>> ^NaMeCaF:

Wow, I say Protesters firing guns and beating police pretty much deserve to get shot.


It's a rebellion dude. They want to resignation of the Kygyrzstan president. So they take to the street.

The cops are getting their asses beat because they broke formation. The worse thing to do, when retreating, is to break formation. It is a given that people should not break and run, they should withdraw. Something like this;



You see how the actors portraying Navy Seals never turn their backs, and never break formation; only until it is relatively safe. Never turn and run, when the enemy is bearing down.

For a Melee see any movie depicting armored formations, break the shield wall and it is a massacre.

Norton is clearly the asshole here.

He's accomplished very little noteworthy things in his life, but talks & acts as if he has. Not that Ventura is a fucking hero, but the guy was a Navy Seal, a celebrity (albeit WWF), & a fucking governor. Least he deserves a bit of recognition, but Norton didn't even give it lip-service.

I think Ventura showed tremendous restraint and, for that, he gets my respect, if nothing else.

>> ^quantumushroom:
1) USA is not a democracy.


Correct. It is a constitutional republic.


2) Torture is illegal against American citizens and uniform-wearing soldiers of other nations' armed forces.


Wrong. The Bill of Rights does not differentiate between citizens and non-citizens. It only speaks of 'persons'. It embodies certain essential rights common to all men (and women) regardless of race, creed, gender, sexual orientation, or nationality. True, it only pertains to actions taken within US borders, and against US citizens outside of the US. However, as signatories to the UN Convention against Torture, we have agreed that agents of the US shall not torture.


3) Terrorists fit neither description of #2, therefore legal protections do not apply no matter how badly the ACLU wants them to. The same legal charade was attempted by leftists during WW2, scrambling to give German saboteurs the protection of the American legal process. It failed and the Germs were rightly executed (people had way more common sense + balls back then).



Funny story about them saboteurs--you must be talking about Operation Pastoreus, which gives us the rich legacy of secret military tribunals. The thing is that we would have known NOTHING about the plan, if not for the fact that its leader, intent on betraying the Nazis from the start, turned himself in to the FBI and told them everything they needed to know (he actually had to travel from NYC to Washington, DC to do this, as the FBI Office in NYC hung up on him, thinking him a crank). For this essential service, the leader who had turned on his own people and spared countless American lives was thrown in a cell with the other seven, and sentenced to die. Hoover, director of the FBI, felt that the stroke of luck that had benefitted them in this case didn't play as well in the media as a tireless army of FBI agents, knocking down doors. The leader had been tried separately, and the military judges had been informed about his vital role in breaking the case, and STILL he was sentenced to die. It was only after the details of the case were released that his sentence was commuted. Instead of being treated as a hero, he and another German 'spy' who had turned on their Nazi masters were deported back to Germany, where they were treated as traitors.

So, you know, try another one.


4) While rich in history, most of the rest of the world is quite lame...unstable, squalid, rife with tribal hatreds going back centuries. Other governments' depths of corruption make the USA's look like a school play about tooth decay. Europe is graying and its traditions and culture dying. It would be better off mummified than Muslimfied.


"To save the village, we had to destroy the village." How well did that mentality work in Vietnam?


5) Obama is a laughingstock to America's sworn enemies and is played like a harp by all manner of sociopathic dictators around the globe. He's made America seem as weak as a legless kitten.


Yawn.



6) The USA will never get proper credit or respect for the good it does in the world (at least, not from American liberals). Part of being The Big Dog is being challenged. When China eventually takes over as Big Dog, the rest of the world will long for the good old days.


You know, this is what's so funny about 'free market' ideologues. Their belief that the free market will right all wrongs seems to falter when the market starts favoring an outcome that's much less favorable to them, whether it be the speaking of Spanish, or the growth of non-Christian faiths, or hegemony under a different overlord. Once that happens, the free market must be ignored, and nations toppled.


7) Peanut-head Eric Holder already tried to raise a legal stink about torture and was rebuked. Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training and only 3 of the terrorists were waterboarded, for the purpose of gaining intel, not torture for torture's sake.


Democracies AND constitutional republics do not believe that torture is permissible, regardless of outcome. The ends do NOT justify the means.



Since torture "doesn't work" the logical alternative is to kill all terrorists/insurgents on the battlefield without mercy. Yet this approach is also poo-pooed.


How is this logical? I know--I shouldn't feed the troll here, but I've got some time on my hands.


9) Liberal logic eats its own tail. Dependent on moral relativism to exist, it cannot by its own definition ever claim a lasting moral high ground.


Capitalism eats its own tail. It begets inequities that yield monopolies, and once we have monopolies, capitalism collapses. Communism eats its own tail. In fact, every ideological concept, when taken to its purest form, contains the seeds of its own destruction. The thing about liberalism is that, unlike conservativism, it is endlessly questioning its own relevance and truthfulness. You would, of course, see this as weakness, but like steel, tempering drives out impurities and leads to a stronger material.

1) USA is not a democracy.

2) Torture is illegal against American citizens and uniform-wearing soldiers of other nations' armed forces.

3) Terrorists fit neither description of #2, therefore legal protections do not apply no matter how badly the ACLU wants them to. The same legal charade was attempted by leftists during WW2, scrambling to give German saboteurs the protection of the American legal process. It failed and the Germs were rightly executed (people had way more common sense + balls back then).

4) While rich in history, most of the rest of the world is quite lame...unstable, squalid, rife with tribal hatreds going back centuries. Other governments' depths of corruption make the USA's look like a school play about tooth decay. Europe is graying and its traditions and culture dying. It would be better off mummified than Muslimfied.

5) Obama is a laughingstock to America's sworn enemies and is played like a harp by all manner of sociopathic dictators around the globe. He's made America seem as weak as a legless kitten.

6) The USA will never get proper credit or respect for the good it does in the world (at least, not from American liberals). Part of being The Big Dog is being challenged. When China eventually takes over as Big Dog, the rest of the world will long for the good old days.

7) Peanut-head Eric Holder already tried to raise a legal stink about torture and was rebuked. Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training and only 3 of the terrorists were waterboarded, for the purpose of gaining intel, not torture for torture's sake.

Since torture "doesn't work" the logical alternative is to kill all terrorists/insurgents on the battlefield without mercy. Yet this approach is also poo-pooed.

9) Liberal logic eats its own tail. Dependent on moral relativism to exist, it cannot by its own definition ever claim a lasting moral high ground.

"Who do you think would win in a fight: A NAVY seal, a real seal, or the singer Seal?"

>> ^quantumushroom:
AG Eric Holder tried and failed to prosecute waterboarding as torture. It goes something like this: Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training, with the goals of building resistance and familiarity with enemy forces that might do it. Navy SEALS were not waterboarded with the goal of inflicting permanent damage. The Sheikh subjected to waterboarding was ALSO not being injured with a goal of inflicting permanent damage; his waterboarding was done to gain valuable intelligence.
Is there a liberal with the nerve to tell the survivors and families of victims of a terrorist attack, "Sorry, since we don't torture captives, we had no way of knowing about the imminent attack."? Because that's the true result to which s/he should be held accountable.
Liberalism thrives on justifying anti-common sense from the darker edges of morally gray areas. It's preposterous to me that on this one issue (torture), the liberal movement, as it were, claims to be rocksteady, while at the same time unlawfully bestowing legal protections reserved for legitimate soldiers on savages fighting under no country's flag, who violate all the rules of warfare.
Despite what moral relativists claim, it is entirely possible for a human being to commit savage acts which forfeit all his rights to humane treatment, the protection of laws, and life itself.

It's easy to understand why the "liberals" feel the way they do about torture when you take the number of innocent people that were tortured and you put yourself in their situation. You're minding your own business and you get picked up, without habeas corpus being extended to you, and are interrogated ruthlessly for information that you do not have. Not only is this wrong and archaic, it may "make" enemies that were indifferent before. If you were picked up by a bunch of Muslim extremists, would you not be willing to do whatever it took to get back at that group? Now imagine if your only education told you that every Muslim extremist represents the ideals of a certain country. You'd wanna want to be a part in hurting that country.

AG Eric Holder tried and failed to prosecute waterboarding as torture. It goes something like this: Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training, with the goals of building resistance and familiarity with enemy forces that might do it. Navy SEALS were not waterboarded with the goal of inflicting permanent damage. The Sheikh subjected to waterboarding was ALSO not being injured with a goal of inflicting permanent damage; his waterboarding was done to gain valuable intelligence.

Is there a liberal with the nerve to tell the survivors and families of victims of a terrorist attack, "Sorry, since we don't torture captives, we had no way of knowing about the imminent attack."? Because that's the true result to which s/he should be held accountable.

Liberalism thrives on justifying anti-common sense from the darker edges of morally gray areas. It's preposterous to me that on this one issue (torture), the liberal movement, as it were, claims to be rocksteady, while at the same time unlawfully bestowing legal protections reserved for legitimate soldiers on savages fighting under no country's flag, who violate all the rules of warfare.

Despite what moral relativists claim, it is entirely possible for a human being to commit savage acts which forfeit all his rights to humane treatment, the protection of laws, and life itself.

>> ^quantumushroom:
"As a matter of law, CIA waterboarding — like the same waterboarding actions featured in Navy SEALs training — cannot be torture because there is no intention to inflict severe mental or physical pain; the exercise is done for a different purpose.

Jesus Christ this is dumb. Of course there is intent: those guys didn't accidentally get waterboarded...
Unless your interpretation is "inflicting severe mental or physical pain is legal as long as you intend well," in which case...
Jesus Christ this is evil.

>> ^quantumushroom:
For all you libs that still think "waterboarding is torture", Attorney General Eric "Peanut-head" Holder tried his best to make that equation work and failed.
"As a matter of law, CIA waterboarding — like the same waterboarding actions featured in Navy SEALs training — cannot be torture because there is no intention to inflict severe mental or physical pain; the exercise is done for a different purpose. When Rep. (Louie) Gohmert’s questioning made it crystal clear that Holder’s simplistic "waterboarding is torture" pronouncement was wrong, the attorney general — rather than admitting error — tried to change the legal definition of torture in a manner that contradicted a position the Justice Department had just urged on the federal courts. It seems that, for this attorney general, there is one torture standard for Bush administration officials, and another one for everybody else."

Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training, not to inflict harm and suffering. Waterboarding Sheikh Kalid was not done to inflict harm and suffering, but to extract information.
Remember libs, out of 500 Gitmo jumpsuit vacationers, only 3 were waterboarded for the sole purpose of gaining intel.
Some of you said it yourselves: Mancow (and now Olbyloon) embraced waterboarding as a rating stunt. The inevitable suffering--but no permanent harm--from being waterboarded was not the point, the media circus and ratings were.


Umm so its not torture if the intent is not to cause suffering?

Like I really need to say this again, but you're an idiot.

Torture
Main Entry:
1tor·ture
Pronunciation:
\ˈtȯr-chər\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Middle French, from Old French, from Late Latin tortura, from Latin tortus, past participle of torquēre to twist; probably akin to Old High German drāhsil turner, Greek atraktos spindle
Date:
1540
1 a: anguish of body or mind : agony b: something that causes agony or pain
2: the infliction of intense pain (as from burning, crushing, or wounding) to punish, coerce, or afford sadistic pleasure
3: distortion or overrefinement of a meaning or an argument : straining

From: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/torture

Waterboarding is torture, by its very definition. Waterboarding is an act that causes agony to acquire information.

I can only hope that if the US does not prosecute the former administration for war crimes, that another country does.

For all you libs that still think "waterboarding is torture", Attorney General Eric "Peanut-head" Holder tried his best to make that equation work and failed.

"As a matter of law, CIA waterboarding — like the same waterboarding actions featured in Navy SEALs training — cannot be torture because there is no intention to inflict severe mental or physical pain; the exercise is done for a different purpose. When Rep. (Louie) Gohmert’s questioning made it crystal clear that Holder’s simplistic "waterboarding is torture" pronouncement was wrong, the attorney general — rather than admitting error — tried to change the legal definition of torture in a manner that contradicted a position the Justice Department had just urged on the federal courts. It seems that, for this attorney general, there is one torture standard for Bush administration officials, and another one for everybody else."


Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training, not to inflict harm and suffering. Waterboarding Sheikh Kalid was not done to inflict harm and suffering, but to extract information.

Remember libs, out of 500 Gitmo jumpsuit vacationers, only 3 were waterboarded for the sole purpose of gaining intel.

Some of you said it yourselves: Mancow (and now Olbyloon) embraced waterboarding as a rating stunt. The inevitable suffering--but no permanent harm--from being waterboarded was not the point, the media circus and ratings were.

Ventura is a former Navy SEAL and Governor.. he has more clout discussing these topics than most people.

>> ^kronosposeidon:
Who cares what a former 'Survivor' contestant thinks about hot-button political issues? Oh yeah, the same people who care what Miss USA California thinks about gay marriage. And what Miss Wasilla thinks about Russia. Jesus. These are the intellectual heavyweights of the Republican Party. And they wonder why they got their asses whipped last election.


There is no proof that torturing people gives better information than without torture. This is a ridiculous argument to make.

>> ^quantumushroom:
Would you be able to tell the families of victims and survivors of a terrorist attack that "due to maintaining higher moral ground" we didn't torture a detainee with possible information that might have prevented it? I couldn't.

>> ^Rotty:
This is a fucking joke, right? For every union guy who "stepped up" there must have been five watching and scrathing their asses.


That's not the way unions work.

This was a 100% union ship. All personnel on the ship were/are union. There is union protocol and training on any union sea vessel. A portion of the training has to do with fending off pirates.

These guys were union, and their training saved their asses. If it weren't for their training, the Navy SEALs wouldn't have been able to fire the shots that ultimately ended the entire saga.

Navy Seals did it for me *happy

>> ^lavoll:

one captain freed in an awesome navy seals operation, but rememebr that theres a much bigger picture always.


That's true, but this is real terrorism staring us in the face, on the high seas, not tribes of pissed off poor people in Iraq and Afghanistan.

This is the real terrorism that we should be fighting.

And in Juarez, too, just south of us. These are real, pressing dangers, yet they are ignored and our best fighting force, our supposed "defense", is stuck in to poor-ass countries halfway around the world.

just a couple of things... the boat the captain was held in, glenn beck makes it sound like it was practically an open canoe they were in just drifing helplessly around in. Look at a pictures of it, and ponder the strategic challenges of getting a hostage out of there alive.
http://www.vg.no/uploaded/image/bilderigg/2009/04/13/1239629798597_486.jpg

The pirates are now swearing revenge, and they have 230 other seamen held hostage on other ships.
http://www.icc-ccs.org/index.php?option=com_fabrik&view=visualization&controller=visualization.googlemap&Itemid=219
and theres now a great possibility that they will start being more violent than before.
one captain freed in an awesome navy seals operation, but rememebr that theres a much bigger picture always.