Pat Buchanan: Black Americans should be grateful we brought them over on slave ships!

[HAL 9000 96]

Promise I'll watch it somewhere that isn't at work. So do you commit to its message? Just to be clear...

It's the David Chappellle sketch where he is a blind black man who belongs to the KKK. Actually, I'm wondering the Chappelle sketch that depicts an Escalade shortage when the reparations come through is where he might be getting upset that whitey's going to have to pay out soon.

Oh I remember it now. Wait! The DVD's at home...

Still waiting for him to commit to its content AND be ready to answer serious questions as to the points it brings up (*thinking of getting to 70*)

For now, sadly, I must wait on some human tissue that's on its way for me to do things to in the name of science.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

According to the other thread, BY has now suggested that we fantasised the whole thing. Maybe I will wake up and get out of the shower and find none of this ever happened?

If someone really cares to they can post the links to a list of the choice quotes he's made. Not that it would make any difference - he won't admit to anything; and what's more he won't stand behind his own opinion - which he has defended seriously, dismissed as a joke, and now made out that he didn't say it at all.

Its totally irrational and so is he.

[Heracles 417]

If someone really cares to they can post the links to a list of the choice quotes he's made. Not that it would make any difference - he won't admit to anything; and what's more he won't stand behind his own opinion - which he has defended seriously, dismissed as a joke, and now made out that he didn't say it at all.

Its totally irrational and so is he.

By all means as I am still waiting for those racist posts of mine.

[HAL 9000 96]

According to the other thread, BY has now suggested that we fantasised the whole thing. Maybe I will wake up and get out of the shower and find none of this ever happened?

If someone really cares to they can post the links to a list of the choice quotes he's made. Not that it would make any difference - he won't admit to anything; and what's more he won't stand behind his own opinion - which he has defended seriously, dismissed as a joke, and now made out that he didn't say it at all.

Its totally irrational and so is he.

Oh I think you just volunteered yourself for copy & paste duty brother 6.

We don't want to reach page 100 that-a-way!

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

We'll be at 60 by nightfall!

[HAL 9000 96]

We'll be at 60 by nightfall!

Hey who needs 60 when you can get 70 for the same price?

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

According to the other thread, BY has now suggested that we fantasised the whole thing. Maybe I will wake up and get out of the shower and find none of this ever happened?

If someone really cares to they can post the links to a list of the choice quotes he's made. Not that it would make any difference - he won't admit to anything; and what's more he won't stand behind his own opinion - which he has defended seriously, dismissed as a joke, and now made out that he didn't say it at all.

Its totally irrational and so is he.

Oh I think you just volunteered yourself for copy & paste duty brother 6.

We don't want to reach page 100 that-a-way!

Well its already been done hasn't it. And as I say, its not like he'll admit to anything.

Going by his reasoning, if he were late for work he'd deny the time of day.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

70 is ambitious. This thread is on life support as it is. 60 and let's call it a night.

[HAL 9000 96]

70 is ambitious. This thread is on life support as it is. 60 and let's call it a night.

I WILL call you a racist if you do!

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Oh no! Please don't! I'll cry.

[Peikko 1,575]

You are a shite stirrer though.

[Empress of Groovy 373]

Helmet Pride!

Everyone can join.

[Peikko 1,575]

Helmet pride? Excellent! I'll laquer up.

[Heracles 417]

From prosperity to failed state: how one man destroyed a nation

Peter Godwin

March 28, 2008

ONCE it was Africa's shining city on a hill, a beacon of prosperity and economic growth in a continent shrouded by poverty. Emerging in 1980 from a seven-year civil war against white-settler rule, the newly independent nation of Zimbabwe embraced racial reconciliation and invited the country's whites (one in 20 of the population) to remain and contribute to the new nation.

I was one of those who gladly dismissed Rhodesia and became Zimbabwean. Upon the firm economic infrastructure he had inherited, Robert Mugabe, our first black leader, built a health and education system that was the envy of Africa.

I remember criss-crossing the continent then as Africa correspondent for a British newspaper, and each time I returned to the newly renamed capital of Harare, I was reminded that in comparison to what surrounded it, Zimbabwe was like Switzerland. The roads were well maintained, the elevators worked, electricity was constant, you could drink the water, the steaks were world-renowned. The Zimbabwe dollar was at near-parity with its American namesake.

Today the country is unrecognisable. Zimbabwe has the fastest-shrinking peacetime economy in the world. This week, one US dollar will fetch 55 million Zimbabwe dollars on the street. Hyperinflation has soared well above 100,000%.

Commercial agriculture — the backbone of the economy — lies shattered. All but a few of the country's 5000 large-scale farmers, most of whom were white, have been run off their properties by Government-backed squatters and militia. From being a food exporter, Zimbabwe would now starve without UN famine relief. And even with it, half the population is malnourished. Education and health care have collapsed. In a community ravaged by AIDS, life expectancy has plummeted from about 60 years to about 35, the world's lowest. Zimbabwe has more orphans per capita than almost any other country. Water is undrinkable, power infrequent, roads potholed, fuel scarce, corruption endemic.

Why? It comes down to one man: Robert Mugabe, now in his 28th year in power and still refusing to go. Like Sampson, he would rather pull the temple down around him, would rather destroy Zimbabwe than leave office. The damage he has wrought will take generations to repair. The country's free-fall into failed statehood began in earnest in 2000. That was when the electorate tired of him and his increasingly imperious one-party rule and voted down his attempt to do away with term limits so that he could continue as president.

Mugabe, the one-time guerilla leader who now saw himself as liberator of the country, reacted with astonishing venom. He turned on the newly emboldened black opposition, harassing, imprisoning and torturing their supporters. And he threw off the land those white commercial farmers he had invited to remain in 1980, distributing their farms among his cronies, which helped precipitate the economic catastrophe because few of them had the inclination or technical know-how to farm.

Mugabe became an African Ahab, Melville's "monomaniacal commander", marinating in a toxic brew of hate and denial as he plunged his ship of state down into the dark vortex, railing all the while from the quarterdeck against the great white whale. He blamed Zimbabwe's plunge on the largely symbolic sanctions imposed by the West. And he refused to negotiate with his own, overwhelmingly black, opposition, dismissing them as lackeys of Britain, the former colonial power.

Why do Zimbabweans continue to put up with Mugabe? In large numbers, they don't. Since 2000, most have tried to vote against him in presidential elections, but these were blatantly rigged. Now, as many as 70% of those aged between 18 and 60 have left the country. It's an exodus on a par with the flood of Irish immigrants into America after the potato famine. And it's also the key to how the shattered Zimbabwe state survives — remittances from its diaspora. People like me sending hard currency back to family and friends. By doing so, we inadvertently help Mugabe to survive, too.

Now a sprightly 84-year-old, Mugabe has recently moved into a $26-million palace, with 25 bedroom suites, furnished with Sun King flourishes. He rules as a dictator through a network of army officers. It is on them that he will rely once more to mastermind the presidential election tomorrow. Mugabe has already rejected various constitutional reforms backed by South Africa. Electoral rolls are a joke, stuffed with fictitious voters. Police officers are to be allowed into voting booths "to assist illiterate voters". And votes are to be counted not at individual polling stations but at a single "national command centre" staffed by senior army officers, which is where the rigging will likely take place.

Mugabe has banned most independent observers, instead inviting teams from China, Russia, Iran and Angola — nations with no modern history of free and fair democracy. And finally, the more than 4 million in the Zimbabwe diaspora are not allowed postal votes.

None of this bodes well for Mugabe's two main opponents. Morgan Tsvangirai, of the Movement for Democratic Change, is a veteran of several rigged poll defeats and seems unlikely to fare any better this time, despite the enthusiastic crowds he draws to his rallies. Mugabe's other threat is Simba Makoni, a member of Mugabe's own politburo until he was expelled recently for daring to compete for the presidency.

The only real hope is that the men responsible for carrying out the rigging — Mugabe's secret police, his senior Government apparatchiks and the army leadership — may have lost faith in their leader. Perhaps they will refuse to fiddle the vote, especially because Makoni, a former cabinet minister, is running as a "reformist" candidate, presenting the prospect of change with continuity. It is a very slim prospect. LOS ANGELES TIMES

Edited March 27, 2008 by Boo-Yah!

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

From prosperity to failed state: how one man destroyed a nation

Peter Godwin

March 28, 2008

ONCE it was Africa's shining city on a hill, a beacon of prosperity and economic growth in a continent shrouded by poverty. Emerging in 1980 from a seven-year civil war against white-settler rule, the newly independent nation of Zimbabwe embraced racial reconciliation and invited the country's whites (one in 20 of the population) to remain and contribute to the new nation.

I was one of those who gladly dismissed Rhodesia and became Zimbabwean. Upon the firm economic infrastructure he had inherited, Robert Mugabe, our first black leader, built a health and education system that was the envy of Africa.

I remember criss-crossing the continent then as Africa correspondent for a British newspaper, and each time I returned to the newly renamed capital of Harare, I was reminded that in comparison to what surrounded it, Zimbabwe was like Switzerland. The roads were well maintained, the elevators worked, electricity was constant, you could drink the water, the steaks were world-renowned. The Zimbabwe dollar was at near-parity with its American namesake.

Today the country is unrecognisable. Zimbabwe has the fastest-shrinking peacetime economy in the world. This week, one US dollar will fetch 55 million Zimbabwe dollars on the street. Hyperinflation has soared well above 100,000%.

Commercial agriculture — the backbone of the economy — lies shattered. All but a few of the country's 5000 large-scale farmers, most of whom were white, have been run off their properties by Government-backed squatters and militia. From being a food exporter, Zimbabwe would now starve without UN famine relief. And even with it, half the population is malnourished. Education and health care have collapsed. In a community ravaged by AIDS, life expectancy has plummeted from about 60 years to about 35, the world's lowest. Zimbabwe has more orphans per capita than almost any other country. Water is undrinkable, power infrequent, roads potholed, fuel scarce, corruption endemic.

Why? It comes down to one man: Robert Mugabe, now in his 28th year in power and still refusing to go. Like Sampson, he would rather pull the temple down around him, would rather destroy Zimbabwe than leave office. The damage he has wrought will take generations to repair. The country's free-fall into failed statehood began in earnest in 2000. That was when the electorate tired of him and his increasingly imperious one-party rule and voted down his attempt to do away with term limits so that he could continue as president.

Mugabe, the one-time guerilla leader who now saw himself as liberator of the country, reacted with astonishing venom. He turned on the newly emboldened black opposition, harassing, imprisoning and torturing their supporters. And he threw off the land those white commercial farmers he had invited to remain in 1980, distributing their farms among his cronies, which helped precipitate the economic catastrophe because few of them had the inclination or technical know-how to farm.

Mugabe became an African Ahab, Melville's "monomaniacal commander", marinating in a toxic brew of hate and denial as he plunged his ship of state down into the dark vortex, railing all the while from the quarterdeck against the great white whale. He blamed Zimbabwe's plunge on the largely symbolic sanctions imposed by the West. And he refused to negotiate with his own, overwhelmingly black, opposition, dismissing them as lackeys of Britain, the former colonial power.

Why do Zimbabweans continue to put up with Mugabe? In large numbers, they don't. Since 2000, most have tried to vote against him in presidential elections, but these were blatantly rigged. Now, as many as 70% of those aged between 18 and 60 have left the country. It's an exodus on a par with the flood of Irish immigrants into America after the potato famine. And it's also the key to how the shattered Zimbabwe state survives — remittances from its diaspora. People like me sending hard currency back to family and friends. By doing so, we inadvertently help Mugabe to survive, too.

Now a sprightly 84-year-old, Mugabe has recently moved into a $26-million palace, with 25 bedroom suites, furnished with Sun King flourishes. He rules as a dictator through a network of army officers. It is on them that he will rely once more to mastermind the presidential election tomorrow. Mugabe has already rejected various constitutional reforms backed by South Africa. Electoral rolls are a joke, stuffed with fictitious voters. Police officers are to be allowed into voting booths "to assist illiterate voters". And votes are to be counted not at individual polling stations but at a single "national command centre" staffed by senior army officers, which is where the rigging will likely take place.

Mugabe has banned most independent observers, instead inviting teams from China, Russia, Iran and Angola — nations with no modern history of free and fair democracy. And finally, the more than 4 million in the Zimbabwe diaspora are not allowed postal votes.

None of this bodes well for Mugabe's two main opponents. Morgan Tsvangirai, of the Movement for Democratic Change, is a veteran of several rigged poll defeats and seems unlikely to fare any better this time, despite the enthusiastic crowds he draws to his rallies. Mugabe's other threat is Simba Makoni, a member of Mugabe's own politburo until he was expelled recently for daring to compete for the presidency.

The only real hope is that the men responsible for carrying out the rigging — Mugabe's secret police, his senior Government apparatchiks and the army leadership — may have lost faith in their leader. Perhaps they will refuse to fiddle the vote, especially because Makoni, a former cabinet minister, is running as a "reformist" candidate, presenting the prospect of change with continuity. It is a very slim prospect. LOS ANGELES TIMES

Yes - one man and his administration destroyed a nation with ruinous economic policies, and denying his people the right to vote in fair and free elections.