fluff

fluff

think I figured out the pink/red fluff vs fluff mystery :-)

he he...sounds like Drug Wars. I used play that stupid game for hours!

Here's some light reading for you AoS - I've tried to find relatively unbiased resources to avoid getting skewed information for political reasons...

Study of perception of dangerousness and risks of driving while under the influence of marijuana:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17874895


I think this is a pretty fair article demonstrating that marijuana DOES affect one's ability to drive, but not to the extent of alcohol. But just like alcohol, if you're really high you're not going to be able to drive well:

http://www.nuffy.net/...-driving-performance.html


I think the error in Klown's point though, is that just as drunk driving is enforced as much as possible, if marijuana is legalized driving while intoxicated will also likely be reconsidered and reformed to match the new laws so that prosecution is possible. No, they won't catch every intoxicated driver, but I doubt the effects would be drastically increased over the current scenario after legalization given the prevalence of pot in the US. I also don't think this invalidates legalizing marijuana in the first place, as it's worked just fine with alcohol for quite a while now. It's a valid concern, but I think there are much larger obstacles to effectively legalizing marijuana.

You think there's not thousands of people in Iraq right now that wouldn't have loved to take a pot shot at a gunship w/ an RPG if given the chance hellz? If I'm in a helicopter flying over Baghdad on a security patrol and I see someone carrying what looks like a RPG to me, you better believe I'm gonna shoot them before they get the chance to shoot me once I get clearance....cuz anyone in Iraq wearing civilian clothes and carrying a RPG is more than likely someone who wants to kill me. How are the pilots from the video supposed to help the fact that from that distance a camera and some filming equipment look way too similar to weapons to risk their own lives? How could the pilots help that the intelligence ladder that is supposed to report friendlies in the area to aircraft in the air broke down and didn't inform them that those were potential friendlies?

In retrospect it may have been an over-reaction to the facts presented, but given the situation they were in, I can't say I would have done anything differently...and I most definitely do not have a hard-on for killing foreigners. Hindsight is 20/20, but try imagining yourself in their shoes without all the retrospect though....can you honestly say you wouldn't take the actions available to you to protect your own life if you saw a person that appeared to be preparing an offensive against you?

It's not like the guys woke up that morning and said to themselves, "Hey, let's go kill us some totally innocent towelies today!", it was a simple error in judgment by some people who wanted to make sure they got home to see their families instead of being blown out of the sky for giving someone the benefit of the doubt when they shouldn't....

Of course they were happy about the kills - they thought they just killed enemy combatants. How much you wanna bet their reactions changed more than slightly when they found out they killed innocent civilians? I'm not saying that's how I'd behave in the situation, but I can totally understand why they reacted the way they did...and I wouldn't fault them for it unless their macabre attitudes didn't change once they found out the mistake they had made.

I also didn't ask if you knew what an AK-47 and RPG ARE, I'm pretty sure that just about anyone w/ Google can figure out that much in about 10 seconds. What I asked was if you thought you could identify one accurately on a video screen from a couple of miles away...I know I sure as hell couldn't tell in the shot from above what was strapped over that guy's shoulder - nor could I tell that there were children in that van, even when they digitally zoomed in on the van in the post edit.

Sorry man, the military is human just like the rest of us....mistakes are going to get made. And when mistakes get made with live ammo/explosives, people die that shouldn't. That doesn't mean that the whole military is evil by any means....I'm sorry that doesn't fit into some idealistic model of how war can only involve the death of bad guys and heroes dying with honor to protect their countrymen, but that's how the real world works.

ha ha ha....fluffes....nice

I dunno Donny....most of the ones that have come out so far have been pretty fugly. Maybe the hot fluffes just have more discretion :-)

Yes, Tiger is my hero too...

Is it one of them Olympic bears? Can't remember what they're called or what games they're from....

Actually, 801 of them = multies....seeing as this is the multi server and all.

I should also say I agree wholeheartedly that the US is by no means innocent in this conflict, or in the way things are done in general. I think the US has done some terrible things in the past, including actions taken in Iraq and Afghanistan, and including the way goals were accomplished in Iraq or what some of the underlying goals were. That's not to say that I think the initial plan wasn't also based on good reasons for doing what was done....just that the ends don't justify the means, and that some of the alterior motives were less than honorable. I just don't happen to agree in this situation that this is one of those cases.

Dear Pang,

Please make a NSFW version of EE so I can haz my pr0nz and my Earth at the same time!

Thanks,

NOW3p

TAN - How can you ignore 4 decades of previous history between two countries that are currently at war and say they're not relevant? That's like saying that the US colonists were wrong for separating themselves from the British because the Brits hadn't done anything wrong to them THAT day.....

But yeah.....wrapping up the whole genocide, human rights abuse/violations stuff, development of illegal weapons and all that was really just a bonus when Bush woke up one morning and said "Golly, who should we invade today?". I mean, are you honestly that ignorant, or just trying way too hard to prove a point? War is never caused by just 1 party....ever.


AoS - if they were gathering bodies of people who were previously assumed to be carrying weapons, wouldn't they then in fact have also been assumed to be gathering weapons then? I mean, the weapons that the dead bodies were supposed to be carrying didn't just up and walk away once the firing started, did they? I see that as an awful huge stretch to place blame on someone....especially when this is a commonly known set of events to the US military where insurgents DO come out and gather up weapons before ground troops arrive so they can be used to fight another day.

If they were honestly as "trigger happy" as you guys like to say, why would they have bothered to wait for ROE approval and just claim that they were fired on instead?



Hellz X, I'm gonna assume you've never been in a situation where someone wanted to/was trying to kill you, and your post is based on a lack of understanding about not only how it is to be in that situation, and another lack of understanding about how soldiers are instructed to identify/classify targets. I'm also gonna go ahead and assume that you have not the foggiest idea what a RPG or AK-47 looks like on a video screen from several miles away, or what it would look like in a collapsed state. So the soldiers didn't wait for the folks they thought were insurgents to fire first....would you prefer that the pilots/gunners had waited until an RPG WAS fired and one of those helicopters was shot down???? I'm not sayin it's not horribly sad that these people died...but had the situation been a little different (as it all too commonly is in Iraq/Afghanistan), we could just as easily sitting here talking about how sad it is that 2 helicopters and their full compliment of crew was shot down because they were unable to engage hostile, armed combatants.

Saying "they had to know it wasn't a weapon" is just downright foolish....these guys were looking at a black and white image from what looks to be at least a couple of miles away....as I said before, if you can stand there and tell me you can distinguish children, weapons, cameras, etc....I'm gonna stand right here and tell you you're full of fluff...there's just no way those guys could have known if that was a camera or an RPG - it was a large black metal object strapped to an Iraqi's back in a group of people who looked like they were carrying weapons. Even in the blown up images that the editors of the video used to make it look like you could see these things, it was STILL grainy and indistinguishable.


To be fair, I'm not defending the soldiers - they made a grievous mistake, and one that I hope the whole US military learns from, and makes changes because of, as I think things like this could be avoided in the future. But I'm also not reactionary enough to say it was anything more than a mistake....a mistake that plenty of other people would have made had they been in those same shoes. You guys standing here bashing them for it is nothing more than high and mighty BS based on absolutely no understanding of the situation they were placed in, and what their training dictates they do with it.

I'll at least give AoS credit though, it's nice to find one person around here who's capable of having an intelligent conversation/debate without insulting anyone.

I'm not understanding how the pilot lied? He requested permission to fire on what he thought was an armed enemy combatant...how is that illegal/lying?

TAN - I think if you solely look at when the US occupied Iraq, you're missing several decades of history that led up to the current state of affairs, and using short sited history to prove your point. Saying it's X's fault or Y's fault at this point is just downright foolish, to be completely honest.

I don't necessarily think pot itself is bad...but people who think their mental capacities aren't impaired, or at least try to claim so, are either turning their heads to cold hard facts, or just living in a fantasy world....and even worse, skewing an otherwise valid argument with their own personal opinions.

I'm all for RESPONSIBLE use. If you wanna sit in your own house or a buddy's house and get ripped, go for it. If the gov't wants to legalize pot, and you wanna go sit in a coffee shop and get baked, knock yourself out. So long as you're not endangering public welfare w/ your private habits, Idgaf what you do to be blatantly honest.

But that also means you don't rip a bongload of nuggets then hop in your car and try to drive because your reaction times are impaired by up to %200 (in multiple independent documented studies). Pot also impairs your spatial awareness, concentration, and depth perception...all of which hinders your ability to operate a motor vehicle safely. AoS, if you can honestly operate a vehicle as well when you're stoned (which quite frankly, I highly doubt), then more power to you....just understand that just about ALL current research points to you being in an extremely small minority of people.

Obviously there are hurdles to either side - but personally I don't see those hurdles as reasons not to do something one way or the other....I think it's become fairly obvious to most folks that the system we're currently using just isn't working anymore.

That's a little trickier topic. In general I agree with you, though. I think that a certain amount of foreign aid in today's global economy is necessary and benefits the US, but the Middle East is definitely disproportionately funded, even given that there's a war going on there. Anything to keep the Commies on their side of the world, I guess.... :-/

forget BK....SLIDERS! :-D

Nothing turns to paradise overnight, that's a given. But the efforts ARE working, even if slowly. Until you've been involved in the process, it's very hard to comprehend just how time consuming/complex it really is to do some of this stuff. Heck, it's been nearly 20 years since the US first set foot in Bosnia, and they're STILL in the process of rebuilding things and routing out war criminals there and in the rest of the region. When I left, there was still at least another decade worth of work to do before Bosnia could even apply for EU membership due to all their internal problems.

The trick to making things "better" in Iraq isn't getting rid of the Taliban/Al Qaeda/Etc, you are right in your observation that that is impossible right now, it's convincing the Iraqi's that they're better off without them around and that they're able to do things on their own. When that happens, the Taliban/Al Qaeda/Etc won't have anywhere left to hide.

Mind? He looks forward to that!

I know when this happened several years ago in Bosnia, EUFOR used it as a catalyst to revamp their policies for engagement of potential hostiles. I would hope the same happens from situations like this in Iraq.

Just like with the US about Iraq (and sadly, most of the rest of the world too), there are enough misconceptions and people willing to believe whatever they're told about the other side, they don't really need things like this to fuel recruiting...although that's not to say it won't be used (completely out of context, of course) for those purposes.

The loss of innocent lives is terrible, but it is the price of war. War is messy, bloody, and unbiased - if you really want to blame someone, blame the insurgents that hide amongst civilians, show an utter disregard for human life (either the soldiers, or their own country men) and take pot shots at soldiers that are trying their best not to kill anyone who's not a combatant, forcing the military to engage them while they're surrounded by innocents. THAT is what led to this situation, NOT blood thirsty pilots or a big evil military.

I agree that we have to take precautions to avoid unnecessary loss of life wherever possible. However, as I said before, had that been a weapon, and had they waited to fire, it would have been 4 dead Americans. Since they had no way of knowing for sure until it was too late, they referred to their training - which in all honesty, just can't predict a situation like this. It is emotionless, standardized procedure made to ensure that everyone is following the same set of rules....because at the end of the day it's those policies that generally SAVE innocent lives in these situations. In this case, the victims were just extremely unfortunate to have presented a very suspicious profile that fit the standards for a hostile target.

I also feel bad for their families, but my hope is that some day they come to understand that as tragic as this was, it's just one of those situations where you can't directly blame anyone. Quite frankly, I feel just as bad for the pilots who will have to live with their mistake on their consciouses for the rest of their lives - for me, that would be a terrible prospect.

http://www.youtube.com/...ZJyHE&feature=related

Treat it like alcohol/tobacco, and tax it. Just like beer, if people wanna smoke pot and what not let 'em....just so long as they don't hop in a car and think they can drive through rush hour. I'm for enforcing responsible use.

bears are heartless killing machines

is that heartless killing machine on roller skates/blades or sumthin? looks like he's skating...

fluff is pink on my screen

F5, Enter, repeat

way better

After more than half a decade living in post-war/post-conflict countries working to rebuild collapsed governments, I think blaming the people involved in this situation is rather petty and pointless, not to mention short sighted.

Collateral damage is a part of war, no matter how unfortunate, painful, tragic, or uncomfortable it is. This was obviously a horrible scenario, but it's also very clear that the pilots did not act on civilians with malicious intent; they acted on civilians presenting suspicious activity (obviously from a good distance away given the image quality) that represented a repeatedly presidented threat to their lives and the lives of others in the area.

They very clearly state in the audio they saw what appeared to be several weapons on individuals that shouldn't have been carrying them, and acted according to their training and orders - even if they were mistaken in what they saw. The ground controllers that gave authorization to fire could only trust the pilot's judgment in that situation, and also acted according to their training for the situation at hand. When the van arrived, it presented an additional threat to what was perceived to be a terminated threat -I don't believe anyone can honestly for one second tell me that you could actually tell from the video the gunner was looking at that there were children in the front seat of that van...even when they zoomed in on it and pointed them out with arrows, it still wasn't a clear image.

I don't take much offense to the disregard for the deaths they inflicted either, as at the time, they thought they had just killed people who were trying to kill them or their fellow soldiers. Had they KNOWN that they had just killed innocent civilians, children, and foreign journalists, I'm pretty sure you would have seen an entirely different attitude from all involved.



So far as the military covering it up - understandable, even if not ok. Firstly, I don't think it was so much a cover-up as it was the military making sure they got their official messages right. Instead of saying one thing right away and having to come back and say something different later, thereby opening themselves up to even more criticism (standard operating procedure for government programs/offices), they chose to withhold official announcements until they had all the facts. Secondly, this is a PR and diplomatic nightmare for them, as people will tend to do exactly what we're doing now by blowing it way the hell out of proportion because it makes us uncomfortable to think that our country did something like this. Not to mention the fallout to diplomatic relations in Iraq which are just now starting to progress at a decent speed - the loss of which would = further bloodshed and violence which would make 30 bodies pale in comparison.

I think this was a horrible tragedy, but at the end of the day it was a simple mistake made by people who are placed in extremely stressful situations where their lives depend on being able to act before their enemy. As bad as this was, it could have just as easily been the other way around and it actually WAS an RPG strapped over that guy's shoulder - then we'd be mourning the death of 2 pilots and 2 gunners instead of 12-15 (not 30 as you originally said) civilians who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Fornication such as this.....oh, excuse me.....for an occasion such as this, I propose we christen by pissin!

shouldn't that read "imaginary numbers is accepting NUDE members"?

Woohoo! First quote in a siggy on the new boards! :-D

Woohoo! I have my own personal peanut gallery!

Morty - send me a msg in FFA. I'm bored with letting netting sets get ruined by lame/terrible suiciders, it's time to cause some ruckus.

fluff fluff ass fluff cum bubble Barbara Streisand

missed one!

peeerrrrrdddddyyyyy!

Yeah! I'm the first best loser!

names from the past....fun

damnitt.....I had just gotten used to old style boards again.

This is nice though....