respect Bin Laden? - anonymous-

[harumscarum]

And the threat posed by bin Laden is also underestimated, says Scheuer. "I think our leaders over the last decade have done the American people a disservice...continuing to characterize Osama bin Laden as a thug, as a gangster," he says. "Until we respect him, sir, we are going to die in numbers that are probably unnecessary, yes. He's a very, very talented man and a very worthy opponent," he tells Kroft.

Pretty bold statement. PH has started discussing this in the 60 min thread about the same guy(anonymous):
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...security_cia_dc
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...-2004Nov11.html

(login for wp:robbyroboto@yahoo.com-password)

So should we start to respect our enemy?

[gr8fuldaniel]

Why would you start a 2nd thread on the same topic?
60 minutes topic

[harumscarum]

I was unsure that people would know to navigate to the 6th page on a thread named 60 minutes for it. I think that it is an interesting story and will be in the headlines next week. If this is a problem then a mod can delete it.

[gr8fuldaniel]

I suppose you are right, never mind.

This should be a hot topic. Do you think he was fired entirely for doing the show?

[Scribbler1]

Originally posted by harumscarum, So should we start to respect our enemy?

I think we sould ALWAYS respect our enemies. Even though we as a culture must always demonize our enemies we do ourselves a disservice to automatically think they are stupid.
To respect your enemy is not to underestimate him. We are told since childhood to respect fire and electricity because the stuff can kill us. Why not do the same with PEOPLE who can kill us?

[Technosoul]

I think respect might not be the correct wording, how about just not under-estimating the enemy?

It is kinda tricky however, we did not under-estimate Saddam and in that case we perhaps should have, where as under-estimating Bin Laden (or his god) might have been one of our nation's biggest misstakes.

I think our government respects North Korea because they seem to have some power, perhaps real nuclear weopons and certainally a large and well-trained miltary.

Rumfield under-estimated the anti-occupation protesters in Iraq, which resulted in a big mess during the pre-estimated post-war reconstruction stage.

The word respect means "you are as good as we are, as worthy as we are, and worth listening too". Now we should not respect people who take hostages and behead them, or those who conduct sneak attacks on non-military targets by surprise.

But by the best of our ability we should estimate developing situations correctly, and if possible, not to under-esitmate a possible or real enemy, but also not over-estimating a threat and attacking someone in a premptive way based on a wrong estimation. Got get it right on the target.

Technosoul,

[OberonDOtherseid]

Originally posted by Scribbler1,+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='0' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Scribbler1,)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteBegin-harumscarum, So should we start to respect our enemy?

I think we sould ALWAYS respect our enemies. Even though we as a culture must always demonize our enemies we do ourselves a disservice to automatically think they are stupid.
To respect your enemy is not to underestimate him. We are told since childhood to respect fire and electricity because the stuff can kill us. Why not do the same with PEOPLE who can kill us?[/b][/quote]

This is true but I think it is more like respect their potential to cause you harm and never throw caution to the wind, not respect him like he was your dad or something......that requires the desire to emulate them or mirror them. I think Bin Laden is someone to watch and not take for granted, that is as far as the respect goes for that bum.

[Scribbler1]

Originally posted by OberonDOtherseid,   This is true but I think it is more like respect their potential to cause you harm and never throw caution to the wind, not respect him like he was your dad or something......that requires the desire to emulate them or mirror them. I think Bin Laden is someone to watch and not take for granted, that is as far as the respect goes for that bum.

That is exactly what I said. He must be respected as a threat and a very clever one. We Americans have gotten WAY too arrogant when it comes to conflict. "He is against us, therefore he must be a drooling moron" is on the minds of too many of us and that mindset can have deadly consequences.

"not respect him like he was your dad or something......that requires the desire to emulate them or mirror them."

That is why I included the fire and electricity references, just to avoid that misinterpretation. As a matter of fact I'm surprised I haven't been called an Osama Lover by now.

[gr8fuldaniel]

Ive heard it said "We have him right where he wants us"

Respect, not honor.
Of course if hes dead, and that could well be, then you dont need to respect him anymore.
He could just be a Boogeyman that they video taped years ago when we were training him in al-CIAda, yet he may have died a year ago from kidney failure. So you can let go of your hate if it is eating you up. Its as easy as letting go.

[Compugasm]

In martial arts, we bow to opponent before battle. This is a sign of respect.

[bullshitdetector]

Originally posted by gr8fuldaniel, Ive heard it said "We have him right where he wants us" Respect, not honor. Of course if hes dead, and that could well be, then you dont need to respect him anymore. He could just be a Boogeyman that they video taped years ago when we were training him in al-CIAda, yet he may have died a year ago from kidney failure. So you can let go of your hate if it is eating you up. Its as easy as letting go.

Do tell, you can let go of your hate for Bush too and his ancestors, right?

[Scribbler1]

Originally posted by bullshitdetector,+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='0' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (bullshitdetector,)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteBegin-gr8fuldaniel, Ive heard it said "We have him right where he wants us" Respect, not honor. Of course if hes dead, and that could well be, then you dont need to respect him anymore. He could just be a Boogeyman that they video taped years ago when we were training him in al-CIAda, yet he may have died a year ago from kidney failure. So you can let go of your hate if it is eating you up. Its as easy as letting go.

Do tell, you can let go of your hate for Bush too and his ancestors, right?[/b][/quote]

I don't read this as Bush hating, more like the realization that the CIA has been pulling stunts like this for decades, LONG before there were any Bushes INSIDE the White House.

[OberonDOtherseid]

I read it as reference to Bin Laden, to let go of the hate for him because he is most likely dead. Regardless of the fact that the CIA is always pulling shit over peoples eyes it was a reference to letting go of our hate for the man, not the CIA. BSD does make a valid point, if he is dead and people should just move on, so should they move on in regards to the Bush family who allegedly had ties with Hitler.