Homeland

[brandonislegend]

great episode.

[ItsMillerTime]

great episode.

GREAT episode. That's what I like to see out of Homeland... motherfvcking spy games.

[longhornfan1234]

Saul is a real n!gga. He was going to sacrifice his life for the greater good.

[KevinNYC]

Saul is a real n!gga. He was going to sacrifice his life for the greater good.

a mensch.

[Thorpesaurous]

He was pissed!!!

And it was a good scene. It had some genuine tension.

[KevinNYC]

He was pissed!!!

And it was a good scene. It had some genuine tension.

The great dramatic thrust of this event is by having Saul in danger, they are personalizing collateral damage.

If the logic of the drone war is that we are at war and sometimes even when you follow your best intentions non-combatants die in war, then they should have taken the strike on Haqqani at the first instance. Their medical student asset was dead, a high value target was there and was surrounded by militants.
One civilian was there. Saul. If that civilian was not Saul, they would have taken that strike 99 out of 100 times.

[KevinNYC]

Anyone watching The Affair? It's pretty good. The first episodes are better, but a story you don't see much.

[Thorpesaurous]

The great dramatic thrust of this event is by having Saul in danger, they are personalizing collateral damage.

If the logic of the drone war is that we are at war and sometimes even when you follow your best intentions non-combatants die in war, then they should have taken the strike on Haqqani at the first instance. Their medical student asset was dead, a high value target was there and was surrounded by militants.
One civilian was there. Saul. If that civilian was not Saul, they would have taken that strike 99 out of 100 times.

I agree. And it was smart from a story telling angle, because Saul is among the only characters left on the show that has enough value to be worth doing this with and still drive the conflict.

[Thorpesaurous]

Anyone watching The Affair? It's pretty good. The first episodes are better, but a story you don't see much.

I've been watching it. I've liked it so far. The best thing is that it's not a common thing on TV at the moment. And I do like the double side of the story gimmick.

I think it's a little unfortunate they went to the murder well, because it felt like their was enough here just with the affair portion of the story. But I like the slow reveal of even who it is that was murdered. And now that they've revealed the coke angle it's making enough more sense that I have less problem riding out the murder stuff.

And I guess my other gripe is that the two sides of the story don't seem that consistent. Sometimes she seems more hesitant on her side of it, and at other times she seems more hesitant on his side. I feel like the variances in the behavior from angle to angle could be a little more defined, and it would make that affect work better. But either way it's an interesting touch.

And just in the last few weeks I started to get this theory:

[COLOR="White"]That what we're seeing is actually his book. [/COLOR]

And apparently I'm not the only one.

[longhornfan1234]

The great dramatic thrust of this event is by having Saul in danger, they are personalizing collateral damage.

If the logic of the drone war is that we are at war and sometimes even when you follow your best intentions non-combatants die in war, then they should have taken the strike on Haqqani at the first instance. Their medical student asset was dead, a high value target was there and was surrounded by militants.
One civilian was there. Saul. If that civilian was not Saul, they would have taken that strike 99 out of 100 times.

You would drone an American citizen who isn't a terrorist and hasn't violated any American or International laws? I'm glad you're not in charge.

[Thorpesaurous]

Here's an amusing article from Grantland on the missing characters from Homeland's past. In addition to it's amusing observations, it sort of points to my issue about this show seemingly just disregarding it's history pretty completely. Especially the stuff about Jivadi at the bottom. A lot of shows sweep old stories under the rug. I still have friends waiting for the Russian to come back in The Sopranos. But I can't think of anything that does it at this level.


Homeland is not known for making sense for more than two or three episodes in a row. When everything is working, it can be a gripping thriller, but more often than not, especially over the last two seasons, it runs off the rails, throwing weird, unnecessary shocks, and, in a pinch, a redheaded ghost-terrorist at viewers. The past few seasons have forgotten one of the lessons of the first season

[KevinNYC]

You would drone an American citizen who isn't a terrorist and hasn't violated any American or International laws? I'm glad you're not in charge.

Do you understand what the euphemism collateral damage means? Also the CIA understands it's at war. Soldiers die when you go to war.



Saul would not be the target of the attack, the terrorists would be the target of the attack and CIA members do die in the service of their country.

The point of my message (which you missed) is that by framing it this way, the makers of Homeland are you making you ask questions.

This is also hilarious because you have a whole shtick going that before 9/11 Clinton should have used cruise missile (waaaaay less precise than a drone) to bomb an entire farm comlex to kill Bin Laden along with lots of women and children and several members of the royal family of an ally of the US. You like to pretend this was an obvious call and the American would have backed Clinton on this move even though children would have died. Both of those contentions are false. It was especially not an easy call because in order to ensure that Bin Laden you would need to bomb a greater area which would kill more people. You also couldn't be sure Bin Laden would be there when the bombs fell because it would have TAKEN HOURS TO GET THE BOMBS TO DROP. Can you imagine the outcry in 2000 if you killed a bunch of women and children and Bin Laden had left hours earlier? Also an attack that missed would have led to Bin Laden going underground like he did after 9/11.

It was only after 9/11 that public support was there for killling Bin Laden regardless of the consequences. The event you keep hyping was even before the USS Cole Bombing. If you remember Bush didn't even do shit against Bin Laden UNTIL 9/11. The Cole Bombing wasn't even enough for the new administration to make him top priority.

I suspect you may be ignorant of the fact that Clinton and CIA tried other ways of getting Bin Laden at Tarnak farms, but failed. You claims are just pure 20/20 hindsight.

[longhornfan1234]

Do you understand what the euphemism collateral damage means? Also the CIA understands it's at war. Soldiers die when you go to war.



Saul would not be the target of the attack, the terrorists would be the target of the attack and CIA members do die in the service of their country.

The point of my message (which you missed) is that by framing it this way, the makers of Homeland are you making you ask questions.

This is also hilarious because you have a whole shtick going that before 9/11 Clinton should have used cruise missile (waaaaay less precise than a drone) to bomb an entire farm comlex to kill Bin Laden along with lots of women and children and several members of the royal family of an ally of the US. You like to pretend this was an obvious call and the American would have backed Clinton on this move even though children would have died. Both of those contentions are false. It was especially not an easy call because in order to ensure that Bin Laden you would need to bomb a greater area which would kill more people. You also couldn't be sure Bin Laden would be there when the bombs fell because it would have TAKEN HOURS TO GET THE BOMBS TO DROP. Can you imagine the outcry in 2000 if you killed a bunch of women and children and Bin Laden had left hours earlier? Also an attack that missed would have led to Bin Laden going underground like he did after 9/11.

It was only after 9/11 that public support was there for killling Bin Laden regardless of the consequences. The event you keep hyping was even before the USS Cole Bombing. If you remember Bush didn't even do shit against Bin Laden UNTIL 9/11. The Cole Bombing wasn't even enough for the new administration to make him top priority.

I suspect you may be ignorant of the fact that Clinton and CIA tried other ways of getting Bin Laden at Tarnak farms, but failed. You claims are just pure 20/20 hindsight.

Killing an American citizen is different than killing arabs who aren't American citizens. They're not protected by US Constitution.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...n_1514895.html

Former CIA agent:

"We saw a security detail, a convoy, and we saw bin Laden exit the vehicle, clearly," Crumpton told CBS's Lara Logan, describing aerial images captured by a drone flying somewhere outside of Kandahar. "The optics were spot in, it was beaming back to us, CIA headquarters. We immediately alerted the White House, and the Clinton administration

[KevinNYC]

Killing an American citizen is different than killing arabs who aren't American citizens. They're not protected by US Constitution
You're still missing the point by a mile. You're confusing a criminal being punished and a soldier fighting on behalf of his county.

A soldier killed while storming the beach at Normandy is not the same thing as a murderer killed in the electric chair. Saul was in danger because he was an active participant in a counter terrorism operation. They didn't stop the drone strike because Saul was an American. They stopped it because it was someone they knew. The head of the CIA was happy they stopped it because it saved embarrassing the agency. Saul as you pointed knew this was the wrong call and as you said acted like a "real *****." Saul knew as soldier, this was the wrong call and if they spared him many more might die.

This is a clever stratagem on behalf of the producers because they know the audience knows and cares for Saul so it personalizes the concept of collateral damage.

US soldiers die in war in service of their country. CIA Agents who die in the line of duty also die in service of their country[QUOTE=longhornfan1234]
Former CIA agent:

"We saw a security detail, a convoy, and we saw bin Laden exit the vehicle, clearly," Crumpton told CBS's Lara Logan, describing aerial images captured by a drone flying somewhere outside of Kandahar. "The optics were spot in, it was beaming back to us, CIA headquarters. We immediately alerted the White House, and the Clinton administration

[KevinNYC]

Your whole "We would have gotten Bin Laden if not for you meddling kids, I mean President Clinton" shtick is hilarious because it rests on the premise that it was overwhelming obvious that Bin Laden was a danger to the domestic US and no cost should have been spared. And the rest of the country including the Republicans agreed with this assessment

This is just simply false in 1996.

It's false after the embassy bombings in 1998.

The attack on the Cole showed their growing ambitions. It took place the month before George W. Bush was elected president. It would take the CIA a few months to determine it was Al Qaeda. They issued a "preliminary judgement on Dec 21 that it was Al Qaeda. Do you think this was enough to invade Afghanistan? Do you think the Congress or the American would have agreed, especially with a new president about to come it?

And what about that New President. You love to point out how Clinton failed at his obvious tasks. So what did the new administration do? What did they do after being briefed by the Prior Administration that Al Qaeda was the number one threat? Here's Richard Clarke's memo saying it urgent that Principals meet on Al Qaeda. He send it 5 days into the new administration. That urgent meeting was eventually held on September 4th, 2001.

What about the Response the USS Cole Attack? Yesterday's news. Stale.

From the 9/11 report.

(National Security Advisor Condoleezza) Rice told us that there was never a formal, recorded decision not to retaliate specifically for the Cole attack. Exchanges with the President, between the President and (Director of Central Intelligence George) Tenet, and between herself and (Secretary of State Gen. Colin) Powell and (Secretary of Defense Donald) Rumsfeld had produced a consensus that 'tit-for-tat' responses were likely to be counterproductive."

The report states the new team at the Pentagon didn't push for action.

"On the contrary, Rumsfeld thought that too much time had passed and his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, thought that the Cole attack was 'stale.'

The plain truth is the new adminstration did not think Al Qaeda was an urgent threat. Their policy was still being worked on Sept 10, 2001 and that was a three phase effort that would span into 2004. The fact that they didn't treat it as an urgent threat belies your whole point.