Wow, this one got me going...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32833550/ns/world_news-terrorism/

As I said last week we are disconnected from the real world; therefore, I read some more news articles to help keep you up to date with the latest news.

First news article from MSNCB is about Bin Laden sending Americans another tape around the September 11^th anniversary. He is thought to be hiding in the mountains along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. In the tape he insulted the Americans and President Obama. Bin Laden said President Obama to be “‘powerless’ to stop the war in Afghanistan, and Americans' inability to grasp why the Sept. 11 attacks occurred has ‘cost you a lot without any result whatsoever.’” He later talks about how President Obama is not changing the way President Bush handled the war because he kept many of the military leaders such as Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Bin Laden states the reason they are staying at war with us. "We have demonstrated and stated many times, for more than two-and-a-half-decades, that the cause of our disagreement with you is your support to your Israeli allies who occupy our land of Palestine," Bin Laden said. Later on he said, "Ask yourselves to determine your position: is your security, your blood, your children, your money, your jobs, your homes, your economy, and your reputation dearer to you than the security of the Israelis, their children and their economy?"

This is a very powerful news article. I, however, do not like how the reporter can just take random quotes and report about them. By doing that, the news article can be read to say anything because it was taken out of the original context. After reading this news article, it is very clear that the war we are fighting it is still very real. It is actually scary how much they know about your news and politics when we probably do not know nearly the same amount about theirs. I do understand that we live in a republic and the government has the right to keep any information from us its wants to. As American citizens we believe that we should still know everything which can be a scary thought. I think we think like that because we always say we live in a democracy but when we say the Pledge we say “to the republic for which it stands.” Because we were required to say it every morning in grade school, I do not think many people realize what they are saying, they just say it. Students do not take the time to think about what it really stands for and means. They do not think about the millions of lives that were lost for the freedom of this country. “Freedom is not free” is a bump sticker that is seen all around town but has a deep meaning behind it. George Washington told this country to remain isolationist and even Bin Laden is hinting on that when he said "Ask yourselves to determine your position: is your security, your blood, your children, your money, your jobs, your homes, your economy, and your reputation dearer to you than the security of the Israelis, their children and their economy?" This is a very powerful message and should be strongly considered by the people in the White House. I am not against the war and I am not for the war. Even though this message is about not being in the war, it has a very powerful message behind it. In AP government we learned that every war has a declaration and it states why we are there and when it will be over. That is how and why we know the point of each war in the past. When my teacher asked the class why we were fighting the War on Terrorism everyone in the class had a different answer. This further proves the point that we do not really know why we are fighting. Throughout the war we have switched countries to fight, we heard different reasons on the news for changing countries, and we are not clear on when it is time to leave. We do not know when because we never made a declaration. That is why it was so easy for senators to say they were not for the war during the election even though the funded the war. A 4 year old girl is not going to ask her parents for a promiscuous outfit and get to wear it if her parents do not approve of it. They are not going to fund it for her to wear. That is the same thing with the congress they cannot fund the war and then all say they are against it. I understand during 9/11 everyone was for it because we were attacked on our own land but part of being in the government is planning ahead and not acting on impulse. I am not saying that is what the government did it just feels like it.

As I stated earlier I am not for this war and I am not against. Because I do not feel I know all my information on why we are over there and the reasons behind it, I cannot make an educated opinion. I know hard core liberals are generally against the war and hard core conservatives are generally for the war. Since we are already over there, as much as President Obama wants to get us out, it is going to be hard. Just because we are in the middle of a war, it is going to be hard to slowly leave. Last time we tried that was Vietnam. Everyone knows how badly that turned out.

On a side note, they make us sit through history class because we are supposed to learn from our past and not make any of those mistakes again. Well, when they took Caesar out of power there was chaos. Why did our leaders not think that, that would happen when they took out the power in the Middle East?

Wow, well I had meant to write about more news articles, but this one got me going.