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Opinion Poll Manipulation

G

greenrd

Gone But Not Forgotten
(ACCOUNT RETIRED)
Joined
Aug 18, 2001
Messages
103
http://www.zmag.org/millerpolls.htm

I'd take this article with a pinch of salt, but even so, it just goes to prove, yet again, the old saws:

1) It all depends on how you ask the questions.

2) In war the first casualty is always truth.
 
I have a fairly large circle of friends and we all agree with what the media are reporting.
I think the truth may be a casualty, but not as this report suggests.
 
propaganda is one of the most powerfull tools either in war time or peace time

remember loose lips sink ships and dig for victory

casio
 
just remember propaganda is used to shape your views

ie most peeps on here have never met bin laden but no-one belives he mighnt not have done it - im not saying he didnt but all you have to go on is dubya and blair saying its him and they've both lied before so why not again?

i do think he did it and i hope they get him and kick the sh*t out of him but are these my opinions or propaganda?
casio
 
What proof is there that they lied about anything, apart from hearsay?
 
i dont know m8 it wasnt a very well thought out post sorry:D

casio
 
But they dont have ice cream.....Oh s..t, I'm getting as bad as the rest of you.:p
 
I was somewhat perturbed by the recent video pictures of Bin Laden... That long face, the beard, the big soulfull eyes - where had I seen that before?

In hundreds of religious paintings of Jesus, is where.

Creepy. Is Bin Laden the much-touted Anti-Christ? Discuss.
 
lol peeps will be trottin out the nostradamus again and the like,
well spotted though i never thought of that :)
casio
 
rynner said:
I was somewhat perturbed by the recent video pictures of Bin Laden... That long face, the beard, the big soulfull eyes - where had I seen that before?

In hundreds of religious paintings of Jesus, is where.

Creepy. Is Bin Laden the much-touted Anti-Christ? Discuss.
Click to expand...
Thought that one was settled long ago, wasn't his name Hitler, maybe this is his reincarnation.
 
I like to think of myself as the average man in the street, but I have yet to be approached and questioned as to my views on the now un-folding war. I am alone in this?

Also have you noticed how when there is a down-turn in the global economy a "war" always conviniently pops up?:confused:
 
very convenient, yes. There are posts I've read saying that Bush knew that there was an economic downturn coming, and that it was going to scuttle his election pledges on tax etc, when all of a sudden the biggest distraction going comes along (cf, bush snr - gulf, thatcher - falklands, clinton/blair - kosovo).

Who ends up getting all the contracts to rebuild essential infrastructure after these campaigns? Why the very same countries that made the weapons that blew the country up in the first place...

You just have to imagine those boardroom conversations:

IMF: So, mr-newly-elected-post-dictatorship-president, we've just successfully bombed your country back into the dark ages, and you say your having a bit of difficulty getting things started again?

mr nepdp: yes, most of the young men in my country are now traumatised, injured or dead, we've spent our entire budget on (whoops) US / french weaponry, and our children and elderly are about to face a very cold winter with no supplies, no heating and reduced hospital services.

IMF: well, funnily enough a few of my good freinds, mr balfourBreaty, and mr AMEC are available, and for a small fee we can also provide you with a kick start for your economy (repayable in blood over a hundred years). How does that sound?

mr nepdp: hmm, what's the other option?

IMF: starvation, an overthrow of your fragile coalition, and a return to power for the old regime (who are very fond of our new range of helicopters, apparently).

ad infinitum.

The only way any of these 'wars' (most of which are the fabricationof the military-industrial comlex) will be ended is if complacent governments whip themselves into shape, ban the export of arms to countries with human rights records and /or military regimes. But seeing as both the US and UK are military regimes, it seems unlikely for this to happen. 'Ethical foregin policy' anyone?
 
I also liked the fact that Blair recalling parliament...not for a debate, but so they (and therefore the media) can listen to another of his rousing speaches. I for one would like to hear less phoney rhetoric about being one community, and more aid measures, more diplomacy, and an end to the present bombing campaign. To hear tony bothering on about, 'doing our best to avoid civilian casualties' makes me sick. The only way to gaurantee 0 civilian casualties is not to bomb. How is bombing a ruined country going to do anything, except possibly give the arms companies something to write home about.

If we were really a world community, we wouldn't allow play-ground bullies, with their infantile grasp of global problems, to terrorise women and children. We'd take their conkers off them, and send them home.
 
I like the way they're sending bombs, but also food parcels, to show they're "friends" of the Afghan people.

"Ohmigod it's a bomb!!!!!! Oh hang on, they're goodies really... there's a tin of spam behind it..."
 
Yeah, but they're strapping the food parcels to cruise missiles...
 
dot23 said:
I also liked the fact that Blair recalling parliament...not for a debate, but so they (and therefore the media) can listen to another of his rousing speaches.
Click to expand...

I reckon he's going to change his name to Winston and start smoking big cigars.

It's also a very convenient distraction for all the problems he should have been addressing since he came into power, eg, health service, etc, etc.

Carole
 
talking of blair > churcjill, did anyone see the cover of the guardian G2 last week, with blair as churchill and gladstone (good of the sideburns)?
 
It seems a strange way to "smoke a man out".

We're not at war with the taleban yet we're killing their women and children.

Would it not have been better to launch one of americas much vaunted policing actions and just shoot one of the ruling taleban clerics untill he gave himself up?

Or is that too close to the actions of a despotic austrian in the 1930's.

My biggest fear is that there is no-one capable of stopping this appaling 'war'.

And Tony Blair has all but pledged allegiance to the flag and the war on terrorism, yet last year he released every terrorist we had managed to arrest during the troubles in N. Ireland. Way to go Tony!!! Is he going to arrest himself? Bomb his own constituency? Probably not
 
As likely as the US are to give Henry Kissenger to Chile...

8¬)
 
It's all to easy to criticise the coalition for what they're doing in Afghanistan, but at least they did say to the Taleban, for several weeks running, "Hand over that murdering terrorist bin Laden, or we will assume you are on his side and treat you as an enemy too".

Let us not forget that the thousands who died in NY and Washington (not to mention various US embassies and the USS Cole) got no warning and no choice.

Personally I am relieved the action taken has been relatively restrained. Admittedly the food drops are really just a token gesture at present, but when in any other war was such a gesture made?

All war is wrong, but people like Tony Benn who forever drone on about international law etc, seem to totally ignore the fact that bin Laden and his ilk recognise no law, civil, military OR religious, and ad hoc methods have to be used to restrain him and protect ourselves (which is, after all, the purpose of government).
 
I don't necessarily criticise the actions taken, just the cleanliness of the hands taking those actions. The history of Britain, what was the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and the US playing chequers with the rest of the world because they could laid the ground for a lot of the problems we now see... Israel, Latin American, Afganistan etc.

Just looking at the last few moves, the Carter Administration engineered the Russian invasion which took a low end third world country back to the stone age for its people, and gave the then noble freedom fighters, first line weapons and training in terror, when they were already skilled in hill fighting (as the British had found in the 19th Century)

The Gulf War came and went, to no clear conclusion, stopping at the gates of Bagdad for the simple reason they had no one to replace Saddam (bad over site when taking a principality by arms... ask Niccolo M about that)

Then Sept 11... an unforseen counter move by someone who learned amost of what he knew from the CIA.

now today... A creature that can plan what was done needs to be expunged from the species, but, for the US or the UK to take the moral high ground is, at best, rich.

Just my opinion

8¬(
 
To return from political commentary to something closer to the original subject of this thread, two related items:

http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/31567.htm
is about the anthrax outbreak.

Then below is a copy of an email sent to a friend in America (I've removed name of sender's family since I'm reproducing this without permission.):

XXXX's daughter and son-in-law are in the medical field and work at Jefferson Memorial Hospital at Pine Bluff.

They were here today and we were watching the news and discussing it, They told of some things that were disturbing to me. They said that one of the doctors at the hospital (eastern but did not know where he was born), disappeared the day before the terrorist attack in NY and has not been seen since. The location is scary because the Pine Bluff Arsenal is where all the chemical warfare stuff is stored. (mustard gas and Lord knows what else)

Also they said that another guy wore a Tee shirt after the bombing that said the United States deserved what they got. When some of the people jumped on him about it, he said, "It won't matter---this country will be under a new flag REAL soon anyway." (or something like that) This is REALLY close to home! I believe they said that he was fired. I HOPE SO.
 
Hmmm...

I realize that folks rarely post the obvious.... since most of us see no need to state in public what we all think is screamingly obvious...

..but I continue to think that a lot of folks here are being, perhaps, too clever by half. I think the obvious, simplest answer is that there is not some vast, shadowy conspiracy ... the authors of the attacks on the WTC/Pentagon are not to be found in the White House, or in Israel, or the bowels of a shadowy Military/Industrial Complex...etc... but rather, the attacks were, as they appeared at first blush, the work of Arabic terrorists, most likely tied to Bin Laden.

Bin Laden's taped statement all but took credit for the attack; at the LEAST he called them the work of the Muslim "vanguard". I suppose one could suggest he was (1) lying, trying to take credit for the attack for his own reasons or (2) a dupe, being fooled by the USA/Israel/some shadowy conspirators or (3) an accomplice of the MIC, somehow "in" on Bush/Blair/Israel's plans.

But isn't it at least as likely...or even MORE likely...that he and his fellow-minded terrorists simply ARE culpable?

As to "clean hands"... I am sorry, but I do not believe the USA or those in the West to be the moral equivalents of those who got on those planes on September 11 and perpetrated the ensuing slaughter. But here, I reveal, I suppose, my own outlook and moral compass. I realize it is very popular, in the West, to look in the mirror when seeking to assess blame..but frankly, in this case, I am not buying it.

Shadow
 
If there's one thing worse than a politician, it's an armchair politician, if their ilk had their way in 1939 there would be only one race by now, white, blonde, and blue eyed, our forebears went to war and many died to to end that kind of despotism.
 
Can anyone explain why people who did not trust Blair or Bush
before the eleventh should trust them now?

In their favour, all that can be said, it seems, is that at least they
are not Osama bin Laden. It reminds me of that clincher in all
political arguments when someone says, "Oh, I suppose you'd
prefer it if Stalin/Hitler/Arthur Scargill was in charge".

Today we can all read the e-mail from a Blair
press officer which that said the eleventh was a great day to hide
other bad news. This was one hour after the attack!

That is how politicians of all colours really think.
 
True Colors Revealed...

All that can be said in favor or President Bush or PM Blair is that they are not Bin Laden? Really?

Such an assertion would be uproariously funny, if it was not indicative of the kind of glib cynicism that passes for "skeptical thought", all too often, when political matters are raised on this Board...

Shadow
 
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