ripe for insane murderous groups like ISIL to thrive.

We learned the hard way that taking down secular dictators in this region - and giving the people the chance to govern themselves (they tend to want to go all Islamonuts) is a disastrous policy. As in Egypt, Libya, Syria - you take out a dictator- well worse shit erupts.

They will likely eventually succeed in creating the Caliphate or "Islamic State" - this shit aint goin away anytime soon. Obama will go down in history more than anything as "The Pres when IS came to be" this is truly going to be HIS WAR and it's un-winable.

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Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.

-Voltaire