Marine talk Apr 20, 2007 4:03PM PST

responses: FF_Killa~ Yeah, in Fahrenheit as well as Columbine Moore does stretch a couple things to feed his agenda but Columbine is very interesting/effective..... well, ok it didn't change anyone's mind on gun control but once again it made Canada look great. Why We Fight's a better documentary than Fahrenheit though. As for Thanks for Smoking yes it's very funny elie~ Yeah, ever since Satan basically knew everything in and out in the Bible, creeps have been the smartest among us..... which is why we should act NOW to kill all MENSA members(kidding) Anyway, we had a Marine who's been in Iraq and I think a former student of my English AP teacher's class speak for this same class. Some of the more important parts of this(Not EXACT quotes, but nothing that skews what was said): Disclaimer: when (laughter) appears it's audience laughter Girl: "Do you think we should pull out?" Marine: "No. 1) it's a slap in the face to the men and women who died and what are they dying for if we tuck our tails and run? 2) It'll take months and I understand.... now I'm told your the smart people so I don't want to get in a political debate here, but while I understand that a lot of you don't agree with the war but the fact is we ARE there and our pulling out will just make things worse. The police there are not ready to handle things without our help, they still need the government to mature. So no, our pulling out will only worsen the situation." Other Girl: "Now that your back here, what are some differences you notice?" Marine: "Well, your news is about the most biased thing I've ever seen. It's all negative. They show only what's bad in Iraq. There are many, many people that want us there and understand that if we leave things will only get worse. They show only the people who don't want us there. They don't show.. now granted Iraqis don't recognize Christmas but we were out there handing out presents despite danger and on Halloween we were handing out candy despite danger to give something back to the Iraqis no matter how little. There was one city(he did give the name I'm just a dumbass and forgot it) where because we made sure to be forceful the civilians there were not afraid to go out and get in the middle of a gunfight between us and insurgents because of the fact we suppressed the enemy about completely. And that's the way it should be." Me: "Do you think we need more troops in Iraq?" Marine: "Ummm.... (pauses) at first we did. But y'know that's always the hardest part is the first couple of months. Now? No, we don't need more troops now. I'm sure you've all heard of Bush sending a few thousand more troops to Iraq. We don't need more troops, we need the capable men and women over there to do their jobs well now." On the massacres in Ballikah(forgive me if the name's wrong, I just heard it today though he said he's sure we knew about it :X) which had no question because it was a part of his presentation before Q&A: "I'm sure you've heard, there was a Marine who had gotten shot by an Iraqi there and well... some Marines supposedly shot a bunch of people in revenge. I hate to say this but those Marines probably DID do it and deserve to go to jail for what they did." On Iraq Police(IP): "We give them these uniforms.. basically what I'm wearing now, blue shirt, navy blue pants.. but because they're afraid of people knowing they're the police, they wear jeans and ski masks. And they don't use the Chevys we gave them either. They'll say 'bad guy, bad guy, take car' and well, if we know it's a really bad person's car we SOMETIMES let them have it. Problem is they watched Fast and Furious way too much(laughter) and then we're patrolling and we see guys with ski masks and jeans with machine guns hanging out the window in a nice sports car and on more than one occassion it's almost gotten ugly. They'll get out of the car and say 'Don't shoot IP! IP!(Iraq Police)' and we're like 'Well wear your freaking uniforms then'!(more laughter)" He also drew a couple things like a pie chart with major groups in Western Iraq(where we're mainly stationed) such as Sunnis 20%(whom the Marine has said many don't want us there since Saddam was a Sunni and they got some nice benefits off that, thought some Sunnis DID appreciate our presence), and I think it was Kurds 60% and Shiites the other twenty but those may be switched. He also had a scrap book of news articles and Saddam emblazoned currency(no longer accepted) and a map of where they were stationed with most streets code named after animals. Then pictures(one of which had an IP officer which a girl pointed out was in his uniform. He said 'yeah THAT one is!'(more laughter)) of various things including the "tallest building in Iraq" used to snipe militia(they wanted clearance to explode it but collateral damage would be too great)..... 4 stories tall. Boy: "What would you say to someone who wants to join the military?" Marine: "I think it's the greatest thing you could do for your country. I would talk to someone with experience... I'm sure your teacher will give you my email if you have any questions. Recruiters have a bad habit of stretching the truth." Then a video of them finding a bomb and exploding it(we got more in depth with IEDs but this is the funny part) with his Southern accented friends' "JESUUUS CHRIIIIST!" A girl requested it be played again and it got loud laughter both times. There was much more to this but that's mainly what I remember.