War Debate 

We had the debate, and the professor friggin' tricked us. He asked "who wants to be on the pro-war side?" and four people (including me) raised their hands. Then, he asked who wanted to be anti-war, and about 8 people raised their hands. Then, he revealed that everyone who raised their hand would be defending the opposing position, and he put the people who didn't have a preference on the anti-war side, which was originally the pro-war side. Confused? Good. So, I did end up having to argue against the war. I used the argument that it was nothing but a distraction so people wouldn't notice the economy, and I said that Bush is using the war to accuse people of being unpatriotic so they're frightened into supporting him. The professor did a very strange thing during this. He originally said, "I'm not going to say anything. I want to let you guys debate." Then, he started commenting every so often and said that he would be the "fact guy," but wouldn't support any one opinion. Unfortunately, this gradually deteriorated into arguing against the war. So much for being a moderator. First, he said that the justification (other words he used were "propaganda" and "rhetoric") for the war has changed in the last year. He said that when the administration couldn't prove a link to 9/11, they started looking for WMD, and when that failed, they talked about the humanitarian benefits, which, according to the professor, are not working. Of course, in the process, he made the mistake of claiming that Bush specifically mentioned Niger in the State of the Union speech (he called it "sleight of hand"), failing to realize that no specific country was ever named. He also argued that the economy is only improving because of the war, and that we're going to be in debt for years because we can't pay back $87 billion. In addition, he said that when Bush took office, there was a budget surplus thanks to Clinton, and he blamed Dubya for the current deficit. These people are really predictable. There was another fun incident with one of the students. He apparently is very anti-war, so he had to argue for the war. He was trying to make an argument, and he basically said, "uh....we had to invade...because...DAMN IT! I wanted to be on the anti-war side!" He later called President Bush a "nut-job" and said Clinton was better. I think I've written too much again, but war debates are always fun. I do like how the professor was open to all points of view, but it bothers me that he couldn't stay neutral for 60 minutes of his life. I have to go to band practice in about 15 minutes, but when I come back, I want to write some stuff about political correctness that's been bugging me lately. I may submit it to the new blog showcase if it's good enough. Until then, blog safely, and don't put words in the president's mouth.

UPDATE
In my rush to get this written before I had to leave, I left out a couple points. In addition to the statements I've already listed, my professor said a couple other idiotarian things. First, he claimed that Donald Rumsfeld supposedly started planning the Iraq war 3 hours after the WTC attacks. He also said that the U.S. funds more terrorism than any other country in the world (shocking, isn't it?). He gave examples of various covert military operations and assassinations, but I fail to see how that counts as terrorism. The U.S. doesn't attack innocent people. I'll remind you that this is the professor who thought Wesley Clark had already won when he announced his candidacy, and he thinks Bush is only president because he has more money. It was funny to hear him talking about last night's Democratic debate, though. He said he was very disappointed, and he found the candidates "uncharismatic and uninspiring." Well, maybe that's because they haven't told us any of their plans yet! As far as I know, their policy is to do the opposite of what Bush would do. In fact, I think I'll give that policy a name: WWDD--What Wouldn't Dubya Do? I doubt it'll catch on, but I still think it's pretty accurate.