?
Maybe you should take a page from C-Span and "revise and extend" your remarks.
Cheers!
What an odd take.
... I opposed waterboarding, but the Obama administration, in its showboating denunciations of past practices, will soon encounter further dilemmas as it broadcasts that the largely unchanged war on terror is now a more enlightened criminal-justice matter. Euphemism and creating new names for existing policies alone won’t cut it.
At some point, Obama must answer why waterboarding mass-murderers and beheaders like Khalid Sheik Mohammed is wrong, while executing by missile attack (no writs, habeas corpus, Miranda rights, etc.) suspected terrorists and anyone caught in their general vicinity in Waziristan — or pirates negotiating extortion — is legitimate. (Remember, there is no longer a "war on terrorism," so in these "overseas contingency operations" we are now judge, jury, and executioner — or are we resurrecting the Phoenix program for the Hindu Kush?) ...
So, Hanson is off the hook with you, but I am not, regretfully so, because as I told you on some occasions I follow your posts on money matters for my education and I hope I learned something from you.
About torture. The argument you use (and please correct me if I am wrong, I don't want to put words into your mouth) that torture is morally reprehensible and makes us to be no better than them, is very much similar to the argument that opponents of capital punishment use: that killing a man (defenseless at this point) is simply wrong.
As the saying goes: extreme cases make bad law. I am for both killing a *defenseless man* as a capital punishment for his crimes and for *torturing a defenseless man* in some extreme situations. It cannot be a *matter of fact casual procedure*. But there are some situations when there is no other choice. In expression often used by Hanson it's a *tragic choice*.
It can not be divorced from the circumstances of the case. Similar to deliberations on the murder case when circumstances can show it to be a manslaughter, or negligence or a cold blooded premeditated murder - and the perpetrator will be punished accordingly. In the case of torture, the context is the key as well. An enormous popularity of Jack Bauer and 24 is that people emphasize with him and his moral struggles (agony is a better word) when circumstances leave him with no other choice than torture a man in the race against time to save lives. Its a ticking bomb situation: an attack is imminent unless we gain some information to stop it. I don't agree that civilization sells its soul if it agonizingly allows torture in some extreme cases in order to save lives.
The same as capital punishment triggers special scrutiny, torture should as well. BTW, when the society executes a murderer, he is often weak and remorseful, but its done anyway.
Don't remember whose quote it is, but it goes this way: an American or British top leader was asked in what case he can see a nuclear weapon to be used. The answer was: "If I tell you, it removes the deterrence factor, doesn't it?"
Same as using nukes against Japan. Lots of civilians died so the war ended sooner saving countless Japanese and American lives. Many people to this day say it was not justified. I think it was. There is no doubt in my mind that it saved at least one magnitude more than it killed.
But I would not want to be the one to make that decision. As Hanson says: it's a Tragic choice.
If your honor can and will be used against you to kill you and yours - it means that barbarians will survive at expense of your civilization.
JasonC - your “outrage” is ridiculous.
You try to claim a moral high ground by claiming that certain techniques are “torture” - but when you read what was authorized - “enhanced interrogation techniques” - it is absolutely absurd to consider them “torture”.
If the enhanced interrogation techniques ARE considered torture - then the word torture is totally without meaning!
You - and the left wing radicals would have us give the terrorists tea and crumpets - speaking loudly to them would be torture.
Absurd!! In WWII - the Brits had captured German spies - and the spies were told to submit to special deception techniques - or be summarily executed as spies. (A few spies refused - and they were executed, with other spies being able to see what was in store for them if they failed to assist.) Such tactics would be against the Geneva Convention FOR captured soldiers - but spies and terrorists operate outside the law, and therefore do not get any legal protections.
Yes - the left hyperventilate againt the abuse of putting a captured terrorist in a small box with a ...gasp gasp - catepillar in the box also ....but most rational people recognize that with an illegal/immoral enemy, additional actions must be taken.
Again - WE DID NOT TORTURE. We used ENHANCED INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES. But if you disagree with me - then your dissent is antognizing me and that is torture to me, and you therefore must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law for the crime of torture. </sarcasm> If torture can be redefined by others, surely I can re-define torture to include everything that the liberals are doing to create a socialist/statist country.
The liberals who would attack those who protected our country are just like the Animal Liberation Front people who would attack and kill those who don’t embrace their vegan lifestyles. They have elevated the importance of animals and therefore have lowered the value of man. The liberals have elevated the rights of terrorists - and have therefore de-valued the rights of citizens to live in a country and be protected from attacks. That means Honor is a meaningless concept to JasonC and his friends.