.

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

20 hours ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

You're missing the point.  The Middle East has inflicted 1400 years of conquest, mass murder, slavery, destruction of knowledge, religious extremism, and terror on the world.  The need to mitigate their chronic bad behavior supersedes any concern for their well being.  They brought this on themselves. 

Is it satisfying to watch innocent people suffer?  No.  Is it satisfying to rid the world of a violent culture, thereby reducing the average level of human suffering?  Absolutely.  If the Middle East doesn't want the world to take pleasure in their destruction, they need only change their culture, make amends, and prove they can be good neighbors. 

I must stress that the Middle East had to work hard to earn this level of disdain.  The bar was set extremely low: all they had to do was mind their own business.  Instead, they chose to play violent games.  I repeat: they decided to make it a game.  Now that they've brought this suffering upon themselves, they don't get to whine about it. 

Play stupid games; win stupid prizes. 

I think you missed my point. 

I agree that sometimes the world is a nasty place. But the human collateral damage from a war (especially in the ME) is not fun or satisfying. People dying and suffering is not fun or satisfying. We may need to accept realities, but using words such as satisfying about suffering is inappropiate. And go ahead and call me a squamish, sensitive liberal. I don't care. 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

8 minutes ago, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

I think you missed my point.  

I agree that sometimes the world is a nasty place. But the human collateral damage from a war (especially in the ME) is not fun or satisfying. People dying and suffering is not fun or satisfying. We may need to accept realities, but using words such as satisfying about suffering is inappropiate. And go ahead and call me a squamish, sensitive liberal. I don't care.  

If you experienced the fruits of Middle Eastern culture firsthand, you'd call it satisfying.

You need to get out more. 

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

5 minutes ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

If you experienced the fruits of Middle Eastern culture firsthand, you'd call it satisfying.

You need to get out more. 

And you need to learn history. Start with the crusades. And also look at colonial history in the ME. Europe and West has inflicted lots of pain on the ME. 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

Just now, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

And you need to learn history. Start with the crusades. And also look at colonial history in the ME. Europe and West has inflicted lots of pain on the ME.  

I have learned my history.  The difference between you and I is that I started from the beginning. 

The crusades were a response to centuries of Muslim attempts to invade Europe.  The Spanish Inquisition was a response to a century of Muslim occupation of Spain.  European colonial history in the Middle East was a response to the unrelenting violence of those cultures; there was no other way to deal with them. 

Consider that the United States didn't bother building a navy until it became clear these nations would continue seizing US ships and enslaving US citizens.  The War on Terror began in 1800.  Or ask Eastern Europe about their experience with the Ottoman Empire. 

Wherever these cultures spread their influence, death and destruction follow.  They're not to be tolerated, they don't deserve sympathy, and I won't apologize for my culture's self defense. 

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

34 minutes ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

I have learned my history.  The difference between you and I is that I started from the beginning. 

when is the beginning to you? 

35 minutes ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

The crusades were a response to centuries of Muslim attempts to invade Europe.

The moor invasions had nothing to do with the crusades.

35 minutes ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

The Spanish Inquisition was a response to a century of Muslim occupation of Spain. 

the Spanish inquisition was about using religion to cement power. If I remember correctly after jews and muslims they went after other christians - protestants. 

--------------------------

I am little busy so I don't have time for a better response. But basically it seems to me that you are confusing quest for power / money with culture. The West is no better than the ME (or any other region). You probably just have an axe to grind with the ME. 

 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

6 hours ago, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

when is the beginning to you? 

The moor invasions had nothing to do with the crusades.

the Spanish inquisition was about using religion to cement power. If I remember correctly after jews and muslims they went after other christians - protestants. 

--------------------------

I am little busy so I don't have time for a better response. But basically it seems to me that you are confusing quest for power / money with culture. The West is no better than the ME (or any other region). You probably just have an axe to grind with the ME.  

For the purposes of this discussion, the beginning is the dozens of Middle Eastern (Read: Muslim) attempts to invade Europe prior to the crusades.  Also, their extensive raiding of Europe to capture slaves.  If you consider that the violence and slaving started with the beginning of their religion, 632AD is as good a date as any. 

The "Moor" invasions were part of the problem, but they weren't the only problem.  Islam was raiding & invading Turkey, Sicily, Italy, France - practically every nation on the Southern coast of Europe.  Faced with this chronic problem, the Pope finally acknowledged that Christianity needed an organized response.  Hence, the crusades.  I can't speak to how well/poorly the crusades were executed, but I do know they served an important purpose. 

Read the history of Spain prior to the inquisition.  Islam had invaded Spain, slaughtered people, and taken women to be slaves and concubines.  Also read a bit about Islam.  Once Spain had ejected the Islamic invaders, they needed to eliminate that foreign influence.  The problem was "Taqiya": the Islamic practice of lying about their religious beliefs in the presence of non believers.  Because of Taqiya, Spain couldn't just accept a person's word; rigorous questioning was required.  It always gets ugly when people play dirty and lie.  Islam made that choice; Spain was simply responding.  I can't speak to what Spain did with the inquisition after they'd rooted out invaders, but I do know The Inquisition was created to serve an important purpose. 

If you think European culture is no different than Islamic culture, you don't understand either.  I'm not particularly religious, but I can respect most religions.  Christians, Buddhists, Taoists, Hindus, Sikhs, and a host of other philosophies at least attempt to better the world.  Many have made great progress advancing human rights and reducing suffering.  I cannot respect Islam because it has always used lies, oppression, and violence to achieve its goals.  Islam has no redeeming qualities.  It adds nothing of value to the world, makes no attempt to improve itself, and destroys everything it touches. 

That brings us to the quest for power.  I'm aware that religion is always used to consolidate power, is always political, and always leads to some extremism and atrocities.  That's the nature of the beast.  The question is whether a religion has redeeming qualities to compensate for those inherent risks.  Most religions do; Islam does not.  Based on Islam's sordid history, I'd prefer it be quarantined from the rest of the world. 

What's particularly interesting about Islam is that it's entirely incompatible with Western liberalism, human rights, and everything else your culture stands for.  If I were you, I would ask myself what life would be like for my children in a Muslim nation.  Then I would ask myself whether I'm comfortable with the possibility of a Muslim majority in my own nation. 

Islam has laws and culture of its own; Muslims will not assimilate into or accept yours.  Give that some serious thought. 

[Uvuvwevwevwe Onyetenyevwe Ugwemuhwem Osas + 96]

Islam - 1200 years of conquest

https://youtu.be/t_Qpy0mXg8Y?t=732

If you don't believe non-muslims, then listen to a muslim tell you about Islam

https://youtu.be/Bc3rNSy7aQ8?t=23

Islam - 270 million people killed in 1400 years - What every human must know

https://youtu.be/FWEYyyzykbU?t=8

 

Edited July 5, 2019 by Uvuvwevwevwe Onyetenyevwe Ugwemuhwem Osas

[John Foote + 1,135]

3 hours ago, Uvuvwevwevwe Onyetenyevwe Ugwemuhwem Osas said:

Islam - 270 million people killed in 1400 years - What every human must know

How many did Hitler, Stalin, and Mao manage in just the 20th century? 

Roughly 40% of Germany wiped itself out arguing over protestant verses catholic. And of course as Monty Python fans all know, there is that Spanish Inquisition thing. One way they identified muslim neighborhoods, the areas with lower disease rates. Darn muslims had far less disease. All that cleaning, washing their hands and feet for prayer, helped reduce spreading germs.

I have heard a phrase, "Religion is the original weapon of mass destruction." 

To single out Islam as the bad boy is to ignore atrocities by many religions.

In the original spreading of Islam the Arabs weren't trying to convert, just conquer and enrich, not unlike Napoleon. The Khans inadvertently spread Islam, but they weren't trying to save any souls, and Ghangis himself wasn't muslim. Two of Mohammad's wives were even jewish. 

What man does with the message of God of Abraham is often pretty brutal, and historically Islam doesn't corner the market.

 

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

22 hours ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

For the purposes of this discussion, the beginning is the dozens of Middle Eastern (Read: Muslim) attempts to invade Europe prior to the crusades

At the time Europe was at war with itself. Feudal lords was pretty always raiding each other. Not to mention Scandinavian vikings. 

Either you are cherrypicking or you need to study more. 

22 hours ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

The "Moor" invasions were part of the problem, but they weren't the only problem.

Moor Invasion(s) had nothing to do with crusades. 

22 hours ago, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

slam was raiding & invading Turkey, Sicily, Italy, France - practically every nation on the Southern coast of Europe.  Faced with this chronic problem, the Pope finally acknowledged that Christianity needed an organized response.  Hence, the crusades.  I can't speak to how well/poorly the crusades were executed, but I do know they served an important purpose. 

To understand the crusades you need to understand:

1) The ME was richer than Europe

2) Europe was feudal; meaning that only way for a 2nd or 3rd son to gain riches would be through warfare

3) The church made money on the crusades by lending money to the feudal lords that would raise armies. 

4) The ME was militarily superior, but NOT united.

The crusades was mainly about economic interests; a good example is the 4th crusade which actually sacked Christian Constantinople. 

---------------------------------

Above is a very simplistic breakdown, but I think you get where I am going with it...  

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

2 hours ago, John Foote said:

How many did Hitler, Stalin, and Mao manage in just the 20th century? 

Roughly 40% of Germany wiped itself out arguing over protestant verses catholic. And of course as Monty Python fans all know, there is that Spanish Inquisition thing. One way they identified muslim neighborhoods, the areas with lower disease rates. Darn muslims had far less disease. All that cleaning, washing their hands and feet for prayer, helped reduce spreading germs.

I have heard a phrase, "Religion is the original weapon of mass destruction." 

To single out Islam as the bad boy is to ignore atrocities by many religions.

In the original spreading of Islam the Arabs weren't trying to convert, just conquer and enrich, not unlike Napoleon. The Khans inadvertently spread Islam, but they weren't trying to save any souls, and Ghangis himself wasn't muslim. Two of Mohammad's wives were even jewish. 

What man does with the message of God of Abraham is often pretty brutal, and historically Islam doesn't corner the market.

Comparing deaths when the world population was tiny compared to the 20th century? 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_pirates

They did indeed begin immediately after "the prophet" and you might be right that his name should have been spelled profit. The ME was only wealthier than Europe because of all their thievery. Looting and pillaging are quite profitable.

One of Mohammad's "wives" was a 9 year old Jewish girl whose parents he had just murdered. A real piece of work

[Uvuvwevwevwe Onyetenyevwe Ugwemuhwem Osas + 96]

3 hours ago, John Foote said:

How many did Hitler, Stalin, and Mao manage in just the 20th century?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
Whataboutism (also known as whataboutery) is a variant of the tu quoque logical fallacy that attempts to discredit an opponent's position by charging them with hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving their argument,which in the United States is particularly associated with Soviet and Russian propaganda. When criticisms were leveled at the Soviet Union during the Cold War, the Soviet response would often be "What about..." followed by an event in the Western world.
 

3 hours ago, John Foote said:

Roughly 40% of Germany wiped itself out arguing over protestant verses catholic.

https://www.quora.com/When-someone-responds-to-an-argument-by-changing-the-subject-what-fallacy-are-they-using

Depending on how the subject was changed, it would be a Red Herring logical fallacy, Irrelevant conclusion, or possibly a Non Sequitur could be used to intentionally change the subject.

Sometimes the subject isn't changed intentionally, and the person using one of these fallacies has something in their head that sounds close enough to the subject that they don't realize they aren't talking about anything relevant to what was just previously being talked about.

People often have a set ‘script' so to speak of what they would say about a specific topic, and have planned arguments ahead of time so they think they are still on the same topic because they see some connection they've thought about ahead of time they haven't mentioned to you to show how they think they're still talking about the same topic.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_herring
A red herring is something that misleads or distracts from a relevant or important question

3 hours ago, John Foote said:

To single out Islam as the bad boy is to ignore atrocities by many religions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
Whataboutism (also known as whataboutery) is a variant of the tu quoque logical fallacy that attempts to discredit an opponent's position by charging them with hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving their argument,which in the United States is particularly associated with Soviet and Russian propaganda. When criticisms were leveled at the Soviet Union during the Cold War, the Soviet response would often be "What about..." followed by an event in the Western world.

Edited July 5, 2019 by Uvuvwevwevwe Onyetenyevwe Ugwemuhwem Osas

[David Jones + 84]

On 6/21/2019 at 2:35 PM, Guillaume Albasini said:

 

Two red dots...

Both can be correct. My guess is that what has happened here is a case of a drone that either intentionally or unintentionally grazed their airspace and they shot it down the moment it did so (assuming it was official and not some faction in the country). The US could have been testing to see what they would do, I would not put such an action past this administration. Presumably whoever was flying the drone was alerted to this eventuality immediately and hightailed it out of the airspace. It's all a question of how you define "shot down". Iranians could be talking about the moment they fired the missile, they could also be talking about the moment it hit the drone and the US can be talking about the moment the drone hit the water. None of the above occur at the same location. The first is likely to be the closest to Iran, the last is almost certainly outside of their airspace due to the fact that these object is traveling at high speeds and would for the most part continue on it's initial trajectory until hitting the water. Regardless, nobody is going to war over such an incident. At least in a relatively sane world that is..

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

On 7/5/2019 at 11:51 AM, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

At the time Europe was at war with itself. Feudal lords was pretty always raiding each other. Not to mention Scandinavian vikings. 

Either you are cherrypicking or you need to study more.  

Moor Invasion(s) had nothing to do with crusades.  

To understand the crusades you need to understand:

1) The ME was richer than Europe

2) Europe was feudal; meaning that only way for a 2nd or 3rd son to gain riches would be through warfare

3) The church made money on the crusades by lending money to the feudal lords that would raise armies. 

4) The ME was militarily superior, but NOT united.

The crusades was mainly about economic interests; a good example is the 4th crusade which actually sacked Christian Constantinople. 

 ---------------------------------

Above is a very simplistic breakdown, but I think you get where I am going with it...  

I disagree.  The historical record shows repeated attempts to invade Europe spanning several centuries prior to the crusades.  You're welcome to your opinion though. 

[David Jones + 84]

To those of you debating "who did what", it doesn't matter. What matters is that we stop this idiotic behaviour. Before the Crusades there were the Romans (I'll let you guess what they did in the East), before these were the Macedonian (rampaged all the way to India and named all cities the same.. hhmmm nice work there) and before them there were the Persians (not one but two invasions in relatively short succession, the second time having had trouble getting through a few hundred Spartans. It might be worth considering what the world would look like today if those few hundred potential bisexuals hadn't taken out thousands and delayed that particular invasion. Rather ironic. The Greeks could probably utter similar sentences to the ones Europeans often hear from the USA in regard to WW2. I believe that would go something like this: if it wasn't for a few hundred Greek bisexuals we might all be speaking Farsi now) and before them there may or may not have been the invasion of Troy over a woman (nice story but nobody is taking thousands of men across the treacherous sea unless they think there's something to plunder and conquer, certainly not just because your brother couldn't hold on to his wife) so really it just keeps going round and round. It would be a good idea to step off this merry go around before it's too late.

Edited July 8, 2019 by David Jones

[John Foote + 1,135]

On 7/5/2019 at 11:51 AM, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

The crusades was mainly about economic interests; a good example is the 4th crusade which actually sacked Christian Constantinople. 

Absolutely. There was also a Crusades in France against the French, I think the 7th Crusade was against the Cathars.

If I recall my history from decades ago, the church was also trying to stop the folks from fighting each other. Europe was very much feudal. What the crusaders brought back changed everything. Learning about the Catholic church's behavior in that time was a body blow to my religious belief structure. Knights of Templar were a serious money making machine.

The Khans stalled out in Hungary, but weren't defeated. Rather the internal power bickering undid them. Persia, Japan, India, China, all more advanced than Europe of the time. But not typically united. They had their own internal things to deal with.

The Arabs expansion wasn't to try and convert, but rather just old fashion pillage, and they were always basically insular, not concerning themselves with what the rest of the world had to offer (except for loot). What we now call Saudi Arabia, wasn't the center of power. Bagdad, Damascus, and to a lessor degree Cairo mattered. I believe our history books call Mesopotamia the birthplace of civilization (ignoring the east). One group had the upper hand, then another, then another. Persians then got in on the act and much of the Islamic Age of Enlightenment, the leading scholars of the day were Muslims from Persia. The sectarian divide in Islam started the day Mohammed died. To be an early caliphate leader was a death sentence, they pretty much all died violent deaths, unless they were lucky enough to be poisoned.

 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

On 7/5/2019 at 9:58 AM, John Foote said:

How many did Hitler, Stalin, and Mao manage in just the 20th century? 

Roughly 40% of Germany wiped itself out arguing over protestant verses catholic. And of course as Monty Python fans all know, there is that Spanish Inquisition thing. One way they identified muslim neighborhoods, the areas with lower disease rates. Darn muslims had far less disease. All that cleaning, washing their hands and feet for prayer, helped reduce spreading germs.

I have heard a phrase, "Religion is the original weapon of mass destruction." 

To single out Islam as the bad boy is to ignore atrocities by many religions.

In the original spreading of Islam the Arabs weren't trying to convert, just conquer and enrich, not unlike Napoleon. The Khans inadvertently spread Islam, but they weren't trying to save any souls, and Ghangis himself wasn't muslim. Two of Mohammad's wives were even jewish.  

What man does with the message of God of Abraham is often pretty brutal, and historically Islam doesn't corner the market.

 

 

On 7/5/2019 at 11:51 AM, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

At the time Europe was at war with itself. Feudal lords was pretty always raiding each other. Not to mention Scandinavian vikings. 

Either you are cherrypicking or you need to study more. 

Moor Invasion(s) had nothing to do with crusades. 

To understand the crusades you need to understand:

1) The ME was richer than Europe

2) Europe was feudal; meaning that only way for a 2nd or 3rd son to gain riches would be through warfare

3) The church made money on the crusades by lending money to the feudal lords that would raise armies. 

4) The ME was militarily superior, but NOT united.

The crusades was mainly about economic interests; a good example is the 4th crusade which actually sacked Christian Constantinople. 

---------------------------------

Above is a very simplistic breakdown, but I think you get where I am going with it...  

There's an important distinction between people abusing their religion and their religion systematically supporting bad behavior.  Islam systematically supports bad behavior. 

There's also a difference between violence/oppression/slavery two millenia ago when the entire world was doing it and violence/slavery/oppression in the modern era when most religions & cultures have bettered themselves.  Christian Europe changed for the better; Islam did not.  Islam needs to either get with the program or disappear. 

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

On 7/4/2019 at 8:23 PM, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

What's particularly interesting about Islam is that it's entirely incompatible with Western liberalism, human rights, and everything else your culture stands for. 

I don't necessarily disagree. My only point that part of this equation is also the tribal culture that still dominates large parts of the ME. 

 

On 7/4/2019 at 8:23 PM, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

If I were you, I would ask myself what life would be like for my children in a Muslim nation.  Then I would ask myself whether I'm comfortable with the possibility of a Muslim majority in my own nation. 

As per above - I don't necessarily disagree with the diagnosis; the biggest disagreement is on the medicine. I believe we need to change how we go about integration and more importantly - we need to understand that our foreign policy and trade policies effect how many people come here - i.e if we could make it more attractive for people to stay where they are we have less integration issues. 

 

On 7/4/2019 at 8:23 PM, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

Islam has laws and culture of its own; Muslims will not assimilate into or accept yours.  Give that some serious thought. 

I know what sharia is. And I have given this some serious thought. 

I would like to give an example - we have a friend from Iran. He is a surgeon, a brilliant one actually. And he is a committed atheist. He hates Islam. He is well integrated into Danish society. Abides by our laws and contributes. However, I would NOT want my daughter to marry someone like him. His views on society / gender roles etc is stuck in the 40s. 

What Europe has a failed at is communicating in a way that the immigrants understand - i.e. they come from places where government is brute force and there is no trust in government. And we try to integrate them using our soft approach. That is never going to work. 

another example - Switzerland has a great program for treating drug addicts. They give them free drugs. This reduces crime (and police resources to crime) and actually they have a much higher success rate at geting the addicts out of the addiction. But morally speaking this stupid libtard policy - why should we reward people that make bad choices; even if it is cheaper and more effective than punishing them. 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-swiss-drugs/swiss-drug-policy-should-serve-as-model-experts-idUSTRE69O3VI20101025

[David Jones + 84]

On religion and specifically the Islamic and Christian rivalries. It seems these religions have more in common than I realized. Apparently all the way to recognizing the same Archangels Michael and Gabriel. In fact, the Islamic holy book was seemingly delivered by the latter. So really, if we wanted to define the conflicts over centuries as a result of conflicting religious beliefs (I'm not convinced and I would say religion is only used as a rallying cry to organize the troops and the actual reasons are much more mundane and animalistic), then what we have here is a conflict over an interpretation. Almost as if we were to start a ware because of the different interpretations of pronouncing a word such as "tomato". If such an entity as God exists and is observing humanity, then it/she/he is likely experiencing a perpetual "facepalm" situation.

Edited July 10, 2019 by David Jones

[James Regan + 1,776]

On 7/3/2019 at 5:36 PM, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

Yes.  You're misunderstanding their definitions.  The quoted 20MMbpd consumption includes all "petroleum" products: biofuels, natural gas liquids, etc.  The quoted 12-14MMbpd production excludes some products.  Hence, crude oil "production" is at 12-14MMbpd, petroleum "consumption" is at 20MMbpd, and the US is set to be a net exporter of crude by year's end. 

Details matter. 

 

Edited July 10, 2019 by James Regan

[James Regan + 1,776]

On 7/3/2019 at 5:36 PM, BenFranklin'sSpectacles said:

Yes.  You're misunderstanding their definitions.  The quoted 20MMbpd consumption includes all "petroleum" products: biofuels, natural gas liquids, etc.  The quoted 12-14MMbpd production excludes some products.  Hence, crude oil "production" is at 12-14MMbpd, petroleum "consumption" is at 20MMbpd, and the US is set to be a net exporter of crude by year's end. 

Details matter. 

Gents,

i don’t really mind how you decide to break down the data to suit yourselves but the fact is the USA consumes 20MBbl/ day and I’d one third away from being a net producer.

I will bet a dollar to a pinch of dookie 💩 that USA is not a net producer by years end.

 

https://www.indexmundi.com/energy/?country=us&product=oil&graph=consumption

https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_oil_consumption

https://www.statista.com/statistics/282716/oil-consumption-in-the-us-per-day/

 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

4 hours ago, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

I don't necessarily disagree. My only point that part of this equation is also the tribal culture that still dominates large parts of the ME. 

 

As per above - I don't necessarily disagree with the diagnosis; the biggest disagreement is on the medicine. I believe we need to change how we go about integration and more importantly - we need to understand that our foreign policy and trade policies effect how many people come here - i.e if we could make it more attractive for people to stay where they are we have less integration issues.  

 

I know what sharia is. And I have given this some serious thought. 

I would like to give an example - we have a friend from Iran. He is a surgeon, a brilliant one actually. And he is a committed atheist. He hates Islam. He is well integrated into Danish society. Abides by our laws and contributes. However, I would NOT want my daughter to marry someone like him. His views on society / gender roles etc is stuck in the 40s. 

What Europe has a failed at is communicating in a way that the immigrants understand - i.e. they come from places where government is brute force and there is no trust in government. And we try to integrate them using our soft approach. That is never going to work.  

 another example - Switzerland has a great program for treating drug addicts. They give them free drugs. This reduces crime (and police resources to crime) and actually they have a much higher success rate at geting the addicts out of the addiction. But morally speaking this stupid libtard policy - why should we reward people that make bad choices; even if it is cheaper and more effective than punishing them.  

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-swiss-drugs/swiss-drug-policy-should-serve-as-model-experts-idUSTRE69O3VI20101025

It's not necessary to piss away your wealth trying to uplift nations that never have and never will achieve stability.  Just control your borders as nations have always done.

You're letting questionable people into your country and then trying to change them.  That's playing with fire.  The appropriate way to uplift the world is for wealthy, successful nations to colonize failed nations.  Don't let their culture infect yours; insist that your culture overtake theirs. 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

4 hours ago, David Jones said:

On religion and specifically the Islamic and Christian rivalries. It seems these religions have more in common than I realized. Apparently all the way to recognizing the same Archangels Michael and Gabriel. In fact, the Islamic holy book was seemingly delivered by the latter. So really, if we wanted to define the conflicts over centuries as a result of conflicting religious beliefs (I'm not convinced and I would say religion is only used as a rallying cry to organize the troops and the actual reasons are much more mundane and animalistic), then what we have here is a conflict over an interpretation. Almost as if we were to start a ware because of the different interpretations of pronouncing a word such as "tomato". If such an entity as God exists and is observing humanity, then it/she/he is likely experiencing a perpetual "facepalm" situation.

The trappings of a religion matter less than the philosophy it teaches. Philosophy leads to thought, thought leads to action, and action leads to tangible results.  We care about the results.  E.g. does your religion, on average, convince people to be peaceful, or does it encourage violence? 

The similarities between Islam and Christianity are superficial.  Mohammad stole elements from Judaism, Christianity, and possibly other religions.  He then weaved those elements into his own, personal philosophy - a philosophy which is radically different from and completely incompatible with Christian values.  This is why Christianity slowly established human rights and uplifted Europe while Islam continues to destroy everything it touches. 

[BenFranklin'sSpectacles + 762]

3 hours ago, James Regan said:

Gents,

i don’t really mind how you decide to break down the data to suit yourselves but the fact is the USA consumes 20MBbl/ day and I’d one third away from being a net producer.

I will bet a dollar to a pinch of dookie 💩 that USA is not a net producer by years end.

 

https://www.indexmundi.com/energy/?country=us&product=oil&graph=consumption

https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_oil_consumption

https://www.statista.com/statistics/282716/oil-consumption-in-the-us-per-day/

 

Ok.  Explain this: 

"In 2018, net imports of petroleum averaged 2.3 MMb/d, the equivalent of 11% of total U.S. petroleum consumption and the lowest percentage since 1957."

Averaging 2.3MMbpd in 2018 means imports were approximately 1.5MMbpd by Jan 2019.  At the rate the US is increasing production, it could easily be a net exporter by end of 2019.  QED. 

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,192]

On 7/4/2019 at 2:54 AM, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

And you need to learn history. Start with the crusades. And also look at colonial history in the ME. Europe and West has inflicted lots of pain on the ME. 

You need to learn some basic history for WHY the crusades were launched to begin with.  They were launched in defense of the Byzantine empire which used to be Roman(still kind of were) + Christian and were being slaughtered by the Muslim Turks.   Keep up your alternative history.

[NickW + 2,714]

On ‎7‎/‎4‎/‎2019 at 11:47 AM, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

when is the beginning to you? 

The moor invasions had nothing to do with the crusades.

the Spanish inquisition was about using religion to cement power. If I remember correctly after jews and muslims they went after other christians - protestants. 

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I am little busy so I don't have time for a better response. But basically it seems to me that you are confusing quest for power / money with culture. The West is no better than the ME (or any other region). You probably just have an axe to grind with the ME. 

 

The Popes calling of a Crusade was a convenient way of providing the Byzantine Empire with a free supply of military labour to take the pressure off their borders from the Seljuk empire. Byzantine couldn't afford the standing armies or mercenaries needed to hold back the Seljuks. At least in the eastern Med it kept the war in Asia rather than on European lands.

The convenience for Northern European Kings was it provided an incentive for troublesome bored Northern European Knights to go off and win their assured place in heaven rather than stir up issues in their home countries.