Sure. Just as infuriating as people saying "inquiry" instead of
"enquiry". But English is defined by common usage. Misspell it enough and
the new spelling becomes standard.

The number is significant because enough people "believe" in it?

Nah, way too theistic in thinking for my tastes.

And I still don't see what's so interesting. Just recently (I'm *not
making this up), just a bit before the London attack, for three or four
days, every morning I looked up at the clock in my top menu bar on my
monitor, it was 9:11.

I could make a big deal out of that. But why?

They are incomparable. I have the solution for world freedom. I have a
non-Christian based set of ideologies that need to be exported.

Oh my. A solution for world freedom. Aren't you the second coming?

What were you doing to ensure that human rights in Iraq were not lost
to a dictator, once again? Or don't you care about human rights in
Iraq? Ditto for Iran et al.

Not much that can be done. The US public fell for the neoconservative
game.

Ending institutionalized rape/holocaust/state-slavery in Iraq is not a
game. It's the best thing that has happened since the Soviet Union
collapsed.

I see. So you fell for the neocon game.

Iraq is probably going to collapse into being a "failed state" or a US
backed "strongman" will take over.

What did you do to try to determine why Iraq shouldn't turn into something
like Australia instead of a failed state?

What did *I do? You want I should wave my magic wishes at them?

I was against neocon imperial ambitions but they had three-quarters to
ninety percent of the country hooked and there's not much *I could do
about that.

I devoted my life to trying to ensure that Iraq didn't become another
failed state with accompanying human rights violations.

How's that workin' out for ya?

The current government of the US
couldn't care less about human rights.

That's complete crap. What would you like them to do about human rights
that they aren't already doing?

Oh you've really fallen for the game.

They have a geopolitical strategy
and by the time the public catches up (if they ever do), it'll be too
late to do much of anything.

There is nothing wrong with their geostrategy.

You're in Australia right? Okay, pay attention then.

Understand that I'm against the idea of my country being the nuclear armed
hegemon of Earth. But when I run into people like you that seem to be
cheering the neocons on in their reach for global dominance, I at least
can be reassured by the fact that *my country will be running the planet.

Our military budget is now equal to the combined budget of everybody else
on Earth. Our nuclear capability not only exceeds everybody else but we're
considering whole new systems (and apparently considering a strategy to
allow nukes to be used in the battlefield). Low Earth orbit will be ours
(just ask our military). And there's a really cool, ICBM style system
being talked about that will enable us to deliver weapons anywhere on the
planet in about 45 minutes.

Oh yeah, once we finish repositioning in the Middle East, we'll control
the last major oil reserves on Earth.

Welcome to the Empire!

Iran is a complete sham. The parliament is only there to fool people like
you. It has no power.

So it was a great idea to convince them we were on the verge of invading?
I'm sure that helped.

Which is too bad as Iran was moderating over time.

No it wasn't. It was working furiously to build nukes.

Or not. According to the neos, so was Iraq. Funny thing, nobody can find
these "WMDs." Weird huh?

Then again, we should have left them alone back in the '50s. If we
hadn't overthrown their government and installed the Shah, things would
probably look very different over there.

We will never know how little we could have done to win the Cold War. All
we know is we did enough.

Actually, we did far too much. The USSR was collapsing under its own
weight. The build up under Reagan was utterly pointless. We knew even then
that the USSR had begun to decline. But, like now, nobody listened to the
CIA.

Now it's time to free Iran.

No, now it's time to put Iran and Saudi Arabia under *our control. That
way, you, the EU, China, et al will have to depend on us for oil.

You should continue to kiss US *****. I mean, Australia? Like it'd make a
difference if *you objected to us running the planet...