Thrawn continuing the lie and using them under false circumstances is just as bad as doing it himself. Their compensation was the "cleaning" of their planet which was intentionally delayedm in order to keep their servitude. They were essentially slaves, no matter if they thought they were doing their duty or not. There is no excuse for that. Leia was not using them as slaves, the Noghri commited themselves to her without false pretenses. There was no deception involved. Thrawn's motivation for conquest was to bring order to the galaxy under his own rule. The Rebels and the New Republic were motivated to restore democracy to the galaxy. Big difference. The Rebel agenda was not that of an individual person to further their own goals over the well-being of their people. That keeps them from being tyrannical. Thrawn was unrestrained by law and continued the abuse of power by those that preceded him. That makes him a tyrant. I cannot find anything that redeems him in any way in my eyes. That is my view of the Empire. No amount of good ever done under Palpatine or Isard could redeem the Empire. With other leadership, the Empire was better. Pellaeon being the best of them. They still did not do enough in my eyes. I do not think the Empire became shades of grey until the Fels, which I have already mentioned. The moffs are still evil, but Fel and the Imperial Mission did enough to temper that evil and make the Empire shades of grey.



There is nothing to suggest he was any different than the other warlords, so I am treating him as such. Daala's massacre was genocide. Genocide does not only include ethnic identity, but national identity also. The national identity of the Dantooine settler was that of refugees. Daala thought it was a New Republic base, found out that it was not, then intentionally targetted the refugees for shock value. Terrorism is probably a better word for it since it was driven more by shock value than hatred for a certain group of people.



It was not a true separation of power, all of the moffs ultimately answered to him. When he did not give them instruction, they did what they wanted. Palpatine was not going to concern himself with all of the matters the moffs faced. Their fear of the Emperor kept them in line and he pretty much did whatever he wanted. He essentially had absolute power because the moffs rarely stood up to him. When they did, they usually ended up destroying each other. Once the fear was gone, so was the moff council. They gave up their "power" for authority. If Palpatine disagreed with a senate resolution, he would just overule it. Just because there was separation of power in theory, it does not mean there actually was. In the end, the Senate never really did anything Palpatine did not approve of. The shock of Plapatine dissolving the senate stemmed from the realization that the government was even going to bother feigning democracy or political freedom anymore.



Everyone knew of the atrocities. Just because he was stationed on the Chimaera does not mean that he was isolated from the rest of the galaxy. He obviously agreed with the creation of the Empire since he was not purged. Everyone knew of the orbital bombardment of Caamas. Many heard of Tarkin literally landing on protestors. The big one was Alderaan. A planet was simply destroyed along with 8 billion people. There also happened to be an Imperial superweapon capable of doing that very thing right next to it. Everyone knew the Empire did it. It is impossible to cover up the dissappearance of an entire planet. But Pellaeon just continued to deny it. After he found out it was true, he still denied it, despite overwhelming proof. He continued to serve the Empire responsible for the intentional killing of billions of innocents.



That is not my arguement. My arguement is that the horrible acts the Empire commited far outweigh any good it did. That is reason for defection. The United States has made mistakes, yes, but the United States is a good country overall. The Empire was not. Now you are really just spreading propoganda. The government did not lie about the reasons for invading, sovereignty has nothing to do with war, the Iraqi government posed a clear danger to the United States, waterboarding is not torture, unlawful combatants are not covered under the Geneva convention, the Patriot Act broke no laws (I assume that is what you mean by domestic laws), and the power of the Executive branch was not expanded. Bush was vocal about his beliefs, but the power fell to congress for legislation. The only times the executive branch gained a lot of power was during the presidencies of Lincoln and FDR, off the top of my head. The reason soldiers do not desert or defect is because they believe in what the country is doing. They believe it is the right thing to do. One of the advantages of having a volunteer military. A soldier does his duty not for the government, but for the American people. The actions of the government are always questioned and challenged by the people, just as they should be.



Definition of Absolute Monarchy: Rule by one person — a monarch, usually a king or a queen — whose actions are restricted neither by written law nor by custom; a system different from a constitutional monarchy and from a republic.

I was referring to the intention of nobilty restricting the monarch in feudalism, which more often than not did not happen. It does not matter if monarchs had opposition from nobility, as long as they were not bound by law and were seen to abuse power, they were absolute monarchs. When it comes down to it, they could do what they pleased until they were dead. There were multiple ways to keep the nobles in their pockets. Every absolute monarch has faced resitiance in some way, that does not mean they do not hold all of the power. Most of the resistance actually came in the form of the clergy, unless the monarch appointed them too. By your logic, Louis XIV was not an absolute ruler either. The nobility still existed and had power and influence, they were simply centralized in the Palace of Verailles rather than their respective territiories. I only brought up Rome because of Palpatine's similarities to Julius Caesar. A strong man that was granted emergency powers in a time of need that he eventually used to create a new Empire.



My entire argument is that the Empire is inherently evil. It can change, but not easily. They are not shades of grey until the evil and good are relatively balanced with some leeway in either direction. Until the Fels, I think the Empire was still overwhelmingly evil. Before that, every incantation of the Empire was despotism because all of the power was held either by one person or a small group of people. But what separates the soldiers that defected from those that did not? The will to do what is right. The ones that did not defect were either nieve or weak willed. Although Pellaeon did a good job as leader of the remnant, he did not do enough to redeem the Empire. Do not get me wrong, the reduction of prejudice against aliens an the outlawing of slavery was a giant step in the right direction, but I would still classify him as evil for his past inaction despite his pesonal beliefs. That is why I do not classify him as a great leader. He did not stand up for his ideals when serving other leaders of the Empire. A quote by Edmund Burke sums up Pellaeon well, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

one thing is for certain.
this thread is getting better and better with every entry!

yes that was clear Danger, but not to us.
The United States are not the Global Police, and we only stick our noses in business that isnt ours, for gain.
thats the name of the game isnt it? consume? we have been doing this since the beginning of time. you guys want to talk about politics and whats wrong and whats right, but you arent seeing the biggest picture out of all of this. This is what we do as people, regardless of race, ethnicity and religious sect. Emperors, Czars, Ceasars, Kings, presidents, governors...they have been doing this since forever.
Just because Bush Sr. was in the CIA, doesnt give him or his half retarded son the right to go in there and take over, because thats exactly what we did.
we did it with the Indians, and now we have to share countries with other countries.
did we do to bring peace to the Sunnis and Shiites? Hell no we didnt! Bush Sr. and Jr. and their cabinets didnt give a blasted about the murders. THEY CARE ABOUT THE OIL!!
why do you think they put Saddam to death so quick? war Crimes? really? how about the Genocidal freak Slobadon Milosavich? he isnt dead. and his genocides were more horrific then saddams. if someone says that saddam was put to death because of what he did, instead of what he didnt do(which was bend under our pressure), then that person is Naive and watches way too much Fox and O'reilly Factor.

Sorry, a clear danger of what? What could he do to us? Obviously Iraq was not an existential threat to the United States the way, for example, Nazi Germany was an existential threat to France and the USSR. Also obviously Iraq was not an existential threat to our allies in the region, given what happened in the first Gulf War. "Embolden[ing] our enemies around the world?" What does that mean? Who are these enemies, and how were they emboldened? Most of the countries that have unfriendly relations with the US also despise Iraq or are at best indifferent (Iran, al Qaida, North Korea). In what manner was Iraq dangerous to us? They did not have and were not developing chemical/biological/nuclear weaponry. They did not serve as a state sponsor of al Qaida or any other international terrorist group. I am not seeing where the danger was supposedly coming from here.

By Osama Bin Laden's own words, we were seen as a paper tiger during Clinton's administration for what we didn't do. We didn't help the Somalis, we didn't stop Milosevic, we didn't do much of anything to defend ourselves or enforce our word. Clinton wouldn't even send in support for our Marines when it hit the fan in Mogadishu. Do you know what happened after Bin Laden saw this? World Trade Center bombing #1, USS Cole attack, barracks bombings, etc. And our response? Kill Bin Laden when given the chance? Pass. Hit back for bombings? No thanks. President Clinton sure showed that asprin factory whose boss though.

Bin Laden saw a paper tiger and that is exactly what we were during the Clinton Administration. Too many of us were busy excusing away his infidelity and criminal lying about it because hey, times were good. Jobs were a plenty and the economy was roaring. The smartest thing Clinton did regarding the economy was largely leave it alone then assume all the credit. That, however, is an entirely different discussion.

Liberty has been disappearing for the last 8 years. The Patriot Act was akin to the Alien and Sedition Acts from the early 20th and 19th centuries. They restricted American freedoms and liberties for greater perceived securities. Greater liberty will only come from economic prosperity I'm afraid.


Clinton's troubles with showing more military flex around the world came from opposition in congress and not having American support to send troops overseas.

The Sunnis and Shiites have been disagreeing in Iraq for centuries, but not killing each other en masse. There has been more secretarian violence in the last 5 years, than the previous hundred. Caused by the rapid destabilization of their government and the total destruction of their infrastructure and the presence of an occupying force. The reason the U.S. handed the government over to its own people, besides being the right thing to do, was that there was no way the U.S. could maintain any government facility of Iraq. The military is stretched too thin and the resources just didn't exist for the U.S. to maintain any government control over Iraq.


As to our reason for entering Iraq for oil, I find that unlikely. Mostly because we don't have any oil to show for it. No, the reason we went in is because there was a vendetta to settle, and I don't think the blood lust from 9/11 was quenched from just Afghanistan. Though our extreme concern for Saddam setting the oil fields on fire again when initially going in raises an eyebrow if we didn't want that oil.

Saddam did not have weapons of mass destruction. Chemical rounds were found, but they were not WMDs. You can find the same quantity and quality of chemical rounds buried at some military bases. The issues with UN inspectors and Iraq are numerous. They were basically always in and out, and UN inspecters were there only a few weeks before the U.S. invaded, saying there were no WMDs. We still went in. Saddam was a tyrannical dictator, but he was the soveriegn ledaer of Iraq. Our ally in Pakistan is also a dictator. Burma and North Korea too. Pakistan and North Korea actually have WMDs, flaunt it in our face, but we invade Iraq. Why is that? What are the procedures for picking and choosing which dictator is our ally and which is the enemy? There is no question Saddam was a very bad man, but he isn't the only one to kill Kurds. November 2008 the Turkish government was mad at the U.S. for our strategic bombings of Kurdish villages in Turky. The Kurds have been fighting viscously for their own nation-state for the last 60 years. They have attacked our troops in northern Iraq numerous times in the past where we had to bomb their villages in other countries. Yes, people die in war, but the Iraq war was unnecessary.

Fox isn't any more trustworthy than any other form of media these days. Propaganda is the state sponsored media outlet. Unless you are suggesting that the federal government feeds the stories to CNN or other networks besides Fox, then its not propaganda. It biased news, and Fox is just as guilty. Ask them, they will tell you how biased they are.

Waterboard, still torture. Drowning hurts. Tear gas hurts. Not only does waterboarding casue physical pain, it causes pyschological pain. And utilizing tear gas to obtain information through painful interragation or coercion would, in fact, be torture. Waterboarding isn't even effective in that regard. Very little information was evidently obtained from the technique. U.S. troops are subjugated to both so they could resist other nations torture techniques. Right there, it is recognized as torture.


Actually, if you look at economic statistical data from the 1930s, ypou can see evidence of FDRs reforms making a difference soccially and economically before WWII broke out in Europe even. The industrial-military complex of WWII was one giant social project anyways, providing millions of jobs paid for by the government. You can hate FDR all you want, but his policies are the reason why our parents and grandparents did not starve to death in the 1930s. And the Greatest Generation would be outraged to hear the things you say about him.

We all know Saddam used WMDs against the Kurds an the Iranians throughout the 80s. If you do not, look here. After the Gulf War, the U.S. an U.K. located and destroyed a lot of the WMDs and the equipment capable of making them with the help of UN weapons inpectors from 1991-1998. Iraq stopped cooperating, so the U.S. and the U.K. executed Operation: Desert Fox in 1998. The intention was to weaken Saddam's grip on the country through targeted airstrikes. The chief UN weapons inpector, Richard Butler, said, "following Iraq's expulsion from Kuwait, it became clear that the Saddam Hussein government had created a range and quality of weapons of mass destruction that was truly alarming." There were still many tons of WMDs unaccounted for. This is not including the chemical components you mentioned. Iraq had no reason to get rid of them. They probably did not have as many as the intelligence suggested, but they had them nonetheless. We actually have found some too, just not the ones we were looking for. Read this. And we also know Saddam had the will to use them. We attacked Iraq first for three main reasons. Saddam was the easiest target, Iraq is a good foothold in the Middle East, and they were the most dangerous. North Korea is using Nuclear weapons as bartering chips, they have no real intention of using them. Pakistan has ended the majority of its terrorist ties and have been cooperative in recent years. Iraq had the strongest terrorist ties. It was actually the Turkish government that was bombing Kurds. Check your sources. We only bombed the ones in Northern Iraq that were attacking our forces. Saddam specifically targetted noncombatant Kurdish civilians. The war in Iraq was inevitable.



I watch and read from a plethera of news sources including FNC, MSNBC, CNN, the Daily Kos, Drudge Report, and the American Thinker. Of them all, FNC is the least biased. They have genuine conservative and liberal anchors and guests. There will always be a slight bias, but they are the most honest. MSNBC is propoganda because they had have and will have a vested interest in the success of the Obama Presidency. They also serve as a nice little safe haven where the liberals can have interviews without being challenged. CNN, the Daily Kos, Drudge Report, and the American thinker are all just biased. That is not a bad thing until they claim to be balanced or they outright lie. The only reason people think FNC has an extreme right wing bias is because all the other news channels have an extreme left wing bias. All things considered, FNC is moderate to center-right.



Simulated drowning does not cause any lasting physical or mental side-effects. It does not hurt, it creates fear. It is not torture. Just extremely uncomfortable. No information has ever been released on the effectiveness of waterboarding and we likely will not find out for a while. The memos that Obama left regarding waterboarding conveniently left out how much information was gathered through the method. Why? It does not serve his agenda. If we did not gain anything with waterboarding, the liberals would have ran with it. The fact that they did not shows me it was effective. U.S. troops are subjugated to tear gas in order to make sure they use their gas masks, not any other reason. If waterboarding was, we would not use on our soldiers. Any physical or psychological effects would impair their ability to do their job. It is used to train soldiers because it is the closest thing to torture without actually being torture.



Yeah, the economy rebounded in 1933, and then it tanked again in 1937. The Depression was not stagnant, it went up and down all of the time making no real progress until World War II. Although I can see your point that the miliary contracts were a social program, I do not think it really was. While it was the government that paid for the contracts, it was the private sector that created the jobs. There would not have been a need for those contracts if not for the war. There was a demand and the private sector created the supply. Capitalism saved us, not socialism. I do not hate FDR, I just do not like the majority policies. Using other recessions as an example, it is likely that laissez-faire policies would have brought us out sooner. I agree with the economist Thomas DiLorenzio, "FDR’s New Deal made the Great Depression longer and deeper. It is a myth that Franklin D. Roosevelt 'got us out of the Depression' and 'saved capitalism from itself,' as generations of Americans have been taught by the state’s education establishment." My grandparents and great grandparents actually were not fond of Roosevelt. I doubt anyone would be outraged by simple criticism.

This is patently ridiculous. Have you listened to anyone talk about what it is like to be waterboarded? Christopher Hitchens, who is legendarily hawkish, volunteered to be waterboarded and lasted literally less than 3 seconds. He said it was the most terrifying and horrible experience in his life. "Just extremely uncomfortable"? If you really think that, you are sick. Why not burn someone very mildly over their entire body. It'll heal. No permanent damage. Why not strangle someone until they are almost dead, then cut them down. No permanent damage. Are neither of those torture as well? Why not break someone's leg and set it, over and over. Maybe several hundred times. Is it torture yet?

Drowning someone, even if it is "simulated" drowning, hundreds of times is torture.

Information? If the information we've been getting from waterboarding is so good, why have we made so little progress rolling up al Qaida? The reason why is that when you torture someone, they will say anything and everything to get you to stop torturing them. The information is notoriously worthless.



What does Iraq have to do with bin Laden?

That's right, nothing.

What have been the best things to happen to al Qaida since its formation? Their attacks on September 11th and our invasion of Iraq. Those attacks occured during Bush's administration. An administration that dismissed Richard Clark, the world's leading terrorism expert, from his security position in the government, because he was too pushy and didn't stop annoying people about how dangerous bin Laden and al Qaida were and how much attention the US needed to be paying them. Invading Iraq created so many new jihadists that they were able to build an entire new branch (al Qaida of Iraq). It also put thousands of Americans straight into these jihadi's crosshairs, where they still are.

Again, how was Iraq a threat to us. And before you pull out the tired "OMG HE HAD WMDZORZ!" argument, you might want to take a closer look at that article you cite: "Since 2003, coalition forces have recovered approximately 500 weapons munitions which contain degraded mustard or sarin nerve agent.

Degraded. As in, it doesn't work. They found artillery shells full of ruined nerve gas. They also found artillery shells that could have had nerve gas in them, but didn't, which wouldn't have mattered anyway because the nerve gas wasn't even viable in the first place.

So, is it fair to say that you are comfortable with a Saddam regime in control of chemical weapons (WMD or not) as long as its not too many? How many is too many? Is it also fair to say that you would prefer we find out his nerve gas was "degraded" only after he lit off a missle or two?

The problem with looking for a "smoking gun", as the horribly biased "news" agencies called it, is that it only smokes when its been fired. I don't know about you, but if I have credible evidence that a hostile entity has a loaded weapon with a history of pulling the trigger I'm not going to wait around for it to be fired at me.