Are Anti-War Activists Terrorists?

Bartholomew

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It happened after the patriot act existed as legislation. Before the patriot act, there were no pretenses to investigate our group.

Why was she flying with incense?

The same reason people fly with shaving cream and toothpaste? They intend to use them after the flight.
 

Duncan J Macdonald

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In what way? Because they were out protecting those too, last time I checked.


From the ACLU site:
[bolding mine]
The ACLU established the Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief in 2005. The Program is designed to help safeguard American constitutional principles by ensuring that governmental laws and practices neither promote religion nor interfere with its free exercise.
What I emphazised is clearly a violation of the Establishment clause.

The ACLU is trying to foist their own interpretation on the nation as a whole through legal strong-arm tactics.
 

Duncan J Macdonald

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Anti war activists are patriots, btw.
That doesn't follow. If we invert your statement, then "patriots are anti-war activists", which is patently false.

So, saying "Anti war activists can be patriots", or "Some anti-war activists are patriots" would be better.
 

kuwisdelu

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Not patriots if they advocate victory for the other side, spit on our troops, and interfere with military bases and rail movements and such.

That's as small a minority as pro-life activists who blow up abortion clinics and murder doctors. Probably smaller. All the anti-war activists I know are of the idea "support the troops, not the war."
 

She_wulf

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Not patriots if they advocate victory for the other side, spit on our troops, and interfere with military bases and rail movements and such.
If a person who conducted guerrilla warfare, actively engaged troops and spoke out against the regime not a patriot, what was Patrick Henry or Benjamin Martin (aka Swamp Fox)?

Oh, your definition is that they can't interfere with Amerika, right?

But that's what Jefferson advocated. Was he a terrorist?

Amy
 

donroc

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Amerika. We have touched a nerve, haven't we. You can change my definition after your side overthrows our government.

I doubt if Jefferson would have or condoned active interference with military operations in time of war. He never served or even fired a weapon at anyone as far as I know. And the actions of those you mentioned plus all the rest of our founding fathers and moms are beyond comparison with those whom I described.

Again, Speaking out is is fine. Marching with placards is fine.

Disrespecting those who serve and, I repeat, interfering with troop movements and hoping our country loses are not acts of patriotism.
 

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LimeyDawg

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That doesn't follow. If we invert your statement, then "patriots are anti-war activists", which is patently false.

So, saying "Anti war activists can be patriots", or "Some anti-war activists are patriots" would be better.
Meh, I'm calling this one crap. First off, don't invert anything I post to make your position stronger. It proves nothing, and is so weak an argument as to render the point moot from the beginning. Secondly, your contention that the inversion is "patently false" has no basis in fact. I'm stunned. Let's review.

Patriotism has nothing to do with the support of war. Patriotism has to do with support of the country, a belief in the doctrines of the nation. "I'm proud to be an American" is a patriotic statement. So is "The US should not be at war in Iraq." Anti war activists appear to understand a forgotten point: that freedom of speech means the freedom to question the actions of government. They understand it on a level miles above the average, because they, like other patriots before them, have called government to task for it's illegal actions despite the fact that such speech often bring them derision or violence. Patriotism is not synonymous with popularity. Patriotism is synonymous with courage to believe in the Constitution, even if such belief means sticking your neck out to the axe of popular opinion. Kowtowing to the rhetoric of the regime is not patriotism. It is the basis for the tyranny of majority rule. Ben Franklin understood this.
 

LimeyDawg

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Not patriots if they advocate victory for the other side, spit on our troops, and interfere with military bases and rail movements and such.
I agree wholeheartedly. But these aren't the ones I'm referring to. I'm speaking of those with the courage to call the baby ugly, and use the system to regulate the system (free speech, courts, the press, etcetera).
 

donroc

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I agree wholeheartedly. But these aren't the ones I'm referring to. I'm speaking of those with the courage to call the baby ugly, and use the system to regulate the system (free speech, courts, the press, etcetera).

And those are not the ones I was referring to. Kumbayah. ;)
 

LimeyDawg

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Amerika. We have touched a nerve, haven't we. You can change my definition after your side overthrows our government.

I doubt if Jefferson would have or condoned active interference with military operations in time of war. He never served or even fired a weapon at anyone as far as I know. And the actions of those you mentioned plus all the rest of our founding fathers and moms are beyond comparison with those whom I described.

Again, Speaking out is is fine. Marching with placards is fine.

Disrespecting those who serve and, I repeat, interfering with troop movements and hoping our country loses are not acts of patriotism.
Jefferson said, in "Notes on the State of Virginia, Query XXII":
"It should be our endeavour to cultivate the peace and friendship of evey nation, even of that which has injured us most, when we shall have carried our point against her. ...Never was so much false arithmetic employed on any subject, as that which as been employed to persuade nations that it is their interst to go to war. Were the money which it has cost to gain, at the close of a long war, a little town, or a little territory, the right to cut wood here, or to catch fish there, expended in improvsing what they already possess, in making roads, opening rivers, buiilding ports, improving the arts, and finding employment for their idle poor, it would render them much stonger, much healthier and happier. This I hope will be our wisdom."

If there is anything to add on the matter of war, feel free.
 

sassandgroove

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Meh, I'm calling this one crap. First off, don't invert anything I post to make your position stronger. It proves nothing, and is so weak an argument as to render the point moot from the beginning. Secondly, your contention that the inversion is "patently false" has no basis in fact. I'm stunned. Let's review.
Actually- inverting a statement can work if you agree on the definition. It is an examination of language and can reveal fallacies. So don't get all in a huff when someone does it to you. However, I think your following paragraph defends your position pretty well.
 

LimeyDawg

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Ah, I'm not in a huff, quite the contrary. Stimulating discourse makes me smile, but I accept your point.
 

LimeyDawg

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To whit, I offer the following from Jefferson's inaugural address:

"And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions...But every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists. If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it."
 

Duncan J Macdonald

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LimeyDawg said:
Anti war activists are patriots, btw.


That doesn't follow. If we invert your statement, then "patriots are anti-war activists", which is patently false.

So, saying "Anti war activists can be patriots", or "Some anti-war activists are patriots" would be better.

Meh, I'm calling this one crap. First off, don't invert anything I post to make your position stronger. It proves nothing,...

It proves that you made a statement of the form A = B. Logically, B must then = A. Inverting the statement is a simple test. So simple, in fact, that there is no need for a formal proof. To quote the Masters:
Monty Python said:
All of Elmer Cogen is dead. However, not all of the class of dead people is Elmer Cogen.

...and is so weak an argument as to render the point moot from the beginning. Secondly, your contention that the inversion is "patently false" has no basis in fact.
A=/B Therefore, the contention that A=B is patently false.

I'm stunned. Let's review.

I'm stunned too. Especially when you respond to donroc thusly:

<snip irrelevant bits>
donroc said:
Not patriots if they advocate victory for the other side, spit on our troops, and interfere with military bases and rail movements and such.

I agree wholeheartedly. But these aren't the ones I'm referring to.

The ones you're not refering to (which was non-obvious in your original post) would be the anti-war activists that aren't patriots, right?

Your petard is over that way, next to the electric hoist.
 
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kuwisdelu

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It proves that you made a statement of the form A = B. Logically, B must then = A. Inverting the statement is a simple test. So simple, in fact, that there is no need for a formal proof. To quote the Masters:

Actually- inverting a statement can work if you agree on the definition. It is an examination of language and can reveal fallacies. So don't get all in a huff when someone does it to you. However, I think your following paragraph defends your position pretty well.

Nope, sorry. A square is a rectangle. But that doesn't mean a rectangle is a square.
 

Joe270

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Now you're being obtuse, Kuwi. Oh, sorry, that's triangles, not squares. Nevermind.
 

LimeyDawg

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Well, Dunc has a point. I should have said some or most. Since I didn't adequately define my contention, dunc wins.