Originally Posted by Danilynn

for me. Not at all.

One of the questions on the poll was whether one would accept threats of physical punishment or harm to a loved one of a terrorist as a means of causing the terrorist to change his ways.

Imagine this scenario: I am a kidnap victim, and in an effort to get my release the cops seize the kidnapper's eight-year-old child from school. The police make a phone call to the kidnapper and tell him that his eight-year-old child is there. After some short introduction of the child's voice the police start beating the child and warn that they will keep beating the child until he is dead unless the kidnapper surrenders and releases me.

My mother is no more, so I would have to get more personal. Myself.

What do I, in gross fear of being murdered, wish would happen? That I be killed -- or that the child get emotional trauma that turns him into a monster like his father? I say that it is better that the kidnapper's child be left unmolested. Such, you might say, is a rational assessment of the comparative worth of a 59-year-old who might have 20 years of life remaining -- or the misery that some innocent child experiences that that child as an adult can do to humanity as a whole.

Would I meet such a moral standard? God forbid that I should have to find out. Courage is far from automatic in people -- me included.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

I suggest that we take this conversation about children's moral development to a thread that I have created to discuss the topic:

http://www.fourthturning.com/forum/s...815#post517815


I brought it up here because I thought that the moral infantility of many Americans is relevant to the topic of the 2016 election. Should mass depravity contribute to catastrophic politics in America, then the tendencies are built into American family life, mass media, religiosity, and other aspects which no political figure could have created. Tendencies that have coarsened political life are best discussed in that thread.

No country whose people is morally depraved can maintain its liberty; it will invariably vote for brutes. Democracies face enough danger from demagogues who make wild and contradictory promises yet conceal that they will treat savagely those either opposed to them or not in strong-enough support. But if people want government to abuse people unlike them and so vote -- that is how democracy works. If you shoot yourself in the heart you will die because such is how the body works.

I fail to see how mass support for or acquiescence in torture can result in anything other than political brutality.

I believe there's more than enough individual brutes on the right to effectively counter any political brute that the left is dumb enough to elect to serve itself.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

One of the questions on the poll was whether one would accept threats of physical punishment or harm to a loved one of a terrorist as a means of causing the terrorist to change his ways.

Imagine this scenario: I am a kidnap victim, and in an effort to get my release the cops seize the kidnapper's eight-year-old child from school. The police make a phone call to the kidnapper and tell him that his eight-year-old child is there. After some short introduction of the child's voice the police start beating the child and warn that they will keep beating the child until he is dead unless the kidnapper surrenders and releases me.

My mother is no more, so I would have to get more personal. Myself.

What do I, in gross fear of being murdered, wish would happen? That I be killed -- or that the child get emotional trauma that turns him into a monster like his father? I say that it is better that the kidnapper's child be left unmolested. Such, you might say, is a rational assessment of the comparative worth of a 59-year-old who might have 20 years of life remaining -- or the misery that some innocent child experiences that that child as an adult can do to humanity as a whole.

Would I meet such a moral standard? God forbid that I should have to find out. Courage is far from automatic in people -- me included.

Imagine this scenario, you are the President of the United States and a known terrorist was caught with vague instructions and orders relating to a terrorist attack that involves a dirty bomb being used in a major city. As the President, you have several options available to you including torture. If all other not so nasty options fail, do you resort to torture or do you adhere to your personal beliefs and fears and accept the inevitability of dirty bombs being detonated by a group of terrorists in a major city and all the loss of life and the casualties that will be directly associated with it.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Imagine this scenario, you are the President of the United States and a known terrorist was caught with vague instructions and orders relating to a terrorist attack that involves a dirty bomb being used in a major city. As the President, you have several options available to you including torture. If all other not so nasty options fail, do you resort to torture or do you adhere to your personal beliefs and fears and accept the inevitability of dirty bombs being detonated by a group of terrorists in a major city and all the loss of life and the casualties that will be directly associated with it.

So, you decide to use a method of getting information that does not work, and only gratifies your need for cruelty.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Imagine this scenario, you are the President of the United States and a known terrorist was caught with vague instructions and orders relating to a terrorist attack that involves a dirty bomb being used in a major city. As the President, you have several options available to you including torture. If all other not so nasty options fail, do you resort to torture[?]

No, but not because of some personal belief system, but rather, the bottom line reality that torture doesn't work. Torture would most likely result in the wrong answer given, say Boston instead NYC. Both cities are fairly close in proximity so that would make the wrong answer plausible. The reason I put that out there is that the scenario you put forth means there is no other information besides something like "a major city will have a dirty bomb detonated by a known terrorist". It implies there is no other actionable intelligence besides the 2 pieces of information you stated.

...
or do you adhere to your personal beliefs and fears and accept the inevitability of dirty bombs being detonated by a group of terrorists in a major city and all the loss of life and the casualties that will be directly associated with it.

Actually, that would mean that the intelligence community has no idea of what it's doing. This is the reality. It failed to see the rise of ISIS, it failed to predict the Sony hack, and for all I know, it has no clue on if there's already been some sort of penetration of the power grid. If you really want chaos, you'd go for something like shutting down the power grid. This is known information, but The US is stupid and isn't addressing that particular vulnerability. The proper thing to do is for the intelligence community to conduct a threat assessment , bring that list to the attention to the appropriate members of congress + President. It's then the job of congress + President to take measures to mitigate the threats. If dirty bombs are a threat, radiation is hard to hide. That means if you wish to mitigate that threat, you'd use satellites and other assets to locate it.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Imagine this scenario, you are the President of the United States and a known terrorist was caught with vague instructions and orders relating to a terrorist attack that involves a dirty bomb being used in a major city. As the President, you have several options available to you including torture. If all other not so nasty options fail, do you resort to torture or do you adhere to your personal beliefs and fears and accept the inevitability of dirty bombs being detonated by a group of terrorists in a major city and all the loss of life and the casualties that will be directly associated with it.

The President does not have torture as an option. Such would be a "high crime or misdemeanor" suitable for impeachment.

Let us recall the most infamous case of domestic terrorism, that of Timothy McVeigh bombing the Murrah Building. Was any agency of law enforcement tracking him down before he bombed the building? He committed his crime on a veritable spur of the moment. No police agency can stop such a deed. As a US citizen he could not be deported. He had no prior criminal record.

How does one get a dirty bomb into the United States? How does one slip it through? Sure, the terrorist is going to declare it in his checked baggage. (irony intended). Customs inspectors usually ask some question that can usually trip up someone entering the US for the wrong reason. Let us say that someone says that he intends to visit the Grand Canyon... in Arkansas. That sort of mistake, a contradiction, suggests a liar. The customs official will probably start looking for drugs.

Torture does not work except to degrade human life.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

I believe there's more than enough individual brutes on the right to effectively counter any political brute that the left is dumb enough to elect to serve itself.

The Right has the brutes. Mass support for torture among Republicans scares the Hell out of me.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

I believe there's more than enough individual brutes on the right to effectively counter any political brute that the left is dumb enough to elect to serve itself.

You are out of your intellectual league here.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

No, but not because of some personal belief system, but rather, the bottom line reality that torture doesn't work. Torture would most likely result in the wrong answer given, say Boston instead NYC. Both cities are fairly close in proximity so that would make the wrong answer plausible. The reason I put that out there is that the scenario you put forth means there is no other information besides something like "a major city will have a dirty bomb detonated by a known terrorist". It implies there is no other actionable intelligence besides the 2 pieces of information you stated.

Realistically speaking, you'll never know if it works or not on a particular terrorist unless you're willing to try it.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

Actually, that would mean that the intelligence community has no idea of what it's doing. This is the reality. It failed to see the rise of ISIS, it failed to predict the Sony hack, and for all I know, it has no clue on if there's already been some sort of penetration of the power grid. If you really want chaos, you'd go for something like shutting down the power grid. This is known information, but The US is stupid and isn't addressing that particular vulnerability. The proper thing to do is for the intelligence community to conduct a threat assessment , bring that list to the attention to the appropriate members of congress + President. It's then the job of congress + President to take measures to mitigate the threats. If dirty bombs are a threat, radiation is hard to hide. That means if you wish to mitigate that threat, you'd use satellites and other assets to locate it.

The government actually warned Obama about the probability of a rise of a group like ISIS before he pulled our troops out of Iraq.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

You are out of your intellectual league here.

I agree. Odin and Eric are in your intellectual league here.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Realistically speaking, you'll never know if it works or not on a particular terrorist unless you're willing to try it.

You have to take the use of a particular "weapon" in the aggregate though. If something works in some isolated instance, but fails in the aggregate, it's bad policy. I can even take this to how stuff works in the prison system. Here , inmates have to abide by 2 sets of rules. The first of course are the rules laid down by the guards and the 2nd are the ones that are part of "prison culture". The prison culture has one important rule: "snitches get stitches". A prisoner will normally do whatever it takes to talk to guards in such a way to achieve "plausible deniability" on behalf of some other inmate, just to save his skin.

As far as how well torture works, here's a link.
http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/an_...ss_of_torture/

Now, nevermind the blowback of having such a policy in place. If the US engages in torture, then other actors are then free to do likewise to US personnel. After all, what defense can we offer up when we do something and some other actor does likewise? Now one has to go into why does terrorism exist? The answer is also blowback from prior covert actions the US has done in the past. Since there's a time lag, few can make a connection. The Iranian Revolution in 1979 can trace its roots to a covert operation in the 1950's where we did a regime change there.

The government actually warned Obama about the probability of a rise of a group like ISIS before he pulled our troops out of Iraq.

A better source that was ignored was the Kurds. They live there, so they should know.

http://news.yahoo.com/washington-ign...-politics.html

Has usually believed in the "Spock doctrine" ie "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
In an ideal world there would be no need for torture. But this is far from an ideal world no matter how friends on the left think it should be.

It it may be distasteful, it may not even work, but when the well being of the many is at stake, one must do everything possible.

Also (added)-Odins remark that "doesn't care how many people it affects, torture is wrong" reminds me vaguely of the quote by Joseph Stalin : " one death is a tragedy , a million is a statistic"

Originally Posted by Hutch74

Has usually believed in the "Spock doctrine" ie "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Pet peeve: This always bothers me because when used it is nearly always incomplete. If we wish to borrow from this particular piece of sci-fi mythology (and it is a very good one), it is important to remember that this philosophy is part of a story arc that includes the third film as well. That is seldom is, is due to the second film being awesome and the third film being crap.

But it should never be forgotten, the total needs philosophy must include the reverse statement as well. There was always meant to be a balance between logic and morality. This is the entire idea behind this story arc. This is why Kirk was willing to sacrifice his career, the careers of his crew and everything they loved by stealing the Enterprise. He did this for no other reason than to help his brother.

Originally Posted by Hutch74

Has usually believed in the "Spock doctrine" ie "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
In an ideal world there would be no need for torture. But this is far from an ideal world no matter how friends on the left think it should be.

These days, with the vogue of libertarian and anarchist views (especially on the web), it is the right-wing that thinks this is an ideal world. That's why they think we can get along with less government, or no government. What we need, though, is law, and principle. Torture goes against this need; it is illegal and immoral.

It it may be distasteful, it may not even work, but when the well being of the many is at stake, one must do everything possible.

If a method does not work, then it is not something "possible." It does not improve the condition of the many. It degrades it. Being as bad and immoral as your enemy, does not accomplish your purpose, if that purpose is to defend a free society of laws. You have merely become your enemy. And you legally permit the enemy to do the same things to you.

If your purpose is to establish a totalitarian dictatorship, then torture might be tolerable to you (even though it still won't work). That is the purpose of Dick Cheney, Mr. Yuu and the others who established this regime of torture in the USA in 2002. Mr. Obama, although quite imperfectly, supports a purpose that is more in line with the purposes of this country as stated by the original founders, Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Roosevelt, Mr. Kennedy, etc.

Originally Posted by Hutch74

Has usually believed in the "Spock doctrine" ie "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

The Klingons operated under that principle, too, as an evil empire. All social orders have their own assumptions of collective purpose. America's oligarchs would have us believe that their enrichment and indulgence are the highest purposes in any life. First ask how to create wealth that can trickle down, then ask what sacrifices we can all make by transferring our wealth and deferring (if not altogether denying) our hopes can ensure the complete dominion of the oligarchs -- and never ask any questions.

In an ideal world there would be no need for torture. But this is far from an ideal world no matter how friends on the left think it should be.

In an ideal world there would be no need for slavery, either. But in this far-from-ideal world slavery is so manifestly unjust and counterproductive that it does no discernible good, and we must reject it nonetheless. If we must tolerate an abusive practice then we must find some overwhelming good in the loathsome practice. What good did the torture in Abu Ghraib do? None! To stop the plots of an underground resistance one must either

(1) exterminate the local populace, in which case one becomes as evil as Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Saddam, etc.
(2) capture the leadership of the defeated enemy
(3) destroy the possible means of communication of command and stop the transfer of money by the Bad Guys
(4) create mass trust among the local populace

Torture did none of those -- not that the first is in any way desirable. Even if the Rove/Cheney/Bush Administration had elaborate rationales for torture the reality showed that torture did not work. Torture was a failure, and the Rove/Cheney/Bush Administration didn't have a clue. The Administration was able to find low-level personnel to sacrifice as 'rogue operators' to achieve the plausible denial to save personalities at the apex of power.

It it may be distasteful, it may not even work, but when the well being of the many is at stake, one must do everything possible.

The Spock doctrine is of self-sacrifice, and not of acquiescence in failure.

Also (added)-Odins remark that "doesn't care how many people it affects, torture is wrong" reminds me vaguely of the quote by Joseph Stalin : " one death is a tragedy , a million is a statistic"

I could replace "death" with "torture" in Stalin's cynical statement and have a similarly-horrible argument.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

I believe there's more than enough individual brutes on the right to effectively counter any political brute that the left is dumb enough to elect to serve itself.

"Brutes on the Left"? There aren't enough to pose a threat to you. Besides, the rejection of brutality is essential
for the preservation of the rule of law. Should we ever abandon the rule of law, as by acquiescence in torture, we lose our freedom.

Yeah man, Jack Bauer'll show 'em! Cut off a finger ... make 'em talk!

Then there was the one where he slightly sliced the guy's throat with the Samurai sword, and then, after the guy gave the info, sliced off his head anyhow! Yeah! / sarc

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Imagine this scenario, you are the President of the United States and a known terrorist was caught with vague instructions and orders relating to a terrorist attack that involves a dirty bomb being used in a major city. As the President, you have several options available to you including torture. If all other not so nasty options fail, do you resort to torture or do you adhere to your personal beliefs and fears and accept the inevitability of dirty bombs being detonated by a group of terrorists in a major city and all the loss of life and the casualties that will be directly associated with it.

The fact that this kind of shameless utilitarianism is considered a valid argument just goes to show how far the cultural rot within American society has gone. I feel dirty just reading your post.

Greetings!

I am sorry that I have been away so long, but unfortunately I lost access to an old email address that has the password to the site. I have been reading through a few of these things, and I would like to add my two cents, if that is alright.

First off, torture: Here I will not make the moral argument, but rather point out that either way, we signed the Geneva Convention and thus are bound to it: no matter how you slice it, Dick Cheney should be in jail. No matter how you slice it, allowing prisoners to get the same treatment that the Japanese gave to our soldiers in World War II is hypocritical and weakens our global position – places like China and Russia have absolutely no reason to listen to us when we gripe about human rights and democracy while we don't practice it at home. These are places where women are tied to beds and have their babies forcibly removed from their womb and chopped to pieces. These are places where jails are in such condition that drug-resistant forms of tuberculosis have arisen from them (we thus have almost no standing to debate them when we incarcerate people for profit, but I digress…) It does not matter if a Democrat or Republican what's behind the thinking that led to a horrible legislation and the tacit acceptance of torture as a method of interrogation, because it matters more that neither side did absolutely nothing to stop it. I suspect part of the reason why so many now except torture as par for the course is because, much like Goebbels said, if a lie is told enough times becomes the truth. Similarly, A public can be lied to and finessed enough so that they do not even pause to hear themselves speak, let alone think.

Originally Posted by Odin

The fact that this kind of shameless utilitarianism is considered a valid argument just goes to show how far the cultural rot within American society has gone. I feel dirty just reading (that) post (suggesting that torture is an appropriate way of dealing with terrorism).

A democratic process can be no better than the morality of the electorate... and if nearly 50% of Americans think torture acceptable, then maybe I am in the wrong country.

It is ironic that America is one of the most church-going countries in the world -- but what are the preachers saying about torture? We are toward the top in the world in the quantity (if not quality) of formal education -- but what are people learning in school? The mass media are unreliable; they give people the mind candy that they think they want (but that comes with soul-rot).

I cannot say that cruelty is the source of all evil -- but I can see it as a source only of evil except through some strange accidents. As a nation we rightly break any tendency toward cruelty early... and we keep the message clear all the way to whatever level of existence one gets to that cruelty is wrong.

We rise above our worst instincts lest we drown in the septic tank.

[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)]Second, the next election: I am rather nervous as to what is coming next. It is still early days, but looking at the current roster I am more than a little dismayed. My mother was born in 1955. I have tried numerous times to explain to her that her ambitions to see a woman become president have to come second to what might actually be good for the country; her ideas and dreams are rooted in the 1970s, our country's problems are rooted in now. She does not understand that part of the reason the DNC is putting her up as a candidate is that it's a sly dirty trick, a classic case of identity politics. They know perfectly well that women her age will flock to Hillary simply because she is a woman, and not really think hard about her background, qualifications, and above all her record. no matter what I say to my mother or other women of her generation, they will hear no different: it is a man's world and by God they must break that glass ceiling anyway they can, ignoring that their children have been used to the idea of women in [/COLOR][COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)]power since the fourth grade running for class president and at work most of their sons do not stand up when a woman enters the room since more likely she enters with them as an equal. (I am merely using this as an example of male Millennials being used to seeing women in positions of power and do not intend to start a debate of whether other posters on this board stand up or sit down when a girl enters the room: males born between 1981–2004 have watched their mothers go off to work in pantsuits and the lunch room at work in the present day is decidedly mixed sex, very unlike the early 1970s.)[/COLOR]

[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)]I am 32 years old. I watched that woman vote for the Iraq war, I watched her vote for the Patriot Act, I watched her give a very disrespectful answer to a Senate committee on Benghazi, and I'm old enough to remember her as First Lady: for all the triangulation the Clintons did, the one demographic they didn't truly give a damn about where those that were too young to vote. We saw her. We saw her champion "w[/COLOR][COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)]omen's rights" while staying married to what can only be described as a swine in exchange for a political career. The same woman also threw her daughter a $3 million wedding while most of us in the early Millennial cohort have had extreme difficulty just getting the basics of life under our belt, like affording a place to live and starting a family. On top of that, her daughter married some bigwig at Goldman Sachs, and tone deafly Hillary thereafter attempts to steal Elizabeth Warren's rhetoric on income inequality, and she thinks we don't know the difference.[/COLOR][COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)][/COLOR]

[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)]I admit I'm rather curious as to what sort of campaign strategy she has, but I would guarantee she is going to use Chelsea Clinton as a carnival barker to get people like me in her tent. I wonder if she realizes how badly that could backfire, since Chelsea is now an adult and quite frankly is about as talented as a lounge singer with laryngitis and the epitome of nepotism overruling talent, the physical embodiment and proof that the game is rigged (for reference, go back to old newspaper articles from the summer about her stint at NBC: the woman couldn't even handle showing up.) I also marvel what the papers are saying now, that there is a split in the Democratic Party: something tells me the Democrats won't realize until too late that it's not about the split in the party, more accurately, it's about a huge demographic completely and utterly disagreeing with third way politicians/dinosaurs left over from the Clinton era on issues of labor, immigration, the current poor structure of government, and corruption. Millennials may be too young to remember anything about FDR, but we sure as hell feel the pinch when we get low-paying jobs with no future, our friends, many of which are people we went to school with and also are minorities, get treated like crap and are excluded from the ballot box, and not a single Clintonista has ever done anything but talk about changing any of this, usually ex post facto and almost never taking action, showing us all exactly on which side their bread is buttered. And the tech corporations seem to be the biggest butter manufacturers going since the DNC bread is slathered with their dollars. Funny – the Clintons didn't give a damn about us when we were 14 and used core Millies as nothing better than props whose cheeks they could pinch but within a day sign away their future with Glass-Steagall's repeal. It may just be that the 2016 elections will show them how past indifference shall bite them in the ass when Hillary once again says something either patently false or incredibly tone deaf, and the Millennials boo her off stage.[/COLOR]

And now for the Republican side of the aisle: the day that Millennials actually vote in large numbers for this party is the day they find Jimmy Hoffa buried under Giants Stadium in the end zone.

Facing facts, they've completely and utterly alienated this demographic, which is making up more and more of the electorate. Too many of us, bluntly, are black or brown. Too many of us hate and despise bankers on Wall Street and nearly all of us have no memory of Ronald Reagan nor see any inspiration in the ideas that Reagan had or the fact that the during the 1980s country was likely run by an old man who had gotten too used to being a rich man (going over the tapes I must say the claw like diamond encrusted hand of Nancy evermore reminds me of two words: Lady Macbeth.)

The only reason they won the midterm is because we didn't show up. The thing that neither side of the aisles understand is that we could give a fiddler's fart about partisan politics. Relating to myself and my mother, she always chides me about voting Democratic, and tells me to vote for the lesser of two evils. I don't know if I can speak to the experience of other Millennials on this board, but what I can say is watching my mother do that since I was in diapers has not produced the result she expected but rather resulted in a body politic that responds to the public less and less. Since I was a little sprout, I have watched the choice in candidates become reduced to evil Democrat versus evil Republican, and the choice and difference between the two being very thin. It's like something out of Kafka: any choice you make of the two options you are given will lead to damnation.

A typical method of how politicians in this country win elections this by blaming the other side – what does an entire demographic do if it knows that both political parties are morally bankrupt? What happens if for the first time voting for the opposition does nothing to change the status quo? What happens when a large portion of the population can see right through the dog whistle trick of blaming your opponents party when you're just as guilty? Polls are usually quite clear as to what Millennials want. The slow steady escalation of civil unrest makes this even more clear, as does the popularity of the Hunger Games series in film. The Koch brothers and other fundies of the Republican Party clearly are not interested in anything 20 and 30 somethings have to say and do so at their peril because if they cannot attract new members to the party, the Republican Party eventually will die, Tea Party and all.

The current crop of politicians on the Republican side of the aisle come from an era now known as the Reagan Revolution. Truly I pity them. Most are X'ers. Most probably don't realize that the Gospel according to Alex P Keaton where free-market economics trumps all, isn't quite valid when those same economics become predatory; men like Alex P Keaton learned absolutely nothing from their grandparents that when there are no checks keeping the wealthy from sucking the blood of workers until they are dead all hell breaks loose. People forget that in the 1930s there were a lot of strikes, many of them violent. I make the prophecy here right now that if Ted Cruz or his ilk win the election, eventually he or his party will attempt some legislation that will destroy collective-bargaining for good, or some disaster strikes and Cruz will attempt to take Powers for himself not guaranteed in the Constitution and go well above anything we have seen thus far. (In typical fashion the Democrats will do nothing to stop them.)That just might be the breaking point. I guarantee you after that, Millennials will march on Washington, no longer waiting for a leader and past the point of hoping for one, and probably leave no one alive. The national anthem from that point forward will probably be the Rains of Castamere. I know I sound extreme, but never in history have a group that has been oppressed or marginalized through wealth concentrating into few hands not rebelled. I fear this outcome is a possibility, and only hope some puppet from the Democratic side of the aisle gets selected so we can buy time and wait until a few Millennials can stand for office, or better yet, someone like Elizabeth Warren achieves the impossible and gets the office.

Originally Posted by Mary Kate 1982

Greetings!

I am sorry that I have been away so long, but unfortunately I lost access to an old email address that has the password to the site. I have been reading through a few of these things, and I would like to add my two cents, if that is alright.

First off, torture: Here I will not make the moral argument, but rather point out that either way, we signed the Geneva Convention and thus are bound to it: no matter how you slice it, Dick Cheney should be in jail. No matter how you slice it, allowing prisoners to get the same treatment that the Japanese gave to our soldiers in World War II is hypocritical and weakens our global position – places like China and Russia have absolutely no reason to listen to us when we gripe about human rights and democracy while we don't practice it at home. These are places where women are tied to beds and have their babies forcibly removed from their womb and chopped to pieces. These are places where jails are in such condition that drug-resistant forms of tuberculosis have arisen from them (we thus have almost no standing to debate them when we incarcerate people for profit, but I digress…) It does not matter if a Democrat or Republican what's behind the thinking that led to a horrible legislation and the tacit acceptance of torture as a method of interrogation, because it matters more that neither side did absolutely nothing to stop it. I suspect part of the reason why so many now except torture as par for the course is because, much like Goebbels said, if a lie is told enough times becomes the truth. Similarly, A public can be lied to and finessed enough so that they do not even pause to hear themselves speak, let alone think.

Russia and China don't listen and won't ever listen to us when people like you gripe about human rights and democracy. People like you have no teeth or willingness to shed blood for such causes and therefore you are viewed as being no major threat to them.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

Now, nevermind the blowback of having such a policy in place. If the US engages in torture, then other actors are then free to do likewise to US personnel. After all, what defense can we offer up when we do something and some other actor does likewise? Now one has to go into why does terrorism exist? The answer is also blowback from prior covert actions the US has done in the past. Since there's a time lag, few can make a connection. The Iranian Revolution in 1979 can trace its roots to a covert operation in the 1950's where we did a regime change there.

Al Qaeda and ISIS are free to do whatever they want to US citizens and US personal who end up in their custody.

Really? Russia has attempted very recently to annex Ukraine. This flouts several treaties. In China, it is par for the course for when they do something wrong, say, harvest organs from prisoners without their consent or knowledge, or force women to abort their babies even when they're just weeks away from giving birth, that they will attempt to deflect their bad behavior with ours: "why are you picking on us when you have done the same thing? You don't have anything to back up the argument except do as I say not as I do." It is a very common hat trick of Chinese politicians to portray us as foreign devils and emphasizing the negative of US policy. And I hate to break it to you, but even our allies are listening.

We hold no moral high ground by torturing anyone. As I said earlier, we signed a contract. Just because we are the United States does not mean we should do whatever we want however we want. To paraphrase Shakespeare, else let them know/the ills we do, our ills instruct them so. By acting in accord with international norms on torture, we take away a very big weapon from our enemies. I speak more of the wars of ideas, like democracy and human rights, ideology. Whereas you are correct that certain conflicts cannot be solved except the point of a sword, this is not one of them. How does becoming more like our enemy by wiping our butts with the Geneva Convention make us a stronger nation? Answer me that

PS – Actually, yes, I would go to war but unfortunately I prefer to fight when I have to, not because I want to. And conflating waterboarding prisoners with shedding blood to defend my country is ridiculous. Even history proves this: the British tried to protect their interest in what is now South Africa during the Boer War. They were ruthless and cruel to the Boers, imprisoning them and starving them. Once that genie got out of the bottle, it proved impossible to be put back, since some years later a couple of Germans got a hold of some old British designs: you know them today as Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Dachau, Treblinka, and Bergen-Belsen. The British did not have to round up the Boers and put them in encampments to steal their land, but that they did….And look what precedent was set. Let us pray that it is not too late for the United States to rectify the mistake it has made.