No, you're doing it all wrong. What you need to do with facts that disagree with State Department propaganda is to lazily label them as conspriacy theories and call it a day.

No matter what the West does or does not do someone somewhere will find a way to blame us.

How is it not the fault of the West?

The people of the Middle East didn't ask Great Britain to bring it's imperialistic dick and draw up a dozen countries out of nothing after WWII, nor install monarchs to sell oil cheaply to British Petroleum while the citizens were left to fend for themselves.

The people of the Middle East didn't ask for the Palestinians to pay the price for Nazi war crimes by seizing land for the benefit of immigrants from Europe.

The people of the Middle East didn't ask England and America to violently overthrow the democracy of Iran after it dared lay claim to the benefits of oil production, and installed the brutal Shah who ruled for decades.

The people of the Middle East didn't ask the CIA to put their stooge, Saddam Hussein, in power in Iraq, nor launch an invasion of Iran.

The people of the Middle East ask for American support for every brutal dictator in the region, whether it be Egypt or Iraq or Iran or Saudi Arabia.

Hint: There were no drone attacks in Syria nor US support for the rebels when Assad's own people tried to rebel against him and he proceeded to gas them

Hint: there is no civil war in Syria, and Assad never ordered gas attacks.

Guns and fighters and money come from Assad's enemies, not Syria. And who is stupid enough to believe that Assad would order gas attacks the day weapon inspectors arrived in the country? Or why he would suddenly use them when his military was making gains against the opposition, instead of the year before when the Syrian government was losing ground?

This is as asinine as whining about what a mess indian and black communities were in 1900, and whining some more when someone mentions slavery or the Trail of Tears.

Defense spending HAS been cut back

Dressing up the end of the overt occupation of Iraq and reducing the occupation of Afghanistan as a cut for the benefit of the rubes does NOT make it one. The United States is still spending more than the rest of the planet combined and that's going to change any time soon.

severely

You're using that word, severely....

Then the United States wouldn't be trying it's hardest to renew a cold war with Russia at the same time it's continuing it's half dozen dirty wars throughout the ME east at the same time it's ramping up AFRICOM at the same time it's preparing for the third war on Iraq.

quit funding NATO

Then the Pentagon would lose the deflection that NATO provides. Libya isn't a war, it's a limited NATO operation with no boots on the ground!

ends up being the US warmongering the world

FTFY. Who's going to protect the world from the U.S.?

Its about time the US stopped paying for the defense of Europe, and let them pay their own way for that.

LOLz. You think the European share of of the Pentagon's ~1000 military bases around the world has anything to do with "defense"?

Far more than just Free Syria. The United States has spent years arming 'radical muslims' to fight Assad, and now wants to attack these armed radicals. You wouldn't think Americans would be so eager to get punked by the USG a second time after the invasion of Iraq, but two beheading videos is all it takes.

Sure thing:

• "The 9 page, extensive report has since been vindicated many times over with revelations of US, NATO, and Persian Gulf complicity in raising armies of extremists within Libya and along Syria's borders. ISIS itself, which is claimed to occupy a region stretching from northeastern Syria and across northern and western Iraq, has operated all along Turkey's border with Syria, "coincidentally" where the US CIA has conducted years of "monitoring" and arming of "moderate" groups.

   
  In fact, the US admits it has armed, funded, and equipped "moderates" to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. In a March 2013 Telegraph article titled, "US and Europe in âmajor airlift of arms to Syrian rebels through Zagreb'," it was reported that a single program included 3,000 tons of weapons sent in 75 planeloads paid for by Saudi Arabia at the bidding of the United States. The New York Times in its article, "Arms Airlift to Syria Rebels Expands, With C.I.A. Aid," admits that the CIA assisted Arab governments and Turkey with military aid to terrorists fighting in Syria constituting hundreds of airlifts landing in both Jordan and Turkey."

And for our "allies"

• "But in the years they were getting started, a key component of ISISâ(TM)s support came from wealthy individuals in the Arab Gulf States of Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Sometimes the support came with the tacit nod of approval from those regimes; often, it took advantage of poor money laundering protections in those states, according to officials, experts, and leaders of the Syrian opposition, which is fighting ISIS as well as the regime."

At what point do Middle-Eastern people begin to take some responsibility for their own problems?

I see the answer to my question is "not any time soon". The people in the Middle East would like nothing more than to be left alone, but western powers have been actively fucking with them for over a hundred years.

How, exactly, is your average shmoe living in Yemen or Saudi Arabia supposed to "take responsibility" in the face of drone attacks and western support for brutal dictatorships?

Any excuse to dismiss the entire post so you don't have try and make an actual response to any of the actual points.

Fractions of a penny on the pork barrel dollar. Slash military spending to a reasonable size - down to the National/Coast/Air Guards - and you'd have far more money to spend on infrastructure and R&D. We could have gone to Mars long ago if NASA's budget was a trillion dollars per year.

You do know that almost all the people fighting ISIS are Muslims themselves, right?

This. FINALLY someone points out that these people are doing this because of what they BELIEVE. People are always talking about how these people are psychopaths and they just want power...and no one seems to want to point out that these people believe a book that TELLS THEM TO DO EXACTLY WHAT THEY ARE DOING.

Wow. It's like America went through the Iraq invasion and decided the lesson to be learned was: suck down USG propaganda by the supertanker and be ready to demand the blood of Muslims on a moment's notice.

ISIS doesn't exist because of the Koran. ISIS exists because the U.S. and the Saudis have been busy funding and training and arming the very 'radical muslims' you are complaining about, to fight Assad in Syria. And because of a backlash to the sectarian, corrupt and violent government headed by al-Maliki.

Now, before some mouth breather starts up with the "you question the storyline? you must support the terrahrists" bullshit, the point here isn't that ISIS are nice people. The point is that if you want to complain about the armed fundamentalist muslims, start at the U.S. State Department, and stop pretending all their motivations are based on religion.

Either there is a not-so-small extremist element in Islam, or a silent majority who refuses to do anything about it.

First, the same sort of idiots were making this same idiot claim after the 911 attacks. Just because you can't be bothered to read about denuciations of terrorism doesn't mean that they didn't happen.

Second, you do know that the only reason ISIS exists is because Assad's enemies - chiefly the United States and Saudi Arabia - have been funding and arming the very "radicals" you are now complaining about?

Third, name one instance of "radical Islam" that isn't directly financed by western imperialists (Syria) or is a backlash to western imperialism (Iranians overthrowing the western-backed Shah).

Hitting their command/control and training operations, from which tens of thousands of them are directed and supplied, is DEFENSIVE, not aggressive.

So you want to hit Langley, Virginia?

'Humanitarian war' is a contradiction in terms. And, of course, there would be no ISIS or a war in Syria if it wasn't created, armed and funded by the CIA and Saudi Arabia. So when do the airstrikes start on Langley?

So when are you signing up to invade Saudi Arabia? They, along with the CIA, created ISIS in the first place to fight Assad. Saudi Arabia, where they chopped the heads of 8 people last month.

That's convenient.

Step 1: Create an uncivil war with foreign fighters and money, trained and armed by the CIA and Saudi Arabia.

Step 2: Declare areas to be "lawless" due to the war you created, and use that as a reason to make more war with bombs.

Brilliant!

Dur wut? Obama is the one who caused this by creating, funding and arming ISIS in the first place. There would have been no war in Syria for the last 3 years if the United States and it's pals Qatar and Saudi Arabia weren't sending a steady supply of guns and fighters. The Saudi Arabia that chopped off the heads of at least 8 people last month.