Cameras and planes

no_name wrote:
Ron Hunter wrote:

Alfred Molon wrote:

In article , Marvin says...

That hasn't stopped trains in Europe, and Europe is just as big as the
U.S.

No it isn't. The U.S. is 15% larger in area, and the distances are
much larger, taking into account Alaska and Hawaii.


Europe extends up to the Urals.


And that is whose definition?

Well, it's the one I learned in geography class in NC public schools
back in the 1950s.

West of Urals = Europe, East of Urals = Asia.



I guess we used different textbooks in Texas. Ours emphasized political
definitions rather than mountain ranges.

On Sun, 20 Aug 2006 02:20:01 -0500, Ron Hunter wrote:

Bush: "It's not about the oil."
Cheney: "It's not about the oil."
Rumsfeld: "It's not about the oil."
Charley Rose: "It's not about the oil."
Condaleezza Rice: "It's not about the oil."
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

As they say about lawyers, when her mouth moves . . .

He who has the gold makes the rules.
Money matters.
Oil is important.

"National interest" is much more than just oil, but oil is certainly a
major factor to consider.

And in this case we can add "He who controls the selective
dissemination of secret, classified information can easily, albeit
underhandedly, move the nation in the direction that He intends",
all the while being simultaneously cheered on by a nation of
enthusiastic, nationalistic, patriotic, overly willing dupes.
Sometimes, as with the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, it's the result of
an early, unintentional mistake, as well as the inability to admit
the mistake once the smoke clears. Secrecy is a big enabler here.
Iraq was different, in that unintentional mistakes. of any, were of
no consequence when compared to the *many* intentional deceptions.
I'm not even sure that National Interest was paramount. Self
Interest was, but that's too difficult to prove, and administration
officials and insiders are no more likely to come clean than O.J.


"National interest" is much more than just oil, but oil is certainly a
major factor to consider.

If you could have played back to you reruns of every time you saw
or heard someone saying "It's not about the oil", you'd be amazed at
how often you were inundated by that bilge. How you just said it is
accurate, but the way it was almost always said in the past implied
that oil played NO part, not that it played a only a minor part.
The main, nearly the ONLY reason given was to prevent mushroom
clouds on the horizon. Until, of course that pretense couldn't be
maintained, and it was then replaced by a more workable reason,
until that reason was also discredited and replaced by yet another.
It's more than obvious now that Wolfowitz, Negroponte and Cheney are
channeling Gen. Curtis LeMay, Pat Robertson and the Amazing Kreskin.
Shrub, Condi and Powell don't have the strength and virtually no
chance to resist their overwhelmingly powerful mind rays.

Ron Hunter wrote:

ASAAR wrote:

On Sun, 20 Aug 2006 02:53:11 GMT, no_name wrote:

Bush: "It's not about the oil."
Cheney: "It's not about the oil."
Rumsfeld: "It's not about the oil."
Charley Rose: "It's not about the oil."
Condaleezza Rice: "It's not about the oil."

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.


As they say about lawyers, when her mouth moves . . .

He who has the gold makes the rules.
Money matters.
Oil is important.

"National interest" is much more than just oil, but oil is certainly a
major factor to consider.


I don't see where national interest actually figures into it. More it's
"What's good for Exxon/Mobile is good for the USA". Lookin' out for the
interests of a very small group of major campaign donors.

Three dollar a gallon gas ain't doing anything good for the rest of
Americans.

If they'd really been thinkin' 'bout the national interest, they
wouldn't have gone in there and screwed everything up so bad.

Not that I think they deliberately set about ruining Iraq's oil
industry. That was just a happy by-product (for some) from their
complete incompetence.

--

These are my views. If you've got a problem with it, you can blame it on
me, but this is what I think. I am not the official spokes-person for
any Government, Commercial or Educational institution.

John

Ron Hunter wrote:

no_name wrote:

Ron Hunter wrote:

Alfred Molon wrote:

In article , Marvin says...

That hasn't stopped trains in Europe, and Europe is just as big as
the
U.S.

No it isn't. The U.S. is 15% larger in area, and the distances are
much larger, taking into account Alaska and Hawaii.



Europe extends up to the Urals.



And that is whose definition?


Well, it's the one I learned in geography class in NC public schools
back in the 1950s.

West of Urals = Europe, East of Urals = Asia.



I guess we used different textbooks in Texas. Ours emphasized political
definitions rather than mountain ranges.

You're confusing history with geography. While the two are intertwined,
they are not exactly the same.

Historically Europe was the Western Roman Empire + the Germanic tribal
areas and extending up into Scandinavian countries; such that at various
historical epochs Europe is larger or smaller, depending on how far east
is relevant to whatever wars are being fought during the period under
consideration.

Geographically OTOH ... there really is no difference between Europe and
Asia, it's all one gigantic land-mass. But the Urals provide a handy
reference point to divide up the school year.

--

These are my views. If you've got a problem with it, you can blame it on
me, but this is what I think. I am not the official spokes-person for
any Government, Commercial or Educational institution.

John