I see fresh off their failure to fire Keith Olberman, the right-wing PC police are after Bill Maher:
In 2002, ABC decided to not renew Bill Maher’s contract after he made some disgraceful comments on his program “Politically Incorrect” concerning America’s military response to 9/11. After what transpired on “Real Time” Friday, the heads of HBO should be equally outraged, if not more.
As the discussion moved to the attempted assassination of Vice President Cheney last week, Maher asked his panel why it was necessary for the Huffington Post to remove comments by readers concerning their disappointment that the attempt failed. As the conversation ensued, Maher said one of the most disgraceful and irresponsible things uttered on a major television program since Bush was elected.
In a nutshell, the host said the world would be a safer place if the assassination attempt succeeded. And, he even had the nerve to reiterate it.
***Wake up, HBO: one of your hosts said the world would be a safer place if the Vice President of the United States of America had been assassinated.
I watched Bill Maher last night because Barney Frank was one of the guests, and I am always interested in what he is going to say. Say what you will about him, he speaks his mind and is honest, and I respect that. At any rate, Maher never said he wished the assassination attempt was successful, and what makes this lame smear so silly is that newsbusters posted the actual transcript and a link to the video (bonus fun fact- Msunderestimated is livid with Maher, but has an approving link to the video of Ann Coulter at CPAC immediately preceding the Maher clip), proving that Maher did not in fact say he wished the assassination had been successful:
Maher: But I have zero doubt that if Dick Cheney was not in power, people wouldn’t be dying needlessly tomorrow. (applause)
Scarborough: If someone on this panel said that they wished that Dick Cheney had been blown up, and you didn’t say…
Frank: I think he did.
Scarborough: Okay. Did you say…
Maher: No, no. I quoted that.
Frank: You don’t believe that?
Maher: I’m just saying if he did die, other people, more people would live. That’s a fact.
Saying that X would happen if Y had happened is not the same thing as saying Y should have happened or you wished Y had happened. There is no way around that, even when you selectively quote and remove the jocular context from the program.
I understand now why Politically Incorrect ended. It was replaced with what appears to be the wildly more popular Politically Correct v. 2.0, run by the right wing.
BTW- Frank did not disappoint. He had one of the best reasoned responses to why saying lives had been wasted in Iraq, although true, should be avoided. His reasoning is that yes, while the administration has squandered a bunch of lives, and that saying lives had been wasted is not an attack on the noble sacrifice of our soldiers, but an attack on this administration, it is unnecessary to bring additional pain and suffering to those who have lost loved ones by using the term “wasted.” I tend to agree, and I will try to post the transcript of that portion if I can find it.
Darrell
Barney Frank accused Bush of “ethnic cleansing” over Katrina. I can see why you hold him in such high regard John.
John Cole
I know this will come as somewhat of a surprise to a dim bulb like you, Darrell, but thinking someone is honestly speaking their mind is not the same as agreeing with their sentiments.
In fact, one acould argue the only reason you are still around here is though I think you are a total turd and an ill-informed party hack, I think you honestly believe the dribble you are spewing. As such, I have not banned you for being a troll.
So embrace your inner Barney Frank, Darrell. It really is all you have going for you.
over it
John Cole….
I think I love you!
Seriously, you just made my day…I am still laughing. :)
Oh, and don’t be jealous or anything, I think I love Bill Maher as well. ;)
(I have a thing for SMART men who tell it like it is)
Darrell
You unprincipled scumbag.. you defended the use of the term “wasted” when Obama used it to describe fallen soldiers in Iraq. Here is what you wrote:
cd6
At least Maher didn’t use swear words.
Paddy O'Shea
The disconnect here is over whether anyone is actually listening to the right anymore. It used to be that rightwing demands came with the possibility of increased ratings points. But since that powerful impetus has now shifted to the Bill Mahers and Keith Olbermanns of the world, what’s the point of giving them the time of day?
I think what confuses the right during their darkest hours is that they actually thought that the media power it once enjoyed had something to do with their message.
Turns out it was only money after all.
Cole missed another good reason for keeping Darrell around. That is he serves as a bright and shining example of the debilitating disease that currently afflicts the right. As such he serves admirably as house leper.
Pb
Bill Maher’s real sin–he speaks the truth, and some people just can’t handle the truth. That was the case with his (and D’Souza’s!) comments from 2002, and it sounds like that’s the case now, still. A recap, this is what got Bill Maher fired (and D’Souza promoted?) in 2002:
John Cole
Anbd I still do defend the use of the term wasted. I don’t think John McCain or Obama said anything wrong when they said lives had been wasted. it is true, they have.
That wasn’t Frank’s point, nor mine, in this post. his point was that yes, while, those lives have been wasted, you should take into consideration the impact it will have on those who have lost loved ones. You can make the argument that the lives were, in fact, wasted, without putting those families through the pain.
So I don’t think there is anything wrong with what Obama or McCain said, but I think Frank is right. It probably is better to not use the term so as to not cause any additional suffering.
At any rate, that is not what Obama and McCain were attacked for- they were attacked for slighting the soliders service, degrading their sacrifice- not causing pain and suffering to the families.
Now I know that is requiring you to juggle two to three whole thoughts with only one synapse, but think it over for a bit before you post again.
Darrell
Gosh, even with my one synapse I can see that such parsing of words would put even Clinton to shame.
Of course, at that time, the big objections to Obama using the word “wasted” to describe fallen soldiers in Iraq was exactly the same then – the impact on loved ones and on those serving now, as well as the fact that it denigrates their sacrifice to use that term. But you vigorously defended it as I cited above.
So let’s be clear, back when you defended Obama’s use of the term ‘wasted’, you were perfectly fine with it as long as it “only” denigrated the soldiers, right? But now that you ‘suddenly’ realized that using the ‘wasted’ characterization would also hurt loved ones you have changed your mind? That is precisely what you’re arguing here.
ThymeZone
I agree with both Frank and Maher. The term “wasted” should never be used in that context. Whether you support the action or not, any action, when a serviceperson loses their life in combat, it is not wasted under any circumstances. It’s the wrong word and should never be used.
As for Cheney, he is a warmongering lunatic and a liar. It isn’t rocket science to figure out that his crazy ideas kill people. If the shoe fits, then wear the sumbitch.
If the people on the right don’t like that, then fuck them. The got us into this pile of shit, and I don’t care what they think at this point. Let them go fuck themselves.
ThymeZone
Oh, and good post, John.
John Cole
Darrell:
From the post of mine you, yourself, linked to call me an unprincipled scumbag:
Pretty clearly, what people were attacking Obama for was stating that their lives had been wasted, something they disagreed with. Additionally, they were claiming that this was somehow an attack on the sacrifice of the troops. Concerns about the impact on loved ones were secondary, if that, something that is evident by the fact that I failed to even ADDRESS it.
Frank says that yes the lives have been wasted but you should say it in a way so that it does not upset the surviving family members. I agree with that, and maintain it is not inconsistent to be considerate of the surviving family members all the while recognizing that those lives were wasted.
Now go fuck yourself.
ThymeZone
Yes, and not only that, the term “wasted” is not necessary in order to make the two essential points, which are:
One, the lives may have been lost unnecessarily, which is the responsibility of the civilian authority, and for which they should be held accountable, and …
Two, the sacrifice is honorable and deserving of full respect, regardless of the failure of the civilian authority to have achieved a particular good purpose. These people died for their country, whether the country was right or wrong to ask them to, and the country owes them and their survivors the full measure of respect, accordingly.
jg
You do? Seriously? Do you read other ‘lefty’ blogs and notice that each one has a ‘Darrell’? He’s not being honest he’s being disruptive. Honest conservatives don’t come here anymore.
There is no honest defense of Bush. You have to be pushing a larger agenda which allows you to see past his transgressions. Because of this you can live with the ‘noble lies and pious frauds’. The truth does not set everyone free and his job is to beat down our attempts at finding the truth so his people can keep up what they’re doing.
Darrell
I too think Maher is unfairly being mischaracterized here, just as he was unfairly maligned over this quote of his:
ThymeZone
Maher was right, then, too. Aerial warfare is nothing but mechanized and formalized terrorism when conducted against civilian populations. You might not agree, but until you present an argument to the contrary, which you never have, then nobody cares what you say.
As for the suicide types? At the very least they have the courage of their convictions, which is more than you can say for people who plot bomb attacks on civilian areas on charts on walls a long distance from the action. Those people, like you, are sociopaths. I don’t care what their fucking motives are or what fancy uniforms they are wearing. It’s sociopathy, and terrorism under cover of formality.
Darrell
Well I don’t accept that all aerial warfare = terrorism, but I do mostly agree with Maher’s statement. The terrorists on 9/11 were despicable evil mf’s, but they weren’t cowards.
Why would artillery shelling not be terrorism, but aerial warfare automatically considered terrorism? that makes no sense.
ThymeZone
If it’s against defenseless civilian populations, then of course it is terrorism. If it’s against military positions and assets, then it isn’t, in my view.
Surprisingly, you asked a legitimate question. Maybe we can see more of those?
matt
I think you might be conflating honor and wasted (not sure I worded that right). A serviceperson’s death in combat should always be honored, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be considered wasted as well.
ThymeZone
You are making a semantic argument, but I am making a different one. I am saying that the point can be made without using words that injure people for no good reason.
RSA
Careful with the retyping, TZ.
On this general point, I think there’s an analogy in military history. It’s not uncommon to find descriptions of specific battles as being “pointless” in past wars, and it’s far from a stretch to say that those soldiers’ lives were wasted. Nevertheless there are good reasons, humanitarian as well as political, to avoid burdening the living relatives and friends of dead soldiers by attaching such a label to their deaths. IMHO.
Darrell
Terrorists launch attacks on our troops from within urban, often heavily populated civilian areas. There is simply no way for our troops to fight back without risking civilian casualties when fighting an enemy who chooses to attack them in that fashion.. no matter how careful they are.
matt
Oh, definitely, I agree. I didn’t realize you were making that specific point. My bad.
ThymeZone
That has nothing to do with aerial warfare, which was my point in July, and has been since.
As for “launching attacks within urban … areas …” that’s an activity that blurs the line between terrorism and warfare, and isn’t within the scope of what I’m talking about. It’s the kind of thing you like to drag out in order to cover up for the fact that you sat here and defended sociopathic aerial warfare as a political ploy and won’t be honest about it, and haven’t been for 2/3 of a year now.
Insurgencies are not simple things that lend themselves to Darrellesque harangues, anyway. But aerial warfare against civilian populations is, it’s black and white. The excuse that “we were aiming for the bad guys” is not an acceptable moral cover, and never will be. It’s just pure sociopathy, and deserves to be treated as such. Without exception. Whether the US does it, Israel does it, or Putin does it. Same thing.
ThymeZone
Not at all. I tend to be doing three things at once and often mangle my posts because I am in a hurry and too lazy to proofread.
Darrell
right-wing PC police = cherry-picked blog post which does not represenent typical conservative opinion but does fit the narrative John Cole pushing. “Nitpicking squared” as TimF once said, cherry picking like that.
That ‘Newsbusters’ site has a similar take on Al Franken’s comments when Cheney shot his friend on a hunting trip. I’m not a big Al Franken fan, but you gotta laugh when he said that Cheney “shot a man just to watch him die”.
ThymeZone
Nothing tops the Lewis Black treatment of the subject. See the HBO video “Red, White and Black” for his stand up act from that particular time.
Available via Netflix or any video place. Well worth the hour of your time.
Darrell
Why not? I thought that was the crux of the dilemna.. is it, or is it not permissible to fight back with artillery, gunfire, air attacks, or whatever weapons, against an enemy which launches attacks from within areas that are populated with civilians?
And why would artillery fire be “less bad” than aerial attacks? Aren’t ‘smart bombs’ more accurate than artillery fire?
ThymeZone
Sorry, it’s “REd, White and Screwed” by Lewis Black, on HBO video.
TR
Darrell clearly wants to be banned. That makes it unanimous, so go ahead and do it.
Darrell
Actually, I was reacting to this
ThymeZone
Urban fighting by and against troops is the “crux of the dilemma” related to the morality of aerial warfare?
Yeah, I’ll need to see a little explanation of that. From here it just looks like another of your endless jackalope bait-and-switch operations.
If you want to talk about aerial warfare, then talk about aerial warfare. But after 2/3 of a year, I think it’s pretty clear you have no intention of doing that.
Darrell
Urban or any area populated by civilians where terrorists launch attacks. If ‘smart bombs’ are more accurate than artillery fire, then why would aerial attacks against terrorists be considered terrorism, but artillery fire or tossing grenades in the same area not? I don’t see the “black and white” distinction, and I don’t think others do either.
ThymeZone
Nope, wrong. That’s just one of a list of excuses to cover for the fact that aerial warfare against civilian populations is terrorism.
Claiming that “we were aiming for bad guys” is not a moral cover for it. It’s just a lie. It’s a lie to deflect from the fact that aerial warfare, like its sibling, terrorism, is just an expedient form of warfare that trades at the lowest level of morality possible, the level of pure sociopathy. We want to do this thing, and we really don’t care that innocent people are going to get killed. That’s all there is to it, period.
All the other crap, which is the crap you spout when cornered, is just lies. Anyone can see through them.
Except you, apparently.
Punchy
It cant be this vague, IMO. A recruiting center isn’t armed, but it’s a military asset, so I’d consider it terrorism. Likewise, were terrorists to blow up a Escalade filled only with off-duty servicemen. Assests, sure, but unarmed. Thus, terrorism.
Liberterians may even argue that citizens ought not be considered defenseless, giving the 2nd Amendment, or at least shouldn’t complain that they are….
ThymeZone
I’m not parsing every possible distinction that can be made between warfare and terrorism.
I’m saying a specific thing: Aerial warfare against civilian populations is mechanised terrorism. It is formalized terrorism, where the formality and the mechanization are part of the process of trying to put a screen between the act, and the morality of the act.
The formalities, the apologies, and the excuses don’t change the fact: It’s terrorism. Aerial warfare against civilian populations has no other rational purpose other than to terrorize and coerce.
Rome Again
A task they knew they were going to perform going into it, and are only apologizing later because it would bother sensibilities of the average American citizen, who might just vote.
ThymeZone
Or, Israeli. Or European. Or Lebanese. Or whoever.
The most sinister words: “We deeply regret ….”
Yeah, but not deeply enough, knowing that it would happen, to forego doing the thing.
Try killing a bunch of people and then presenting the “I deeply regret” defense. You’ll go to prison for life, or get the needle. Why? Because that isn’t a defense.
We shift our moral values in favor of the desired outcomes in war. We lower ourselves to a standard we’d never otherwise accept. And then we pretend that we didn’t.
Killing people to achieve some ulterior motive (as opposed to immediate defense against clear and present threat) is sociopathic.
Remfin
Interesting re-writing of history. Maher was not fired for talking about “America’s military response to 9/11”. He was fired because he characterized American military action BEFORE 9/11 in a way people did not like. It’s a completely gratuitous 9/11 invocation to demonize Maher. The worst sin…people can’t even condemn him about it, because he was substantively correct. So he must disappear from the eyes of the public…
Kevin Hayden
Excellent points, John. Politicians caused the unnecessary loss of lives. That’s how to say it with complete consideration to the loved ones.
I also thought it classy that when McCain did it and a journalist asked Obama about it, he said words to the effect that with his military record, no-one could ever legitimately attack McCain for not being supportive of the troops.
It is refreshing to see campaigns conducted without the constant smear.
As for Maher, he’s blunt to the point of rude but that’s the point of his show. He doesn’t cross the line into threatening. Plus, he’s often funny. Coulter isn’t even in his league; she just knows how to rouse lynch mobs to boost her career.
Richard 23
This is why far left liberal wackjobs cannot be trusted with national defense.
War is not a game. It is not a morality contest. It should be fought with all the tools available and won at all costs or not fought at all.
History is written by the winners. History, unfortunately, is constantly re-written by liberals in their ivory towers.
But “ThymeZone” (if that’s your real name) is a military expert. Pray tell, what other tools of warfare are to be taken off the table. How much do you really want to tie the hands of our military so that it cannot win? Let’s find out how far out there you really are.
Darrell
Police are called to a disturbance and are fired upon from within the house upon arrival. In the course of firing back, a child is tragically shot and killed by a police bullet.
Was this a terrorist attack “against” a child? If not, then why the hell do you characterize military strikes against terrorists as “terrorist” attacks against civilians?
chopper
politically, it’s easier to ask forgiveness than it is to ask permission.
that’s ‘aerial warfare’ in what way?
Ted
You may have to at some point, if you want to have any commenters left.
Rome Again
There’s a problem with your analogy Darrell. Any policeman will tell you that a domestic fight is the last situation they want to respond to. It’s the most dangerous to both civilians and policemen alike.
Our military doesn’t seem to have much trouble talking themselves into bombing civilian populations, including wedding parties and such.
Moreover, the wedding parties would have gone on had the military not intervened to stop the festivities, whereas the domestic situation was not planned by the police.
Jon H
The whole ‘wasted’ issue seems to depend on the context you’re looking at.
The way I see it, most of the time when a soldier is killed in action, at the time they’re probably doing something that is not a waste – supporting and/or guarding their fellow soldiers, for instance. A crew of an Apache probably doesn’t think what they’re doing is a waste when they’re providing air support for a squad on the ground, so that wouldn’t be a waste if they get shot down.
However, at the administration level, having put them in that situation in the first place is definitely a waste of their lives.
Ted
Oh my god. Shut the fuck up. Your little metaphor for dropping bombs on the suburban neighborhoods of populations belonging to a country that didn’t attack us reveal you to be the sociopath and psychotic fuck that you have always seemed to be.
Darrell, you’re reviled by everyone here. Go take your pile of shit elsewhere.
Richard 23
I understand what you’re trying to say, Darrell, since the wackjob left hates the police almost as much as the military, but your analogy is a little flawed.
It would only work if the police in question called in an airstrike and accidentally killed the kid and perhaps the family cat and perhaps broke some dishware. Although dishonest as hell, ThymeZone was refering to arial warfare.
ThymeZone
The writing of history has no effect on the intrinsic morality of aerial warfare. Any more than the writing of Intelligent Design texts has an effect on the history of the earth and living things.
ThymeZone
You can try to change the subject forever. After eight months, I have no reason to think that you’ll ever do anything else.
Dropping bombs on sleeping children and their mothers is not analagous to a police raid that goes wrong, and it isn’t “an attack on terrorists.” It’s terrorism. Period.
Claiming after the slaughter that “we were only aiming at bad guys” is not a defense, and doesn’t affect the reality of what happened.
If Israel, or the US, or any country or any entity (such as Al Qaeda) can’t find a way to achieve its ends without resporting to slaughtering civilians, then that’s too bad, it has to endure whatever it has to endure instead. That’s the price of having a moral standard that means anything.
West Coast Libertarian
Let me be Devil’s Advocate.
TZ said:
Considering Dresden, the firebombing of Tokyo and of course Hiroshima and Nagasaki you are obviously correct. It does not however follow that, to quote Seinfeld, that there is anything wrong with that. It appears to me that it may be a perfectly appropriate military tactic to terrorize and coerce a civilian population in order to have it give up the fight, stop hiding insurgents, or whatever. It may be immoral but it may be militarily advantageous or even neccesary.
Just saying.
Nikolay
In case you didn’t notice, Maher outrage is all over the rightosphere now. And it’s just getting started.
ThymeZone
Note to self: You’re a monster, AFAIC.
A “libertarian” who pimps the incineration of cities full of people, including kids?
Well, it’s the Internet, you can find anything here.
It is immoral, and that’s all there is to my assertion.
Negotiate away your morality at your own peril. I won’t.
Tsulagi
I’m a little late to this post. So the Depends crowd is now losing bladder control over Maher, huh? Typical. The rational thinking astronaut versions of Jack Bauer keeping America safe and strong by deciding what you should hear or what should be banned on your teevee.
I’d second that.
You may be an old turd, but that was reasonably well said.
ThymeZone
Wow. The Marginal-O’Sphere? Who cares?
Really. Who the fuck cares?
ThymeZone
:-)
ThymeZone
Just for the record, I’m not THAT old.
I’m younger, for example, than both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.
No, not combined. Separately.
West Coast Libertarian
Let me get this straight. Because I can see and articulate the other side of an argument I am a monster? Even after I specifically said that I was a Devil’s Advocate?
ThymeZone
You tell me what a person who advocates killing kids is?
A lawyer?
Again, it IS immoral. And you are pimping an immoral thing. The “military” dodge is just that .. a dodge, a way to dumb down the moral imperative until you can justify what you want to do.
Yes, a monster. Don’t like it? Take it up with someone else.
ThymeZone
Why yes, you are in fact an advocate for the Devil.
Tell the Devil thanks for this fucking useless war while you are getting your paycheck.
AkaDad
New Rule
We should only use the word wasted properly.
For example, the only way I can handle Darrell’s posts is when I’m wasted.
ThymeZone
Why not? John Cole probably writes them when he’s wasted.
chopper
that’s the problem. i personally defend certain aeriel bombardments, which i and others would consider ‘mechanized terrorism’. well, maybe that’s a flaw in my character, maybe i’m not as idealistic as i should be, but at least i admit it. yeah, there are times when i figure mechanized terror is defensible.
John Cole
I do not write them PPGAZ.
Not sure how many times I have to tell you that.
ThymeZone
Your character strikes me as fine. I’d just call it a bad choice by a person of good character.
ThymeZone
Me either.
Rome Again
You’re as old or young as you feel, I believe. Age is just a number, the purpose of which is keep track of data, something I’m not concerned with.
ThymeZone
In that case, I am 17.
Pb
“You’re only as old as the woman you feel” — Groucho Marx
Rome Again
and what happens if she doesn’t act her age?
Pb
Even better?
Rome Again
Hmm, perhaps I’ve just discovered the secret to the fountain of youth, no one should ever act their age. The interacting we do with close others can make us even younger?
Kevin Hayden
Maher outrage is all over the rightosphere now. And it’s just getting started.
I used to date a gal with an overexcited dachshund. Paper towels proved the perfect antidote for all the piddle.
Fortunately, most paleo-conservatives save their energy for real enemies. They don’t swoon at the sight of a comedian.
TR
Yes, American history is one giant left-wing conspiracy.
Marc
Oh no. A bunch of angry nerds in their basements, who have a track record of getting mad about everything and getting everything wrong. Oh. No.
Zifnab
Hey, 10 years ago those angry nerds would have created a tidal wave that kicked Maher off the air. Give it a few weeks. I’m sure a letter campaign coalition of FotF, PNAC, and the KKK will blip the radar at least as they try to get Bill ousted one more time.
dslak
I don’t know much about the firebombings in Japan, but I don’t think Dresden is such a useful example because the loss of life was due to the fact that the city was not as heavily defended as the Allies expected, thus meaning that nearly all the weaponry deployed reached its target. Had the commanders known that the city’s defenses were no longer operating, or if they had been, the situation would have been different. No one on the Allied side intended to level the city along with its inhabitants.
I think the biggest problem with WCL’s position is simply this:
TZ is saying that an actions being strategically advantageous doesn’t make it right, so it seems that WCL’s point is moot. If we really thought it was the case that the strategic benefits of an action outweighed all other considerations, we wouldn’t be signatories to things like the UN Charter, the Declaration of Human Rights, or the Geneva Conventions. Of course, those are all quaint, anyway, aren’t they?
RSA
To add to dslak’s point (I think), there’s an obvious slippery slope here. People generally don’t talk about the attack on the Twin Towers as having been an unfortunately misguided military tactic.
Fraud Guy
Late to the party, but I have to rebut the military history wannabes.
There is no real historical defense for the militarily beneficial effects of the bombardment of civilian populations.
The counter to Dresden is the Blitz, when Germany was bombing London and other civilian areas. The net effect was to solidify British opposition to the Germans. This impact was implicitly understood in ground warfare by the Yugoslav Partisans (and the Vietnamese, among others), who deliberately took actions that would cause German reprisals against civilians, in order to solidify their support during the occupation.
Hiroshima is also held up as a defense for bombardment, because it supposedly got the Japanese to surrender. Even though they were already planning on it, and preparing to submit to the Allies. However, it did get them to surrender before the Russians joined against the Japanese, and avoided them annexing parts of the Japanese islands ala East Germany.
But military benefit. Sorry, no. When you read history, read the full narrative, and you will see that for every “benefit”, there are usually more negatives for civilian bombardment. However, it does create impressive kill totals.
Darrell d'GazZone
Where were you people when Pat Paulson was deriding the presidency of Richard Nixon while at the same time mocking the ultimate sacrifice made by our brave fighting soldiers in Vietnam?
Were those lives “wasted” as well?
It is always the same with you people.
Darrell
The bombing of Hiroshim and Nagasaki saved lives.. It saved the lives of Japanese civilians and American soldiers. Would it have been more moral to have followed a course of action (not dropping the atomic bombs) which would have resulted in more death and more destruction? Of course not, which is one reason (among several) why TZ’s moral posturing over aerial bombing is so phony.
The battle of Okinawa, which just preceded the dropping of A-bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, resulted in more deaths than Nagasaki and Hiroshima combined.. and more importantly, the battle over Okinawa made it crystal clear that the Japanese were going to fight it out to the last man.. and on their mainland, that “kamikazee” mentality would have meant more lives lost and more destruction.
Paddy O'Shea
Looks like the Bushies have been funneling some of our taxpayer dollars to various al Qaeda related groups.
There are no depths to which these people will sink to protect their Iraqi oilpatch from Iran. And that includes financing terrorists who continue to kill Americans more than 5 years after 9-11.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/022607A.shtml
http://thinkprogress.org/2007/02/25/hersh-qaeda
Darrell
It’s also possible to envision a scenario where annihilating an enemy including their civilians would be justified in the case of legitimate fear of survival. Talk to anyone who lived during WWII. One thing you’ll come away with is the fact that there were serious doubts at the time whether the US would prevail and survive as a nation, as the US was initially getting our ass kicked, losing battle after battle after having Pearl Harbor taken out, and at the same time taking on a new front in Europe. People had legitimate reason back then to fear for their survival, and they did.
In an extreme situation like that, survival trumps all, and if civilians on Nazi side need to be killed in order to break the enemy’s back in order for us to survive, then that is what needs to be done. It would be the “less bad” alternative.
Richard 23
Now Japan has Prince Pickles. The next war may well be fought by cute anime characters and giant mecha robots. And tentacles. Don’t forget the tentacles.
Darrell
In other words you have no answer, because you cannot justify the inconsistencies with your absolutist position on aerial warfare.
ThymeZone
Just go away, man. You are without doubt the worst thing on this blog. You’re a disgrace. Go the fuck away.
John doesn’t have enough sense to ban you? Maybe he doesn’t care any more and just wants to see the thing wither.
People are very tired of you and your fucking bullshit. The blog isn’t worth putting up with you any more. Seriously, it just isn’t worth it.
You suck, dude. In every possible way, as a person, as a poster, as a citizen of this country, whatever you are, whether it’s ana actual person, or a group spoof project, you just suck.
Get the fuck out of here. Go somewhere else.
dslak
Maybe it’s just my ignorance, but I’m not aware of any viable moral theory that equates what is in the interests of one’s country with what is moral. Presumably, it must be possible for one’s country to make decisions which are immoral – even in a period of duress – for the concept of morality to even be meaningful. That is, of course, unless you’re a fascist.
To preclude any attempts at trolling: I think a nation’s interests are also generally in line with what is moral, though perhaps not inherently.
Darrell
That post sums up well the intellectual rigor of TZ’s “arguments”.
And although John Cole has called me a “turd” and a “dipshit” among other names, you can bet your miserable life that he would love to see trash like you leave his blog, especially when you go ‘mental’ in your incoherent outbursts.
Darrell
Sure it’s possible. What is your point?
ThymeZone
He can block me with a keystroke, and is welcome to do so as he sees fit.
dslak
Lord, give me strength.
ThymeZone
Well, that’s often a moral choice, in and of itself.
Nations constantly make moral assertions, through the words and deeds of their leaders.
Moral values have consequences. A nation which puts its expedient interests above moral standards, or tries to represent its expedient interests as if they were moral standards (i.e., “We have a right to defend ourselves … (and therefore, we excuse ourselves for whatever hideous thing we just did”), will end up paying a price for it in the long run. I’m not exactly religious, but I think the idea that the wages of sin is death is pretty valid in a metaphorical way. The wages of sin, for a nation, is going to be death, in all liklihood, when the sin is that the nation has decided that hubris is its guiding principle.
See, for examples, the recent behavior of Israel, and the United States. Their hubristic and bellicose postures are the type of sin I am talking about, and the wages of that behavior will be death. Death for people, death of ideas, death of values, death of the future.
That’s why you don’t want to start wars of opportunity. That’s why aerial warfare against civilian populations is immoral, and why its rightful name is “terrorism.”
Darrell
Do you agree that an act can be evil, but still the right thing to do, if all the alternatives to that act are worse?
Conversely, a good action may be wrong if there was an alternative which was “more good” than the action which was chosen.
ThymeZone
You are exactly the kind of person (or spoofed thing, or whatever the fuck you are) that would sit up at night trying to figure out how to negotiate your way to acceptance of an evil act … just so that you can say, “See, I’m smarter than you.”
Your stupid, bellicose and hubristic adolescent notion of right and wrong is exactly why this country is fucked in a useless war right now, and presiding over the continued fucking of the most dangerous region on earth, the Middle East.
Your stupid, bellicose “It ain’t evil if I can excuse it” attitude is like a pall of toxic gas on this blog.
Marc
Can we bookmark this for the next time a conservative lectures us about “the moral relativism of the left”?
Ted
Hello, you shrieking banshee!
I second the “get the fuck out of here” motion. No one here wants to see your comments, so why don’t you scurry on back to Free Republic where you’ll be welcomed with open arms?
ThymeZone
Just to be clear, Darrell, what you are describing is called Ends Justify Means.
As I have said many times here, EJM is not compatible with democracy, and it is not morally supportable.
You say it is. Good for you. You’re wrong, and you are a good example of what happens when EJM and hubris are the basis of a value system.
dslak
If an act is evil, then it can’t be the right thing to do, by definition. It doesn’t really matter what the alternatives are, since some of the morally salient alternatives would have to be better in order for an act to be evil.
Rome Again
Define worse and good Darrell. Worse and good to whom? For whom?
You believe it is right to do evil if your nation’s supremacy is challenged, as far as I’ve been able to ascertain. I believe supremacy isn’t a reason to kill people. You have shown time and again on this forum that you believe it is.
How absolutely fucking sickening.
dslak
Consequentialist moral reasoning isn’t entirely at odds with democracy, but it might not be the best basis for a constitution. Laws like speed limits are entirely based on the ends – saving lives – justifying the means – banning motor travel over a certain speed.
The Lord!
Casts Bull’s Strength on dslak! Get a +4 bonus to Strength for 1 min / level!
Ted
What do you expect? You’re talking about a sociopath.
Paddy O'Shea
The definition of shit-canning a perfectly good Sunday:
Reading Balloon Juice as Darrell the Leper earnestly explores situations where mass murder could be considered to be a moral alternative.
Packing up the kids and heading off to the beach oh Bloggers of the Damned. Going up into the low 80s here in Lo-Cal.
Enjoy Hell.
Zifnab
That’s a bit of a benign way to phrase it. Boiling water is the means to cooking pasta, and in this case the ends justify the means. I think the point is that the ends don’t always justify the means. And its more in regard to the tough choices like, do I save a thousand embryos at the cost of a living baby’s life. Utilitarianism. Is it ok to rob from the rich to feed the poor? Is animal experimentation ok, if it means saving human lives? Can we ethically maintain our presence in Iraq even if it really is sparing us terror attacks at home?
Darrell
That’s simply not true if all the alternatives are more evil.
Rome Again
Really, I thought speed limits were a result of conventional wisdom.
See, I have this idea that more accidents happen in intersections where drivers are going UNDER the speed limit, rahter than out in the open where drivers are exceeding the limit.
I can negotiate a turn at an intersection very well, and I can also travel at a rate quite a bit higher than conventional wisdom’s reminder signs says I should, without hurting a living soul, and have done so on numerous occasions.
Low speed limits actually are NOT justification for fewer accidents. The fact that certain idiotic people are given driver’s licenses when they can’t negotiate their way into a parking space without leaving evidence of difficulty is proof of that.
Krista
I think it comforts TZ to think that Darrell is just a very interesting experiment of yours. The alternative is that he might be a real person, which is very, very frightening.
dslak
Everyone else here gets the point that, if an act is evil, it can’t be the right thing to do, right? You run into a problem with consistency if you take the position that the best act out of a set of options you don’t like is evil.
Richard 23
Sounds like something Darrell would say since he’s obviously a liberal troll trying really hard to make conservatives look like evil troglodites.
Rome Again
It is frightening, especially if he’s only a small part of a larger whole.
ThymeZone
Well, I’d say that the kinds of acts we are talking about here are evil a priori. By definition. For example, bombing sleeping children and their mothers, or firing rockets into cars filled with fleeing mothers and children, is evil.
If you can negotiate excuses for those acts, then you have descended into sociopathy.
The “let’s find an absurd rationale” argument is the intellectual masturbation of mental pygmies, AFAIC.
Ted
Yeah. Darrell would kill a child if it would get him out of a deadly jam.
dslak
This is why you don’t see me playing that game. The question is: Why do you?
ThymeZone
Point?
dslak
Darrell wouldn’t have any reason to stay here if you didn’t keep him entertained.
Rome Again
But, TZ, the absurdity is only apparent to us, they don’t think it is absurd at all. I would replace that word with “acceptable”, which is an absurdity in itself.
Rome Again
Perhaps because Darrell would then go through life unchallenged in the notion that doing evil is acceptable if American supremacy is kept intact? Perhaps it’s more important to fight that notion than to decide it is not worth involving ourselves in the argument at all?
demimondian
No. Evil is not implicit in an action, but only in an actor.
Causing a child’s death through strategic bombing is not, in itself, any more or less evil that causing that death in some other way. Conversely, however, ignoring the possibility that the child will be harmed is evil, no matter what mechanism the negligence takes. If, by ignoring the hazard your actions pose, you come to negligently kill those who’ve done nothing wrong, then you have descended into evil.
ThymeZone
Hmm. Well, I don’t agree with that. But anyway, I’m on record numerous times:
I will stop posting here if Darrell does. Get him to agree, and he’s gone. And bonus, I’m gone too.
ThymeZone
Proof that sooner or later, if you just wait, you will see every manner of completely banal, absurd, and, yes, evil ideas expressed on the Internet.
Without doubt, the stupidest thing ever said here. Not even Darrell can top that one.
srv
People never remember that Goering never had a war crimes trial after all he had done (ie, area bombing London). What was good for the goose was good for the gander.
Darrell and Goering, two peas in a pod.
demimondian
Interestingly, that was exactly one of the things I was thinking about.
And here’s another thing to think about. Go look up the mortality rate among civilians, and particularly among children, in war zones no involving strategic bombing. My bet is that you’ll be surprised at how high it is — because wars, in general, throughout history, have been terrible for the innocent. The difference between modern war and traditional war is only the mechanism of their deaths: in the modern world, they die directly through violence, and in the traditional model, they die of starvation, exposure, and cold. They still die, ramdomly, wastefully, and without purpose.
That won’t be news to anyone who has studied the history of warfare. War is far more lethal to the displaced and unarmed than it is to the armed and sheltered, and it has always been so. Warfare itself is organized terror to the local civilian populace, and it always has been, however much you quote Clausewitz about “diplomacy by other means”. It is never better than the least bad of a bunch of bad alternatives.
Pelikan
Well, I’ve just got one, simple, direct question. Darrell, if I was catching the kind of abuse you are, I’d leave, go somewhere else where I wasn’t hated. Hell, almost anyone would, you’re not changing minds, in fact, if you really do believe in your positions, you must be smart enough to realize you’re making it worse for your side…
So, why stay? Do you get off on the abuse? Are you one of those people who’s got a “piss off a liberal” bumper sticker? Because frankly, I’d love to hear the reason why you spend so much time with people who obviously dislike you.
-Pelikan
Richard 23
On the topic of smearing, Max Blumenthal went to CPAC and made an unflattering video which starts out with an ambush of good patriotic American author Michelle Malkin (who received an Accuracy in Media Award). He attempts to get her to sign a picture of Japanese internees. Very clever, Max. It goes downhill from there.
He even gets to ask Ann Coulter a typical hate filled insulting question about why she isn’t married. Nice.
Of course the far left smear merchants at Think Progress are loving it up. Disgraceful and uncivil, dare I say “unhinged,” the lot of them.
Darrell
How so?
Darrell
Ah yes, everyone here at grouthink central Darrell = Goering believes it, so it must be true, right? And you distorted my words, in that I never said a set of options I “don’t like”. I said that an act can be evil, but still the right thing to do, if all the alternatives to that act are worse.
Rome Again
What does it take Darrell, for you to come to the idea that an evil is acceptable? What will you accept as legitimate to that statement and what will you not accept? Can you give me scenarios where it would not be acceptable? Can you help me understand under what scenarios you could accept such evil?
West Coast Libertarian
Glad to see the thread is still live. Let’s stipulate the following:
1. There are no good wars.
2. War is hell.
3. There may be necessary wars.
If a country is forced into war the objectives must be to win it and to do so as quickly as possible. If you cannot define “winning” the war is a mistake. (By this criteria both Vietnam and Iraq are mistakes.)
While fighting a necessary war, politicians and generals must make decisions that I for one do not envy. To take examples out of WWII, when Germany was raining V1 rockets on London, British intelligence sent word to Germany that the rockets were landing west of the city. Accordingly, the Germans targeted further east, the result of which was that innnocent women and children in towns east of London were killed in their sleep by rockets directed there by British intelligence.
By using Enigma (I believe, but am subject to correction) the Allies were aware that the Germans had become aware of Allied plans to invade Calais. If the invasion were called off, the Germans would have known that the code had been broken. Accordingly a Candian force was sent to Calais and was massacred.
Both of these actions were arguably immoral and/or necessary. My point is that if the greater good requires ugly choices to be made, it doesn’t help to simply say that that the choices are immoral.
With respect to the comment regarding the Geneva Convention, it appears to me that it is not only a moral position to take but also in our long term strategic interest to comply. Similarly regarding TZ’s comment about reaping what you sow, I agree, but again that appears to be saying no more than we should not take actions that are against our long term interests.
I await being called a monster again.
Darrell
dslak, these are the very people who you say “get” your point. Are they unhinged to the extreme? Absolutely. But hey, you’ll take confirmation wherever you can find it, even among the clinically insane.
Rome Again
And where is your doctorate Darrell, that you would try to diagnose me over the internet as being clinically insane?
Didn’t you learn from the Schiavo incident that you should never make a diagnosis over the internet? Furthermore, if you don’t have the expertise that warrants a degree in psychology, perhaps you’d like to cease and desist from impersonating a doctor when you clearly are NOT one.
Rome Again
Whoops, that should have read Psychiatry, not Psychology… but same thing.
Get a fucking degree before you diagnose me, asshole.
Redhand
So tell me “ThymeZone,” was Truman guilty of a “war crime” when he ordered the dropping of the A-bombs on Japan, even though all the evidence at the time (and still today) tends to show that more lives would have been lost if the U.S. invaded Japan? Is Paul Fussell, who wrote “Thank God for the Atom Bomb,” just a terrorist sympathizer whose other anti-war literary works — “The Great War and Modern Memory,” “Doing Battle: The Making of a Skeptic” — should be dismissed out of hand?
People like you are more full of sh*t than a X-mas goose with your sadly predictable “one size fits all” moral absolutism. And for someone who despises “Darrell” as much as you do you should take a look in the mirror. You are the left-sided mirror image of what you so effortlessly condemn in him.
grumpy realist
The problem with Ends Justify the Means is that this will be used by any entity either in power or wishing to attain power to carry out acts that if carried out by an ordinary person, would be considered evil. Witness much of the history of the Christian church and their attitudes towards (pick one) heretics, pagans, people in the New World, etc…. Witness similar actions carried out by governments around the world.
John, my own concepts of human lives being wasted: if we did not enshrine the concept of pro patriem mori, we might have avoided such debacles as the charge of the Light Brigade, most of WWI, a heck of a lot of the 30 years war, and most of the Crimean war. There were a lot of deaths in those wars that served nothing more than to fertilize the fields of Europe.
Sometimes I agree with the SF writer who said that the benefit of war was to get rid of young saber-rattling men. Unfortunately it gets rid of a lot of other people as well.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Funny you mention that. Curtis LeMay, hardly a peacenik tree-hugger, thought that he’d committed war crimes. He said that if the US had lost the war against Japan in or after 1945 somehow, they’d all have been put on trial for war crimes. So the guy in charge of the firebombing of Japan thought it was a war crime, albeit a “necessary” one.
Make of that what you will. I’m just pointing it out.
ThymeZone
I think so, yes.
What you describe is exactly the kind of expedient morality I’m talking about.
The war could have been ended without dropping those bombs on civilian populations. It was expedient to use the bombs the way they were used, and we’ve enjoyed now sixty years of rationalization and excuses for it. However, those excuses are just part of the negotiating process, which is aimed at finding the point at which people, or nations, are willing to become something they loathe, in order to get something they covet.
Darrell
Probably so, at cost of millions of more lives. But what do those lives matter to a phony, morally posturing gasbag like yourself?
Rome Again
Really, I’m sure you’ve gone through every single possible outcome that could have resulted if we had not dropped those bombs and calculated the results of each possibility to come to the only conclusion that anything else would have cost so many more lives.
It’s amazing how you so easily take bait from others Darrell.
Nope, not a single possible alternative could ever have existed. Not a SINGLE one. Nope, not at all. Never in a million years. Not one!
Righty-Oh!
Andrew
Ca’tn we talk about Jennifer Love Hewitt’s breasts again?
dslak
What would be the argument for the immorality of these actions? Surely it can’t be that people died, because people would have died either way. The numbers come down in favor of the decisions that were made. Before labelling something as “arguably immoral,” you need to have some ethical criteria in mind that would bolster such an argument.
dslak
I really don’t think it’s that difficult a concept to grasp: Something can’t be evil and “the right thing to do.” The definition of the right thing to do is good. An act cannot be both good and evil. This is a simple matter of logical consistency.
ThymeZone
I seriously doubt that.
For example, around 106k American military personnel died in the Pacific theater in the entire war, right?
That’s around 25k per year for four years or so, including all branches of the armed forces.
Darrell
That was exactly his point, and mine. No good alternatives in that people would have died either way. So a decision was made to follow a course of action using the “less bad” alternative. I really don’t think that’s such a difficult concept to grasp.
False.
Rome Again
Not exactly dslak, Satanic worshippers think evil is very good.
We live in an upside down world where those who think they are doing good are actually doing much evil, meanwhile they project onto the those who are unlike themselves the idea that whatever is different from them is obviously evil.
It’s actually quite interesting when you realize how “up is down” a world we live in.
ThymeZone
Let’s make this a little easier for Darrell.
In an imaginary war situation, the choice is between ten thousand casualties suffered by American forces, or ten thousand casualties suffered by unarmed civilians, including old, sick, women, and children, on the “enemy” side of the conflict, by dropping an atomic weapon on one of their cities.
Which do you choose?
Explain your answer.
dslak
I’m talking about the logical compatibility of the concepts, not people’s differences of opinion about what’s good or evil. The fact that there are sociopaths with warped moral perspectives doesn’t impinge on the fact that it’s logically impossible for an act to be both good and evil.
Also, do you mean LaVeyan Satanism, Luciferianism, or simply crazy people who think they’re doing the work of Satan?
ThymeZone
It’s called hubris. Hubris gives a Darrell, or a Dick Cheney, the ability to advocate bellicose policies, even using twisted and in some cases deliberately misleading information to advance the policies, in the name of “peace” or some other noble goal.
Rome Again
I mean all of those, and those who think they aren’t that at all, both at the same time. Some of the best satanic worshippers can be found in various churches across America.
dslak
Well, Rome Again, I was actually being facetious when I asked that question. My point, however, is that even so-called Satanists often believe that their views and actions are morally justified. That, and the ethics of LaVeyan Satanism aren’t all that far removed from Randian Objectivism and much of what motiviates libertarians, anyway.
The Satanist who drinks the blood of children is just a myth (except for the occasional lunatic).
West Coast Libertarian
It is the one that I understand TZ is making, i.e. that innocents were sacrificed because commanders thought that it was for the greater good.
I guess what I am saying is that morality appears to be like Newtonian physics. It is easy to apply in most normal situations, but much harder at the extremes.
Rome Again
No shit, really?
::smooches cuz I was just kidding TZ::
Rome Again
You’re absolutely right there.
West Coast Libertarian
Please, plus fresh links would be nice.
ThymeZone
Uh, no. I would never use that expression. I refer to expedient choices.
For example, who wants to step up and argue that we dropped the bombs in Japan mainly to save Japanese lives? Does anyone here really think that’s what motivated the Manhattan Project, and the decision process, and the design of the strategy?
No, it was to save American lives, only. I do not refer to that as the Greater Good. Lives are not Good in accordance with which country they belong to.
dslak
I don’t think this applies in either case. In the first one, innocent people would die either way, so the option which reduces that number most is best. In the second case, soldiers aren’t really “innocents” in the same way the non-combatants are. They agree to put their lives on the line for strategic purposes, and those in command are supposed to make sure that their sacrifices are not in vain. There might have been other ways of doing that in the Enigma case, but the point is still the same.
Rome Again
::claps and cheers::
Thank you for saying that.
Zifnab
Less monster and more overly practical. The question of, “If someone shoots a gun at you, can you ethically shoot back” is usually an easy one to answer. Either you are so far against violence that you will take no hostile action, even in the defense of your own life, or you are practical enough to allow taking a life in retaliation to a life threat.
By the middle of WWII we’d already answered the “should we shoot the shooter” question. And we’d even gone so far as to acknowledge that war kills people and the goal was to kill the enemy until they stopped trying to kill you – even though your own guys might die in the process. The Brit Intel question was simple. Rockets were being fired at London. The Brits wanted to reduce the casualties. So they got the rockets redirected to a less populated area. That was purely a numbers game. A rocket was more likely to kill a person in the city than in the country (by rather large margins) so the plan was perhaps the height of ethicality given the circumstances. Same with Calais. Strictly a numbers game.
But when people talk of “ethical wars” they typically refer to wars that are in progress. When presented with the options of “to war” or “not to war”, it is always ethical to not war. Neville Chamberline, for instance, wasn’t a pantywaste Prime Minister because he failed to send bombers over Berlin and have Hitler arrested and shot. He was a pantywaste because he failed to use any degree of force against the German threat. No economic sanctions. No political rangling. Just pure appeasement.
In Kosavo, UN and US forces successfully pacified the region with minimal violence. In The Iraq War, Bush 41 had the sense to stop at the Iraqi border. In Afganistan, America targeted the Taliban and Al Qaeda specifically, leaving the tribal warlords in relative peace. Such actions maintained ethicality because they restrained their violence. Much of the debate over bombing Hiroshima has concerned how much fighting we prevented, not how many extra Japanese we got to kill. And that is the idea behind an ethical war. Killing the right people and killing the least people.
THAT is why Iraq and Vietnam were disasters. We couldn’t tell friend from foe so we just ended up slaughtering people en mass. After a while, we stopped even trying.
ThymeZone
Well, not to pick nits, but that’s just among many reasons.
Misguided and completely dishonest US policy and US government interaction with its citizens, would be my biggest reasons. The wars weren’t necessary, or justified, or conducted honorably. The Domino Theory was a bullshit marketing phrase like GWOT. Everything about Vietnam stunk. Everything about Iraq stinks.
Eh?
RSA
Nice summary, Zifnab. I’ll add that moral issues during wartime are very difficult to figure out. (I appreciated the reference to Fussell’s essay above; he writes, “I was simultaneously horrified by the bombing of Hiroshima and forever happy because the event saved my life.” His essay looks at the atom bomb issue based on his experience as an infantry soldier, 40% disabled from wounds fighting the Germans, about to ship out to the Pacific. Very muddy waters.) One of the things that horrifies me about the current war in Iraq is that our leaders have put us in a position to have to make these difficult moral judgments. Avoiding such a situation in the first place was a clear choice, and Bush, Cheney, et al. ignored it. I think that history will view the war in Iraq as one of the worst mistakes the U.S. has ever made.
ThymeZone
Amazing, that anyone could read that and not be fucking horrified.
Sure, incinerating kids on their way to school was a good thing. It saved my life.
I rest my case.
RSA
You’ll have to read the essay. Fussell doesn’t say the atom bomb was a good thing (the title is a quote), but he does want to highlight the moral ambiguities of its use. He admits he was horrified; what reasonable person wouldn’t also be happy that his own life and that of all the friends in his military unit will not be over?
ThymeZone
Sorry, I don’t think there are two ways to read that.
He “admits” he was horrified? It’s the only reasonable response to the event.
ThymeZone
A reasonable person would not utter such a lie. His life wasn’t “saved” unless he can prove that his death was the certain alternative.
Look at the casualty figures for the Pacific Theater. The theater killed an average of 500 US uniformed personnel a week for the entire war. By what conjuring does this guy assume that his life was “saved” to the extent that he can prop that up as a justification for unwarranted slaughter of civilians?
Rome Again
Exactly, I’m sitting here wondering how anyone can be certain that their life was about to be taken otherwise?
ThymeZone
Almost two hours, and nobody can cobble up a response to my 5:23 pm post?
Also, answer quickly: What has been the central “moral” issue underpinning the political viability of the “side” represented on these pages by Darrell, in the last ten years, and more?
Explain to me how this “moral” position is congruent with the hubristic, people-are-disposable views espoused here by the Darrells of the world, WRT to war?
Answer this also, please: What is the point of conjuring up outrage over torture, and then trying to negotiate the incineration of children?
Zifnab
TZ, who’s kids would you prefer get incinerated? There was no shortage of 17 and 18-yr-olds in the armed forces back then. No shortage of fathers storming Iwo Jima. No shortage of brothers and sons who died retaking the Phillipines.
And, again, nuking Hiroshima wasn’t any more moral than the firebombing and costal bombardments we launched before-hand. The only difference between Hiroshima and every other city we leveled was this time we used less ammo.
If you’re going to be intellectually honest about this, just come out and say “Once we broke the Japanese army, we should have just packed up and gone home with or without a surrender.” Otherwise you might as well be offended by the color of our guns as by the style of our ammunition.
ThymeZone
So, you are willing to negotiate the incineration of kids, to save the lives of uniformed combatants?
Just answer yes, or no. I think your post is the answer, and I take the answer to be “yes,” but I want to be clear on the point,in case I am mistaken.
Zifnab
Firstly, one must address the premise. We are under the assumption that by killing 10,000 enemy nation civilians we will be garanteed the survival of 10,000 American troops. I’m not entirely sure how this is supposed to work 1-to-1 or at all for that matter. Would the civilians potentially be drafted in the national defense or just loaded into kamikazis and flung at us? I’m not going to pretend to worry about that but take the premise at face value. Perhaps in killing 10,000 civilians we take a vital strategic location. Whatever. I don’t know.
Yes, this is justifiable, and here is why.
To start, your nation is responsible first and foremost to the lives of your fellow countrymen. If a disease were to break out on the American-Mexican border and we only had so many doctors and so many medical supplies, Americans should get precidence from the American Gov’t. Mexicans should get precidence from Mexican authorities. If there was a famine or a hurricane or any other catastrophe, triage should favor citizens before non-citizens all else being equal. Likewise, in wartime, the respective nation should value citizen lives over non-citizen lives. If America knows that it needs to kill a Japanese civilian to save an American soldier, so long as the war is in progress America is obligated to save the soldier.
Secondly, a soldier’s life is no less valuable than a civilian’s. If you have two men on an island, one who is a soldier and one who is not, and there’s only food enough for one, the soldier doesn’t automatically get the shaft. Signing up for military service is not a suicide pact. You are not signing away your right to live if the government decides it doesn’t want/need/like you anymore. The whole reason Walter Reed is a scandal is because we are ethically obligated to take care of the men and women who bare arms to take care of us. Therefore, if this really is a question of “helpless women and children” versus “grizzled combat veterans”, you don’t simply throw soldiers to the wolves because they’re in the army. Cute, innocent, and helpless are not criteria to be used in evaluating whether someone should be killed or not.
Finally, and this is perhaps the most cynical reason, soldiers cost money. Training and gearing an American soldier costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. Supporting a dead soldier’s family is even more expensive. Enemy nation civilians are free. Getting 10,000 soldiers killed guts your treasury by hundreds of millions of dollars. That’s money your nation needs for healthcare, for education, for public works, and for the rest of your military. America is not obligated to protect everyone all the time. It’s obligated to protect Americans as much as humanly possible. 10,000 foreign civilians are – sadly – worth much less to America than 10,000 enlisted soldiers. That’s the truth, like it or not. It costs a nation blood AND treasure to save a foreign life, and if the nation can’t handle the costs (and at 1-for-1 no country, no matter how rich, can) it shouldn’t be trying to pay them.
So there you go. A native soldier is worth more to the nation, and worth no less to himself and his loved ones, and because he is a citizen his country is obligated to protect him before others. Thus the deaths of 10,000 civilians WOULD be justified if it saved 10,000 soldiers’ lives.
Rome Again
Would you like that in 5,000 words or less, double spaced, typed with fully cited references? LMAO
RSA
There was no certainty, of course. Fussell writes that Allied casualties were running over 7,000 per week at that point in the war, though, so I imagine the average soldier had a reasonable expectation of being killed. But my point in bringing up Fussell is not to defend the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. His point, if I read him correctly, is that you get different views of its morality if you ask the soldiers who were in harm’s way compared with people who weren’t. (And naturally Fussell observes that it’s not the soldiers in combat who actually made the decision; they just reacted to it.)
Rome Again
Aha but there’s the rub. These soldiers expected the possibility that they might die in war, whereas civilian populations did not. Men who play war games should not be saved at the loss of people who were not involved in the war games at all.
And before anyone here decides to deride me about my use of the word games, all wars are games to those in control of such. It’s “King of the Mountain” with deadly machinery at the ready.
Rome Again
then it was nothing but an emotion point with no validity in fact.
ThymeZone
Pretty good response. The scenario I posed was obviously a little unrealistic, but designed to frame the question clearly.
I don’t agree with your answer, but I give you props for answering. I don’t know why the Darrells of the world are so afraid of these direct questions. There is going to be disagreement on a point like this, and it is useful …exactly for the “intellectual honesty” reason you hinted at earlier … to know where everyone stands on these matters.
Darrell is much less hideous if he just answers the question like you did (I mean, to the extent you did, not assuming what his answer would be). But he is too much of a coward to come out and be clear and then let his views stand or fall in fair discussion. Which of course is my entire point here, which has been made much easier thanks to your willingness to answer.
Now as to the answer you gave, I am afraid we disagree. My position is that aerial warfare against civilians is terrorism. I see terrorism as a tactic, pure and simple, and the fact that it is carried out by clean, shiny technology and at a distance from the carnage means nothing to me. It’s the same thing. The fact that the motives behind it are more or less pure, or vile, means nothing to me. It is what it is. That’s what I believe.
As to soldiers’ lives being equal to civilians’ lives … cannot agree there either. Not in terms of the lives themselves, but in terms of our responsibility to the two classes of people. I think our responsibility to civilians is different from our responsibility to soldiers. Simple as that. We are to protect civilians, and soldiers are the protectors. Otherwise, what’s the point? We are all just soldiers, whether uniformed or not?
Excellent answer, though, really. My disagreement with the reasoning, nothwitstanding.
ThymeZone
Clarification, my answer was to Zifnab in response to his excellent post.
RSA
Ever since reading All Quiet on the Western Front, among other great war novels and memors, I’ve had enormous sympathy for soldiers. It always seems to be the bastards at the top, GWB included, who set events rolling that get thousands of people killed while suffering not one whit themselves. Justice in these things is rare.
RSA
Probabilities don’t factor into your reality? All I said was that he was happy his life wouldn’t be over, a paraphrase. I might have said, “that his life wouldn’t be put at further risk,” but I assumed that went without saying.
ThymeZone
Well, you’re being much more generous to him than I can be. i take him to be a liar, and an idiot.
RSA
Fussell is neither, in my opinion; blame me instead for misrepresenting him. I’ll stop, though. It’s a thankless task, and I’m feeling as if I’m sliding into a devil’s advocate position. Further, I don’t think any of this applies to Iraq. That is, if someone were to say, “Should we drop bombs on civilian populations in Iraq?” I’d say, “Fuck no, we should just get out.”
Zifnab
When the possibility of death goes up, the number of enlisties goes down. And this certainly doesn’t address issues like a draft or volunteers to the National Guard who may not have any intention of serving their country beyond civilian capacity.
On the flip side, the Japanese civilians weren’t building bomb shelters out of some whimsical fancy. Those who could not afford to flee the path of war were more than aware of their potential demise. And, in any case, of all the defenses I would rally around civilians ignorance of their lack of safety would hardly be one of them.
West Coast Libertarian
Which gets back to my point that Iraq is a mistake and to keep killing is therefore, in that theatre, wrong.
Zifnab
Here we really will have to disagree. Once you’ve made the decision to go to war, I’m of the opinion that you shouldn’t fuck around. Clean, shiny technology kills people faster and better than dirty, ugly primative tools. And in war, the goal is to make as much mayhem as possible until your opponent caves. If you don’t want to use your shiny, pretty things then don’t go to war to begin with. Otherwise, use the best weapons you’ve got, win, and go home. Ever since WWII, “successful” wars have been those that end quick. And those wars tend to involve lots of high-tech artillery used to obliterate the enemy in weeks rather than years.
It’s all terror. It’s all death. Don’t get bogged down in the tools of the trade, just get the job done so you don’t have to do it anymore. That’s my philosphy on the matter.
Rome Again
Yeah, well, ever since I became a child, I’ve had a soft spot for innocent children.
Your point is moot, children do not sign on to war.
ThymeZone
You are right, we won’t agree on that. We might revisit the war-terror subject later, but just one point ….
What I think happens here is that the thinking you describe, which is pretty common (I’m an outlier here, for sure) changes the way we think about war itself, and the efficacy of war, and the nature of war in our culture.
I think that war is a slippery slope upon which morality just slides into the toilet. It becomes a vehicle for losing our souls. Torture becomes justified. Burning kids becomes tolerable. Everything is negotiable.
How then, having slid into the sewer of morality that is war, to come back and talk with a straight face about such mundane things as “values,” abortion .. or anything?
I think the bottom line is that war itself is immoral, and becomes tolerable only when there is a direct, immediate and measurable threat to life and property that cannot be remediated any other way. Wars of opportunity are always immoral. Maybe we get agreement down that road?
And if we do, then what happens when we have to make the kind of hideous moral choices we are talking about, in the context of a war that wasn’t moral in the first place?
Luckily we have Darrell here to explain it all to us.
West Coast Libertarian
Unless I’m mistaken the following all say the same thing
Rome Again
Probability of a lie? You yourself said it probably wasn’t going to happen (“There was no certainty, of course”), so what probability are we mucking around here? Oh yeah, one that never happened and probably never would have.
You know RSA, I was going to give you a pass on this earlier, thinking you didn’t mean to say so, but you shot your mouth off in your first post about this guy Fussell not only losing his own life, but “all tof his military friends” as well. You do realize the mistake in using the word ALL, do you not?
RSA
You get my agreement (even though this wasn’t aimed at me).
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
What about child soldiers? Happens all the time, always has. The Iranians used to tie these little plastic keys around the necks of 12-year-old kids guaranteeing them entry into Heaven, then send them out in waves to clear Iraqi minefields. Anyone familiar with warfare in Africa, the Spanish Civil War, partisan warfare in WWII, or pretty much any other war is aware of similar atrocities.
10,000 civilian lives vs. 10,000 soldiers between the ages of 10-18. Whose lives matter more?
Also, why is the life of an 18-year-old conscript less valuable than the life of an 87-year-old Army vet who happens to be sitting this one out?
ThymeZone
Well, there are two different and respectable answers above, what do you think?
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Pretty much. Also, it’s hard to moralize the decision someone else takes when they think their life is in danger. Obviously, certain wartime activities (indiscriminate fire, rape, looting, genocide) fall outside that scope. We’re all arguing the grey areas on the fringe of the Pale, not what’s beyond it.
But we can always complicate the scenario: civilian contractors vs. soldiers, child soldiers, civilians who take up arms, civilians who happen to be in the same building as civilians who take up arms, etc. etc. etc. Tons and tons of shades of grey, few blacks and whites. The only morally consistent position I’m aware of is utter pacifism. Thou shalt not kill. On the other hand, everyone thinks that’s unrealistic Hippie shit, so here we are.
RSA
Yes, “all” was a mistake; I was inadvertently exaggerating the danger. Let me try to be clearer: I find it understandable that a soldier who’s been wounded and is about to be sent back into action being happy that the war is apparently over and he will not be killed (i.e., he will not be at risk of being killed by the enemy), even if it’s balanced by horror at the means by which the war has been ended. This seems to me to be a natural human reaction.
ThymeZone
Yes, but we’re straying far away from the origin of the topic here. It goes back to July 2006 and Lebanon, and cars full of fleeing kids and buildings with sleeping kids and their mothers being bombed. Videos on CNN of kids burned up in front of their (also burned) mothers as they tried to flee.
And Israel with their standard excuses, and of course, Darrell and his bullshit.
It was a fairly narrow question up to a point: Can we condone Israel’s bombing of kids in order to achieve basically a political goal set against Lebanon (since no clear military objective could be defined).
Almost nine months later, Darrell still won’t answer that question. Yet he presumes to lecture us.
Rome Again
Thank you for acknowledging that. I still think if anyone is going to die in war, it should be the guy who signed up for it, not the civilian who didn’t; but thank you for clarifying your point of view.
RSA
Ah, comity once again :-). For what it’s worth, I personally agree with this:
It just took me until now to realize (slow me) that I was neglecting this point by trying to bring across Fussell’s point of view. Sorry.
demimondian
How is the civilian who didn’t sign up for it different from the guy who was impressed/drafted/otherwise coerced? Remember that a lot of the folks who were fighting in WWII had no real choice — Japanese-American internees who’d fought in Europe and were being redeployed to the Pacific theater, for instance. In what conceivable moral universe were they guilty of any kind of voluntary choice?
Redhand
Actually, ThymeZone, I’d be fascinated to know what your answer to this question is. Would it make a difference if you were in the set of 10,000 estimated U.S. casualties? If not, should I think of you as a Christ-like figure?
In the context of the time, I think dropping the atom bomb was the only decision Truman could have made. I would have preferred that he adopted Ernest Lawrence’s suggestion to drop a demonstration bomb before invited Japanese representatives first (see sttp://www.aip.org/history/lawrence/bomb_text.htm).
But sadly, it took TWO bombs dropped on real people to end the war. What does that tell you about the nature of the enemy leadership we faced (note that I don’t put quote marks around the word enemy) that wasn’t revealed by their defense of Iwo Jima and Okinawa? Invading the Japanese home islands would have made the Russian conquest of Berlin look like child’s play in terms of casualties. No American wartime leader, as opposed to a modern day moralist like yourself, would have found that acceptable in any way.
None of this means I think nucs should be used today, ever, after what we learned at the end of WWII. Radiation sickness and genetic damage spanning generations, and permanently poisoned real estate, are prices too great to pay. I’d go so far as to say that even if Iran got nucs and used them on Israel or the U.S., the response by the attacked country should be conventional, if overwhelming.
But, please spare us further polemics about aerial warfare, as in “Aerial warfare is nothing but mechanized and formalized terrorism when conducted against civilian populations.” To be sure, “strategic bombing” during WWII was the bluntest possible instrument. Although the USAAF adhered to “daylight precision bombing” in the ETO as a doctrinal goal and method, much of its bombing was defacto area bombing like the Brits did (and are still sensitive about today). Moreover, LeMay abandoned any pretense of precision in his B-29 fire-bonging campaign against the Japanese.
But it’s nonsense to say that technology hasn’t made a dramatic difference in the present day. Air forces don’t area bomb anymore, and collateral damage is just that, rather than the object of the mission. On the other hand, maybe you are one of those who actually think all aerial bombing is automatically “terrorism,” despite the precision of cruise missles and smart bombs.
If so, I guess you think Bill Clinton is a terrorist too. After all, he used airpower to stop the Serb invasion and ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, attacked “infrastructure” targets in Serb cities and managed to kill a bunch of innocent Chinese civilians when their embassy in Belgrade was hit.
Since there isn’t a bomb on the planet smart enough to prevent all collateral damage, why isn’t the death of a single civilian is such circumstances “terrorism”? Should we give up one of the most effective weapons we have in today’s ugly world to suit your moral absolutism? I think not.
FWIW, I am a huge opponent of the Iraq war, and get the dry heaves when I hear Cheney blather on about the “inconvenient truth” that the Iraq war is the “central front on the GWOT.” The bastard ought to burn in hell the same way that I hope LBJ is for the Gulf of Tonkin Incident and what followed. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the “enemy” of my enemy is my friend.
Rome Again
Well, to start with, the civilian doesn’t walk around with a gun expecting to shoot a human being to death with hit.
If someone were drafted, I could understand that there should be no distinction, but the fact is, that doesn’t happen often. What happens to the guy who realizing he has been drafted picks up a gun and shoots someone with it? Had that been me, I would rather be shot than shoot back. Good thing I can never be drafted, because I’d make an awful asset to the team.
ThymeZone
Not fascinated enough to read the thread, I guess. I thik my answer is right there.
This topic is a continuation from July of last year, WRT to the Israel war on Lebanon. I made the assertion then in that context, and I stand by it. I was right then and remain right today.
Aerial warfare is not “different” from terrorism because it looks cleaner or because you can lie and call civilian slaughter something lawyerly like “collateral damage.”
Your argument basically boils down to “No it isn’t, because I say so.”
You can browbeat with stuff like “absurd moral absolutism” but that’s just a Cheneyism AFAIC. Crap.
Israel knew what it was doing. It was wrong, it was immoral, and it was terrorism. It’s terrorism no matter who does it. The words you sling around it don’t change the facts.
You are doing nothing but negotiating the incineration of sleeping kids, for your own purposes. You aren’t fooling me, although you will fool some people here, including some lefties.
demimondian
And the civilian doesn’t walk around with a gun — with someone standing behind him or her with orders to shoot to kill if he or she fails to follow orders. Or didn’t you realize that dereliction of duty is a capital offense in a war zone?
And then there’s the question of what civilians are directly supporting the war effort — if I’m a civilian but I’m designing laser guided bombs, am I a military target? Why or why not?
It’s always great to blame the soldiers for being soldiers, and to treat civilians as non-combatants. Neither is accurate — soldiers are often impressed into duty, and civilians are often eager and active supporters of the war effort. It’s hard to find any rational argument in support of the claim that the former is any less morally culpable than the latter.
ThymeZone
Because “collateral damage” is a lie. It’s a dodge.
It’s all part of the kabuki surrounding something that is basically mass murder by people who are in denial about what they are doing.
If you want to believe it, fine, but don’t pretend that you have some right to expect others to believe it or swallow that crap.
Rome Again
demimondian, if I had the choice of being accused of dereliction of duty or shooting another human, I’d choose the dereliction of duty, personally
I cannot fathom shooting another human being just because someone tells me I’m supposed to, sorry. I just cannot do it, and I wouldn’t, no matter how long my alternative of jail time was.
ThymeZone
Terrorism is a tactic.
“Terrorist” is a rhetorical label. A person can be a terrorist in his own home.
“Using airpower” is not the same thing as “aerial warfare against civilian populations.” For a good example of the latter, see Israel v Lebanon, 2006.
Whether the action you refer to is in that category, I am not qualified at the moment to say, I don’t know the details.
Rome Again
As for the question about the civilian producing arms, I’m not the one to ask, I have never been involved in the defense industry in any way, not even peripherally. Do I support someone making bombs, NO; do I support someone putting food on the table? You betcha! I’m torn on how to answer this.
I’ll tell you what. I used to know someone who programmed Pershing II missiles in Germany, and the entire group of guys who were working on that programming were on drugs. I wouldn’t trust those missiles to fire correctly if they maintained that programming code.
ThymeZone
Well, if you had paid any attention, you’d know that I am talking about “aerial warfare against civilian populations.” Rather a specific thing. But I hate to spoil your fine rant.
What exactly do you think is terrorism?
If a couple of Iranian idiots get a truck bomb together a la Tim McVeigh and set it off at a military installation in Virginia, killing no civilians, is that terrorism?
If the same two idiots manage to navigate their Iranian airplane over Israel and drop bombs on an Israeli elementary school and kill a lot of kids … terrorism?
If the same two don suicide bomber belts and walk into a department store in Tel Aviv and kill shoppers … terrorism?
If Israel fires a missile into a car running away from the war, and kills kids in front of their mothers, terrorism?
Do you think the words determine the moral choices here?
Because they don’t. The words are manipulations. The acts are what they are. Explain how you determine these things? Which of the acts I described is a terrorist act?
All? None? Why, in each case?
dslak
You know, I’ve never even tried conversing with Darrell, but given that he’s willing to take a position that is logically inconsistent tells me all I’ll ever need to know about trying such an ill-advised action.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Where did someone else address the issue of the impression of child soldiers? I missed that one.
My answer: no, we cannot condone Israel’s behavior without condoning a lot of other heinous shit that nobody here wants to be caught condoning. Israel often behaves in a thuggish fashion. As do its neighbors.
Still, one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. Did you guys ever see “The Battle of Algiers”? Who do we root for in that movie, anyway? I guess the Algerians are marginally better, since the French colonists had another country to live in and shouldn’t be there in the first place (I think that’s how we’re supposed to feel, anyway); OTOH, it’s fucking hard to root for people who set off bombs in restaurants where little kids are eating ice cream.
Now, what if those little kids were child soldiers in the enemy’s military? Could we blow them up with a clear conscience, since people in uniforms’ lives don’t count for as much?
To reiterate, the only morally consistent position is total pacifism. That’s also the hardest position to swallow; I’m not a pacifist, either.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
“Neighbors” includes Hamas, Hezbollah, etc. Just so we’re clear. Those guys are fucking assholes. Even though I feel sorry for the Palestinians and wish Israel would give them their 1967 land back, I still hate Hamas and Hezbollah. Not that my opinion matters either way, of course.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
No, if they’re in the Iranian military it’s a legitimate military target carried out by lawful combatants. It’s definitely an act of war, since I’m assuming they’re connected with the Iranian government; if they’re not, if they’re some freelance assholes from some self-proclaimed “Party of Allah” or what have you, we’d probably have a decent cassus belli against any Iran or any other country that let their organization operate with impunity. Whether or not we’d act on that cassus belli depends on who’s leading us, who’s our enemy, the relative strengths, and a host of other factors that have nothing to do with morality and everything to do with geopolitics, economics, and the related issues that fuel most of our wars in the first place.
I forget the standard laid out by the Geneva Conventions for determining who’s a lawful combatant and who isn’t. I think it relates to having a chain of command, distinctive uniforms discernible at a distance, answering to some form of government, etc. But it’s been a while since I read up on it, so I could be wrong.
Yes.
Yup.
Yeah.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
How about if you live in a totalitarian state, where refusal to serve under conscription consigns your entire family to death?
D. Mason
I think the argument in regards to aerial warfare and terrorism is missing the point. the difference is really simple: was the act done in defense of ones country/people or in offense against another country/people?
If an Iraqi army or group of militias(note: the word terrorists did not appear there) were seeking out American targets in an effort to invade or subdue or terrorize America(ns) that would greatly expand, in my eyes, the scope of what can be morally justified. In the same way you can hit a woman if she’s coming at you with a knife. Since no such actions occured or were scheduled to occur then it seems to me we’re the party in the wrong.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Is the IRA a terrorist organization? How about the PLO? How about the groups fighting for Lebanon’s independence against Israel? The groups fighting for Lebanon’s independence against Syria/Iran?
Is the IRA a terrorist organization if it blows up a tank patrolling the border? How about if it blows up a UDA safehouse? How about if it blows up a pub in London?
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
This bullshit is also important insofar as it helps us distinguish legitimate military forces from bandits/pirates/gangsters who profess to some sort of political objective. Otherwise, theoretically the LAPD might have to start treating captured Bloods/Crips/Symbionese Liberation Army members as POWs under the Geneva Conventions. If memory serves, that’s how one of the arguments goes.
Rome Again
Well, considering my household now consists of myself I would say it doesn’t change that a bit.
If you add my offspring into the mix, then I’d start having a problem with the dilemma.
If my offspring were never included and only my immediate siblings were, I’d say “have at it” (they don’t deserve to live, really).
Redhand
etc. etc. etc. ad nausiam.
ThymeZone, you are truly hopeless, a person whose only response to debate (even sharp-edged) is vituperation and preening self-justification. I especially love the part about how I’ve “fooled” some “lefties” here. Hopeless.
demimondian
I can’t speak for Snuffy, but once you admit that there’s any moral threshold at which you would pick up a gun and shoot, then there’s a moral threshold at which a soldier is not truly volunteering, but is legitimately coerced. Such a soldier has every right to value his life as highly as that of any *other* civilian.
And, as someone who *has* been in the war business, I believe that a civilian acting consciously in support of the war effort is significantly less protected than a “true innocent”. Killing a war worker takes away a valuable pair of hands and eyes. At the very least, it ties up soldiers defending the installations; in the case of success, it takes away valuable hands and eyes from the logistic machine behind the war itself. Both are legitimate military goals.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Whomever you want, it’s purely hypothetical for us. Unfortunately, not everyone got to enjoy our level of abstract moralizing on the question; after 1944, the Nazis threatened every German who surrendered or failed to perform his/her duty to the utmost with the death of their family. (I’m not sure, but presumably that was their parents and siblings as well as their spouse/offspring.)
I’m just glad to live in a place and time where these decisions are pure theory. It’s hard for me to cast moral judgment on the hundreds of millions of other humans who didn’t have that luxury in the last century. As I said, I feel that the only morally consistent view is total pacifism, but that also requires a certain acceptance of casualties; who knows how many people were killed while practicing satyagraha?
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
My Dad got into an argument once about Hiroshima with his great-uncle, a guy named John Sloan. My Dad pointed out that 100,000 Japanese civilians were killed at Hiroshima. John Sloan, a veteran of the theatre, replied, “Better 100,000 Japanese civilians than one John Sloan.” We can argue that he was just being emotional, or that he didn’t know that for 100% statistical certainty, or that it was callous of him not to give his life for the sake of 100,000 Japanese people he’d never met. Make of it what you will. Regardless, he changed my Dad’s mind on the subject. Personally, I feel pretty conflicted about Hiroshima or Nagasaki. I still think we could’ve achieved the same intimidation of the Japanese by dropping the bomb over open ocean where they’d be able to observe it, or something like that. But hindsight’s always 20/20, isn’t it? And since I wasn’t personally at risk in the invasion, it’s hard for me to judge people who were.
All war is murder. All war is terrorism. All we’re arguing about now that Darrell’s clammed up again is whether it’s less immoral to murder and terrorize some people than it is to murder and terrorize others. The only morally consistent position is to say that warfare is the true immorality, and that you want no part in it on either a personal or a national level.
But that’s a hard pill to swallow on days like 9/11/01, when the collective national and (frequently) personal impulse was to find the people responsible and shove a 50-megaton warhead up their asses. We’ve all got to give Bush some credit for not firing off a bunch of nukes on the evening of 9/11; I really think 60-70% of Americans would’ve supported that decision at the time. (Probably 25% of the public would support him if he did it NOW, so I don’t think my estimate’s off-base.) Later on, when we’d calmed down, most of us would feel pretty bad about it; a fuck of a lot of good THAT would do to the millions of people we’d just incinerated.
The Other Steve
This is what Maher said:
And I ask. Was he wrong?
The Republican party is nothing but a bunch of politically correct babies.
What’s even more fascinating is that Maher didn’t bring up the point… Dinesh D’Souza did, and Maher was simply bringing to point what Dinesh said. Yet somehow, Maher is evil and Dinesh is a Conservative Love Child who gives speeches at CPAC.
I just confirmed. Dinesh D’Souza led a discussion on March 1st at CPAC proving that terrorism is caused by secular extremism, and not religious extremism as some moonbat liberals might think.
The Other Steve
Ok, read some of the comments.
I think it’s hillarious to see Darrell defending John McCain for using the term “wasted” and yet attacking Obama for the same thing.
Party hack? Most certainly.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
Yeah, but when McCain used it, it was a term of support; when Obama used it, it was a term of derogation. This is proven by the fact that McCain is running for the Presidency in the Pro-Defending America Party, while Obama is running for the Presidency in the Pro- Cutting and Running, Appeasing France and Islamism Party.
You’ve always got to consider the position of the speaker before you can consider whether the exact same message is a hard truth or a heartless exultation.
Darrell
TOSer busted again in lie #4377. Show us where I EVER defended McCain over this. Since you can’t because you made it up, you’ll just slither away without ever admitting what a lying sack of sh*t you are.
Ted
Shriek! Shrieeeek!
The Other Steve
Show me where you condemend McCain in the same way you did Obama.
The Other Steve
While we’re at it Darrell, why not jump over to the coulter thread and condemn her.
The Other Steve
Why won’t Darrell condemn McCain and Ann Coulter?