YOU SAY GULAG - I SAY TRUTH EXTRACTION CENTER
East Europe 'has secret CIA jails for al-Qaida'
And this is a problem how? We can't crowd them all into Gitmo' for goodness sake, that would be inhumane.
Besides, the people at these jails weren't picked up for jay-walking. They are top al-Qaida members with knowledge that we need in order to fight them and prevent them from carrying out more attacks. I don't know about you, but I'll put our safety above their comfort anytime.
Besides, the people at these jails weren't picked up for jay-walking. They are top al-Qaida members with knowledge that we need in order to fight them and prevent them from carrying out more attacks. I don't know about you, but I'll put our safety above their comfort anytime.
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11 comments:
How to even comment on this. I suppose I'll tell you any truth you want to hear if you're in the process of torturing me. Ignoring the law (which the CIA acknowledges it is doing by having the prisons in foreign countries where they are not subject to those pesky US civil rights laws) and condoning inhumane practices against prisoners does not make anyone look good and reduces the the rights of everyone. How can we justify calling anyone barbaric when we are doing exactly the same things in the name of our war on terror. What's next? Just becuase the US constitution doesn't apply worldwide does not mean that the "most free nation" in the world can or should usurp its own laws by carrying out interrogations in another country using torture while holding people indefinitely without any ability to defend themselves. This is so far beyond prisoner comfort (if there is such a thing) that I can't help but believe that you totally miss the implications of allowing this type of thing to happen. At a minimum it destroys what little credibility this country has in the rest of the world.
WHOA. Did you even think before you wrote that response? Torture isn't barbaric? I'm sure you'd think differently if someone had placed you on a water board. Or is it just that we haven't decided to use thumb screws and the rack yet? Though your reference to nuts and car batteries seems to suggest that you'd be ok with that too. The problem with your entire argument is that we have no information as to whether or not any of these people have actually committed crimes. As for those eating "gourmet food" at Gitmo...I don't know what you eat but I can assure you nothing they're eating is gourmet...we know that the vast majority of them are only suspected of having planned or having ties to any terroist attacks. If the black jails are the same then these people have done nothing wrong except have an idea. Since when is it ok to punish an idea if no action is taken on it? Because the government has failed to follow say, the law, which I hate to say applies whether its US, world or simply moral, none of these detainees have even been charged with crimes. Something which I'm sure you'd agree should be done and could be done simply if they had committed the acts you use as examples of barbarism. How would you feel if based on who you know or talked to or believed you were locked up and had your nuts strapped to a car battery even if no one tells you why? That's what we're doing. If the government really has a legitimate interest in holding these people then they should have a legitimate interest in upholding some standard of humanity and allowing these people the opportunity to speak to attorneys and to defend themselves. If the government has actual evidence of wrongdoing and not just a cute hunch, then let them be charged, convicted and jailed through proper procedures. With your line of reasoning I think you'd be happy living in China where they'd kill you if they found out you were gay. I mean why not? They only believe that being gay is wrong so strapping your nuts to a car battery to have you change is no problem right?
I'm just flabbergasted that you're apologizing for these murderers. I would imagine there's nothing they could do that you couldn't excuse, even at the expense of your own freedom and life or that of your fellow Americans. Oh, and here's the menu for those poor suffering misuderstood philosophers at Gitmo'. It sounds like good eatin' to me. Too good.
In typical fashion you fail to get the point and twist your own interpretaion of what I said in an attempt to discredit what I said. I don't see a single place where I apologized for or excused any actions of those that committed murder. And I won't. I've simply stated that if the government has a legitimate reason to hold someone then they should respect the laws and charge them with a crime and let them be convicted. As I stated, it would be easy to charge and convict someone of a murder if they have, in fact, committed one. There is no need for torture we should have left that behind in that lovely period in human history called "The Dark Ages." What would you be saying if the story broke that American soldiers were being held in inhumane conditions, tortured, denied council and not charged with anything for as long as the country holding them saw fit? (and I'm not saying it has never happened but one does not justify the other) I'm sure you'd be here denoucing that country as barbaric and calling for its immediate destruction. How can we do the same thing to others and not say the same thing? For you torture seems to be ok only because the americans are commiting the acts of torture. I fear for my own safety more when my own government fails to follow its own laws. Statistically, I'm far more likely to be beaten and tortured by a cop in the US in my own town that I am to die at the hands of a terrorist. Without a law preventing that then what hope is there that I won't be beaten?
It is also telling that you haven't in any way (save for a cute menu) rebutted what I've said. You can't. You know that torture is wrong but you want to be able, under the guise of rightousness, to say that we're only protecting ourselves. I think that is what every person who does an act of torture says.
Give me a break. My liberal head has yet to selectivly edit out what you've said and instead has presented an argument that you have yet to rebutt. I think you need to reread my previous comment so that you don't miss the spot where after I acknowledged that torture has been committed that I said "one does not justify the other." I your viewpoint we should allow black poeple in this country to rape whites because back in the day we did it to them when they were slaves. Sounds fair to me. Ok sorry, by your rational, they should only be allowed to sexually assault white people because that's more like tickling than actual rape.
I think that water boarding is, at least in the civilized world where it isn't ok, considered torture. I've never had it done to myself and can only hope that I never do. It may not be as physically traumatic to the body as the things you mention, but it does cause psychological damage...but that doesn't matter right?
But since it is only "rough, unpleasant" and "foot tickling" by comparison, I want you to pretend to be detained and try it over the weekend with your friends. Then you can report back to me how much you enjoyed the experience...oh and don't forget, you can't sleep between now and next Sunday and you can only have vitamins because food might give you some strength with which to resist. To keep the scenerio as real as possible I want you to know that you haven't commited a crime but I'm sure you'll be happy to know that, in a country you've never been to, people like you will feel more secure after having you put through the experience just because you might know something or someone who might do something. At the end of the weekend, I'm sure that you'll be so happy that you had the experience you'll be first to sign up to have it happen again. But WOOOHOOO you're safe!
Let me say it again - I do not believe that we are torturing people. We obviously have different standards for that though.
These monsters aren't citizens, aren't POWs, and don't deserve kid glove treatment. I'm sure that waterboarding is absolutely horrendous. The thought of it makes me very glad that I'm not an Islamofascist terrorist. As for it's "psychological" effects - these people aren't all there to begin with.
You also keep defending these assholes by implying that their detention is just arbitrary: "...just because you might know something or someone who might do something." and "... no information as to whether or not any of these people have actually committed crimes." and "How would you feel if based on who you know or talked to or believed you were locked up..." You keep implying that they've just been picked up because they smelled funny, rather than captured while making war on the United States and her allies. You will be hard pressed to convince me that there are any people being interrogated simply because of who they know.
If these criminals don't want to experience interrogation - they should lay down their weapons and hate filled plans for murder and go back to their deserts and leave us the hell alone. I'll be happy to let them live out their 12th century lives in peace if they'll stay out of mine in the 21st.
Setting aside torture, you finally got to my whole point but missed again. Their detention is arbitrary. If it is not and we actually have evidence to back up a reason to hold them then why can't we just do that? Charge them with a crime, put on evidence and convict them. The problem is (whether you believe it or not)that we have picked them up for who they knew, what they believed and what we perceived them to be planning. Nothing that we can actually call criminal. Citizens or not, people need to be protected. Yes, that includes us. However, tromping on others to protect ourselves and our way of life is exactly the same as having them tromp on us to protect their ideas and way of life. It isn't better that we do it with sophisticated weapons and they do it with suicide bombs. The end result is people are maimed and die. It doesn't matter who shot first. What matters is that we attempt, however futile you or anyone else believes it may or may not be, to get them to respect our way of life and, in your words, "leave us the hell alone." We cannot expect them to stop hating us when we perpetuate it by doing things that are inhumane, in violation of our own standards and not leaving them the hell alone. If we justify our actions by saying, "they started it" then is there ever an end? Someone can always say that. Will there always be someone who hates us, yes. Will there be another attack, maybe. But there is always someone like you willing to label them Islamofacists and hate them as much as they hate us. You sound just like they do "better to kill them than be killed" No one has ever gotten ahead with that attitude because it self perpetuates the problem.
My fear of the US government resorting to this type of action is that it will start to happen here. "That will never happen" you might say, but read the Patriot Act. Read some of Scalia's opinions from the Supreme Court. Those things which have, and are becoming, the law of the US are starting to take away the freedoms that you and I enjoy. Under Scalia's opinion there is no right to privacy. It isn't explicity written into the constitution. Goodbye to Roe v. Wade hello back alley abortions. Goodbye Lawrence v. Texas hello sodomy laws which make it illegal for you and I and the rest of the gay US to have sex. Goodbye need to get a warrant, hello wire taps and someone reading your private communications. It is already happening.
The "it can't happen here" attitude is exactly what caused 9/11 and Pearl Harbor (conspiracy theories, which I tend not to believe, aside). It is the same type of attitude that made Hitler's reign possible. If you allow the power of the government to tread on the rights of others believing that it is going to make you safer, then you are consenting to them taking away your rights. Maybe you're willing to accept that in the name of "safety" but I'm not.
Whew! You certainly are afraid of a lot supposed internal threats, but you're blind to the outside threats (otherwise known as "actual" threats.)
Don't worry - no one is going to take away our right to fuck. Even when it was illegal to sodomize in almost every state - it didn't slow the sistas' down at all. Roe v. Wade may be curtailed (and rightly so) but I doubt it's going the way of prohibition anytime soon. Also, I really don't think the government has much interest in tapping your wires or searching your house. Relax, our democracy is intact.
You say: "We cannot expect them to stop hating us when we perpetuate it by doing things that are inhumane, in violation of our own standards..."
I don't know how to tell you this but they hated us just fine before they started this war. I guess you would have sat down with the Japanese to try and get them to respect our culture after Pearl Harbor? I'm sure that would have worked out great! You'd have no better luck getting Osama bin Laden or any other Islamofascist to respect our culture and way of life. The terrorist leadership is almost exclusively western educated. They know our culture inside and out, and they hate it and fear it. They don't want "peace" you fool - they want control.
Tell you what, you go try to find Osama, or al-Zawahiri or Abu Musab Zarqawi, buy them a coke, teach'em to sing in perfect harmony, and explain how it would be better if they just learned more about us and we could all get along and respect each other. While you're gone I'll make your funeral arrangements. Do you want your head buried with your body, or do you prefer cremation?
You just don't get it.
You're right. I don't get why you don't think the Islamofascists are a danger, but you fear Justice Scalia.
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