On tracking terrorists and other unwanted individuals

And yet by all accounts, JFK stole an election by using mafia contacts in the union to shuttle voters from one district to another to vote many times. The same man was also so busy nailing so many women(who weren't his wife) while occupying the oval office, he was rumored to be practically crippled by syphilis. Winston Churchill was no saint either. Roll the clock forward to today, where anyone in elected office caught cheating on their significant other can practically be drummed out of office for it.

I'll grant you that Americans are overly numb to the dangers of government overreach, but it didn't happen overnight. They/we are like frogs in a pot of water on the stove, and the heat was turned up very very slowly.

In today's USA, the person who discovers Iran Contra, or the Watergate break in, is classified as a traitor and charged with treason. Newspaper reporters who report such information risk the same. Excuses and justifications are made from the Oval office for the behavior, the press refuses to investigate, either out of partisanship, or fear of lack of access to the whitehouse, or worse, fear of being branded a criminal, and partisan muppets mindlessly nod, "these are not the droids we are looking for". Control the media and you control everything.

Remind me of how many movies about WWII, or any engagement we were involved in that didn't tell the story of us as the good guys, doing the right thing to the Japs/Krouts[Ethnic slurs are useful during wartime, helping to dehumanize the enemy so you don't blink when you need to wipe them out]. Sure we nuked em.

Movies made today about our intelligence gathering operations fall into one of two categories. They play up the moral dilemma to provide sympathy for extreme actions against a few to save many, or they play up the sinister nature of the "torturer"(as you call them). Nothing much has really changed except for the amount of media available to suit any taste.

 

Are you trying to agree or disagree with me? It seems to me that you are going around and around to say the same thing as I said. I am quite aware that Americans are no angels. At the end of the WWII, the women in liberated Paris (even prostitutes) preferred the Germans to Americans because of the so many rapes. I remember the signs in front of restaurants when it stated Niggers, Jews and Dogs are not allowed but despite all these there was a culture that USA as a country should take the moral high road independent of what happened in reality. There was a culture that we can stand to any adversity and win over it which was symbolized in the strong, silent cowboy type. There was also a belief in hard work and making it in the world. In 1980´s that culture changed and Michael Douglas symbolized it by saying "Greed is good" in the movie Wall Street. The change of the culture brought us the financial melt down when everyone was trying to steal as much as possible without doing any work. Now the culture of high moral and social values has also changed and Americans are becoming a bunch of frightened, gutless sissies that will accept and do any thing to survive and at the same time consider it normal.

 

Good, so it will be easy for you. Because the issue here is, do YOU know the proper definition of torture? Did you read the proper definition of torture? Can you repeat the proper definition of torture for us?
Why don't YOU post the proper definition of torture for us?

 

The implication from your earlier post is that Americans now celebrate torture, unlike the Americans of yesteryear. My response is that Americans will justify practically any behavior in the middle of an armed conflict, so long as it is in furtherance of the success of the armed conflict. I doubt that behavior is any different in any living thing, Human or beast, that has survived this long in the evolutionary cycle.

As far as what people what people find entertaining to watch on TV, there is an audience for almost any kind of content and anti-hero dramas have been popular for a long long time, not just in America. For Goat Sex porn, you'd probably find a wider audience in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.

Not sure what you are getting at here, but it reads like racism/antisemitism. The Germans were very good at selling the whole "master race" thing, even in America. The Japanese, every bit as racist, had a harder time selling their brand of racism in America. The Germans thank you?

That belief is still strongest in America, even though social mobility is now lower in America than many first world nations.

First, greed is good, on principle. It is reliable. Consistent. Universal. You can build a culture around these types of stable concepts, which is why capitalism succeeds and socialism fails.

Second, I love your summary of Americans, the way a KKK member might summarize black people, or a Nazi might summarize Jews. A culture this large and this diverse still exists nowhere else on the planet, so those types of generalizations are idiotic, especially coming from a Quebecois.

I agree there is cultural decay in America. It is a growing dependence on/trust in the state for everything (See life of Julia). Unsurprisingly, much of our cultural decay comes from the ideology pushed by people like yourself. Should we thank you?

 

Can you read? The definition was in my post. It doesn´t matter how many time you repeat the word proper, it won´t change the definition of torture in international treaties that USA has signed.

Definition of torture

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-thousands-rapes-French-women-liberating.html

What I posted was that I know about the reality but the important point was that people in USA, UK, Canada,... never believed these were acceptable action by their soldiers and it was something associated with an enemy who supposedly had low moral values.

 

Acceptable? Where did you get the idea such actions were acceptable? Things happen in a war zone. I'm sure the Canadian's raped their fair share of hookers as well. A rapist is a rapist, and a criminal is a criminal, whether he be Italian, French, German, Canadian or American.

To claim the leadership of any of those first world nation condoned the practice seems entirely groundless, though many have covered it up to avoid embarrassment. Iranians, on the other hand, have been known to grant their guards "temporary marriages" to prisoners so they can legally rape their female prisoners while they are held.


Still trying to figure out how your comments about blacks and jews weren't racist/antisemitic.

 

I see your post and your included cite (I disagree with the definition in your cite because it has too many loopholes). But you miss my point - I want to hear from you, in your own words, what YOU consider to be torture. Is it making someone uncomfortable? Causing physical damage that can be medically healed? What level of permanent damage is acceptable?

Let me put it another way - what is your OPINION on what torture is or is not?

 

never believed these were acceptable action by their soldiers

never adv (not ever) nunca adv

I have never been to China.


Are you capable of reading? I post NEVER and somehow you manage to understand that I meant people accepted it. How can describing the history and the signs that they had in front of restaurants and motels in southern parts of USA been racist /antisemitic? The whole love of Isreal and they can do no wrong is a relatively new phenomena which started at the end of 1980s. Anti-Semitism was quite strong in USA before that. You could see that during McCarthy era which made the Jews as much target as supposed communists. Nixon even while helping Israel was a real bigot and anti-Semite who made fun of Kissinger because of Jewish heritage. Telling the history of USA as it was doesn´t make someone a racist.

 

I agree with the convention and definition torture is below.

The term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.

 

The implication of your post was that it is somehow acceptable now. If not, you are quite right. It has never been acceptable.

 

I wasn´t talking about the action itself if it's acceptable or not, I was speaking about people´s view that considered it unacceptable even if in reality was happening and the new way of thinking that considers it as acceptable.

 

The new way of thinking considers rape acceptable. Fascinating. I'd like to see your evidence.

 

You are acting like a moron again. It is not about rape and I gave that just as an example that I know about reality but people didn´t accept it as normal because it was happening. It is the attitude that accepts torture, secret prisons, imprisonment and execution without trials and spying on everyone acceptable. It is a way of thinking that believes everything and everyone is a fair game and there are no principals as long it protects them from some imaginary treat or enemy.

 

Americans have every bit as much trouble with torture, secret prisons, executions without trial, and spying(on the American public) as they do with rape.

You clearly missed the detail that has been littered throughout my posts. Most people of nearly any culture would support any of these activities, at least temporarily, if it meant self preservation. No culture would support any of these activities into perpetuity or if they were not directly related to self preservation.

If you can wrap your mind around that fact, you'll have a much better understanding of where we are at. You'll also be a lot more comfortable with head butting, cold cocking, and punching someone in the nuts in a street fight.

 

When do you think the Americans will come out of self preservation mode and stop support of these activities?
It is a cultural change. We all know people lie and steal but we always tell our children that they should not lie, be honest and do not steal because it is bad. Now imagine that we start teaching our children that they should lie any time that suits them and steal as much as they can. Soon enough we will have a society that is not even capable of distinguishing between right and wrong.

 

The problem I have with that is that, first of all, "severe pain and suffering, whether physical or mental" is a nominalization - it can mean different things to different people and therefore is wildly subject to interpretation.

Second the passage "for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind" seems to mean that, if you can come up with a purpose not listed here, or if it's done for no reason, then hey, it's O.K. I seem to recall that was the debate years ago. There was a theory that the purpose of Hitler's Holocaust was that it was a vast occult human sacrifice ritual. That purpose might escape the above definition. I think that Obama once pointed out that torture for it's own sake is legal by the above definition.

 

How do you make up such BS? Is there a special class that people go to? What is the point of the nonsense that you posted? According to the definition of torture that USA as a country has signed the treaty against it, what US government was and probably is doing is torture and illegal and no amount of nonsense from your side is going to change it.

 

But you yourself have no definition of torture. From your above post, it appears that you don't understand the discussion. And your last sentence makes no sense. Explain it to me - what is Obama doing that you claim is "torture and illegal" and how does it apply to your cited definition?

What's disturbing here is that you can cite the definition, but you are unable to discuss or explain it.

 

I don´t think Obama personally tortured anyone but we are talking about U.S. Government and not Obama as person.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterboarding

A civilized society should not tolerate secret prisons and secret prisoners which can be treated according to different authorities desire without any control by the law. As long as such practices continue, the continuing use of torture or not use of torture will be an open ended question. A country which wants to portray itself as the leader of the free world deserves better than the tainted reputation as a country run by torturers.