The more you go to church, the more you support torture

[PixelPusher]

...and for the record, the Pew survey explicitly used the term "torture", not "enhanced interrogation' or any other euphemistic dodge frequently employed by the pro-torture crowd.



Survey: Support for terror suspect torture differs among the faithful (http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/04/30/religion.torture/index.html#cnnSTCText)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.

More than half of people who attend services at least once a week -- 54 percent -- said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is "often" or "sometimes" justified. Only 42 percent of people who "seldom or never" go to services agreed, according to the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.

http://aftermathnews.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/waterboard_inquisition.jpg?w=322&h=450
15th Century Spanish church officials conducting a routine interrogation.

White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified -- more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.

The analysis is based on a Pew Research Center survey of 742 American adults conducted April 14-21. It did not include analysis of groups other than white evangelicals, white non-Hispanic Catholics, white mainline Protestants and the religiously unaffiliated, because the sample size was too small.

The president of the National Association of Evangelicals, Leith Anderson, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The survey asked: "Do you think the use of torture against suspected terrorists in order to gain important information can often be justified, sometimes be justified, rarely be justified, or never be justified?"

http://intersectionvictoria.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/jesus-survive-cross-blog-4.jpg
A Nazerene terror suspect undergoes torture by Roman security

Roughly half of all respondents -- 49 percent -- said it is often or sometimes justified. A quarter said it never is.

The religious group most likely to say torture is never justified was Protestant denominations -- such as Episcopalians, Lutherans and Presbyterians -- categorized as "mainline" Protestants, in contrast to evangelicals. Just over three in 10 of them said torture is never justified. A quarter of the religiously unaffiliated said the same, compared with two in 10 white non-Hispanic Catholics and one in eight evangelicals.

[ploto]

These are probably the same religious people who support the death penalty

[Cry Havoc]

Even the Bible says that real believers are few, and that there are many who go as a show of pride. No surprises here.

[Winehole23]

"Many bear the thyrsus (http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA*/Thyrsus.html), but few are the bacchantes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacchante)."

[FaithInOne]

I support death penalty and torture but I don't go to church :depressed

[spurster]

Maybe they saw the Passion and wanted more.

[DarrinS]

Secular liberal societies put a high value on human life.


Sincerely,


Dead babies

[boutons_deux]

Pro-life Christian countries don't start wars and don't kill non-combattants.

Sincerely,
Adolph Hitler,
dubya & dickhead & friends

[Extra Stout]

Pro-life Christian countries don't start wars and don't kill non-combattants.

Sincerely,
Adolph Hitler,
dubya & dickhead & friends
I'm totally on board with Hitler.

Sincerely,
Dietrich Bonhoeffer

[jack sommerset]

I don't go to church, I don't have any religion I believe in and I support torture to get info out of terrorist. I'll say once again, waterboarding is for pussies.

[AntiChrist]

I don't douche regularly, so my vagina reeks.


Really?

[ChumpDumper]

I don't go to church, I don't have any religion I believe in and I support torture to get info out of terrorist. I'll say once again, waterboarding is for pussies.Internets Tough Guy.

[jack sommerset]

Internets Tough Guy.

Internets Pussy

[ChumpDumper]

What was it like being waterboarded?

[jack sommerset]

What was it like sucking ur moms tit?

[ChumpDumper]

I have no recollection of breast feeding, and I have never been waterboarded.

[jack sommerset]

I only believe one of those answers.

[ChumpDumper]

Suit yourself.

How many times have you been waterboarded?

[jack sommerset]

About as many times as you.

[ChumpDumper]

Gold.

[jack sommerset]

Exactly

[RobinsontoDuncan]

How about the upwards of 700 innocent people the US tortured?

Hey Jack, you do realize that most of the prisoners held at Guantanamo have been relased and not charged with any crime--after the US determined them to be completely innocent... after they tortured them first.

What was the name of that Canadian gentlemen they abducted from NYC a few years ago, flew to Syria, tortured the hell out of him, only to find out it was a case of mistaken identity?

What about those guys mr. tough guy? they pussies too?

[jack sommerset]

How about the upwards of 700 innocent people the US tortured?

Hey Jack, you do realize that most of the prisoners held at Guantanamo have been relased and not charged with any crime--after the US determined them to be completely innocent... after they tortured them first.

What was the name of that Canadian gentlemen they abducted from NYC a few years ago, flew to Syria, tortured the hell out of him, only to find out it was a case of mistaken identity?

What about those guys mr. tough guy? they pussies too?

First of all waterboarding is not torture. Actually thats all I have to say.

[braeden0613]

I've always found that alot (not all, of course) of people that call themselves Christians are more pro-war, pro-torture, and even anti-Muslim so this doesn't really surprise me. I guess this is just the political time that we live in. There used to be anti-violent and anti-war Christians. So as a Christian that's against abortion, torture, and preemptive war, what does that make me?

[Extra Stout]

American evangelicals are Republicans first and Christians second.

[jack sommerset]

American evangelicals are Republicans first and Christians second.

Whites can't jump,blacks favorite food is chicken,Asians have slanted pussys,Mexicans are short,towel heads are terrorist.....................LAME

[Oh, Gee!!]

I get it: "Republican" is a derogatory term. Good job, Jack.

[jack sommerset]

I get it: "Republican" is a derogatory term. Good job, Jack.

You would come up with that conclusion dick and once again I am not a republican. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

[baseline bum]

First of all waterboarding is not torture. Actually thats all I have to say.

What more could you say to back up such a stupid assertion?

[jack sommerset]

What more could you say to back up such a stupid assertion?

Have you ever been waterboarded?

[MiamiHeat]

Have you ever been waterboarded?

lolol

[Yonivore]

I think Andrew McCarthy should have the last word on this whole matter with his response to Attorney General Whack-a-do on being invited to provide cover and be a whipping boy on some panel to look at policy that has already been decided.


May 1, 2009

By email (to the Counterterrorism Division) and by regular mail:

The Honorable Eric H. Holder, Jr.
Attorney General of the United States
United States Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20530-0001

Dear Attorney General Holder:

This letter is respectfully submitted to inform you that I must decline the invitation to participate in the May 4 roundtable meeting the President’s Task Force on Detention Policy is convening with current and former prosecutors involved in international terrorism cases. An invitation was extended to me by trial lawyers from the Counterterrorism Section, who are members of the Task Force, which you are leading.

The invitation email (of April 14) indicates that the meeting is part of an ongoing effort to identify lawful policies on the detention and disposition of alien enemy combatants—or what the Department now calls “individuals captured or apprehended in connection with armed conflicts and counterterrorism operations.” I admire the lawyers of the Counterterrorism Division, and I do not question their good faith. Nevertheless, it is quite clear—most recently, from your provocative remarks on Wednesday in Germany—that the Obama administration has already settled on a policy of releasing trained jihadists (including releasing some of them into the United States). Whatever the good intentions of the organizers, the meeting will obviously be used by the administration to claim that its policy was arrived at in consultation with current and former government officials experienced in terrorism cases and national security issues. I deeply disagree with this policy, which I believe is a violation of federal law and a betrayal of the president’s first obligation to protect the American people. Under the circumstances, I think the better course is to register my dissent, rather than be used as a prop.

Moreover, in light of public statements by both you and the President, it is dismayingly clear that, under your leadership, the Justice Department takes the position that a lawyer who in good faith offers legal advice to government policy makers—like the government lawyers who offered good faith advice on interrogation policy—may be subject to investigation and prosecution for the content of that advice, in addition to empty but professionally damaging accusations of ethical misconduct. Given that stance, any prudent lawyer would have to hesitate before offering advice to the government.

Beyond that, as elucidated in my writing (including my proposal for a new national security court, which I understand the Task Force has perused), I believe alien enemy combatants should be detained at Guantanamo Bay (or a facility like it) until the conclusion of hostilities. This national defense measure is deeply rooted in the venerable laws of war and was reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in the 2004 Hamdi case. Yet, as recently as Wednesday, you asserted that, in your considered judgment, such notions violate America’s “commitment to the rule of law.” Indeed, you elaborated, “Nothing symbolizes our [adminstration’s] new course more than our decision to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay…. President Obama believes, and I strongly agree, that Guantanamo has come to represent a time and an approach that we want to put behind us: a disregard for our centuries-long respect for the rule of law[.]” (Emphasis added.)

Given your policy of conducting ruinous criminal and ethics investigations of lawyers over the advice they offer the government, and your specific position that the wartime detention I would endorse is tantamount to a violation of law, it makes little sense for me to attend the Task Force meeting. After all, my choice would be to remain silent or risk jeopardizing myself.
For what it may be worth, I will say this much. For eight years, we have had a robust debate in the United States about how to handle alien terrorists captured during a defensive war authorized by Congress after nearly 3000 of our fellow Americans were annihilated. Essentially, there have been two camps. One calls for prosecution in the civilian criminal justice system, the strategy used throughout the 1990s. The other calls for a military justice approach of combatant detention and war-crimes prosecutions by military commission. Because each theory has its downsides, many commentators, myself included, have proposed a third way: a hybrid system, designed for the realities of modern international terrorism—a new system that would address the needs to protect our classified defense secrets and to assure Americans, as well as our allies, that we are detaining the right people.

There are differences in these various proposals. But their proponents, and adherents to both the military and civilian justice approaches, have all agreed on at least one thing: Foreign terrorists trained to execute mass-murder attacks cannot simply be released while the war ensues and Americans are still being targeted. We have already released too many jihadists who, as night follows day, have resumed plotting to kill Americans. Indeed, according to recent reports, a released Guantanamo detainee is now leading Taliban combat operations in Afghanistan, where President Obama has just sent additional American forces.
The Obama campaign smeared Guantanamo Bay as a human rights blight. Consistent with that hyperbolic rhetoric, the President began his administration by promising to close the detention camp within a year. The President did this even though he and you (a) agree Gitmo is a top-flight prison facility, (b) acknowledge that our nation is still at war, and (c) concede that many Gitmo detainees are extremely dangerous terrorists who cannot be tried under civilian court rules. Patently, the commitment to close Guantanamo Bay within a year was made without a plan for what to do with these detainees who cannot be tried. Consequently, the Detention Policy Task Force is not an effort to arrive at the best policy. It is an effort to justify a bad policy that has already been adopted: to wit, the Obama administration policy to release trained terrorists outright if that’s what it takes to close Gitmo by January.

Obviously, I am powerless to stop the administration from releasing top al Qaeda operatives who planned mass-murder attacks against American cities—like Binyam Mohammed (the accomplice of “Dirty Bomber” Jose Padilla) whom the administration recently transferred to Britain, where he is now at liberty and living on public assistance. I am similarly powerless to stop the administration from admitting into the United States such alien jihadists as the 17 remaining Uighur detainees. According to National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair, the Uighurs will apparently live freely, on American taxpayer assistance, despite the facts that they are affiliated with a terrorist organization and have received terrorist paramilitary training. Under federal immigration law (the 2005 REAL ID Act), those facts render them excludable from the United States. The Uighurs’ impending release is thus a remarkable development given the Obama administration’s propensity to deride its predecessor’s purported insensitivity to the rule of law.

I am, in addition, powerless to stop the President, as he takes these reckless steps, from touting his Detention Policy Task Force as a demonstration of his national security seriousness. But I can decline to participate in the charade.

Finally, let me repeat that I respect and admire the dedication of Justice Department lawyers, whom I have tirelessly defended since I retired in 2003 as a chief assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York. It was a unique honor to serve for nearly twenty years as a federal prosecutor, under administrations of both parties. It was as proud a day as I have ever had when the trial team I led was awarded the Attorney General’s Exceptional Service Award in 1996, after we secured the convictions of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman and his underlings for waging a terrorist war against the United States. I particularly appreciated receiving the award from Attorney General Reno—as I recounted in Willful Blindness, my book about the case, without her steadfastness against opposition from short-sighted government officials who wanted to release him, the “blind sheikh” would never have been indicted, much less convicted and so deservedly sentenced to life-imprisonment. In any event, I’ve always believed defending our nation is a duty of citizenship, not ideology. Thus, my conservative political views aside, I’ve made myself available to liberal and conservative groups, to Democrats and Republicans, who’ve thought tapping my experience would be beneficial. It pains me to decline your invitation, but the attendant circumstances leave no other option.

Very truly yours,

/S/

Andrew C. McCarthy

cc: Sylvia T. Kaser and John DePue
National Security Division, Counterterrorism Section
I think the Democrats are on their own now. They've pretty much alienated the intelligence community and any lawyers that might have been willing to give the honest counsel.

Good Luck!

[Ignignokt]

What a bunch of fake outrage.

[MiamiHeat]

Most forms of psychological interrogation methods are OK in my book.

anything that brings physical pain is torture, imo.

so sleep deprivation is OK. if waterboarding is SAFE to the victim and is only a psychological thing, then it is OK to me too.

[ChumpDumper]

Had the torture excuse-makers been working in good faith, I would agree with McCarthy.

They obviously were not.

When a lawyer completely ignores existing case law when forming an opinion, that lawyer is either totally incompetent or completely dishonest.

[Yonivore]

Had the torture excuse-makers been working in good faith, I would agree with McCarthy.

They obviously were not.

When a lawyer completely ignores existing case law when forming an opinion, that lawyer is either totally incompetent or completely dishonest.
Oh please do cite case law applicable to alien combatants captured on a field of battle.

[MiamiHeat]

Had the torture excuse-makers been working in good faith, I would agree with McCarthy.

They obviously were not.

When a lawyer completely ignores existing case law when forming an opinion, that lawyer is either totally incompetent or completely dishonest.

How many times have you been waterboarded?

[ChumpDumper]

Oh please do cite case law applicable to alien combatants captured on a field of battle.There is plenty of case law -- military and civilian -- regarding waterboarding.

I know you want so bad to be able to torture and think it's is the best thing America could ever do.

I disagree.

[ChumpDumper]

How many times have you been waterboarded?None.

[braeden0613]

American evangelicals are Republicans first and Christians second.
This is quite a generalization but I know some people that fit this bill completely. Fox News is probably third

[Yonivore]

There is plenty of case law -- military and civilian -- regarding waterboarding.

I know you want so bad to be able to torture and think it's is the best thing America could ever do.

I disagree.
So, cite the law...

You're so fond of badgering people over details, in here. Put up or shut up.

[jack sommerset]

I would bet my big balls,my nuts,my sac that if Obama said waterboarding is not torture chump would agree.

[Ya Vez]

so those great atheist leaders like Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, and Fidel Castro have never ever tortured... atheist are so lovable...

[clambake]

so those great atheist leaders like Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, and Fidel Castro have never ever tortured... atheist are so lovable...

fake christians do it, too.

[braeden0613]

so those great atheist leaders like Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, and Fidel Castro have never ever tortured... atheist are so lovable...
so we should be like these dictators? what are you trying to say here?

[hope4dopes]

Pro-life Christian countries don't start wars and don't kill non-combattants.

Sincerely,
Adolph Hitler,
dubya & dickhead & friends

Hilter was no christian, he found many too many faults with it to suit his vision.......I know my church supports torture but Rev. Wright says only for the jews and whitey.

[hope4dopes]

One more thing I think the word torture may not lead to a healing within the family of man, I propose we call it MAN MADE CONFESSIONS. whadda ya think.

[Yonivore]

One more thing I think the word torture may not lead to a healing within the family of man, I propose we call it MAN MADE CONFESSIONS. whadda ya think.
Janet Napolitano approves.

[pkbpkb81]

How about the upwards of 700 innocent people the US tortured?

Hey Jack, you do realize that most of the prisoners held at Guantanamo have been relased and not charged with any crime--after the US determined them to be completely innocent... after they tortured them first.

What was the name of that Canadian gentlemen they abducted from NYC a few years ago, flew to Syria, tortured the hell out of him, only to find out it was a case of mistaken identity?

What about those guys mr. tough guy? they pussies too?

um yes yes they are

[Marcus Bryant]

I'm totally on board with Hitler.

Sincerely,
Dietrich Bonhoeffer

No kidding. Talk about general historical ignorance...

[TheProfessor]

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
--Mohandas Gandhi

[Marcus Bryant]

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
--Mohandas Gandhi

Unfortunately, often true.

[hope4dopes]

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
--Mohandas Gandhi

Gahndi encouraged Indians to volunter to fight for the british empire in three wars the boer war,WWI and WWII.The british did not want non whites fighting in the boer war so they relegated Ghandi to the ambulance corp he was dissapointed,but actively recruted for them. Also I think ghandi's sons would have felt ghandi was far from being christ like himself.

[Winehole23]

Say micca, are you familiar with the concept of spiritual conversion?

What do you suppose the saints were before they became sainty-saints?

[Cry Havoc]

So, cite the law...

You're so fond of badgering people over details, in here. Put up or shut up.

Yonivore, meet Geneva Conventions.

Geneva Conventions, meet Yonivore.

[Ignignokt]

Yonivore, meet Geneva Conventions.

Geneva Conventions, meet Yonivore.

so when is alqueda signing the geneva conventions.

[Cry Havoc]

so when is alqueda signing the geneva conventions.

I guess we only have to treat people like they're human if they signed the GCs. How nice and compartmentalized that makes our decisions.

[TheProfessor]

Gahndi encouraged Indians to volunter to fight for the british empire in three wars the boer war,WWI and WWII.The british did not want non whites fighting in the boer war so they relegated Ghandi to the ambulance corp he was dissapointed,but actively recruted for them. Also I think ghandi's sons would have felt ghandi was far from being christ like himself.
Thanks for the history lesson, but what does that have to do with religious people hypocritically supporting torture?

[Cane]

Yonivore, meet Geneva Conventions.

Geneva Conventions, meet Yonivore.


Haha, nice pwnage.

[hope4dopes]

Thanks for the history lesson, but what does that have to do with religious people hypocritically supporting torture?

I was reffering to your use of ghandi as some sort of litmus test of morality also to point out how things aren't so black and white, how sometimes even saints can be sinners.

[hope4dopes]

Say micca, are you familiar with the concept of spiritual conversion?

What do you suppose the saints were before they became sainty-saints?

What religion do you think ghandi converted from and what religion do you think he converted to. I think Ghandi's made some unholy alliences of convenience to accomplish what he wanted for India.He felt it was neccesary,but alot didn't.

[jack sommerset]

Ghandhi was a pussy. I am not saying that to be funny or "tough" He was a sad pathetic man who just sat around acting like a pussy. Not eatting to get his way. My 6 year old doesn't even try that BS. Churchill knew this guy was a enemy but its hard to beat down a old pathetic dog.

[TheProfessor]

I was reffering to your use of ghandi as some sort of litmus test of morality also to point out how things aren't so black and white, how sometimes even saints can be sinners.
You're attacking Ghandi to avoid addressing the issue (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man).

[PixelPusher]

Ghandhi was a pussy. I am not saying that to be funny or "tough" He was a sad pathetic man who just sat around acting like a pussy. Not eatting to get his way. My 6 year old doesn't even try that BS. Churchill knew this guy was a enemy but its hard to beat down a old pathetic dog.


Martin Luther King, Jr. was a pussy. I am not saying that to be funny or "tough" He was a sad pathetic man who just went on walks, gave speeches and let himself get arrested like a pussy. Then some cracker shot him. What a loser.


Jesus Christ was a pussy. I am not saying that to be funny or "tough" He was a sad pathetic man who just sat around weeping and praying the Garden of Gethsemane like a pussy. He even told one of his disciples who tried to defend him to step off after he cut off the ear of one of the temple guards sent to arrest him. Sure enough the Romans nailed his pacifist ass to a cross.

[hope4dopes]

You're attacking Ghandi to avoid addressing the issue (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man). attacking?...Oh my God.....I attacked Ghandi someone call the thought police, I didn't know I wasn't allowed to study something and ponder, and question, and be perplexed, and come to conclucions and change conclusions, It's not like he's Jesus H Christ or something......OOpps I'm sorry it just slipped out I didn't mean it.

[hope4dopes]

I guess I'm more intrested not in the question"what would Jesus do", but the question "what would mohammed do"

If mohammed was captured and had plans in his empty little noggin,about the bombing of a major american city, or say a biological threat to a bunch of infedel scum, and he was politlely asked to share would he be forthcoming? I mean this is what the jihadist think about, what would mohammed do in this situation.
Or I think what would mohammed do if he captured an enemy also an infedel scum, who knew of plans to say destroy mecca or medina and wasn't forthcoming. Yes I think about that and then I'd do what I think mohammed would do...... I'd cut their fucking nuts off.Praise be to Allah.

[clambake]

is there anyone here with better timing than PixelPusher?

[jack sommerset]

PixelPusher.Really? This is how you waste ur time. Just making up shit. Pathetic LOSER!

[smeagol]

Ghandhi was a pussy. I am not saying that to be funny or "tough" He was a sad pathetic man who just sat around acting like a pussy. Not eatting to get his way. My 6 year old doesn't even try that BS. Churchill knew this guy was a enemy but its hard to beat down a old pathetic dog.

:rolleyes


What a stupid post, Jackie-boy . . .

[Cry Havoc]

:rolleyes


What a stupid post, Jackie-boy . . .

What baffles me is why people even respond to his posts anymore.

[jack sommerset]

What baffles me is why people even respond to his posts anymore.

unlike u i make sense.

[hope4dopes]

What baffles me is why people even respond to his posts anymore.

Well honestly this was a pretty stupid thread to begin with.

[Warlord23]

Ghandhi was a pussy. I am not saying that to be funny or "tough" He was a sad pathetic man who just sat around acting like a pussy. Not eatting to get his way. My 6 year old doesn't even try that BS. Churchill knew this guy was a enemy but its hard to beat down a old pathetic dog.

Like I've said before, you are the absolute worst poster on this site and it isn't even close. Good for you that we have freedom of speech, so you can flaunt your astonishing levels of mental retardation.

[Winehole23]

(Redacted. Too mean.)

[RobinsontoDuncan]

Gahndi encouraged Indians to volunter to fight for the british empire in three wars the boer war,WWI and WWII.

Wrong. Gandhi encouraged Indians to stay loyal to the British empire during these conflicts and not to agitate for Independence or rights.

And you are also wrong about WWII, at which point Gandhi was in prison and had already been advocating for Indian home rule for more than a decade, he did not support WWII at all.


The british did not want non whites fighting in the boer war so they relegated Ghandi to the ambulance corp he was dissapointed,but actively recruted for them.

Wrong. Gandhi did not, and never would, sign up to fight, nor did he encourage other Indians to. He always intended to run an ambulance corps.


Also I think ghandi's sons would have felt ghandi was far from being christ like himself.

One of his sons killed himself because he was so intimidated by living in Gandhi's shadow. I don't know what point you are trying to make here, but you clearly need to think before you type/ make historical proclamations.

[jack sommerset]

Like I've said before, you are the absolute worst poster on this site and it isn't even close. Good for you that we have freedom of speech, so you can flaunt your astonishing levels of mental retardation.

I know for a fact their are posters on here that have special needs and they have kids with special needs. Don't be a insensitive little fuck to those because I don't agree with you. Don't respond. It's pretty fucking simple.

Look up what Chruchill thought of Ghandhi. He thought he was a fanatic and an ascetic of the fakir type. Not everyone thinks starving urself to get your way is all that heroic "warlord". Some think its pretty fucking pathetic.

[Winehole23]

Oh please do cite case law applicable to alien combatants captured on a field of battle.Do you think it's "generically acceptable to torture anyone of sufficient rank or value"?


If the Germans had captured a colonel with probable knowledge of Patton's battle plan, torture would have been OK. If the Taliban caught a deputy consul who knew when the next attack on Kandahar was scheduled, torture would be OK. If al-Qaeda catches a Air Force pilot who might tell them the secret of detecting and shooting down drones, torture will be OK.


The following is not *case law*, I know, but posted for the general edification. US statutes count too, don't they?

http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/usc_sec_18_00002340---A000-.html


(a) Offense.— Whoever outside the United States commits or attempts to commit torture shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both, and if death results to any person from conduct prohibited by this subsection, shall be punished by death or imprisoned for any term of years or for life. (b) Jurisdiction.— There is jurisdiction over the activity prohibited in subsection (a) if— (1) the alleged offender is a national of the United States; or
(2) the alleged offender is present in the United States, irrespective of the nationality of the victim or alleged offender.

Definition of torture:
(c) Definition.— As used in this section the term “war crime” means any conduct— (1) defined as a grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party;
(2) prohibited by Article 23, 25, 27, or 28 of the Annex to the Hague Convention IV, Respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land, signed 18 October 1907;
(3) which constitutes a grave breach of common Article 3 (as defined in subsection (d)) when committed in the context of and in association with an armed conflict not of an international character; or
(4) of a person who, in relation to an armed conflict and contrary to the provisions of the Protocol on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices as amended at Geneva on 3 May 1996 (Protocol II as amended on 3 May 1996), when the United States is a party to such Protocol, willfully kills or causes serious injury to civilians.

(d) Common Article 3 Violations.—
(1) Prohibited conduct.— In subsection (c)(3), the term “grave breach of common Article 3” means any conduct (such conduct constituting a grave breach of common Article 3 of the international conventions done at Geneva August 12, 1949), as follows: (A) Torture.— The act of a person who commits, or conspires or attempts to commit, an act specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control for the purpose of obtaining information or a confession, punishment, intimidation, coercion, or any reason based on discrimination of any kind. (B) Cruel or inhuman treatment.— The act of a person who commits, or conspires or attempts to commit, an act intended to inflict severe or serious physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions), including serious physical abuse, upon another within his custody or control...
(D) Murder.— The act of a person who intentionally kills, or conspires or attempts to kill, or kills whether intentionally or unintentionally in the course of committing any other offense under this subsection, one or more persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including those placed out of combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause...
(G) Rape.— The act of a person who forcibly or with coercion or threat of force wrongfully invades, or conspires or attempts to invade, the body of a person by penetrating, however slightly, the anal or genital opening of the victim with any part of the body of the accused, or with any foreign object.
(H) Sexual assault or abuse.— The act of a person who forcibly or with coercion or threat of force engages, or conspires or attempts to engage, in sexual contact with one or more persons, or causes, or conspires or attempts to cause, one or more persons to engage in sexual contact....

[Winehole23]

Yoni: Who will surrender to us on the battlefield, knowing that we have an official policy that parses torture as not being torture?

[Winehole23]

From Daniel Larison (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2009/05/02/the-dangers-of-precedent/)'s conservative, Orthodox Christian perspective:

Will (http://www.ordinary-gentlemen.com/2009/04/war-crimes-then-and-now/) at Ordinary Gentlemen writes:

I’m totally baffled by people who look to past atrocities for some sort of ethical guidance.
Well, quite so. One of the odd things about this is that it tends to make the atrocities even more central to the perception of the overall war effort than they might otherwise be. Instead of acknowledging them as wrongful excesses in an otherwise justified military campaign, which a reasonable person could easily do and leave it at that, the argument from war crimes has the strange effect of making the commission of war crimes seem absolutely essential to waging the war in question. While the defenders of these excesses may believe they are protecting the reputation of the government and the war it was fighting, they succeed mainly in affirming a double moral standard in judging wartime acts, thereby undermining the moral authority of the very cause they purport to be protecting against critics.



I would add that the recourse to past crimes to evade accountability for new crimes is a good argument in favor of enforcing strict accountability for crimes recently committed. If such crimes are permitted to go unpunished, their apologists will continue to work overtime to shape the debate in later years and decades in favor of the decisions leading up to those crimes, and the more time goes by the apologist will be able to fall back on one unassailable retort: “If this was a crime, why didn’t anyone in the government investigate and prosecute it as such?” Having warned against witch hunts and “criminalizing policy differences” in the beginning to intimidate the responsible institutions into inaction, the apologists will then remind the public that no charges were ever filed and no convictions were secured.



So, ironically, some of the defenders of the torture regime are making the best argument for the prosecution of past administration officials by their own invocations of past government illegalities. They are unwittingly reminding us that crimes unpunished today can easily become tomorrow’s conventionally accepted “correct” decisions. Every usurpation or instance of lawbreaking that is not challenged and reversed creates a precedent for the next round of usurpation and lawbreaking, and the fact that there is a non-trivial number of people in America who think that the illegal acts of Lincoln, FDR, Truman or others should have some mitigating effect on how we treat illegal acts under a more recent administration is one of the best reasons why crimes committed during the last administration must be investigated and lawbreakers must be prosecuted. Had many past administrations been scrutinized and their crimes investigated and punished, it is less likely that we would have to cope with an executive branch that acts as if it is above the law and which seems to be able to to break the law with impunity. If we fail to hold past administration officials accountable, we not only make a joke out of the rule of law, but we ensure that no legal or institutional constraints will prevent a future administration from committing similar wrongdoing in a time of crisis.

[Winehole23]

The Argument From War Crimes Returns (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2009/05/02/the-argument-from-war-crimes-returns/)


Posted on May 2nd, 2009 by Daniel Larison



(http://digg.com/)
Others (http://www.juliansanchez.com/2009/04/30/war-crimes-past-and-present/) have (http://www.ordinary-gentlemen.com/2009/04/war-crimes-then-and-now/) already covered (http://johnschwenkler.wordpress.com/2009/05/01/reductio-ad-historiam/) this fairly well, but I suppose I should say something about Michael Goldfarb’s (http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/04/jon_stewart_truman_was_a_war_c_1.asp) preoccupation (http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/05/stewart_apologizes.asp) with defending past war crimes. Julian Sanchez makes the important point regarding the nuclear strikes on Japan:

To the extent it’s a controversial claim, it’s controversial because we don’t like calling U.S. presidents war criminals, not because it’s a difficult question whether obliterating entire areas inhabited by large civilian populations with the flimsiest of military targets as a pretext should now be regarded as a war crime.
Sanchez is correct that it isn’t a difficult question as far as law and morality are concerned. War crimes are not justified or obviated by necessity–necessity is almost always the rationale governments use to explain why they committed war crimes. As Stewart’s pathetic backtracking shows, however, it continues to be a politically charged and risky thing for a prominent public figure to claim. Politically and as a matter of retaining viewers, Stewart may be right that acknowledging the nuclear bombings to be war crimes was “stupid,” since there is no upside or popularity in saying so publicly, but Stewart’s own recantation is a good example of how perverse and distorting the prevailing “judgment of history” can be. Judged by any consistent standard of treatment of non-combatants in wartime, mass incineration must surely rank as a far worse crime than the very serious crime of torturing prisoners.


Because the prevailing view of Harry Truman and his decisions at the present time happens to be favorable, we are all supposed to believe that the “judgment of history” has “vindicated” Truman. This is a nice way of saying that propaganda and hero worship have overcome moral reasoning, and time has caused the moral horror of even a significant part of the American right in the 1940s to fade from memory. This favorable view of Truman is inextricably tied up with the cult of the presidency, our depressing but all too human habit of praising bad wartime leaders at the expense of better peacetime executives, the mythologizing of WWII (and therefore the minimizing or justifying of any wrongdoing on the Allied side) and the implicit devaluing of Japanese civilian lives every defense of both fire-bombing and nuclear strikes includes. None of this seems to occur to the people who continue to glorify Truman and to use Truman as an example of how tainted, bad Presidents may yet be viewed as great successes by posterity. What Truman’s posthumous rehabilitation should tell us is that half-truths and falsehoods, if repeated often enough, can become widely accepted, and that virtually no American political leader, no matter how many blunders he made and no matter what criminal acts he ordered, is beyond redemption at the hands of later sympathetic people who find that leader’s decisions to be useful precedents for their own preferred course of action. The “judgment of history” has, for the time being, ruled in favor of Truman, and therefore challenging this judgment is something to be mocked.



Stewart might reflect on the truth that a “complicated decision in the context of a horrific war” could be applied to many crimes ordered and carried out by governments in wartime. If we aspire to hold America to a standard according to which “we don’t torture,” one might think the same concern for human dignity and justice would also require us to say, “We are America–we don’t incincerate civilians, and we certainly don’t do it en masse.” Or, rather, we know full well that this has been done in our name many times in the past (and certainly not just at Hiroshima and Nagasaki), but we should also be able to say that this was wrong and should never be done again. Pro-life Christians who remind us of the Massacre of the Innocents to protest the terrible crimes committed against the unborn must be able to see the same Massacre in the gratuitous nuclear annihilation of the center of Japanese Christianity. It is when convenience and so-called necessity are most tempting that adhering to moral principle is the most difficult and the most crucial.



The love affair with war crimes (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2006/07/25/the-argument-from-war-crimes/) that some on the mainstream right (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2006/07/28/the-argument-from-war-crimes-ii/) have (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2006/08/05/the-argument-from-war-crimes-iii/) never ceases (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2006/08/17/argument-from-war-crimes-iv/) to perplex me (http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2007/05/01/the-argument-from-war-crimes-v/). When smaller wars have been waged in which civilian centers are being bombarded, we often hear from this crowd that the problem with Western nations today is that they lack the will to inflict the mass casualties inflicted during WWII bombing attacks, and when challenged about ongoing operations they will say, “Oh yeah, well what about Dresden and Tokyo?” To which I might respond, “Well, what about them? These were unspeakable crimes.”



Many of the same people who preach such insipidly simplistic and irrational messages about fighting and even “ending” evil will be the first to find refuge behind the “complicated” nature of wartime decisions. At least they will do so if it means that they can ignore the real moral complexity of these situations, in which all belligerents are capable of committing war crimes and ought to be held to the same standard. It is this latter point that is really quite simple: if the torture practices authorized by the last administration had been carried out against Americans, we would not hesitate to call them crimes and demand punishment for the guilty, and if the same kinds of bombings were done to our cities by foreign military forces we would not think twice about calling them war crimes. Acknowledging this should not be an occsasion for excessive self-flagellation, but it does have to be acknowledged. Perhaps even more corrupting and dangerous than the abuses of power and wartime excesses themselves is the willingness to minimize or approve of wrongful acts carried out by the government.



P.S. Here is an older post (http://johnschwenkler.wordpress.com/2008/12/18/doomed-to-repeat-it-ii/) from John Schwenkler to remind us of what it is we’re talking about in this debate.

[Winehole23]

Via (http://www2.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=cc408c85-fbcf-42cd-9463-c991a42519dd&p=2) Larison:


Now, I don't want to answer dogma with dogma. Strategic and national interests played major roles in the decisions of all combatants in the First and Second World Wars. They do in every war. It's a messy world and the motives of nations are seldom simple and pure.


The sort of Americans who cheer for Fred Thompson would agree with that statement -- as it applies to other countries. What they cannot seem to accept is that it applies to their country, too. For them, Americans are unique. The United States is unique. And what sets America and Americans apart is purity of heart.


"We are proud of that heritage," Thompson said in Iowa after citing the mythology of America-the-liberator. "I don't think we have anything to apologize for."


Nothing to apologize for. Never did anything wrong in 231 years of history. Nothing.

This is infantile. And dangerous. A superpower that believes it is pure of heart and the light of the world will inevitably rush in where angels fear to tread. And then it will find itself wondering why the foreigners it so selflessly helps hate it so.

[EVAY]

I've always found that alot (not all, of course) of people that call themselves Christians are more pro-war, pro-torture, and even anti-Muslim so this doesn't really surprise me. I guess this is just the political time that we live in. There used to be anti-violent and anti-war Christians. So as a Christian that's against abortion, torture, and preemptive war, what does that make me?

unusual

[braeden0613]

unusual
:toast

[PixelPusher]

http://www.juliansanchez.com/2009/05/04/morality-isnt-free/

...

Still, if you think of the United States as being defined, in part, by a certain set of moral ideals—if you don’t merely want your side to win international conflicts, but think that in virtue of these ideals we deserve to win—it seems very odd to then think of conduct in war as a question of pure expediency. Practicing torture or bombing civilians because it would “save lives” is, one supposes, better than doing it for the sheer sadistic pleasure of it, but sets the bar too low. I don’t mean to take the position at the opposite extreme—fiat justitia, ruat caelum—but surely “saving lives” is the beginning of what a justification of these actions might sound like, a minimum, a necessary-but-not-sufficient condition. If defenders of torture could establish that it’s effective, that it uniquely able to extract vital, reliable information that prevents more deaths than are caused by the swelling of terrorist ranks, the loss of international cooperation, the waste of resources chasing false leads—if all that were well established—that would be step one, the basis for opening a discussion of whether it might be justified.

Since recent polling suggests that regular churchgoers are more likely to believe torture is justifiable, perhaps it’s appropriate to paraphrase a certain late rabbi: If you refrain from savage acts in wartime only when brutality would gain you nothing, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do the same. Vague talk about “saving lives” obscures a vital question: What kinds of costs are you willing to bear, what risks will you accept, in order to avoid doing evil? If you’re prepared to discard a principle as soon as there’s some significant benefit to be gotten by doing so, then it’s a principle of expediency, not morality. If you’re ready to resort to torture, or to targeting civilians, as soon as there’s some chance it would “save American lives,” then you’re declaring a commitment to abide by moral constraints, so long as observing them is free.

We are required, it seems to me, to choose: We can accept that we’re one more country like any other, guided by pure rational self interest, in which case “if it might save even one American life…” is as much justification as we can ask for any policy, and the only question (though still, of course, a difficult and complex question) is how we go about it. If, on the other hand, we think there’s something exceptional about the United States—that we’re defined by a particular moral vision beyond the universal desire for comfort and safety—we need to accept that hewing to a moral vision sometimes comes with costs, and then ask how much ours is worth to us.

[Winehole23]

If you’re prepared to discard a principle as soon as there’s some significant benefit to be gotten by doing so, then it’s a principle of expediency, not morality. If you’re ready to resort to torture, or to targeting civilians, as soon as there’s some chance it would “save American lives,” then you’re declaring a commitment to abide by moral constraints, so long as observing them is free.

[Ignignokt]

We don't believe in killing, but we do practice capital punishment.

in the case of torture. the life of the inoccents are more worthy than the damned.

As a christian one wouldn't kill one's self, but in order to protect the innocent, you would put your own life in danger knowingly that it will put u in certain death.

General Washington's view on torture was shaped for different reasons. The colonies while they warred with the brits, considered them still kin. You would fight your brother, but you'd never aim for his face.THe brits also fought like nobles and wouldn't try to kill innocents as a rule. Now there might have been exceptions, but the brits and hessians, played within the war rules of europe. War strategies were to achieve decisive military defeats, not genocide.

So as the state which has a duty to uphold my life. I want them to achieve whatever means possible to protect me and my family.

[Ignignokt]

so in other words. Live with your plattitudes, but i'm not gonna make the decision for some innocent life to keep them from dying.

We don't torture or practice enhanced interrogation to win on the battlefield, we do it to save others who have no say in this matter. NO MAN HAS THE RIGHT TO TAKE ANOTHERS LIFE.

and like one of our founding fathers said (in paraphrase), "THe only vote that should never be allowed, is a vote against democracy."

A vote to allow the destruction of a free society, is self allowed tyranny.

Sometimes there is no black and white.

/thread.

[hope4dopes]

so in other words. Live with your plattitudes, but i'm not gonna make the decision for some innocent life to keep them from dying.

We don't torture or practice enhanced interrogation to win on the battlefield, we do it to save others who have no say in this matter. NO MAN HAS THE RIGHT TO TAKE ANOTHERS LIFE.

and like one of our founding fathers said (in paraphrase), "THe only vote that should never be allowed, is a vote against democracy."

A vote to allow the destruction of a free society, is self allowed tyranny.

Sometimes there is no black and white.

There is no black and white....well that's a concept that takes an adult to understand, so you may get alot of flack for this one.

/thread.

[PixelPusher]

We don't believe in killing, but we do practice capital punishment.
Speak for yourself. There's lots of people who believe in both propositions, and lots of people who believe in neither.


in the case of torture. the life of the inoccents* are more worthy than the damned.
*make that "American" innocents. For everyone else, shit happens, war is hell, blah-blah-blah...

Perhaps that was an unfair assertion on my part...

As a christian one wouldn't kill one's self, but in order to protect the innocent, you would put your own life in danger knowingly that it will put u in certain death.

General Washington's view on torture was shaped for different reasons. The colonies while they warred with the brits, considered them still kin. You would fight your brother, but you'd never aim for his face.THe brits also fought like nobles and wouldn't try to kill innocents as a rule. Now there might have been exceptions, but the brits and hessians, played within the war rules of europe. War strategies were to achieve decisive military defeats, not genocide.

So as the state which has a duty to uphold my life. I want them to achieve whatever means possible to protect me and my family.
...oh, nevermind. Thanks for re-affirming tribal limits of your morality.


so in other words. Live with your plattitudes, but i'm not gonna make the decision for some innocent life to keep them from dying.

We don't torture or practice enhanced interrogation to win on the battlefield, we do it to save others who have no say in this matter. NO MAN HAS THE RIGHT TO TAKE ANOTHERS LIFE.
But we have the right to torture? WTF? And didn't you attempt to throw capital punishment in our faces a couple of paragraphs ago? You're all over the place.


and like one of our founding fathers said (in paraphrase), "THe only vote that should never be allowed, is a vote against democracy."

A vote to allow the destruction of a free society, is self allowed tyranny.

Sometimes there is no black and white.

/thread.
A vote to put the interests (security) of "the state" ahead of individual rights is self-allowed tyranny, and will result in the destruction of a free society. If our ideals really don't amount to more than empty plattitudes, if they're just rhetorical gang signs to rally our tribe and taunt the other tribe, then the United States really isn't exceptional. It's just another country. Just another flag waved by a bunch of monkeys killing other monkeys.

Bumper-sticker patriots can't have it both ways.

[Ignignokt]

Speak for yourself. There's lots of people who believe in both propositions, and lots of people who believe in neither.


*make that "American" innocents. For everyone else, shit happens, war is hell, blah-blah-blah...

Perhaps that was an unfair assertion on my part...

...oh, nevermind. Thanks for re-affirming tribal limits of your morality.


But we have the right to torture? WTF? And didn't you attempt to throw capital punishment in our faces a couple of paragraphs ago? You're all over the place.

A vote to put the interests of "the state" ahead of individual rights is self-allowed tyranny, and will result in the destruction of a free society. If our ideals really don't amount to more than empty plattitudes, if they're just rhetorical gang signs to rally our tribe and taunt the other tribe, then the United States really isn't exceptional. It's just another country. Just another flag waved by a bunch of monkeys killing other monkeys.

When am i ever going to argue with Pixel pusher the human being and not Pixel Pusher the attack bot.

First off, you're despicable and a mindless hack, your thread poses the question as to why chrisitians believe in torture, i respond with my own faith by awnsering that same question, and i get a "thanks for reaffirming your tribal thought".

If that's what this is all about, Pixel i want you to personally state yourself, that if an attack would render your loved ones dead, you'd be satisfied knowing that we held our heads high.

I want you to put that on your signature.

I want you to tell everyone you love including your kids if you have any, that Daddy would allow their destruction because he doesn't believe in a technique that doesn't kill someone.

Well, you know what, i could care less, what you think. You don't get to decide who lives and who dies. Individuals do. And if i were that CIA agent, i would use whatever means necessary to save your loved ones and give them that choice.

I'd rather you call me a racist bigoted, narrow minded christ freak than have your loved ones engulfed in flames.

[PixelPusher]

When am i ever going to argue with Pixel pusher the human being and not Pixel Pusher the attack bot.

First off, you're despicable and a mindless hack, your thread poses the question as to why chrisitians believe in torture, i respond with my own faith by awnsering that same question, and i get a "thanks for reaffirming your tribal thought".

If that's what this is all about, Pixel i want you to personally state yourself, that if an attack would render your loved ones dead, you'd be satisfied knowing that we held our heads high.

I want you to put that on your signature.

I want you to tell everyone you love including your kids if you have any, that Daddy would allow their destruction because he doesn't believe in a technique that doesn't kill someone.

Well, you know what, i could care less, what you think. You don't get to decide who lives and who dies. Individuals do. And if i were that CIA agent, i would use whatever means necessary to save your loved ones and give them that choice.

I'd rather you call me a racist bigoted, narrow minded christ freak than have your loved ones engulfed in flames.
No, I will not cop to your straw man.

[PixelPusher]

I want you to tell everyone you love including your kids if you have any, that Daddy would allow their destruction because he doesn't believe in a technique that doesn't kill someone.


If death is the only limit to what you would do to save your kids from "destruction", why stop at torture? How about doing what they do in Great Britain - put up a shitload of CCTV cameras to monitor us for our safety? It wouldn't kill anyone and it would help insure your child's saftey. How about we unshackle our law enforcement from the namby, pampy idealistic plattitudes proffered in our Bill of Rights and allow for warrantless search and seizure?

How far is too far to protect your child? Is there no limit for you as long as no one is taking anyone's life away?

[hope4dopes]

Hey ignigknot you know that old whinehole and pixie are just arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin,I don't know maybe they didn't have the chance to become lawyers or something.But if some shit head dragged them into an alley and bitch slapped them around then took their wallets they'd be screaming for the cops to start busting heads, any head.

[Ignignokt]

Life is a strawman.

[Ignignokt]

Hey ignigknot you know that old whinehole and pixie are just arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin,I don't know maybe they didn't have the chance to become lawyers or something.But if some shit head dragged them into an alley and bitch slapped them around then took their wallets they'd be screaming for the cops to start busting heads, any head.

I know that they mean good, but. that's just it. I live in the real world.

[Ignignokt]

If death is the only limit to what you would do to save your kids from "destruction", why stop at torture? How about doing what they do in Great Britain - put up a shitload of CCTV cameras to monitor us for our safety? It wouldn't kill anyone and it would help insure your child's saftey. How about we unshackle our law enforcement from the namby, pampy idealistic plattitudes proffered in our Bill of Rights and allow for warrantless search and seizure?

How far is too far to protect your child? Is there no limit for you as long as no one is taking anyone's life away?

I didn't know torture was a plattitude in the bill of rights.

[Ignignokt]

redistribution of wealth is a violation of property rights, a plattitude in the bill of rights. we could go on and on about each sides hypocrisy, and i don't claim to be faultless.

But, what bout my wager?

[PixelPusher]

Hey ignigknot you know that old whinehole and pixie are just arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin,I don't know maybe they didn't have the chance to become lawyers or something.But if some shit head dragged them into an alley and bitch slapped them around then took their wallets they'd be screaming for the cops to start busting heads, any head.

Like the con artists who lives his life in paranoia because he's convinced everyone else is as depraved and deceitful as he is, you assume everyone else share your conviction that "nobody else really believes in any of that ethical crap".

[braeden0613]

A better question is, would you be alright if Christ was standing next to you while you torture someone (or allow it)? See how that "well we might save lives at some point" argument works. It may seem like an extreme example, but if you truly believe in "what would jesus do?" it applies here.

[hope4dopes]

I know that they mean good, but. that's just it. I live in the real world.

Oh I don't think they mean good I just think there's a disconnect,

[hope4dopes]

A better question is, would you be alright if Christ was standing next to you while you torture someone (or allow it)? See how that "well we might save lives at some point" argument works. It may seem like an extreme example, but if you truly believe in "what would jesus do?" it applies here.

Are you a christian

[braeden0613]

Are you a christian
yeah I've said so in this thread

[hope4dopes]

Like the con artists who lives his life in paranoia because he's convinced everyone else is as depraved and deceitful as he is, you assume everyone else share your conviction that "nobody else really believes in any of that ethical crap".

Things aren't black and white.

[PixelPusher]

But, what bout my wager?

What wager? We already broke the torture cherry. I'm sure if we are ever attacked again, you will ignore all other possible explainations and assume it must have been because Obama didn't let Jack Bauer shove a knife in some guy's kneecap, but are you really so naive as to think the re-affirmation of the illegality of torture would stop some CIA, FBI, or even Joe Blow down the street from going apeshit on a terror suspect if there really was a ticking time-bomb scenario? You don't think they wouldn't "take one for the team" if they really thought the "24" universe had collided with our own and we really were "out of time!"?

Why is it so important to you that we codify torture?

If we don't even have the collective fortitude to punish a bunch of nitwits who insisted on ordering the CIA to waterboard some guy (who already gave up the goods to the FBI in a regular interrogation) 83 times i one month because they pissed their pants over every daily security breifing and were desperate for ANY intel they could get, whether it was legit or not (and it wasn't), what makes you think the United States would want to prosecute your lone wolf CIA agent who saved Washington D.C. from a nuke?

[PixelPusher]

I didn't know torture was a plattitude in the bill of rights.


Eighth Admendment: Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Now you know. And knowing is half the battle.

[hope4dopes]

yeah I've said so in this thread

Well in that case....what I see was Christ wasn't teaching or trying to uphold a set of ethics, he was trying to get people to raise their levels of spiritual awareness, and abilities.Much like Buddah.

[hope4dopes]

Now you know. And knowing is half the battle.

Since when does the social contract extend to those trying to destroy the society.

[hope4dopes]

No, I will not cop to your straw man.

chickenshit.

[PixelPusher]

Since when does the social contract extend to those trying to destroy the society.

Thanks for reaffirming my point about ideals being nothing more than empty plattitudes for bumper-sticker patriots.

[braeden0613]

Well in that case....what I see was Christ wasn't teaching or trying to uphold a set of ethics, he was trying to get people to raise their levels of spiritual awareness, and abilities.Much like Buddah.
I don't want to sit here and argue the Bible, but basically everything in there says otherwise. You are free to believe however you want, but I still think its outrageous that a majority of Christians support torture. I also think its interesting how the right argues for absolutes regarding gay marriage, abortion, etc., but then suddenly when torture is introduced, its relativism all day long.

[PixelPusher]

Tell me something hopes4dopes...do you believe that America the "Greatest Nation on Earth, and the Greatest Nation that ever existed"? If so, what makes us so great, so exceptional? Aircraft carriers? ICBMs?

Clearly you don't think it's has anything to do with "American Ideals" regarding liberty and democracy.

[hope4dopes]

Thanks for reaffirming my point about ideals being nothing more than empty plattitudes for bumper-sticker patriots.


You wouldn't answer ing's question you won't answer mine go count angels on the head of your pin.

[hope4dopes]

Tell me something hopes4dopes...do you believe that America the "Greatest Nation on Earth, and the Greatest Nation that ever existed"? If so, what makes us so great, so exceptional? Aircraft carriers? ICBMs?

Clearly you don't think it's has anything to do with "American Ideals" regarding liberty and democracy. It is the flower of westeren thought.

[PixelPusher]

You wouldn't answer ing's question you won't answer mine go count angels on the head of your pin.

Ing's question is bullshit. As to your question regarding whether we should extend justice and human rights to those outside of the American tribe, I'll go with what Newt Gingrich said in 1997:


"As I said in China this spring, there is no place for abuse in what must be considered the family of man. There is no place for torture and arbitrary detention. There is no place for forced confessions. There is no place for intolerance of dissent." "While we walked through the Rotunda. I explained to President Jiang how the roots of American rule of law go back more than 700 years, to the signing of the Magna Carta. The foundation of American values, therefore, is not a passing priority or a temporary trend.

I still believe it if even if Newt has to backtrack and qualify to keep his footing in a political party that is beginning to make acceptance of torture the new litmus test for GOP purity.

[PixelPusher]

It is the flower of westeren thought.
Huzzah! Another rally cry for tribe!

Care to expand on that, or are you just going to leave it as, as Ing put it, an empty plattitude?

[hope4dopes]

I don't want to sit here and argue the Bible, but basically everything in there says otherwise. You are free to believe however you want, but I still think its outrageous that a majority of Christians support torture. I also think its interesting how the right argues for absolutes regarding gay marriage, abortion, etc., but then suddenly when torture is introduced, its relativism all day long.


I don't think Christ gave anybody the idea he came to end war,or physical death, or suffering, like buddah said suffering is the nature of reality.But do you think that the spiritual evolution of Man would have gone up or down if hitler wasn't stopped.If human slavery wasn't stopped would the nations evolution gone up or down.If totalitarian regimes control do peoples evolution go up. War is one of the four horsemen it is something other than gay marriage,or abortion,something like a hurricane, but I'm not sure humanity has evolved to the point where it can give war up.

[hope4dopes]

Huzzah! Another rally cry for tribe!

Care to expand on that, or are you just going to leave it as, as Ing put it, an empty plattitude?

Do you live with the illusion your beyond the "tribe"

[PixelPusher]

Do you live with the illusion your beyond the "tribe"

lol, how comical...like some mafia goon who believes ratting out to the Feds is the worst possible thing you could do, worse even than fraud, extortion and murder.

Tribe uber alles is your bag, not mine. I don't subsume my moral identity to some gang affiliation.

So how bout that whole "Flower or western thought" trope?

[hope4dopes]

lol, how comical...like some mafia goon who believes ratting out to the Feds is the worst possible thing you could do, worse even than fraud, extortion and murder.

Tribe uber alles is your bag, not mine. I don't subsume my moral identity to some gang affiliation.

So how bout that whole "Flower or western thought" trope?

No, you're such a product of the tribe, like ing was saying you have no face no voice you don't stand out or alone.This riciulous radical chic costume was embarresing 20 years ago.I don't know anybody outside a cartoon that even has a "moral identity"

[braeden0613]

I don't think Christ gave anybody the idea he came to end war,or physical death, or suffering, like buddah said suffering is the nature of reality.
I never said that. You were arguing that Christ wasn't trying to impose ethics or morals on the population.

But do you think that the spiritual evolution of Man would have gone up or down if hitler wasn't stopped.If human slavery wasn't stopped would the nations evolution gone up or down.If totalitarian regimes control do peoples evolution go up. War is one of the four horsemen it is something other than gay marriage,or abortion,something like a hurricane, but I'm not sure humanity has evolved to the point where it can give war up.
I'm not even talking about war, but torture. Once you remove someone from the battlefield, they are no longer "at war". Interrogators can't hide behind the "anything is justified during war time" defense when the prisoner is handcuffed in a cell. And let's not forget we hanged some Japanese for waterboarding during WW2 and how many slaves were tortured in our country's history.

[Winehole23]

I never said that. You were arguing that Christ wasn't trying to impose ethics or morals on the population.I agree. micca is trying to trot out the JC as a sort of second Moses, in the vein of Exodus 32.


And he said unto them, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor.

[PixelPusher]

No, you're such a product of the tribe, like ing was saying you have no face no voice you don't stand out or alone.This riciulous radical chic costume was embarresing 20 years ago.I don't know anybody outside a cartoon that even has a "moral identity"
More projection, more disbelief that anyone could possibly see the world any differently than your carefully constructed political cliches.

Yes, everyone is a product of the tribe they were born to, but if that were the end-all, be-all of what determines someone's moral, ethical and political values, how is that someone who grew up in a Christan, conservative Republican family didn't end up going to church, stroking his chin over a copy of the National Review and voting Republican?

[Winehole23]

So as the state which has a duty to uphold my life. I want them to achieve whatever means possible to protect me and my family.Wash the sand out of your vagina and nut up. Uphold your own frigging life. The state doesn't owe you a living and it's not your friend. If security is your pearl of great price, you're a fucking pussy. Real men love and promote liberty and human dignity, not petty revenge.

Rolled up in one big nasty ball the islamofascists couldn't beat us in 1000 years. That you take them so seriously underscores your lack of confidence in this country and its ideals. Fuck you, Iggy.

[hope4dopes]

I never said that. You were arguing that Christ wasn't trying to impose ethics or morals on the population.

I'm not even talking about war, but torture. Once you remove someone from the battlefield, they are no longer "at war". Interrogators can't hide behind the "anything is justified during war time" defense when the prisoner is handcuffed in a cell. And let's not forget we hanged some Japanese for waterboarding during WW2 and how many slaves were tortured in our country's history.

Well first I'm not in the mood for arguing if that's what your into tonight I think Pixie might be agreeable.
You know back in the 70's I was in Ireland,back then there were tanks in the streets of belfast I think bobby sands was on hunger strike in Long Kesh prison, razor wire, and english soldiers with machine guns patrolling the streets.I was hitching through the south of Ireland in the republic, and talked to people about the situation, and I was really surprised to find that many irishmen despised the IRA, they despised their targeting of innocence, they despised their bullying of thugs with guns which is what terrorists desend to.I was surprised because I had family from Ireland and I knew in what High regard The IRA had been held and what it desended to when it started targeting civilians, later I was to make friends with a family from afganistan and heard stories of the Taliban.Terrorists are not soldiers.I guess I learned that from Irishmen and the IRA.

[hope4dopes]

More projection, more disbelief that anyone could possibly see the world any differently than your carefully constructed political cliches.

Yes, everyone is a product of the tribe they were born to, but if that were the end-all, be-all of what determines someone's moral, ethical and political values, how is that someone who grew up in a Christan, conservative Republican family didn't end up going to church, stroking his chin over a copy of the National Review and voting Republican?

no not everybody....you are though.

[hope4dopes]

I agree. micca is trying to trot out the JC as a sort of second Moses, in the vein of Exodus 32.

hey precious.

[hope4dopes]

Wash the sand out of your vagina and nut up. Uphold your own frigging life. The state doesn't owe you a living and it's not your friend. If security is your pearl of great price, you're a fucking pussy. Real men love and promote liberty and human dignity, not petty revenge.

Rolled up in one big nasty ball the islamofascists couldn't beat us in 1000 years. That you take them so seriously underscores your lack of confidence in this country and its ideals. Fuck you, Iggy.


If your spelling teacher heard this kinds lanuage coming out your mouth she'd wash it out with soap.

[PixelPusher]

Well first I'm not in the mood for arguing if that's what your into tonight I think Pixie might be agreeable.
You know back in the 70's I was in Ireland,back then there were tanks in the streets of belfast I think bobby sands was on hunger strike in Long Kesh prison, razor wire, and english soldiers with machine guns patrolling the streets.I was hitching through the south of Ireland in the republic, and talked to people about the situation, and I was really surprised to find that many irishmen despised the IRA, they despised their targeting of innocence, they despised their bullying of thugs with guns which is what terrorists desend to.I was surprised because I had family from Ireland and I knew in what High regard The IRA had been held and what it desended to when it started targeting civilians, later I was to make friends with a family from afganistan and heard stories of the Taliban.Terrorists are not soldiers.I guess I learned that from Irishmen and the IRA.

So how did it end? Did Great Britain torture the IRA out of existence? Surely they didn't end up negotiating with these mindless terrorists...

[Winehole23]

If your spelling teacher heard this kinds lanuage coming out your mouth she'd wash it out with soap.She'd make tripas out of you, micca.

[PixelPusher]

no not everybody....you are though.


hey precious.


If your spelling teacher heard this kinds lanuage coming out your mouth she'd wash it out with soap.

This is what happens when he runs out of ammo.

[braeden0613]

Well first I'm not in the mood for arguing if that's what your into tonight I think Pixie might be agreeable.
You know back in the 70's I was in Ireland,back then there were tanks in the streets of belfast I think bobby sands was on hunger strike in Long Kesh prison, razor wire, and english soldiers with machine guns patrolling the streets.I was hitching through the south of Ireland in the republic, and talked to people about the situation, and I was really surprised to find that many irishmen despised the IRA, they despised their targeting of innocence, they despised their bullying of thugs with guns which is what terrorists desend to.I was surprised because I had family from Ireland and I knew in what High regard The IRA had been held and what it desended to when it started targeting civilians, later I was to make friends with a family from afganistan and heard stories of the Taliban.Terrorists are not soldiers.I guess I learned that from Irishmen and the IRA.
Again, I wasn't even talking about the comparison between soldiers and terrorists. But if you want to stop arguing I'm fine with that.

[Winehole23]

This is what happens when he runs out of ammo.What ammo?

[hope4dopes]

This is what happens when he runs out of ammo. no this is what happens when I try and Ignore some empty headed dolt.

[hope4dopes]

She'd make tripas out of you, micca.

I think it's cute when you try being I think the word is"macho" did I pronounce that right?

[Winehole23]

no this is what happens when I try and Ignore some empty headed dolt.It didn't work. Your self-pwnage streak proceeds unbroken. You already set the record I think. Why not quit while you're ahead?

[Winehole23]

I think it's cute when you try being I think the word is"macho" did I pronounce that right?Probably not. Your grasp of English still seems a little shaky to me.

[hope4dopes]

So how did it end? Did Great Britain torture the IRA out of existence? Surely they didn't end up negotiating with these mindless terrorists...

The IRA lost support of the population, and the Irish Republic took a greater role in negotiations .The british population was getting tired of sending sons to belfast to get shot up, and spending millions of pounds on security forces and told the UDF to shut it.

[hope4dopes]

Probably not. Your grasp of English still seems a little shaky to me.

Oh my I thought "macho" was a spainish word.

[Winehole23]

Keep digging, micca. And don't send me a postcard when you get there.

[PixelPusher]

The IRA lost support of the population, and the Irish Republic took a greater role in negotiations .The british population was getting tired of sending sons to belfast to get shot up, and spending millions of pounds on security forces and told the UDF to shut it.

So Great Britain stopped playing into the IRA's hands...interesting...

[hope4dopes]

Keep digging, micca. And don't send me a postcard when you get there.

Adios you tough little pachuco.

[Winehole23]

I thought I told you to stay in the car.

[Winehole23]

No more postcards. It just makes you look bad, and you annoy the rest of us.

[Ignignokt]

Wash the sand out of your vagina and nut up. Uphold your own frigging life. The state doesn't owe you a living and it's not your friend. If security is your pearl of great price, you're a fucking pussy. Real men love and promote liberty and human dignity, not petty revenge.

Rolled up in one big nasty ball the islamofascists couldn't beat us in 1000 years. That you take them so seriously underscores your lack of confidence in this country and its ideals. Fuck you, Iggy.


You're right. it owes me sand.

So now you're a hardcore libertarian, so you're against uni healthcare, wealth distribution, welfare. WOw! :lmao you said it.

And petty revenge?

Are you now trying to phase out dumb with your own name? I'm not going to go trash the dudes village, i'm just going to extract info from him to save the lives of others.

If you're such a manly man, man up and go to afghanistan and protect the rights of women and gays.

Cmon real man.:lmao

You're such a fake, it's nice exposing you.

[Ignignokt]

How bout that pussy Truman? dropping that a bomb on those japanese citizens.

That wineslit23 he's such a real man, he would have gone into japan armed with nothing but a swiss army knife and and a wire and would of brought reckonin.

[Winehole23]

...

[Winehole23]

You're right. it owes me sand. Then pound sand, bitch.

[Ignignokt]

Pound sand, bitch.

:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao :lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao:lmao

u mad?

rofl rofl rofl.

[Ignignokt]

...

COMPLETE meltdown!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!

[Winehole23]

Go hump a sand castle. You can pretend it's a minaret.

[Ignignokt]

Then pound sand, bitch.

:lol

This is what happens when he runs out of ammo.
:downspin:



twnage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Ignignokt]

Go hump a sand castle. You can pretend it's a minaret.

heyohhh!!! :rollin

[Winehole23]

twnage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!You shouldn't thump such a weak chest -- it might cave in.

[Ignignokt]

You shouldn't thump such a weak chest -- it might cave in.

http://www.tvacres.com/images/brawny_ad.jpg


Substance.

[Winehole23]

I posted plenty of substance. You replied to none of it.

[Ignignokt]

I posted plenty of substance. You replied to none of it.


Go hump a sand castle. You can pretend it's a minaret.



:whine

[Winehole23]

What's your take on the Larison posts?

[Winehole23]

Who will surrender to us on the battlefield, knowing that we have an official policy that parses torture as not being torture?Unsurprisingly, no one has addressed this.

[Ignignokt]

Unsurprisingly, no one has addressed this.

The people who are fighting us are very cynical, they probably believe we'll turn them gay or something. They don't look at us as dignified torture or not.

[Winehole23]

Does the cruelty of our enemies oblige us to be cruel?

[Winehole23]

We should abandon our own Sabbath, because others do not keep it?

[Winehole23]

You're the cynic, Iggy. You'd sell your birthright for a mess of pottage.

[Winehole23]

By promoting torture, you also sell our own soldiers down the river.

[Winehole23]

Also Iggy, you never answered the question.

Who will surrender to us if we torture?

[jack sommerset]

Also Iggy, you never answered the question.

Who will surrender to us if we torture?

What kind of bonehead question is that? Countrys have been torturing people for thousands of years. You act like the USA has a policy to pick up randoms just to be cruel to them. We are taking about waterboarding! We are talking about saving lives. Protecting our country from crazy fucks.

Seriously this is getting fucking stupid. Some of you people think the USA is some sort of wicked cruel country just like Obamas wife does.You whinny lil bitches. Obama will do whatever it takes to get people to talk if he needs information. Bet ur tiny lil nuts on that. As long as you have people who strap bombs to themselves,fly airplanes into people,build gas chambers to kill religious groups you will have countrys like ours to think of ways to get information out of people and some of u lil whinny bitches will complain about.

This waterboarding is a political issue because people like Pelosi want to make the Republicans look cruel. Her saying she knew nothing about this was a straight up lie. Notice she has no more comments. Take her ass to court and put her in jail. USA will use methods to get information out of people, they should be very thankful its was waterboarding.

[Winehole23]

What kind of bonehead question is that?It relates to military custom. If our adversaries on the battlefield know we mistreat prisoners, will they surrender to us or fight to the death?

[Winehole23]

This waterboarding is a political issue because people like Pelosi want to make the Republicans look cruel.Wrong. Torture is a political issue because it is illegal, immoral and un-American.

[Winehole23]

What kind of bonehead question is that? Countrys have been torturing people for thousands of years. You act like the USA has a policy to pick up randoms just to be cruel to them. We are taking about waterboarding! We are talking about saving lives. Protecting our country from crazy fucks.Pardon me if I don't want to shitcan the Constitution, treaty obligations, US statutes and my personal values because terrorism makes you wet the bed and cry like a baby. Grow up. The world is dangerous.

Your car, your workplace, the old wiring in your house, your swimming pool, your handgun, your prescription drugs, your dinner plate and falling down are more dangerous to you -- by far -- than terrorism will ever be.

[MannyIsGod]

Pardon me if I don't want to shitcan the Constitution, treaty obligations, US statutes and my personal values because terrorism makes you wet the bed and cry like a baby. Grow up. The world is dangerous.

Your car, your workplace, the old wiring in your house, your swimming pool, your handgun, your prescription drugs, your dinner plate and falling down are more dangerous to you -- by far -- than terrorism will ever be.

Perspective is a beautiful thing. Its amazing to me to see a right winger (not saying its happening here - although I'm almost sure it has) complain about how the swine flu isn't a big deal because the regular flu kills tens of thousands a year and not realize how much they've changed this country over an attack that caused 3 thousand deaths.

[Ignignokt]

Also Iggy, you never answered the question.

Who will surrender to us if we torture?

enemy combatants.

those who strap bombs to themselves will probably not care either way.

[Winehole23]

No one is suggesting they do.

[Ignignokt]

Pardon me if I don't want to shitcan the Constitution, treaty obligations, US statutes and my personal values because terrorism makes you wet the bed and cry like a baby. Grow up. The world is dangerous.

Your car, your workplace, the old wiring in your house, your swimming pool, your handgun, your prescription drugs, your dinner plate and falling down are more dangerous to you -- by far -- than terrorism will ever be.


That's why we need to not be proactive with seatbelts and aids prevention! :toast

[Ignignokt]

Pardon me if I don't want to shitcan the Constitution, treaty obligations, US statutes and my personal values because terrorism makes you wet the bed and cry like a baby. Grow up. The world is dangerous.

Your car, your workplace, the old wiring in your house, your swimming pool, your handgun, your prescription drugs, your dinner plate and falling down are more dangerous to you -- by far -- than terrorism will ever be.

If you're talking about the constitution, it protects citizens. If you're talking about the geneva conventions, 1. alqueda did not sign it. 2. any type of interrogation would be illegal.

The world is dangerous.
THat's why some people take its flaws a little more serious with pragmatism aswell.

[Ignignokt]

Perspective is a beautiful thing. Its amazing to me to see a right winger (not saying its happening here - although I'm almost sure it has) complain about how the swine flu isn't a big deal because the regular flu kills tens of thousands a year and not realize how much they've changed this country over an attack that caused 3 thousand deaths.

TB killed more than all the southern lynchings of blacks combined. It's amazing how society made the civil rights such a big deal.
:toast

[Winehole23]

The world is dangerous. About 2/3 of the detainees at Gitmo were not.

[Winehole23]

Otherwise, Bush wouldn't have released them, right?

[Ignignokt]

About 2/3 of the detainees at Gitmo were not.

did we torture all detainees?

[LnGrrrR]

did we torture all detainees?

We denied them habeas corpus, that's for sure. lol

[DarrinS]

If we could focus all this venom and vitriol info fighting Islamic terrorist (instead of Bush admin boogeymen), the war on terror could be won handily.

[Winehole23]

If we could focus all this venom and vitriol info fighting Islamic terrorist (instead of Bush admin boogeymen), the war on terror could be won handily.Bad talking SpursTalk posters are making us lose the war on terror. Incisive, Darrin.

[Ignignokt]

We denied them habeas corpus, that's for sure. lol

that's rich. THat's why we have millitary tribunals.

[Ignignokt]

Bad talking SpursTalk posters are making us lose the war on terror. Incisive, Darrin.

Dissent, is something else.

Name calling, and losing one's temper is making us lose the war on sanity.

[LnGrrrR]

If we could focus all this venom and vitriol info fighting Islamic terrorist (instead of Bush admin boogeymen), the war on terror could be won handily.

I'm serving, are you? lol

[LnGrrrR]

that's rich. THat's why we have millitary tribunals.

Do you know exactly what habeas corpus is?

[Ignignokt]

Do you know exactly what habeas corpus is?

the right to be brought to a judge to challenge detainment.

[Winehole23]

THat's why we have millitary tribunals.To deny habeas to the defendant, to give secret evidence and testimony against him, and to present confessions obtained by torture? To manufacture convictions? Agree 100%. That is how the military commissions were supposed to work, but the system was incompatible with sunshine and ultimately unpalatable to a (distinctly) conservative Supreme Court.

[Ignignokt]

Do deny habeas to the defendant, to give secret evidence and testimony against him, and to present confessions obtained by torture? To manufacture convictions? Agree 100%. That is how the military commissions were designed.

what?

[DarrinS]

I'm serving, are you? lol

No, but I have several family members that are. For the record, I am not some torture advocate.

[LnGrrrR]

the right to be brought to a judge to challenge detainment.

The military tribunals were not brought about by request of the DEFENDANT. They were brought about by the government, when they felt like it, with less than the bare necessities of what was needed for a fair trial.

[Ignignokt]

The military tribunals were not brought about by request of the DEFENDANT. They were brought about by the government, when they felt like it, with less than the bare necessities of what was needed for a fair trial.

does the constitution apply to enemy combatants?

[Winehole23]

does the constitution apply to enemy combatants?According to the Supreme Court in Hamdi and Boumedienne, yes it does.

[Winehole23]

what?You, Sir, seem to be a stranger to the purpose of a kangaroo court.

[Winehole23]

does the constitution apply to unlawful enemy combatants?Fify. There's an important difference.

[LnGrrrR]

does the constitution apply to enemy combatants?

Yes.

Habeas corpus is VERY important.

[Ignignokt]

Fify. There's an important difference.

so whats your oppinion?

[Winehole23]

About what?

[Ignignokt]

About what?

in this case unlawful combatants.

and if you're so rigorous about the constitution why don't you support financial freedom as well.

or do you cherry pick which liberty is more important?

[ChumpDumper]

The supremes weren't specific about it, but a good plurality of them in Hamdan pretty clearly intimated that habeas corpus should be extended to citizen and noncitizen detainees alike. The rules of detention and the limited due process allowed seem to make it nearly impossible for anyone to be released due to a habeas hearing, so I don't see the problem.

[Winehole23]

Geneva is a treaty obligation, there is a 1996 war crimes statute forbidding torture, and a Reagan era convention repudiating torture, just off the top of my head. None of these have been repealed, so in principle they're all still in effect.

My own spiritual values conduce to a similar result. Do unto others...

IMO terrorism belongs provincially to criminal procedure. The laws are on the books, a corpus of case law already exists. The courts are open, normally functioning and access to them is unhindered. Bring em back to the US and prosecute em.

If torture works so well and is legal besides, we'll have all the evidence we need, right?

[Winehole23]

and if you're so rigorous about the constitution why don't you support financial freedom as well.

or do you cherry pick which liberty is more important?That's clear as mud. Come again? You're saying I don't support what, please?

[Winehole23]

Although I invite you to read the entire thirty-one page report, there are a few points worth highlighting that notably contrast with the conventional narrative of the terrorist threat:




"The total number of worldwide attacks in 2011, however, dropped by almost 12 percent from 2010 and nearly 29 percent from 2007." (9)
"Attacks by AQ and its affiliates increased by 8 percent from 2010 to 2011. A significant increase in attacks by al-Shabaab, from 401 in 2010 to 544 in 2011, offset a sharp decline in attacks by al-Qa'ida in Iraq (AQI) and a smaller decline in attacks by al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and al-Qa'ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)." (11)
"In cases where the religious affiliation of terrorism casualties could be determined, Muslims suffered between 82 and 97 percent of terrorism-related fatalities over the past five years." (14)
Of 978 terrorism-related kidnapping last year, only three hostages were private U.S. citizens, or .003 percent. A private citizen is defined as 'any U.S. citizen not acting in an official capacity on behalf of the U.S. government.' (13, 17)
Of the 13,288 people killed by terrorist attacks last year, seventeen were private U.S. citizens, or .001 percent. (17)


According to the report, the number of U.S. citizens who died in terrorist attacks increased by two between 2010 and 2011; overall, a comparable number (http://blogs.cfr.org/zenko/2012/02/24/america-is-a-safe-place/) of Americans are crushed to death by their televisions or furniture each year. This is not to diminish the real--albeit shrinking--threat of terrorism, or to minimize the loss and suffering of the 13,000 killed and over 45,000 injured around the world. For Americans, however, it should emphasize that an irrational fear (http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/137279/micah-zenko-and-michael-a-cohen/clear-and-present-safety) of terrorism is both unwarranted and a poor basis for public policy decisions.http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/06/americans-are-as-likely-to-be-killed-by-their-own-furniture-as-by-terrorism/258156/

[boutons_deux]

more torture and more divorce

More religiously conservative Protestants? More divorce, study finds
Divorce is higher among religiously conservative Protestants – and even drives up divorce rates for other people living around them, a new study finds.

The study, slated to be published in the American Journal of Sociology, tackles the “puzzling paradox” of why divorce is more common in religiously conservative “red” states. If religious conservatives believe firmly in the value of marriage, why is divorce especially high in places like Alabama and Arkansas?

To figure that out, researchers from the University of Texas and the University of Iowa analyzed county divorce statistics against information from an earlier study of religious congregations. They categorized Protestant denominations that believe the Bible is literally true as "conservative Protestants."

Researchers discovered that higher divorce rates among conservative Protestants were tied to earlier marriages and childbearing – factors known to ramp up divorce. Starting families earlier tends to stop young adults from pursuing more education and depresses their wages, putting more strain on marriages, University of Texas at Austin professor Jennifer Glass said.

But the study went a step further: Glass and another researcher also discovered that people living in areas with lots of conservative Protestants were at higher risk of getting divorced, even if they weren’t conservative Protestants themselves.

County by county, for every 1% increase in the share of conservative Protestants compared with mainline Protestants, the divorce rate increased 0.02%, the study found. Glass argued that community institutions in such areas might encourage early marriage, affecting divorce rates for everyone who lives there.

“Pharmacies might not give out emergency contraception. Schools might only teach abstinence education,” Glass added. On top of that, “if you live in a marriage market where everybody marries young, you postpone marriage at your own risk. The best catches … are going to go first.”

The study also found that it was not poverty nor higher rates of marriage, on the whole, that were driving up divorce in “red” counties, as others had theorized.

“It’s surprising,” said W. Bradford Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia. “In some contexts in America today, religion is a buffer against divorce. But in the conservative Protestant context, this paper is showing us that it’s not.”

Wilcox added that the study also showed that more “secularism” – people not adhering to any religious tradition – was also linked to higher rates of divorce.

The nonprofit Council on Contemporary Families, where Glass is a senior scholar, provided a map (http://i0.wp.com/www.contemporaryfamilies.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/map_conservative_regional_divorce.jpg?resize=697%2 C538) to illustrate how divorce rates and populations of conservative Protestants
overlap. "Young people of every religious belief -- or none -- are influenced by cultural climate," it wrote in an announcement on the study.

http://www.latimes.com/world/worldnow/la-sci-sn-red-states-religious-conservative-divorce-20140116,0,7835151.story#ixzz2t31gVaAf

Family Values! :lol