>>Let’s see. Clinton fires 90 some odd atty’s and no media hype. President Bush fires 8 and all H*** breaks out?
What am I missing here<<
There are other concerns about Gonzales. I’ve always felt the President should be free to pick his staff and so firing prosecutors doesn’t bother me.
What worries me about Gonzales is his patterns of justifications of the abuse of individual rights, particularly with regard to torture.
Are you referring to the "torture" that US military personnel go through in their training, or are you referring to something more extreme? If so, what, exactly????
>>Let’s see. Clinton fires 90 some odd atty’s and no media hype. President Bush fires 8 and all H*** breaks out?
What am I missing here<<
Do you guys pay attention at all? Using that as a defense just makes you sound ignorant. Rush isn’t even using that one anymore. GWB fired ALL USAs in the same way that Clinton did when he came into office. All presidents do that.
The purpose of the GC was to limit the devestation of war by discouraging nations, militias and others from using civilians and critical civilian infrastructure like hospitals, schools and houses of worship as cover for troops, equipment and weapons, from using civilians as human shields, etc, so that after a war is over the society can get back on its feet as soon as possible and order can be restored.
When involved in a fight you must at times seek cover; naturally you are going to gravitate towards using as cover or staging areas whatever it is you enemy is unable or unwilling to hit. If you are a terrorist your choices are unlimited, even cruel- the best places are among the innocent. If you are a lawful combatant the choices are limited, for you seek to avoid killing people unneccessarily and cannot use hospitals, churches, schools to take cover. You have rules of engagement and could face prosecution for violating them, or death at the enemy's hands if you abide by them. The terrorist isn't burdened by rules and uses this weakness against you.
The GC was designed to handicap the terrorist by denying him protections that are reserved for lawful combatants and bystanders. It was to make a distinction between what is lawful behavior and what is not acceptable, or rather, who is legal and who is not. Those who abide by the rules- whose fighters are distinguishable from the civilian population, who do not hide their weapons so as to appear as noncombatants, those who have a clear chain of command which can and are held accountable for the behavior of their personnel and so on ...fall on the lawful side of the GC and because of this they are supposed to be treated civilly on capture according to GC guidelines. This last was the 'reward'- the 'carrot'- to encourage a code of honor that intended to protect civilians and make recovery from war easier.
The 'stick' is simply that those who fail to abide by the code will not be recognized as lawful combatants and cannot expect to be treated as such. Nor SHOULD they be treated as such lest the 'stick' cease to have any effect or meaning and the purpose of the GC fail. This is why the GC doesn't offer protections to those outside its definitions of lawful combatants and civilians- it is essential for the survival of civilization that we not reduce soldiers to the status of outlaws nor elevate outlaws to the status of civilians or soldiers.
Ideologies which need fear to thrive - communism, islamofascism, anarchic mobs and the like - don't care for the distinction between lawful combatants and unlawful ones because they by nature fall on the unlawful side.
Gonzales realizes there is a difference between soldiers and terrorists and that is why those who don't hate him so.