Dipple

It's similar to American Football, same shaped ball, but you can only pass it backwards, and play doesn't stop so often so you have massive confrontations called Scrums and Rucks. Youtube it, its pretty good.

Yeah they were, I'm a silly Englishman who should have double checked these things

The spending potential would be the same...

Solved poverty? What's the solution?

It is a very heavily veiled reference to this event yes. LOL.

That's exactly my point, a terrorist is defined by the USA, it's a political word. Nelson Mandela WAS a terrorist in the technical sense, but the USA decides who is a terrorist and who is not based on how they fit into their political scope. I study War at King's College London, I'm not basing this on stuff I've read on the internet. Try Lawrence Freedman, Theo Farrell, Brian Holden Reid, etc. I'm not going to dig into Vietnam to find an example for you, I don't need to persuade you, you are clearly resistant to anything but what you've been told on CBS. War is nasty, and all actors act very unpleasantly, there is no good war, and any war the USA fights is one they don't need to fight. It annoys me when American teenagers get butthurt when someone suggests that the country they belong to is not the shining beacon of human civilisation that they think it is. I love America, I live here at the moment and its great, but the US government acts in such a standard, imperial manner, and this is not a good manner, in my opinion.

Sure they do, they do it by bombing "strategically important sites" that need not be military sites, bridges, municipal buildings, hospitals occasionally. This is legal under international law, and civilians are inside those buildings. There's rarely anything strategically important about a town hall, but if you bomb it and kill some civilians you press your point pretty hard to the rest. Its a nice way of avoiding responsibility. And Nelson Mandela was a terrorist by US standards. The thing that absolves him is that he was fighting for a good cause, but we are the ones who judge what is good or not, its very subjective, so in this way countless terrorists are viewed as freedom fighters rather than terrorists.

Yeah, this is why it's a bad tactic, it doesn't mean the USA didn't use it. Vietnam...

Armies constantly target civilian structures as part of a war effort, when they do so they know that civilians will die, and until VERY recently this has been considered as both acceptable and desirable in war, as fear is a lot easier to wield than respect.

It is essentially proven that in 1985 Ronald Reagan had the Panamanian president assassinated. He never announced this formally, nor did he apologise for it but it is considered a sound historical fact. My problem with terrorism is that by definition it is something that almost all armies have carried out throughout history, purposeful attacks on civilians with the intent of generating fear. Only, when done by an army it is viewed as legitimate, whereas when done by a non-state organisation for whatever means, just or unjust it becomes terrorism. Did you know for example that Nelson Mandela was considered a terrorist, and was jailed due to his links to a bomb attack on an elementary school?

As soon as I hear "terrorist" I consider an argument lost. If you do any detailed reading into the subject you see that terrorist is just a brush used to paint your enemies, like "heretic" was in the middle ages. The USA assassinated the president of Panama in 1985, its illegal sure, but who's going to challenge them?

Earlier this week an attempted assassination of the Saudi Ambassador to the USA was uncovered. The attempt was linked to the Iranian government who openly oppose both the USA and the Saudi government for their involvement in the Middle East. The Saudi government has a history of human rights abuses, they operate a heavily conservative Islamic state that is seen by many to be oppressive and backwards. The USA has a very close relationship to a state which is not dissimilar to Taliban Afghanistan or Iran itself in its behaviour. So my point is that people get mixed up with Real Politik and idealism, Osama's assassination was an act of Real Politik, that is, ruthless and strategic operation in order to secure one's goals - yet it was viewed as an idealist triumph over evil. In this way, Iran has been demonised in reverse for attempting something very similar, however not in correspondence with our set of views as people living within the American sphere of thought.

Ok, so its difficult for me to talk about these things to people who are firmly embedded in the American world view. I am not suggesting that these people are ignorant, because this view is immensely pervasive, and it affects thought processes at every level. I'm referring broadly to Obama's political assassinations of senior Al Qaeda members. I don't pretend to support the politics or tactics used by Al Qaeda, but it must be recognised that they are a political body, with clear aims that enjoy a level of legitimacy in parts of the world. The western reaction to these killings was jubilation, especially to Osama bin Laden, as he was such a hated character due to his alleged orchestration of the 9/11 terror attacks. I personally feel that this reaction is unsavoury, that by responding with happiness at another's death we lower ourselves morally. This is the sort of reaction that we look upon with disgust when it goes on in the Middle East, and it is no different for us. There is no clear cut good guy/bad guy, and a human life is equal to a human life regardless of character.

You have no authority to issue those statistics. I would be surprised if 85% of the world cared one way or another about Osama Bin Laden, in lots of places he was viewed as a troubled visionary, Yemen, for example. This is clearly just a fundamental point of departure between our philosophies. I believe that killing a murderer brings some of their crime onto you, for you are choosing to continue killing where killing needn't be.

I don't support Al Qaeda's politics nor do I condone their behaviour. I was simply pointing out that they have purpose in their killing. I would say that any death, no matter how bad a person, is a negative thing, and should be viewed as such. I was not happy when Osama died, especially since there was an opportunity for him to be captured.