Carter: America tortures
Former President Jimmy Carter said Wednesday he is convinced the United States engages in torture that clearly breaches international law and told CNN President Bush creates his own definition of human rights to escape violating them.
CNN Story
On the other hand, don't forget it's an election year (and a half)
Well, he does have a point.
Americans have certainly tortured prisoners in the recent past.
Not to mention the Extraordinary Renditions process.
Is there even a question? When the Bush administration lists all the tortures that they've classified as not officially torture, that's pretty much an admission of guilt.
Look, if the price of freedom is secret imprisonment and torture we should all be willing...
Carter is: a) a modern-day Democrat, with all that implies, and b) the guy whose Administration couldn't win at the Iranian hostage rescue.
I didn't vote for him either, but -- full disclosure -- mostly out of apathy. Enthusiasm for politics didn't develop until later.
Not to mention the Extraordinary Renditions process.
To bad that does not qualify as torture or you might actually have a point.
But of course we could talk about the treatment of the Irish by the British if you want to look at a country in the western world who set the standards in modern times for the treatment and torture of prisoners.
Not in itself, but it is only done in order to enable torture.
Not in itself, but it is only done in order to enable torture.
Says who? you?
Everybody. There's no other reason to do it.
Everybody. There's no other reason to do it.
Everybody who?
Why of course there is, for interrogation. I fully support it.
But of course we could talk about the treatment of the Irish by the British
But we are not talking about the British - are we. We are talking about Americans who love, endorse, and advocate torture. TheMercenary loves torture? Or does TheMercenary oppose torture by Americans? Based upon a political agenda that supersedes ethics, my bet is that TheMercenary loves Americans doing torture. It is synonymous with those who love and support Cheney - who also publically advocated torture. So which is it, TheMercenary? Do you love torture or do you oppose torture? ... not that I believe he has the balls to answer without being elusive.
But we are not talking about the British - are we. We are talking about Americans who love, endorse, and advocate torture. TheMercenary loves torture? Or does TheMercenary oppose torture by Americans? Based upon a political agenda that supersedes ethics, my bet is that TheMercenary loves Americans doing torture. It is synonymous with those who love and support Cheney - who also publically advocated torture. So which is it, TheMercenary? Do you love torture or do you oppose torture? ... not that I believe he has the balls to answer without being elusive.
I love for us to do whatever it takes to win. We don't torture. Although we do have some people who went over the line in the forms of abuse of detained persons, and many of them were punished. Some were not punished. Now tw, define torture. List all of the things you think are torture that you know the US has used on detained persons in an effort to extract information. I bet you don't have the balls to do it. Do you?
Water-boarding is torture.
But of course we could talk about the treatment of the Irish by the British if you want to look at a country in the western world who set the standards in modern times for the treatment and torture of prisoners.
Oh hell yes. We treated them appallingly.
Doesn't in any way alter the fact that America has given up its moral highground on torture, 'disappearances' in the form of extraordinary renditions, and indefinite imprisonment without legal process.
Why of course there is, for interrogation.
Interrogation by torture.
Interrogation by torture.
Says who?
Water-boarding is torture.
Nawwww... :p
Says who?
Says the fact that they're taking people to secret prisons in torture-friendly countries.
"head-slapping, simulated drowning, and frigid temperatures."
More fraternity pranks being called torture. Puh-leeze. :rolleyes:
Just because our techniques aren't as brutal as Al-Qaeda's methods doesn't make it any more right or justified.
I totally disagree.
We're so firmly in semantics-land here, that just to say what we do is "torture" puts us in moral equivalence with, you know, actual torture, things that nobody disagrees is torture.
And that's where the argument is now: Carter says "America tortures", by his definition of torture, which he has expanded as wide as he can because then we don't have an argument about whether it's ok to slap somebody. Stuff your mama did to you as a kid is now "torture". Stuff you would do to win a $100 bet is now "torture". Stuff weaker than any 15 second segment of Jackass is now "torture". And why. Because it's the only way to win the argument.
Stuff your mama did to you as a kid is now "torture". Stuff you would do to win a $100 bet is now "torture". Stuff weaker than any 15 second segment of Jackass is now "torture". And why. Because it's the only way to win the argument.
Right on -- we can even do more than that. Some people have been able to fast for as many as thirty days or more
and they did it willingly. Imagine what kind of great information we could extract if we withheld food for even longer periods of time! Bring them right to the edge of death and make them talk. In the end it isn't torture -- not a mark on 'em! They'll live. We never ratified -- never even signed -- the Inter-American Convention, so we can do everything from beat someone "less-than-severely" everyday for months on end to perform mock executions so often the prisoner suffers cardiac arrest or embolism from stress. Again:
not torture! Death by natural causes, people pull pranks worse than this, etc etc.
On a parallel, I once had a neighbor with a husband who screamed, insulted, mocked, and called her worthless everyday for years while they were married. She had the nerve to call these non-physical events "abuse" and ended up saying she needed prescribed medication to keep the panic attacks away to function normally in society and sleep at night. Guy never laid a finger on her and now she says she's having trouble with relationships
because someone yelled at her. Whatever. Geeze. My mom yelled at me when I was a kid and I turned out just fine. :rolleyes:
I totally disagree.
We're so firmly in semantics-land here, that just to say what we do is "torture" puts us in moral equivalence with, you know, actual torture, things that nobody disagrees is torture.
You've got it wrong. "Things that nobody disagrees is torture" is essentially the set of things that Al Qaeda does that we don't. You're the one in semantics-land, Mr. "Stuff your mama did to you as a kid".
Yay us that we aren't as bad as Al Qaeda, but it doesn't excuse the things that we do.
Nawwww... :p
As long as you are ok with Americans being treated that way, then fine.
I'm not.
If we adopt the tactics of the enemy we ARE the enemy.
You've got it wrong. "Things that nobody disagrees is torture" is essentially the set of things that Al Qaeda does that we don't.
How is that not what's what I said. What AQ does, everybody agrees is torture. What we do, not everybody agrees is torture. The definers, such as Carter, call it torture in order to make the moral equivalency case.
Yay us that we aren't as bad as Al Qaeda, but it doesn't excuse the things that we do.
But your line of thinking "we are not as bad as Al Qaeda" contains the notion that "we are bad", and now that is your starting point and you're working to prove it. You could just as easily start with "Al Qaeda does much MUCH worse things than we do, 999 times out of 1000, ordered and instructed from the top, motivated by inhumanity as a part of their very nature... and that is what makes Al Qaeda bad and us good. That said, we are overdue for discussions and instruction about where the limits are and why."
But you didn't, and that suggests to me that you are shooting at that moral equivalency notion and I don't understand why.
And that's where the argument is now: Carter says "America tortures", by his definition of torture, which he has expanded as wide as he can because then we don't have an argument about whether it's ok to slap somebody. Stuff your mama did to you as a kid is now "torture". Stuff you would do to win a $100 bet is now "torture". Stuff weaker than any 15 second segment of Jackass is now "torture". And why. Because it's the only way to win the argument.
That is the beauty and curse, depends on which way you take it, of American media. President Carter can say what we do is torture and then someone else can look into it deeper, make a rebuttal, than someone else can take a different viewpoint, make an opinion, and so on. That is the best available way to take at this issue on a subjective topic such as this. It is also the best way to learn.
For my personal view on the topic, I can see how slapping can be considered torture since torture is so situational. If I am a guard and need to take a prisoner somewhere and he resists, so I pistol whip him, that will usually not be seen as torture. But, if I take two kids, this actually happened by the way in Greece, and force them to slap each other as hard as they can while all the guards chant and mock them without any greater purpose, I would definitely consider that torture because it is pointless entertainment for the guards on the behalf of the prisoners. Pistol-whipping is without a doubt considered more brutal than slapping, but when put in different situations, one comes out much worse than the other because of intentions.
When we look farther into the topic, we get a greater understanding and can then make a better judgment on how we should react.
But your line of thinking "we are not as bad as Al Qaeda" contains the notion that "we are bad", and now that is your starting point and you're working to prove it. You could just as easily start with "Al Qaeda does much MUCH worse things than we do, 999 times out of 1000, ordered and instructed from the top, motivated by inhumanity as a part of their very nature... and that is what makes Al Qaeda bad and us good. That said, we are overdue for discussions and instruction about where the limits are and why."
I don't see how that makes us "good". I am not suggesting moral equivalency because the scenario can never allow it with such different environments, but Al Qaeda should not be a factor in this discussion at all. If your child is getting C's in math and he points out that he is doing better than his neighbor, who gets F's consistently, how would that make your child good at math? Whenever I brought up that excuse my father always said that what he is doing doesn't matter and looking back my father was right, and I believe that should also be applied to this situation. What Al Qaeda is doing should not determine how we treat our prisoners since we live in different environments and should strive for different goals, doing so only seems like a cop-out to me unless you can show me otherwise.
How is that not what's what I said. What AQ does, everybody agrees is torture. What we do, not everybody agrees is torture.
Only because it's us saying it's not. Before we were doing it we agreed that it was. That's why the Bush administration had to issue new definitions of torture.
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Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This
tor·ture /ˈtɔrtʃər/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[tawr-cher] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation noun, verb, -tured, -tur·ing.
–noun 1. the act of inflicting excruciating pain, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information, or for sheer cruelty.
2. a method of inflicting such pain.
3. Often, tortures. the pain or suffering caused or undergone.
4. extreme anguish of body or mind; agony.
5. a cause of severe pain or anguish.
–verb (used with object) 6. to subject to torture.
7. to afflict with severe pain of body or mind: My back is torturing me.
8. to force or extort by torture: We'll torture the truth from his lips!
9. to twist, force, or bring into some unnatural position or form: trees tortured by storms.
10. to distort or pervert (language, meaning, etc.).
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[Origin: 1530–40; < LL tortūra a twisting, torment, torture. See tort, -ure]
—Related forms
tor·tur·a·ble, adjective
tor·tured·ly, adverb
tor·tur·er, noun
tor·ture·some, adjective
tor·tur·ing·ly, adverb
—Synonyms 6. See torment.
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This tor·ture (tôr'chər) Pronunciation Key
n.
Infliction of severe physical pain as a means of punishment or coercion.
An instrument or a method for inflicting such pain.
Excruciating physical or mental pain; agony: the torture of waiting in suspense.
Something causing severe pain or anguish.
tr.v. tor·tured, tor·tur·ing, tor·tures
To subject (a person or an animal) to torture.
To bring great physical or mental pain upon (another). See Synonyms at afflict.
To twist or turn abnormally; distort: torture a rule to make it fit a case.
[Middle English, from Old French, from Late Latin tortūra, from Latin tortus, past participle of torquēre, to twist; see terkw- in Indo-European roots.]
tor'tur·er n.
(Download Now or Buy the Book) The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
torture (n.)
c.1495 (implied in torturous), from M.Fr. torture "infliction of great pain, great pain, agony," from L.L. torture "a twisting, writhing, torture, torment," from stem of L. torquere "to twist, turn, wind, wring, distort" (see thwart). The verb is 1588, from the noun. Tortuous "full of twists" is recorded from 1426.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This torture
noun
1. extreme mental distress [syn: anguish]
2. unbearable physical pain
3. intense feelings of suffering; acute mental or physical pain; "an agony of doubt"; "the torments of the damned" [syn: agony]
4. the act of distorting something so it seems to mean something it was not intended to mean [syn: distortion]
5. the deliberate, systematic, or wanton infliction of physical or mental suffering by one or more persons in an attempt to force another person to yield information or to make a confession or for any other reason; "it required unnatural torturing to extract a confession"
verb
1. torment emotionally or mentally [syn: torment]
2. subject to torture; "The sinners will be tormented in Hell, according to the Bible"
WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary (Beta Version) - Cite This Source - Share This
torture [ˈtoːtʃə] verb
to treat (someone) cruelly or painfully, as a punishment, or in order to make him/her confess something, give information etc
Example: He tortured his prisoners; She was tortured by rheumatism/jealousy.
All examples fairly clearly state that the definition of torture includes mental pain or anguish.
How do you like them semantics?
And none of them includes the phrases "organ failure" or "
shock the conscience", as per the Bush administration's redefinitions.
Only because it's us saying it's not. Before we were doing it we agreed that it was. That's why the Bush administration had to issue new definitions of torture.
You can't think of any other reason why we might revisit the official definitions, other than there was a new administration?
Relying on a Supreme Court finding that only conduct that “shocks the conscience” was unconstitutional, the opinion found that in some circumstances not even waterboarding was necessarily cruel, inhuman or degrading, if, for example, a suspect was believed to possess crucial intelligence about a planned terrorist attack, the officials familiar with the legal finding said.
If you have a suspect that's believed to possess crucial intelligence about a planned terrorist attack, do you waterboard him? What if his psych profile indicates that's the only way to get that information out of him in 24 hours?
You can't think of any other reason why we might revisit the official definitions, other than there was a new administration?
Because we want do do something that was previously considered torture, or because we've already started doing something that was previously considered torture. Those are the two possibilities that I see.
This thread is torture. I'm suffering severe mental anguish just reading it. :alien:
That's a sure sign that the right wing is winning the war on torture, to see even poor Aliantha tortured like this.
I thought it was a war on terror? Oh hang on, it's about freeing Iraq. Oh no wait, we're still looking for that slippery little sucker Bin Laden.
Gosh, I'm so confused. I think I'll go have a tim tam!
Because we want do do something that was previously considered torture, or because we've already started doing something that was previously considered torture. Those are the two possibilities that I see.
As of 9/11, everything changed. We face a newly exposed enemy that has a quite different nature than any we've encountered before, requiring a different type of war.
The previous rules were set up for an enemy that didn't routinely use torture because we didn't want it used against us, and we wanted the strongest possible definition. The new reality is based on an enemy that routinely beheads people for their recruitment videos. There's no question that they'd torture, and our rules are not something they pay attention to.
Gosh, I'm so confused. I think I'll go have a tim tam!
Just one?
As of 9/11, everything changed. We face a newly exposed enemy that has a quite different nature than any we've encountered before, requiring a different type of war.
The previous rules were set up for an enemy that didn't routinely use torture because we didn't want it used against us, and we wanted the strongest possible definition. The new reality is based on an enemy that routinely beheads people for their recruitment videos. There's no question that they'd torture, and our rules are not something they pay attention to.
If they don't pay attention to our rules, why bother to change them then? Isn't that in effect giving them the power because we're obviously paying more attention to their rules.
As of 9/11, everything changed.
...
The previous rules were set up for an enemy that didn't routinely use torture because we didn't want it used against us, and we wanted the strongest possible definition. The new reality is based on an enemy that routinely beheads people for their recruitment videos. There's no question that they'd torture, and our rules are not something they pay attention to.
Your reading of pre-9/11 wars must have been a lot less descriptive than mine. Vietnam and World War II, specifically.
Every war since the dawn of man has had this "new reality" and every culture in which torture has played a part in war found it fully justified. This time is no different, except that many in the US are turning a blind eye to the benefits history provides.
"The major means of getting intelligence was to extract information by interrogating prisoners. Torture was an unavoidable necessity. Murdering and burying them follows naturally. You do it so you won't be found out. I believed and acted this way because I was convinced of what I was doing. We carried out our duty as instructed by our masters. We did it for the sake of our country. From our filial obligation to our ancestors. On the battlefield, we never really considered the Chinese humans." -Uno Shintaro, former Japanese officer
The rules were written for the cold war.
As of 9/11, everything changed.
Not everything. Torture is still wrong.
We face a newly exposed enemy that has a quite different nature than any we've encountered before, requiring a different type of war.
The nature of the enemy is irrelevant. Torture is about the nature of ourselves. If that changed after 9-11, then we need to change it back.
So how many people here pontificating want us to win and al-Q to lose? Let's see those hands.
How many people think we're all losers for being in the situation we're in? Let's see those hands.
Sitting on mine, then: the reduction of the Non-Integrating Gap is a strategic necessity to reduce the world's troubles, which are much the likeliest to come from the Gap, compared with from the Global Functioning Core, Old or New.
Yes,
Thomas P.M. Barnett has made quite an impression on me.
What our present Administration is doing is an actual attempt at this. Damned if I can see any legitimate objections to it, I can tell you. I see a lot of false, communisto-fascist-symp speciousness, but nothing any too legitimate by comparison with the goal of shrinking that Gap.
would you like to translate that to simple english UG. There are morons in the house.
So how many people here pontificating want us to win and al-Q to lose? Let's see those hands.
Define "win" in the context of this "war".
Not everything. Torture is still wrong.
That didn't change, just the definition did. The government defined it up... and you're defining it down.
Says the fact that they're taking people to secret prisons in torture-friendly countries.
Hearsay evidence.
Not proof.
No matter how much you want to believe it.
If they don't pay attention to our rules, why bother to change them then?
Good point. That is how we would win IMHO.
As long as you are ok with Americans being treated that way, then fine.
To late.
Not that it is happeing... that you feel it is how they should be treated, since it is how we treat their soldiers.
That didn't change, just the definition did. The government defined it up... and you're defining it down.
I'm leaving it where it was. The government "defining it up" is an admission of guilt.
If you have a suspect that's believed to possess crucial intelligence about a planned terrorist attack, do you waterboard him? What if his psych profile indicates that's the only way to get that information out of him in 24 hours?
Except that torture, or being put in fear of death and pain are notorious for producing unreliable information. Given how fucking pathetic our (US and USA) intelligence was on little matters like the WMD in Iraq, I don't trust them to have any real clue as to who they're torturing, and the likely result IMO is that innocent, or barely involved, individuals, with no real information to offer, will instead scream out whatever names they can come up with.
I don't know how much you trust your police and internal security personnel, but an innocent man was gunned down on faulty intelligence on the London Tube. In that instance the intelligence and surveillance led to a shooting: it could just as easily have led to an arrest and interrogation. If such methods as simulated drowing and sleep deprivation were employed with that innocent, and incorrectly identified man, what's the betting he'd have come up with something to tell them after a few weeks?
And now I'm wondering which was worse. Dying without being tortured or being tortured then spending the next however long in prison.
Good point. That is how we would win IMHO.
Yes well, the question has been asked, how do you define winning this conflict? When do you think enough is enough? How many more people have to be killed?
Knowing that your nation is no better than their enemy... that your pride is now misplaced.
I really have no idea what the reliability is of any type of interrogation. All I've heard is a bag of wind from both sides, and never from anybody with an actual background in the matter.
The CIA lady that was being interviewed on one of the TVs I was watching while on the treadmill a couple days ago would not discuss any of the things we actually do to prisoners (cause the terrorists are watching and train against the stuff we admit to doing)but was sure none of it was torture.
She was very proud of the "thousands" of intelligence reports that have been generated by coercing said prisoners (in non-torturous ways of course). Would not discuss how many of those thousands were at all accurate... came off sounding like real jackass imo.
She was very proud of the "thousands" of intelligence reports that have been generated by coercing said prisoners (in non-torturous ways of course). Would not discuss how many of those thousands were at all accurate... came off sounding like real jackass imo.
Maybe to you, but she is right on target. No one needs to know the details IMHO.
Except that torture, or being put in fear of death and pain are notorious for producing unreliable information. Given how fucking pathetic our (US and USA) intelligence was on little matters like the WMD in Iraq,
The intel was there. Those in power chose to cherry pick it and ignore what did not fit their policy plans.
I really have no idea what the reliability is of any type of interrogation. All I've heard is a bag of wind from both sides, and never from anybody with an actual background in the matter.
I have a very good friend who is currently in Iraq as a GS worker with NCIS as an interrogator.
This can give you some insight. I gave it to a young kid in HS 2 years ago. He is now a Army interrogator.
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9780316011532&itm=3
There is a new one out on the subject that I have not read yet but just ordered. Looks good.
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9780451221124&itm=1I believe that in fact there is less torture now than there has been in the past, precisely because of the explosion in digital cameras that allowed us the unexpected glimpses into Abu Ghraib and others. The truth is you can't get away with anything these days.
A friend of my dad's served during Vietnam as a translator. The vast majority of his job was translating what prisoners were saying as they were being interrogated. According to him, he never saw a single prisoner leave the room alive, period.
I believe that in fact there is less torture now than there has been in the past, precisely because of the explosion in digital cameras that allowed us the unexpected glimpses into Abu Ghraib and others. The truth is you can't get away with anything these days.
A friend of my dad's served during Vietnam as a translator. The vast majority of his job was translating what prisoners were saying as they were being interrogated. According to him, he never saw a single prisoner leave the room alive, period.
Yea, times have changed quite a bit. Even then if you have enough people involved someone is eventually going to spill the beans on what went on if wholescale illegal activity was going on.
I really have no idea what the reliability is of any type of interrogation. All I've heard is a bag of wind from both sides, and never from anybody with an actual background in the matter.
But you have direct quotes from people who do this stuff. We have long known from professionals that torture results in inconclusive facts and more often results in lies. Furthermore, a tortured man cannot be 'read' or tested with a 'lie detector' test. A man who talks without torture can be 'read' and can tested with a lie detector machine. Professional interrogators state this repeatedly.
From the BBC of September 2006 entitled
The jihadi who turned 'supergrass' and also quoted in The Cellar on 30 September 2006 as
Why does America need Secret Prisons? "I believed that the police were very cruel and used torture to get their answers," he said.
But Mr Abbas was in for a surprise. He was treated with civility and Muslim respect.
As a result, Nasir Abbas blew open the entire terrorist organization called Jemaah Islamiyah - also known as the Bali bombers. Those who remain free quickly separated from Jemaah Islamiyah and are rumored to have formed small isolated terrorist cells. Why? Mr Abbas was not tortured. Therefore he could cooperate in response to his own convictions.
Same is reported on America's earliest interrogators in a finally not secret gathering reported in The Washington Post on 6 Oct 2007 entitled
Fort Hunt's Quiet Men Break Silence on WWII and also posted in The Cellar.
"We got more information out of a German general with a game of chess or Ping-Pong than they do today, with their torture," said Henry Kolm, 90, an MIT physicist who had been assigned to play chess in Germany with Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess.
Blunt criticism of modern enemy interrogations was a common refrain at the ceremonies held beside the Potomac River near Alexandria. ...
The interrogators had standards that remain a source of pride and honor.
"During the many interrogations, I never laid hands on anyone," said George Frenkel, 87, of Kensington. "We extracted information in a battle of the wits. I'm proud to say I never compromised my humanity."
The reason to justify torture is an assumption that a tortured man will talk. Yes. And professional interrogators then note how few truths are mixed with too many lies. Torture is when the interrogator has no idea and no way of knowing what is truth – and desperately needs to know that truth. But torture often results in statements that cannot be confirmed by all common means of judging validity, is often what the interrogators want to hear, and resulting statements are too often completely bogus. Torture so routinely results in bad information as to even create a long list of phony Orange alerts.
When does torture work? When some ‘feel’ it must work. After all, anyone tortured will tell only truths – right? Therefore all that torture in Abu Ghriad with the arrival of Gen Miller got confessions of WMDs, terrorists hiding in America, and Orange Alert attacks on the Prudential Building in Newark and the Golden Gate Bridge.
Therefore all that torture in Abu Ghriad with the arrival of Gen Miller got confessions of WMDs, terrorists hiding in America, and Orange Alert attacks on the Prudential Building in Newark and the Golden Gate Bridge.
That was more like prisoner abuse, not torture, used in an effort to "soften up the prisoners" for the interrogators according to the reports. All of the pics that came out of Abu
Ghraib showed prisoner abuse, none of them were torture sessions in an effort to directly get info.
would you like to translate that to simple english UG. There are morons in the house.
Aliantha, no I would not like. The remark gives offense. Get this and get it good: I dumb down for no one. No one in or under heaven.
You come up to my level; it's both possible and it's really pretty nice here.
I can point you at things to look over and talk over. PM me if you like.
Define "win" in the context of this "war".
First off, Kitsune, your use of the pooh-poohing quotemarks is wholly illegitimate, and I'll thank you to stop. It is a tactic of the America-must-lose-because-it's -- well -- America faction, and those people think only in fascist drivel. Reject fascist drivel and the people who drivel it, and you'll help sustain the Republic. It will also help you to stop talking a bunch of fascistocommunist-antihuman shit and drivel. A Congressional declaration of war is not required to start the shooting, and never has been, and is very unlikely ever to be -- and the Supreme Court, both houses of Congress, and the Department of State are all fine with that, particularly in the long view -- they all recognize that situations can turn ugly fast if some peckerslap wants them to and that situations vary in size. And if we had declared a state of war, just where would the bozos of the Left be on this anyway? They'd still not be behind our winning, now would they?
This is why I'm not a leftist: I'm too honest a man.
Now that you've been reminded what good behavior and intelligent thinking are like, on to your... demand. If you think you're being patronized -- you're right. I patronize people who
insist on idiot-think; they tire me. Sophomoric suits sophomores, but it's been a long time since I was one. The difference that this makes is a hard one to communicate effectively, one generation to a younger, but the difference sure is there, and it can cause impatience.
Victory lies in active reduction of the Non-Integrating Gap, as Barnett puts it, and I think he's got it right. His overall theory is that the world's troubles are going to spring not from the great powers of the developed world and probably not from the growing powers of the large nations who are well along in developing -- Russia, China, India, Brazil and one or two others -- but from those parts of the globe where globalization has not yet spread, and cultural, informational, and especially economic connectivity are not yet achieved -- almost all of Africa, Haiti and quite a bit of the Caribbean and some of its rim, the tribal territories half of Pakistan, southeast Asia -- those always-poor places that for some dang reason never seem to get a break and get rich. They are so often undemocratically run also that one can hardly believe that to be mere coincidence.
Victory in the Iraq campaign, part of the overall War on Terror, is in bringing Iraq from its previous place in the Non-Integrating Gap where Saddam like so many Arab despots was keeping it, towards at least being what Barnett calls a seam state, one both physically and in other senses on the border between the world's economically Functioning Core and the Gap. It's not an instant process; you can't push a society's development too fast or the whole shebang comes apart.
American foreign policy generally favors a "go fast" approach in developing nations out of the Gap and into the Core, and in every society in question there are both "go fast" and "go slow" factions on the matter of globalization and integration into the greater global economy. Tension is inevitable during the process, and it can become such as to create a major rift and a sizeable conflict. It depends on the strength and determination of the reaction of the reactionaries, and reactionaries must be expected. There are external "go slow" exponents also, for many varied reasons, some worthy, some just plain obstructionist. What drives the American foreign-policy ideal and a "go fast" pace is that when people get rich and have the prospect of getting steadily richer, they are much more content and much more willing to be team players with the rest of the world, and not resort to banditry. Face it, most of what vexes us about places like Syria, Iran, and North Korea is a penchant for banditry, no? Counterfeiting, even.
Well, there's likely a lot more, but it's time to let somebody else talk and bring it up.
Aliantha, no I would not like. The remark gives offense. Get this and get it good: I dumb down for no one. No one in or under heaven. You come up to my level; it's both possible and it's really pretty nice here.
I can point you at things to look over and talk over. PM me if you like.
UG, what you said doesn't make sense.
it just goes to show................. Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny.
BTW UG, if that's how you respond to people who ask for clarification it's no wonder people don't listen to you. :alien:
First off, Kitsune, your use of the pooh-poohing quotemarks is wholly illegitimate, and I'll thank you to stop. It is a tactic of the America-must-lose-because-it's -- well -- America faction, and those people think only in fascist drivel.
My use of the quotation marks stems from the many varied ideas of what winning this war means to the many different people involved. Depending on who you speak to, we're fighting actions, we're fighting ideas, and/or we're fighting a religion or religious extremists. We are not fighting a traditional war, we are not fighting an organized army, we are not fighting any nation. The edges of the scope of winning are even more blurred in what it involves, depending on your point of view, and are as narrow as Iraq and Afghanistan or as wide as all of the middle east and expands, perhaps, to ideas and concepts embedded in populations worldwide. It is just as multifaceted and has just as many potential (as well as seemingly unreachable) ends as our decades long War on Drugs. I'd simply like to know how you define a win for The United States and what would determine this ordeal to be over with.
I did not realize the use of quotation marks in this fashion was a known tactic of The Enemy. I'll take note of it and, in the future, be sure to remain suspicious of anyone I witness doing it in writing or marking quote mark motions in the air with their fingers when discussing such matters.
That would be 'a good idea' Kitsune. :alien:
What caused Kitsune to hate America?
I'm not going to tell you he does; just that the antidemocracy oids do this all the time, and you know how I feel about them. I thank Kits for clarifying; this is good. However, I don't see any necessity at all for such quotemarking -- I never do it wrt the war.
Aliantha, tone also matters in inquiry -- it can come off throroughly and wrongly rhetorical.
I did say I can point you to some things to look at. This guy Barnett is one busy li'l blogger, and his site seems a pretty good introduction to what he's all about. I can't expect everyone to have read his books but I will say they are worth the reading. I'm only certain two Cellar Dwellars have read either of Barnett's books: myself and tw -- who's had less of substance to say on them than I have, and I haven't said much.
Thomas P.M. Barnett -- what I've seen of this guy's works leaves me impressed and fascinated.
Somebody has a crush on Thomas P. M. Barnett!
I can spare you a big wet kiss too, Flint! :p
So how many people here pontificating want us to win and al-Q to lose? Let's see those hands.
I think we can find a way to keep America safe and
not have to give up our honor.
I want to win, but not at all costs or with any tactic.
That is not winning.
We cannot win in Iraq, we invaded a nation that was not a threat just to steal their oil.
If we leave them with all of their natural resources in their hands... that alone is as close as we can hope to come to victory.
Rkzen, how is it that you've simply never noticed that leaving "them with all of their natural resources in their hands" is one of our policy goals, from which we've simply never swerved? Look at where the "steal their oil" idea comes from: the lunatic fringe, not the policymakers. Are you sure you should buy the product of the fever-swamps?
Wanting friendlies, not unfriendlies in control of major petroleum reserves is not "stealing their oil."
I've understood this from the beginning in April '03. How do you explain not getting it?
We have an honorless, bigoted enemy, do we not, dar? Where can you find dishonor in stymieing them, then? I cannot, and I have keen vision and no blinkers.
They held elections as we wanted, we have no room to complain about whom they elected.
I certainly have no grounds for complaint there.
Then we can leave them to it.
We have an honorless, bigoted enemy, do we not, dar?
As with any large number of people, I'm sure that some Iraqis are honorless. We don't know that any of the prisoners are among those. As a matter of fact, we don't know for sure that any of the prisoners are enemies, since they've never had a trial.
Even should it be true, lack of honor in my enemy does not require me to give up mine.
Where can you find dishonor in stymieing them, then? I cannot, and I have keen vision and no blinkers.
You say 'stymie' when you mean 'torture'.
You say 'stymie' when you mean 'torture'.
The preferred term under the new definition is "victory tickle".
lol kitsune. That's very funny.
We lost our honor and dignity in conducting this goddamn war, UG and The Mercenary. Bush can't even applaud 'successes', such as the deaths of Saddam Hussein and his sons, especially since Saddam faced his death with relatively more dignity than Bush and the neocons did in conducting this war. That's how bad this war got for America, UG and Mercenary.
Deadbeater, the abyss set between you and us seems unlikely to be bridged: can't any of you get it through your heads how inherently, necessarily good and noble it is to destroy dictatorships and dictators, replacing them with democracies? Honestly. Anyone who can't see how much evil and oppression and poverty we can eliminate this way is missing quite a bit of his frontal lobes. When the last dictator is hanged on the entrails of the last national chief of secret police, how much misery will have fled the world? None here make answer, strangely enough.
The neocons are hardly evil: they want to propagate democracy (even if they're a bit more statist than I like, but in politics half a loaf, etc.) and as such must be regarded as friends of all mankind. Now there are a lot of ill-founded shitheads screaming at this, but that's because they're fascist sympathizers, deep down. I have no fascist sympathy whatsoever anywhere in my being, and for this nobility of mind I am dissed by troglodyte cryptofascists and quasibarbarians, who have the mad effrontry to imagine themselves virtuous. Damnation to the lot of them who are such, along with Hitler, Stalin, Mao the psychopath, and Pol Pot. They're keeping evil company and haven't the foggiest idea of the depth of their sins.
Dar, I will thank you to drop that silly idea: I said
stymie and stymie is what I mean. Whatever you do, do not lie to me about what I say unless you particularly want me to skin you alive and sew your hide back on backwards with red baseball thread. Lying to me about what I said all because you have a foundationless opinion makes me very angry.
Our foes must be defeated. That is truly supporting the troops, rather than that feeble lipservice the Democratic Party gives the idea. That lot is visibly looking for a way to both lose the Iraq campaign and blame the Iraqis for it, and Christ it makes me tired.
We lost our honor and dignity. . .
The Left has lost its honored place, true enough.
Dar, I will thank you to drop that silly idea: I said stymie and stymie is what I mean.
Give me a specific case where the mistreatment of these prisoners has had the direct result of drawing the conflict in Afghanistan or Iraq to a positive conclusion. Then I might agree that the word is 'stymie'. However I will never agree that torture of a human being is worth 'stymieing'.
Whatever you do, do not lie to me about what I say unless you particularly want me to skin you alive and sew your hide back on backwards with red baseball thread. Lying to me about what I said all because you have a foundationless opinion makes me very angry.
Ah. So we should torture the enemy so that we can protect our American freedom? Would that be the freedom to threaten to torture me? Or would that be my freedom of speech that you would like to curtail by threatening me?
I think you would benefit from an anger management class.
There's a lotta things I think UG would benefit from. Would he ever do them? No way.
Trust me on this one - it's not worth it. You've been here longer than me... but still, take my word for it, you'll feel a lot better for simply ignoring UG and letting his obvious contradictions and cognitive dissonance go by uncorrected. It's not worth the argument and the belittling he'll throw at you.
Just walk away. I've been proud of myself this last batch of UGism; I've hardly responded at all. Give it a try, dar.
When the last dictator is hanged on the entrails of the last national chief of secret police, how much misery will have fled the world? ...I have no fascist sympathy whatsoever anywhere in my being, and for this nobility of mind I am dissed by troglodyte cryptofascists and quasibarbarians, who have the mad effrontry to imagine themselves virtuous... Whatever you do, do not lie to me about what I say unless you particularly want me to skin you alive and sew your hide back on backwards with red baseball thread.
Wow, you're in rare form today, UG. You completely crack my shit up!! :lol:
There's a lotta things I think UG would benefit from. Would he ever do them? No way.
I understand your point, Ibram. And I agree that UG is unlikely to change his mind from anything he reads here. But sometimes you have to speak out.
Trust me on this one - it's not worth it. You've been here longer than me... but still, take my word for it, you'll feel a lot better for simply ignoring UG and letting his obvious contradictions and cognitive dissonance go by uncorrected.
The point is not to win. The point is to learn - to better grasp - a mindset behind people such as Cheney, Project for a New American Century, and others with a political agenda so strong as to pervert reality.
Those same UG attitudes were more overtly expressed on American streets during Nam. The expression "The whole world is watching" occurred because UG types had to cure Americans of their 'subversive political views' – with billyclubs.
Appreciate the opportunity to learn. UG is not an exception. He more bluntly expresses an attitude probably found in at least 20% of Americans today. Those others will not speak up when it is politically incorrect. But I suspect that 20% number does properly represent how many fully agree with UG's spirit.
The point is not to win. The point is to appreciate another perspective and the reasoning that justifies that opinion. UG is not the exception in America.
Deadbeater, the abyss set between you and us seems unlikely to be bridged: can't any of you get it through your heads how inherently, necessarily good and noble it is to destroy dictatorships and dictators, replacing them with democracies? Honestly. Anyone who can't see how much evil and oppression and poverty we can eliminate this way is missing quite a bit of his frontal lobes. When the last dictator is hanged on the entrails of the last national chief of secret police, how much misery will have fled the world? None here make answer, strangely enough.
The neocons are hardly evil: they want to propagate democracy (even if they're a bit more statist than I like, but in politics half a loaf, etc.) and as such must be regarded as friends of all mankind. Now there are a lot of ill-founded shitheads screaming at this, but that's because they're fascist sympathizers, deep down. I have no fascist sympathy whatsoever anywhere in my being, and for this nobility of mind I am dissed by troglodyte cryptofascists and quasibarbarians, who have the mad effrontry to imagine themselves virtuous. Damnation to the lot of them who are such, along with Hitler, Stalin, Mao the psychopath, and Pol Pot. They're keeping evil company and haven't the foggiest idea of the depth of their sins.
Dar, I will thank you to drop that silly idea: I said stymie and stymie is what I mean. Whatever you do, do not lie to me about what I say unless you particularly want me to skin you alive and sew your hide back on backwards with red baseball thread. Lying to me about what I said all because you have a foundationless opinion makes me very angry.
Our foes must be defeated. That is truly supporting the troops, rather than that feeble lipservice the Democratic Party gives the idea. That lot is visibly looking for a way to both lose the Iraq campaign and blame the Iraqis for it, and Christ it makes me tired.
The Left has lost its honored place, true enough.
Ahem, haven't you recall that I favored getting Saddam out? However, Bush botched even that, pulling off the impossible: making Saddam a sympathetic guy, and turning Bush into an anarcho-fascist. That's right, I said it. Bush turned into an anarcho-fascist, by ruling over only the oil fields, and leaving the rest of the country to rot.
Whatever you do, do not lie to me about what I say unless you particularly want me to skin you alive and sew your hide back on backwards with red baseball thread. Lying to me about what I said all because you have a foundationless opinion makes me very angry.
What a sweetie. UG, Dar didn't lie, he reinterpreted your words and posited a potential and, in the view of many, better and more apposite term for what you were describing. That isn't lying, it's engaging in debate.
The point is not to win. The point is to appreciate another perspective and the reasoning that justifies that opinion. UG is not the exception in America.
tw, please, I read the cellar before bed, are you trying to give me night terrors? :P
Ahem, haven't you recall that I favored getting Saddam out?
I'm guessing not. Oh I hate that argument, it's logic is so twisted it makes a helter skelter look straight forward. We get that here too, amongst some of the right wingers (even the right wingers who've hijacked the left wing parties :P). A friend of mine (an ex MP) has spent her entire life campaigning for human rights; supported the dissident Iraqi trade unionists who sought asylum in my country; lobbied for greater support of those trade unionists and political radicals who were persecuted by Saddam; visited Halabja in support of the Kurds.
She was vehemently opposed to the war. Still, even now, with all that's happened and all the death and destruction which has rained down on that country, the right will accuse her of supporting Saddam. Usually it's a sideways swipe: "Not all of us were against the war ****, some of us are happy Saddam's gone". The two are not mutually exclusive no matter how much someone may try to argue that they are. One could be entirely against the war without being a supporter of Saddam. One could be wholly against Saddam and be active in the struggle, without being in favour of the invasion.
There's a word for that kind of logic...my mind's gone blank though and I can't think of it (tired, tough meeting tonight :P). I'd be very grateful if one of you excellent and eloquent debate hounds could tell me what word I'm looking for :P
There's a word for that kind of logic...my mind's gone blank though and I can't think of it (tired, tough meeting tonight :P). I'd be very grateful if one of you excellent and eloquent debate hounds could tell me what word I'm looking for :P
Coulter.
False dichotomy?
Coulter works, though.
False dichotomy?
*shakes head* it's a single word. God, I hate that. I hate it when words escape dammit. I much prefer it when they're locked safely in my head where I can reach them at will....little bastards...
Bifurcation?
Also referred to as the "black and white" fallacy and "false dichotomy," bifurcation occurs if someone presents a situation as having only two alternatives, where in fact other alternatives exist or can exist.
Heh! now this is some funny shit.
Ahem, haven't you recall that I favored getting Saddam out?
No, I don't recall, but if I missed that, I do apologize. In my defense, I don't believe it's ever come up in anything we've said to each other.
However, Bush botched even that, pulling off the impossible: making Saddam a sympathetic guy, and turning Bush into an anarcho-fascist. That's right, I said it. Bush turned into an anarcho-fascist, by ruling over only the oil fields, and leaving the rest of the country to rot.
What? Bush did not make Saddam into an sympathetic figure -- because as you said, it's impossible. Sure, he has his fans in Tikrit, just as he always did, but does anyone give weight to that lot of fascist-symp creeps? This if anything is some unreality put out by the lunatic fringe on the America-must-lose left. As for "botched," Saddam is
dead, dammit, which is not "botched" by any rational standard I've ever heard of. Nor is there any such thing as an "anarcho-fascist," as a bit of thought will tell you these terms are about as mutually exclusive as may be imagined. Try imagining somebody ordering you to, fascistically, nationalize major industries but to have no government -- over which he shall not-rule? It collapses of its own absurdity. What on Earth are you doing buying any of this?
Frankly, our effort around any of the oil fields isn't getting any coverage from anybody, either cable news or network. I would hesitate to believe we're doing anything in particular. Even the opposition in Iraq seems to think blowing up pipelines is passe'. And if you're only getting your knowledge of the Iraqi theater of operations through the likes of the New York Times and their fellow travelers, whose bias against George Bush is beyond all reason and so far as I can see without any merit, of course you're not going to be informed about Iraq at all.
An unbelief in the legitimacy of Republican Presidents such as the Times' editorial staff evinces is not worthy editorial policy, but a sort of disgusting spasm. Comes of having too many modern Democrats in journalism, no doubt -- JFK would have thought the current lot a bunch of idiots. No wonder circulation is declining and more conservatively inclined news outlets are growing and being increasingly trusted. They are the ones getting it right.
And I agree that UG is unlikely to change his mind from anything he reads here. But sometimes you have to speak out.
This is because frankly none of the opposing ideas put forth here have been good enough to persuade me to adopt them. I don't buy shoddy goods -- and speaking against destroying fascist autocracies is about as shoddy as it comes, am I right? Therefore, I speak out, to show you the enlightened, prodemocracy, prohuman way. Anti-fascist/anti-communist can hardly help but be pro-human, can it?
Funny how much goddam fighting I get from people whose sympathies should not lie with foreign fascists, yet too apparently do, and for the silliest of rationalizations. It was crap in the Sixties with the New Left's fascisto-communist sympathies and it's not improved forty years on. Superannuated, obsolete crap is crap cubed. You should be ashamed of your antidemocracy sympathies, you know. Well --
now you know. I observe that Leftism tends to prevent certain understandings.
I see what I said still stands: throughout this page, "none here make answer, strangely enough." Lots of scrabbling around the side-issues, which tells me I'm getting through to those who once were blinkered.
Please take note that UG has no answer for this:
Give me a specific case where the mistreatment of these prisoners has had the direct result of drawing the conflict in Afghanistan or Iraq to a positive conclusion. Then I might agree that the word is 'stymie'. However I will never agree that torture of a human being is worth 'stymieing'.
or this:
Ah. So we should torture the enemy so that we can protect our American freedom? Would that be the freedom to threaten to torture me? Or would that be my freedom of speech that you would like to curtail by threatening me?
What does that tell you?
It would seem obvious that you could spin things like that so long as the fighting in Afghanistan is still going on. I call that intellectual dishonesty, dar512. I urge you to cease it and forever desist, that you may come into the practice of honesty, rather than sympathizing with more fascistic mullahs. Sure, the fighting's not over, and none of us knows when it might be, and shooting at foreigners is still almost more of an Afghan tribal sport than playing bushkazi. I don't expect peace, quietude, or rose gardens there anytime soon, precisely because of the Afghan penchant for shooting at anybody of a different language, a penchant practiced mutually by everybody.
We are struggling primarily against a non-national enemy who is driven by his bigotry, is he not? The way we can beat these people is by getting information, since we cannot put pressure upon their nation -- and clearly we are indeed getting information enough to take down their leadership on a semiregular basis, which tells me we're doing something right -- I've been involved in secretive national doings myself, whose triumphs are unheralded every bit as much as their failures get trumpeted. I reckon we are having our successes, quietly. I don't think we should be interrupting them.
Your second boxful is frankly frothy rhetorical stuff, unworthy of reply. Think better.
I reckon we are having our successes, quietly.
Most of our successes are pretty quiet to those not having them, i suppose. The media isn't let to know about them a whole lot.
I'll bet they're not too quiet to those in the room with the uh, 'successes' though. They're probably more like
no[COLOR="White"]...[/COLOR]please[COLOR="White"]...[/COLOR]imtellingyouidontknow[COLOR="White"]...[/COLOR]whatareyoudoingwiththa[SIZE="3"]a[/SIZE][SIZE="4"]aa[/SIZE][SIZE="5"]aaaaanostopnomakeitstop[/SIZE]gurglegurgle[SIZE="5"]noooimtellingyouiswearaaaaaa[/SIZE]gaspgaspgasp[SIZE="5"]makeitstop[/SIZE][SIZE="6"]makeitstoppleaseimbeggingyou[/size][SIZE="5"]u[/SIZE][SIZE="4"]u[/SIZE][SIZE="3"]u[/SIZE][SIZE="2"]u[/SIZE][SIZE="1"]u[/SIZE]
...you dont want to know what the failures sound like.
mostly, they stop after that gurgle, gurgle part.
Ibby you just sent a shiver down my spine.
I reckon we are having our successes, quietly. I don't think we should be interrupting them.
UG precedes that quote by claiming he was privy to secret successes. Then he *speculates* that torture results in useful information. For all his privy access, he really does not know? In the next sentence, he converts total speculation into a fact - then uses that 'fact' to justify torture.
Barak used this exact same logic to 'play the white boys'.
Urbane Guerrilla cannot answer and completely sidesteps two simple questions:
Give me a specific case where the mistreatment of these prisoners has had the direct result of drawing the conflict in Afghanistan or Iraq to a positive conclusion. Then I might agree that the word is 'stymie'. However I will never agree that torture of a human being is worth 'stymieing'.
and
Ah. So we should torture the enemy so that we can protect our American freedom? Would that be the freedom to threaten to torture me? Or would that be my freedom of speech that you would like to curtail by threatening me?
Urbane Guerrilla is asked these questions repeatedly. UG avoids answering these questions repeatedly by attacking the questioner.
It would seem obvious that you could spin things like that so long as the fighting in Afghanistan is still going on.
How ironic. UG's responses are typical of a conspiring terrorist trying to hide his complicity. Even Barak did not resort to deceit.
UG - dar512 asked you two simple questions. Why not answer him with honesty? Is honesty that difficult - especially when it might contradict a political agenda? Answer his questions without political accusations. His questions are simple. Why can Urbane Guerrilla not answer dar512’s questions? Why must UG attack the messenger?
[B]Please take note that UG has no answer for this:
What does that tell you?
It tells me they are doing a good job of keeping things secret that should be kept that way and you don't know if a positive or negative result has happened or not.
[FONT="Century Gothic"][SIZE="3"] Why does UG post multiple times every day ... and still cannot answer even one of dar512's two questions?[/SIZE][/FONT]
Neither of you, tw or dar, are being honest, and if you get attacked for your dishonesty, you really shouldn't be implying I'm anything other than right. Enjoy your pseudotriumph if you can but remember: it's all based on you lying to yourselves. You can't lie to me. You never could accept the best answer, and tw in particular cannot endure an American victory, and is covering this up very thinly with noise. You and I both know what an actively antipatriotic individual you are, and for it you are damned.
Would you like some music to go with that dance?
I've given a worthwhile answer. Those who say otherwise are merely talking stuff.
I can picture you with earplugs, saying nah-nah-nah-nah-nah-nah, while you type that. It made me giggle like a school girl.
Dar's dishonesty consisted in the conceiving of his question: he might better have put it "Are we winning in Afghanistan and if so, when have we won?" That might have been a better question, and it wouldn't have been crafted to try and trip up someone, as dar's was -- not that he's very good at that when he's crossing swords with someone of my experience. If I'm going to answer a "have you stopped beating your wife" special, it will be an answer to something deeper than the surface of the question.
Tw has for a couple of years now been desperate to find anything at all he could give me grief about. Not on his best day. Not for the likes of him.
The opposition to this war against the newest fascists remains without any idea for actually winning it at all, let alone winning it better than the Bush Administration can. This prevents their point of view from having worth or integrity. You yourself, Bruce, have no idea how better to win this war, nor, I note, any principles on which to base an idea that your road has more virtue than mine. I did in effect ask you about that not long ago and got back complete silence. Either you have no principles on which to oppose me, or you're being reticent because you doubt they'd compare well to mine, or...? Just because you once told me you weren't at all on my side, is that any particular reason to run around trying to prove it at each and every opportunity? People who try that around me tend to talk themselves into corners...
The only right road against undemocracy is to win against it. There's nothing wrong with accomplishing this by a holistic strategy incorporating both war and peace -- but war is needed to answer the war they'd start to prevent, for whatever reason their warmongers think sufficient, their integration into the global economy and attendant culture, or mosaic of cultures.
Neither of you, tw or dar, are being honest, and if you get attacked for your dishonesty, you really shouldn't be implying I'm anything other than right.
Please fill us with your honesty. Our loins ache for your honesty. Answer dar512's two simple questions.
... he might better have put it "Are we winning in Afghanistan and if so, when have we won?"
No, Bush fucked that one up big time.You don't know the answer, dar doesn't know the answer, I don't know the answer (though I have understanding enough of these things to make a couple guesses), Sean Hannity doesn't know the answer. There's a whole crowd of us who don't have a definitive, fully knowledgeable answer.
And OPSEC is why. This whole fight is going to be won or lost on HUMINT. HUMINT can be a dirty business -- it's where the old cloak and dagger of espionage novels comes in. Of course, losing the war is even dirtier than that, isn't it? Or had you noticed? Most of the rest of information gathering is a day at the office, or something close to radio astronomy. These only become relevant if they are where the information is. With this foe, these are mostly where the information isn't.
There is one answer I do know: if we do it the way you want it done, success will not follow. There will be no "positive conclusion" if we do what you want. I'd rather not have it that way, understanding your motivations as clearly as I do.
The only right road against undemocracy is to win against it.
"Me fail English? That's unpossible!"
So, if
the US once ruled waterboarding a war crime once upon time, is it now no longer considered that because
we're the people administering it or is 1947 too "pre-9/11" to understand?
Wonder if it would help make illegal's in the US go home?
no, but i bet if you put a bullet in the skull of 1/3 illegals caught coming across and let the word get out, they'd quit coming.
Probably more than that get killed, maimed, or raped trying to get here as it is, so I bet you're wrong.
i think you exaggerate a bit, but let's pretend you are correct. you are saying that the illegals who make it this far only represent 2/3 of those that started the journey. ok. so if we take 1/3 that make it this far and put one in the back of the head that leaves only 43% of those that started the journey. Then you put an appropriate punishment in place for employers caught with illegal employees (such as the law recently passed in arizona). So now you have only a 43% chance of surviving your journey and will have a hard time finding a job once you arrive... my guess is you'd see a reduction in traffic.
Since you think I'm exaggerating, you might want to watch this film sometime:
http://www.amnestyusa.org/filmfest/slc/11032005.htmlAmnestyUSA... now there's a credible source. Not.
i live not too far from the border and deal with illegals frequently. i'll listen to the first hand accounts rather than an agenda based documentary.
no, but i bet if you put a bullet in the skull of 1/3 illegals caught coming across and let the word get out, they'd quit coming.
Random land mines would be much more effective. The Coyotes always lead. From what I have read one of those big fires in Southern Calf. exposed all their cover and it is going to be a lot harder to cross now. Maybe they need to have a few more controlled border fires.
AmnestyUSA... now there's a credible source. Not.
Um, you can find the movie--"Wetback"--on imdb.com and amazon as well.
Um, you can find the movie--"Wetback"--on imdb.com and amazon as well.
I can also find Mr. Magoo and Free Willy.
i live not too far from the border and deal with illegals frequently. i'll listen to the first hand accounts rather than an agenda based documentary.
Srsly--you should check it out, and then make your judgment. It won't kill you, I promise.
I can also find Mr. Magoo and Free Willy.
That's nice, but they're not relevant to the topic at hand, are they.
Just because it's on the AI site does not mean anything other than AI endorses the film.
It's a documentary made by an independant production company. Unlike Mr Magoo and Free Willy of course.
That's nice, but they're not relevant to the topic at hand, are they.
The point is that the film is agenda driven. Biased. Not proof of anything.
All documentaries are agenda driven. I'll bet you paid plenty of attention to the ones about the holocaust, and maybe also the ones about how brilliant it is to be in Iraq at present...blah blah blah.
Maybe they should be showing it in their home countries and not ours, you would think it would discourage them.
The point is that the film is agenda driven. Biased. Not proof of anything.
I suggest you watch it first, and then post your comments.
Apparently they have been showing it in their own countries.
Doesn't seem to have changed much.
I am more interested in getting more people to join this:
http://www.minutemanproject.com/I suggest you watch it first, and then post your comments.
Well I guess I could see a film about the poor Taliban and how they have been mistreated as well, but it really does not change how I feel about them.
Illegal's who travel that far to break into our border with some pie in the sky hope is doing nothing more than breaking our law. Why do you want them to ignore our laws?
Maybe they should be showing it in their home countries and not ours, you would think it would discourage them.
You will realize the irony in your statement, after you watch the friggin' movie.
OK, I'll stop shilling it for now. I just couldn't resist after Merc's last comment.
Oh, but aren't they a biased source? As in, not proof of anything? :rolleyes:
Oh, but aren't they a biased source? As in, not proof of anything? :rolleyes:
No that source is totally biased. And
I am freely willing to admit it. Biased against having illegal people enter our country as well as looking for ways to get control of the situation rather than putting heads in the sand and pretending that no problem exists.
Now you admit your sources are biased. ;)
Anyway, I agree there are huge problems that need to be fixed, but my perspective differs completely from yours, which I believe you're aware of.
I am. And I am going to call Amnesty USA becasue you are torturing me. :D
I am. And I am going to call Amnesty USA becasue you are torturing me.
That's just your blood desperately trying to escape a tortured existence. It explains the red face and that throbbing neck vein.
That's just your blood desperately trying to escape a tortured existence. It explains the red face and that throbbing neck vein.
that's not my neck vein...
Okay, I am such the third wheel here. tw, take my whip...please.
that's not my neck vein...
A throbbing penis? Well it is Halloween.
My mistake. TheMercenary does not have a vain boner in his body.
We claim to be a civilized society. To use torture for any purpose is to give up that civilization and become as barbaric as our adversaries. The entire Bill of Rights is being challenged now all on the grounds that circumstances allow the government to make new rules. No, the end doesn't justify the means. No, might doesn't make right. Just say no to what the Administration is doing.
Too many people here aren't interested in humanity's cause, which is democracy's cause, which is America's cause -- this is not open to rational dispute, after all -- winning.
Shame on all these people.
Too many people here aren't interested in humanity's cause, which is democracy's cause, which is America's cause
That's your opinion UG.
TheMercenary does not have a vain boner in his body.
How would you know about my boner?
... and become as barbaric as our adversaries.
Which is why we continually pull out and never finish these messes we start. We can only win quickly by conducting the war to win. All war is barbaric. You must take the fight to the enemy in a manner he understands, if barbarism is the method, so be it.
You must take the fight to the enemy in a manner he understands, if barbarism is the method, so be it.
Do you think we would have a better chance of winning this war if we beheaded the enemy and published videos of it? We could chain them to vehicles and drag them through the streets to make a point, just like they have been known to do. Would you support the military stooping to their level, kidnapping their families, and torturing them on television while demanding their surrender?
Why doesn't our military do these things if they are the methods required to win?
1) Yes. But I think if it were done in a clandestine manner it would be very effective.
2) I think you already know the answer to it.
2) I think you already know the answer to it.
Actually, I don't. What do you think it is?
Actually, I don't. What do you think it is?
Its because we need popular support and are expected to act justified and they don't. It would be like comparing a community known buisness owner who is in debt and a homeless man with no family in debt. The business man will not go to the extremes as the homeless man because he has much more to lose if caught while the homeless man probably doesn't have much if anything to lose, making him much more likely to go to dangerous extremes for the money.
If the United States starts torturing innocent people (*stands in front of Gitmo*) and we are found out, our support will plummet and people will very quickly turn against us while no one supports Al Qaeda so it doesn't matter what they do, everyone will still hate them.
Do you think we would have a better chance of winning this war if we beheaded the enemy and published videos of it? We could chain them to vehicles and drag them through the streets to make a point, just like they have been known to do. Would you support the military stooping to their level, kidnapping their families, and torturing them on television while demanding their surrender?
Why doesn't our military do these things if they are the methods required to win?
Because the idea is not to
become what we are fighting.
At least for those of us with ethics.
Also, at that point we have
no right to complain about what they are doing to others in any way.
If the United States starts torturing innocent people (*stands in front of Gitmo*) and we are found out, our support will plummet and people will very quickly turn against us while no one supports Al Qaeda so it doesn't matter what they do, everyone will still hate them.
If the goal in all of this is to "win the war on terror" (essentially a war on a mindset, a fight against an idea), wouldn't it stand to reason that we would want to appear in a light that would sway those on the middle ground to support our goals, to change their minds and move them away from extremist groups? Would we really be able to do this if populations in the countries we occupy/have bases/have conflicts in knew we were beating people for information? While "win any way possible" logic says they should, since everyone but the enemy would
obviously want us to win the war by any means possible to alleviate their suffering, I really don't think "Torturing in Support of Democracy" has a ring to it that will instill pride and gain the support of people in middle eastern nations. Knowing a knock could come at your door and you might be swept off to some camp and waterboarded for months while your family thinks you're dead thanks to misinformation is
not going to be well received. Those actions are associated with oppressive, feared dictators, not democratic peace keepers.
...and torture will
not remain secret if used, just as it has not in this war so far, nor in any other war. The worst atrocities committed against human beings, the war crimes the US stands against and actively wants to stop, have always managed to come to light at some point. Want to keep it all a secret? Kill your captors, including the innocent ones that didn't have the information you were looking for.
If the reason to torture is to support the war, to end it faster, and that the ends justify the means, then we really need to think ahead to what the supposed final goal of this set of conflicts is: to end terrorism and support democracy. If we're going to use force to do this, then we need to do it right. Just as our military has evolved to fight these new battles against people that are not members of any army, it absolutely must evolve further to look to the long term consequences of its actions, how those actions are received by the people they effect, and what the response will be.
You can torture for information you think might save a life, but no one should be surprised when the ranks of terrorists/anti-US groups swell when the news spreads that the coming liberators will beat to within an inch of your life to get at information if they think you have it.
That's your opinion UG.
Ali, just why do you suppose I might have it, hmm? :eyebrow:
I'm not hearing enough enthusiasm for breaking the undemocrats, wiping away their legacy of oppression. As you know, it's dishonest to say I'm talking about Republican Party members.
I'm not hearing enough enthusiasm for breaking the undemocrats, wiping away their legacy of oppression.
This was the spirit and tone of rhetoric also used by Hitler to subvert the German government. Hitler also insisted that he and his party were the only true patriotic Germans. If he was not posting a political agenda, then UG would have called them Democrats - not undemocrats. Honesty becomes a victim when political agendas are more important.
Ali, just why do you suppose I might have it, hmm? :eyebrow:
I'm not hearing enough enthusiasm for breaking the undemocrats, wiping away their legacy of oppression. As you know, it's dishonest to say I'm talking about Republican Party members.
I think it's a matter of perspective as to what constitutes humanities cause. That's why I think your way is only your opinion. I'm sure others share it (your opinion), but your way of solving the worlds problems doesn't match other people's way of doing it.
This was the spirit and tone of rhetoric also used by Hitler to subvert the German government. Hitler also insisted that he and his party were the only true patriotic Germans. If he was not posting a political agenda, then UG would have called them Democrats - not undemocrats. Honesty becomes a victim when political agendas are more important.
Well UG is only 2 steps away from being a Nazi himself. What do you expect? lol
Honesty becomes a victim when political agendas are more important.
Ipse dixit, tw.
My spirit is to crush the Hitlers -- yours is to crush democracy -- and I applaud the wisdom of crushing and hanging Saddam before he was a Hitler-sized world problem. You don't see the Democrats being that wise, nor visibly desiring to. That is why I don't vote Democrat, and the last time I did was I don't know when in the previous century. They don't deserve any support.
Aliantha: Godwin's Law, darling!
From Wiki:
A 2005 Reason magazine article argued that Godwin's law is often misused to ridicule even valid comparisons
I think my statement was a valid comparison. :) I think you're misusing Godwins Law...darlink. ;)
If you disagree, I guess we could always have a poll?
Not remotely misusing it, nor remotely valid either, as I cannot honestly be mistaken for a Nazi by anyone with a knowledge of Nazism and the steps leading to it. And my remark was more in the nature of a caution than an accusation. Tw's flirting with crossing that line too, but that's typical tw: always he opposes the success of the Republic in foreign policy. Ask him sometime if he wants us to win this, for the global Functioning Economic Core or anything else. He's very uniform about supporting anti-democracy over democracy. It's profoundly xenophobic if not just plain bigoted. It amounts to "less than democracy is good enough for those foreigners." G. Zuss. This guy's got a very manifest totalitarian streak. It's enough to make me talk like the Pharisee did about the tax collector.
Not remotely misusing it, nor remotely valid either, as I cannot honestly be mistaken for a Nazi by anyone with a knowledge of Nazism and the steps leading to it.
Well. I have some knowledge of the steps leading to Nazism and also of what constitutes nazism, and I'd say the comparison is valid.
UG, you only have a couple of themes.
The minor ones are cooking, language, drama, music. Minor not because these are unimportant human endeavors, but minor diversions from your major obsession: killing everyone who does not agree with you. I have to tell you, it's tiresome.
And you're such a pompous hypocrite about it. "I command you to be democratic or die." Look, friend, you don't speak for all humanity. Give it, and us, and yourself a rest.
UG, you only have a couple of themes.
The minor ones are cooking, language, drama, music.
UG has a dramtic flair for cooking human flesh with profane language? What kind of music goes with that?
Red wine or white?
we all have different views, now one can speak on anyone elses behalf
Actually, having experience of both democracy and nondemocracy, I do speak for all humanity, and you don't speak for anything human on this point, V. You should be the one giving it a rest. Don't defend the evilly indefensible unless it's your life's goal to get skinned for being a fascist sympathizer. No hypocrisy there, I assure you. The way you're using the word suggests you ought to repair to a dictionary and refamiliarize.
Well. I have some knowledge of the steps leading to Nazism and also of what constitutes nazism, and I'd say the comparison is valid.
So far it doesn't sound like it. People trying to call me a Nazi are doing so from so acute an ignorance of Nazism as to astonish.
Actually, having experience of both democracy and nondemocracy, I do speak for all humanity
:mock:
I've got to say that he doesn't speak for me...but I suppose if he pointed a gun in my face or told me he was going to kill my children if I didn't go along with him I might let him think he could speak for me.
Nonsense. And on multiple levels.
oh come on now...he has plenty of good stuff to say. He just has an equal amount of tripe I think.
50 50 isn't too bad. Some people around here are 100% shit.
So two cheers for me. I doff my Gee Bee ball cap in acknowledgement. ;)
Aliantha, you're indisputably a human being -- the state of the art in Turing machines hasn't gotten that good. I speak for you, whether you care for all that I say (which would after all be surprising, for after all we don't know each other that kind of well), and regardless of whether I'm self-appointed -- taking the initiative to do it, that is -- or other-anointed. Same goes for Queequegger, really. It is simply what I do when I'm trying to be philosophical.
Humanity is better when it prospers. Less-than-democracy is invariably associated with less than prosperity. Any in doubt could look it up. Respect free expression and property rights. Stay armed enough to make genocide impracticable and you additionally benefit from making crime impracticable too. That government that governs least, or least needs to govern, is that government that governs best.
