Do the Germans or Japanese Deserve Your New Car Purchase?

In contrast to Germany, where Volkswagen is headquartered, Japan is giving important support to the rebuilding of a democratic Iraq:

"JAPAN STANDS BY AMERICA "December 13, 2003 -- Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has given the go-ahead for the deployment of 600 ground troops to Iraq early next year. They will be supported by air and naval units. It's a major victory for the Bush administration. ... "[T]wo Japanese diplomats and their Iraqi driver were gunned down in Tikrit the weekend before last. But their murder, and threats from al Qaeda that Japan will be attacked if it assists the U.S.-led coalition, seem only to have stiffened Koizumi's resolve. ... "It makes South Korea's promised deployment of 3,000 troops more likely to happen.

"And - with forces of 28 other countries already helping the U.S. in Iraq - it underlines the relative isolation of France, Germany and Belgium, the European states that opposed the forceful removal of Saddam Hussein. ... "Koizumi believes that Japan's honor is at stake: "The United States is Japan's only ally," he said, "and it is striving very hard to build a stable and democratic government in Iraq . . . Japan must also be a trustworthy ally to the U.S."

Source:

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Germany's government, on the other hand, ran a gratuitously anti-American election campaign, joined France and Russia in sabotaging U.N. support for the removal of Saddam Hussein, has refused to commit troops to suppress continued Baathist and jihadist terrorism in Iraq, is refusing to cancel debts for contracts made in support of Saddam, and is now shrilly complaining that it won't be offered Iraq rebuilding contracts paid for by U.S. taxpayers.

If you care about democracy in the Middle East and an end to terrorism originating from that venue -- and are trying to decide between a German or Japanese car -- I'd skip the German car until that country restores its moral fabric to that obtaining when Germany was a loyal NATO ally and appreciated the U.S. as the nation that defended Germany from Soviet takeover and was foremost in pressing for its reunification.

Reply to
Richard Schulman
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Do you work for Toyota, Honda or Nissan?

If you were *really* serious about supporting American diplomacy, wouldn't you suggest buying an American car instead of a Japanese car?

Oh, yeah, that's right...your only *real* intention here was to flame the VW group.

Reply to
JCF

Nice try, but no. I've been a regular but infrequently posting member of this newsgroup for two years and am the owner of a 2002 Passat, which I'm quite happy with so far. But I wouldn't buy a German car right now, for reasons given in my post.

The subject heading was a takeoff on similarly titled recent thread in this newsgroup. I think buying a good American car is a fine idea.

Nope. As I said in my post, I look forward to Germany returning to a more admirable foreign policy, but until then, I'm recommending that people who care about establishing democracies in the Middle East and suppressing terrorism funded and organized from that region not buy a German (or French) car.

Reply to
Richard Schulman

Inline

Nah, he's just got a lit menorah up his tuchus.

"Asked whether the exclusion of those countries from bidding on construction contracts violates international law, Bush said, "I don't know what you're talking about by international law. I better consult my lawyer."

source:

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--TW So China comes out and the US goes isolationist?

Reply to
Tundra Wookie

what a bloody ridiculous post. I suggest you inform yourself of the issues first. here's a start:

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cp

Reply to
cp

Whoops.

Now he's just going to call you a "useful idiot" and post some data provided by a neo-con group to "prove" that Saddam and Osama were bosom buddies.

Reply to
Brandon Sommerville

My VW was made in Mexico and my Honda was made in America. And is Chrysler American or German now? Just buy the car you want.

Reply to
John Rutledge

News events this morning haven't been kind to my critics. Had the advice and all-out efforts of Germany's Schroeder government and France's Chirac government prevailed, Saddam Hussein and his Baathist allies would still be murdering, raping, gassing, and funding international terrorism.

Now Saddam doesn't even have a rat-hole outside Tikrit to call his little kingdom any more, and the Mideast and world will be better for the change.

Let Germany and France receive the anger of international consumers until their governments unreservedly rejoin humanity's ranks.

Reply to
Richard Schulman

Did he have WMDs in his pocket?

Reply to
Brandon Sommerville

And that's exactly why I don't buy American cars. Well, the actual reason is that they're not worth their money (steel tarifs come to mind). The US just cleaned their own mess (they recruited Saddam to fight Iran), why would any country get involved besides for the contracts?? France and Germany are the few countries that stand for their values instead of their and other countries money.

Reply to
Baudolino

Richard Schulman:

Brandon Sommerville:

You're so predictable, Brandon. But the nits being picked today and seen around the world were all from Saddam's beard.

The WMDs will show up, just as Saddam did eventually. Meanwhile, another of your previous scoffs fell by the wayside today: proof that Saddam Hussein was the key backer of 9/11:

=-=-=-=-=-=

Terrorist behind September 11 strike was trained by Saddam By Con Coughlin London Telegraph, Dec. 12, 2003

Iraq's coalition government claims that it has uncovered documentary proof that Mohammed Atta, the al-Qaeda mastermind of the September 11 attacks against the US, was trained in Baghdad by Abu Nidal, the notorious Palestinian terrorist.

Details of Atta's visit to the Iraqi capital in the summer of 2001, just weeks before he launched the most devastating terrorist attack in US history, are contained in a top secret memo written to Saddam Hussein, the then Iraqi president, by Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti, the former head of the Iraqi Intelligence Service.

The handwritten memo, a copy of which has been obtained exclusively by the Telegraph, is dated July 1, 2001 and provides a short resume of a three-day "work programme" Atta had undertaken at Abu Nidal's base in Baghdad.

In the memo, Habbush reports that Atta "displayed extraordinary effort" and demonstrated his ability to lead the team that would be "responsible for attacking the targets that we have agreed to destroy".

The second part of the memo, which is headed "Niger Shipment", contains a report about an unspecified shipment - believed to be uranium - that it says has been transported to Iraq via Libya and Syria.

Although Iraqi officials refused to disclose how and where they had obtained the document, Dr Ayad Allawi, a member of Iraq's ruling seven-man Presidential Committee, said the document was genuine.

"We are uncovering evidence all the time of Saddam's involvement with al-Qaeda," he said. "But this is the most compelling piece of evidence that we have found so far. It shows that not only did Saddam have contacts with al-Qaeda, he had contact with those responsible for the September 11 attacks."

Although Atta is believed to have been resident in Florida in the summer of 2001, he is known to have used more than a dozen aliases, and intelligence experts believe he could easily have slipped out of the US to visit Iraq.

Abu Nidal, who was responsible for the failed assassination of the Israeli ambassador to London in 1982, was based in Baghdad for more than two decades.

Source (free registration required):

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Reply to
Richard Schulman

Perhaps, if we don't have to turn him over for a civil trial in Iraq for a few weeks, we may be able to have a chat with him, and find out if he placed WMDs in Syria, or still has something hidden in Iraq.

I'm no fan of our intelligence community, or of Bush's willingness to act on slanted information, but there were just too many metal shipments into Iraq, and too many reports of weapons works, for us to have found NOTHING. That's just too clean.

Maybe we'll get a better idea in a few weeks. In the mean time, let's pray for our soldiers during the short term desperate increase in attacks we can expect, and then pray for an oppportunity to get them the hell out of there, and bring them home!

Reply to
REInvestments

So you don't think U.S. money has been pouring into Germany, both government and private, since say.......WWII?

Reply to
REInvestments

Tell it to these celebrating Iraqi's:

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I have some Canadian friends and they make it a point to communicate that your hatred of America and our president is not universally shared up there. How convenient it must be to benefit from sitting in the slipstream of the good that America does for the world and judge us - while you do nothing. BTW, congrats on your new pro-American PM. That must drive you crazy.

Reply to
John Rutledge

So do I. Now all we have to do is *find* one...

-- Mike Smith

Reply to
Mike Smith

Well, we did know Saddam was real.

We'll see if it holds up to scrutiny. Your last bit of evidence failed miserably once you realized that the Weekly Standard's editor, the author of the article, Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld are all members of Project for a New American Century, a radical group that promotes American geostrategic preponderance in world affairs and has strongly advocated regime change in Iraq since the 1990s.

Who knows, this one may be the right one, but it doesn't change the fact that Bush & Co lied through their teeth to the world to get the results that they wanted.

Reply to
Brandon Sommerville

It's not a hatred of America, it's a dislike of being lied to by the American President. When asked for evidence, the world got more hand waving and threats of economic retaliation.

Reply to
Brandon Sommerville

John Rutledge

Brandon Sommerville:

There were no lies by the American president -- except in the fevered partisan imaginations of his opponents. Characteristically, you are again seeking to change the subject into carping at President Bush and provoking a long unfocused partisan brawl in this newsgroup rather than face the fact, so clear to billions of people this morning, that the world is a far better for place for the mass murderer and terrorist funder Saddam Hussein having been removed from power and extracted Saturday from his Tikrit-area rat hole, no thanks to Germany, France, and Russia.

Whence my request to those contemplating a new car purchase to abstain from purchasing German or French cars until better foreign policy behavior is forthcoming from Berlin and Paris.

Reply to
Richard Schulman

Right. Except for the tons of WMDs that he had ready for immediate use. I know, I know, details, details...

No, I was explaining to John that as a rule we don't hate Americans up here and was explaining why there was dislike of Bush.

No one is upset that Saddam has been captured and no one is arguing that the world is indeed a better place without him.

And there's nothing partisan about that, is there? Nope, just good ol' Richard sticking up for what's right in the world. Give me a break.

Reply to
Brandon Sommerville

Brandon Sommerville wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@news.teranews.com:

He did grow a beard

Reply to
William Munns

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