Terry

Joined

• started 1,986 topics
• posted 18,437 times   see topics posted on
• send a message

Posts by Terry

• 
  49

  A deeper examination of The New World Translation

  by Terry in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  shorturl.at/ouakr.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  
  
  shorturl.at/ouAKR
  
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  LoveUniHateExams
  

  Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Yemen, Oman, Bahrain, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait and Lebanon are all independent Arab countries.
  

  If I've missed something, could someone explain it to me ...
  _____
  
  Independent? The U.S. Military casts a shadow over them all.
  Who can come and go - when and where?
  
  Ah, what would being INDEPENDENT actually mean to tribes with differing religious loyalties and blood relations?
  Being interfered with (especially by INFIDELS) would ruin any sense of independence, certainly.
  
  Tribal leaders acted at whim throughout history and incursions and blood-letting widened or narrowed occupied land.
  For Arabs, it is the LANGUAGE which unites them as a people.
  The Koran is said to be written in God's perfect language (Arabic) and it strongly coheres and even binds while simultaneously drives a wedge between Arabs and non-Arabic speakers.
  
  The Ottoman Turks, for example who spoke (duh) Turkish, and Kurds (see topic subject) spoke Kurdish.
  This makes them "other" and marks them the way Jehovah's Witnesses mark JW's who question the authority of the Governing Body.
  
  At the Versailles Conference, Great Britain and France IMPOSED borders already historically pre-established by current residents regardless of affiliations or blood feuds.
  But - too bad for them!
  
  T.E.Lawrence performed admirably in "efforts" to point out how destructive an act this would be.
  He drew up reasonable demarcations and tribal definitions but was completely over-ruled after a pretended respectful "listen."
  ______
  
  Who are the Arabs?
  
  The SAUD family and SAUDI dynasty didn't get along with the HUSSEIN family and its dynasty, refusing to join the Arab Revolt "for freedom."
  (Back and forth these struggles were ongoing with the population, as a whole born, reared, and dying not knowing anything but turmoil and civil unrest. Don't fret - It was "normal.")
  
  The TURKS imposed a Suzerainty on Arabs:
  "Suzerainty is any relationship in which one region or polity controls the foreign policy and relations of a tributary state, while allowing the tributary state to have internal autonomy."
  ______
  As T.E.Lawrence had predicted, neither French nor Brits would succeed at gaining any cooperation with their newly named states and colonies even after pretending to let them run things and backing them up in internecine battles.
  The French finally threw up their hands, Great Britain shrugged and vanished.
  
  A struggle in 1927 caused another big shift as Wahhabi insurgents succeeded in transplanting their culture and rule and kicking out the Saudi family (which had, in turn, already kicked out the Hussein dynasty when Britain stopped supporting them.)
  
  IS ANYBODY INDEPENDENT YET?
  
  Imagine how disgusted Great Britain and France were in 1938 when enormous oil reserves were discovered under the Saudi dynasty. Talk about broken promises, ill-will, mistrust!
  
  Ahhhh, but the United States was suddenly all flowers and kisses and pillow whispers about defending the Saudi dynasty from all aggressors! President F.D.R. and Abdul Azziz became engaged to married politically aboard the U.S.S. Quincy and the honeymoon has lasted all these years!
  
  Did Arabs now transform into Arabians?
  
  Notice the map has been branded as belonging to the Saudi dynasty: Saudi Arabia and not just Arabia. It's like TRUMP TOWER.
  
  Oh yes. Make no mistake about who has BIG AMERICANS in their back pocket.
  
  Under President Nixon, the agreement to become Saudi's well-armed nuclear protector led to Saudi agreement to ONLY SELL OIL if it were purchased in American dollars (called Petro-Dollars) because Nixon was running out of actual gold reserves enough to back U.S. currency. By going off the gold standard, the currency has ever since ENTIRELY depended on PETRO_$$ sales.
  
  After 1945 and the end of WWII, the unrest in the Middle East tempted the U.S. time and again to imagine they could keep a "balance of power" going by covert meddling in local political leadership.
  
  (How? Nobody had ever been up to that impossible task?)
  
  One huge catastrophe was the U.S. insistence on selling arms and even nuclear weapons to PUBLIC ENEMY NUMBER ONE: the State of Israel.
  
  So, what does it mean to be an INDEPENDENT STATE in the Middle East? If you are Iran and want your Ayatollah to rule the political and religious state with Sharia law BUT the U.S. has kicked out the democratically elected fella - what is THAT? Independence?
  The SHAH was in our back pocket - but - alas! Uprising - bye bye.
  
  Was that Independence?
  
  If you are a Tyrant like Saddam Hussein and everybody is terrified of you - citizens of Iraq will suffer while the United States merely gives lip-service to the "ain't it awful" hell on earth. But - if Saddam goes after Kuwait OIL -- suddenly shock and awe appear and the balance of power (such as it is) is pulled apart at the seams.
  
  Is that Independence?
  
  American troops are deployed and despised as Infidels no matter how much "help for your own good" they think is necessary.
  The U.S. policy is sugar coated with humanitarian concern but the 150,000 violent deaths seem to be "necessary."
  There is incredible hypocrisy here - but our men and women in uniform are told it is their duty and they obey orders.
  
  "The United States is home to five of the world’s 10 largest defense contractors, and American companies account for 57 percent of total arms sales by the world’s 100 largest defense contractors."
  Lockheed Martin, the largest defense contractor in the world, is estimated to have had $44.9 billion in arms sales in 2017 through deals with governments all over the world. The company drew public scrutiny after a bomb it sold to Saudi Arabia was dropped on a school bus in Yemen, killing 40 boys and 11 adults."
  
  Half the population of the U.S. is against gun violence. Now isn't that ironic?
  
  
  OUR TROOPS are deployed:
  Iraq

  Afghanistan
  
  Oman Turkey

  • United Arab Emirates
  • Kuwait
  • Bahrain:
  • Qatar
    
    Who wants our help? The Kurds, you say?
    
    
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  I agree we are dealing with monsters. No good guys in the lot of them.
  What got me interested in this topic started with a BBC Documentary
  on T.E.Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia).
  I've read at least 30 books about Lawrence over the span of the last half century.
  However, the Documentary's last half dealt with the blow back to the world at large in the Middle East, the aftermath and consequences of promises made seemingly in "good faith" to the Arabs that they'd have their independence.
  
  Lawrence began with "good intentions".
  His purpose was shaped toward giving his personal friend S.A. FREEDOM and enlarged to include the Arabs as a people.
  
  In short, lying to people you are asking to die for a deception violated T.E.Lawrence's conscience. (It didn't stop him, however).
  Britain and France's bad faith Sykes-Picot agreement destroyed any
  plausible deniability of making good on assurances of independence.
  
  Okay, so what?
  So, I wondered how many repercussions have continued over all the in-between years (leading up to today) have been chiefly due to MORE LIES, deceptions, false flag operations, and broken promises of independence and such.
  
  This led me to another documentary on the history of the C.I.A. with a view to specifics about many bungled "regime change" dirty tricks.
  
  In other words, down the rabbit hole goeth I.
  
  I am quite UN-interested in conspiracy theories, Bilderberg nonsense, illuminati naughty, or any of that tinfoil hat shtick.
  
  The more documentary footage I watched the more my naive view of "good guys" and "bad guys" failed to match up to reality.
  
  The secret operations of Intelligence operations are clearly illegal when they violate law. Presidents Nixon and Bush didn't seem to mind, to say the least.
  But, unknown (perhaps) even to the bosses and Presidents are these blackOps that will do nothing short of "get er done by any means necessary" and cover the consequences with official lies, doctored documents, Top Secret camouflage, and stonewalling.
  
  It is pretty clear (at least to me) Media outlets rely too heavily on carefully crafted Intelligence leaks/lies and talking points.
  The public at large catch them at it and it stops nothing.
  
  The corruption isn't really punished EXCEPT public show trials with fall guys and jaw-boning breast-beating, and pearl clutching by politicians.
  
  To conclude:
  Bush made very clear he wanted to go into IRAQ and the secret C.I.A. operatives provided pretexts and plausible deniability along the way.
  WEAPONS of MASS DESTRUCTION was an empty pretext and
  Media pumped life into it and fear mongering, table pounding Hawks pushed the debacle through a misled public relations push.
  
  Eight wars under the Obama Administration. Arms sales to every awful, sociopath in the Usual Suspect list, playing off one ally against the other and continued Propaganda by Media, Congressmen, Academics, and our chances of hearing uncolored reports is growing thin.
  
  WHY DO OUR KIDS have to die for all this? That's the bottom line.
  Tulsi Gabbard is now being slimed for her anti-regime-change stance as a Democrat. The Queen of War, Hillary is at the helm of that smear.
  
  War is not about helping the poor helpless Kurds. Sorry, the military ignores students dying in Chinese uprisings easily enough. The REAL reasons Syria is worth blood and treasure is the same it has always been in the Middle East and perfectly upstanding men (and women) like T.E.Lawrence are being torn apart by all the lies.
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  In a 2005 interview with President Assad of Syria (5 years BEFORE the so-called Arab Spring) CNN interviewer Christiane Amanpour spoke of the intentions of the U.S. relative to Assad's leadership.
  
  ___AMANPOUR: Mr. President, you know the rhetoric of regime change is headed towards you from the United States. They are actively looking for a new Syrian leader. They're granting visas and visits to Syrian opposition politicians. They're talking about isolating your diplomatically and, perhaps, a coup d'etat or your regime crumbling.
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GcP1Gb_1Jc
  ___
  The history of the C.I.A. in toppling regimes comes into play here.
  The playbook is a matter of record how it has always been achieved.
  A secret fund (black ops) is set up to funnel weapons to any indigenous groups who are against the targeted leader and "advisers" from the C.I.A. handle the training.
  The Obama Administration gave the green light to a 1 billion dollar weapons funnel and suddenly ISIS and Al-Qaeda (U.S. enemy) were holding these weapons courtesy of the American taxpayers.
  Obama had been pressured to give the okay and he caved.
  .("a presidential finding authorizing the C.I.A. to covertly arm and train small groups of rebels at bases in Jordan. The president’s reversal came in part because of intense lobbying by foreign leaders, including King Abdullah II of Jordan and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel...)
  
  The New York Times reported (after this secret program was revealed and the embarrassment of supplying weapons to the 9-11 terrorist organization came to light):
  
  "Once C.I.A.-trained fighters crossed into Syria, C.I.A. officers had difficulty controlling them. The fact that some of their C.I.A. weapons ended up with Nusra Front fighters — and that some of the rebels joined the group — confirmed the fears of many in the Obama administration when the program began. Although the Nusra Front was widely seen as an effective fighting force against Mr. Assad’s troops, its Qaeda affiliation made it impossible for the Obama administration to provide direct support for the group.

  American intelligence officials estimate that the Nusra Front now has as many as 20,000 fighters in Syria, making it Al Qaeda’s largest affiliate. Unlike other Qaeda affiliates such as Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the Nusra Front has long focused on battling the Syrian government rather than plotting terrorist attacks against the United States and Europe."
  shorturl.at/chvIN Link to NYTimes article.
  _____
  
  TIMELINE
  

  2007 April - US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi meets President Assad in Damascus. She is the highest-placed US politician to visit Syria in recent years. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice meets Foreign Minister Walid Muallem the following month in the first contact at this level for two years.

  2007 September - Israel carries out an aerial strike against a nuclear facility under construction in northern Syria.

  2008 July - President Assad meets French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris. The visit signals the end of the diplomatic isolation by the West that followed the assassination of former Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri in 2005.

  2008 October - Syria establishes diplomatic relations with Lebanon for first time since both countries established independence in 1940s.
  
  

  2009 March - Jeffrey Feltman, acting assistant US secretary of state for the Near East, visits Damascus with White House national security aide Daniel Shapiro in first high-level US diplomatic mission for nearly four years. Meets Foreign Minister Walid Muallem.

  Trading launches on Syria's stock exchange in a gesture towards liberalizing the state-controlled economy.

  2010 May - US renews sanctions against Syria, saying that it supports terrorist groups, seeks weapons of mass destruction and has provided Lebanon's Hezbollah with Scud missiles in violation of UN resolutions.
  
  2011 March - Security forces shoot protesters dead in southern city of Deraa demanding release of political prisoners, triggering violent unrest that steadily spread nationwide over the following months.
  ___________________BBC link: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-14703995
  
  Hypocritically, the U.S. was simultaneously supporting ("inadvertently") enemies and terrorists.
  

  That is a dilemma that concerned the US government even before the protests began. The author of an April 2009 cable expressed concern that some of the projects being funded by the US, if discovered by the Syrian government, would be perceived as "an attempt to undermine the Asad [sic] regime, as opposed to encouraging behavior reform."

  The Post reported that much of the money – as much as $6 million since 2006 – has been funneled through a group of Syrian exiles in London, known as the Movement for Justice and Development. The group is connected to a London-based satellite television station that is broadcast in Syria, known as Barada TV, which has recently expanded its coverage to include the mass protests.

  Several other civil society initiatives in Syria received secret US funding, but by 2009, US officials were concerned that the Syrian government had discovered the US funding.

  Christian Science Monitor link: https://www.csmonitor.com/World/terrorism-security/2011/0418/Cables-reveal-covert-US-support-for-Syria-s-opposition
  
  ___The U.S. used the "Arab Spring" as pretext for engagement but
  the C.I.A. had spent millions (at least a billion) setting up Assad for regime
  change.
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  Cofty (insert large rambling excuse)
  
  Gosh. All those words and yet you just don't care and don't have the time to give one tiny quotation from an expert that sends me arse over end.
  
  Why join a "Discussion" when you just don't care and don't have the time to back up your airy dismissals?
  
  
  I'm afraid this is a case of Paper Tiger-ism.
  Meow
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  Not so silentbuddha : here is what I wrote.
  Have a field day.
  
  shorturl.at/nIR07
  
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  Watchtower tactic alert.
  Label the "mentally diseased apostate" and shun them.
  
  No facts offered. No actual exchange of ideas. Only caustic opinions and posturing name-calling.
  
  social media troll is someone who purposely says something controversial in order to get a rise out of other users.
  
  Let me quote a person you MUST AGREE with: his name is Cofty
  ________

  cofty2 years ago

  So many examples recently of posters who imagine their subjective opinions have as much validity as objective facts.

  Laziness and arrogance.
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  COFTY:
  “...the disagreement is between a stack of books by academics and a video by Glenn Greenwald.”
  _______
  TERRY:
  Have I somehow missed a citation from you and your academics? I don't see any quotations - only Cofty assertions.
  
  What has Greenwald said with which you vicariously disagree?
  
  You can’t rob a liquor store by showing a pistol with no bullets unless the proprietor succumbs to mere intimidation :)
  
  Did you miss my non-Greenwald citations somehow?
  
  Tim Anderson (The Dirty War on Syria) April 2016
  Robert F. Kennedy, Jr, (Why the Arabs don’t want us in Syria) March 1, 2016
  The New York Times (Oct. 8, 2018)
  James F. Tracy (Global Research) Jan 30, 2018
  Steve Kangas (A Timeline of CIA Atrocities) Feb 3, 2019
  James Joyner (James Clapper not charged with lying to Congress) Mar 13, 2018
  Media Benjamin (The Guardian)
  
  ______
  
  So far, I've seen a listing of your book collection and no quotation from these books.

  This isn't rebuttal from you - is it? Rebuttal requires actual effort rather than mere remonstrance.
  
  

  
  
  
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  Cofty: "This thread - your OP in particular - are full of misinformation that is nothing short of gas lighting"
  ______
  gas-lighting (verb) : manipulate (someone) by psychological means into questioning their own sanity.
  ______
  Terry: If you feel psychologically manipulated to the point you are questioning your own sanity -- I can only shake my head astonished I could cause you so much pain and suffering.
  It is not my intention to hurt you.
  
  However, may I bring to your attention my perception?
  
  Your tone and rhetoric are unnecessarily provocative, Cofty.
  
  No need to get personal. If you disagree the world still spins.
  If I were allowed to prescribe pills, I'd give you a scrip for "chill" pills.
  ___
  cofty: "Your sympathy with Assad and Erdogan and your lack of concern for the Kurdish people is sickening."
  _____
  Terry: So, now I've made you 1. Question your own sanity 2. Manipulated you psychologically and 3. Sickened you.
  Gosh.
  I don't assume you are paranoid and thin-skinned just because your language brims over with indicators of your assigning malevolent animus to me --and over what? My opinions based on my reading?
  Your stack of books is BIGGER than mine. You win? Okay, if that is therapeutic for you.
  _____
  EXAMPLES of DISAGREEMENT below
  _____
  Cofty: "Kurds have no oil Terry - they do not have a square yard of earth to call their own."
  Terry: Source The New York Times Oct. 8, 2018 :
  Quote from above:
  "What makes Kurdistan — and Kurdish oil — so important?Kurdistan is crucial because of its vital location — straddling Iran, Syria, Turkey and Iraq. Ever since the Kurds were denied their own state after World War I, they have been focused on a search for self-determination. The Kurds’ key leverage is oil: Kurdistan has roughly one-third of Iraq’s total oil reserves, much of it located under the sands near the city of Kirkuk, which was once a stronghold of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria."

  Cofty: "Kurdistan is a region not a state. The oil belongs to Iraq."
  ______
  Terry: The NYTimes quote says "Kurdish Oil" and says it is what makes the Kurds important. "The Kurds' key leverage is oil."
  ______
  Cofty: "There are so many fanciful assertions in this thread. Typical, myopic, self-loathing rhetoric."
  _______
  Terry: Why do you have get so personal so quickly, Cofty?
  It is unfriendly and non-productive, imho.
  _______
  Cofty: "your assertion that the Syrian conflict was not triggered by Assad's violent reaction to popular protest against his oppressive rule is the most outrageously biased and wrong-headed statement in this entire thread.

  It is straight out of Putin's playbook and the sort of gas-lighting spewed daily by RT.

  You are more guilty of subjective and manipulated opinions than your readers."
  _____
  
  Cofty, Community Guidelines on this discussion group indicate its purpose is friendly discussion. That's really important.
  

  Be nice

  We're a global community of people from many different cultures and backgrounds. Not everyone is going to share the same beliefs or opinions but everyone has the right to feel comfortable using and visiting the site.

  So please be polite and respectful in your interactions with other members. This includes the moderators who work hard to keep things on track.
• 
  65

  KURD is the word - and the word is KURD

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  kurd is the word - the word is kurd________who the heck are they?.

  once upon a time, world war one ended and three people created a new place out of thin air called: iraq.

  (gertrude bell, lawrence of arabia, winston churchill).this new country was divided up into 3 chunks:kurdsunnishia_____solemn promises made by colonel t.e.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Terry

  
  
  Let's take being a JW as an example.
  
  On the outside the Org looks to be one way, on the inside it is another.
  Once you are IN ... the mindset is self-confirming and rules out EVERY other source of information.
  Then too, you are taught how to REFUTE even good sounding arguments and absolutely to avoid EX-Jdubs. (We know why).
  
  (I keep that in mind when I'm warned away from certain commentators.
  I see for myself and make up my own mind (often requiring research).
  
  If you leave the Org you can become so upset and biased it becomes impossible to see any aspect of the fellowship as having value at any time. Or, you might remain friendly, kind, and reasonable in your attempts at dialogue.
  ______
  Lists of MEDIA include:
  the frivolous, the liars, the clueless
  as well as:
  genuine fact finding.
  So many YouTube channels peddle POV analysis. And many, if not most, are simply crap.
  There ARE good ones. Ya gotta search.
  
  I prefer Documentaries when I can find them and books by "been there/done that" authors.