Future of Dakar Rally now in doubt

[Sonart]

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Quote by: Punkbuster That of course makes the precarious presumption that "global warming" is going to cause all of this.

Global Warming - or to be politically correct, 'Climate Change' - is happening now and is happening faster than predicted. And beyond artic melting, the most dramatic changes so far have been increased drought. China, Australia, the southern U.S. and, of course, Africa.

East Africa Drought - Oct. 2007

Drought in Southern Africa - Mar. 2007

Africa will suffer the brunt of climate change -- "For Africans, climate change is expected to bring greater incidence of disease, reduced crop production, and increased occurrence of extreme weather that could worsen droughts and flooding." - Apr. 2007

Quote by: Punkbuster But that does not explain the current iteration of our favorite Muslim/Nazi group. Al-Queda today is here to kill the infidel and to drive the infidel from Muslim lands.

Number one, Africa is the new world for Islam, from Somalia, spreading west across Northern Africa, and south through Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and across central Africa, Islam is spreading. And where there's conflict between Muslims and non-Muslims, you're going to find al-Qaeda, and the worse the climate gets, the more conflicts there will be, and the more opportunities for al-Qaeda to insert themselves.

Quote by: Punkbuster Al-Queda today is here to kill the infidel and to drive the infidel from Muslim lands.

We aren't the only infidels, Punk. Just look at Sudan. Africa is filled with black African infidels who are going to find themselves in conflict with the muslim expansion.

Quote by: Punkbuster Then if we leave (we wont of course at least for now since oil is under the ground and I am for us staying) but if we leave it would then be fun to watch them terrorize "moderate" Muslims of different tribes and hunt and kill those who dont believe in full sharia law.

3/4s of Africa is already a basketcase, Punk, and I don't see it improving. Our staying isn't going to change that... it'll simply collapse beneath our feet from internal conflict as Africans increasingly fight each for the remaining resources.

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[Punkbuster]

Ok so Africa is in disarray- is this anything new?
And Africa is not the new world of Islam- Been Muslim for a long time. Its just that Muslim terrorists sensing that Western intelligence and military are spread too thin to cover Africa and the Mid East countries not wanting to see an awesome thing stopped (1$100 bl oil) by renegade Islamo Nazis are clamping down on Al Queda in Saudi and other places are moving south for recruits.
If you want to know the REAL new breeding ground for Islamo Nazis go to Southern Mexico and South America. It is strating in the Mountains of Chiapas and spreading south. They are all taught to hate the "West" They are winning converts slowly but surely.
And on climate change thats off topic but have many other threads that cover it. But words like "is expected to" and "Could" are used too much in the debate/ Same thing happened in 1977 it was the new Ice Age that was widely predicted and "could have" taken place. In the billions of years of the earths existence the swing from predicted Ice Age to predicted melt down in 30 short years seems a little too much of a pendulum to me. Not that I am not for all efforts at conservation, "greening" and finding a way to live without Oil and coal burning. (I say the "prophets" who are making money off the cause should 1> Turn their AC's off first 2> Keep only one house 3> Make sure that their kitchens arent bigger than 90% of "normal" peoples entire homes and 4> Dont pretend that "Carbon offsets" can justify their "owning a private jet" and having a 7000 sq foot home lifestyle 5> Accept Nobel Prizes for Climate scare by staying home and video conferencing their medal reception a nd not burning thousands of gallons of Jet A going to Stockholm.
Then I will be more apt to downsize my lifestyle

[Nono]

Hey, Punk, I thought y'all launched this thread to talk about the Dakar Rally.
Apparently not.

[Matt W]

Indeed. Either debate the topic, or rant elsewhere.

[Sonart]

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If it please the Court, we're are on topic...

...the Dakar Rally was a popular auto road race held in Africa, and was canceled because of the threat of al-Qaeda. We're now talking about the state of Africa and it's infestation with al-Qaeda. Some issues are simply manifestations of larger ones.

C'mon guys,... and besides, how many people here do you think even pay attention to the Dakar Rally.

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[Nono]

Quote by: Sonart How many people here do you think even pay attention to the Dakar Rally.

They may be thin on the ground in San Diego, but where I live it's ... well let's say there's a modicum of interest.

Anyway, no kidding Africa (Muslim Africa) has its share of barbus. Big deal. When I was in Senegal a couple of years ago I saw a number of kids wearing Osama T-shirts. You see kids in the US wearing heavymetalsatanic T-shirts. What to make of it?

What?! They murdred four French tourists in Mauritania? That part of the world has always been pretty wild. This is but the latest manifestation.

Sonart doesn't favour the kind of US policies that have done so much to boost Islamic fanaticism, but I think Punk does. He wants so "exterminate" certain people.

Now where have we heard that kind of talk before?

[GHook93]

Quote by: Nono They may be thin on the ground in San Diego, but where I live it's ... well let's say there's a modicum of interest. Anyway, no kidding Africa (Muslim Africa) has its share of barbus. Big deal. When I was in Senegal a couple of years ago I saw a number of kids wearing Osama T-shirts. You see kids in the US wearing heavymetalsatanic T-shirts. What to make of it? What?! They murdred four French tourists in Mauritania? That part of the world has always been pretty wild. This is but the latest manifestation. Sonart doesn't favour the kind of US policies that have done so much to boost Islamic fanaticism, but I think Punk does. He wants so "exterminate" certain people. Now where have we heard that kind of talk before?

I agree with this, Senegal would have been dangerous whether or not Al Qaeda presence was being felt, but the threat of Al Qaeda does intensify thinks 10 fold!

[Sonart]

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Nono and Punkbuster -- I'm going to concede that you're probably more right than I am on some points. Indeed, Senegal and rest of Suharan Africa have been Muslim since Suleman. Islam is, however, expanding into Central and South Africa... Ethiopia, Congo, Uganda, Nigeria, Niger, Zimbabwe, etc.

And indeed al-Qaeda is out to wreak havoc wherever the west maintains vital interests in Muslim countries, which, although oil is certainly important, includes a variety of strategic minerals, such as cobalt, chromium, manganese, platinum, industrial diamonds, etc.

And yes, Africa absolutely has been a basketcase for generations. But the affects of climate change on African agriculture is going to be what completes the perfect storm of chaos on that sad continent. Witho or without Nigeria's oil, if we can keep mineral rich South Africa stable, that may be the best we can hope for, because we don't have nearly the resources to rescue the rest of them.

Quote by: Punkbuster And on climate change thats off topic but have many other threads that cover it.

Not really... climate change is moving rapidly from "could happen" to "is happening now" -- it's affects are being seen in a thousand ways around the globe -- and one of the places it's happening is Africa, because they have so little economic resiliance to even minor changes.

I'm predicting that within 10 years or so, almost everything that happens politically in Africa will be connected in some way to climate change.

Quote by: Punkbuster In the billions of years of the earths existence the swing from predicted Ice Age to predicted melt down in 30 short years seems a little too much of a pendulum to me.

Actually, we should be on a 25,000 year downward trend towards the next Ice Age. But that was interupted by the man-made anomoly that began 200 years ago. It seems too much for you because you can't comprehend the affect of THIS on the earths environment...



...and because what you also have to imagine is that this curve represents not just human poplation, but also our industrial/technological capacity to pillage and pollute the planet.

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[Punkbuster]

Well your curve chart makes my point- 30 years ago (near the tip of the curve- we were on the precipice of a NEW ICE AGE. And now its changed?
And thousands of ways? and what parts of the planet will get colder becasue of this- Antartica ice shelf is growing as fast as the Artic's is melting.


And as far as the Dakar Rally goes it matters not how many care of the event (tens of thousands do but that is small in the grand scheme of things) it is that the event has been held in Africa for decades without incident and now because WE are wrong and our POLICIES are wrong they threaten death on innocents that take part in this event? Its all because of big bad USA.
I also personally believe (from afar not knowing the threats) that Muslims are big talkers (they get an extra virgin in heaven for big talkin?) and probably nothing would have happened had they held the rally.

And of course I know what you "blame America for everything" people are thinking. Yes I fully understand the parallel of the US "killing innocents" in Iraq but two truths are clear-
1> The war may have been partly about oil (other countries have oil that we could easily take over and we dont- Nigeria) but like it or not it was
"common knowledge" to all that he had WMD- even Chirac told Colin Powell that Saddahm would surely shoot chemicals at the advancing US army - WRONG Russia, Germany, France, Saudi, Dutch etc... all on board that he had WMD. Dont want to rehash that but the "blame America firsters" always pull that card when others act barbaric.

2>While many innocents have died in the sectarian war that has followed the invasion- (150k is the last estiamte) many tens of thousands also would have been killed by Saddahm and his pervert kids. So its not like we invaded paradise. And no we dont just let countries do what they want- Kosovo EVERYONE wanted us to kill the Serbs. And Bill Clinton said Rwanda was his biggest mistake- My words here- in other words he should have intervened and killed a hundred thosuand or so "innocents" to save 800,000.

It will always be easy to rationalize the murder of innocents by others against us because "we have done wrong"- like it or not when WE (and I believe it will happen) get bombed back to the stone age- the world can then fend for itself without us- oh what a wonderful world it will be.

PS Wonder what Saddahm and the boys would have done with $100 oil?

[Sonart]

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This probably isn't the place to continue discussing global warming, since there's an ongoing global warming thread here.

However, the short answer to your question...

Quote by: Punkbuster Well your curve chart makes my point- 30 years ago (near the tip of the curve- we were on the precipice of a NEW ICE AGE. And now its changed?

Yes, but it was 200 years ago (see chart) and I just showed you exactly why... 200 years of a massive human population explosion compounded by an equally massive explosion in our industrial capacity to produce greenhouse gases.

Quote by: Punkbuster Antartica ice shelf is growing as fast as the Artic's is melting.

No, it's not. That's disinformation based on ice growth in the interior of the continent. Over all, the Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking at a faster rate than predicted.

Quote by: Punkbuster I also personally believe (from afar not knowing the threats) that Muslims are big talkers

You mean they haven't committed enough suicide bombings yet to convince you???

Quote by: Punkbuster And of course I know what you "blame America for everything" people are thinking.

We "blame America for everything" people??? How's that?

Quote by: Punkbuster 1> The war may have been partly about oil (other countries have oil that we could easily take over and we dont- Nigeria) but like it or not it was "common knowledge" to all that he had WMD - even Chirac told Colin Powell that Saddahm would surely shoot chemicals at the advancing US army - WRONG Russia, Germany, France, Saudi, Dutch etc... all on board that he had WMD. Dont want to rehash that but the "blame America firsters" always pull that card when others act barbaric.

Except that he DIDN'T have any WMD. That's a proven fact. Nor did EVERYONE believe that he did... far from it.

And Iraq was entirely about oil, to this extent... The basic premise of the Neo-Cons is that, with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States is the sole remaining super power on the globe. Therefore, it's in our interest to USE that power to fix global problems areas as we see fit.

Global problem area #1 is the middle east, specifically the oil produciing Gulf Oil region, and it's biggest pain-in-the-butt, hated-by-everyone nuisance has been Saddam Hussein. Time for the Super Duper U.S. to apply a bit of Machiavelian, prison yard politics... meaning we march straight up to the baddest bully in the yard (although Iraq was actually the weakest), beat the holy crap out of him, get his mind right (install a pro-U.S. democracy), and then turn to the rest of the inmates and, with our steeliest Clint Eastwood stare, ask, "allright.. Punks! ...who wants to be next?" Whereupon Syria, Iran, North Korea, etc. etc. would all lower their heads and avert their eyes, muttering , "No way, not me, dude", and the Persian Gulf region all goes back to the business of pumping cheap oil. Problem area #1 solved.

Except, it didn't quite work out that way, did it?

Quote by: Punkbuster 2>While many innocents have died in the sectarian war that has followed the invasion- (150k is the last estiamte) many tens of thousands also would have been killed by Saddahm and his pervert kids.

So? Innocents are dying at the hands of evil dictators all over the world. When did Iraq's become our problem?

Quote by: Punkbuster So its not like we invaded paradise. And no we dont just let countries do what they want- Kosovo EVERYONE wanted us to kill the Serbs.

Amazing, isn't it... Clinton didn't have to mislead us about Bosnia and Kosovo, he managed to tip-toe through the minefield of conflicting European, Russian, UN and Muslim mideast interests, end each of those conflicts in a few short months, with Serbia undergoing regime change and Molosovic on the dock for war crimes, and all without losing a single American life to enemy action.

Pretty impressive, huh!

The difference of course, was that Bosnia and Kosovo were active conflicts, about which Europe was terrified the Balkan conflict would spread into the wider region, and the U.S. had to be begged to finally step in and solve the problem for everyone... which we successfully did, to the world's respect and awe.

Quote by: Punkbuster And Bill Clinton said Rwanda was his biggest mistake - My words here- in other words he should have intervened and killed a hundred thosuand or so "innocents" to save 800,000.

Which he didn't because of his experience in Somalia (where unbeknownst to us at the time, al-Qaeda was beginning to take a active role) That's where he found out that Americans would support the use of our military for ALTRUISTIC missions -- meaning saving people only for the sake of saving them, with no other national interests involved -- only so long as there were no significant casualties. Following the battle of Mogadishu, Americans wanted nothing more to do with Somalia if it meant more dead soldiers being dragged through the streets, and there was no reason to believe that the chaos of Rwanda would be any different. Whatever Clinton might regret in hindsight now, I suspect he was right not to go in... not until Americans decide that saving tens of thousands of black Africans - just for the sake of saving them - is, in fact, worth American lives.

PS Wonder what Saddahm and the boys would have done with $100 oil?

And would there be $100/bbl oil if we hadn't invaded Iraq? Who knows, but I do know that it isn't doing diddlysquat for the Iraqis right now. They still -- after 5 years -- have only partial electric power, partial water and sewage service, partial phone service and huge lines for gasoline.... when they can afford it.


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