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Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

rshow55 - 02:26pm Jul 21, 2003 EST (# 13070 of 13072)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

And such a microbiologist thinks, professionally, about the process of dying. It is easy for me to imagine other stories to cover the known facts. To me, the idea that Kelly killed himself seems pretty similar to a scene in Chicago where the word was that "they both reached for the gun."

They Both Reached for the Gun By FRANK RICH http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/23/arts/23RICH.html

"To see why "Chicago" became the movie of the year in a year when America sleepwalked into war, you do not have to believe it is the best picture of 2002 . . . All you have to do is watch a single scene.

"That scene is a press conference in 1920's Chicago. A star defense attorney, Billy Flynn (Richard Gere), wants to browbeat a mob of reporters into believing that his client, Roxie Hart (Renée Zellweger), did not murder her lover when in fact she did.

13014-http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.BR6RbO7Fr04.242076@.f28e622/14690 13015 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.BR6RbO7Fr04.242076@.f28e622/14691

As for checking on whether of not the President is gisterme - that checking wouldn't be so hard to do. And stranger things have happened. For example, the US went into a war, under totally false pretenses, after engaging in a long negotiation with the UN that looks, now, like either insanity, or fraud, or some mix.

Could I be wrong. Sure. But I do think I have good reasons to think gisterme is Bush.

And gisterme would have judged some key things much better if he did pay more attention to this thread. Looking at gisterme's postings makes interesting reading.

rshow55 - 05:32pm Jul 21, 2003 EST (# 13071 of 13072)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

Sometimes, gisterme and I agree on key points - including the ones set out in 10120 below - though some of that agreement (in italics below, with phrases discussed thereafter) was based on an assumption of much better data than the Bush administration actually had. In Sketchy Data, Trying to Gauge Iraq Threat By THE NEW YORK TIMES http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/20/international/worldspecial/20WEAP.html

On March 17th, I didn't actually imagine that the quality of judgement of the Bush administration could be as bad as it has proved to be - as summarized in A Bloody Peace in Iraq http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/21/opinion/21MON1.html . Most Americans couldn't imagine either the deceptive overstatements, or the bad judgement, that have been revealed since. Perhaps it is worth setting out areas of agreement that have not changed - and areas where reassessment seems essential.

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rshow55 - 10:12am Mar 17, 2003 EST (# 10120 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.BR6RbO7Fr04.242076@.f28e622/11665 reads:

"This is a superb piece - and states some issues clearly.

A Decision Made, and Its Consequences By DAVID E. SANGER http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/17/international/middleeast/17ASSE.html

"To say that "I have some differences with the Bush administration" is putting the matter mildly - but all the same, just now, I think that Bush and Blair are right that for a workable system of international relations and international law, there has to be a place for military force.

"One can say that "containment has worked " and of course that's true.

"It has worked as well as it has - it has the shortcomings that it has.

Many of the most miserable, muddled, gruesome messes and tragedies in the world are traceable to the fact that containment works as it does - and results in paralysis, and systems of deceptions and evasions that completely close off clear action - for any purpose - right or wrong. In addition - the stability of containment can, under many circumstances - build up explosively unstable (and wrenchingly ugly) messes.

"Force is sometimes necessary, too. If Bush and Blair aren't exactly right on the time and place - they're right on that key principle.

"And with that principle central to the disagreement - and a renegotiation of international law necessary if it is to work now - I think now may be a good time for action, everything considered.

"There are times when there is no question that - for resolution - there has to be a fight. If the fights can't be resolved at the level of ideas, flesh rends."

(end of 10120 )

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