Worry when your king says ...

[Grok]

"SUPPORT THE TROOPS"

An emotional argument used by the Bush administration to rally people behing POLICY is that Americans should support the men and women in uniform.  If we take on our rights with vigorous responsibility, we must exercise our speech when we disagree with our government policy.  In oppressive tyrannical states, they fear open speech against policy and have no qualms using the soldiers and sailors to help shape public opinion.  We have such a government in place.  Quite frequently Bush, Rice, and others, when faced with increasing policy opposition have accused naysayers of "undermining our men and women in uniform".

When you must argue about war, and I hope everyone DOES argue about war, try to rise above this cheap transparent trick.  When you listen to your government speak on television, or read the speeches on other media, learn to recognize when they're offering such rally calls as "support the troops".  Whenever you hear them your heart should not jump, but instead your stomach should churn with disgust.  How dare they play with the lives of our families in a policy debate?  Is their position on policy so weak that it cannot stand without saying "well our troops are already there, if we openly discuss why they're there, you put their lives in jeopardy."  They do dare and they do not care that you disapprove, if it works to get you to stop questioning policy.

[WoOdTroll]

Thats true, how dare they play god with your lives.

[CrAz3D]

I know a group in town that is way anti-war, they still have support our troops signs, cause they care.

[iago]

I hope the troops do great, they're good people. 

But I also don't like politicians toying with people's emotions.

[Explicit]

I hope the troops do great, they're good people.

But I also don't like politicians toying with people's emotions.

It can't be helped though.  It's known that when a politician is telling you one thing, in reality they are really telling you something else.  I suppose the level of gullibility has grown quite large.

[iago]

I hope the troops do great, they're good people.

But I also don't like politicians toying with people's emotions.

It can't be helped though.  It's known that when a politician is telling you one thing, in reality they are really telling you something else.  I suppose the level of gullibility has grown quite large.

And this is why I hate politicians and don't vote. 

[Arta]

This "support our troops" thing is such a bunch of crap. We had the same thing here for a while. The answer to this bunch of crap is:

No, I don't support our troops. They shouldn't have been sent there. That said, I very much hope that as few of them as possible die. I also hope that they kill as few people as possible. I also hope they come home as soon as possible, and that when they get back, they use their vote to kick out of government the idiots who put them in harm's way for no good reason.

[hismajesty]

I find it amazing that Grok, being a retired member of the armed forces, is against anything that involves supporting our troops. I have respect for Grok simply because he served, even though I disagree with almost everything he says. I also have respect for everyone else that is or has served, because they answered the call and rose to defend our great nation. Anyone who doesn't support them, I feel, shouldn't be protected by them.

[CrAz3D]

I find it amazing that Grok, being a retired member of the armed forces, is against anything that involves supporting our troops. I have respect for Grok simply because he served, even though I disagree with almost everything he says. I also have respect for everyone else that is or has served, because they answered the call and rose to defend our great nation. Anyone who doesn't support them, I feel, shouldn't be protected by them.

I used to think that way, about having respect for people just because they served.  I now find that it doesn't matter if they serverd or not...they could've just been in it specifically for the money (colege education money) & couldn't have given a damn about what happens to us.

[hismajesty]

Very true, but I'd much rather have a blanket-affection of respect versus one of disrespect. I'm grateful we have men and women that are willing to do this for us, and without them our nation wouldn't be as great as it now is. Certainly Grok wouldn't like it, I'd think, if his son or daughter (or himself as a retiree) were being disrespected.

Plus we have Invert here who's in the Army iirc, and Jigsaw is joining up. What about them? Should we not care to support them?

[Grok]

I find it amazing that Grok, being a retired member of the armed forces, is against anything that involves supporting our troops. I have respect for Grok simply because he served, even though I disagree with almost everything he says. I also have respect for everyone else that is or has served, because they answered the call and rose to defend our great nation. Anyone who doesn't support them, I feel, shouldn't be protected by them.

You are precisely the type of person I wrote this post for, and hope to educate you on the differences between emotional argument and policy debate.

Part 1. President George W. Bush is the person who sent the young men and women in uniform to die in Iraq.  His decision was POLICY.  It was his policy decision that put them in harm's way.  If any single person in this entire world is NOT supporting the troops, by any definition that you would use against me, then President Bush should be your #1 target of that accusation.  He has full power to "support the troops" by correcting his policy, a policy which he admits was based on wrong information, yet he does not.  Instead he keeps sending troops to die for a cause that was non-existant.

Part 2.  I fully support our troops as American citizens who have also committed a portion of their lives to protecting the United States Constitution.  However, I am wholly opposed to the POLICY implementation which is to take honorable and truly patriotic citizens and throw them into a false conflict with real danger for imagined causes.

The thing is, you cannot understand my position, but I do understand yours.  I used to be programmed in the same way, believing that "supporting my troops" is equivalent and intertwined with "agreeing to executive policy" from the White House.  After all, they are our elected leaders, surely they must be doing the right thing for our country, for our freedom, hell, for the safety of our own lives!  If I cannot publicly agree with policy, it follows that I must not support the troops.  And as you say, I do not deserve protection from them.

If you could understand my position on this, you would see that support of troops and support of policy are not just two sides of the same coin, they are just two coins in the same strong box.  They're related in that both issues are in this same box (war in Iraq), but realizing that one is a silver dollar and the other is fools gold should not be a quantum leap of recognition!

[Grok]

Plus we have Invert here who's in the Army iirc, and Jigsaw is joining up. What about them? Should we not care to support them?

Blunt question -- In your mind, is disagreeing with policy the same as not supporting our troops?

[CrAz3D]

I find it amazing that Grok, being a retired member of the armed forces, is against anything that involves supporting our troops. I have respect for Grok simply because he served, even though I disagree with almost everything he says. I also have respect for everyone else that is or has served, because they answered the call and rose to defend our great nation. Anyone who doesn't support them, I feel, shouldn't be protected by them.

You are precisely the type of person I wrote this post for, and hope to educate you on the differences between emotional argument and policy debate.

Part 1. President George W. Bush is the person who sent the young men and women in uniform to die in Iraq.  His decision was POLICY.  It was his policy decision that put them in harm's way.  If any single person in this entire world is NOT supporting the troops, by any definition that you would use against me, then President Bush should be your #1 target of that accusation.  He has full power to "support the troops" by correcting his policy, a policy which he admits was based on wrong information, yet he does not.  Instead he keeps sending troops to die for a cause that was non-existant.

Part 2.  I fully support our troops as American citizens who have also committed a portion of their lives to protecting the United States Constitution.  However, I am wholly opposed to the POLICY implementation which is to take honorable and truly patriotic citizens and throw them into a false conflict with real danger for imagined causes.

The thing is, you cannot understand my position, but I do understand yours.  I used to be programmed in the same way, believing that "supporting my troops" is equivalent and intertwined with "agreeing to executive policy" from the White House.  After all, they are our elected leaders, surely they must be doing the right thing for our country, for our freedom, hell, for the safety of our own lives!  If I cannot publicly agree with policy, it follows that I must not support the troops.  And as you say, I do not deserve protection from them.

If you could understand my position on this, you would see that support of troops and support of policy are not just two sides of the same coin, they are just two coins in the same strong box.  They're related in that both issues are in this same box (war in Iraq), but realizing that one is a silver dollar and the other is fools gold should not be a quantum leap of recognition!

You are relying on emotional agument too.

Part1:
-He didn't send them there to die, he could've just drowned them in the Atlantic if that's all he wanted done.  He sent them there to accomplish an objective.
-"Supporting the troops" means just that, nothing hidden behind.  It isn't some weird agenda saying liberals are queer & George Bush is God, it just means that our country loves our troops & would like to see them come home & do good.
-Time & time again it has been explained why we can't pull out, don't be that blind that you can't see why we have to stay there longer

Part2:
I'm super confused now.  Do you support our troops & not policy, do you not support anything, do you need some change?...

[Forged]

He sent them there to accomplish an objective.

An objective that upon further review was based on false intelligence, so once that is realized it is time to send the troops home.

it just means that our country loves our troops & would like to see them come home & do good.

I don't want to see anything bad happening to the soliders that protect my life by risking their own.  However, at this point it seems like these honorable men are dying in vain.  The reason they are in a forgein country risking their lives day after day has been proven to be unfounded, so I support them in the sense that they should be home getting ready for christmas dinner with their family.

Time & time again it has been explained why we can't pull out, don't be that blind that you can't see why we have to stay there longer

Mind sharing that reason with me.  I have heard a few reasons and they all suck.

[Arta]

Please could one of the right-wing posters substantively define what it means to "support our troops"?