One nation under God? so if we make a mistake we all make it? I made this Iraq mistake?

For your reference:
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/index.asp
http://www.immi.gov.au/

Paper Mario! I loved that on GC! Damned cool.

Resident Evil GC(sometimes called REmake) is for the Gamecube. I bought it along with RE 0 and RE 4, 10th anniversary edition package. Warning for the wary, it's very scary & very tough. Far tougher than the original as both Jill & Chris.

Oh, I thought it was an arcade game. Won't find a MAME version then, but you can find the DC and GC versions on E-Bay. http://search.ebay.ca/ikaruga

(Still gonna keep my eyes peeled for a ROM)

I sorta wished they stuck with the RPG/turn-based elements. Thousand Year Door is definitely up there on my top games for GC, along with RE4/REmake.

Yes! Why I bought a GC and will probably be buying a Wii. If you have 3 people to play this with, it doesn't get any better.

Amazing. I recall taking an hour flight in a chopper from Vegas through the GC... what a ride. We had a Gino-Latino dude flying with us that screeched like a lil' girl. His girlfriend had to hold the vomit bag for him while he sick-upped.

Why are tools like these two wanting to coddle those who torture and kill NONcombatants such as journalists and humanitarian aid workers; an enemy who boobytraps the dead bodies of American troops with explosives?

Moral high ground? We're not fighting a war against even semi-civilized soldiers of a legitimate nation.

islamofacists are subhumans who use their own women and children as bullet shields and homicide bombers. Do you think THEY give a damn about 'rules of war?'

This enemy can't be reasoned with and they are part of no country's armed forces. The GC does not apply here.

mecca delenda est.

peretz pt 2:

Your path combined with the inherent secrecy of Cheney Administration can only lead to totalitarianism. Your premise and the practice of this Administration depends on my accepting without proof that you know exactly who all of the bad people are. In the cases of SKM and OBL, this is a very simple calculus. However, I contend that you must keep the baseline protections such as the GC even for "unlawful combatants" because there always are those who will be falsely accused, actually innocent, or truly void of any actionable intelligence. And the Bush Administration has shown no great competence in developing reliable intelligence, building nations, or even building solid cases against many of the detainees.

Arar was only guilty of being in the country without papers. For that, a Canadian citizen was deliberately deported not to Canada but to a prison in Syria, an enemy country, a known terrorist haven, and a known human rights offender. You may blame ABC or CBS all you want, but it is a disgraceful series of events. I pray that you are never in the US without the appropriate documentation if the reasoned response from the US government will be to send you to a prison in Syria or the Sudan rather than back to Israel.

peretz pt 1:

I would never go so far as to say the GC is immutable or perfect. Laws rarely are. But your premise, as extended, has the effect of completely removing the moral underpinnings of civil society. If I accept your premise that the rules/laws do not apply when you are dealing with those who are lawless, then I must accept and trust the idea that you know for an absolute certainty that everyone that you round up and torture will be "lawless."

Let us say that police brutality is disgusting and unacceptable, but when you are dealing with criminals, then it is OK because criminals do not follow the law. We can also say that using chemical and biological weapons is wrong, but if someone like Saddam has them and is going to use them against our troops, then we can drop chemical amnd biological weapons on all of the people of Baghdad so equal footing in the duel is restored.

rickegee:

It's not an extreme hypothetical that only happens on 24 or other Hollywood productions. A live case in point is Khaled Sheikh Mohammed. He was, according to ABC's Brian Ross, waterboarded. He yielded and gave up realtime information that was used in stopping several concrete attacks inside the US. Hundreds of lives were saved. I don't see how refraining from strong interrogation, and even torture, would have been the moral choice in this case, and many others. If a captured terrorist has operational details of attacks, it seems to me that using whatever means necessary to extract the information and save lives is the clear moral imperative.

Arar was not innocent of being in the country illegally, hence he was deported according to civil procedures. I'm not sure what makes his stories about being tortured credible. Seems to me like he's just got an axe to grind and is enjoying his 15 minutes.

You didn't really address the question on why the GC should be immutable, or I didn't understand you to answer it. My basic premise is this: Between two countries that are fighting according to these laws of war, by all means the laws of war should be followed. But when fighting against a country that doesn't observe the same laws or against terrorists that don't clearly represent any country whatsoever, how is it that the GC applies in the first place?

In days of yesteryear, people had duels according to certain rules. For example, the duelers would pick from identical weapons, stand back-to-back, walk 20 paces, turn and fire. If one dueler attempts to observe the rules while the other clearly does not (tries to turn to fire at 2 paces, for instance), what value are the rules? If the one insists on dueling according to these rules while the other refuses the rules, the "honorable" one in this case is just being stupid.

Of course torture should be considered aberrant and disgusting in society. But we're not talking about "in society," we're talking about outside of society. Indeed, we are talking about what actions are moral in combating those who wish to destroy society altogether.

Just a couple of points for polite, intellectually honest discussion.

In a society, laws change all the time according to the will of the people. Why are the laws of war adopted 60 years ago immutable today? The General there in the video talks as if the convention is impossible to change, perfect and unamendable for the remainder of eternity. I think the GC is a good thing, but I don't want to go so far as to say it is more sacrosanct than any other law. Even the US Constitution (wish my country had a Constitution) can be amended, why not the GC?

On moral grounds, aren't there extreme circumstances in which torture is warranted? For example, you capture a terrorist involved in a nuclear plot... isn't any method moral in such a case? Is one to believe that it is really more moral to allow millions to die just to avoid inflicting some pain on the terror-plotter? I think there must be cases where any form of questioning is acceptable. Is sleep deprivation, slapping, loud music, etc. really torture? Shouldn't the definition of torture be limited to techniques that cause bodily harm?

I don't really know anything about Rumsfeld's handling of the DoD. I know Democrats hate him, and some Republicans too - I don't really have enough information to form an opinion. So I'm not defending Rumsfeld. Just questioning some of the reasoning in the clip and in some of the comments here.

Thanks in advance for your thoughtful responses... I'm really interested in how some of you come to some of your conclusions.

I can't belive people are complaining about $250. Seriously why does every one think a game has to have incredible graphics to be fun. Give me an awesome 2d platformer any day I'll gladdly pay $500 for a system that has consistantly fun games, even if the graphics are totaly the same as the GC.

The Wii does have a substantial jump in power from the GC. It has intergrated Wifi ($100 on xbox) and it comes bundled with a game. Now all I need to do is get one at launch.

Too Funny!

I hate to say it but I would not have recommended the PS2 to that mother. "Does he have friends" "yes 3 that would be over often" "how old" "12" "What games" "with dragons"

PS2: Only 2 controller ports, higher percentage of M games, and is missing key dragon games!

GC is the way O_O

what's with all the urban slang? it was slightly funny at first, but then just got obnoxious.
corporate america needs to realise that some crazy bimbo and two psuedo announcers isn't going to drive a salesman, or successfully drive a company. then again, mcdonalds now relies on the slogan, "I'm lovin' it." so meh...
and the mom situation is so incredibly far off it's not funny. like the kid isn't saying to her every three seconds, "Mom, I want a [insert fav console name here]"

all in all, it's not too bad a strategy, as long as you're helping someone with a need. Accosting someone with the entire thing if someone's already chosen and decided on a product isn't needed at all. The GC guys here are pretty cool though, if they can see you don't want to be bothered.