Big Brother is Watching You

[O Really]

What's my point? I don't know - it's certainly not that if a majority votes for wholesale torture that it's the right thing to do. I think I'm saying that when you're dealing with people who gladly hack off people's heads for sport in front of a camera, that it's probable that the same tactics used in dealing with a garden variety American criminal or a bonafide prisoner of war aren't likely to work.

[O Really]

When you're dealing with people who gladly rain death down on civilians from the comfort of a SoCal drone command then cheer the camera images on the nightly news, is it justifiable to hack off the heads of GI prisoners of war?

Maybe - certainly from their perspective. But here's a different perspective on "raining death" ...
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... rfare.html

[O Really]

In the eyes of the individual, perception IS the reality. But one can't understand an attitude or action taken related to that attitude unless s/he knows the perspective of the person taking the action, whether it's raining death or chopping heads.

[neoplacebo]

Religious fanatics don't necessarily recognize any laws other than their own. That's the nut of it. How you decide to deal with it defines you not only to those fanatics, but also to everyone else. If you violate your own stated values and morality, your credibility and character become tarnished, likely to the point of no recovery. Sort of like one of those "you buy the ticket, you take the ride" gigs that my old friend Dr. Thompson used to write about.

[O Really]

I take it you guys are not fans of contextual or situational ethics, eh?
You're Javier, not Jean Valjean?

[O Really]

Reviewing the "United Nations Convention against Torture", it would appear that just taking the suspect out back and shooting him with a clean head shot would not be a violation. It would appear also that since torture "...does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions," that if a country made sitting in thumb screws a "lawful sanction" as penalty for refusing to answer questions completely and honestly, that would also be acceptable. And since the thumb screws would then not be considered "torture" it would be OK to ship a recalcitrant suspect off to that country, right? Yeah, I know - silly, right? Except that for every absolute law there are a hundred work-arounds. So it is ultimately an ethical issue, regardless of practicalities.

[O Really]

No, int'l law doesn't work that way - making torture legal by saying it's legal. You're misreading. Nor is shipping someone to a torture state for the purpose of being tortured legal. We are the rogue nation. But, the practical issues are in addition to the ethical and legal ones, anyhow. Being a torture state, using proxy torture states and training torturers have and do harm America's interests, that's a practicality.

I don't think I misread. The first Article defines torture and the reasons for which it's prohibited. It specifically excludes pain and suffering caused by legal sanctions. I did have an error, though, since my silly example legalized thumb screws for not answering questions, that would be covered under the "interrogation" part of Article 1. Anyway, I'm not really arguing that trying to find loop holes so as to legally torture is a good thing.

There are some interesting countries signed up, though. If a country is on the list, can we send our miscreant to one of them without being guilty of proxy torture? Like Somalia. Can we send them to Somalia?

[O Really]

I think you need to read the entire United Nations Convention against Torture and the rulings based on it. There's no way that a nation can, for example, legally waterboard just by saying that waterboarding is a "legal sanction".

I don't know if rendition for the purpose of torture is banned under the Convention, but it should be.

Well, maybe not without receiving criticism, but apparently they could - at least if they can impose amputation... http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/yemeni-m ... 2013-09-16

[O Really]

I sometimes like to take a different point of view, maybe Cheney's advocate, for sport and to avoid being lulled by groupthink to believe only one side has substance. But I am seriously disturbed about the alternatives of what to do with a person for whom the usual restraints of a civilized society hold no limit, and the usual sanctions hold no fear. I don't think it's reasonable to afford the rights of a US citizen to non-citizens who not only are not a part of the common societal bond, but who actively seek to destroy the system that would otherwise protect them. I don't find it reasonable to keep them locked up forever, either. I'm beginning to think you could ask them nicely once, then shoot them. Or drop them off 50 k from Paranatinga.

[O Really]

.... Still, there's int'l law.[/color]

...
Or drop them off 50 k from Paranatinga.

Because our relations with Brasil are so excellent already?

[/quote]
I'm no expert on international law, but my understanding is that it applies to countries that have agreed to abide by it, not to individuals. So if our miscreant is from Berzerkistan which is not a party to any agreements, we could choose to follow what international law might apply if Berzerkistan were a party, but that might include sending him back under the custody of the Berzerkers, which isn't likely to happen.


Yeah, I thought that (a) what could be more miserable for a Berzerker, who may be Muslim, grown up in an arid deserty type place, speaks mostly arabic...than a jungle in a portugese-speaking mostly Catholic place. And then (b) there's NSA able to keep tabs on him until a big cat or snake gets him or the Russian drug dealers find him.

[O Really]

You're saying that because we're a signatory, we have to be nice to the Berzerker scum bag even if his own country is not a signatory and spits into the face of civilized behaviour? I suppose that makes sense since the signatories are themselves promising to do or not do certain things. OK, we're back to shooting him again.

[O Really]

Places of incarceration probably aren't ever "nice", nor intended to be. Brings up an interesting question, though - how do US facilities compare with other reasonably civilized countries. We know compared to the Nordic areas, they're pretty much dungeons, but how about the world at large? Here's one viewpoint regarding Europe... http://www.cepprobation.org/page/83

[O Really]

Did I ever say the US wasn't a violent war-mongering country for the last couple of centuries?

[O Really]

"Civilized" in the sense of the large number of countries that live generally by law and don't find it a reasonable thing to do to kill their daughters for being raped.

[O Really]

Not that I personally think the US had any business being in that part of the world in the first place, but the author of your article was a bit over-simplified in simply stating "No country on earth could be or could ever have been less of a threat to the United States..." As I (vaguely) recall, the issue was an attempt to resist the dirty hairy commies and particularly their control of what was or became the Ho Chi Minh Trail, bringing supplies, people, etc. to Vietnam. Although the original venture was ill-founded, and it probably wouldn't have done much harm to just let the dominos fall - as they eventually did anyway after 55,000 US military deaths, and billions of dollars - there was some strategic value in that area to be protected or attacked. I don't have the time, but I wonder if there's a "page 2" or "rest of the story" to any of the others on that list. Like maybe Peru, when the US was there on request of and assisting the lawful government du jour. Not that the US had any business there, either, but you know you have to chase commies wherever you find them.

[neoplacebo]

Yeah, it's that perspective thing again. I think the worst torture would be to inflict your own perspective to the "enemy" somehow, thus making them seem to themselves as dumbasses.

[O Really]

Our country finds it a reasonable thing to do to kill its sons for going to the store, and funds some who find it a reasonable thing to do to kill their daughters for being raped as long as they're not Taliban or AQ.

I posted and linked for the list, not the accompanying text. Let's not debate Vietnam, but we do always have the perspective that our violence is justified while others' is not.

Oh, puh-leeze. "We" do not find it reasonable to kill our sons for going to the store, and the long-lasting outrage that got a trial in the first place and lasted long after the technicality of a decision is evidence of that. And it would be nice if everybody a country allied with always had clean hands, but they (and we) don't.

You're not going to find me defending the Vietnam war. I was against it at the time, screamed outside the White House fence "Hey hey LBJ, how many kids did you kill today" and have continued to believe that it was the wrong thing to do and was done poorly. But looking at a list of "places the US has bombed" it would be intellectually lame not to ask "why were they bombed?" And you have to look at each incidence not in the light of 20 or 50 or a hundred years hence, but in the context of the time. If you extended the list back before WWII, eventually the US would be on the list bombed by itself. Or at least the rebel-rousers.

Countries have allies. And if you found that a certain number of the bombings on the list were done in defense of an ally, would they still count the same as a meaningless act of macho aggression? In one sense, you're a bomber whether you bomb for the revolutionaries or the dictators, and sometimes it's hard to tell who if anyone wears the white hat, but I think historical context matters. Some decisions may have been right; some were clearly wrong, but all those events on that list are not equal. Kuwait, of course, was not bombed except as a means of chasing off the Iraquis, which seems to have been in their best interest. IMNVHO, the US has been way too willing to jump into a fray it could have avoided, and much of the time has taken itself way too seriously and arrogantly as the guardian of the "free world." I'm never going to argue that the US doesn't have a violent culture and violent history. But the rest of the world isn't all peaches and creme either, and "no man is an island entire of itself."

[O Really]

... it doesn't take a great leap to look at us like you do the head loppers and killers of raped daughters.

No, it doesn't. Particularly from those with a fixed belief system not rooted in any sort of reality. If you've never been to China, it's easy to visualize Chinese in the most negative stereotyped form. If you've been indoctrinated from birth, it's hard to break loose. Israelis and Palestinians have lived within 50 miles or next door from each other for decades, but their hatred isn't based on what they see but what they believe. If you're in Berzerkistan and the only thing you know about the US is that they're infidels and bombed your neighborhood, you're probably going to be pretty hostile. No doubt. But - taking again the Cheney's advocate position - you can't make decisions believed to be in your best interest based on what somebody who probably isn't going to like you no matter what you do thinks. (Do I get an "attaboy" for sentence complexity on that one?)

[O Really]

Great - You're Cheney and now I'm Rumsfeld.

I don't think the Israelis could find a white hat in the Lone Ranger's closet. I don't think (in fact I know they don't) have any real interest in ever working out a mutually beneficial agreement with the Palestinians. But from whichever side you look, the continued antagonism is based on beliefs, not an understanding or pursuit of what might be possible.

[O Really]

Here's a copy of the bill, in case anyone wants to read it before petitioning.
http://www.intelligence.senate.gov/pdfs ... ements.pdf

Here's an article critical of the bill... http://www.peachpundit.com/2013/10/31/f ... ollection/

Here's the tracking on the bill - prognosis about 20% chance of passing. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/s1631