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That's the way the world works. Terrorists and terrorist states are always pushing the boundaries, and seeing how much they can get away with. A good solid reputation goes along way towards preventing wars. If we act as the superpower with the glass jaw, then are enemies next time will be more likely to attack us, it is common sense, it may not be just in your eyes, but it is the plain unvarnished truth. I know you must think the World must always offer some nice neat solutions for everything where everybody wins, and no one gets hurt, but that is not the way the World is.

It is not so uncertain, history has taught us that if you appease the enemy, he will try to take advantage of you and get more. Hitler didn't attack because he was mad at somebody, but because he saw an opportunity to conquer the world.

That's the way the World works, in order to safeguard Democracy and Freedom, somebody must make the ultimate sacrifice, if people are unwilling to fight for freedom, they soon have it taken away from them, history has taught that, I'm sorry you find it to be such an unpleasant lesson, but that's the truth. When we tried to avoid War in the late 1930s, Hitler just got bigger and more powerful, and would have continued to get bigger and more powerful until someone challenged him. France waited too long, let Hitler get away with too much and when its back was up against the Atlantic and it had no choice but to challenge him it was too late. There is an old Roman saying, "If you want peace, prepare for war."

And you want to turn a stalemate into a defeat? this calls for better strategy, not defeatism and throwing in the towel! the Democrats can't strain their brain to come up with a better strategy, they take the easy and lazy path of quiting and pulling out troops, making the US look weak and inviting more enemies to attack us in the future. If Iran annexes portions of Iraq and makes itself larger, they will see the reward of taking on the United States and wearing us down, the Democrats have shown them that, and they will attack again.

It seems certain the George Bush overestimated the Iraqis' ability to pull themselves together, it is really a complement when you consider what George Bush thought the Iraqis were capable of. Instead I suppose you think we should have gone in their expecting Iraqis to be our inferiors and treating them no better than slaves, ruling them with an Iron Fist just like Saddam did. So who's right were the Iraqis capable of democracy, or are they no better than to be made slaves of as Saddam Hussein has done? Careful, wouldn't want anybody accusing someone of cultural prejudice would we.

It may be true that George Bush was too patient, maybe he kept on his subordinates who tried the same old strategy for too long, maybe he should have been a tougher boss and did more hiring and firing. Maybe he sould have made those Generals "pay through the nose" for not achieving the results he expected. Perhaps those generals should have listened to those human rights advocates less, and the insurgents would have found less places to hide, is that what your advocating? You see the Insurgents have lasted so long because our soldiers have been vwery careful not to harm civilians while trying to pursue the terrorists, and in return for listening to liberal suggestions on how to fight and not fight the terrorists, they have gotten nothing but grief from them

This style of warfare requires patience, something you don't have, when you obey rules of engagement designed to minimize collateral damage you end up with long protracted conflicts. What you were asking for is impossible, a quick war with minimum civilian casualities. You either have a quick war with massive wholesale destruction, ruined cities, and millions of civilian casualities, or you have a long protracted quagmire with soldiers patrolling streets, becareful to identify the enemy before shooting and getting shot for all their trouble. The way you present the problem has only one possible outcome, defeat for the United States. Defeat is not a good strategy to ensure our security, yet you do not have the patience for fighting the long protracted struggle your style of warfare calls for.

Your right, George Bush listend to you liberals too much and you betrayed him like the fine Brutus you are. George Bush tried to hard to allow the Iraqis to set up their own government and write their own constitution, is that the problem? Should he instead simply conquered the place and place a general in charge of the occupation government for the next 10 years? If you want a quick war, you should stop complaining about human rights abuses; if you insist on fairness and justice, you are going to get a long protracted war, that is the trade off when dealing with an insurgency. None of you Democrats have any better ideas, you just want to quit, easy for you to lose isn't it? FDR would never have understood the modern Democrat, he believed in winning, not just his elections, but in winning for America as well. Modern Democrats want to win by losing at America's expense, they make America a little less secure each time and they get the short term reward of saying, "see we got us out of the war, peace in our time," and our enemies lick their chops and slobber over the spoils and see opportunities for further gains in the future.

The Democrats aren't calling for more troops now are they, always when they get into power it is just too late to add more troops now, isn't it. Now they are in power their grand strategy for success is to quit, cheap easy, and it doesn't wrack their brain too hard, they get elected to sound the call for retreat, that is all they do, very easy isn't it? The Democrats gain because they gain power by doing this, and the enemy gains by getting what they want, the free world gets smaller by this, but the Democrats don't care as they rush to negotiate surrender with Iran and Syria.

What do you call a society that elects terrorists into office through a perfectly legitimate election by the majority of the voters? You still have to deal with that government don't you, and in order to deal with that government, you must make certain blanket statements about that government, you must say that it is this and it isn't that. You know something about the overall tendencies of the electorate that elected that government also, it is not a blanket statement to say that everyone in that society supports terrorism when only a majority is required to elect that government. I talk about cultural tendencies meaning that the majority of its people believe in such. If the majority elects evil leaders, then that majority is evil, there is no reason for good people to elect terrorists that murder innocent people, the only excuse is that they are ignorant and did not know Hamas was a terrorist organization, and how likely was that considering their long history of carrying out terrorist acts?

Come off of it, you show your ignorance in many different ways too, you don't seem to know that military age begins at around 18 and ends somewhere around 40, there are more people over 40 than under 18.

There are asteroids on the Moon already. Every crater you see has the asteroid that made it underneath its surface.

I think the easiest thing to build would be a Moon base, as it is close to Earth and there is a continous launch window open to the Moon at all times. the Moon lacks certain elements to be sure, but an initial Moon base or Mars base would not be that self-sufficient anyway. Food can be grown on the Moon, especially at the Lunar Pole where all you need is mirrors to reflect sunlight down into a domed pressurized greenhouse containing plants. Fertilizer would come from human waste, water would be recycled, and food would not have to be constantly shipped from Earth to feed the Astronauts. The atoms would continuously be recycled between the plants and the astronauts. The is really not that much difference between a free floating space colony and a lunar settlement. On the Moon space begins at the surface, and the same old vaccum and the same harsh sunlight shine down on a Moon base as it does on a space station. At the Lunar Poles, you can arrange for any day/night cycle that you like, you just need mirrors to reflect sunlight into the colony for when you want day. A polar Moon base would have a continous view of the Earth and of half the sky at all times, it would be a good site for an astronomical observatory, though you'd never see what's below the Lunar horizon as all the night sky does is rotate above you on a monthly basis.

Probably initially lunar material would be sent to Earth via rocket. What GCNRevenger says does make sense if you need to obtain hydrogen from Earth. probably initially that would be how its done. A rocket could use Earth's gravity to bend its course back to the Moon if done right. The payload could have a seperate smaller rocket to guide the payload into the Earth's atmosphere. I think antartica is a rather big target for any decent guidence system to hit, alot of other meteors were found there. The platinum dropped on Earth is likely to be alot heavier than any hydrogen lifted up. Perhaps the payload would need ablative shielding so it can survive reentry intact. Platinum is very heavy, I'm not sure its worth the areodynamic structures to ensure a soft landing for such a heavy hunk of metal, what is important is that the metal arrives in one piece so that its easy to recover. I think an Antartic glacier would make a great target zone. The meteor would excavate a crater in the ice and vaporize alot of ice into water vapor as it hit. Since it is only a hunk of metal, there is no need to treat it as you would human passengers, all that's important is getting it down to Earth as cheaply as possible.

Hydrogen would have to be brought to the Moon if it is not already there. Initially it would be brought from Earth, later on it could be brought from Mars. The cost of bringing hydrogen to the Moon from Mars may be less than bringing it from Earth.

A Mars colony would be more expensive, the ability to live off the land parly compensates for its greater distance from Earth.

Eventually as the volume justifies the initial investment, it will make sense to build a mass-drive on Mars and to build space colonies, and a lunar colony is not much different from a space colony in any case, the same requirements need to be met. With a space colony however, you can provide Earth normal gravity, and there is enough material in space to provide for a living area of about a thousand times that of Earth if not more. The asteroids are an obvious source for materials to construct O'Neill type colonies, but the Moon is alot closer and access to it is continuous, as opposed to each asteroid where their is a launch window for access to each. The Moon is kind of like the 8th continent, it has the surface area of Africa, and it will eventually be possible to schedule trips to the Moon like one does for the Airlines. You launch to Orbit and when your properly aligned with the Moon you make a translunar injection. People will be coming and going to the Moon at all times, where as at Mars their are times when the journey is optimal and their are other times when it is nearly impossible. A Mars Spaceport will be very busy at certain times with incoming and outgoing spaceships and at other times it will be quite and nearly deserted.

The most obvious place to build space colonies is in Earth orbit, as that provides for continuous access to Earth and near real time communication which maximizes the opportunity for trade and commerce. The Moon with thusly figure prominently in the supply of construction materials that can be easily had from the Moon, and thus mass-drivers will be constructed. For other elements, other extraterrestrial sources will be considered such as the asteroids and Mars. Hauling stuff off the Earth is expensive due to the gravity.

I'm just telling you what I see from talking to various people in the New York Area, they voted for John Hall over Sue Kelly, because John Hall new how to say retreat, and Quit, and give up. These Democrats have no solutions, all they no how to do is quit and quiting is easy. Democrats were willing to quit during the Civil War too. Democrats were running against Lincoln telling the country that we should just give up and recognize Confederate Independence, if they had their way, we might have quit in 1864, one year before victory over the South. Sherman took Atlanta that year and that turned the tide, but it was a near thing.

And you want us to simply quit a war we are already involved in, give up and make ourselves look weak in the eyes of our enemies. Quiting is a very easy thing for a Democrat to do, there is no shame in it at all in their eyes, they quit Vietnam and they want to quit Iraq too, quitting has become habitual for them. Why do we have an armed forces anyway if the Democrats don't allow them to win?

And the Democrats will make a half-hearted attempt to stop them and then they'll quit just like they did in Vietnam and Iraq. Our enemies will really be quaking in their boots then won't they.

I am not of military age, so what's your point? The Democrats won't let the forces we have their win, they won't fund the War, and I'd just be joining a retreating Army in any case, how is that supposed to help?

General Eisenhower did us a disservice by coining that phrase, he has made us less able to defend ourselves in the future like we did during World War II. It was the Military-industrial complex that enabled our Victory over the Axis powers! You want to deny us that for the future, you want us to be weak like France, which actually tore up its military-industrial complex prior to World War II?

Well you don't want them to win, you seem to embrace losing, and if the enemy thinks we lose easily then they'll attack us and our soldiers again.

I have just made one. Southerners are more patriotic now than Northerners. I should know, I live in New York State, and I was born in the South. I saw the attacks on 9/11 and over the years I saw New Yorkers forgive these attackers and slowly transfer the blame onto George Bush, because they all want to be Democrats more than they want to be red-blooded Americans. Everyday when I pass that hole in the ground at the World Trade Center I am reminded of that attack and who did it. I am not about to forgive or make excuses for the enemy as many New Yorkers do! I am not willing to play the politica game to my country's detriment as they seem willing to do either!

People in small rural areas can more easily go to the city and look for a job than they can join the military and go to Iraq. The military is a respected profession down south. The military involves sacrifice, it involves spending prolonged periods of time away from your family, on the plus side, it offers training, job stability, medical benefits, things that many civilian jobs are increasingly lacking. If it weren't for the military, you probably wouldn't be talking about going to the Moon or Mars right now, it was the military that provided the impetus for developing these space vehicles which brought us to the moon. Space technology is basically derived from military technology, there is a cruise missile in the works right now that employs scramjet technology, technology that may later prove beneficial for reaching space.

The only reason you have the vote is because there is a military to defend your country and your right to vote, it is high time that you appreciate that rather than look down your nose at them.

How about Platinum? I understand Platinum also has a high melting point, a mass driver could fling a platinum slug at Earth, and it would probably survive atmospheric reentry with most of the platinum intact. Platinum is an important metal for building hydrogen fuel cells. If we could devise a cheap method of getting a large amount of platinum from the Moon to the Earth, then we'd have to devise a cheap method of mining all this platinum out and bringing it to the Mass driver. It might make sense only if there was an awful lot of platinum in one spot. Getting spaceships to haul the platinum back to Earth is bound to be expensive. Some method would need to be devised to obtain platinum more cheaply from the Moon than from the Earth's crust.

The important thing is that we are taking the first steps, we are going to the Moon and Mars, we are off to a slow start, but we are headed in that direction. After 2008, George Bush will be out of office, it will be up to someone else to continue the program or possibly accelerate it. I don't think much justification can be found for reviving the Shuttle.

I think a polar Moonbase is a good place to start.

The question is, what is going to be the primary pask of the Polar Moonbase? It is basically a space station sitting on the surface of the moon. Its not much different ibn concept from the ISS, except it has the Moon undeneath it. Outside its walls is the same vacuum that is outside the ISS.

Could one build the equivalent of a Solar Power Satellite on the Moon's surface out of lunar material? If you space out the panels so they don't shadow each other and have them in high places so they constantly track the sun, it can be just as effective as an SPS. I think it would be experimental, basically we would be seeing if its possible to process lunar material into solar cells using a compact factory, and a microwave or laser transmitter could be erected, or perhaps a mass driver could be built. From the Lunar Pole, it would be possible to send Lunar material to L4, or L5, or L1. We could experiment with these techniques and see if lunar material can be collected into orbit.

Actually the first Northern President was President John Adams, he was the second president of the United States and he was from Massasschesetts.

Where was the word "glorious" in this sentence?
Did the United States lose the War in the same manner as the Confederate States of America, when Lee Surrendered his Army to Grant?
But now that you mention it, there was some glory in abolishing slavery, and the point was the South was truly defeated, their Press stood foresquare in support of the Southern Cause of secession and slavery, and we had to defeat them by destroying their army. The Civil War was the only example where some Americans suffered defeat and actually lost a war.

We "Lost" Vietnam mainly because some of our politicians felt that forcing that War to deliberately be lost by our side was a cheap and easy way to get elected. Clearly the public wasn't happy about the War's prolongued nature, but their was two things that could be done about it, one was to find a "Ulysses S Grant" that knew the right strategy for winning it, and the other more easier thing for the Democrats is to deliberately lose the war so we could get out of it. Being a loser is a winning formula for many democrats, losing wars becomes addictive for them, and whenever there is a new War, they always look for ways that the War cannot be won. I'm just an old fashioned American I guess, I prefer my side to win. Most of the people we fight against are really bad anyway. You have terrorists on the otherside and our losing means their winning and those "pacifists" that want us to lose are actually helping out the terrorists with their propaganda.

Did the United States lose the War the Same way Hitler Lost World War II, with Hitler in a bunker of his bombed out Capital with the German Armed forces mostly destroyed?
Did the United States lose the War in the same manner as the Confederate States of America, when Lee Surrendered his Army to Grant?
If not, then the United States did not really lose this war in any military sense, our armed forces were not destroyed and the United States was not conquered! What did happen is that we were betrayed from within, by the US Media that wanted to see us lose, and who used their biased coverage of the war to undermine support of the war at home to such a degree that Democrats would be elected in both houses of Congress. The full story of the War was not gotten out, only the selected portions of it, that favored the undermining of moral and boosted and encouraged the enemy to fight on and harder. The Media, it seemed to me was always more concerned about who was in power in the corridors of Washington rather than who won the War. Since victory in Iraq meant victory for the Republicans, the Media therefore wanted to see the United States lose like in Vietnam. The Vietnam Antiwar movement has always been the Democrats preffered path to power. But America's dissatisfaction has always been that we weren't winning, not that were weren't losing. The only people who would like to see America lose are the Democrats, that is how they get into power, and losing is easier for them than winning as they have no military competance for achieving actual military victories on the battleground, and that is why the Iraq study group contains no Generals or military experts, what they were really look for was a palitable way to lose the war, something the American Public wouldn't mind and which would be a slave to their pride as they forced American forces to retreat!

Well, that's because we are a democracy with civilian leaders, not a military dictatorship!
All this Schwarzkopf "hero worship", seems so unseemly for a liberal like yourself. Find a military expert that supports your conclusions and then you go on to suggest that he should be treated like he was God, and that everyone should listen to him. Would you want General Norman Schwarzkopf running the United States of America?

Treason against Saddam Hussein, not against Iraq! The Kurds were fighting for their freedom. I don't happen to think that Saddam Hussein was Iraq as apparently you do from that statement

It was just protecting its power nothing more.

You mean become a Jew?
Nah, no thank you. My motivation is that the liberal community is treating Israel unfairly in its attempt to become evenhanded between Palestinians Terrorists and the Israelis. Whenever I accuse the Palestinians of supporting terrorism, then I get this right to have their stolen land returned. This side steps the issue as to whether murdering innocent civilians deliberately is wrong. I've seen the Palestinians all go crazy and support Hamas and their launching of rocket attacks, and kidnapping of Israeli citizens, that I wonder whether after all this behavior they actually deserve to get their land back. Maybe if they asked nicely and had a little bit of patience, rather than go on a killing spree, then people would be more inclined to support their getting some land back. The Initial Israeli borders covered only a think slice of land. Israel only got larger after it was attacked twice. At one point it occupied the Sinai pennusula after Egypt attacked, it later on gave it back, which was the majority of land Israel ever held. Egypt wouldn't take the Gaza strip though, they wanted a beachhead for the Palestinians to cause trouble and kill Jews, and they didn't want to be held responsible for attacking Israel again, so they had the proxy Palestinians do it instead and disavowed all responsibility for their actions. Much of arab military strategy has to do with evading resposibility for the actions of proxy groups that they support under the table. I'm not buying it. When I see wrong, I see wrong. If one group clearly wrongs another, I don't try to be even handed for the sake of peace. Murder is wrong, and is always wrong, and what the Palestinians have been doing is murder, they don't obey any of the rules of the battlefield, they don't try to avoid civilian casualities and only target the military, oh no, they seek out civilians to hit because they are an easy target. I'm not prepared to accept terrorism as part of the legitimate struggle and strategy of modern warfare, therefore I can't see any side which employs terrorism as right or as deserving of victory.

A rather fine supplicant that one. Howard Dean is definitely a Democrat first and an American second!