U.S. Gov charging american citizens for "ferry" out of Beirut????

[sonar732]

I just finished watching a video on cnn.com that stated the U.S. Government is charging their own citizens to board the Marine helicopters waiting for them on U.S. Embassy grounds. WTF????

What a way for our own government to show how much they care.

Guy standing in the door of U.S. Embassy looking at the chopper to freedom and safety. "What do you mean I have to pay the government back? Last time I checked, you were here to protect us, and if that means flying us out of here, so be it."

Mostly everyone here knows that I'm a middle conservative who supports our government, but come on.

[blue3golf]

CNN would say anything to make the current incumbents look bad. Wouldn't watch that channel for anything.

[bigboywooly]

Am not from the US but from England and while I share your sentiments what you have to remember is the large amount of people that are in Lebanon purely for money - and lots of it - tax free too
Always a sticky situation - people flood to danger zones for big bucks then when it kicks off expect everyone else to come running to save them
Its a risk they are putting themselves in

At least your government is on the ball whether they charge or not
I think the British government has supplied a man and a rowboat to get them off

[sonar732]

Update....

After a fury of debates on the Senate floor, the White House has reversed the "standard" policy and are NOT charging.

[Ducimus]

*shrug*

Im honestly not suprised that they orginaly charged for it. Goverment does alot of stupid crap. Only thing i dont understand, is why.. why would any US citizen want to go and live in Lebenon or any other country in that part of the world?! When it comes to "bad things that can happen to you", i would think living anywhere near that part of the world is just asking for it.

[bradclark1]

It's what bigboywooly said. It's the draw of the dollar.

[Ducimus]

Thats not saying much. How so? What are they dong that make so much money? And i dont mean dodging taxes either.

Money would have to be pretty damn good to put your head in a place where someone might want to cut it off when you least expect it.

[bigboywooly]

Theres an awfull lot of construction going on over there to rebuild the last lot of trouble
And typically these sort of countries look to the west for the expertise
Hell there are already western companies in Iraq rebuilding
But like Decimus says - if you put yourself in that position you have noone to blame but yourself

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by bigboywooly

Theres an awfull lot of construction going on over there to rebuild the last lot of trouble
And typically these sort of countries look to the west for the expertise
Hell there are already western companies in Iraq rebuilding
But like Decimus says - if you put yourself in that position you have noone to blame but yourself

No kidding. There are lots of civilized parts of the world I haven't seen yet, I'll skip those places.

[August]

Originally Posted by bigboywooly

Theres an awfull lot of construction going on over there to rebuild the last lot of trouble
And typically these sort of countries look to the west for the expertise
Hell there are already western companies in Iraq rebuilding
But like Decimus says - if you put yourself in that position you have noone to blame but yourself

Yep. I would make 10 years pay in 6 months working in my field in the ME. Of course 10 years pay doesn't do me any good if I get my head chopped off by some fanatic or get blown up by a stray bomb or missle.

[scandium]

#1 Lebanon was not a war zone until Israel began bombing and ivaded it.

#2 Lebanon is not Iraq or Saudi Arabia. They are a small democratic country (population: 4 million total), and one of the most progressive countries in the region. To talk about it as though it were Saudi Arabia not only does the place a disservice, it makes the poster appear ignorant.

#3 Not only is it a democracy, half of its Parliment is Christian, and English, French, and Armenian are widely spoken there just as Arabic is.

The hypocracy on display here astounds me. Lebanon is precisely the kind of peaceful progressive democracy that the US envisioned Iraq as becoming after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, one of the "dominoes" that once knocked over would cause democracy to spread like wildfire through the ME (the Republican domino democracy theory).

Unfortunately a group of militants formed to fight the IDF during the Israeli occupation of Lebanon commits the tragic stupidity of firing rockets at an Israeli town and kidnapping a pair of Israeli soldiers, and even though this was done without the knowledge, approval, sanction, or plan of the democratic Lebanesegovernment, Isreal - a US client state - decides to undo all of this progress and reduce the country to the same kind of stone age that so much of the rest ME is, and the attitude is "what a hell hole, and people who live there ask for it anyway".

[joea]

Don't forget, I don't know about the United States, but there are loads of immigrants in Canada who have family and visit often. 21,000 registered alone, weren't there lots of Lebanese Christians who went to the USA too??

[scandium]

Originally Posted by joea

Don't forget, I don't know about the United States, but there are loads of immigrants in Canada who have family and visit often. 21,000 registered alone, weren't there lots of Lebanese Christians who went to the USA too??

Indeed. Our Foreign minister puts the number of Canadians in Lebanon at somewhere between 16,000 - 40,000. And at least 8 Canadians have been killed so far by the IDF, and 6 more critically injured. 5 of them were killed when an Israeli aircraft destroyed a house in Southern Lebanon.

Meanwhie:

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/isr...166441755.html

Israel pounded Lebanon from the air and launched limited land attacks across the border today as thousands awaited evacuation. The death toll mounted as the conflict entered its second week with no end in sight.

The Israeli army said its ground troops crossed into southern Lebanon to hit Hezbollah guerilla outposts in "restricted" attacks while Israeli jets pounded the group's Beirut stronghold and the Shweifat area outside the capital.

At least 10 villagers were killed in an Israeli air strike that destroyed several houses in the southern village of Srifa.

At least 17 other people were killed in overnight air strikes on other parts of south and east Lebanon, security sources said.

A big explosion also shook Beirut's southern suburbs not far from its airport during on air raid. Widespread damage was reported.

The conflict has forced around 100,000 Lebanese to flee their homes and many foreigners to flee the country.

One has to wonder where this 100,000 Lebanese nationals are fleeing to and what they're going to do when they get there...

[basilio]

Originally Posted by scandium

The hypocracy on display here astounds me.

I totally agree.
I usually visit the SH3's section forum, and was absolutely shocked to read on this board how many people think that this war is "justified".
While I FULLY respect everybody's opinion, I can't stop worring about all the civilians that were/are being killed everyday.

[STEED]

Originally Posted by bigboywooly

I think the British government has supplied a man and a rowboat to get them off

If they could get away with it they would.